#i am player character dont have name beyond that yet

[abc04]

happy post but small so going here good things happening to us finally finally feel very relieved

[s0lar-ch3ri]

tell me all about dnd character(s) please i am begging

OMG OMG OMG OMG OKAY OKAY OKAY!!!!! HAGVJDFD GLADLY I WILL

I GOT A COUPLE SO LETS GET INTO THIS:

ohevet: first ever character! uses she/they i think (and if they didnt, they do now! update: JUST REMEMBERED, IT WAS HE/HIM FOR A CIS WOMAN! THROW OUT THE OTHER IDEA SORRY) and also my first aroace character. his name is a joke with that honestly, as ohevet is hebrew for love. i lost the stat sheet a bit back BUT im working on rewriting the stats so i can make an actual character of him! his backstory is kinda silly and i dont really remember it rn so ill also be redoing that shit for sure, but i do know one thing, he's cursed. with this marking on his face, hes able to get "Stackable Concussions" (which me and my dms came up with stat affection ideas but i do also wanna make my own for funzies, and i doubt either would mind if you also wanted to lol). by the end of the campaign, he had been like the only one to not try to seduce someone (my friend had gotten a nat 20 to seduce "mommy nature" so theres that) and had a stack of 10 concussions. how he was still standing is beyond me. did i fall for him? abso-fucking-lutely, i made him hot and wanted him carnially and yet hes aroace so what can my gay ass do? (fun fact: one of my dms is my now girlfriend!) btw before i forget, mountain dwarf fighter, and had a lizard he took off the floor rather then pay for a pet, one of the players had its brother/cousin.

ivy: meant to be an npc for my campaign (which btw ill gladly talk about BUT MY PLAYERS CANNOT SEE THIS LOL ARCADIAN AND GAYWITCHNERD SKIP TO THE SECOND PARAGRAPH ON IVY), but a played character in my friend's (arcadian) campaign (arcadian was the one to try and seduce "mommy nature" btw). speaking of npc, the played character and npc have different stories, so we going with npcs rn! ivy (she/they/star pronouns lol) was meant to be a royal guard who did training and learning in the forests, but im thinking of making her a shop owner (eh, probs for out of dnd oc shit). while in the forest, she sorta fell for a nymph there which looks a lot like one of my players characters (agreed romance thing lol). while in town, i plan for her to sorta like fall for said player after bumping into them and shit. that being said, love wont be her only motivation! i do have some plot ideas i need to think up, but im pretty ready to connect shit in. also shes gonna have a dog familiar (my dog) just to involve her somehow lol. oh yeah she slso has gay moms

NOW WE TALK HER AS A PLAYED CHARACTER! in arcadians campaign, shes a half-elf druid like before, but her lesbian parents arent really too existant. (hey gaywitchnerd, i dont mind you reading this, but your character wouldnt know this info) due to issues with her planet, ivy has had her set of challenges, and is looking for strength in knowledge (literally). back home, theres some fucking secret thing there for some deity. on this route, its a pursuit of learning what the deity is. (another idea i had was that the swamp she once lived in is commonly disregarded, and due to anxiety she worried about it being forgotten and shit happening to it so she went looking for power to protect it) there are religions based around it, but ivy isnt exactly religous but still learning as much as she can about it. (fun fact for this one, but its related to the oc: i was planning for her to have BPD, but i wasnt sure how to play one so as a non-dnd character im gonna find ways to incorperate it, also she likes one of the pcs and an npc, the pc is my gfs one but i doubt they realise it lol)

hunter: like all my characters, i go into it with a basis, something i build around for them (ivy is an acception, she was just gonna be an npc), and hunters no different. since the campaign features 3-4 tabaxis (cant remember for sure), an undead, and other various magical people, i wanted to be just a regular guy, which i am! human fighter guy and all that, pretty normal (most extraordinary thing is that hes a magician)...except humans arent fucking normal here because its a tabaxi village. i fucking love that i didnt know this btw! CAUSE I DID NOT, NOR DID MY FRIENDS REALIZE. the story with this guy that i got is he was a traveling performer, one who used this bow tie made special by his fiancé, which works like the bandana chip uses. this however, got taken while traveling, and hes not willing to preform at a show or anything until he gets it back. for the tabaxi village hes disguised as a cat and his whip is his cat tail (this is to make up for the fact that im not a tabaxi with them all lol)! fun fact for him now: his original design was meant to look feminine and masculine to encapsulate my bigenderness in a character ("the most magical thing about them is their gender!"), but ended up feeling too extra for the "just a guy" vibe and got a total redesign lol (he/him cishet man btw, gonna be fun to try <- bigender afab)

techic: my newest campaign character (who i get to play again in 5 minutes, but by the time i finish writing this, we may have started already lol)! a genderfluid tiefling warlock, who worked as a cashier at a 8/12 before shit went down (its an apocalypse campaign). (update, it did actually, writing while we wait for players to arrive) the funny idea with this one? "what if they made a deal for surgery and just got more out of it?". not much on them rn so fun fact time! their mom is a pc (played by arcadian) and currently being locked in a closet cause they ate their zombified partner!

[supercantaloupe]

okay yeah actually, i’ll bite. i’ve got some of my own thoughts about the unsleeping city and cultural representation and i’m gonna make a post about them now, i guess. i’ll put it under a cut though because this post is gonna be long.

i wanna start by saying i love dimension 20 and i really really enjoy the unsleeping city. i look forward to watching new episodes every week, and getting hooked on d20 as a whole last summer really helped pull me out of a pandemic depression, and i’m grateful to have this cool show to be excited about and interested in and to have met so many cool people to talk about it with.

that being said, however, i think there is a risk run in representing any group of people/their culture when you have the kind of setting that tuc has. by which i mean, tuc is set in a real world with real people and real human cultures in it. unlike fantasy high or a crown of candy where everything is made up (even if rooted in real-world cultures), tuc is explicitly rooted in reality, and all of its diversity -- both the ups and downs that go with it. and especially set in new york of all places, one of the most densely, diversely populated cities on earth. the cast is 7 people; it’s great that those 7 people come from a variety of backgrounds and identities and all bring their own unique perspectives to the table, and it’s great that those people and the entire crew are generally conscious of themselves and desire to tell stories/represent perspectives ethically. but you simply cannot authentically represent every culture or every perspective in the world (or even just in a city) when your cast is 7 people. it’s an impossible task. this is inherent to the setting, and acknowledged by the cast, and by brennan especially, who has been on record saying how one of the exciting aspects of doing a campaign set in nyc is its diversity, the fact that no two new yorkers have the same perspective of new york. i think that’s a good thing -- but it does have its challenges too, clearly.

i’m not going to go into detail on the question of whether or not tuc’s presentation of asian and asian american culture is appropriative/offensive or not. first of all, i don’t feel like it’s 100% fair to judge the show completely yet, since it’s a prerecorded season and currently airing midseason, so i don’t yet know how things wrap up. secondly, i’m not asian or asian american. i can have my own opinions on that content in the show, but i think it’s worth more to hear actual asian and asian american voices on this specific aspect of the show. having an asian american cast member doesn’t automatically absolve the show of any criticisms with regard to asian american cultural representation/appropriation, whether those criticisms are made by dozens of viewers or only a handful of them. regardless, i don’t think it’s my place as someone who is not asian to speak with any authority on that issue, and i know for a fact that there are asian american viewers sharing their own opinions. their thoughts in this instance hold more water than mine, i think.

what i will comment on in more depth, though, is a personal frustration with tuc. i’m jewish; i’ve never really been shy about that fact on my page here. i’m not from new york, but i visit a few times a year (or i did before covid anyway, lol), and i have some family from nyc. nyc, to me, is a jewish city. and for good reason, since it’s home to one of the largest jewish populations of the country, and even the world, and aspects of jewish culture (including culinary, like bagels and pastrami, and linguistic, like the common use of yiddish words and phrases in english colloquial speech) are prevalent and celebrated among jews and goyim alike. when i think of nyc, i think of a jewish city; that’s not everybody’s new york, but that’s my new york, and thats plenty of other people’s new york too. so i do find myself slightly disappointed or frustrated in tuc for its, in my opinion, rather stark lack of jewish representation.

now, i’m not saying that one of the PCs should have been jewish, full stop. i love to headcanon iga as jewish even though canon does not support that interpretation, and i’m fine with that. she’s not my character. it’s possible that simply no one thought of playing a jewish character, i dunno. but also, and i can’t be sure about this, i’m willing to bet that none of the players really wanted to play a jewish character because they didn’t want to play a character of a marginalized culture they dont belong to in the interest of avoiding stereotyping or offensive representation/cultural appropriation. (i don’t know if any of the cast members are jewish, but i’m assuming not.) and the concern there is certainly appreciated; there’s not a ton of mainstream jewish rep out there, and often what we get is either “unlikeable overly conservative hassidic jew” or “jokes about their bar mitzvah/one-off joke about hanukkah and then their jewishness is never mentioned ever again,” which sucks. it would be really cool to see some more good casual jewish rep in a well-rounded, three-dimensional character in the main cast of a show! even if there are a couple of stumbles along the way -- nobody is perfect and no two jews have the same level of knowledge, dedication, and adherence to their culture.

but at the same time, i look at characters like iga and i really do long for a jewish character to be there. siobhan isn’t polish, yet she’s playing a characters whose identity as a polish immigrant to new york is very central to her story and arc. and part of me wonders why we can’t have the same for a jewish character. if not a PC, then why not an NPC? again, i’m jewish, and i am not native, but in my opinion i think the inclusion of jj is wonderful -- i think there are even fewer native main characters in mainstream media than there are jewish ones, and it’s great to see a native character who is both in touch with their culture as well as not being defined solely by their native-ness. to what extent does it count as ‘appropriative’ because brennan is a white dude? i dunno, but i’m like 99% sure they talked to sensitivity consultants to make sure the representation was as ethical as they could get it, and anyway, i can’t personally see and glaring missteps so far. but again, i’m not native, and if there are native viewers with their own opinions on jj, i’d be really interested in hearing them.

but getting back to the relative lack of jewish representation. it just...disappoints me that jewishness in new york is hardly ever even really mentioned? again, i know we’re only just over halfway through season 2, but also, we had a whole first season too. and it’s definitely not all bad. for example: willy! gd, i love willy so much. him being a golem of williamsburg makes me really really happy -- a jewish mythological creature animated from clay/mud (in this case bricks) to protect a jewish community (like that of williamsburg, a center for many of nyc’s jews) from threat. golem have so often been taken out of their original context and turned into evil monsters in fantasy settings, especially including dnd. (even within other seasons of d20! crush in fh being referred to as a “pavement golem” always rubbed me the wrong way, and i had hoped they’d learned better after tuc but in acoc they refer to another monster as a “corn golem” which just disappointed me all over again.) so the fact that tuc gets golems right makes my jewish heart very happy.

and yet...he doesn’t show up that much? sure, in s1, he’s very helpful when he does, but in s2 so far he shows up once and really does not say or do much of anything. he speaks with a lot more yiddish-influenced language than other characters, but if you didn’t know those words were specifically yiddish/jewish, you might not be able to otherwise clock the fact that willy is jewish. and while willy is a jewish mythological creature who is jewish in canon, he isn’t human. there are no other direct references to judaism, jewish characters, or jewish culture in the unsleeping city beyond him.

there are, in fact, two other canon jewish characters in tuc. but...here’s where i feel the most frustration, i think. the two canon jewish humans in tuc are stephen sondheim and robert moses. both of whom are real actual people, so it’s not like we can just pick and choose what their cultural backgrounds are. as much as i love stephen sondheim, i think there are inherent issues with including real world people as characters in a fictional setting, especially if they are from living/recent memory (sondheim is literally still alive), but anyway, sondheim and moses are both actual jewish people. from watching tuc alone you probably would not be able to guess that sondheim is jewish -- nothing from his character except name suggests it, and i wouldn’t even fault you for not thinking ‘sondheim’ is a jewish-sounding surname (and i dislike the idea/attitude/belief that you can tell who is or isn’t jewish by the sound of their name). and yeah, i’m not going to sit here and be like “brennan should have made sondheim more visibly jewish in canon!” because, like, he’s a real human being and it’s fucking weird to portray him in a way that isn’t as close to how he publicly presents himself, which is not in fact very identifiably jewish? i don’t know, this is what i mean by it’s inherently weird and arguably problematic to portray real living people as characters in a fictional setting, but i digress. sondheim’s jewish, even if you wouldn’t know it; not exactly a representation win.

and then there’s bob moses. you might be able to guess that he’s jewish from canon, actually. there’s the name, of course. but more insidious to me are the specifics of his villainy. greedy and powerhungry, a moneyman, a lich whose power is stored in a phylactery...it does kind of all add up to a Yikes from me. (in the stock market fight there’s a one-off line asking if he has green skin; it’s never really directly acknowledged or answered, but it made me really uncomfortable to hear at first and it’s stuck with me since viewing for the first time.) the issue for me here is that the most obviously jewish human character is the season’s bbeg, and his villainy is rooted in very antisemitic tropes and stereotypes.

i know this isn’t all brennan’s fault -- robert moses was a real ass person and he was in fact jewish, a powerhungry and greedy moneyman, a big giant racist asshole, etc. i’m not saying that jewish characters can’t be evil, and i’m not saying brennan should have tried to be like “this is my NPC robert christian he’s just like bob moses but instead he’s a goy so it’s okay” because...that would be fuckin weird bro. and bob moses was a real person who was jewish and really did do some heinous shit with his municipal power. i’m not necessarily saying brennan should have picked/created a different character to be the villain. i’m not even saying that he shouldn’t have made bob moses a lich (although, again, it doesn’t 100% sit right with me). but my point here is that bob moses is one of a grand total of three canon jewish characters in tuc, of which only two humans, of whom he is the one you’d most easily guess would be jewish and is the most influenced by antisemitic stereotypes/tropes. had there been more jewish representation in the show at all, even just some neutral jewish NPCs, this would not be as much of a problem as it is to me. but halfway through season 2, so far, this is literally all we get. and that bums me out.

listen, i really like tuc. i love d20. but the fact that it is set in a real world place with real world people does inherently raise challenges when it comes to ethical cultural representation. especially when the medium of the show is a game whose creatures, lore, and mechanics have been historically rooted in some questionable racial/cultural views. and dnd is making progress to correct some of those misguided views of older sourcebooks by updating them to more equitably reflect real world racial/cultural sensitivities; that’s a good thing! but these seasons, of course, were recorded before that. the game itself has some questionable cultural stuff baked into it, and that is (almost necessarily) going to be brought to the table in a campaign set in a real-world place filled with real-world people of diverse real-world cultures. the cast can have sensitivity consultants and empathy and the best intentions in the world, and they’ll still fuck up from time to time, that’s okay. your mileage may vary on whether or not it’s still worth sticking around with the show (or the fandom) through that. for me, it does not yet outweigh all the things i like about the show, and i’m gonna continue watching it. but it’s still very worth acknowledging that the cast is 7 people who cannot possibly hope to authentically or gracefully represent every culture in nyc. it’s an unfortunate limitation of the medium. yet it’s also still worthwhile to acknowledge and discuss the cultural representation as it is in the show -- both the goods and the bads, the ethically solid and the questionably appropriative -- and even to hold the creators accountable. (decently, though. i’m definitely not advocating anybody cyberbully brennan on twitter or whatever.) the show and its representation is far from perfect, but i also don’t think it ever could be. still, though, it could always be better, and there’s a worthwhile discussion to be had in the wheres, hows, and whys of that.

[homespork-review]

Homespork Act 2: The Racism of the Conductor’s Baton (Part 2)

FAILURE ARTIST: We don’t get much time to mourn with Dave because the comic flashes to a weird wizard statue. This statue is ZAZZERPAN THE LEARNED. Wizards are another recurring theme in Homestuck. Andrew Hussie once artfully defaced this cheesy book called Wizardology (warning: lots of really offensive humor). Anyway, Rose hates the giant statue and the other wizard paraphernalia her mother collects and believes her mother does this only to spite her. On a platform is a bronzed vacuum (with a place to put alcoholic beverages) that Rose gave her as an ironic present. On the couch there’s a life-sized princess doll that Rose has attached a Cthulhu-type head to. All these things set up Rose’s troubled relationship with her mother. Rose believes her mother is taunting her and Rose taunts her back.

BRIGHT: This scene also establishes that some things (the Cthulhu doll for one) are too big to be captchalogued.

CHEL: Actually, that was noted with the harlequin doll earlier but we forgot to mention that.

FAILURE ARTIST: Rose goes to the kitchen. On the fridge is a crude picture of her late cat Jaspers, who turns out to be more than a family pet. There’s more signs of this cold war between mother and daughter on the fridge.

CHEL: Also, numerous liquor bottles in the kitchen and comically exaggerated displays of wealth, such as a fifteen-thousand-dollar picture frame.

FAILURE ARTIST: After fussing with the fridge, Rose tries to leave the kitchen only to run into her mother. She tries escaping but lands comically in some wizard statuettes.

CHEL: Mom Lalonde is mopping the floor, with no water in the bucket, holding a martini in her other hand. The woman clearly has a problem. Again, this is an issue with the portrayal of the parents; this is pretty funny, but were a real mother behaving this way, it would seriously mess up the kid, and whether we’re supposed to take it as Rule of Funny or not later becomes inconsistent.

BRIGHT: I think a lot of the humour here is supposed to come from the implication that Mom Lalonde actually is a loving if clueless (and drunk) parent, and Rose is reading her badly. On the other hand, something is clearly very wrong, and while Mom Lalonde may indeed be loving the situation is definitely having an impact on Rose.

TIER: Say whatever you want, but when putting on the late game Cerebus Retcon goggles there are probably non-humorous questions to be asked about how screwy Mom Lalonde is as a parental unit if her daughter has ended up interpreting most of her actions as mocking or backhanded towards herself. Like, kids don't just decide that.

ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 3

CHEL: Back to Dave, he’s chatting with GG and they’re being adorable. GG comments about her birthday present to John, the green box we saw in the car earlier, and…

GG: no!!!!!!! GG: he will not open it GG: he will lose it!!! TG: oh TG: uh TG: wow sorry to hear that i guess? GG: no its good actually! GG: because he will find it again later when he really needs it GG: which of course is why i sent it in the first place! TG: see like TG: i never get how you know these things GG: i dont know GG: i just know that i know!

I think here is when we start to get inklings of the kids’ unusual abilities - I mean, unusual in the context of the weird world they live in. A bit more is established about GG’s home life and Dave’s attitudes, too:

GG: i have to feed bec which is always a bit of an undertaking TG: man TG: if i were you i would just take that fucking devilbeast out behind the woodshed and blow its head off GG: heheheh! GG: i dont think i could if i tried!!! TG: yeah TG: say hi to your grand dad for me too ok GG: ._. GG: yes i guess an encounter with him is almost certain GG: it is usually........ GG: intense!!! TG: well yeah isnt it always with family TG: but he sounds like a total badass

“Intense” in a world where attacking your father with a hammer isn’t worthy of comment sounds worrying. We’ll see how that goes.

FAILURE ARTIST: Dave has the tiniest of smiles here and in Hussie’s annotation he says that one pixel created Dave/GG. Whether or not their connection is romantic, Dave obviously feels great affection for her.

CHEL: Interactions between all four of the kids are really sweet, honestly. Dialogue and character interactions are one of the strongest points of the comic overall. Personally I have a soft spot for the OT4.

TIER: In my unprofessional opinion, the beta humans are by far the most functioning and tight knit group of the various groups within the comic, for what that's worth considering the overall dysfunction junction. They're sweet to one another is what I'm saying.

CHEL: Dave talks to John, who mentions the creepy trails around his house and how he thinks he’s seen monsters, which we the audience have definitely seen; creepy little black imps with fangs and, oddly, jester outfits. They bear a striking resemblance to the Wayward Vagabond, in fact. Dave makes fun, but at least pretends not to disbelieve him, and urges him to keep his hammer at the ready. Dave can’t find his Bro, but can find “Lil Cal”, implying Bro is nearby.

TG: lil cal is the shit EB: that's fine, you are entitled to your opinion, i am just saying that being a white guy who is a rapper with a ventriloquist doll is not cool by any stretch of the imagination or by any definition of word cool, ironic or otherwise. that's all i'm saying. WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 5

Would a non-white rapping ventriloquist be any cooler? I’m struggling to see how. Ventriloquism, by definition, sucks the cool out of any other aspect of the thing. And now I’m picturing Carlton from Fresh Prince trying to rap with a ventriloquist’s doll.

BRIGHT: Back at the Lalonde residence, Rose attempts to ‘Youth Roll’ out of the front door, but her escape route is blocked by her mother, who appears with martini glass in hand. Time for our second Strife of the comic! (And can I say that I really like the music for this one?)

As with John’s strife with his dad, this strife tells us a lot about Rose’s relationship with her mother. John had the AGGRIEVE and ABJURE options; Rose also gets AGGRESS (PASSIVE) and ABSTAIN. It’s pretty telling that one of these options is an EMPTY SUICIDE THREAT, and ‘Abstain’ has Rose fending off her mother’s insistent offer of the martini glass.

FAILURE ARTIST: I liked the EMPTY SUICIDE THREAT at the time but now I think it deserves an ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?

BRIGHT: Mom Lalonde may be intended as loving-but-clueless, but she’s offering her thirteen year old daughter alcohol, over Rose’s protests, and something is clearly very wrong if suicide threats are a normal part of life. (Something similar will come up in the future, but in that context it isn’t played for laughs.)

ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 4

On a lighter note, ‘Abjure’ has her mother offering her A BEAUTIFUL PONY. Rose reacts in the moment like this is terrible, but does later pat the pony’s nose.

At any rate, the strife ends when Mom Lalonde apparently gets bored and decides to do some dusting. This takes all the fun out of using the front door, so Rose goes around the back to make her break for the generator.

Meanwhile, John is trying to read up on weaponizing sylladexes (sylladices?), but is being nagged by a voice to turn around — which he finally does, just in time for a monster to ram into him so hard it turns the panel pixelated. Strife time!

John’s bout with the Shale Imp kicks off with the monster threatening the Con Air bunny. John’s efforts to defend it are intercut with Rose’s progress out of the house and through the rain to the mausoleum. I think this interplay works quite nicely — it keeps both things moving without letting the reader get impatient -- but your mileage may vary.

The imp aggravates John by punching the bunny in the belly and waving it at him. John attacks the imp and breaks his hammer, then attacks it with the handle and gets knocked flat. Finally he weaponises his sylladex and chucks his inventory at it until it explodes into a shower of grist.

PUT THE BUNNY BACK IN THE BOX!!!!!! Now why couldn’t he put the bunny back in the box?

Because he’d set it as his strifekind, it turns out.

In true video game style, defeating the imp causes John to level up! In Homestuck, this is done by ascending one’s echeladder, a series of player levels with whimsical, old-fashioned names. John climbs two rungs, from Greentike to Plucky Tot, and earns 125 Boondollars.

Note how efficient this is: In one panel we can see that the echeladder is a levelling system, that Boondollars are in-Game currency, and that levelling up has increased John’s amount of grist and how much of it he can carry. He’s also got a new kind of grist called ‘Shale’. Hussie does take an extra panel to clarify the grist capacity expansion, but that makes sense as it’s a small part of the original panel. Compare this to the dozens of panels we’ve had laying out how sylladexes work. These panels are much more information-dense, and the comic flows better for it.

CHEL: Exactly what “grist” is and what it does beyond allowing changes to the house, why those changes are needed, and what “boondollars” are for hasn’t been explained yet, but will be soon, and it’s clear they’re something to do with the game so it’s not outright confusing.

BRIGHT: John spends the next few panels sorting his strife specibus out, and stashes the bunny in there for safekeeping. There’s something amiss, but he can’t quite put his finger on it...

Meanwhile, Rose has reached the mausoleum and prepares to activate the generator. The taxidermied corpse of her beloved pet lies in state, dressed in a tiny suit. A sad fate for an animal who should have peacefully decomposed in a flowerbed. Rose kicks it off the pedestal to make room for the laptop.

John discovers what’s wrong when a bucket of water perched atop his door lands on his head. The culprit behind this sudden dousing?

"[S] WHAT THIS IS SO OUTRAGEOUS (HD)" (Watch on YouTube)

Apparently the sprite has a sense of humour.

Next up is a pesterlog between Rose and Dave. There are hints that all is not well in the Strider residence.

TG: hey TG: dont tell john this but i think he might have been right about the puppets TG: theyre sort of starting to freak me out a little TT: You're referring to your brother's collection? TG: i mean dont get me wrong i think its cool and all TG: the semi-ironic puppet thing or whatever TG: or semi-semi ironic TG: man i dont even know TG: im just starting to think some of this shit is going a little far and its kind of fucked up TT: I've seen his websites. TT: I like them. TG: haha yeah well YOU WOULD TG: oh man i wish lil cal wouldnt look at me like that TG: with those dead eyes jesus TG: sometimes i dream that hes real and hes talking to me and i wake up in a cold sweat and basically flip the fuck out

Well, not so much hints as flashing neon signs. Dave’s gone very quickly from insisting that everything his brother does is cool and Lil Cal is awesome, to admitting that he has nightmares about Lil Cal and is freaked out by his brother’s ‘semi-ironic puppet thing’. We don’t know much about Bro’s websites yet, but we do know that Rose has a morbid streak, and Dave is clearly disturbed by the content.

Dave leaves to find his brother’s copy of the game, and we return to John, who, to quote Rose, has ‘just had a bucket of water dumped on his head by the ghost of his dead grandmother, who also happens to be dressed like a clown.’

And yes, that is indeed John’s dead Nanna, returned to help him on his journey through The Medium and beyond -- or at least, she claims she is. John has to take her word for it, as he doesn’t remember her at all. According to his Dad, John was pretty young when she died. Speaking of his Dad, he’s been kidnapped by the forces invading John’s home.

Nannasprite gives John the background of the game and what’s going on. His house is now in the Medium. This place was created by the game software, but is physically independent of it -- and no, he’s not inside a computer. The Medium floats in the Incipisphere, a place outside the normal flow of time in the kids’ universe. Above the Medium is the realm of Skaia.

According to Nannasprite:

Legend holds that Skaia exists as a dormant crucible of unlimited creative potential. What does this mean, you ask? I'm afraid my lips are sealed about that, dear! Hoo hoo!

Nannasprite is somewhat like a tutorial assistant for the game -- she helps guide John and provides information, although she’s somewhat cryptic.

We are getting a lot of new words here, but Hussie is defining them pretty well as we go, so I don’t think it merits a point.

At any rate, Skaia is defended by the forces of light, while forces of darkness plot its destruction. These two forces exist in an endless stalemate on a stage at the centre of Skaia until a player with a prototyped Kernelsprite enters the Medium. Then the prototyped Kernelsprite splits, with one Kernel carrying the prototyping information up to a kingdom basked in light, and another Kernel carrying it down to the kingdom of darkness. Each kingdom has four Spires, and when the Kernel reaches one, it propagates the prototyping information to the kingdom’s forces.

This is why the imps were dressed as jesters: John prototyped his Kernel with the harlequin doll, and whatever the other players prototype with will influence what forms the soldiers take. When the first Kernels reach the spires, the battlefield gets bigger and the war begins for real.

Oh, right -- and the forces of light are always destined to lose.

So what’s the point? Apparently, that’s for John to find out. For now, though, he needs to head towards Skaia, going through the first of seven Gates. The first Gate is situated directly above John’s house, but the others are going to be harder to reach. We now find out what all that Build Grist is for: To get to the Gate, they need to build the house higher to reach it. And then they can rescue John’s Dad, solve the ultimate riddle, and save the Earth from destruction!

...or not.

Nope, according to Nannasprite, Earth is doomed. Done for. Kaput. There is nothing they can do to save it.

John is pretty bummed about this. He isn’t cheered by Nanna’s assurance that he has a much more important purpose than saving the planet, although she fails to elaborate on that point and instead floats off to make cookies.

CHEL: I think here we earn another couple of points.

HURRY UP AND DO NOTHING: 2 HOW NOT TO WRITE A WEBCOMIC: 11 Failing the Turing Test - wherein the character has no reactions whatsoever While the emotional lives of characters should not be described in their every tiny wrinkle, characters must have emotional lives. When someone boos them off a stage, they should experience chagrin. When they fall from a tenth-storey window, they should feel alarm. The writer should not count on dialogue like “Yikes!” to get the point across.

Brief confusion and feeling “bummed out” by the news that one’s entire planet is doomed does not count as an adequate reaction. I’d expect more fear, more concern. As pointed out before, doesn’t John have any friends other than Dave, Rose, and GG? His Dad has friends, wouldn’t he be concerned for them on Dad’s behalf? If nothing else, more curiosity about this “more important” business?

BRIGHT: Now, I could actually buy this in some circumstances — John is a teenager, doesn’t seem to have close connections outside those we see on screen, and he’s been having one hell of a weird day. I wouldn’t be surprised if grasping the scope of destruction was simply beyond him at this point. It’s a lot to take in, and it’s only been a few hours since life went to hell in a handbasket — not to mention, he’s in an active combat zone. There’s a lot going on, and if he was to shove it out of his mind while he dealt with the immediate crisis, I could see that as pretty realistic.

Of course, that would depend on him actually reacting at some later point, when he had a chance to slow down and it could sink in. As it stands...well, if that does happen, we never see it.

CHEL: Does this also count as “Oh, Don’t Mind Him” for the How Not To score?

BRIGHT: I think so, yes.

CHEL: Then here it goes!

HOW NOT TO WRITE A WEBCOMIC: 12 Oh, Don’t Mind Him - where a character’s problems remain unexplored In real life, people are riddled with chronic problems that are not addressed for long periods of time, if ever. But in fiction, all problems are just the opening chords of a song. If there is a brother who has a problem with alcohol, a child who has lost her dog, or even someone whose car has simply broken down, the reader will worry about those people and expect the author to do something about it.

Technically, this could count for seven billion or so points, minus any people who successfully entered their own game sessions, but we don’t want to get out of hand here and it really only counts as one big problem.

However! I am very fond of this idea in theory. The obvious option would be that the purpose of the game is to save the player’s homeworld. We’ve all seen the “save the homeworld” idea in scifi and fantasy before. Here, the homeworld is beyond saving, but there is another option, and exploring that is the storyline. The forces of light cannot have a traditional victory; the protagonists must find a victory on the terms they have. It’s not a theme one sees often, and I like it.

FAILURE ARTIST: John and the other Beta Kids’ lack of angst of the destruction of their planet doesn’t stick out as much here as it will later when almost everything else is milked for angst.

CHEL: I’m not really sure the planet being destroyed is a great basis for a Rule-of-Funny-based story if that was what he was going for, to be honest. “Billions died, lol!”

[ariyadaivaris]

hey ive been trying to figure out how to do this for awhile and since some anons have asked im gonna try 2 articulate my feelings about f*nn and this is not going to be very polite and im sorry, its nothing personal and if you have a perspective on him that i dont its fine and i absolutely get you and im glad you can enjoy that! i just wanted to try and work through how the fuck i feel about him and this is ultimately a pretty personal post and not a Manifesto on How F*nn Is Bad (i dont think he is, particularly, ftr), so like, if youre not interested which I CANNOT FAULT YOU FOR AT ALL, just know that its cool to go on! this isn’t trying to start shit or anything, i genuinely dont want to, im just writing this for Me, basically. its alright. 

thanks thats the intro done okay take care i love u

what...does f*nn have even. he’s good in the ring but he’s surrounded by people who are better. he doesn’t have a character. what motivates him? what the fuck is he even fighting for? what is his personality, even? he absorbs the storylines of everyone around him in any feud he does too often for him to be as underdeveloped as he is and yet we are here and WHY???

i mean. apollo. let’s look at apollo! apollo is similarly kinda underdeveloped character-wise and most of who he is comes from who he is irl, and people don’t really play characters up irl! but like. it’s not glaring in the same way f*nn is, because

1) apollo got called up SUPER SUPER EARLY in nxt where f*nn had YEARS to develop a character and still holds a spot as longest reigning nxt champion, and

2) apollo plays a support role! he’s not a main event player (which is fucking criminal in and of itself but thats another issue) and him being underdeveloped+not as fleshed out lends itself pretty well to him supporting people however they need support at the moment. it’s not Ideal but it works well for who he is in the context of story stuff, which is not the case for f*nn

(also 3 secretly but apollo’s moveset is actually really varied and interesting which f*nn’s is...not but that’s a subjective thing obviously lol)

like. f*nn is just. such a nothing of a wrestler. i’m sorry but genuinely i don’t know or understand what there is there. he doesn’t have a character besides...vagueing people on twitter until he gets what he wants and yes okay i know that’s not an entirely true unbiased thing to say and im sorry but also i dont think im exactly Wrong

(also about vaguing people on twitter i know that has something to do with how bad his 2017 booking was, i WON’T deny that, and multiple people are booked badly in dubya at once and they all deserve more than that, but also f*nn’s the only person who really got any rage on his behalf as far as i’ve seen and it’s definitely affected my feelings about that)

the only thing he’s got going for him is a storied history in new japan, which itself feels lacking in the ring, and which honestly...gets...a lot more credit than deserved (and mostly SOLO credit at that)? he DID create the bullet club but his bullet club was essentially an entire stable of Foreigner Heels. cheap heat. any story he told (and i only know that there was apollo 55, im unaware of any other feuds, so bear that in mind) feels so...like...secondary to that of anyone he worked with. he could be a support role and get away with being the white bread he is but GOD FORBID that should happen, and so he just engulfs the story of anyone around him and does nothing and it’s just

it’s disappointing and its boring and exhausting to see him get shot after shot after shot doing the same thing over and over again because He Can. i have nothing much against him, i think he’s petty and petulant and very...self-absorbed, like, not in an entirely bad way but in the sense that he buys a lot of his own hype? and its...off-putting. i don’t know him personally though obviously, that’s just how i feel about him based on what ive seen, but like, as a person, its whatever. i just can’t stand him as a wrestler or a character. he’s generic and unmotivated and so. NOTHING and it’s exhausting to watch and try to make something meaningful and enjoyable out of. especially juxtaposed with the miz rn, and even with s*th, who i hate but who at least HAS a personality even if it’s a genuinely awful one

not even going into the fan reception of f*nn vs anyone else who’s more deserving and interesting than he is, lmao, i’m bitter as anything about how f*nn is treated compared to the cruiserweights because NATURALLY and OBVIOUSLY i’m biased, you all know this, i don’t deny it, i cant say this comparison is all the way fair when im so so so FUCKING cwuisewweights, but like, the reaction to f*nn getting Beachballed vs any of the 205 dudes getting Beachballed was so heartbreaking in how much More he gets just for the name he’s got

i don’t know. i don’t know. i just think he’s such a nothing of a character, surrounded by people (taguchi, joe, kevin, hideo, FUCK IT, even s*th or like, fucking, KENNY, or the young bucks, or ANYONE) who really care about the character and story they have against him, and instead of being relegated to a supporting role where he’d be like, Worth anything, he’s thrust into whatever title picture or main event there is because He’s F*nn B*lor and it’s so...so much less talked about or acknowledged and for the life of me i don’t understand why. i don’t know what it is im missing

again, i don’t have much against him as a person, i personally don’t like how he acts but he doesn’t seem Proublematique in any way beyond...the foreigner heel stuff which is inherently built in anti-japan sentiment EVEN THOUGH that is strictly kayfabe afaik (though he does fucken. support the special olympics and did some Cool Trendy Straitjacket Entrances as prince nevitt and that is a very VERY personal thing i have against him) i guess that’s what matters. i just. ugh. im over it

i appreciate him being vocally supportive of queer fans but i don’t owe him for that and i still think it sucks that he, a (as far as i know) straight white dude, is getting the platform to do that instead of people who are actually queer and out in the same company. sonya isn’t getting this chance, and more blatantly, darren never got that chance. despite having the block the hate movement, and despite the fact that his coming out is what got him a face turn while it was ENTIRELY and COMPLETELY unacknowledged in the canon universe of wwe proper. like, i guess that’s not f*nn’s fault but there’s a common trend of men of color being pushed down to boost him up and it’s not the best. i don’t think that’s all his fault but i don’t like it

again this isn’t like, denouncing Liking F*nn, its fine! this isnt decrying everything about him, i don’t wanna fight about this, and if you like finn, sincerely i’m glad you can find something there to like and i hope you’re having a good time with him! and to boot i really DON’T know much about anything he did before dubya, and so i could very well be wrong about everything. like, calling the gullet blub just a Cheap Heat Stable? that interpretation could be and probably is wrong. i know that, and i know that’s probably gonna affect how i feel abt him, but also god i do not care even a bit enough to learn and i would rather die than look at pr*nce nevitt/gullet blub anything

i dont know. i hope this didnt come off as.......TOO shitty, i know this is a stupid and mostly impenetrable post, its alright, this is just me trying to work through this for myself and i promise its not like...a huge thing. thats all! thats all. im sorry if i worded this weird at all and i know my perspective isnt the best or most informed on this, but also i am very very tired of f*nn and i don’t think that’s an unfair thing to say

[glitchplight]

I heard that Cyber Sleuth has a gay character in it. Do you think its worth it to buy the game for that? Thanks in advance! 🙏

OK I haven’t actually finished the HM yet but I am pretty close, or at least close enough I think I can confidently answer this for both games now

trying to keep this answer as spoiler-free as possible (even though my art blog is very close to becoming full of spoilers just because of who I ship lol)

so the two characters here we have to look at seperately

so first, the lesbian (who… I named on my last post but she’s spoilers and I COMPLETELY underestimated just how straightforward they were about her crush in HM) was handled pretty well in the first game, but I am still FLOORED by how amazingly they handled her in HM. as said before, they are very very straightforward about her being in love with this girl. its also always framed very positively, as in her feelings for the other girl and what she tries to do for her as a result is always a positive force in the other girl’s life, and is treated with lots of weight and care by the writers. I mention that because its the main reason I’m so invested in her as opposed to other canonically gay characters. another thing I enjoy is that her feelings for this girl are probably the biggest thing about her character, without compromising her character. which… is not something thats easy for me to explain ahaha, but I appreciate it a lot

I honestly can’t think of any problems at all with the way she was presented. maaaaybe a tiny phrasing issue in the first game which I was told was a translation issue anyway. the only thing I’ve seen other people bring up is how whether her feelings are actually returned is left open for interpretation. personally, given some contextual stuff, this isn’t something I mind (personally I feel like it would be unrealistic for the other girl to be able to figure that out within the scope of the game anyway but thats just my onion), as I’ve found I valued my above points more usually when it comes to this kinda thing. personally the other girl leaving it at “I don’t know how to describe our relationship other than beyond friendship and words” is GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME but you know, you do you in the case that its a dealbreaker for you

as for the gay male character exclusive to HM…. his handling is really something. I won’t say most of it is bad since tbh its a sort of narrative that is pretty personal to me (I mean there IS a big issue but I will get to that later) but I guess if you are looking for representation, that isn’t the word I’d use for this I suppose? it deals a lot with being so incredibly repressed about having gay feelings for your best friend that it makes you fucking miserable and self-hating, so I mean just a heads up thats what you are getting into wth this character. also he’s a very? alphys-like character in the way he does things, if that makes sense to those that have played undertale. I can’t really go into detail about that without spoiling though...

the big major fucking complaint I have that I mentioned earlier actually has to do with a dialogue option the protagonist has. this option makes it look as if you can make the protagonist confess that he’s in love with the gay male character. ITS BAIT. the protagonist immediately takes this back as if it was a joke. I’ve avoided this dialogue option, but considering that no matter what you pick, the screen fades to black, and considering the above dialogue option mentioned is completely unfitting for the situation, it kinda makes me think that the only reason this is to be mean-spirited towards players towards players that wanted to return the feelings, which honestly makes me FUCKING LIVID. I dont’ really have much more to say about that, other than to be aware of it.

so is it worth it to buy the game for the gay character you mentioned? yes, the lesbian character I mentioned is AMAZING in these games BUT I admit you will have to buy both games to really get the full scope of things (tbh to even enjoy hackers memory at all it would not work without playing cyber sleuth vanilla first). you can also prrrrobably get something out of the gay male character exclusive to hacker’s memory too, but the big complaint I had certainly sours things, so just keep that in mind.

if you want me to get into more detail on either of these characters, feel free to send me an ask off-anon and I’ll be happy to respond to you privately! I still have a lot more to say to those that don’t mind spoilers ahaha

[bigbrothernetflix-st]

EPISODE ONE

“its week ONE. why is everyone being so cracked i hate it here i absolutely hate it here someone take me out with a sniper rifle” - aria 

HOH: Jev UPSIDE DOWN: Jacob & Gina NOMINEES: Kiki & Nash POV: Nash FINAL NOMINEES: Kiki & Mo EVICTED: Mo (14-1)

PRESEASON CAST ASSESSMENT

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEdLzVoyttU&list=PLFEwPPy8j010XXwntq80VSU0qLNTNpSIN&index=2&t=0s

JOEY

WOO holy shit this cast is filled with such insane personalities, and I cannot WAIT to play this game!

NASH

tell me why i'm already nervous

NASH

waits patiently for mo to pick another damn person to infect

GINA

skghkdgljhgdlj BRAIN HURTY,, sm people to talk to and everyone is so so nice! just glad I'm not winning hoh

ARIA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-bwCxQGRhk

alternative title: im very mean for 20 minutes

KIKI

so far the cast seems very sweet! a little quiet so far but otherwise im really enjoying talking to them!! and i think the twist is a cool idea but could be dangerous.... maybe a little too easy to expose alliances

GINA

I really like this cast! I'm actually really good friends with Aria (but we keeping that a secret) and I recognize Joshua from other orgs! Also, this twist seems super fun!

ARIA

okay,,,,okay,,,ok,,,k my brain is struggling to complie everything ive learned today i am STRUGGLING!!!!

So!! Lets make a tier list

We're working together (didnt even need to discuss)

-Nathan

-Jacob

-Gina

Asked to work together

-Joey

-Joshua

Implied we're working togther but lower tier

-Jev

-Josh C

-Monty

Super Sweet & Nice

-Bri

-Kiki

-Dem

-Mo

Sweet but i want a response

-Nick

-Emma

_saira

-jake

-Nash

So thats what i've gathered for today mostly, Jacob-Joey-Jev-Joshua all seem to really want to work close with me and we've talked a bit of game ( ITS ALL THE Js HELP) and seem super open while the girls seem more closed off as of now, kinda worried gina isnt gonna be active enough but idk, oh also everyone is noticing bri is CHAOS and that nick is talkative/assertive. more to update in a bit but heres a trust ranking for night one, one more thing jev said he doesnt like nathan or nick :OO and someone else mentioned nick being overbearing

1.Gina (i love her to the moon and back)

2. Nathan( the charisma SNAPPED this game go off sir!!)

3. Josh C (they're also charismatic but they're hecking hilarious and our view are pretty similar) 

4.Jev (they cared about me!! and im nice to them and this is just really wholesome)

5.Jacob (LOVE him but we havent talked enough beyond "we're winning this game")

6.Joshua (super fun to talk to, same og community king)

7.Bri (they wont keep info to themselves but shes SO sweet pls take my heart)

8. Joey (hes kinda sketching me out tbh but also he wants to work with me so)

9.Nick (they wouldnt put me up and thats all i could ask for)

10.Monty (PLEASE trust me i need ur braincells)

12.Kiki (sHES SO SWEET AND GOOD AT ART ADORE HER)

13.Mo (existential dread buddies <3)

14.Dem(approached game w/ me,,,but on the first message so might be doing that w/ everyone)

15.Nash (kate protection gang!!!)

16.Saira (we loVE DOGS! and thats it)

17.Emma (feel better soon,,,then pls talk to me k thanks)

18.Aria (dont trust anyone,,,not even yourself)

DEM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykD4dZjsDl0

BRIANNA

https://youtu.be/odNZXz-jNtw

MO

If alliances have been made already, I am gonna have some QUALMS... This cast is very cute, I love meeting new people, let's see we have

Aria - an ANGEL we've been talking about SIX the musical and slime tutorials

Brianna - The first person to recognize me using a Carole & Tuesday song in any of my videos. I'm v grateful.

Dem - He kinda jokes like a mom... 

Emma - I'm friends with Emma outside of the game and she is such a chaotic sweetheart. We been in the house a day and she plays Lois Griffon singing Doja Cat... for what...

Gina - I have not talked with her, I just said hi.

Jacob - Jacob is nice. I think I've yet to have a super positive ORG experience with him tho. So. Yeah.

Can I do the rest tomorrow cus I'm tired and just not in the mood. Okay thank you.

SAIRA

I was a little surprised by the amount of people dming me but they all seemed pretty nice! The twist sounds cool, I'm excited to see how it plays out

JEV

i definitely did NOT expect to win the first hoh but here we are, i have no idea what i'm gonna do but i need sleep so that's tomorrows problem

JOSH C

HELLO! it's your boy josh coming to give you some thoughts on the cast. coming into this game, the only person i know of beforehand is.. JACOB who has managed to snake me in both games we've played together so that's cute. i don't really have a choice but to trust him for now bc that's my only outside connection so we'll see how it goes. he's fun to talk to so i don't really mind but my eyes are PEELED for it going south.

my favorites just from the first night are probably aria, kiki, nathan, and saira. for no REAL reasons other than i just feel like i've had the best conversations with them and they were more fun than the rest of the cast. i'm not sure if those will stay the same but that's HOW I FEEL RIGHT NOW!!

i've reached out to everyone and heard back from everyone (other than nash.. dunno what that's about so i'll just let it sit there. i don't REALLY mind bc it's good if i win HOH because it's a good reason to throw someone up there). everyone is cute enough, though i think i've connected LEAST with brianna, dem, joey, and monty? just haven't gotten a lot of energy back from them but i'm hoping that was just FIRST NIGHT jitters of people not putting in their full effort into their social game.

i'm going to spend today just chatting with people so i have a base relationship with them and that way if jev goes the route of asking people who they'd him to nominate -- i'm not someone they name simply for not knowing who i am. trying to be a little SOCIAL QUEEN. fun and funky so let's hope it pays off.

for the twist, i'm not really sure how to play this. i don't think the first round is going to have the BEST power hidden in it but it'd be nice to know that i for sure won't be first boot. (though i'm feeling OKAY enough that jev won't kill me bc we've talked at least). i think i'm going to wait a minute before i ask someone to send me in, or someone just sends me in on their own accord. that way people don't look at me for having a secret power bc it'll be really easy to narrow down who has one and that's just such an unnecessary way to get a target on your back. i like the twist, it's just hard to figure out how to play it and maybe i should just wait until someone does it for me or i'm one of the later people to get it so i get safety when there are less people in the house and it'll be harder to survive.

xoxo gossip josh

SKINNY NICK

https://youtu.be/yNBReh_pBPk

NATHAN

He's here, he's queer... and oddly enough starting off by not doing a Video DR; however, I think when making an initial first impression/trust list this method seems to go a little smoother... First off, coming right off of Big Brother Pasio and thrown into this game has made my head hurt more than it should. I forgot how annoying and tiresome the initial conversations are with everybody. With that said, I have begun to kinda pick out a path that may be suitable for me this season. In Pasio, my goal was to lay low, not be seen, and form connections. That strategy is going to be partially active this time around as well. I'm a big personality, and while that's fun and cute, I learned by keeping a low profile in the beginning portion while remaining social it does wonders. I don't need to be a Skinny Nick character and be talking in the house call and house chat at every ounce I get. With that being said, this season is full of Pasio players... some in which I had both good and bad experiences with. However, pushing that aside I really have my eyes set and locked on Aria. I have a feeling that the other Pasio alumni may see her for how she played in Pasio and I do as well, but I want to make sure her and I are on as good as terms as possible. She did NOT like me in Pasio, so rekindling that flame is ultra important. Alongside Aria, I get to play with both Monty and Jacob who I've had rocky relationships with in the past, but have grown to become great friends outside this. Working with them is going to be vital, but keeping them too close is suicide. With that being said, here's my initial trust ranking:

1. Aria

2. Jacob 

3. Nash

4. Jev

5. Josh

6. Monty

7. Joey

8. Nick

- - -

END LIST

JOSH C

okay, well nominations just came out and i can't say i'm too surprised that nash got nominated for eviction considering she hasn't responded to me yet and most everyone else is saying the same. i can't really imagine anyone using the veto on her unless she has a complete social turn around in the next 24 hours but that seems like.. a stretch. just gotta hope she doesn't win! we love an easy first week boot!

i'm a little sad about kiki getting nominated because i've really hit it off with them, but i think it's a good way to secure some trust with them and spark off a relationship. i've been trying to already be like YOU GOT THIS, YOU'RE STAYING! NASH DOESN'T TALK TO ANYONE! and i think they're being receptive. i like that i can joke around with them, so i'm hoping they enjoy me as much as i enjoy them.

i've also had aria and jake come talk to me about noms which means they trust me and that's GOOD. i want to try to secure something with them soon because i think they're both people that would want to work with me and i know that jake doesn't have a lot of connections already so being an early ally of his would be BIG.

just trying to focus on being a cute little social presence so people don't really focus on targeting me early on. i think this is a game full of half social players and some.. not so exciting people so it'll be easy to just slip through by not being the most boring person around. i don't want to promise TOO many people loyalty just yet but i think building a small core for myself will be important to keep me safe and i'm hoping that can come with jake/aria/kiki/jacob(?)

JAKE

chile............. where the fuck am i?

i dont know what dimension i'm in right now with these people but i am ready to show them what i am made of!! so far i've felt..... on the outs of most of what is going on so im just gonna give my perspective on things so far!! 

the cast....... ill just do an assessment

dem: said maybe three words to me since we've started... so there's that

saira: seems like a queen! i def need to talk to her more i've been sleeping on her and i think we'll get along well

joey: girl sometimes idk what this man is saying to me but we're rolling w it..

nash: her "sick" ass hasnt responded to my message from yesterday so bye

joshua: oh he can work! hes fun to talk to and i def see some potential to working with him. hes only 16 so yung so pure i remember those days </3

nathan: hes so hot god i literally want to eat his entire ass but i dont wanna be creepy so im trying to subtly flirt with him SDLKJFSKF he seems to be a sneaky player to me but hopefully thats not the case and we can be a showmance later on hehe

emma: LEGEND. QUEEN! PUT SOME RESPECT ON HER NAMEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! my ride or die in this thing <3

jev: oh jevfrey my angel im so happy he's here!!! he's a loyal guy from what i remember and ill def be working with him ESPECIALLY now that hes the first hoh ayyyyY!!!! i feel completely safe with him

kiki: oh i LOVE THEMMMM we had a great connection from the jump and i have a soft spot for them for sure. theyre sadly nominated this week i did not know why jev made that decision but i will make sure they stay know THAT

monty: monty left me on read :( we had a kinda awk convo so idk how monty feels about me right now?? i def dont think he trusts me and ugh i hate the tension!!!!!!!! i hope we can resolve it all and be friends again

josh: KDJKFG i love this man... hes not entire truthful and is def playing me a bit but i think he's great and hopefully he doesnt turn out to be the snake i think he has the potential to be

gina: idk what to think of this girl she doesn't reply much to me and we haven't really spoken much for me to really get a good read of her. i infected her and idk if she'll take that a certain way i came to her with the explanation that we just havent talked as much. idk shes fine?

mo: hahhaha hes a cutie too and i think hes not much of a talker so i think hes nice for the most part it's just kinda hard talking to him sometimes

brianna: um....... yeah we haven't spoken yet and she infected me so idk how to feel about her yet. she claims it was this number system but do i fully believe thats what she based it on? not really.. so ill def have to talk to her more

aria: NOW THIS........ THIS IS ELEGANCE. THIS IS CLASS. THIS IS EXPENSIVE. THIS IS TASTE, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN! this 15 year old girl has me shaking to my god damn core with her social game within a 20 minute conversation ive already devoted my entire game to her and our "attention whores" alliance. iM GAGGGEDDDD i really like her and i know shes a big threat but if shes with me then we can do some damage together hehe

skinny nick: SKINNYYYYY i dont have much to say about nick i think they're well connected in this game so i have to make sure i'm good with them a little more. our convos are a little dry hopefully that'll change as the game goes on

jacob: a sweetie.. i really like jacob as a person but as a player he scares the shit out of me DSLKFGFKJ he lied to me like every round in BBHOS9 so i dont rly know if i can trust him. he def has other friends in this community hes playing with so ill have to sus out who exactly that is...

and......... yeah! kiki and nash are nommed. gina n jacob went to the down under. i think jacob will def get whatever power is down there he is one lucky man so i wouldn't be surprised if it's something good. oh well hopefully when i go i get whatever the best thing is a dpov mayhaps!.......

i hope the next hoh is something i can win because i want these people to TALK TO MEEEE tell me where their heads are at for god's sake! me on day 2: why arent you telling me all your alliances? dFGKLF i feel like im okay just gotta talk to some said people more and try to make sure they dont hate me!

JOSHUA

I thought Jev was nice but I'll have to go back on that because he absolutely is not fooling a single person, I thought we'd be allies but he's been acting sus all day so he can choke on rat piss. Joey and nick literally aren't talking to me at awl so... they can choke and die too. Aria is talking to me a lot but I know she talks to everyone a lot sjdkjds queen of big brother pasio... but I trust her for now I guess. Other than that I'm not super like concerned with anyone else I mean brianna kiki gina mo are nice I guess.. mo is a little hard to talk to though so :( anyway glad to be here but my social is kind of rocky skjdjskdj : ( ( ( ( ( 

JEV

SKINNY NICK

https://youtu.be/0Kb-twzCkYI

MO

trying to hint to dem that I’m not okay... wonder if it’s working

ARIA

its week one. its week ONE. why is everyone being so cracked i hate it here i absolutely hate it here someone take me out with a sniper rifle im sick of this, but its fine im gonna try to do my best to explain EVERYTHING bc whew is there a lot..

First off lets start with the fact ive been talking with everyone from the moment i woke up and my fingers hurt so much but also now people like me and thats all i need in life so heck yes!! So when it was nash vs kiki i start planting seeds to keep kiki with people and then nash wins veto so thats thrown out the window yayyyy- 

Things start happening after jev renoms Mo. First off i get a call with crack kills (joey bri me) and we discuss the vote a little bit with Joey leaning towards keeping Mo and Me/Bri wanting to keep Kiki, joey leaves and me and bri talk about the alliance we were invited to (jacob josh jake kiki us) and then i notice theres a house vc which i then go and join alone.

It was silent for a bit before they mentioned they were talking about votes and were being kinda secretive about names but i asked directly so Mo tells me that dem told him that there was 5 confirmed votes against Mo (nash Jacob Nick Joshua/Jacob(dont remember which) and Josh c) he said the names really fast so i mightve missed a few and nathan interjects about my notes and like??? shut up nathan???? anyways i act all shook about an alliance and we talk about votes and apparently when mo campaigned to bri she just sent "hugs" and im caCKLIGN FDSGFDSH anyways that confirmed 5 votes is gonna make people nervous and cause people to keep Mo which like, im not totally against but i just want a unan vote please. Also i think dem & emma dont really trust me which is big ughhh idk if one of the pregame girlies (any of the names from that list) win hoh next week ill throw one of them utb easy peasy 

So then i start asking around to gina and she ghosts me??? gina NEVER ghosts me so im sketched out there and Mo is asking for my help when i already told kiki i would save her its such a messsss. So if i had to guess the sides i would say 

PREGAME GIRLIES: Nash Jacob Jake Joshua Josh c kiki

UNCONNECTED NOT PROTECTED: Dem Joey Emma Nathan Mo

Whomst: Saira Jev Monty Nick Gina Bri

Help: Aria

So, where do i go from here? How do i make sure this vote comes out hecking even,,, im not sure. nvm i am sure because Mo just told me they want to give up HFBHJBSDFS MO MY SAVIOR ILL NEVER FORGET YOU KING <<<<3333333 okay nvm hes not fully giving up but im giving him an avenue that would make my life much easier where im telling him to have good convos with people so they connect more and if anyone feels moved theyll come to me and ill get the ball rolling with a easy peasy unan vote hopefully. But i think i might be able to manipulate this situation to my advantage WHEW im hyped now!!

So lets say mo leaves the thought of those "five confirmed votes" is still gonna be in peoples heads mainly dem/joey/emma/nathan which might form into a side and go hard for hoh taking out some big social player and then we have two sides going after each other which would be cute.

I would make trust rankings but i trust no one fbhsafd and thats on pewiod

JAKE

WHEW!!!!!!!!!!! im not the first boot :~) let's celebrate that.... 

but i'm not too thrilled about these noms...... im happy nash won POV she started talking to me more and shes actually really cool so i wanted her to stay. i am sad kiki is nominated i don't want them to go at all..... and mo being the replacement nominee was a shock to everyone i think..... 

i don't have a problem with mo leaving cuz we have a weak connection i just thought dem was going up based on my prior conversations with jev. he says dem started talking to him more but i just wish jev would talk to me and emma about his decisions if we're "aligned"?? like whats the point of having an alliance if we don't have any say in your decisions?

today i woke up to a message from josh asking me what i think about being in an alliance with jacob brianna aria and kiki........ and im just like wtf where this come from and he said that jacob is making it and its just his fave ppl??? im like ok like im not one to turn down an alliance but i let him know that i dont rly trust jacob n brianna as much as the others in the alliance. hopefully this makes him feel close to me and not blab his mouth to jacob ab that! 

brianna has yet to speak to me and jacob is just someone im always gonna have a hard time trusting sooo if i have to nominate them down the line i won't hesitate unless this alliance is genuine and helping me in the game.

i really only trust emma so far with aria being my secret spy and big meat shield im gonna need in this game. aria's super well connected and im hoping she'll be able to provide me w the information i need to take bitches down later on. 

i think i'd be worried about brianna winning bc we've never talked but at least we have this alliance possibly in the works?? and i dont know if nick would nominate me we haven't talked much..

but i want to win the next hoh so people actually talk to me LOL praying i can win

[lilietsblog]

Strike Witches episode 1: first impression

so im gonna try strike witches: the unknown anime i chose to not familiarize myself with the premise beyond 'something like fighter pilots i think?' that i picked up by osmosis

oh hey look a discarded doll. def war is hell vibes here

cant say im a fan of the visuals from the first several seconds, the color scheme and everything seems kinda bland? the only reason im making this observation is bc i had to pause to let it load tho

oh look Very Noticable CGI

(i have a headache and am vaguely nauseous and basically am Very Cranky as a result)

man, there aren't even characters yet. it's been almost two minuets and there still aren't people for me to relate too that's a crime by which i dont mean that literally but just 'this might not be the thing i want to watch right now'

oh hey monsters okay this is better than just straight up war is hell between humans omfg in 1939 subtle 'we wanna play with ww2 era toys but without bringing up the fact japan was on the side of nazi germany' i assume sure im onboard if thats the premise

magitech??? magitech!!!

that's. their legs. in those things. are they evoking Baba Yaga and her travels in a stupa bc thats okay panty shots i think imma quit at the end of this episode

oh i. just realized this is the movie that actually makes it a bit better and gives me more hope lets try the actual first episode first

ok the first shot is of the sky and not a discarded doll that's already better

holy shit whatever this video player is it allows to load external captions from pc or url. technology progresses at an incredible pace

i love that the fighter planes are clearly shown attacking the vortex first 9u9

opening has so many girls wearing shoes but no pants. im just. this entire device's entire point is clearly to fanservice that does not mean this is bad character-wise yet ofc. i watched and liked fucking rosario+vampire. this show has a chance yet. lets see what its got

the op song is nice its also very straightforward about aesthetic of this show being 'girls without pants in absolutely non-sexual situaitons' and i can respect that

and oh look it actually does start with characters interacting right after exposition that's what im talking about

okay so now might be a good time to mention that the first context i heard of strike witches was uh. misogynist porn. like the kind that doesnt go for 'look at these relatable characters being kinky' but for 'consider: what if powerful girls got hurt instead'. so thats the context in my brain and i want to fucking overwrite it

military uniforms+panties are definitely an aesthetic and im incredibly amused by it okay every single girl here doesnt wear pants sure that actually looks like a swimsuit rather than panties and thats nice

also they are characterizing the protagonist! like i know thats not much to ask for but im going into this straight off blogging about madoka and this is just such a relief! she is kind and brave and plucky and talks gently to a scared kitten and I love her also she Does Not Think Things Through shes like the typical shonen protagonist but a girl. im in

Yoshika her name is Yoshika

and her motivation is her dad but eh sure whatever I kind of like the touch of 'it was classified military information' not sure why

theres nothing about Yoshika that qualifies her other than her personality and magic powers huh

yep thats a swimsuit aww shes a healer!

I love that the military observers rush to help as soon as they see something is off theres work and then theres helping emergencies

oh!!!! her mom and grandma are around!!! and teaching her!!! im happy!!!

Yoshika why is all that a 'but' to 'you should learn to control your power' i dont think there was any subtext of 'you shouldnt even try' there? or was it? maybe i should just trust her for now

awww Yoshika actually doesn't want to go to war <3 but this woman thinks she will because she wants to help people and she'll help people the most there I I like this ;~; I'm so happy I like this I love Yoshika's 'fuck war' instinct I love her drive to help everyone and in fact the trope of magical healer almost killing themselves to help a patient (despite it being professionally inadvisable) is actually the thing i made my very first rp character sooo :> you know. stuff something is fishy about that letter. its no coincidence it was sent just now... I love Sakamoto and her A+ social skills HA HA HA HA HA also huh... she's not in on whatever's up with that letter

Yoshika so uh alright she'll take her without enlisting her huh interesting but uh what about school I guess military and witches can override all that and it kind of makes sense to me thematically

'Britannia' gee how familiar that name sounds and i dont mean geographically

so hm could Yoshika be a military doctor without actually enlisting? how do the formalities work there i like that Sakamoto doesnt question her dislike of all things military like its unexpected but mostly bc Sakamoto's got a one track mind that has a hard time expecting anything other than what she wants to happen and beyond that its like 'sure ok a conscientous objector got it' even though its weird how there would be conscientous objectors to fighting MONSTERS its not like theres an alternative to not fight I mean also clearly Yoshika is a kid and theres room left for that in other characters' treatment of her opinions and I love that they dont get Offended that she doesn't understand and Have Proper Respect well Sakamoto doesn't at least not sure about how other people will react

man that raccoon on the road sure was convenient though. like i first thought it was Sakamoto's deliberate tactic to gauge Yoshiko's powers. she was opening her eye to i guess do just that visually and then the raccoon appeared and it just felt very natural that one follows from the other? is this foreshadowing or are the writers of this anime just unfamiliar with the concept of 'subtle' i dont mind if its the latter tbh

(im writing a ton of reflection bc the episode broke after i tried to rewind a little and i decided to download it after all, and its doing that)

so far, this show seeems nicely straightforward and fast paced. like, really straightforward. yoshiko's introduction? saving a kitten. making a ww2 era anime without difficult shit? monsters attacked in 1939. motivations and revelations are handled with all the subtlety of a hammer to the face, from the raccoon to the letter. even fanservice has the same charming quality that makes me actually be okay with the entire point of their outfits being gratuitous panty shots. making sense and having pretense is for the weak. this anime knows what it wants to be and is going straight for that. i respect that approach

also its p clear that what it wants is to be character driven and its been Delivering on that since its only half episode one and i already Love two characters personally and also some supporting cast (Yoshiko's entire family)

and like you know that in some other show GASP MIGHT MY DAD BE STILL ALIVE would be a reveal saved for like. the halfway point. but here its literally the starting point spurring everything into action bc all other motivation was just too slow to get the character where she was supposed to go. good job yo

there's this trope where the main character doesn't want to go into the main conflict (Refusal of the Call)... and very often it's handled by either 1) letting them wallow until everything goes to shit showing how wrong they were or 2) immediately conveniently wrecking everything so they have no choice now I uh. am really glad this show went a different way if just joining the conflict isnt a good enough motivation GET A BETTER ONE and IT DOESNT HAVE TO BE ANGST (and it doesn't have to be romance, either!!! why are those two the only things writers seem to be able to think of jfc)

...okay I was more like two thirds through the episode rather than half but my points stand

okay so I think what just happened was Yoshiko realized the parallel between herself and her dad leaving and got scared and her response was to comfort other people and I love that <3

I love that Sakamoto doesn't have a doubt in her mind that Yoshiko isn't going to be useless and will definitely help and also comes to her to discuss this explicitly <3

man I love Sakamoto and her absolute lack of social graces and sense of when enough is enough

and the fact that Yoshiko is working chores now and seems to enjoy it too <3

and it's when it's established that she's part of the team that Sakamoto starts showing off <3 she clearly has a dedicated well thought out campaign of convincing Yoshiko going on and its borne out not of manipulation but of clear conviction that she is right and she just has to show the girl what she doesnt know yet <3

ahaha of course showing off worked <3

so I paused and imma make a bet with myself on whether Sakamoto is going to tell her 'if you liked that you can join' right now or leave that unsaid subtly my bet is that she is, bc subtlety is an entirely foreign concept to this wonderful human being, and if i lose im going to make my bed right now not even waiting for the end of the episode let's see

oh she starts with education huh, this is not widely known? i had no idea anyway lets see if she says the thing

I love that it's her dad and it's this kind thing of 'this is what he said he was going to do, and he did' <3

huh so that was slightly more subtlety than I expected, she offered her to try them rather than trying to recruit her directly so I lost the bet gotta go make the bed now

BAM DONE YAY GOOD SELF CARE

hey more main characters!!!! I love all of you already!!! you have personality and discuss things that make sense!!! including their outfits!!! I love them!!!! the parasol girl is my favorite but also the tiny girl and the red-haired girl they are all my favorites!!!

omfg a month of travel and half a day early Yoshiko gets impatient I love her

YOU ARE A NONCOMBATANT she said with the steely confidence of a commanding officer <3

I love so much that Sakamoto respects Yoshiko's boundaries re: fighting???

OMG THE ENDING SONG I LOVE IT

I love the upbeat and airy tone this show manages to have despite the premise??? like I had trepidations at the start bc I dislike doom&gloom-heaviness of 'war is hell' narratives and I'm not a WW2 affictionado. but instead of shiny boom boom toys and angst it's all character adorableness and so much sky??? even the lack of pants ends up feeling like freedom this is the anime we all deserve