#getting to write spawn is the real important part of all this

[vomitspit2]

ur viltrumite mark snippet makes me sick to my fucking STOMACHHHHHH its so good im gonna b thinking abt it 4 so long ,,, thank u 4 the food its so good im gonna shit my pants

i think viltrumite mark def isnt like main mark, in the sense he isn't outwardly goofy or anything like that, but hes still got those core mark traits [bad at geography, believes in doing the right thing [but it depends on what he has been told the right thing is], keeping the people he loves safe, etc.] and its what draws me in the most ,,,,, like cracking him open like a cadbury egg and slurping up whats on the inside its just so appealing !!!!!! another reason why i liked that viltrumite mark snippet is how he stuttered over what he said to the sculpture like ,,, no 'i love you' no 'i miss you' just . 'you were a good person' and then destruction, the last thing left of his anchor. ARUGHHHHH im gonna beat him to death i love ALL mark graysons

ALSO THANK YOU FOR THAT POST ON SINISTER MARK BEING A CANNIBAL. i read the comics, had a fun time, thirsted over mohawk a lil, and i REMEMBER reading how he said that they all ate each other to survive !!!! all marks have a thing for biting or blood, imo, it just varies, but HE DOESNT FUCKING EAT PEOPLEEEEE i am supremely peeved when people get characters wrong . sighhhhhhh . hes still my fav tho <3

ANYWAY . soooo excited for that viltrumite mark fic u were posting snippets of im already in love w the mc !!!!!!! also i fully suspect that they might get their ass beat by nolan ,,,, or get chewed out ,,,,,,, i feel like nolan, who raised his son on viltrum, definitely is outwardly gruff, but behind closed doors he cares SOOOOO much for mark, but doesn't rlly know how to express it that well

bro you had me STUNNED receiving this in my inbox holy hell …. i’m glad that i could write something that would resonate so deeply; your entire message was a delight to read (◍•ᴗ•◍)❤!!!!!

i LOVE viewing and developing viltrumite mark as a very stoic and expressionless individual — i think a lot of the fandom can agree that’s how he is. as i’m writing this bigger WIP for him, it’s really fun to shed the layers of main!mark off him while still keeping him in some resemblance of his counterpart — all the traits you listed are what i feel the bones/skeletons of mark’s personality are and each variant wears a different skin of it! so real, cracking him off like a cadbury egg. i’m putting that bitch under a microscope 🔬 he is appealing to study!!! orz orz …. also i had him stutter off the phrase bc i wanted him to be catch and choke on using pet instead of person to identify the mc as such! i think recognizing and caring for them as an individual is SO much more meaningful than an ‘ily’ or ‘i miss u’ for viltrumite mark.

it just feels lame to me to characterize sinister mark as the only cannibal in his universe before they were all deserted 🥀 like there is so much to do with him (all the variants actually — they’re free real estate!) but watering down just the guy who survived to be ‘cannibal guy’ 💔 ugh lameeee ,,, i love the idea that they all bite or enjoy blood in various degrees! the solidarity i feel with you on that!! like you get it, you see the vision (≧▽≦)!

bc of this message, i decided to include a few snippets of that WIP — i’m hoping it’ll be done in may, it’s at 8K currently — bc i could not not hand out freebies after receiving such a jaw-dropping message!

i can say that nolan is definitely not going to be a happy camper in this one-shot. i don’t want to spoil much but ahhhh i love the predictions!!!!!!

[chattersstuff]

The vast majority of the BG3 fandom (Astarion lovers..) didn’t get the game, specifically Astarion’s backstory AT ALL. I look at posts of him under his tag and most of it is nsfw art or written smut..there’s literally a part of his dialogue where he says “I don’t think I want you to think of me in terms of sex. I don’t know if I want anyone to.” Not saying he’s asexual, but saying he rather have a sexless relationship than one with sex (at least during the timeline of the game). He also says “I want to wake up beside a handsome virgin” which I don’t know why people thought that was strange, ESPECIALLY with his background of having nothing but sex with people without even wanting it. I get so angry when all people do is sexualize a character and almost nothing else, but it makes me the most angry when it’s someone that asexual or has a bad background with sex. “Astarion is so freaky” I assure you he is not and if he heard the things most people on social media said about him (if he was real, he’s not) I guarantee he’d be upset and not all “oh darling, why didn’t you tell me you longed for me sooner?” That whole “I love sex, let’s have sex” act was when he was seducing and using Tav. Big reminder people need. When he’s ascended that’s different because he’s basically all powerful and his ego grew, also he’s a whole different character at the point. He’d make a point to Tav that he’s in charge and his pleasure is the top priority and he’s the most important ever. Ascended Astarion only wants to be pleased when he chooses to, spawn Astarion kinda still thinks he has to please others to get around (in game timeline). “He’s just a character, we’ll write smut all we want because he’s hot” It’s okay to write smut about him, Neil hasn’t said anything against it, nor have the devs, but stop writing ONLY smut for characters that would (most likely) hate it. The devs definitely tried really hard to a similar point out and it kind of backfired a bit because a lot of people only want sex even though it’s so overrated. A good piece of fried chicken is better. Though that’s my opinion.

(This post has been heavily edited to come out as less hostile than it was and unnecessary opinions or gripes have been removed. I won’t personally target people that write this kind of subject about Astarion or other characters, it doesn’t do any real harm. This is just my opinion, I don’t mean to shove it down people’s throats like I did with the old post, I apologize. Nor do I mean to baby SA survivors that are comfortable with sex, this is just something that makes ME upset as it is my blog, so I post my opinions.)

[derww]

for @heartcircus.

its not like zam actually tries to talk: he stands, carefully holding his notes, just staring at spawn, noticing one familiar face after another, feeling like all thoughts in his head became too heavy, and then just. turns around. and leaves.

you know, all of the princezam nature is to oppose, is to fight. but the last seasons taught him about just how important it is to appreciate people around, to do not only for yourself but for them too. and just today he promised to not interfere with mapicc's plans.

he can't fight, but he can't support. so he leaves. first time in many days, he has no words to say anymore.

all of it is just too familiar, and memories of the past cloud his mind and make every part of his body weak and stale. story repeats itself, and hed hate to see it continue and weave hemself into it, so he does not. i need some time to be alone, he says to derapchu and goes almost to the border – to sunny hill, surrounded by snow-capped mountains.

this time something in it reminds him too heavy. he doesn't build a castle. instead, he builds a hut.

it's not so bad, he says to himself, laying firewood in the stove, it's not season 4 anymore, noone will backdoor the server and mapicc will stop. sooner or later. i cant fight him, but i dont have to. everything will end. and then ill go back.

he feels so fucking tired. only now he understands just how tired he is. so he lies down. and sleeps. and sleeps. and sleeps.

it never gets better; the tombstone of exhaustion only presses him down harder and harder. he sleeps and sees dreams. he cooks himself food and eats it, feeling no taste. he plants flowers and takes care of them. sometimes he talks to derapchu. he never tells where he is.

only in so slow time he suddenly understands just how misplaced he is. he's patch on patch, stitched over and over again with scraps of fabric, no matter how worn or unsuitable they may be, over and over and over, stitched with scars running through his spine. he is a trace of something forgotten, overlaid by images of other people and experiences, accustomed to it so much that it feels like himself. he sleeps and sees no nightmares. maybe it's for the worse.

so far from anyone, without any real goal, Immersed deep into himself, he easily starts missing hours, days, and weeks. time doesn't feel real, and he, at the end, too. people write him. sometimes he answers. he never agrees to meet.

i'll go back when the mawn thing will be over; he promises to derap but hardly believes in it himself. something makes him feel like he has nothing to come back to. this house is also not his home, but it's at least silent here.

derap persists, but in the end he gives up too. and, in the end, he is left alone. he grows dandelions in the field around. when an unfamiliar flower appears in the field, he does not prevent it from growing nearby.

he blinks and feels like he missed a whole week. sometimes he just lies there and doesn't move. he doesn't feel the softness of the pillow, the springy floor under his feet, and, after all, he doesn't feel pain either. a ringing void freezes in his head. he feels tired, but sleep doesn't help.

he missed a moment something changes.

something about how the world exists around him. something about how forest smells like. something about how the grass is rustling under his feet. something is wrong, but he barely makes himself care. it doesn't matter, not really, but time still slows down. he slowly dips his hands into the loose earth, feeling the coolness and texture. nothing here belongs to him, but that's not the point. he plants some poppy seeds. one of them ends up in a pot on his windowsill.

i'm fully okay, he says to derap while not being able to remember what he ate today, i'm just in retirement for now. i will go back to you, i promise. i just need some time.

the boards under his feet creak differently. sometimes something whistles, like an unfamiliar bird. sometimes it seems to him that the grass next to the house is crushed.

isn't this a true peaceful life, he asks himself. to run away from everything and be alone. in the end, there is no way to harm anyone if you are alone. he feels like he was running a marathon all this time and only now stopped.

he adds blue orchids, but their blue is drowning in the red. he takes the smallest orchid inside and turns it into a magnificent flower. In a moment of weakness, he takes the cornflower inside. the next one turns out to be an orange tulip. he doesn't comprehend it.

is it what i wanted in season four, he asks himself. this place strangely reminds him of it. he reminds himself of it, too, allowing himself to feel anything. he still can't decide if it's a good thing. 

the rain is pounding on his window. someone is knocking on his coffin lid. poppies fill the whole field.

i miss them, he writes on a paper. but i can't go back yet. not while spawn is someone's. not while i have to fight my best friend.

when he comes back from the forest, his house still keeps warmth. his footsteps are echoing, and his diary is open by the wind. i miss being able to decide, this page says. i was good at it once.

he doesn't feel sick. he feels dump. the green in his cape is starting to fade.

sometimes it seems to me that i won't be able to overcome this, he writes. but I know i can handle it. i always can. i will overcome anything. i just can't give up.

the forest smells of pine and fir, and it has not been lost in the trees for a long time, wandering far beyond the edge. the forest always brings him back when he wants to. it never holds him by force and generously supplies him with tree cones and wet moss. he always comes back because he has nowhere to go.

this time, when he comes home, he has a visitor. he is not surprised: he calls them by name, nods, makes tea from fir needles.

mapicc rests his head on his elbows.

– lets go home, – he says. zam shakes his head.

– to mawn? – he asks.

mapicc squints.

– yes.

– i won't.

– why.

zam looks at him almost regretfully.

– because i refuse to fight you, – he answers simply, – and i will have no choice but to.

– even fighting me is much better than- than whatever this is, – mapicc remarks irritably.

– i don't want to fight you ever again, – zam signs, – i know you like me as your enemy. i do not.

– you don't have to fight me. join me.

– i hate everything you've created, – he answers with pity, – and i can't change it. please, leave me alone. do whatever you want to do. and one day i'll be able to go back.

– i dont understand why you oppose it so much. you haven't even given it a try. is it, like, that bad? people love it; you can love it too.

zam shakes his head.

– did you really come to convince me to love what I hate?

– i came to invite you to my thing.

– not this time.

in the end, mapicc still leaves. only after that zam takes his floor apart to find a secret passage under the boards. it leads to a dug-out underground room filled with anything. there are books everywhere. an unmade bed. and a pot with a dandelion in the middle of the makeshift countertop.

mapiccs room, says the sign. he adds a glow ink to it and looks around again.

for an infinitely long moment he considers just starting to live here.

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

I think part of the trouble with reading ML as a magical girl team is that it’s really written to be Marinette as the Lone Hero.

Sticking with Winx Club as an example (which I absolutely loved), even though Bloom was clearly the main character, the other girls got focus and attention and their own narratives unrelated to Bloom’s. Alya doesn’t have that; nearly the entirety of her scenes and focus are still for or related to Marinette’s story, which the writers have outright told us is always meant to come first.

As such, I think the more solid reading of ML is that it’s a poorly written superhero romcom that pretends to be a magical girl team, but only ends up offering crumbs. It’s why we’re shown the extra Miraculous and given a “core four/five,” only for it to be revealed that the new holders aren’t actually permanent team members. A decision I remember thinking at the time made absolutely no sense, but now in hindsight can be perfectly explained by how doing so would necessitate that attention/focus be taken from Marinette, which ML absolutely refuses to do.

In fact, I’d wager that’s the actual reason Chat Noir has a crush on Ladybug before Adrien falls for Marinette: it keeps his attention even as a hero focused on her. There’s plenty of salters who love to deride him for not focusing enough on the “job” and making LB pick up his “slack,” but that fits the show’s intentions perfectly. Chat can’t be written to (as) capable if LB is to shine. Hence why we had the whole Catwalker argument being nonsensically centered around “perfection.” 😭

(Post with the Winx club example for context.)

You're absolutely right. Miraculous is trying to be a loan hero show (or perhaps a serious hero and silly sidekick show) where Marinette is the only important character outside of the villains, a magical girl team show where female friendships are the most important relationships in the show, and a heterosexual rom-com all at the same time which leads to a ton of nonsense choices because those are three genres that really don't mix!

While I never outright said it, the post about rom-coms vs magical girl team shows was spawned by the fandom conflict over Alya's writing in the later seasons. I wanted to take a moment to point out why she keeps being given the roles that people expect Chat Noir to get and why both sides of that fandom conflict have very valid feelings given the way that the show is being written, so I didn't talk about the lone hero thing since that doesn't really play a part in Alya and Adrien's fight for narrative importance. If we're looking at Miraculous as a whole though, then it's 100% a piece of the puzzle when you're trying to figure out where the writing went wrong.

I've mentioned a couple of times that they're putting way too much on Marinette's shoulders. The main reason that I feel that way is because they also decided to give her a full team of heroes to work with which is deeply confusing. If they really wanted to go the Marinette-is-the-only-real-hero route, then we should have never gotten any additional heroes beyond Ladybug and Chat Noir. Keep Chat Noir as the comedy sidekick and let Ladybug use all of the other miraculous as powerups without ever handing them out.

After all, when it comes down to their actual role in the narrative, most of the team feels like nothing more than a powerup since they basically just do whatever Ladybug tells them to do. Outside of Viperion and Bunnyx, there's no reason why Ladybug can't just dual, triple, or quadruple wield. This is extra true because they took the time to tell us that Marinette is able to wield more miraculous than most people and then... never really did anything with that. Why have a line like this one from Kwamibuster if you're never going to have Marinette do more than the occasional dual wield?

Master Fu: No Miraculous owner in all of history has ever been mentally and physically strong enough to use that many Miraculous at the same time. Wayzz: Marinette truly is special, Master.

Switching from a team back to a duo would also fix the awkwardness of Adrien's writing as that really wasn't a problem back in season one. The hero who does all the cool stuff and their wacky comedy sidekick who keeps things fun is a classic setup for a reason!

[p5x-theories]

I know its not the most important part of the trailer, but what you think its the deal with the Loki Whale?

Im aware that Loki's design is based on a aready existing military pattern, expecially one used on ships, so its not too far fetch that they used it on a 'water' themed palace. But also feels like they are just teasing us at this point 🥲

Ik it could just be a funny easter egg, but my 2 cents its that its related to how unstable the metaverse is right now.

You know, like when you dream and you see things that are an mix of things you saw in real life, but they make no sense. Thus Whale Loki is born lol

Huh, I actually didn't even consider it might be Loki-related when I first saw the trailer! My first thought was that star pattern you see in some of P5's UI:

But you might be onto something about it looking a bit more like Loki's pattern than the stars... not to mention the- wait, does it have horns, too, even??

I reopened the trailer to double-check that the red stuff coming off the whale actually is part of it, since it's reminiscent of Loki's red braids as well, but as it was turning I noticed it appears to have horns coming off the top of its head (it's upside-down in this screenshot), too!

I think you were right the first time, this feels much more like it's intentionally Loki, and less like coincidental dazzle camouflage. What the heck is going on with this whale??

Metaverse instability is possible, though I'd argue we don't even know if the Metaverse is unstable, so it's sort of a shot in the dark. Let's look back at where we've seen this whale before... I'm pretty sure it's only been in Chapter 3?

We first saw the whale swimming through the waters of the third Palace, towards the start of Chapter 3, the night after Katayama was posted as a phantom and forbidden from interacting with students outside of class, and just before we see it confirmed that Katayama is the Rush Rider. The transition during the cutscene seems to connect the whale to all the copies of that Mementos boss that we then see spawn in Mementos.

We then saw what looks like the whale's silhouette again in the 3.2 trailer, but this time it appeared to be swimming over what might be Mementos instead? It's then immediately followed by another shot of those boss guys spawning in Mementos. Granted, we haven't seen this in the game yet, so these two shots might not actually be shown back-to-back in the proper cutscene.

Since the Palaces are accessed from within Mementos in this game, it's not super weird that the whale might be able to leave the Palace... or maybe getting rid of the Palace by changing Katayama and Akashi's hearts will set the whale free? Either way, I can at least imagine how the whale gets out there. I'm not sure what the watery-looking filter over Mementos means, though, but it's interesting because right now I kind of associate the ocean the most with Wonder, given his Persona awakening and his Velvet Room.

But I really think it means something that the Loki whale was in the third Palace first and foremost. And as I was grabbing those screenshots and writing out the context for its other appearances, thinking about the whale while doing so... I think it might be inflicting something like a weaker Call of Chaos on Katayama and Akashi??

I feel like that's a wild thing say, but it could explain two currently inexplicable pieces of information revealed by the plot: 1) basically everything about the Rush Rider; like Katayama said: "lately whenever she gets on her bike, her body feels hot and her head gets fuzzy. She admits she doesn’t even remember biking onto a train, like in the video on Magatsushin", and 2) why, in Wonder's vision, Akashi snaps and stabs Riko, when that's extremely out of character for him, and also wouldn't make sense for him to do if he just had no desires left.

As we know it from P5, Call of Chaos let Akechi drive people's Shadows berserk, leading to the breakdown incidents- incidents where people suddenly do reckless, usually violent things- which the victims then wouldn't really recall after the fact. That aligns suspiciously well with Katayama and Akashi's strange actions, and we've only seen the whale in their Palace. This whale was barely on my radar half an hour ago, but now that I've typed this whole response out, I'm totally convinced that this is the whale's doing, somehow. So, thanks for bringing it up!

Still no idea why it exists in the first place, or what it might mean if the whale will be roaming free in Mementos after the Palace is gone, though...

[kitscodingblog]

Coding Update 7

I'm gonna try to keep this blog updated at least once a week so I make sure I'm always doing SOME sort of coding.

Something something read more.

So the Alien Invasion game is coming along pretty well. I'm learning a lot of tools very quickly. Which also means I'm forgetting a lot of stuff quickly sometimes haha.

So here's some of it. AlienInvasion is basically the whole game stuff, including all the sprites and other key information. It had me do a lot of creating Classes in separate files, then importing them into the main file to keep things clean. Which I get is mostly to keep everything clean and organized.

I'm also, as a full disclosure, mostly just writing the code it wants me to write. So this isn't wholly my own or anything.

Also I have NO idea what sprite group is. I think, if I'm understand it right, it's basically creating a stored group/list thing for the bullets and aliens?

Also there's this. The super().__init__() . I have, literally, no idea why that gets called. It never explained it or made an reference to why its used in the Sprite function. It just said "we call super() so it works properly" and I was like but WHY?? What does it MEAN??

I still don't know.

Also as you can see here, this is everything slimmed down to make the code easier. It had me write out what each of those events do first, under run_game(self), then it was like "we'll refractor this so the code is easier to read." Plus it makes it 100x easier to adjust the code.

I could go into the specifics of them but nah. Just know that they do what they are supposed.

Though while writing the bullet function, it originally let me spawn as many as i wanted as i spammed Spacebar. As I was testing it, I was like "huh.. Those bullets are off screen but I'm pretty sure they still exist. Which means eventually this will be a huge problem." And sure enough, the next part was like "those bullets will add up and slow down everything, so let's fix that." Which means I'm at least thinking about the right things sometimes! Yippie!

So as of right now: I have a moving ship, a bunch of aliens, the ability to shoot up to 3 bullets on screen, and I can close the game. The next part I think is making the aliens move and get blown up!

I did have a hard time doing the on-your-own problem though. It wanted me to create a bunch of stars, like I did the aliens, which worked fine AT FIRST. But then it wanted me to randomly space them, so it looked more like a real night sky.

The problem? If a star spawned outside the borders of the game, my whole thing FROZE. It became completely unresponsive. I also couldn't figure out how to get it to choose a random number for EACH star. It basically chose a random number when loaded and stuck to it.

I ended up looking up the code for how they did it, but i still didn't really understand it. Oh well. I'll go back to it some other time.

I also tried to do an easy Leetcode problem, the famous "two sum" interview question. Basically, it needs to pull numbers from a list to add up to the target sum, then print out their location within the list. so if its two numbers that equal 9, and they are in the list spots 0 and 4, it'll print [0, 4].

I know WHAT it wants me to do, and I know WHAT i want IT to do, but not HOW to do it. Which...made me really frustrated. I think its just cause I don't know how to use sorting algorithms, or any of the search ones. Which is a whole nother beast to manage. I'm honestly not sure how to even APPROACH that. Or where to study it. So I'm putting a pin in it for now.

I think I might learn some of it when I do some of the other projects, but I guess we'll find out. If anyone has any advice to learn that stuff please feel free to send it my way.

I think the other thing is it's gonna start making me think in math terms I don't know or understand. Like I was watching a show about programming and they were talking about uh.. Lambda math or something? and I was like "nope I have no idea what you are referring to." I'm under the impression I might be OKAY without knowing a ton of math, but uhhhh. We'll see I guess?

Anyway, I'll keep you posted. The most important part is ya gurl isn't giving up. We gonna do it to win it!!!

-Kit

[tsaritza-mika]

Sharing a peek at my current WIP that I started writing in an effort to distract myself from the actual horrors of real life

Not sure if I should post the full thing, but let me know if there's interest

It was a difficult question to answer. How does one go about feeding so many spawn without giving themselves away, and drawing the wrong attention? Unfortunately it wasn’t a question they were going to be able to answer in a single night either. Feeling a familiar set of hands settling on his shoulders and giving them a firm rub, he relaxed slightly, glad that she was there with him to keep him grounded when he needed it. “Alright... While it’s far from ideal, I suppose for now we have no choice but to continue as you have been. Though keep your feedings to simply wild creatures. Hook horrors and the like, for example. Do your very best to avoid attacking other inhabitants of the Underdark for now.”

“So no Duergar then? Gnomes? Drow?”

“None. No Drow, no deep gnomes, no duergar, and no other inhabitants of similar intelligence and organization. And, as I said, that’s strictly ‘for now’. Taking on a project like ours may necessitate an alliance of convenience or two, so the last thing we should be doing is making enemies while we’re still this vulnerable. Now if you’re attacked... Well, we can hardly be blamed for defending ourselves, and if we get the benefit of a meal in the process...” 

The six of them looked at each other, likely searching for any objections to the idea. Frankly Astarion was surprised there didn’t seem to be even a little push back on the idea. Though considering the putrid swill Cazador had force fed them, healthy animals and creatures were still a marked improvement. “With that settled, we have two immediate objectives: First, we’ll need to start creating something of a census. A way for us to keep track of the other spawn, and since we’ll be needing to make use of such things in the very near future, we’ll need to have a working list of all of their former professions. The second is far more simple, yet just as important. I want to address them, and tell them all of this. We need to drive home the fact that we are free spawn. They have the right to leave if they wish, but they need to know that ultimately if they stay, they will be a part of something.”

“Wait, you want to let them leave? Just like that?”

“Of course not! But remember what it felt like when we knew we didn’t have a choice in the matter. If you take away the choice, then that’s all you want. What we’re offering, is safety in numbers, and a chance to simply live among others who understand their condition. It won’t be perfect, but when put up against being held in a cage and neglected for decades, roughing it for a while as we build a place of our own sounds akin to fucking paradise!” Giving his shoulders one last gentle squeeze, Mika backed away as he stood once more. Gods she was so proud of him just then. He’d come so far, made so much progress toward actually claiming his own life and body, his own future for the first time in two centuries. Of course, there was still a way to go, but she was more than confident that he could make it. Watching as they began to make their way back outside, Mika followed closely behind Astarion, ready to act however he needed as he stood to take the reins and lead.

[hayleythesugarbowl]

It’s Nice To Have a Friend || Thomas Barrow & reader • Part 2

⋆𐙚₊˚⊹♡ Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 ⋆𐙚₊˚⊹♡

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚ masterlist • thomas barrow masterlist ⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚

summary: you’ve now been working at downton for a week and, your friendship with Thomas growing (if somewhat confusingly), something happens that could jeopardize your job

word count: 1.6k

warnings: none

a/n: hope you guys enjoy part 2!! i love writing for Thomas so much 🩰🪐

<— previous part • next part —>

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~°~❦~°~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hours passed.  Meals were served. Days went by. And before you knew it you’d already been working at Downton for nearly two weeks. You’d adjusted well, you thought, and everything had passed very smoothly with help from Anna and Mrs. Hughes…and Thomas Barrow.

     Surprisingly, he’d been a huge help to you. He knew the house inside and out and it payed off. Despite his saying you weren’t friends, he always found a way to guide you in the right direction or give you useful information. You supposed he was trying to prepare for running this house someday. 

     He could pretend he had no desires, but you knew he wanted to be butler.

     He still remained mostly a mystery to you, however. A you sat across the table from him now and sipped your tea, you couldn’t help but feel like no one really knew the real Thomas. And you’d not even been here a fortnight.

     Daisy came to the table to serve everyone their dinner and you were brought out of your thoughts. 

     “(Y/n)? You look as if you’re still never awoken since breakfast!” Anna smiled at you.

     “Lost in thought, that’s all,” you said.

     “How’s your mother holding up?” Anna asked you from across the table. 

     “She’s getting by, I believe,” you answered. You’d written to her once to tell her about your getting settled and in the letter you’d inquired about the farm. She’d sounded optimistic but you could sense the worry in her words and it just made you even more determined to make things work for her. 

     “I envy her,” O’Brien said, “at least she’s not slaving away her days for nothing in return.”

     “O’Brien,” Anna warned.

      “If you expect sympathy, you’re not going to get it from me,” she said, “that’s all. If you expect me to pity a woman who’s—”

     “You must forgive O’Brien,” Thomas looked at you, “She doesn’t know what it’s like to have a mother, being the spawn of Satan and all.”

     Thomas raised an eyebrow at you and then got up, putting out his cigarette on the table and leaving the room.

     O’Brien got out of her seat as well, and, walking in the opposite direction as Thomas, went presumably to feel indignant outside, you figured. 

     “I don’t know how you do it,” Daisy said from beside you. “Thomas’s never stuck up for any one of us like that.”

     “He’s not unpleasant,” you said, blushing despite yourself. 

     “Maybe not to you,” Anna and Daisy shared a look.

     “Well, I think he’s rather welcoming.”

     “Careful, or he’ll make you his friend,” Anna joked, her voice filled with mirth.

     “You won’t have to worry about that,” you said, thinking back, “he’s told me he doesn’t have friends.”

     It seemed as if your dinner had barely been finished with before everyone was preparing for the family’s supper. 

     Everything was especially hectic today due to the guests attending. Mr. Carson had giving his speech earlier on about it and everyone was in a hurry.

     “Lord and Lady Hardcastle are visiting from London this week and it is of utmost importance that you are all on your best behavior as we must leave a good impression,” he’d said. 

     “I don’t see why we have to work ourselves into a state because someone’s grandparents decide to take a trip to the country,” had been Thomas’s reply. 

     You knew he was just grumbling because he had to act as first footman while you were short staffed—which “was insulting to a respected valet like himself”—but secretly you agreed with him. You wanted to make a good impression and you hoped everything went according to plan but you couldn’t help but internally wish it all would be over as you took part in all of it. 

     Once the main course was sent up, everything calmed down a bit. You sat down for a minute to rest your weary feet.

     After what seemed like seconds, desert had been sent up and as you went to stand you noticed a bowl of some sauce or another that you were sure shouldn’t have been left downstairs.

     “Daisy? Is this supposed to go up?” You asked her.

     She stopped her cleaning and looked up at you. Her eye catching in the dish, she made a face of pure horror. “Oh, Lord, yes it is! Oh I’m done for! I was supposed to tell William it was to go on the raspberry pudding!”

     “Not to worry,” you told her, “I’ll take it up.”

     “Have you lost your mind? What if someone sees you?”

     “They won’t. I’ll hand it off to one of the footmen or Thomas on the stairs.”

      It being settled with some trepidation on Daisy’s part, you rushed up the servants stairs and caught Thomas coming back down. 

     “Oh thank goodness, here this goes up now, it’s for the pudding.” You handed him the bowl of sauce in your hands and he took it into the dining room. Thomas headed back downstairs but you didn’t move.

     Now that you were there, you couldn’t help but peek around the corner. It was magnificent! The shimmering chandeliers and exquisite artistry—you’d never been in such a beautiful house. You took another step forwards until you were perched on the top step.

     You noticed William coming up behind you too late. You spun around, hearing footsteps and slammed into him, knocking the dish he was carrying out of his hands and flying into the dining room along with you. You stumbled backwards, your foot accidentally catching on the table leg holding the platters and dishes which Mr. Carson stood next to on the other end. You scrambled to get up, very aware you were not supposed to be seen in the dining room, but in your haste you tripped over the now broken china on the ground and fell forwards, grabbing at the table and brought down more than a few serving dishes with you. 

     Silence. You wished you could sink into the floor and disappear forever. The Crawley family and their guests sat in shock. Mr. Carson hurried over.

     You started, “I—I’m sorry—”

     Mr. Carson interrupted you, breathless. “I am so sorry, My Lord. We will deal with this immediately.” 

     “Don’t bother Carson, we were just heading over,” he stood up and the rest of the party followed suit, heading towards the drawing room.

     “Once again, I apologize for the behavior of the staff, it will not happen again.” The Butler reiterated.

     “Don’t lose sleep over it Carson, i know it wasn’t your fault—and if we’re being completely transparent, an interruption was rather welcome to shorten this dull evening,” he smiled, but in more seriousness said, “I do hope, however, that tomorrow’s dinner won’t be so eventful.”

     “Of course not, M’Lord.”

     Lord Grantham left with the rest of his family and soon the dining room was empty except for you, William, who was trying in vain to clean up the mess, and Mr. Carson. 

     “William, fetch the other footmen. (Y/n), we will talk later.” Mr. Carson rushed in the other direction and you tried to brush yourself off, utterly miserable.

     “Well, everyone who’s called me a clumsy fool would love to see this,” William said nervously. 

     “Indeed we would,” Thomas appeared at the top of the stairs

     “Nonsense,” you protested, “I’m the one to blame. I shouldn’t have even been upstairs.”

     Thomas’s eyes widened at the sight of the dining room, “No, you shouldn’t have, now go and get yourself cleaned up. I’ll take care of this.”

     William went downstairs to acquire help and you hesitated.

     “I—” You meant to thank him and insist you must help but the words caught in your throat. All of the stress of the past week and the mortification of this evening piled on top of each other and all that came out of your mouth was a sob. You sunk down against the wall, cradling your arms against your chest.

     A look of concern passed over Thomas’s face and he stepped towards you, kneeling down. 

     “Come now, it’s all right. No one’s died,” he placed his gloved hand on your shoulder gently.

     You put your face in your hands, the tears coming harder.

     Thomas seemed at a loss. After a few “there there”s in vain, he stayed silent for a moment. 

     You knew you should get out of the dining room and go downstairs—to pack your things, if nothing else. There was no way you’d be able to keep your job after this, you thought miserably. You wrapped your arms around your knees. You tried to make yourself get up. You were being a foolish schoolgirl, you told yourself, no use shedding tears over the inevitable. 

     “My dream is to find someone that loves me,” Thomas said, interrupting the silence, “—you asked me before. I want to care for someone and be cared for in return. Everyone thinks I’ve got it out for Mr. Carson’s job, and I might, but I wouldn’t be opposed to settling down neither.”

     You lifted your head, staring up at Thomas. You couldn’t believe he’d just told you that. Seeing you lift your head, he began to stand up again. 

     “Now, that’s enough of that,” he offered you his hand and you stood up too, dusting yourself off and wiping tears from your face. “Now go down and have a rest while I handle this.”

     “I can’t let you do all of this yourself—” You protested.

      “I said let me deal with it, alright? You’re in no state to be handling china anyway,” he smiled at you and you found yourself smiling back as you headed towards the stairs.

      “Thomas?”

      He turned to you. 

      “Thank you,” you said, “for everything.”

      “Don’t mention it, (Y/n).”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~°~❦~°~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

<— previous part • next part —>

ˋ°•*⁀➷ part 3 out now!! hope you enjoyed <3💌🍒

[bitegore]

@cleverthylacine re: this post and particularly the bit about reparative readings

(I think we're getting off topic and wanted to avoid clogging OP's feed lol)

I think there's a tendency toward what I can really only describe as call-to-action-to-Fix-Fandom attitudes when it comes to discussing any kind of -isms in fandom when, like. in my view it doesn't actually do anyone any good. Fandom is very big and people are small and largely the biases in society will be reflected in fandom no matter what we as individuals are up to, especially if we're up in arms because of A Post (fleeting, unserious motivation). I prefer to look at common forms of fannish misogyny where it crops up in my own behavior as an indicator of actual attitudes rather than some sort of checklist of Things To Fix In My Fannish Output. I care way, way more about treating the actual women in my life with respect and care than I do about the female fictional characters I think are fun to write about, you know?

So I like really don't trouble myself over whether or not I'm trying half as hard to read into female fictional characters as their make counterparts, I'm with you on that. Fandom is full of people who are enjoying their fictional women because they like them and not out of some misplaced sense of obligation. When I start doing fic and art with female characters it's because I like the characters, not because I'm compensating. But I like having discrepancies pointed out because it helps me set my barometer for what I might be fucking up with my actual friends and acquaintances in real life, which I think is a lot more important and generally relevant to my life anyway.

This is a lot of words to say 'i'm with you' - not only do i think no one should be obligated to do reparative readings on female characters just because it 'evens it out' or w/e, but honestly I think it's an active distraction from the part of the problem worth caring about, which is that it shows a bias in thinking.

I don't really know. As much as I enjoy fandom and it's a big part of my life, I'm pretty intimately aware it's not that important on the grand scale of things. And as much as I enjoy fiction, i'm of the impression that it reveals more about us than we think it does, so even if you do everything on the list to Eradicate All Traces Of Misogyny, the misogyny will keep sneaking back in until you just... are not writing women with misogyny in your heart and mind. It's a barometer for personal improvement more than anything else, the way I look at things. And certainly in concept but I'd like to also hope in reality, I like having the knowledge toward where I can try to be better instead of flying blind. If I stop being misogynistic, then my fic will be less misogynistic too, but like, I have so many better reasons to not want to be misogynistic!

I also think pressuring people to change the things they have fun with for the sake of Not Being a Bigot (prescriptive, & according to my handy-dandy list which I will hand down from on high...) tends to piss me specifically off, and I like to live by a standard of "not enough significant statistical variance from the mean exists in me to consider this a wholly unique behavior or attitude" so I would also assume that other people feel much the same way. So i also don't like to treat any "xyz is misogynistic" as a hard fast rule anyway, because then I'll get mad and start doing it out of spite while also aiming to make it not misogynistic somehow, which might spawn ideas but doesn't really do me or anyone else any good anyway. (That's definitely not a universal issue and i wouldn't be shocked if there are people who badly want the list because it makes them feel more comfortable writing or something; good for them, we're in totally different categories vis a vis fannish bigotry and how we can work on not doing it and the approaches we take will have to reflect that.)

I had one other thing but I think I forgot it. Uhhh something something it's harder to do reparative readings to compensate for misogynistic writing than it is to do it for flat writing with male characters because a lot of the time it either requires you to work with stereotypes you don't like or to outright dismiss elements of characterization and many of us don't want to do either, when background whiteguys tend to just have a handful of extremely neutral traits and nothing else; this is also part of why it can be hard to do the same for characters of color or characters that are clearly meant to be homophobic stereotypes or whatever, I won't fault anyone for not wanting to put their hands in that. nWFC Elita is a pretty good example of that, honestly - I don't remember a lot about the show because I didn't like it and i watched it one time several years ago lol, but I remember walking away with the impression we were supposed to think of her as Optimus's nagging wife, and annoying and overly negative, even though she was right on all counts every fucking time. I'm not writing nWFC-continuity fic because i have absolutely no interest in doing so, and I don't particularly want to carry that characterization over to any other continuity because - why would I? I like Elita-1 better in basically everything else, and she is broadly always Pretty Damn Competent (at least in theory). But in nWFC i can square the circle by comparing her cynicism to, like, Ratchet, who is equally convinced Optimus is making all the wrong moves. Suddenly she doesn't have to be the annoying nag, she's the last lone voice of real legitimate pushback in Autobot HQ, which has been bleeding dissenters as they're ignored, or whatever. And honestly I do like that. But contrast it with, uhhhh... trying to pick a random character here idk it's cheating if i pick bayverse characters... idk let me pick on IDW. If you want to work with the female character from All Hail Megatron, whose name I can't remember but who I genuinely liked, you have to deal with the fact that she falls head over heels for Spike fucking Witwicky right after meeting him and that her job is largely to deliver motivational speeches to the more important male background characters whose names I also can't remember. You absolutely can read depth into her, and I do because I think it's interesting that there's a character who lives through a horrifically traumatic upending of her life and then realizes that the only way everyone will survive is to stick together and immediately makes it her job to make sure they do, but, like, "woman exists as footstool for man's power & place in the plot" is one of the oldest misogynistic tropes in the book. I wouldn't blame literally anyone for not wanting to work around that, and it's... literally her entire role in the plot, so it's also really fucking hard to try and read out or compensate for. I genuinely do not think she even speaks to another woman in the entire comic. I think my point got muddied in the miles of examples; my thinking is that at the end of the day no one is getting paid for this and I don't think it's really an even playing field between male and female characters to reparatively-read-into anyway.

Last final thing is that the tropes that interest me in a character don't often tend to be done in female characters or when they're approached they take on distinctly misogynistic overtones. i really like characters who talk a big game, brag often, are deeply vain, and are not actually half as good as they claim they are... "woman thinks she has skills and is really good at things, but is Put In Her Place by a Man" is also one of my least favorite tropes ever. It's hard to work around that. There's just not much you can do when an entire concept has been all but poisoned for you.

inb4 "he said its ok to be a misogynist!" he said its important to focus on real life & fixing your heart first instead of hoping other people will tell you what not to write to look like you're not a misogynist ^-^

[ohnostalgia]

One of my favorite letters ever sent in to a comic book's lettercol, originally from Savage Dragon #9.

Hey Erik,

This letter will probably never see print. Why is that? Well, I'll tell you why. It is 11 o'clock on a Friday night here in Richmond Hill, and we know. We know! We have finally discovered a few secrets that have only been hinted at in recent years. These secrets were not uncovered in Egyptian ruins or dug up in an archaeological dig. These secrets were found in the pages of your comic book (and the books of the other Image creators, so called writers and artists). The big secret is, IMAGE COMICS SUCK!!!! I think that you guys should change the name of your company from Image to Scamage, because you are not running a comic company, you are running a huge SCAM. Your comics are so stupid and childish that you make Marvel look good. Ok, ok, ok, there are some good aspects to your comics, namely the pretty glossy paper and the awesome coloring. I think that you guys should give a lot more credit to Olyoptics and all your other colorists because without them you guys would be nothing. Oh yeah, if you guys hate Marvel so much, then why do all of your f***in' characters look like Marvel characters with different color costumes?

Ok, I have some questions:

Does everyone in the damn Image universe have to have huge muscles?

There are too many Rob L. biters in Image. Why would anyone want to draw like him?

Is Jim Lee obsessed with t**s? It sure shows in his work.

Does anyone at Image know what a gun looks like?

If Dart (one of the stupidest characters that you created) is so good with darts, why wouldn't she use a gun (recent studies show that a bullet hurts more than a dart).

Does Rob L. thinks that he is a good writer or something?

Why do you have all of those worthless, f***ed up, poorly drawn, poorly written back-up stories?

Why did you try to rip off little kids by putting important parts of the SD story in your TPB?

Why are all of the characters in Image either frowning or screaming?

Do you think that you are tricking people with those stupid foil covers (nothing can save these comics, especially not foil)?

re: TSD #3, quoting Mighty Man, “I’m not that kind of guy.” : what kind of guy is he? A faggot?

Why does Hero and Wizard kiss your asses so much?

Ok, now I have some proposals for Image creators:

Tell Jim Lee and the rest of your s***ty staff that spandex does not stick to muscle formations.

Buy a book on guns, and stop drawing those silly toys.

Learn how to fight before you draw fight scenes in your comics books.

Tell newcomers that they should not try to draw like Rob. L or JIm Lee, because they both suck.

Get some real writers; you guys have no idea how to tell a story.

Stop drawing women in impossible positions just so you can play out your fantasies on paper.

(reg. WildC.A.T.s #6) Tell Jim Lee that his plane crash scene was the most f***ed up thing he has ever created (you know it was stupid), also tell him that his art sucks and that he is a f***in’ thief.

Tell Jim Lee that it would be impossible for Grifter and Zealot to survive when their plane was blown up, jump out, land on another plane, have a conversation, smoke a cigarette, go into the plane, kill all of the crewmen, and land the plane faster than it would take Maul to fall from the height.

Tell Jim Lee to wake up and realize that he sucks at writing, and he needs art lessons because all of the characters look the same.

Tell Rob L. that in order to write a story, words must be used (check out his insert in Hero Feb. edition).

Tell Rob L. that all of his f***in’ characters look like Cable. 

This letter was written to all you losers at Scamage (excluding Pitt and Spawn people) in mind. The reason I wrote this letter to you is because I enjoyed the mini-series, but you regular series sucks just like the rest of Scamage’s comics. Also because you don’t print kiss-ass letters (like Jim Lee)

T-Red & Sir Fabio Death

Toronto, ON, Canada

PS: Erik, your comic started off good but now it sucks. Until you get your s*** together I refuse to buy it.

PPS: MOST of the guys at Scamage are too friggin’ cocky (Jim Lee).

PPPS: Fire Jim Lee and all of his stupid staff.

I supposed we’re all entitled to write one pissy anonymous letter. For a couple of guys who can’t stand us, you sure do read a lot of our comics. Thanks for your continued support!

[basedkikuenjoyer]

A Tale of Two Hannya: Flowers Without Names

Last time we dabbled in this area we made it clear we were just scratching the surface. I have a lot I want to say about how Kiku & Yamato play off of each other and how it plays into manga’s long history of playing with gender. We’ve already brought up the classic series on the right, Revolutionary Girl Utena, and how Yamato sorta falls into some of the same pitfalls of the iconic princely lady. But I don’t think this discussion is complete without acknowledging another very important landmark shoujo that still casts a long shadow today. The Rose of Versailles, an iconic 70s series starring the dashing Lady Oscar. Raised as a man to inherit her father’s spot in the royal guard and her “Anthy,” fitting for a story told with the backdrop of the French Revolution, is none other than Marie Antoinette.

So here’s our thesis. Famously the intent of Rose wasn’t initially Oscar. Antoinette was supposed to be the protagonist but was upstaged by such a novel heroine for the time. Utena was the deconstruction of what spawned in her wake. Wano’s Hannya duo? A wickedly smart evolution that’s actually quite responsive to contemporary social changes.

Oscar really does seem like she ended up being this accidental icon, but for all the glory and passion her story is so often wound up in how she can never really escape being sucked in to “women’s games.” It’s a solid recipe; she’s remarkable as a guard & soldier but situations force her to deal with things as a woman. Contrast between battle and courtroom intrigue. It’s a very old school type of feminist work. Similar tone if a different structure than Kozue in the slightly earlier Attack No.1 and a lot of our Pinkie Violence heroines. Deep down there’s always that “A woman is still a woman” element. That’s fallen out of fashion as more feminist depictions have become normal, but there’s a certain power in that internal dynamic. 

The appeal was just seeing a female lead doing cool shit. And this parallels a lot of world media from the 60s/70s. Still pretty old fashioned gender expectations but seeing women buck them at all was fresh. Thing is...give it twenty years and new issues crop up. By the 90s we have a generation that grew up on things like Rose of Versailles and analogues to the point this action girl tomboy is just a trope. A trope bordering on cliche. A trope that allowed how we write most women to stagnate. Love interests, mothers, etc. didn’t have to get with the times. Just toss in a girl that does cool guy things and you’re golden! Most copycats lacked the balance that made Rose so iconic.  Enter Utena, so far ahead of the curve. I’ve heard her described as revolutionary even.

The titular Utena is a fairy tale character in the real world. She is a perfect lil Mary Sue, but the more the story matures the more it becomes obvious a fairy tale character lacks the sense to pick up on real issues. That’s Utena’s magic; juxtaposing the uber cool main character with the actual scary forces in the world. Leading to an ending that lets seemingly useless, docile Anthy drive the point home. A character like Utena can inspire strength...but most girls are going to have to learn other tactics. “Utena” is the Japanese word for Calyx, the outer part of a flower bud that protects it. Smash the world’s shell...

Revolutionary for the time, ahead of the curve in so many ways. But its 30 years old now. We’re at a point it isn’t rare to see casual critique of leaning on the action girl tomboy as a crutch. Nothing new under the Sun, we’ve been here before. It’ll swing that way until a new generation thinks Peppermint Patty is subversive again. And that’s the landscape One Piece got to have fun with.

Which brings us to our pair of breakout new faces in Wano. One of the biggest changes to stories that play with gender roles in this day and age is the reality we pay more attention to why some people organically feel that way. Yamato’s still playing this trope straight. Very straight actually. Background is totally on par with Oscar and the way you go about it feels very similar...for the most part. Could say the same about Utena, Yams is someone who kept that spark of nobility equivalent well into adulthood. There is definitely not a “woman is still a woman” angle with Yamato. The bath scene is a great example. No, you just don’t have that modesty. 

Kiku has that element though, in spades. Her story runs on it. What was old fashioned becomes forward thinking now by combining two tropes. Let the girly trans woman have that old theme if it isn’t as relevant anymore for most women. Same logic I’d use to say she makes a great quartermaster template. It’d be an eyeroll to make most female crewmates the one swabbing the deck or doing laundry in establishing shots...not so much if it’s Kiku. Which gives a cool edge, what’s stifling for some is liberating for others. 

That said...looking at the two together I can’t unsee the gentle repudiation of the very extreme end “all that matters at all is what you say your are” mindset. We’re not getting into discourse here, I’m just identifying trends that exist regardless of how you may feel about them. One Piece is far, far, far from the only reflection the pendulum is swinging the other way even within the community. Yamato’s treated more on the same tier as like, Bon & Iva. He does feel a little more like a caricature at points. And I do think part of the way they’re used together is making a statement about their relative journeys. How certain aspects can feel like Yamato gets the best of both worlds and Kiku the worst. Yamato doesn’t have to care because at worst you’ll think he’s silly instead of creepy and for meeting that impossible bar of being the perfect lady as good as anyone in Wano...Kiku’s “prize” is having to juggle two sets of lofty expectations.  

I feel like Oda really knew what he was doing here. Knew teenage battle shonen fans would bend over backwards to make excuses for Yamato and aggressively ignore Kiku. If OP Academy’s pulling the same trick this was clearly the intent. Both play with the expectations of that generic Strong Female Character archetype One Piece has generally avoided. Oda’s great at writing women but seems to feel that action girl tomboy is a crutch too. We’ll probably revisit this one down the line. It’s a deep well and one that’s delicate to talk about. But I wanted to end this tour of my drafts page for the last year with a bang.

[shadowshrike]

Early morning thoughts because I can't sleep (apologies if they're a mess):

Setting aside the obvious boost that comes from being a classically attractive wicked vampire elf with a beautiful voice, tragic backstory that is executed in a very real way, and entertaining manner of speech, I believe one of the reasons Astarion's stories get such a strong reaction from so many people is because his narrative has several distinct threads beyond the obvious. Each possible path presents different problems and perks with satisfying but contradictory conclusions - a brilliant trick of CYOA writing - and that dissonance is part of what causes so much fandom fighting. We each value different things based on our life experiences or just what we enjoy in a story. It inspires visceral reactions from the player.

Value honesty in your friends, your own safety, and consent above all else? He's probably not going to spend long in your camp without a stake in him.

Value bodily autonomy, absolute freedom of choice, and the ability to speak freely without fear of repercussion? Ascension might make the most sense for you.

Value the emotional healing process, the hope of becoming a better person, and learning to accept and move on from a crappy life rather than doing 'whatever it takes' to get what you deserve? Him staying a spawn is likely the most satisfying choice.

Of course, we all exist on a sliding scale of values, especially when playing with fiction. People who value honesty or consent highly may let him stick around because they hope he can learn to be better. Someone who values absolute bodily autonomy and confident speech may choose to have him remain a spawn because they believe with time and some DnD magic to cure vampirism, he can reclaim those things eventually a healthier way. People who believe in the emotional healing process and becoming a better person might even go for ascension because they believe his ability to walk in the sun and speak his mind bluntly are essential for him to heal rather than be dependent on others in the long run.

This sliding scale is also part of why people fight. Throwing him out or killing him for attacking or biting you is seen as an overreaction from someone who has a higher tolerance for boundary pushing. Ascending him is equated with irrevocably dooming him for those who want to change his view of the world (and himself) for the better and believe ascension will inevitably lead to abuse of his paramour and whatever spawn he creates. And keeping him as a spawn can feel to some like you're like taking away his freedom so completely by refusing what he wants and forcing him back into shadow that you've trapped him in a new, 'nicer' but similarly insidious cycle of abuse with a "savior" figure that he isn't emotionally mature enough to recognize as controlling his life.

It's all very relative, and that's what makes it fun. Players reacting to Astarion's approvals/disapprovals, following a romance vs non-romance narrative, knowledge of 5e lore, and having a strong versus weak relationship with him can all drastically change the experience of his story. And with open endings, it's easy to tidy up any values that might be important to us but underrepresented in Astarion's fate. I think that's actually a huge strength to his story: we don't know if he gets better or worse when he survives to the end and you make that Good or Evil choice. We can guess based on contextual clues, our biases, and in-game lore. But ultimately, you get to choose for yourself whatever future you like best, even if that's him leaving the party.

So for those who can stomach all the paths and enjoy a bit of literary exploration of competing narratives, I highly recommend you try all the different options for Astarion (and the other companions, but especially him) rather than sticking with one. You'll need unique playthroughs for context, but it's so worth it. The writing and acting have phenomenal breadth with tons of subtle shifts that can happen depending on what you choose.

Just please don't harass your fellow players or Larian employees about whatever preferences you have in the end, okay?

[paragonrobits]

my setting ideas, a few broad points

I generally take a sandbox approach to setting design and character writing; rather than a defined self-contained story, I instead take a few general approaches to settings based on what I want to do with it, and tailor it to the requirements of a specific premise, including the sort of tone I would like to use, expected power levels, and the feel that is intended to a hypothetical audience. As such, the setting is assumed to have a wide degree of variance, but there are a few consistent details.

The Setting takes place within a multiverse; a cosmology inspired by fantasy tabletop RPGs and video game settings such as Dungeons And Dragons (Arguably the biggest influence, largely in part because I honestly don’t really know where to start in not abiding by DND’s examples). Exalted, the World of Darkness setting (in terms of its more bizarre and high-concept notions) and Nobilis (ESPECIALLY the really weird approach taken to different cosmic beings being inhuman but not necessarily malicious and making heavy use of conceptual and indirect powers).

The setting can be applied in a rich variety of ways by tweaking the degree it is similar to real life, the strangeness of the default assumptions to the places mortals live, the average degree of power people have, and most especially the tone. As such, the general averages common in my ideas will be stated, though keep in mind this can be adjusted to specific situations, dramatic in-universe changes as people break rules and create a new normal, or just me going ‘fuck it, everyone has DBZ levels of absurd narrative warping magic’.

One key moment to consider is that the setting overall has two firm rules that, whatever other setting considerations are had, always apply unless specifically stated otherwise.

The first rule is this: “Magical powers are the product of the soul.” All magic happens through the power of at least one sapient soul actively making it happen. Beyond trappings of style and mechanism, no matter the form, ALL magic is the result of magical energies moved through certain currents and patterns to create a specific magical effect, and flows from living minds one way or another. They might not want to do so, or unaware that they’re doing it, but only souls can create this kind of effect. Even random magical effects that seem to spawn from the environment are still the result of this, as the magical energy of the multiverse that creates these effects is comprised of countless threads of ideas, emotions and concepts that spawn from mortal hearts and minds.

The second rule is this: “Complexity does not make life, it IS life.” Anything that is a sufficient degree of complex, enough that it is able to do things in unexpected ways, is considered alive. Spells can take on a quasi-life of their own and behave in unexpected ways, any machine that becomes complex enough can start being a little bit alive, and the more complex something gets, the more alive it is. Souls can germinate from this complexity with relative ease; the setting has many sapient robots, and the majority of them are not deliberately created but appear over time from seemingly normal machines until one day they find themselves thinking “What AM I?” The wise give them civil rights and names. The unwise try to enforce the idea that a machine is nothing but a tool, and they usually wind up wiped out in robot revolutions.

Everything else is up for context, reinterpretation or just going ‘you know what would be cool, PLANET MADE OF BEAVERS’ and boom, you just run with it being wacky.

A few other possible rules, though not as important as those first two, include the following.

“Superpowers and magic for everyone!” All beings have the capability to learn magic of any kind (though actually being able to internalize their principles or getting access to the education required is its own story), and all beings tend to naturally learn at least one or two basic abilities. These basic abilities are intuitive, innate and usually manifest as a straightforward power, physical trait or transformation ability that can be turned off and again. These are referred to as powers, or superpowers. Just about everyone has at least one, and they’re often personality-based, but can also just be a form of wish fulfillment. Powers can be modified through various methods (cybernetics, bioenhancement, weird potions), while magic must be learned. Magical energy applies to both, though.

“Magic is narratively a system, mechanically techniques.” The general approach for magic as its actually learned by characters is that they are assumed to be a bunch of random techniques characters can learn from various sources. In narrative, these are usually assumed to be complex systems of magical secrets, teachings and physical conditioning or modifications amassed over time, and tend to be thought of as specific magical disciplines and schools of thought; the teachings generally act by impressing channels of power into a soul, and the spells work by pushing magic through those channels. Characters can learn just about any technique and often have a grab bag of a bunch of low-effort tricks, but more powerful spells take way more time and energy, and conflicting powers can cause personality instability, mutations and odd problems with your powers.

“Loopholes and clever thinking is how you win fights.” Magic is INCREDIBLY common in the setting, underlying most of its technologies and basic powers, and it is technically possible to win fights through sheer brute power. However in practice, magic operates according to their own unique rules, and these powers are often worded in specific forms of word play that describe how they work. This is important because all magical abilities have limitations and loopholes in how they work, which can always be exploited by enemies which bypass their defenses and attacks; this is by FAR the single most important aspect of combat and overcoming obstacles! Creative power, outhinking enemies and strategy are very important, and its much more easy for a weak but clever person to exploit the flaws in a more powerful character to beat them, and punch out of their weight class. Anyone can theoretically defeat anyone else, no matter how powerful, provided they think cleverly. A lot of magic combat focuses on misdirecting others about your weaknesses while trying to figure their own out.

“Rule of Cool first, efficiency last.” The setting runs on the rule of cool, and that’s not a metaphor or a comment about prioritizing fun and cool fight scenes over anything else. This is an actual rule of magic within the setting; things that are cool, run on creative interpretation and are employed during appropriately dramatic moments are inherently more likely to succeed. Efficiency, however, is less easy to do consistently and magic rebels against attempts to use it in simple and practical ways consistently in short amounts of time; boring and practical means might be reasonable, but magic finds it boring. As such, “why didn’t X just do this thing” is something magic fights against, and attempts to trivialize obstacles or conflicts through an exploit is instead likely to have your magic rebel and transform you or inhibit you in some way. The power of creativity, magic and whimsy hates the concept of Cinema Sins-type nitpicking.

“Magic lives and grows.” Similar to that earlier point about complexity = life, magic is inherently alive in some ways. All magical energy, whether derived internally or from the outside world (with many different disciplines to do it, ranging from communing with spirits, channeling ambient power, or doing creative stuff until you build up the power to blow stuff up with your thoughts), is made up of soul-energy that naturally arises from other forces. This magical energy is further made up of threads of magical power that relate to thoughts, feelings and conceptual themes that everyone has ever had. Those threads become patterns, and dictate the manifestations of power. This means that magic is always a bit weird and causes wild effects all the time! Spells usually have strange side effects and its always appropriate to have a random effect just for fun, but magic causes similar things even in other forms, and magical items (a very common thing in the setting, ranging from items that replicate a spell, mad science gadgets, or powerful artifacts) have a kind of life in their own right, and will naturally grow and change over time. They’re not EXACTLY alive in the same way a creature is alive, but they develop their own quirks, manifest strange traits and their power will shift over time depending on their history and actions.

This does mean that signature magical items and artifacts grow and change with their user, and do not usually remain static. This also means that even very powerful items, if not used for a long time, remain dormant and need a while to fully ‘wake up’, and often change how they operate based on their user and their general vibe.

[sailorsplatoon]

Chapter 2 of a Dedf1sh fanfic I wrote

So I sort of disappeared for a little bit. I thought I would come back by posting the second chapter of that Dedf1sh fic I posted a while ago (which I still don't have a name for, so if you have any suggestions, I'd love to hear them!) Also I tried my best to write Iso Padre in this chapter, but I'm not sure if I captured his manner of speaking properly, so if something seems incorrect I am entirely open to constructive criticism.

Previous

Next

Read it on ao3

Chapter 2 below!

(TW: Mention of blood)

(Side note: If there's ever a TW or CW that I miss, please let me know! I will not hesitate to add anything that needs to be added!)

Ahato woke up with a pain along their entire right side. They’d fallen off the seat and landed on the train floor. They picked themselves up and slung the large duffel bag over their shoulder. They’d probably gotten enough sleep. Looking around the train car, they noticed someone new was sitting in the room with them. A large grey scaly iso pod sat at near the door next to a suitcase full of… plushies? He seemed to be preoccupied by his thoughts. 

“Excuse me?” Ahato asked, hoping to get his attention.

“Oh, hello young squire. I had noticed you were asleep on the floor and thought I would keep you company. Might I ask if you’re alright? I heard you fall but you didn’t wake up.”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just really tired I guess. Thanks for asking. Who are you?”

“I have no memory of my name. I have spent so long here that I have forgotten.”

“Oh…” Ahato felt a sudden sting in their chest. What would they have to go through to forget their own name? A name is so special and important. “I’m so sorry.”

“It is quite alright. I may have forgotten much of my life, but I can still enjoy the little memory I have left.” Ahato stood there in silence for a moment. This man seemed to kind. They couldn’t tell exactly why, but they knew instantly that they could trust him. He’d been through so much. They were similar in that way. Two souls searching for what they lost so long ago.

“My name is Ahato,” they said, “I want to help you. What can I do?”

“Well, it’s not much, but I greatly enjoy when the test subjects here share their mem cakes with me. They’re the slices of memory that you earn from completing tests. They are my only link left to what it feels like to have my own memories.”

“I haven’t completed any tests yet… but I will share all my mem cakes with you once I do!”

“Thank you, Ahato. Good luck. And please, don’t push yourself too hard for me.”

***

Ahato stood at the entrance of the station. Everything was eerily quiet. C.Q. Cumber walked them through how to select their weapon and how CQ points worked before they entered the test. 

At first it looked like a forest, but none of the trees seemed quite real. It was so quiet. The silence was so distracting, Ahato felt like every slight sound was amplified. If only there were some music or something to fill in the space. An octoling spawned on top of a large pillar and started to attack Ahato. Why were they attacking? And was their skin… green? Something was definitely off. Not to mention how much stronger this octoling seemed compared to most octoling soldiers they’d- Splat! Ahato respawned at the start of the forest. They were never a part of the fighting division in the octarian army, their specialty was in the medical unit. How were they supposed to fight when normally they did the exact opposite!? Ahato wanted to give up right there. They knew something was wrong with this place and these weird green octolings were definitely a part of it. How were they supposed to fight them? Then they remembered the kind isopod back on the train. They wanted to help him, and the only way to do that was to pass this test. They took a deep breath and trudged into the forest.

***

Ahato boarded the train, mem cake in hand, bleeding. After a while they gave up trying to fight and just tried to disarm the octolings. Turns out they were good fighters even without their weapons. But Ahato managed to do it.

“Oh Ahato! You’re hurt!” The isopod stood up, worried for the octoling’s wellbeing. 

“I’m okay, really. I’ve had way worse,” Ahato sighed from exhaustion as they brandished the thin spongey mem cake they had earned. They didn’t look at it. Why, out of all of their memories, did it have to be that one? The isopod took the mem cake, seeing how obvious it was Ahato did not want to hold it anymore. The moment he took it he understood.

For my f1ngers, your blood a sheet.

1 stress to keep your heart a-beat.

But soon 1 must adm1t defeat.

“Ahato… are you alright?” The isopod asked.

“Yeah, I already told you. I’m totally fine, I just need to bandage up these cuts,” Ahato had already pulled a roll of gauze out of their bag and was wrapping it around their wounds.

“I don’t mean physically.” 

They paused. That mem cake had revealed more than they wanted it to. “Don’t worry, really I’m okay.”

“If you need to talk, I'd love to listen.”

Ahato thought for a moment. When was the last time they talked to someone about anything past their work for that day? “That was when I learned that just because being a medic didn’t require me to be on the battlefield, doesn’t mean I would see any less death.”

“Was this your first time losing a patient?”

“Yes. They’d been shot by a charger from close range. Typically that would just splat you and then you’d respawn, but this one had been rigged so that it shot out projectiles rather than ink. It was designed after some ancient invention used for hunting I guess? It tore directly through one of their hearts, causing them to lose immense amounts of blood. I’d never dealt with damage from a weapon like that before, so I didn’t know what I could do. I watched them die. I still have nightmares about it.”

“I am so sorry that you had to go through that, Ahato. Saving people is never an easy job. I can tell you cared about it deeply.”

“I was never good enough to fight-” they paused to take an ibuprofen pill- “I couldn’t build machines or train new soldiers. Heck, I couldn’t even manage the weapons supply. Everyone in the army thought I was useless. I thought I would end up being a grave digger. But then the medical unit announced that they were understaffed and I got stuck there. I ended up loving it. I could help people.”

“You are a good person, Ahato.” The two went silent. It wasn’t the awkward silence that Ahato was expecting when they opened up about their past. It was more like a silence of understanding. Like there was nothing more that needed to be said because they both knew what the other was going to say already. It was nice. Ahato started to cry. The isopod hugged her. They sat like that for a long time.

***

“Do you mind if I come up with a name for you?” Ahato asked the isopod. “I know it won’t be like your real one, but I want to have something that I can call you.”

“I would be very grateful if you did. What would you like to call me?”

“Iso Padre. Because you kinda remind me of my dad.”

“Thank you.”

[mapplesand]

Stuff that changed in Morbid Minds since 2023

okay since it's been two years since the idea popped in my head, i feel like it's only fair to see what was going on at the very beginning !

-the first characters to have spawned in were Marco, Tristan and Josh, that's it

-Marco and Tristan were always endgame BUT they weren't supposed to get together until much later in high school

-the second title idea was "Alone Together"

-this was the first design of the characters (Marco, Tristan and Josh)

-YEAH I know, Marco was skinnier, Tristan was blonde AND Josh actually looked like an eboy, how insane is that

-Tristan was always meant to have light brown hair but i couldnt find the right color in picrew and even with my colored pencil so lol

-Marco was also always chubby but couldnt translate that correctly in picrew, he was also only slightly chubby compared to how fat he really is now

-i still think Josh should dye his hair at some point in the story, just not in the parts I wrote for now

-the first thing I wrote back in 2023 were how Marco and Tristan started talking for real (completely different than how I wrote the scene, in the first version they met because they sat at the same cafeteria table)

-the second thing I wrote was Josh's birthday party that I still haven't wrote yet but was planned ever since february 2023 lol

-in this scene they drink a bit, end up in Josh's room while he's drunk because he wanted to show off his guns to them, Josh starts hitting on Tristan, Marco who had a gun in hand points it to his head and tells him off which makes Josh leave and after that Tristan is pretty disturbed by the whole pointing a gun to someone's head so Marco decides to joke around and they end up wrestling on the bed "if someone was to open the door right now it would look really weird"

-Marco became somehow more problematic in the current version of the story

-at first he was just an angry guy but when picking up the story in january 2024 I added his now pretty famous pervert persona and ironically it did made his whole character way funnier to write

-they did all became worse as the concept went on because at first I was scared to make actual main characters with toxic behaviors because i didnt want people to take it the wrong way and then i was like heh fuck it

-the current version doesn't shy away from a lot of stuff, when writing it I really wanted something without filter, something raw about teenagers and how bad they can get and basically everything they can do or say, i mean this is the point i will stand by forever, it's raw and shitty because that's how they should act

-Josh was supposed to be the antagonist, well in some way he could be since he's opposing Marco but like, actual antagonist

-in the first version he wasn't supposed to get a pov until later

-Tyler was created in august 2024 and appeared directly in the story (in chapter 16) even though he popped out of thin air and also became a major character just like that

-I created him because I wanted Josh to have someone to bounce him off during his pov that wasn't someone like his popular friends

-Tyler wasn't supposed to become a main character either but I felt like he had too much going on to be understood as a side character so i upgraded him

-and the most important thing that changed in two years is me because now i'm even more insane about them and it really feels like i saw myself growing but not necessarily in a writer way, just taking different approaches with character to understand them and understand myself more

[handelplayssims]

Cozy Celebrations Part 3

Bugs be damned! We WILL get this done!

Right, so in an entirely new save, I researched the holiday thing. I got real attached to my new guy Ernesto, an elderly comedian, when making him, so I’m going to place him in my main file. ‘sides! Would make sense for Ernesto to meet Kevin and pass along his documentation over.

Also since now I’ll be brought out into manage worlds, might as well edit ThrifTea to be the cheer spot. It’s a shame the auditorium doesn’t allow for club gatherings, since it would be perfect to make it a training spot. Alas!

...huh. I haven’t had romance or friendship changes on for non-played sims. Might need to test those settings out in a different file at some point. Maybe Ernesto’s!

Back to the main file after some tinkering. Right, the research thing didn’t really feel too important, well, relatively. I’m going to have Kevin research Simpedia and then do some writing to simulate the whole actual research and report thing. And now I guess it’s time for Winter Holiday tunes, since Kevin is researching this stuff. Annnnd quest completed and the entire slate of this round of Celebrations quests done. ...I sure do time my blog posts perfectly!

Man, I kinda hope we get a band pack at some point. I usually go off of what music to learn based off of the instruments playing and we got big brassy jazz playing for these winter tunes. Alas! Anyway, park yourself at the radio Kevin. You got music to listen to!

Anyway, now it’s Talk Like a Pirate Day. Kids, and therefore Jayden, love this holiday. ...I’m very much inclined to just have him head out to the park but let’s sort out needs. And Kevin listening to his full tune, thank you! ...aw dang. Jayden has less energy than I figured. Well, I guess it’s time to just chat with Hiroko here.

Janae also wants to make friends. For now, I’m just going to make another club with her co-workers, disband it and start a friendship with someone.

Right then! Jayden managed to make best friends forever with Hiroko! Yay! Now he needs to make friends with three other children, and two more adults. We got Miki and Hawea already in his acquaintances so we have our goal. For now, bed for him!

Let’s see, I am now left with Janae as the last person up and controllable since everyone else went to bed and Marcel is off to work. Let’s actually meet up with Siobhan Fyres somewhere, my designed co-worker friendship.

Coffee was fine but there are far too many people trying to talk together at once when I want a private 1v1! Annoying! Took a full resetdebug, since everyone was just standing still and doing nothing.

Romance Festival...romance festival only happens during prom! Oh snap it’s Saturday! Welp, we’ll see if we get back home in time for this. Otherwise...I’m just going to hangout elsewhere… Mm. The pop up happened after we were done making friends with Siobhan, so sure! Why not!

Anyway, Sidney was the only one invited so he’s the only one going. For the most part we are dancing the night away! Tried to get a photo both photo but someone else swooped in. Holy crap! Sidney won prom royalty! Fitting but this is my first time seeing this happen! Sweet! And thanks to dancing filling the goal list thing for prom rapidly as it kept spawning, he actually got a gold tiered event! Woo! Fantastic prom all around!

Most of the teens vanished for the after-prom once it was past midnight but not Kevin, who I brought along to tell the story of prom night, Ken, because of course, he was the one that we invited over, and Kaori, who joined the group? -shrug-

That being said, I don’t have too terribly much to do this late at night. Might as well have Ken and Sidney go on the haunted house ride and Kaori and Kevin try the ferris wheel. ...didn’t seem to work in Kevin’s case but hey, worked out for Sidney. Right, one uneventful haunted house ride done! Time to head home.

What does everyone what to do now? What they always want to do. Listen to their tunes! (Never set so much music up, it’ll clog whims so hard) Might as well enjoy said tunes! Before we end this with-

Neighborhood Watch!

Bjorn Bjergsen in the Bjergsen hosuehold left his job as an Agency Clerk in the Secret Agent career.

Copperdale: The Gilbert household recently moved out.

Farewell copper! Farewell and good riddance!

Loario Hoapili in the Hoapili household is now a Director of Academics in the Administrator career.

And with that, we are done with this set of goals for Cozy Celebration! Oh wait, one last thing to do before heading out is to place the Super Gaming Console!

Enough with the wreaths and the in-wall tv, this was one of the things I was interested in. Would it have a different gaming selection than the console’s in City Living? Turns out, nope. But it is a different option I suppose. I’ll end this blog and open the next with Sidney and Savannah enjoying some games.