#fun fact 2: i thought i had way more arcane dragons!

[im-a-ramblr]

I posted 1,095 times in 2022

That's 810 more posts than 2021!

138 posts created (13%)

957 posts reblogged (87%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@pocketramblr

@everythingfox

@princeanxious

@exhausted-pigeon

@soni-dragon

I tagged 776 of my posts in 2022

Only 29% of my posts had no tags

#random/personal - 69 posts

#deltora quest - 64 posts

#kitties - 57 posts

#linkeduniverse - 42 posts

#arcane ascension - 42 posts

#linked universe - 41 posts

#lief of del - 31 posts

#corin cadence - 26 posts

#turtle - 25 posts

#toh - 23 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#. within the week it has escalated to having 0 thoughts (and not in a fun way) not want to do anything even projects that i’d been thrilled

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

The few Human/Real Dain AUs are wonderful but they all either end with him dead or just chilling in Del. And while this is fine, I think we need more ones that end in him in some kind of relationship with Jaslief. It can a poly or a QPR with one of them, or a poly QPR, but it needs to happen.

29 notes - Posted March 31, 2022

#4

Something that's been on my mind, on and off since I heard it.... Might try to pick it apart later

32 notes - Posted January 2, 2022

#3

Mmmmm I crave Linked universe fics.

Please let me know if you have/know of any good fics where:

The Chain are paltonic soulmates. Either explicated expressed or just them acting like they are. what that last one means is ones that focus on the fact that these guys can understand each other in a way no one else can, because they've been through things no else can, both pre meeting up and during.

Outsider POV on The Chain. What do the random villagers, mail men, named background characters, or princesses think of them

The Chain reunighting post separation at the end of their adventures. Don't care if it's because of more magic ro because they've all died and are hugging it out in heaven

Very first Link, the the one before Sky, ( Ive always called him Link the Lionheart, but idk if that's his actual title) meeting/traveling with The Chain

83 notes - Posted May 18, 2022

#2

So the LU boys are soulmates in the realist most platonic way possible. As such there should be an AU where they have red strings of fate. (Probs a diff color bc platonic but the point stands) This means they should have all many strings that are all tangled up whent hey first meet. It can also focus on angst where they just see a bunch of their soul strings fading into nothing after a few inches, rather than normal foot or two. But none of that is why I thought about it.

No I thought about it because I think about the boys plucking at their strings like instruments once they all met. So one of them gets sent into town for food (less conspicuous that way) and the whole time Wild, Wind and Hyrule have gathered together and are play 'Hot cross buns' on their soul strings to remind the poor guy to buy them sticky buns

96 notes - Posted June 26, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Sits up: I don't think I ever told anyone I once had the thought of a team in an organization, refered to as a 'cell' whose big guy, aka the powerhouse's code name was the 'Mitochondrion'

124 notes - Posted February 13, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[wildewinged-fr]

30 day dragon share challenge - day 4: arcane dragons

Meyne: Arcane priest whose blindness helps him find greater insights than most others do

Ahnvahr: probably infected with something horrible, luckily too stupid to notice and/or care

Archer: vaultkeeper whose words seem to hold greater weight than they should

Vysse: an ambassador who seeks to guide those who are lost

[fantasmalforce]

October Prompts - Day 2 : Moonlight (Lysander and Xi)

|| Lysander the Dragonborn belongs to @a-tired-birds-ramblings

It was often thought that Druids often drew their power from a source as they expanded their mastery and understanding of the arcane arts through a specific circle. Whether such a theory was true or not had yet to be confirmed- or so all of Xi's books had implied- but the Druid could have sworn that she felt some sort of recharging and inspiring energy from the element by which her circle had taken its name from. Sitting on the roof her quiet homestead at night, basking in the silvery rays of midnight's key star rejuvenated her. A sense of immense calm and peace seemed to seep into her bones, creep into the very fibers of her being, and relax her completely. It was an ideal time to meditate.

Or it would have been, had she lived alone.

A deep breath rattled within the gnome's chest, and she exhaled, basking in the cool glow and the faint tingling it left within her skin. There was a loud creak from behind her however, and momentarily, her concentration was broken. She did not need to open her eyes, nor turn around to sense the it was her life partner attempting to sneak up on her.

"I didn't think you'd notice I was gone." She spoke, voice soft both from weariness and lack of use for a good collection of hours.

"Kind of hard to miss considering we share a bed," the Dragonborn chuckled, trotting up to sit beside her. A yawn rumbled within his throat as he stretched for a moment, then left his legs to dangle off the edge of the roof. "Though you almost got me- using my tail and a few pillows to try and replace you in bed was good."

"Then what gave it away?" The corners of Xi's mouth quirked upwards faintly.

"I had to get up for a drink."

"I should have known." The gnome finally opened her eyes- well, the one eyes that was visible. Glimmering amethyst sparkled up at Lysander, seemingly glowing in the moonlight. Her other eye was covered by an eyepatch with only a few scars peering out from behind the black piece protecting her damaged optic. Framing her delicately tanned and freckles face was a rather fluffy case of bedhead- most unusual for the gnome given how neat and organized she was in all other circumstances. A drift in her appearance was something to take note of. And poke fun at.

Lysander snickered. "You know, bedhead is a good look on you."

"Well I'm certainly glad you think so." The gnome huffed softly, raising her hands to prestidigitate her long red locks to flow down smoothly over her back and shoulders. "Unfortunately I don't plan on keeping it."

The dragon offered a quiet complaint before moving closer and gently clutching her crimson locks between his great claws, deciding to try and braid them back in that way she so commonly wore her hair. "So then tell me, how often do you sneak out like this?"

"Oh, once in a blue moon," the gnome hummed.

"Any particular reason?" He pressed, momentarily pausing the surprisingly deft movements of his hands and leaning down over her shoulder to spy a better look at his wife's expression.

"I come outside whenever I can't sleep. The moonlight is oddly calming, wouldn't you say?" The gnome pressed her knees together, before shifting to sit more on her hip with her legs tucked up against her. "Helps me settle down when the nights get rough."

A somber tone crept into her words as she carried on along her statement. A kind the Dragonborn recognized and grew concerned about. For the briefest moment, he wondered what was going on within his dearest's brilliant mind; what shadow had befallen the radiant flame that seemed to never run out of fuel and so abruptly sniffed out its glow? He had an idea, but he said nothing as he continued to delicately curl her luscious locks around one another, tucking the strands of soft keratin together.

"You know, Xi, if things start... bothering you, you can always wake me up, you know?" Scale brows bunched together as he caught a few loose strands and tucked them back into place. "I don't mind waking up if it means helping you get back to sleep."

"Ah, but you see, my dear, there's a big difference if I stay up late and if you do," she leaned forward, elbow propped up on her thigh and chin resting against her palm. "You have a job to do when you get up, and you need to be well rested for it."

"You have a job too," he nudged at her, tone a bit more stern than he would have liked. "You're the town's librarian."

"Yes, but a whole town is not counting on me to deliver books. Remembering the right page in a tome isn't a matter of life or death, the choice to dog-ear or bookmark something doesn't have the lives of the many attached to it. You—" she turned to glanced at him, "you have an actual duty to perform. And there are a lot of people counting on you to be well-rested enough to do it."

The Dragonborn almost sighed at the words. Xi had a brilliant, yet terrible way of downplaying or glorifying things. Brilliant in that her mastery of word could probably slay a dragon, but terrible with how often she used her tongue to devalue her own accomplishments. Her habit of comparing herself to others was something of a second nature. Some way of coping and defending herself, he'd learned. And he understood where it came from, just as much as he understood it was something they were still working on breaking her out of. These things just took time, and careful syllables on his own side of the chessboard. After his own bit of pondering, the Dragonborn finally finished weaving together the delicate carmine strands and tucked the braid over his wive's shoulder, before using a claw tucked under her chin to turn her head to look at him.

"Well, I still think that's a pretty important job. You yourself have said that you wouldn't be here now if it weren't for a library." He smiled. "You do a lot more than just provide books. You bring a lot of joy and tears with your stories. Offer a quiet place to those who need it. A resource to those with the same thirst for knowledge as you. Maybe even a safe space for the unsuspecting. My job is protect the future. But your job is to educate them so they can protect themselves. I'd say that'd pretty damn important. Wouldn't you?"

The gnome took a moment to think over the word, touching her braid as her husband moved to sit beside her.  "Yeah..." slowly leaned against him as she slowly accepted the fact."

"I guess it does."

[mahalzevran]

DA 20+ Questions

Tagged by @antivan-surana​ thanks! Tagging @situationnormal​ @the-dread-doggo​ @acepavus​ @aroundofgwent​ @lakambaeni​ @kxnways​ @fuckbioware​ (no pressure ofc) and anyone who wants to?

The rest is under a read more because it’s long

01) Favourite game of the series?

Origins, only because you got less and less op as a mage as the games went on. I love all the games tbh.

02) How did you discover Dragon Age?

My friend got my sister into it. They kept talking and talking about it so finally I was like “ok lets see what the big deal is” and here I am now

03) How many times you’ve played the games?

I’ve done Origins twice fully, DA2 four times fully (omg I didn’t realize this until now lol) and DA:I just once fully. I have one unfinished playthrough of Origins with a Cousland, and I’m in the middle of maybe two of DA:I. I think I’ve gone back and replayed certain parts of both Origins and DA:I plenty of times.

04) Favourite race to play as?

Elf I guess? Though I’ve only fully played as a human and elf. I’m in the middle of a dwarf playthrough and I’m thinking of doing a qunari one in the future. It might change idk.

I just really liked playing as an elf in Origins so that’s why I got into elves. But the funny thing is, I wasn’t even thinking of playing as an elf when I played for the first time. I wanted to play as a human. I just did it on a whim.

05) Favourite class?

Mage, hands down. Realistically, they’re the most versatile class. They can do range and melee since anyone can learn how to fight with weapons. But the last two games won’t let you so :)

Also, this stems from the fact that I’ve been a harry potter fan since I could remember.

06) Do you play through the games differently or do you make the same decisions each time?

In my full, proper playthroughs that I’ve finished, it’s slightly different but still the same basic ideas. Sided with mages, agreed with Anders, etc.

But I am planning to try an evil playthrough in the future so

07) Go-to adventuring group?

DA:O (I have two)

Leliana, Wynne, Shale - the OG crew; they were my main crew in my first playthrough and it was a pretty even party

Zevran, Leliana, Alistair - the elf crew; esp. with Rhian they’re all elves because I saw a theory that Leliana is half elf and I’m down

DA2

It’s a mixed bag. If I’m not playing as a mage, I usually take Anders a lot because we need a healer and Merrill can’t heal. I tend not to take Sebastian as much after I max his friendship. After Sebastian, I take Aveline the least. Other than that I just mix it up. Unless I’m romancing someone, then I take them every time.

I’d love to take Anders, Fenris, and Merrill out more often but I hate how mean they all are to each other (looking @ u bioware 👀)

DA:I

My first playthrough, I mixed it up a lot in the beginning but then I ended up bringing Solas, Cole, and Blackwall a lot near the end for some reason?

I love taking Vivienne, Dorian, and Solas out, especially if I’m playing a mage, because it’s such a pretty fireworks show

In general though, if I’m romancing someone I take them with me almost always.

08) Which of your characters did you put the most thought into?

I think it’s a tie between Rhian and Lu.

09) Favourite romance?

To no one’s surprise, it’s Zevran :3

Solas is second because I just really like that angst.

10) Have you read any of the comics/books?

I’ve read The Silent Grove, Those Who Speak, and Until We Speak (because someone gifted me the Omnibus) and The Calling.

I also have Hard in Hightown, which I should probably read lol, and the art book of inquisition.

11) If you read them, which was your favourite book?

The Calling solely because of my mom Fiona and my dad Duncan. 

12) Favourite DLCs?

Awakening because I love everyone and its also really funny that Rhian, who is 19 at that point, had to basically babysit people older than her and also run a whole arling.

I love both Legacy and Mark of the Assassin. Mark of the Assassin was really funny (though I hated the stealth part). I love Legacy specifically because when I was fighting Corypheus, both Varric and Anders K.O.’d and it was just me and Carver. It was a special family moment bringing down a whole entire magister together. I also hc that that was canon and it brought Kaia and Carver closer together.

13) Things that annoy you.

I’m gonna talk about the game bc if this is about the fandom, then that’s a whole other thing.

Anders’ writing for one. It doesn’t make sense that he’d approve of giving Fenris back to Danarius. And also that he wouldn’t tell f!Hawke that he’s bi? Then there’s the fact that Anders, Fenris, and Merrill all don’t get along when they have a lot in common.

Anything that was written by Lukas Krisdkjsdhkdk. Aveline, Sera, etc. he did a really bad job.

Also didn’t like that mages got less OP in the last two games.

There’s also the tone-deafness? Dorian, a brown man, saying slavery is ok. And also there’s the dialogue between Solas and Vivienne where Solas supposedly “owns” Vivienne. I think he says something like “may you learn”? Solas, a white person, saying this to Vivienne, a black woman, when there’s obvious colorism in Thedas? I think not.

There’s probably other but I can’t think of them right now.

14) Orlais or Ferelden?

Orlais is too snooty and Ferelden doesn’t season their food. I pick Seheron and Laysh because that’s where the Asians are at.

15) Templars or mages?

Mages

16) If you have multiple characters, are they in different/parallel universes or in the same one?

Originally, my canonverse was Rhian, Kaia, and Luwalhati. Alden and Bolin were part of an AU. Then Alden finagled his way in there, then I decided to have Bolin in there too. So now i have twin Hawkes and Bolin is part of the Inquisition (if he’s a companion or not, I haven’t thought about)

I have plenty of other OCs that I’m planning on, but they’re currently sorted into a different universe.

17) What did you name your pets? (mabari, summoned animals, mounts, etc)

Pikamon for the Origins mabari. It’s a mix between the names of my two dogs, Pikachu and Cinnamon

Cinnachu for the DA2 mabari, also a mix of Pikachu and Cinnamon.

Lu’s mount is the royal sixteen (hart), which is given to you by Clan Lavellan if you manage to keep them alive iirc, and its name is Luntian, the tagalog word for green which is her favorite color. (In a teen!Lu AU, her mount is the bog unicorn bc she’s an edgelord)

18) Have you installed any mods?

It would be more surprising if I didn’t. How else would I manage to have my characters look like the’re poc?? And also get rid of whitewashing and have some continuity. I usually just do cosmetic mods if it’s my first playthrough. Then I do like “cheats” after I finish the game fully.

Fun fact, I once spent like 2+ hrs modding Origins to have the Zev romance the way I want. I also stayed up until like 5am trying to make Solas look like his concept art lol (it didn’t really work)

19) Did your Warden want to become a Grey Warden?

Rhian didn’t not want to become a warden. She read about them and thought they were an honorable order, but she didn’t expect to ever have a chance to become one. Her goal was to just go up in the Circle hierarchy, maybe even become First Enchanter. Then when the time came, she didn’t really have much of a choice.

20) Hawke’s personality?

Kaia is blue and Alden is purple

21) Did you make matching armor for your companions in Inquisition?

At first, I didn’t get what the big deal was with crafting. It didn’t seem fun at all lol. Then I tried it and was hooked. I don’t have them matching, but I do tend to try to match my Inquisitor with their LI in some way.

My usual procedure for armor in Inquisition is like this. I make everyone wear heavy armor and pick the materials that have the highest attributes, not caring how ridiculous the colors are. Then I go to tint them using a guide for each companion’s color scheme. This is the same for helmet but I usually have them turned off or have no one wearing one.

The only exception is Varric, Cole, and Blackwall. I have Varric wear the rogue armor that looks like his DA2 outfit, and Cole and Blackwall wear the Grey Warden heavy armor. I tint the grey warden armor using a guide for its color scheme.

I have Bull, Vivienne, and Cole wear their unique helmets.

22) If your character(s) could go back in time to change one thing, what would they change?

Rhian - She’d probably want to re-do how she told Zevran that she wasn’t exactly dead.

Kaia - Taken Quentin’s threat more seriously and killed him before he got to Leandra

Alden - He has no regrets

Luwalhati - wouldn’t have taken Sam and Wis with her so they wouldn’t have had to have died in the conclave explosion

Bolin - None, all of his decisions led him to Dorian and he’s happy with that.

23) Do you have any headcanons about your character(s) that go against canon?

They’re all at least part Seheron?

I also hc that neither Carver nor Bethany die because Kaia was able to cast a barrier on both of them before the ogre got them. Then they both became Grey Wardens because Carver contracted the taint in the expedition and wouldn’t join the Wardens unless Bethany came with him too.

Another hc I have is that Sebastian didn’t leave when Anders was spared and stayed to help out. But he went his separate way after because he still didn’t approve of sparing him.

Oh shoot, I almost forgot. The most against canon thing I’ve done probably? Rhian didn’t do the Ritual but she did slay the archdemon without dying. Rhian’s an arcane warrior, so when she slayed it, she was partway in the fade. Being partway into the fade was enough for her essence, I guess, to survive it. But she’s not mortal anymore and kind of a spirit now? So she periodically has to chill in the fade because being in the real world takes a toll on her.

25) Who did you leave in the Fade?

In the game, it was Stroud. I killed Loghain and no way is Alistair gonna be trapped in there. Fiona will be sad. So I made Alistair king in the game only, so Stroud was the one that was left.

This is another off canon thing I did. In my actual canon, Alistair is the warden contact. The Hawke that comes to the Inquisition is both Kaia and Alden. Alden brings Fenris with him because he doesn’t go anywhere without his Boo-Boo. Bethany and Carver also come because Weisshaupt was being weird and it seemed like they would be safer in the Inquisition. Lu + her party, Alistair, Kaia, Alden, Fenris, Bethany, and Carver all come to Adamant. Because there’s so many people, everyone was able to escape the Fade. No one is left behind.

26) Favourite mount? The nugs! All of them :) 

Though I don’t really use the mounts lol

[bloggerthanwolves]

Log #35 - M.P. Redux, Part Two - Late & Over Budget

Finally went and finished the expansion of the mob grinder, AKA the Mitosan Project. After the most recent log about it, most of the rooms were partially dug, but none of the new canals were done, the water routing was partial, and the kill room wasn’t started at all.

So I went and did all that. It took a long time. Just doing all the canals was, I’d estimate, over ten hours. All in all it was spectacularly boring, so here are some highlights:

I was clearing part of an abandoned mine-shaft to let water through and died to Cave Spiders. Respawned near Potwhole and made my way back in a couple of hours.

Somehow, my items were gone - this keeps happening. I know for a fact that chunks at Mitose couldn’t have been rendered for a full five minutes in vanilla Minecraft rules. I even heard someone on the BTW discord claim that the items you drop after death stay for twenty minutes, though I suspect that’s completely false.

You can see in the screenshot my items did drop - so why were they gone? Was I slower to reach them than I thought? Does BTW specifically render chunks where you recently died? Does vanilla Minecraft still count item despawn timers when you’re outside the chunk? Does BTW? Either way the death set me back a few hours and a few diamonds, but was ultimately of little consequence. Wait, then why did I bring it up..? Whatever.

I discovered this...interesting bit of work I did about a year ago. This is the canal mobs fall into from the east wing. But I have no idea why I made it so deep. I don’t want the mobs to take fall damage, so I have no reason to specifically lower the water canal. But for some reason, this was twenty blocks lower than needed, which 1. messed up my kill room plans and required me to raise it, and 2. meant I probably wasted hours digging this out for no good reason. I really have no idea what I was thinking, since I didn’t mention my rationale here.

The kill room. The bit of redstone on the right is a timer (turntable) hooked up to a chopping block attached to a sticky piston. Every fourth turn, it recedes, mobs fall into the kill chamber, then it pushes back onto the mobs, suffocating them, increasing the saw’s damage, and crucially, increasing the drop rate of mob heads.

The loot collection area. Five different chests, each with a different hopper filter. Made to collect creeper drops, skeleton drops, zombie drops, tool/armor drops, and miscellaneous, respectively. If you’re wondering why I bothered with the sorting, it’s because bones, creeper oysters, and rotten flesh only stack up to 16, meaning that a normal double chest would quickly fill up.

Collecting experience from the Vessel of the Dragon.

The Project now outputs easily five or ten times as much as before. It’s not technically done - once I finished digging and started placing vine traps and closing off rooms, I realized that the nine stack of vine traps I had saved would not nearly cover the entire grinder. It covered, like, one half of one wing. So I’ve slowly been harvesting more vines and activating more of the rooms over the last week. At present, it’s at 75% capacity.

Hey, a rare Arcane Scroll drop. Isn’t useful until after the Dragon, I think, but neat.

So, what did I learn from this year-long sabbatical to build a Minecraft mob farm? A few things. Mostly mistakes that will permanently stain this thing.

1. I built it too close to the surface so it was constantly collapsing the ground and leaving scars where water tunnels are, getting in the way of other stuff I want to do. 1a. I built it under a frickin’ desert so it was extra collapse-happy. 2. I built it outside of the permanently rendered spawn chunks which I didn’t know existed, so it will only run when I’m nearby. 3. I only have a single kill room, which is far away from most of the mob spawning area. This means a lot of mobs are spending a lot of time alive, reducing total spawns, and thus total throughput and speed of production. It would be best to have local kill rooms that kill mobs ASAP and then just transport all the drops to a central area. 4. Like 1/3rd of the kill rooms are close enough to my base to be inactive most of the time.

But for all of that, it works, goddamnit, it works, it gets me the goods in the quantities I need. Tons of bones, flesh, and creeper oysters. Iron income is...nice. Not enough to build an actual railroad, even a small one, but nice.

I built a rail track to the kill room for fun and easy access. The booster rails cost most of the my meager gold supply, but I had to celebrate somehow.