#discuss modding

[opera-ghost]

[baba-is-blog]

Baba like dragons?

DRAGON IS FAVORITE

[dread-red-queen]

Invite link is in the comments

Hey everyone I created a Tumblr Community for Cyberpunk 2077 Modding. if your a Modder, like mods or have tips/tricks or how to guides to Modding cyberpunk 2077 this is the community for you.

If you are interested and would like to Join drop my a DM and I will send you a Community Invitation :)

[transformativeworks]

This 24h Poll Doesn't Matter.

.. unless you want to help Mod Remi win in the work!chat.

[aro-culture-is]

Aro culture is getting slightly annoyed that the word "objectification" immediately is associated with being sexualized. Romantic objectification is also nefarious guys. Are there resources about this too? Because i think that deserves more attention than it already has now. Thank you mods

ps i am not pitting romantic objectification and sexual objectification against each other. I just want some sort of. Awareness about the former since it's often ignored and i kinda think many aros will relate?

Thank you again

no that's fair! i honestly don't know if I've seen that discussion except in individual cases, usually when discussing toxic behaviors or new relationship energy (and more, I read that into that?).

[inhuman-obey-me]

Barbatos and 23?

Barbatos + 23 | "Cellar Door" - Spiritbox

cw: mentions of Lesson 16/MC death

"Have you ever seen your own dead body before?"

If you had been aiming to catch Barbatos off-guard for once, you may have just succeeded. The demon nearly chokes on his tea, causing him to mutter an "excuse me" before clearing his throat as he regains his composure.

He pats his lips with a napkin, looking at you with both curiosity and understanding. "I assume there is something weighing on your mind?"

"Mm." You find yourself gazing out the large castle window, the moonlight bathing the Devildom foliage. Despite all the time that has passed, there are nights you find yourself there again, staring at your own mangled body at the bottom of the stairs. How, for a moment, two of you existed in one space — one just resurrected, the other at death's door. "…So, have you?"

"…I have." Barbatos leans back in his seat, gaze still fixed on you. "More than once. The benefit of being able to see through space and time, I suppose."

"Right. I guess you get used to it. Or maybe it didn't jar you much in the first place." There is hint of resentment in your voice, a tightness in your chest as you turn back to meet those dark eyes of his. Maybe bringing this up was a bad idea. Why did you think the demon with control over space-time could ever feel the same way as you?

"I wouldn't say that." Barbatos taps a finger on the table, a sign that he was trying to form his words carefully. "I wasn't always the calm and reassured demon you see before you. I used to be quite an arrogant fool, in fact. I have made mistakes, grave ones."

You remember him speaking before of atonement, a past he was determined to rectify.

With some apprehension, he slowly reaches his hand out to cover your own. His voice is soft as he asks, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"I thought I was over it." The words leave your lips before you can even think, as if Barbatos' simple question unlocked something deep within your soul, breaking bindings that had long buried despair. "But I'm not. After all of this time, I still think about it. I went to the past, I was killed, I was … I was brought back to life only to see another version of myself, to see me … bleeding and mangled and dead." Your voice wavers, but you're determined to hold on. Fingers curls into your palm, nails digging into flesh. "And you … you said you just. Changed the timeline. Collapsed it, made it that this was the real one, that I was the one and only me. But am I? Or," a shaky breath, "… did I just slip into another version of myself? Did a part of me really die back then?" Your voice strains. "I have so many questions, and I'm afraid to know the answers to any of them!"

Barbatos is quiet at first, though his hand still covers yours. His expression is unreadable and distant, and you again wonder if he can understand at all. What was one death to a timeless being?

"My first encounter with death, of my own death…is something I will never forget." He squeezes your hand gently, meeting your gaze. "I … won't speak in detail of it, but it was harrowing. The first time I truly came face-to-face with consequences for my own actions." He shakes his head with a somber chuckle. "Would you believe that I still didn't learn my lesson? Yet, despite all the deaths of self I have either seen through visions or came to encounter personally thereafter, it is the one I remember most vividly."

Barbatos moves now to be next to you, taking both of your hands in his. "My dear, I apologize for the role I played in all of this, and I'm not sure if I can provide all the answers you seek. But I can tell you that you are not alone. Time and space are tricky things, and what you went through is something that would break most. But here you are, still standing strong. " His features soften. "And, there is one thing I know for certain. One answer I can provide."

"What?" You hate how your voice cracks, but you lean in closer to Barbatos' warmth.

"There will always be parts of ourselves that die and are reborn. Such is the nature of the universe." He squeezes your hands again. "But you are very much you. You are meant to be here, and that will never change."

[vasito-de-leche]

;R1999 - Self-Aware AU

Headcanons about an Alternate Universe in which everyone knows they're living inside a videogame. However, Vertin is the only one aware of the entity inhabiting her own mind, the real conductor - the "Player".

this is one of my favorite AUs to slap on whatever media I'm into so here we are <3 not sure if anyone's done this already, but PLEASE PLEASE PRETTY PLEASE link me if you've seen any other ppl write for this AU! this one and any actor AUs are my absolute fave

this is just a word vomit introduction for fun, to get the basic ideas out of my head, so I can start writing for characters individually!

Okay, okay! First of all, some context for the AU before I go deranged overexplaining my HCs!

Aside from the "Storm", there is something else that haunts the people of this world: the fact that their lives are nothing but a simulacrum, part of a game.

The requirements to obtain this "self-awareness" is unknown. Those within the Foundation believe it's related to their respective "roles", that only the main and relevant characters are given the chance to fully open their eyes to the truth. Those within Manus Vindictae claim that one must be strong enough to break through the fog of complacency and their assigned scripts, to have their full potential unleashed and obtain true liberation. Either way, similar to the "Storm", this is a well-kept secret for a very good reason - everyone wants to have the upperhand.

There is one outlier to this whole system. Vertin is not only aware of the truth of this world, but also of her duty as the eyes and hands of the "Player". She must experience it all for their sake. Or rather, whatever she experiences will be the story that the Player will see.

This applies to her suitcase, the place where the Player's influence increases tenfold, bending everything and everyone to their will through her own body and voice. The longer one stays within her suitcase - or within her general vicinity - the easier it is for them to become self-aware.

How does one become "self-aware" and what does it entail?

The requirements and the catalyst for a character to become self-aware are still a mystery. But that's mostly because I specifically wanted to keep them as vague as possible, to allow some flexibility for NPCs and other characters outside of Vertin's suitcase.

The whole process of gaining sentience or self-awareness is mostly described as waking up from a nightmare, or a very, very realistic dream. It's like a switch, something that happens in a second without any warnings whatsoever.

I like to think that most of the people who wake up are easy to spot, because it's a jarring experience and panicking is the most normal reaction - but that they're often taken care of by the Foundation or recruited by Manus Vindictae.

The levels of awareness also depend heavily on each individual - some only know that nothing is truly real, that everything they've done up until that point was just a carefully scripted lie, the most basic realization. Others can understand the rules that govern this game and use them to their advantage, either through observation and study or just inherently.

Overall, the experience of being sentient varies as well, with some describing a disconnect from their body, while others feel exactly the opposite. Again, keeping it pretty vague so that people can fill in with their own ideas!

I'll talk about Vertin's case in detail when we get to her specific bullet point, but the same way the Player is able to experience the "story" through her eyes, she's able to see the same things they do - this includes the UI, the menus and everything you can interact with in-game.

Vertin as a character and a vessel for the Player.

The most common thing I've seen in self-aware AUs in my years of fandom is to turn the player stand-in (the main character that serves for the player to experience the story through and/or project onto, depending on the genre of the game) into an obstacle, one that keeps the characters from truly interacting with the Player, capital P.

The second most common thing I've seen is to simply ignore the existence of this player stand-in and replace it with the Player themself, either through isekai methods or thanks to the customization the game allows, etc etc.

When it comes to Vertin in this AU, I know I want her to retain her role as the center of everything, instead of being sidelined by the Player. She's THE Timekeeper, after all.

There's still some details I'm trying to iron out, like whether she's always been self-aware or if she became self-aware at some point during her childhood at the St. Pavlov Foundation. But I like to think that her relationship to the Player is a parallel to her immunity to the "Storm" - neither of these two things are inherently good nor bad. Surviving the "Storm" is helpful, sure, but it's painful for her. Having an entity like the "Player" haunting her is scary, sure, but it can be an advantage. It's a matter of how she utilizes the assets she was given, since her adaptability and determination are big aspects of her character. Vertin makes up for her mediocre arcane skills with unconventional plans and strategies.

But this isn't to say that Vertin isn't affected by the presence of the Player. Ironically, she's the one person whose freedom is limited. During battles, her skills and Tuning are available to you, they can also prove to be vital to win a fight, but in the end you're still the one calling the shots and choosing when her friends get to attack. You're the one choosing the layout of the Wilderness. You're the one picking which one of her friends deserves to become stronger.

In the last bullet point I mentioned that some characters can understand the rules of the game - Vertin is the most extreme case, as she can see the same UI as you do. She learns the way you like to fight your battles, your own strategies, she can see this and more.

Overall it's a very complex dynamic. It's not as easy as saying that she likes or dislikes you, that she considers you a friend or foe. You're part of her, you influence each other in many aspects and are stuck together for reasons she can't even fathom. While you may be able to read her thoughts most of the time, she becomes invisible once you enter the suitcase - the main menu of the game. Sure, the character you selected to greet you every day is actually talking to her, not you, but she's out of your view and therefore, out of our range. That's when Vertin wonders the sort of person that you are, if you care about her friends as much as she does. Are you playing just to be entertained? Are you invested in these events? Will you be there for her until the end of her story?

Another detail I like to think about is that Vertin is the only one who knows your name. Because at the very beginning, you were asked to input a name and she was there.

[screenshot was taken from this video, since it's the first one I could find that showed this specific part of the game lol]

Well, "your name" not quite right - she knows that whatever you wrote there is the name linked to your account, at least. And that's the name she knows you as.

Those who take residence in Vertin's suitcase or spend prolonged amounts of time with her, growing closer to her and all, end up becoming self-aware. This is a direct side-effect of your presence.

I like to think that characters who reach the 100% Bond can begin to sense the Player, to see the world in a similar way as Vertin does. Maybe even feel their presence EXACTLY like Vertin does whenever there's a battle. There is someone else on the other side of this screen, the fourth wall, who watches over them.

To some, it's hard to differentiate Vertin from the Player, as they just go hand in hand - but Sonetto, for example, has the easiest time telling the two apart.

On the subject of freedom and acting out of script.

The Foundation, Manus Vindictae, Laplace... It doesn't matter if they're self-aware and acting outside of what their script dictates, because they're missing one key ingredient: you. No one else but Vertin and her group knows about your existence, after all.

They don't know that the only story that matters is the one that Vertin is part of. The one that the Player gets to see and read and experience. And because the game gives you a very limited view into the lives of these characters, you don't know what neither Arcana nor Constantine do behind the scenes. You and Vertin don't see that, therefore, it never truly mattered.

Those most likely to start "acting out" are the troublemakers within Vertin's suitcase. Characters who are too curious for their own good, who are more susceptible to supernatural entities, who are just too impulsive - they would start to test the limits and see how far they can go, how much they can interact with the Player. Can the game be broken should they end up shattering the fourth wall? Is there a way for the Player to communicate with them? What will happen to Vertin?

I like to think that Vertin probably supports this, as she's rather curious herself, prone to questioning everything. She would also like to learn more about the Player, to truly tear into the game and see the full extent of your influence and her freedom.

Sometimes, Regulus and X will change their usual voicelines, just enough to be noticeable if one pays enough attention. Characters like Sotheby or Leilani might slip up and address the Player, rather than Vertin. Lilya, Pavia, Bkornblume have new animations and different expressions, ones you've never seen before - they stare ahead, as if searching for something, and then smirk or hum to themselves, deep in thought, like they realized something you're not privy of.

Sometimes, if you leave them as your selected assistant on the main menu, you can catch them muttering to themselves - idle quotes you never heard enough, about the outside world. Diggers does this the most, it's almost embarassing how easy it is to catch him talking nonsense, followed by Sonetto. If you leave Medicine Pocket alone for too long, you might come back to a screen covered in weird scratch marks.

On the subject of these characters being curious about the outside world and all, I think that a good chunk of them are generally content with the way things are?

We have to remember that in-universe, they're arcanists displaced from their respective eras. Their best chance at surviving is siding with Vertin, and if Vertin is content with the way things are, then there's no point in trying to disrupt what they have right now. They're curious enough to prod, but only as far as Vertin allows it.

And I think that's it for the word vomit!

There are some details I didn't know where to fit in, like the possibility of the fourth wall slowly dissipating the more time the Player invests in the game, leading to some characters being able to directly hear you if you talk while playing and whatnot. Or what would happen should someone outside of Vertin's suitcase figure out the existence of the Player, let alone interact with you in some way.

Or the concept of death being meaningless, unless it was pre-established by the game itself.

In Borderlands, there's this game mechanic where you can just be revived over and over and pay a percentage of your money as a fee, even though the canon that's established is that you play through the whole story without dying a SINGLE time - because the revival mechanics aren't canon. There's the divide between story and gameplay. That's pretty much the standard. But what about the deaths in battles in R1999? The amount of times I died to 1.3's UTTU's Flash Gathering is insane. How do self-aware characters feel about this, now that they know that they're bound to die over and over and be brought back because you have to do your Pneuma Analysis or reach the final stage of Limbo?

But that's pretty much it for now, I think I got most thoughts out of my system! Thank you for reading!

[a-forsaken-memory]

Just another round... Shaking out their hands and feet, they braced themselves for another round of this. The words of two people fresh in their mind, it's time to try something new. Well, that's not quite right. They've already jumped through all the necessary hoops to justify this to themselves, this is an investigative round. The only goal is to find out if this will even work, much more if it's even worth it. If they can handle it.

Once she knows that countdown is running, she's off and looking around. Find out who they're up against, any means necessary. The familiar growling is a good sign, followed by spikes erupting from the ground. Maybe the latter is less of a good sign. But she knows John, or hopefully enough to make some educated guesses. He is, luckily, easy enough for them to predict. At least until he learns better- It's not difficult for them to pull his attention off some other poor survivor. Then it's just a game of keeping up with the chase...

Namely, stamina. They're fantastic at pacing themselves, but he's typically rather relentless unless an easier target presents itself. Trying to keep his attention on purpose on top of that? A perfect recipe for disaster, as they slam their shoulder into a corner, the momentum turning them to face him head on!- ??? A gunshot from nowhere. The unmistakable sound of a sword connecting with it's target. Maybe it was right, these people would protect her when needed. For now they've got bigger problems to deal with, hurrying off to look for a method to get themselves patched up. He won't give up on coming after her for long, and she knows it. @phos-saken (hope you wanted to FUCKING READ.)

A fun round, this one was. Plenty of resistance to push through. The familiar hum and ding of his abilities, the reveal of where people were… That new face. No one else was that tall. Had such a distinct look. And no one else on this particular team was quite so fresh. Easy pickings?

The hunt was on.

John roars as he’s stunned, and hit once more, seemingly for good measure. But it doesn’t matter. There’s someone that is far more interesting to take after. With a burst of speed, he’s off after her without faltering. Those pesky sentinels couldn’t get in the way on the other side of the arena.

Well, she has what she wants. John’s undivided attention, as he charges after her, rather consistently barely missing his swings. He growls at her as he misses another swing, mad enough to drop the chase to slam his arm into the ground, aiming to hit her with a wall of familiar spikes.

Whatever they’re planning, this better be worth it.

[daily-basil]

i think basil should have a keyblade. if you dont know which i suggest Aubade because it has good color palette and is sad

Basil keyblade be upon ye.

[kaet-draws]

vergil is my dress up doll and i get to put him in ffxiv gear and pose him using samurai skills

bonus pic under readmore

not immune to giving him v's tattoos for no reason other than i like it

[dilly-dahlia]

real question. who in the aphverse is most likely to be a cowboy. i’m talking Texas stereotype. hay between teeth and revolver in the holster. walking into a saloon and the entire place quiets. who is that

(not related to the question but cowgirl Cadenza anyone???)

[year-of-amy]

Day 133: fall out boy reference

[ungurth]

I think the MCD void has finally reached Mystreet… Imma be honest I wasn’t expecting the Void to be the enemy in MyStreet s7 lmao. Are we also gonna get MCD Laurance back with VP Aphmau, Tommy, Polly and Leila? 👀 Tbh I doubt it, even though they seem like the most appropriate ones to be present. Irene won’t be there cuz she’s dead. At least have Toby. Nobody remembers him but I feel like he’d be very invested in stopping it. It’d be out of character for him to not be present. S7 might be the Infinity War of the Aphmau Cinematic Universe lmao.

[jackmanifold-daily]

how do the jack manifold daily mods all feel about the 2024 c!jack lore

yeah pretty good

[iteratorsex]

It took me like a year but I got a sideblog now!

My name's Tarigon. Iteratorsex is my pen name

Main is @rna-world

WATCHER SPOILERS ARE ALL TAGGED "Watcher spoilers"

I've gotten some rather off-topic asks, and while I will still answer them, I'm going to be... miffed about it. Please, my inbox is for RAIN WORLD ONLY!!

If I can't answer an ask with any amount of substance, it's going to be ignored. AND DON'T ASK FOR NSFW STUFF EITHER god. This should be common sense, but it has happened before

Anyways, here I'll primarily talk about my thoughts on Rain World, but I'll also RB stuff related to it and post art. I'll post things from shitpost art, to interesting details I want to note about the game

This account will also not involve much OC discussion, unless it's also related to the main lore. But you should still read Light On Tainted Glass, thanks

I used to do mostly iterator spec bio, and while I still love to do that, lately I've been going through madness.

As well as this, I'll talk about the game design aspects within RW and other modded regions, since that's also very fun

I have a repository for RW lore stuff here (CURRENTLY NOT UPDATED FOR WATCHER. I'M LAZY) ->

And I suppose I should also pin my canon designs of the iterators. It feels fitting to go here

TAG INDEX:

beware, I'm not the most careful about this.

textadactyl - Instances where I'm the OP arterator- art tag treasury - Things I really like nma - not my art garbage wastes - shitposts rwr - things I'll add to Rain World Repo

lore - Broad Lore Discussion theory - theories shit i made up - Headcanon things not grounded in lore spec bio - Speculative biology involving iterators, slugcats, or other creatures discussion - Posts with more than 1 person involved character analysis - Discussing characters narrative analysis - Talking about the themes and... narrative of RW game mechanics - The workings of the game itself devlog - Things said by the RW developers file findings - Stuff about the game files or code mod - Involves mods screenshots - In-game screenshots

downpour - Downpour (Only tagged when explicitly downpour lore, and not when MSC slugcats)

watcher dlc - Everything about watcher

All creatures and characters tagged accordingly.