#exploding wizards

[dukerin0]

I am the author and illustrator of a Tabletop Roleplaying Game called The Devil City & Its 77 Vicious Princes. It's free!

The game is mostly finished. I play it once or twice a week and think about it constantly. The complete text as well as a number of tools to help you play and run the game are located here: https://devilcity.carrd.co/

DC77VP is a troupe system about running a Princely Conspiracy; each player is several PCs at once, portraying one of the 77 Noble Houses of Zarkany. It is a game about:

Being a hot gay villain and plotting hot evil schemes

Hosting and attending sinister balls & whispering behind frilly fans

Bargaining with Boschean devils (or burning them as fuel)

Drawing too much power from Hell's infernal magic and exploding

I wrote this game because my favorite part of TTRPGs is tense conversations with weird, ambitious bastards. I'll probably be posting about it a lot.

[lazylittledragon]

discussion: would gale accept only getting a few decades with his partner because he’s a squishy human OR would he go the lich route a la barry bluejeans

[b4kuch1n]

wizard of both ways

[bitterrobin]

a quick PSA on pre-Robin Damian (again):

He has never called himself the "Blood Son". Those specific words have never come out of his mouth in a comic. In fact, Damian has only had dialogue regarding his bio status or another character's adoptive status like... three or four times.

Yes, pretty much all of those times have something to do with Tim in one way another. That's because Damian was less of a character, and more of a sword-carrying plot device when he was first introduced.

Damian's early writing lines up more with that of a minor villain than any supporting character. He existed at first only to rile up chaos in the Batcave for like, two issues, before his death in the fourth issue he appeared. He was introduced in issue 655 and killed by torpedo-submarine explosion in 658. Damian as a character was effectively "punished" for his earlier actions through a violent death.

You need to understand that early Damian (2009 mostly) didn't have a cemented personality or much characterization other than the basics that Morrison imbued into him i.e he was 10, an assassin, lax about death, very sarcastic/rude in tone, and weirdly spoiled despite his upbringing implying the opposite. Grant Morrison tends to write the large story concepts they like and they don't often adhere to any consistent/previous characterization (as seen with Talia) if it doesn't line up with the vision they want. Not even Damian's existence was kept consistent, as it's very hard to believe that Batman #656 Damian has the same backstory as Son of the Demon Damian or the Ibn al Xuffasch of Kingdom Come.

They didn't flesh out Damian a whole lot when he was first introduced, making him more of a spoiled rich kid who just happened to know how to kill people than the Damian that you probably think of. It took later comic appearances and other writers to add onto Damian's sporadic characterization - because he didn't have much major development after being created until becoming Robin and working alongside Dick.

To further characterize Damian as Robin, now that he needed to play against a larger cast and more established figures, writers needed to come up with ideas fast. So some writers played up his League backstory and wrote him colder, more logical and vaguely terrifying. They made Talia and Ras more and more ooc and abusive. They wrote dialogue for Damian that made him more of an annoying little brother figure, impulsiveness and all. Sometimes his dialogue with female characters drifted towards sexism, as clearly some writers can't write young boy characters without relying on shitty sitcom-style misogynist tropes. He got different moments, some skewing towards insanely violent or towards a normal child reeling from issues. This long trek of his writing was always changing in little ways until the reboot in 2011 and his first real death in Batman Incorporated, and then just continued on afterwards to this day.

In short, early pre-Robin Damian was a mess, and it took a long time for DC to develop him as a full character. (Even now, writers are still "figuring him out" and pulling ooc takes out of their asses). We have fun here.

[ragnarlothcat]

I know I’m a chronic overthinker but I’ve been in the same fandom for three years or so now and I was reflecting that writing seemed so much easier when I first started out. Just looking at my output since 2021 shows a clear trend: I’ve been writing much less and it’s been taking me way longer.

I figured that I’d gotten a little burned out and that three years is a long time to focus solely on the same two guys making out and that there’s a limit to the number of situations I can put them in before I start to get bored. But I don’t think that’s quite my problem because even now, a million years later, I have ideas for dozens of fics and AUs that would be interesting to explore or funny to write.

No, it’s that I’ve let the larger fandom overwhelm me and it’s left me constantly second-guessing my writing. And I don’t mean that I’ve gotten nasty comments or asks, because I haven’t! All the other fans have been consistently wonderful and fun people with really valuable insights. And it’s not that I’ve been obsessing over stats or comments or worrying about going against popular headcanons. I mean, I’m just as excited as anyone else to see an AO3 email in my inbox but I’m also perfectly happy posting niche fics for an audience of me and my three weirdest friends.

It’s more that after so long engaging with other fans and other fics and the general meta, I’ve ended up writing too self-consciously. I’ve read so many interpretations of canon events, analyses of characterization and comparisons between fiction and real-world politics over the years, and I’ve enjoyed them because I genuinely care about these stories and these characters! I like seeing what everyone else thinks and then considering their points of view, no matter how bewildering they might seem at first.

But now it feels like I’m writing almost defensively, like I have to justify every choice I’m making based on this enormous and contradictory body of information. Three years ago I’d have written a scene in a few thousand words and moved on to the next plot point with my momentum intact. Now I’m constantly wringing my hands over things like physical details (I guess he’s not exactly a redhead) or broader social implications (is this trope misogynistic?) or finicky logistics (these locations are too far apart for this scene to make sense) or controversial character nuance (does writing this guy as a kind, doting husband make me an abuse apologist???) and the result is that I’m paralyzed with indecision and a ridiculous need to support everything I write with a lot of context that isn’t especially fun to write or, I suspect, especially fun to read.

I’m aware that this problem is entirely in my own head and that no one has asked me for any of this. And it’s not that all those questions aren’t interesting and important things to contemplate. But I miss the days of sitting down at my laptop and going “wouldn’t it be funny if these dorks played a video game together?” and then writing exactly that.

I don’t know. Were my fics better three years ago? I kind of doubt it. I’ve looked back at some of them and if nothing else I now have a better grasp of what tense I’m supposed to be using. But I definitely had more fun writing those older stories, which maybe feels more important.

[valentimmy]

peepaw

[robinfollies]

some design comcepts for older lily + lewis!!! my latest and greatest headcanon for them is that in the future they get gems and can do magic of their own :33 i just think it’d be neat,,, something to do with their love of magic!!!! 🥺

[itissadbutitsmy-artblog]

peppermint comes from “people explode when theyre upset” kingdom you know that and i know that

dr c: it is unfortunate but spader exploded pep: oh. did he get upset? :(

dr c: .. no, i mean like, he exploded. bloodily. literally. physically. pep: yeyeye i understand that.

pep: (understanding nod) i mean, was it caused by him being frightened?

pep (to cadebra): don’t worry, he’ll be up and about in a little while, good as new

pep: did NO ONE teach this kid Hoodie Hoodie Hoodups??

[koukaaa-descent]

hi loki @lokibrainrot 😁 (PSYCHOLOGICALLY DAMAGES YOU)

[dailyrandomdoodles]

TEE HEE!!! HAD SO MUCH FUN WITH @a-scary-lack-of-common-sense'S DTYIS :3!!!! OTHER VERSIONS BELOW CUT

[dreamcrow]

i know. i Know i am in the tenth circle of blorbo hell rn but

LOOK AT THEM... ;--;

[the-nation-of-today]

Jake & Jinxx + The Phantom Tomorrow + The Back To Back Thing™️

[spilledmilkfkdies]

Hey I saw one of your asks on the wizards being sent to Lightrock instead of Omega by a friend and that reminded me of a theory I had.

What if Duman was sent to Omega by Nabu and that’s why the other wizards went there after the whole trial thing. They were trying to find him. And that’d explain why they were grieving since they could still sense he was alive.

!!! I actually like that, it really does fill up a bunch of holes!! Suddenly Nabu is not a murderer and the wizards aren't dismissive and a little silly

But really hoping for the fairies that Duman either doesn't remember any tricks from back when he fought Aurora, or that he's too weakened to reach any of it. Unless that's a fancy little way out we're leaving for him there. 👁👁

[oricreature]

So I'm in a helldivers rpish server (@omega-helldivers) and we have a heavy rp chat for like war trauma and then Cadet Δ-143 shows up and writes the most beautifully written mental break ive ever read and then people came to support them and then Gunny who is kinda the Task Force paternal figure showed up and was very nice and helped and I just

I wasn't engaged in this in any way and i am still shooketh

[cye-wiz]

shadow spells are powerful things

[mindblownie2]

(fixates on a single split second frame of the season 2 trailer) WIZARD VIKTOR! WIZARD VIKTOR! WIZARD VIKTOR!

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