#i dunno i think this whole thing is kinda iffy

[gamebunny-advance]

Oh yeah, the Punnet Squares

I never did tell y'all what that was about.

I mostly gave up on it after I realized that I didn't know wtf I was doing, but maybe y'all can run with it anyway.

Basically, I was trying to map out how skin color might be inherited in the NSR universe. I'll put the full document I wrote below the cut, but I don't necessarily believe anything in it at this time.

NSR Genes Headcanon

Skin color -Primary colors (reds, yellows, blues) are dominant over secondary colors (oranges, greens, purples). However, the gene which causes the specific hue is caused by something else, and no specific hue appears to have dominance over the other outside the primary and secondary split.

Unsaturated skin tones (black, white, and grays) are usually actually just tints and shades of a saturated color, and purely unsaturated skin is very rare and tends to be caused by a mutation.

However, primary color skin actually have incomplete dominant genes, so it is possible for people who have heterozygous genotypes to result in secondary or tertiary color children.

So, a child from like-color parents are most likely to also be a like color, but depending on the parents' genetics, it is possible for the child to have different colored skin.

For example, two green parents are likely to have a green child no matter what their genes are, but a yellow or blue child is possible if one or both of parents have heterozygous genes.

If both parents have recessive traits and at least one of them has heterozygous genotypes, then the child has the possibility of sharing either parent's skin color, or the primary color shared between both parents.

For example, the child of a purple and green parent as a chance of being blue.

This is vice versa if both parents have dominant traits.

For example, the child of a red and yellow parent has a chance of being orange.

If the parents are complimentary colors (red and green, blue and orange, yellow and purple), then depending on the parents' genes, the child could potentially be any color.

For example, if a Red parent with a Green partner both have heterozygous genotypes (Hh x Hh) or both have homozygous genotypes (HH x hh), then the child could be any color due to every combination being possible, and every color having an equal chance of appearing against each other.

- But, if the Red parent has heterozygous genotypes while the Green partner has Homozygous recessive genotypes (Hh x hh), then the child could be either red or green. Remember that the gene only determines the likelihood of the color being primary or secondary. The hue is independently determined by other factors. So, in this case since red and green are complimentary and thus cannot mix into a primary or secondary color, if the child gets the Hh gene, it can only be red or green.

Mutations -Very rarely, a child may be born with split-color skin (Example: Nadia/Eve). It is more common to see this when the parents have different skin colors, but it is possible for it to appear even when the parents have the same skin color.

Children of mix-color parents also have a higher chance of developing birthmarks in any other color possible in their genes.

Hair color

Hair color works a little differently than skin color: rather than being determined by the color of their parent's hair, hair color is determined by skin color.

It is dominant for the hair color to be similar or analogous to skin color, while it is recessive to be complimentary.

For example, it is more common for a red person to have red hair, and an orange person to have yellow hair, but it is less common for a red person to have green hair and a purple person to have yellow hair.

Skin Color: Alternate Explanation

Children tend to share their parents' skin tone. If both parents have similarly colored skin, then the child is likely to have the same color.

If both parents have differently colored skin, then the child could have either parents' skin color, or a mix. -For example, a red parent with a yellow partner could have a red, yellow, or orange child.

If the parents are analogous colors, then the child has a chance of being a tertiary color. -For example, a blue parent with a purple partner could have blue, purple, or blue-purple child.

If the parents are both different secondary colors (orange, green, or purple), then the child also has a chance of being the primary color shared between both parents. -For example, an orange parent with a purple partner could have a red child just as well as orange or purple.

If the parents are complimentary colors (red and green, yellow and purple, or blue and orange), then the child could potentially be any color, but is much more likely to share either parent's color.

Unsaturated skin colors (black, white, and grays) are also possible but are extremely rare due to these skin colors being recessive to every other color. It is more likely for a person to actually be a shade or tint of a saturated color than it is to be truly unsaturated.

In general, birthmarks/freckles tend to appear as a shade or tint of a person's skin color, but they can appear in completely different colors too. The latter is more common in people with mixed parents, where the birthmark can be either parents' color or the parents' mixed or shared color. For example, the child of red and yellow parents could have an orange birthmark and the child of a green and purple parent could have a blue birthmark. Rarely, a birthmark can be a color not outwardly present in either parent. For example, the red child of two red parents could have a blue birthmark due to one or both of the parents having genes for blue skin. Split color skin is just another form of birthmark, though it is much more rare than smaller birthmarks.

[kozykricket]

about to watch Roize Rasens new video on how he thinks PL Z-A will play out in terms of gameplay and such (he made videos analyzing terapagos and such, and i think his lines of thought are interesting and adjacent to mine)

but before i actually watch it, i want to propose some of my thoughts of what i feel confident in and what im uncertain about, in terms of the plot and gameplay we know the game takes place basically entirely within lumiose city, and... that its a redevelopment after the war. thats common consensus at this point. lumiose is kinda in a poor state, but they have a grand plan to make it better than its ever been. but ive noticed the allusion to like, developing a city for both people AND pokemon, and i think they're really gonna be going into the theming of urbanization, considering zygardes whole thing is the balance of the ecosystem. so like, im imagining... maybe zygarde gets angry and ends up being the driving force for creating a greater lumiose for the present/future of kalos, one where neither life nor death exists too much for either people or pokemon. I think it might be the case of like, okay... heres some people who are the Evil Guys (they're just city planners who argue in favour of taking up more space for people, maybe because they're still a bit iffy on pokemon in this age) but we stand with a small group of people who want to see pokemon have places to live as they do now. i think it'd be really neat if the progression involves -convince the bad people to not over-urbanize -start developing an area -that area is now transformed into something nice, and. well maybe one of the bad people in denial tries to fight us and stop us i could see the plot actually... hm, i just thought this up as im writing this. what if they actually know about zygarde and its desire to balance the ecosystem, so they... are the reason that its cells are all scattered? what if our goal is to be helping rebuild zygarde in a sense, so that it can bring justice and balance to lumiose and the world? because like. zygardes whole thing in gameplay is having its forms based on the amount of cells that are together. maybe they end up like, corrupting parts of zygarde even. or something. i dunno, it could be neat but yeah i think we'll see why lumiose city in the modern day can be a lovely place for people and pokemon, and see how... it was on a course towards becoming not pokemon-friendly. maybe we just have to stop this all because it enrages zygarde in the future, and we're time traveling again. i dunno, hoopa? hoopa involved? my wildest dream would be that the game takes place in both past and present/future, and we get to see the future timeline change completely based on the changes we make in the past. like, we see some dystopian as hell city that has pollution, no place for pokemon, actively harmful. but then after changing some decisions in the redevelopment, when visiting the future we can then see... its not AS bad. but it still isnt quite balanced. might not be polluting as much, but it doesnt really permit pokemon or something. and we keep doing that until we fulfill the balance ....where do xerneas/yveltal fit into this though? you think it'd be easy to theorize but. i dunno. if anyone has thoughts on how they could work... like, if we pull a PLA, then they could easily swap roles and it'd play out pretty much the same. and we can catch both. but what if maybe they DO play separate roles and- hm i dunno. anyways time to watch!

[twigstarpikachutroll22]

Finally making a post with my thoughts on Trolls: Band Together

I’m. Not too excited for this one.

The whole premise of Branch having brothers we didn’t know about (and them having been a boy band), I’m a little iffy on that whole idea. The “surprise, he secretly had long-lost siblings” thing seems unnecessary to me, like, did we really need this? I don’t think we did. And the boy band thing...I dunno, there were a couple of good jokes out of it in the trailer, but boy bands are not really my cup of tea, and I can’t tell how much the ridiculousness of it is just the franchise’s typical goofy fun and how much it’s just kinda stupid. The whole premise just feels like we really could’ve done without it.

I don’t think they’re definitely not gonna execute it well at all. I’ve heard that a major thing in the storyline is going to be seriously addressing at least some of the not-great Implications this has related to Branch’s whole backstory, and I won’t say I have zero hope that they can do that well. But I’m really not sure.

I also hope to heck that they won’t majorly mischaracterize Poppy and Branch or try to cram too much into this movie like they did with Trolls World Tour. Both of those seem possible.

And as to broppy, since I know that’s (too much of) this fandom’s main concern always: 

I’ll say it plain, the “let’s get married!” part of the trailer was the most upsetting part of it for me by far. I don’t want them to get married or engaged in this movie.

And I say that as somecreature who loves broppy as a ship with my entire heart. This is just ENTIRELY too soon for marriage to seriously come up for them. They JUST got together as a romantic couple at the end of TWT. I haven’t watched much of Trollstopia but from what I have seen it didn’t seem like Trollstopia did anything with their romantic relationship, and Trolls: Holiday in Harmony dealt in them just beginning to figure out the whole being-a-couple thing. This seems like an unpopular opinion in this fandom, but I firmly believe we’d need to see a LOT more of them as a couple before marriage gets brought up. We’d need to see a lot more development of their relationship. We absolutely cannot just go from “new couple still settling into and figuring out the workings of being a couple” to “about to get married” just like that.

The only way I could see that moment in the trailers being handled well is A) if it’s actually just a one-time thing and the concept of broppy getting married never comes up again, or B) they end up discussing it and deciding One Day But Not Yet. I will hope with everything in me for one of those to happen, but I don’t have a whole lot of faith.

I won’t say that I’m definitely gonna skip this movie. I do kind of want to see if against the odds they do manage to pull off this premise and the things they want to do with it to some degree or another. And there undoubtably will be good songs and at least a few good jokes. I do think it’s possible this movie might be good. I do think it’s possible there’ll be at least some things I might love about it.

But I don’t think it’s very likely that I will love everything about it all around. And I think there’s a very solid possibility that for the most part it actually will just be straight-up dog crap. I have many, many doubts.

[monards]

I dunno about the whole "looks down on humans" I feel like if anything she would be extremely prideful of being human?? Like she looks down on Celestia and the gods for sure, and yeah she likes dragons, but her achievements as a human are kinda what makes them impressive?

omg hhi ursanic!!!

Looking back at it now, think the ‘looking down on humans’ thing is probably about nibelung instead,, since considering he’s mentioned in that same paragraph (and translation is always a tad iffy) , plus there’s an extremely abundantly common theme of sovereigns not being the BIGGEST fans of humanity,,,, (*cough cough* apep *cough cough*)

she probably IS prideful of being a human like you said,, but if it ends up being the other case; It’s (probably) more so about the fact humans were canonically made by celestia (via the shade of life) and it’s probably not fun knowing you’re still the ‘product’ of a god (hence why she’s making all her messed up kids to take gods out of the equation. probably. maybe. perhaps. perchance)

[yurideification]

Okay. Okay that was like. Pretty good. The handmaiden is a solid 7/10 for me. Maybe 7.5/10. I've watched way too few movies in my life so I don't exactly have a ton to compare it to bit in terms of enjoyment uuuh. Above eeaao. Below mean girls, below but I'm a cheerleader. Below knives out but above glass onion. Does that mean anything? No but feel free to psychoanalyze my taste in movies based on it anyways. Below Click! (2006). Some scenes near the middle dragged on for way too long but it took me until the credits started rolling to realize that I was watching the extended cut. Normal version probably has slightly better pacing. Not a huge fan of how there were like 4 separate plot twists in the second half of the movie and how it was basically impossible to predict how it'd end even with like 20 minutes left. In general the second half kinda felt like a whole different thing than the first. Which like, it was, like literally the movie is divided into 3 parts and the 1st part ends about halfway through. But still? I dunno. More i think about it the more iffy I get. But like I liked it, genuinely. Ending was good too. Even if there's a bit of it I still don't fully understand despite thinking about it. But like it's fine. I'd probably recommend it to anyone who asked. Good movie 👍

[drac-onion]

Back at it again. A year since I posted Beneath Her Mask. Same thing as last time. Fun facts or just looking back at something I done did write once upon a time exactly a year ago.

This is going to be very "stream of consciousness" and probably hard to read, but here goes.

First off, wow that title sucks. I came up with it like right before posting and then rolled with it. Nowadays I would put off uploading something for MONTHS if I couldn't figure out an original and interesting title. Oops.

Anyway, this one is a lot better than the last one. Promise. The whole thing is a little bit iffy still, but I was very new. The formatting is the main issue I have with. The concept is...fine, although I think I could have gone a little bit further with and then lead into where this one starts. Ya know, inform the reader as to the situation that lead to Makoto's desire to keep everything to herself? But I kinda made it ambiguous on purpose. Good thing I didn't have to follow up on this a few months later... Oh wait. The stakes were just: awkward. No gay panic (like the tags say, oops), no internalized anything, no worries over team cohesion with members of the PTs dating, none of that. If I would ever go back and rewrite this (don't fucking tempt me) I would definitely expand on things a lot more. But hey, I probably shouldn't try and go back and fix all my old stuff. I'd never get anything done otherwise.

Oh yeah, Makoto's "113 decibel alarm clock" is a real thing. I actually have one. I sleep through every other alarm clock out there. The thing is so good, it will actually scare you awake. Pretty nice. (If probably a little too loud for apartment living in Japan where the walls are very thin.)

Oh yeah, and the tense a few times. Annoying.

I dunno why I made it three chapters. It's just over 3.5k words. That would have been fine to keep as a single chapter one-shot, but I think I just had a hard time with having scenes switch mid-chapter. Chapters are a good way to signal a scene switch, but nowadays I'll just use a line break and go with it. I've just improved as a writer, I think, and so now my old mistakes bug the shit out of me.

If I named all the issues I had, I'd be here all day. So, what did I get right with this? I think the concept is alright. The dialogue is good at points. The scene in Leblanc is pretty good. Good guy Sojiro being cool with lesbians (very cool of him). And the text convos at the end are also pretty okay. The "out of your league" comment still gets me for some reason. It's kinda funny.

Also I made a custom dialogue option for Akira, referencing the very first thing he says at the beginning of the story. I think it turned out okay. (I'd like to do more art/edits relevant to my writing. I've thought about making cover/chapter art for my current project. I guess we'll see how I'm feeling. A little wattpad-y of me, but it'd be interesting.)

I'm just now realizing that I should've made the "third option" a little cheeky. Maybe something like "Come here often?" or whatever. Ah well. Next time.

So, overall? It's an improvement. It's not perfect, but it was the second thing I'd ever written. (Once again, I don't count the RE one. I should probably anon it tbh.)

Anyway, that was something. The next "retrospective" (I guess that's what these are now) will be on Beneath Their Masks.

That one is a doozy, and I think I'm going to have a decent amount to say about it. It's also really long, so that's also a thing I'm gonna have to worry about. I'll probably do that on 10/1 because that's when I posted the first chapter. Maybe I'll have enough time to write up mini retrospectives for each chapter? And then post those throughout October? That could be interesting. And tiring. But still, interesting. I could pull the original upload dates since I made a tumblr in between ACIFT and BHM. Although those are going to be VERY spaced out, especially near the end. So much for doing a month's worth of prompts WITHIN the month. But I'll save all my whining for when those go up.

Also, shoutouts again to my beta at the time, @makomaki5. I hope you're doing well.

Anyway, I think that's about it. See ya.

[republictrooper]

TOMORROW AND TOMORROW AND TOMORROW

Didnt get a chance to watch Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow until tonight for various reasons, so pardon my late review!

Anyway, for the 2nd week in a row we get that most classic of Trekisms - a really flimsy metaphor for something presented in a way that's kind of insulting if you think about for more than a minute, but this time, also wrapped in some absolutely top tier character torture porn (complimentary)!

Like, the metaphors get a bit tiring and insulting, but... it's nice to have a Star Trek that's doing them again in a way we havent seen since DS9 and Voyager.

Anyway, Viewing Notes:

Who kept my sweet sweet spock from playing the music of his soul? WHO ARE THEY I JUST WANT TO TALK

(also damn starfleet couldnt spring for the noise dampening walls?)

Poor M'Benga. You tried ;_;

"You don't have to bear this alone" OH DOESN'T SHE?????????????

Kinda funny (as in sad funny) M'Benga said that too, since I think he STILL hasn't been able to reveal that he was smuggling Rukiya for years, even if Una eventually found out and agreed to keep his secret.

NGL, Exasperated Kirk in the Alleyway kinda had me laughing a bit. To say nothing of the clothing scene. And the Chess Scene. And the Hot Dog scene. As much as I didnt want to like La'an/Kirk, this is a pretty classic screwball romance setup and I am a SUCKER for those. So. Fine. You got me. I kinda sorta ship it.

Oooo, so THAT'S why this Kirk says he's from Space. Oof. There's a kicker.

I gotta say, New Kirk is making a believer out of me. He's not Shatner at all, which I think he doesn't need to be, but even in this "Earth is kinda Xenophobic" AU, he has that kind of quiet confidence and latent nerdiness of classic TOS Kirk. He's got the sassiness (That little one of us has got to change look he gave to Laan and the Heck yeah I'll just hustle people at chess for money thing) combined with the chivalry (Immediately changing so La'an can have her preferred outfit, charming the people he vanquished at chess with a handshake and a smile) that really works for me.

"Get to the Bridge" oh my gosh SNEAKY AS THE DICKENS.

Pelia remains an absolute delight in every appearance. I kinda love how she just... wasnt a great engineer though? Why would she be? She's immortal, but she's also just a person trying to survive, and she has hundreds of years to live! We need more Immortals who are just this guy (gender neutral), to be honest. Why would she have kept up on engineering stuff for a few hundred years? That would probably get boring! Hell, maybe that's why Scotty replaces her, she gets bored of engineering and decides to try something else! It makes perfect since she didnt learn it yet!

Aaaaand now we get the part I'm not sure I like: What if you went back in time to Defend Baby Hitler from the people who came back in time to kill him, because if you didnt, the future would be worse? Also it's implied Baby Hitler is being, if not actively tortured, at least definitely imprisoned against his will and separated from his friends and family.

I mean... Listen, I get Khan is fictional, as are the eugenics wars, but the metaphor is... I dunno man, the comparison is there and it's kind of iffy, and I while I understand how it kind of adds more dimensions to La'an's struggle with her ancestry, the whole "Millions of people have to suffer and die because thats the way the timeline has to be" sticks in my craw. It'd be like if Past Tense made the twist that the DS9 crew had to kill Gabriel Bell instead of impersonating him at the right moments. I just don't think this was the right story to tell.

I think I can kinda deal with it because you know, this is Star Trek. But gosh, this will not replace Past Tense as my favorite Star Trek time travel story any time soon, no matter how charming Alternate Kirk was.

Sera's rant about the timeline is interesting. One one hand, the clever little "Timeline reasserting itself" to explain plot holes like that Time Voyager travelled back to the 90s and there was no sign of Eugenics Wars was kinda fun, but on the other hand, it smacks of the same kind of overexplaining I disliked with having M'Benga introduce Spock to the harp. Sometimes its enough that Spock plays the Harp! Sometimes its enough that when a single universe lasts for half a century and is written by hundreds of people over multiple series and mediums, little continuity errors slip in!

(nitpick time: You're telling me she cant at least talk to Pelia about this? If they "fixed" things and this is her timeline Pelia should remember her, right? Hell, they outright implied La'an's visit was the reason she became an engineer in the first place! Maybe she mentioned the bunker in Vermont specifically so La'an would know to go meet her there whenever the time travel happened, and threw in the "That painting is a Fake" because she remembered talking about it with La'an! TALK TO PELIA, LA'AN!). I suppose the idea might be that Pelia doesn't know exactly why La'an was in the past and cant be allowed to know more, but. Ugh.

Cuz like, listen, I know the dramatic weight requires La'an not to talk to anyone, but like. The Temporal police dont employ any counselors? If they're saving Mass Murderers from assassination on the reg, La'an can't be the first temporal agent to have mental health issues over that, even as a temporary recruit pressganged into service to save her own ancestor. And it's not like Pike could change anything if she told him, that stuff happened IN THE PAST!

BASICALLY LA'AN IS SUFFERING AND SHE DESERVES SOME COMFORT COME ON I EXPECT BETTER FROM STARFLEET EVEN THE DUMBASS SECRETIVE TIME POLICE DIVISION

Like gosh, that lady was ice cold i think even if Alt!Kirk had survived and hopped a ride over on that little device she would have killed him just to preserve the timeline or some shit.

I dunno. Time travel stuff. Ugh.

Anyway, OK Episode, I loved alternate Kirk, loved La'an and Kirk's shenanigans in modern Toronto/Vermont before things got real, kinda shipped La'an/Kirk in spite of myself, and the temporal intrigue was... intriguing, but "Let's Save Baby Hitler" left a sour taste in my mouth. On to the next Ep!

[kaoarika]

I have been rereading Orange for the sake of completion, now that I was able to get vol 6 and 7, the "Mirai" sequel series (?).

It's been a while since I originally read the manga and watched the anime (wow, latter half of the 2010s? 2015? 2016?), and I still think it's a cute series with an interesting premise based on time and space and parallel worlds and the like, just to save a dear friend of the main cast, who is in a depression spiral due to the death of his mother.

As always, it's not a flawless series and I agree that stuff like the science behind time travel shouldn't have been 100% explained (because it sometimes crumbs over itself), but it's one of those things that make you think, I guess. In fact, re-reading the series I had this feeling of "man, I wish I could re-read the manga again for the first time all over again so I can be mindblown by the "time travelling" thing element of the letters.

I never really understood why the series was discontinued from Betsuma (Shueisha) and moved onto Monthly Action (Futabasha), but I'm 100% I wouldn't be laughing it off as Takano did on the afterwords segment of volume one, I think? I do remember that the series had a couple of hiatus during its brief tenure on Betsuma, so there's probably more behind the scenes stuff we do not know than throwing a "I had a romantic relationship with one of the editors at Futabasha, so..." line. I also like the covers of the Shueisha edition, but I'm not really excited to find out how expensive they might get on the 2nd hand market due to the popularity of the series, lol. I just think they are neat (and iirc, they had a similar graphic design work like those for Ikuemi Ryo's Principal series, also first released around the same time?).

I like all the characters, but somehow I wished it did more for Hagita, Takako, and Azusa. Sure, things here and there show how these characters are (and Takano is obvious how much love she had for Hagita and the whole Hagita and Azusa dynamics on her twitter account(s)), but they tend to get overshadowed by Naho, Kakeru... and sometimes even Suwa (and their love triangle, ngl), who are more "main" characters than the whole group of friends. I mean, both vol 6 and 7 are more on the POVs of both Suwa (original future setting) and Kakeru (new/parallel future setting?), so make that as you will.

I love Suwa... and I always felt a little iffy when reading stuff like "they did Suwa SO wrong" when I was always on the mind state that "it's not like the original Suwa hasn't been erased and he has his own happy marriage and happy family ending"... although there's still the baggage under what kind of circumstance he got THAT happy ending... as I have been finding out with vol 6 and the "Mirai" one shot. Oh, boy...

So... I do have a small grievance about "Mirai" as a whole, however. I understand that, narratively, using the classic "switch reveal" with the older group of friends using the exact same outfits as their original/pre-parallel world is kind of the point to reveal "oh, so these are 'our' charas and not the original future-setting ones"... but, I mean... this series already explores the whole setting idea of "we changed the future!" and somewhat I'm expecting the author to commit to the bit even in this new future setting?

Again, I haven't read vol 7 (which is Kakeru's POV after the original manga's ending), and I would understand that this is also a byproduct of a "dream" that Suwa and Naho had at the end of "Mirai" (this silly idea that sometimes dreams are like "alternate universes, parallel worlds" of our own), but... I dunno... make them use different outfits? maybe different hairstyles? to make a point this is a different future from the original one?

The one that kinda hurts related to this is that I also completely understand that Suwa and Naho had a child in the original timeline setting... so I find it a little... unfair? that Haru (Naho's and Kakeru's son) still somewhat looks similar to Naho's and Suwa's child? when you could have played a little on making "similar things, but still different" from their respective futures, like making Haru a little older or maybe younger than the other child (which we don't even have a name unless it was revealed on other materials)?

You can play with it to make both futures maybe similar in details (career choices might be understandable, although, the original Suwa gave up his dreams of becoming a professional football player after Kakeru's death) but different (smaller details about Suwa's married life and Kakeru's married life) at the same time, you know?

I dunno. I haven't thought that much about the series after a few years and this is what I write about it? Lol.

[sharkneto]

Very iffy on the whole "Five being the founder" thing.. I mean. It's not very surprising that the guy who's power is to time travel is somehow involved in the creation of the time travel committee, but I don't like the Commission (or, I didn't like how they were portrayed in s2) and I kinda would have preferred if they just. Left how it came to be ambiguous and up to interpretation-- But, the idea that they used (are going to use?) Five as some battery for their briefcases, or they study his power to find a way to mimic it, or whatever. That is very interesting to me.

Not sure if that's the way the show is going, but I mean. Five and Lila were able to power up a broken briefcase using Five's power + electrocution so...? There sure is Something there, possibly. And it could be a vague parallel to how the Commission experimented on Five in the comics, assuming that they haven't already done that to show Five. So.. I dunno. It has the potential to be neat. But really that is the only way it will be interesting to me, lmao.

I don't like the idea of Five being the founder of the Commission either. It just continues to validate and redeem the Commission after they were a spectacularly evil villain in S1 - I've ranted before about how the Commission changed from S1 to S2 and the portrayal of Herb and Dot as protagonists rather than antagonists (as they should be) HERE. Five the past two season has been doing everything in his power to stop and get away from the Commission (They want the world to end! They left him to rot in the apocalypse for four decades until he was broken enough to be useful to them!). The Commission is not a good organization and their mission is bullshit and self-serving. And suddenly, Five is the one who founds it??? He's the one who thinks this is a good idea, after he's spent his entire life trying to change the timeline, suddenly he wants an organization that specifically does not allow for change??? Sure, he just lived through an insane paradox that ate the universe and that is what the Commission was hypothetically there to stop from happening (doesn't their jumping around in time changing things make it riskier for a paradox, not less?), but the Commission could do nothing about it anyway and Five ends up in a paradox-proof box by himself in an iron lung??? In what universe does Five go "oh yeah, that's my good ending, I like that". The dude has been obsessively trying to get back to his family for half a century. I refuse to look at this plot point, it does not exist to me.

That said, the only way I even consider "Five is the Founder" is the idea - that is not supported at all by what they set up - is that Five is just a fucked up briefcase battery. They call him the "Founder" because they're mean and have a good sense of irony. That I can get behind because the Commission is that fucked up. They would. He's in his weird paradox box, strapped into that machine because that keeps him contained in case they need more briefcases. Plug him in, zap-zap, new briefcase for time crimes! Great system.

Idk, man. We'll see if they do anything with that if we get a S4 (I hope they don't address it and just drop it like a hot potato), but it just seems so out-of-character for Five to be the genuine founder of the Commission. Only things I liked that came out of that whole journey were fantastic Five and Lila times and the fact Five just carried his fucking skin around instead of finding something to copy the tattoo down onto like a normal person.

[macaronnya]

I've seen some people be disappointed with The Ssum for various reasons. Some I can understand but others I think people are too hasty. So here are some thoughts (not sorted through).

Regarding the many things you can pay for, I get that. It is kinda very in your face (literal game ads, that are kinda cute tho and only 5 sec) and pricey. I myself am very tempted but will see after the first round of 200 days. Pretty sure I'll know if it's worth it, after that. Cheritz is a small company after all and they've been working on this for quite a while. But for now I don't think it's necessary to buy anything to enjoy the game.

He might type slowly but you can just do smth else while waiting and somehow work with that. Now, the Aurora Batteries, those are already more iffy. Per chat, there are 1 to 3 options, where you can use them. Some even give you a call? I really hate this kind of limitation. It's so direct in telling "you may have missed juicy content~", which makes it a lot worse than the hourglasses in Mysme (not that they were bad in the first place). You have a lot of free opportunities to get them there (❤->⏳, through chats, invited guests) and even then, it's completely fine to go without. (Some calls were really 😙🤌 though, but it's very much optional) Here, I'm not sure you can get any without paying or unlocking achievments. But we'll see how it is since it's only the first week after all. Dunno about the other things yet but I'll just wait to see if it's too much, that I'm missing out on.

Regarding Teo, I don't really get how some people are already writing him off as boring and comparing him to Mysme characters. Like, ofc they'd be different. Not only is Teo the only person you're gonna talk to, you have 200 days for that. You'll have plenty of time to discover hidden mysteries and flags or whatever. Apparently, he's even gonna mold his personality based on our conversations. So it makes sense, that he'd be more blank in the beginning, especially during the first 2 days. Now look at Mysme, where you have 11 days for each of the 5, later 7, characters. You have to know which ones you wanna go first and everyone is interacting with one another. And there's a whole very forefront plot that needs to be told. While in The Ssum, for now at least, the plot is just getting to know about a guy in roughly 6 months and fall in love(?). The situations are too different to compare them. Besides that, he's actually just like a normal guy you first meet somewhere randomly. Is everyone able to figure out a stranger's personality and background after a few conversations on the first day or am I just the outlier here? I'm sure you've met at least one person whose personality on the outside differs greatly from the truth after getting to know them more.

I'm not saying you can't say what you think for first impressions; if he seems boring rn then that's just how it is for you. But it's stupid to complain already when the game is barely out, yet.

Anyways, that's all I have to rant about for now. Maybe I am too optimistic from the perspective of smn in the future reading this but I truly think you can't tell anything yet by Day 2. Hopefully, this will age well....

[dis--parity]

———  BASICS  !  

(PEN)NAME: Aria!

PRONOUNS: she/her or they/them

ZODIAC  SIGN: Aquarius sun, Cancer moon, Saggitarius rising (I don’t know what moon and rising signs actually mean but hey ho)

TAKEN  OR  SINGLE:  taken but I’m poly (but I love my partner very very very much)

———  THREE  FACTS  !

I’ve started to get a little more in-touch with my spiritual side recently, and I’m looking into setting up an altar for Aphrodite! All this started after I received a table for free (it was sitting in the foyer with a note saying it was free so I thought hey, why not), so now I’m just looking for a nice table cloth for it and some decor to really amp up the feminine side of it! I’ve always wanted to do this, so I’m very excited for it!

Ever since I got into a D&D campaign recently, DM’d by a lovely, lovely person in Topaxi, I’ve honestly been hyperfixating on that wayyyyyyyyy more than I should have, to the point where I’ve even considered making a blog for one of my player characters! The only thing holding me back from it is the fact that the last time I tried that, it didn’t get any traction and eventually fell apart.

I have a new pitch for an in-character story arc before the real story of the blog is written out, but i just haven’t had the time or energy to focus on it as of yet! I promise I’ll get something out very soon after exams are done, though!

———  EXPERIENCE  !

PLATFORMS USED: In chronological order, I think... Skype, Shamchat, Chatzy, Tumblr (duh), and Discord.

I first established a blog on tumblr in... I think 2016? And I remade into this blog in early 2020, so that leaves me with 6 years of experience on this platform.

———  MUSE  PREFERENCE  !

GENDER: [looks at my roster] ... yeah I might have a thing for female / femme muses HOWEVER male muses are also very fun to write! I don’t really have any preference honestly, the only thing I really critique myself on is their designs as they are right now. Like, I kinda headcanon Alex as being a bit more chubby than her ref sheet suggests, and I don’t put enough emphasis on Yeong-Hui’s scars, either. But, that’s a whole other rabbit hole.

LEAST FAVOURITE FACE(S): I uh. I’m honestly not sure what this question is asking??? Faceclaims are faceclaims, sure I’ve had one or two ruined for me but it’s kinda whatever at this point. The only thing I’m slightly iffy on is IRL faceclaims but unless they’re used to aid an RP blog for an Actual Real Person (I saw an RP blog for the dude from Flubber once and I’m still not over it) then it’s fine as a stylistic choice.

MULTI OR SINGLE: I’ve flipped and flopped between multimuse and single muse quite a lot - I even considered having Theo and Souji on their own separate blog, or even just giving Theo his very own blog, just to keep things consistent. But, honestly, having all of these options here suits me, especially seeing as they’re all in the same story. The thing that burned me out on my last blog was one muse getting more attention than others, and then me burning out on all of them, so I dunno.

———  FLUFF  /  ANGST  /  SMUT  !  ♡    

FLUFF: I love it! Platonic, romantic, slice-of-life threads that don’t necessarily go anywhere, let’s do it! It’s the easiest way to measure and develop the chemistry between two muses, and get them talking about what matters to them in life, and all that - if it’s romantic, or in the pining stage, mixing it up with some affectionate gestures is just SO GOOD LIKE. OOOUGH

ANGST: Oh, you mean my favourite form of revealing backstory! Whether it be through relating an experience that two muses are having with each other to something in their past that it reminds them of, or facing something that had happened to them, opening up about something from my. [coughs] very expansive lore. it’s the best way to trick me into talking backstory and lore!

SMUT: Fuck yeah bro I love to smut it up! With the introduction of Theo to the blog, I’ve seen a lot more friends-with-benefits relationships come in through his bonds, but that’s honestly still so good! At the very least, it gives me an outlet to actually write smut every now and again, which is always awesome... I just wish my other muses would get the same treatment. I do most of my more risqué threads (if I know it’ll be ongoing) over on my other blog, here.

PLOT  /  MEMES: Memes are better to break the ice and just get interactions going, but once I see a bit of chemistry unfold between two muses, I’m more than happy to plot! My only fear is that when I do plot, it’s not met with quite the same enthusiasm from the other side because I am. aheh. VERY much prone to the brainrot sometimes. More involved plots REALLY do get me going though, and I’d love to have more of them!

TAGGED BY: @causalitylinked​ (thank u livi ily) TAGGING: I don’t tend to tag people in these but if you wanna do it then go ahead!

[fandomsnstuff]

Angus figures everything out and fucks up Lucretia’s whole Thing AU

Lucretia hires angus, innoculates him, and is like this is the deal with those missing people cases you were investigating

Angus says oh okay! This totally and completely satiases my curiosity :)

Internally angus says this is sus as hell

So he does what he does best, he snoops

So angus is snooping and somehow, cause he's a little crime boy who can sneak around real good, he finds the starblaster

He's like what the fuck is this

He gets in, and it's.....odd. he doesnt linger in any one room too long, he just kind of pokes his head into the bedrooms and moves on (he figures he shouldnt stay here too long, lest he get caught)

But the most peculiar thing is how lived in this place looks. There's mismatched furniture with throw pillows and blankets in the common area, a chore chart on the fridge, the bedrooms are all cluttered with knick knacks and clothes, beds unmade, theres a lab with papers scattered around tables and taped to the wall

But one room catches his attention

It's... fairly simple, and emptier than the others. Bookshelf with some books missing, a bare desk, but what catches his attention is the pile of red on the bed

He goes to investigate and finds robes and jackets, all with an odd patch and names embroidered on them

He finds, in this order:

A robe with "lucretia" embroidered on it

A jacket and robe, together as if someone had been wearing them at the same time, with "lup" and "taako"

A jacket with "davenport"

A robe with "merle"

A jacket with "magnus"

(there’s no barry robe cause he fell off the ship with it, these are the robes/jackets lucretia took off of the crew members as she sent them off to their new lives)

Now. This is after crystal kingdom and angus was at the candlenights party. He knows the director's name is lucretia

He knows who Davenport is

He knows who taako, magnus, and merle are

This is pre-LUP incident, so he doesnt know who lup is

Angus, appropriately freaked out, puts them all back and BOLTS

Angus vacates the premises

Runs back to his room

He tries to figure out what this all means, but his thoughts dodge around the obvious conclusion that's right in front of him

Hes too nervous to go back, it's not until the L U P incident that he decides okay. I have to go back

So he goes back. He goes into the room labeled Captain's Quarters (although "captain" has been scratched out and changed to "cap'nport". Angus doesnt think too hard about what that means)

In the desk he finds some folders with the same weird logo as the robes and jackets. He doesnt look in them. Not yet. He can do that back in his room. He cant spend too much time here.

Then he goes to the lab. He doesnt know what hes looking for, but he grabs ones that seem important. A notebook or two. Some papers clipped together. He just grabs and shoves them into his bag and he fuckin bolts again

he looks at what he grabbed and some of it he can read, some of it he can't

They lived in that ship. They were going on a mission for something. They made the grand relics to stop something. Theres a lot of notes on the planes.

Angus recognizes the way some stuff is redacted, and he kind of figures out that there must be another voidfish. And if the directors name was on one of those robes, maybe she has it.

Refuge mission comes and goes

Angus, cause he's so fucking good, is able to sneak back into lucretias personal quarters and finds junior. He fills a water bottle with the ichor and gets the fuck outta there

He gets back to his room, innoculates himself and is like AAAAAAAAAA

Cause he can finally put it all together properly

And he basically pieces together the whole hunger situation himself with the notes he grabbed

The stuff he grabbed from davenports room was the crew's like profiles or whatever from when they got hired on to the mission so angus now knows who lup is

So angus is like oh i GOTTA fix this

So he heads down to the reclaimers dorm with his bottle of ichor

Angus: i need you to drink this Merle: what is it? Angus: voidfish ichor Taako: *laughs* hate to break it to you kid, we already drank the voidfish juice. Angus: just- please? Magnus: yeah alright

So magnus drinks it. His breath catches and he kinda goes weak and he's shaking and he drops to his knees. After a minute or two (or more) he looks up at angus. "Holy shit," he says. He grabs the bottle from where he dropped it and holds it out to taako and merle. "Drink it." He says.

"Yeah alright," merle says. Same deal as with magnus.

Once merle collects himself, they both turn to taako.

"Yeah, alright. Sure. Let's get taako in on this weird party," he says, taking the bottle and drinking

This time, magnus is ready and he catches taako when his knees give out

"Im gonna fucking kill her," taako mumbles into magnus' shoulder, his knuckles white as he grips his shirt.

"You're not gonna kill her."

"Im gonna fucking hit her so HARD, i swear to god."

Taako keeps his face in magnus' shoulder, but magnus and merle watch as angus crosses the room to where taako had left the umbrastaff, and he walks back over to magnus and taako on the floor

"Sir?" Taako looks up at angus. Angus holds the umbrella out, "i think i know where your sister is."

(Lup, meanwhile, in the staff: HEEEEELLLLL YYYYYEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH)

It takes taako a second, but he realizes what angus is saying and scrambles out of magnus' hold and to his feet. He takes the umbrella and lifts it, about to snap it when angus says, "wait!"

Taako glares at him. "Ive waited ten years, kid. Make it snappy." "Madame director had a holy symbol in her office. I think it would ward against your sister, if shes a lich." "Uuugggggghhhhhhhhh LUCRETIAAAAAA"

The four of them go down planetside under the guise of a magic lesson and not wanting to burn any more "cryptic messages" into the walls

Taako snaps that fuckin umbrella as soon as his feet hit solid ground

Lup's back!

Lup does some magic shit to summon barry, so barold shows up, happy reunion, and then a Discussion on what to do re: davenport not being innoculated and re: lucretia

Their plan boils down to this: thb and angus will go back to the moon and act as if this never happened. As far as lucretia knows, thb are still under junior's influence

As soon as they can get davenport alone without rousing any suspicion, they bring him to their room and innoculate him. Once he's got his memories back, he'll be powerful enough to a) get his bracer off/disable the tracking spell in it and b) get off the base undetected

Davenport will definitely not want to go back to playing butler, so he'll sneak off the base and hang out with lup and barry until lucretia sends the boys to wonderland

When the boys get sent to wonderland, theyll meet up, get the bell all together, and THEN confront lucretia, cause at that point theyll have the whole light, and they'll have Options

So they do just that. They go back and innoculate davenport a few days later, a week at most

A panic ensues once everyone realizes davenport is missing

AND the tracking in his bracer is turning up nothing

Lucretia's blood pressure has never been higher

But everything goes as business per usual

Lucretia, oddly enough, suspects nothing re: the boys ‘cause surely they wouldve confronted her if they remembered

The boys get sent down to wonderland. They meet up with blupjeans and dav at the entrance. With the six of them with all their memories and full access to their skills they take edward and lydia down in like 30 minutes. Tops.

So edward and lydia get their asses thoroughly handed to them by the six of them

(Davenport has the time of his LIFE)

They head back to the lich cave, barry gets in his new body and gets innoculated (the boys brought some ichor with them for him)

Lup possesses barry, then barry-with-lup and dav get in the pocket spa and back up to the moon they go

Lucretia is in her office when avi comes knocking "Uh... director? The boys are coming back." "Already?" "Yeah." "Are you sure it's them?" "Yep."

Lucretia is.... stunned. It's been... an hour and a half. Two, maybe. She has full faith in the boys but they took down wonderland in two hours?????

Not even two hours

She goes to meet them, highly suspicious

But they arrive and, sure enough, it's them. No magic. No tricks. It's them, for sure.

taako has the bell and hes just holding it casually from the top as if it isnt one of the most powerful magic items in existence. And she can tell he isnt thralled, that's just how hes decided to transport it.

Lucretia: ive got to admit, you boys took care of that...much faster than i expected Magnus: ah, it was no big Merle: piece of cake! Taako: yeah, luce, shit was easy. Dunno what you were talkin' about earlier.

And lucretia just freezes. Luce. Thats what taako called her. It’s what they all called her, really, but it’s the nickname Taako took 4 whole cycles to give to her, officially cracking the door of friendship open to her. And she looks him in the eyes and she knows that he knows. And she looks at merle and magnus and she can tell they know, too.

And taako gives her a venomous smile, all teeth, and says, "why dont we go have a little chat, madame director" and she flinches at the way he spits out her title

She doesnt know what to do but nod and turn to leave. As she turns, there's angus, looking up at her with a determined set to his brow, and she knows he knows too

They head back to her office, and taako pulls the pocket spa out, and before lucretia can ask him what hes doing, out walks barry and davenport. And barrys eyes have got that red glow about them, so she knows lup's here too.

"Take down the lich ward, lucretia," barry says.

She does, and now there's a firey, red robed lich among them.

Now this is where things get a little iffy for how they work out but here's what i got

They have a similar confrontation as canon where theyre bickering about staying or going, shield or no shield, and im thinking this is where taako has his "there's a third option" realization

And, because they did extreme wonderland speedrun, and they didnt take a whole extra day to travel to the lich cave and just used fuckin magic to get there, theyre a whole day ahead of where they were in canon

The hunger is close enough at this point tho that they can enact the plan like. Now.

But magnus insists on returning Fisher's baby to them first

As magnus takes junior, lucretia works on getting the base secured and getting the bureau members ready for if the hunger touches down before they can cut it off

Magnus goes down to fisher with the baby, he takes his axe and swings, breaking the tank open

Johann, still alive and now soaking wet, is like dude wtf

Magnus returns the baby and out goes the story and song

Now johann is REALLY like DUDE WTF

Magnus is like im off to save the universe. Peace.

So since theyre a whole day ahead of the hunger, all seven of them go up in the ship

And then they fight and they win and they cut the hunger off and it's rad

The end

[harley-michaels-main]

umm heyheyhey there cool individual may i please request a kny and bnha matchup?? if theyre closed please ignore this lol anywhays heres some info fdjsjs:

Im 5'2", virgo, INFP, he/him or they/them pronouns, shortish curly brown hair, neurodivergent, i wear glasses, my personality is kinda iFfy yk i have social anxiety and shit, i get pretty passionate about the things i like, insomniac, i guess im pretty chill and honestly dont care too much about stuff, i get told that im pretty mature for my age but im actually a dumbass, i am most defintily reckless and dont give two shits bout it. chronic meme lord ig, demands all the physical affection but will need a thirty minute mental prep time before hand or else i will dissolve cause i get very flustered very easily, and i think that im too sefless sometimes but i mean abksdjlgad i dunno, i am insanely indecisive, and an admire from afar kinda person. also mommy issues so make of this what you will and have a nice day :)

Hi lovely!! I literally want to be your best friend asdlkfa, will you please be a chaotic dumbass with me? N E WAYS here are you match ups <3

Your Demon Slayer Match Up is...

Obanai Iguro

When Iguro first met you, he didn't think too much of you at first. He just saw you as another slayer that needed protection.

Yet what drew him into you was your complete dumbassery. To be honest, he thought that you needed a lot of protection because you didn't think things through.

He thought that you and Mitsuri were a lot alike which is probably why he was so easy with being around you.

As he spent more time with you, he realized that you two had a lot more in common than you originally thought.

He isn't the most social either soo he's fine with just sitting with you and enjoying each other's company without a lot of talking.

He likes it when you two go restaurant exploring. Especially restaurants that specialize in foods from different regions.

Iguro realizes that he likes you when you two hold hands for the first time. Just being in the domestic moments and relishing in each others' presence was enough for him.

After you two get together, not much changes.

Well, outside of your private homes.

When it is just you two, you both love to relax with each other. IF you are up for it, he will hold you for as long as possible.

He doesn't like to say it, but he loves physical affection.

At random times, he'll like to surprise you with little trips. This is only when the both of you have free time, so it isn't very often, but he tries to make the best of it.

Also, if you get along with Kaburamaru, he will most likely marry you.

Iguro may not seem like it, but he is very good when it comes to giving advice. You can count on him to always be there if you just need someone to listen to you or if you need any help.

All in all, he is very accommodating to you and will always be there to lend a hand.

Your My Hero Academia Match Up is...

Sero Hanta

Sero was drawn to you because of your crazy antics. You seemed to fit in so well with his friend group, he thought that it would be great to have you join.

He loves to do crazy things with you. He will always be one of the first ones to sign up to go and do something against the rules.

He doesn't mind your ADHD since Denki has it as well. He knows how it is for most people and he knows why you are the way you are most of the time.

He enjoys taking you adventuring off-campus. He mostly likes to take you to arcades and cafes since that's where he always went when he was younger.

At first, you two only went with the whole friend group, but eventually you two started to go alone.

Sero realizes his feelings for you after you two play Dance Dance Revolution and you royally kick his ass at it.

You two were basically collapsed on the ground in exhaustion, leaning against each other, and laughing while trying to catch your breath.

After you two start dating, he is a lot more affectionate. It takes him a little while to realize that you need time to mentally prepare yourself before you should be touched.

He realized that after he randomly hugged you and you froze for a solid five minutes.

Sero likes to have movie nights with you where you two both choose a movie and see which one puts you to sleep first. (usually, it's the ones he picks)

Overall, he will always be there to take you on random adventures and he will always be there to comfort you when you need it.

[radramblog]

Werewolves are still iffy in EDH

With the release of Innistrad: Midnight Hunt, I’m sure many people myself included were hoping that the set’s Werewolf focus would solve some of the issues with the tribe in Commander. Having been a big fan of the creature type’s mechanics and design in Shadows block, and playing a lot of them in Limited and Standard formats, I was excited to see what MID would bring to the table.

Unfortunately, despite the shiny new commander the deck has, I’m not confident that the many, many issues that make Werewolves awkward in Commander have actually found an answer.

Issue 1: The cardpool

Werewolves are kind of in this awkward place where due to mechanically being tied to Innistrad and its double-faced-card Transform mechanic, there just aren’t very many of them, even though we’ve been to Innistrad 3 times now. As well, of the current 6 Innistrad-based sets, 2 of them (DKA and EMN) are small sets and 1 (AVR) doesn’t actually have any werewolves in them. The number of werewolves, therefore, is not particularly big- at time of writing, 83 cards exist with the word Werewolf or Werewolves, and of those 5 are explicit hate pieces. And one is Victim of Night, a removal spell that happens not to hit them. That leaves 78 cards to work with, outside of Changelings.

Frustratingly, WoTC has done very little to supplement this when visiting other planes. There exist exactly 6 Werewolf-related cards printed outside of Innistrad, with only 4 of those actually being Werewolves. I appreciate the slight bones being thrown in the form of WAR Arlinn, Nightpack Ambusher, and AFR’s own Werewolf Pack leader, but that’s about a card a year, which is not enough to support a tribe like this.

There’s also an issue where most of the Werewolf cards are pretty much just limited fodder. Of the 62 cards with the type Werewolf on them (again not including Changelings), I’d wager maybe 30 of them are playable in Commander, using an extremely loose definition of the word playable and with the understanding that this deck is going to be janky as hell. The tribe really suffers from its flavour-based limits, especially with the lack of non-Innistrad support, even though many of the game’s mechanics could be adapted to flavour of the Werewolf.

The final problem with the cardpool is the weak support cards. Werewolves have a fair few support cards, actually, but the issue is most of them are either not scaled for the format or only apply on one side of a 2-sided card. Many tribes in the middle-ground of card quality can get propped up by a handful of really good support cards- as an example, Treefolk have Timber Protector and Leaf-Crowned Elder, and Myr have Myr Galvaniser, Myr Turbine, and basically every Artifact support card ever to exist. Werewolves are stuck with, outside of one or two spicy new cards, mostly just +1/+1 anthems/counters and a handful of keywords, and also Immerwolf/Geier Reach Bandit (but the latter only half the time).

The result of this is that despite arguably being one of the better supported tribes as far as card numbers, Werewolves seriously pale in comparison to the majority of the field, especially compared to their Innistradi brethren- they look real awkward next to Humans, Zombies, Spirits, and Vampires.

Issue 2: The colours

Werewolves are pretty shoehorned into Gruul as far as the cards go. Both legendary Werewolves and the Werewolf Planeswalker are in the colour combination, as well as the vast majority of the tribe’s members. However, Midnight Hunt has added some other options in all 3 other colours, and there are reasons to run each anyway- mostly to do with, you know, that whole cardpool issue.

Because as good as Tovolar is, this tribe needs a little help from another colour, in my opinion.

White is the most commonly added colour to Werewolf decks, due to getting to play Rule of Law effects to stop your Werewolves from getting flipped back over. If I build Werewolves, it probably will be Naya, just because I already have two Gruul decks, but my issue is the lack of a clear Commander. Samut is clearly the best option, mostly on account of Flash and the deck likely being fairly aggressive, but I have an issue with commanders, particularly Tribal commanders, not accurately representing the deck. But then, what am I supposed to go with? Anara/Bruse Tarl? Gahiji? Rin and Seri kinda work flavourfully, if you squint, but they do nothing for the gameplay of the deck. I probably would have to just get over it and play Samut, and maybe you should too.

Midnight Hunt did also throw some Black Werewolves in, to go with the original 3 from back in the day (the utterly terrible Treacherous Werewolf, Lesser Werewolf, and Greater Werewolf), opening Jund as an option, kind of. My issue with this is that aside from just general good cards, Black doesn’t really add much to the deck’s likely plans, and only one of the new Black Werewolves, Graveyard Tresspasser, is really any good. I suppose this does mean you could run 4-colour with Saskia, but…eh…

This set also added a singular Blue werewolf in Suspicious Stowaway, which is actually kinda okay. And also Blue gets one extra Rule of Law effect in Arcane Laboratory. But I don’t think I’m going to see Temur Werewolves anytime soon. I guess you could run Surrak? Blue does notably also get you a bunch of the better Changelings, on account of their recent Kaldheim iterations being in Green-Blue.

There is always, of course, Morophon. But that fucker’s for cowards. The TL;DR is, that Werewolves’s best commanders don’t give you access to everything the deck needs.

 Issue 3: The tribes

This is somewhat of a more minor issue, but one worth bringing up. Many of the Werewolf matters cards are shared with Wolf matters cards, and so it’s likely worth bringing a few of the better Wolves into the mix. Sarulf, if you’re including Black, or one or both Tolsimir-s in White. Wolves are a tribe with many, many more members, especially adding in all the Wolf Token producing cards, though there are still fewer Wolf Matters cards than Werewolf Matters ones. Also, some of the Werewolf Matters cards are Wolves, like Nightpack Ambusher, Silverfur Partisan, and Immerwolf. So there’s probably a fair few worth throwing in.

As well, seeing as the vast majority of Werewolves have Human front faces, some Humans matter cards like Angel of Glory’s Rise or the new Katilda are worth a shout. There are very few of these that work unfortunately, seeing as you are actively trying to have your humans not be humans, but it’s potentially worth the look.

The reason I find this to be an issue is that you can only add in so many subthemes like this before the deck’s real synergies start to get too heavily diluted. Every Wolf you add makes your Werewolves worse, you know?

I dunno maybe this one was less an issue and more just a recommendation. And yes I know most of the non-Human Werewolves are in fact Eldrazi, but as much as I love those cards they’re both mostly bad and there’s not enough of them, so don’t bother putting Eldrazi cards in there. You have to dump a lot of mana to flip them anyway.

Issue 4: The gameplay

Werewolves as a tribe are extremely challenging from a gameplay perspective. You have to be paying close attention every turn, in order to make sure that you know when your Werewolves are transforming- and in a format like Commander, they are probably not spending nearly as much time with the back half as they are the front half.

While I appreciate Midnight Hunt’s design efforts to simplify this with the Daybound mechanic, in Commander this kinda just makes it worse. Daybound means you are having to track this mechanic at all times, even when you or nobody else has a Werewolf on the field, as long as you’ve played one of the new ones beforehand. As well, the older cards (which you will need some of) are completely unlinked to this day/night cycle, even though they technically use the same trigger, which can lead to some confusion- if, for example, Tovolar makes it Night on your Upkeep, playing a Duskwatch Recruiter is still going to leave you with a Duskwatch Recruiter, not a Krallenhorde Howler.

Considering Tovolar is likely the leader for most Werewolf decks going forward, I appreciate the effort to make him work with the Werewolves of the past, and that he tries to mitigate the tribe’s biggest issue. But there are a whole bunch of really finicky interactions that are both difficult to get your head around and difficult to explain to others when you pull them off. For example, if the player before you casts two spells on their turn, it becomes Day as the turn begins, meaning all your MID Werewolves will transform immediately, then Upkeep happens, and any of your non-MID Werewolves flip as well. Then Tovolar triggers, and you can transform as many of your Werewolves as you want- so if you stack the triggers right, then something like, say, Huntmaster of the Fells or Ulrich of the Krallenhorde will get to transform twice in the same step and get both of its “when ~ transforms” effects.

The other half of this is just the mental load on your opponents. You know what all your cards do, but your opponents aren’t going to! And this is a typical thing in EDH, the game requires either a massive knowledge of Magic, an ability to pick up on new cards and interactions quickly, or both, but it gets so much worse when each of your cards has two sides worth of text to read off whenever you play one. And people (particularly those with less-than-perfect threat assessment) are going to typically assume that the more words on your cards the better they are, so you might get targeted just based on that even though half the words aren’t relevant most of the time.

The long and short of Werewolves in EDH is this: They’re still awkward and janky. I think you can actually build a deck, but you could already do that technically, and I think the additions from MID aren’t quite enough to bump the tribe up to Actually Good. They are, though, about the level of Jank that I appreciate, so maybe I’ll still just build them anyway.

There is potential hope, though. Innistrad: Midnight Hunt is an Innistrad Werewolf Set that contains no less than 15 Vampires (one of my biggest issues with the set!), and the next set is Innistrad: Crimson Vow, the Innistrad Vampire Set. Due to the mechanical requirements, I can’t imagine we’re seeing 15 Werewolves in that one, but I’m hoping we do at least get a couple extras. And hey, maybe one of that one’s Commander decks will be Werewolves!

…The previous was written under the assumption that we didn’t know what the VOW Commander Decks were. As it turns out, we have the names. Neither of them are Werewolf themed.

God damn it, maybe next time we come back to Innistrad then. So, see you in 2026.

[ngc-5194]

twewy anime episode 1: thoughts

i’m gonna preface this whole thing by saying i’m still going to be watching the whole anime.

i like their take on partner pacts and the animation is pretty. the music is nice. i’m always happy for more twewy content. i adore the different location titles. the Noise being 3D is cool and will certanitly help me get used to them being like that before neo: twewy drops. but i feel kinda iffy about a few things.

(also please keep in mind i’m basing my impressions on neku off of the translated version. i know there’s differences between english neku and japanese neku but,,,,,, yeah)

the pacing:

day one listen i know, i know, it’s gonna be different- cutting down a 25~ hour game into a few anime episodes is gonna be difficult. but there’s such a thing as cutting too many corners.

packing the first three days into one episode would’ve been fine on it’s own. i’m perfectly fine with them saving time for later days. day one being compacted to 7 minutes isn’t the worst thing in the world. it works fine length-wise but it doesn’t really feel like day one.

they spend most of their time on day one showing neku waking up. which is fine. it’s rather important to set up what’s happening in this story with the reapers game. but,,, wow they could’ve done it better by making it just a smidge longer.

like,,,,,, keep the scene of neku waking up. keep him reading minds by people walking through him, okay? but instead of just cutting to him by hachiko, keep in him getting chased by Noise. it’s a really minor change, but it affects a lot. it gives high stakes right off the bat, it introduces the Noise as something closer to what they are in game at this point. a threat. something to be feared since at this point in the game you can’t fight them. they just attack you, over and over and over again, and you can’t do anything about it but run. so just give them that same feeling in the anime- that’s it, that’s all i ask for to make day one better in this regard. day two ok, day two was,,,,,, hmmm

for starters: having them wake up in scramble crossing again is,,, a choice. it means that we don’t have shiki looking at the picture of her and eri. it means we don’t have them actually having to try to get to hachiko. it means we don’t have them using scanning as part of the mission (i’ll get to my thoughts about scanning in a sec). it means we don’t have shiki and neku starting to bounce ideas off of each other. it means beat and rhyme don’t like neku for him almost killing shiki. which, sure, them not liking him for that is valid, but that wasn’t the point.

the point was neku was unlikeable enough, standoffish enough, unwilling to trust others enough, that he turned down their offers of help and instead accuses them (shiki included) saying that they could all be reapers. he rejects their offered help, insults them and his partner, complains about their ‘nagging’, and says he doesn’t want to work with them because he feels they’d only drag him down. and this is all after their intro to him of him leaving his partner behind and forcing her to run after him. this is all after him being moody in the corner while the three of them share info and try and befriend each other. that is why beat doesn’t like him in the game. thus, beat and rhyme leave, leaving neku and shiki alone. neku’s already annoyed, both by the interaction with beat and him feeling like shiki doesn’t care because she’s looking at her phone over and over. he constantly ignores shiki, getting lost in thought while shiki tries to talk to him- tries to become closer friends with him while he in turn tries to cut her off, ignore her, keep his walls up. when he’s offered the choice to sacrifice her in order to help himself, he doesn’t hesitate. he takes very little convincing. that is how that scene goes in the game.

so lets look at the anime, huh?

beat doesn’t like neku at first because he doesn’t engage in the conversation. they meet each other while shiki and neku are having their own conversation. beat is the only one of the two to accuse the others of being reapers. not only is the mission no longer a puzzle, but instead just a fight that beat and rhyme also happen to be there for. meaning we don’t get them realizing that if one pair completes the mission everyone survives. when uzuki gives neku the mission it becomes more of a ‘he’s being possessed and controled by the Noise’ thing rather than a ‘he makes this choice for himself because he’s a flawed character and the Noise are drawn to that’ thing. (also since beat’s there he already knows hanekoma and hears what he tells shiki and neku??? i don’t- whatever)

can you see how that’s a little different? day three once again, having them wake up in scramble crossing is an interesting choice. but it’s fine. having them walk to A-East (or O-East now i guess??) instead of waking up there is a fine change to make, i don’t mind it. it gives them an excuse to not have to put the characters in a completely darkened room. what i do mind is the rest of the changes they made to cut the day down.

for one the tech is a reaper now??? and potentially part of the band???? when that’s not what his character was in the slightest??????

second, they changed the mission? the whole thing with the bat is neku accepts beat and rhyme’s help because they clear the mission after neku and shiki take out the big bat. which starts to show neku that it’s really not him against the world and helps him start to open up to the three of them. but no, just having shiki and neku take out the big bat is good enough i guess. also this means memes don’t exist which is a criminal offense /j

all, and i mean all, of this day feels too rushed. they sacrificed good pacing to have it end on a “dramatic” note, and i don’t like that. i really think ep 1 should’ve just been the first two days.

characterization:

neku yeah he’s really the only one on the list.

listen i know in the original he’s more socially closed off than the snappy way he is in the translated version, but the anime misses both of those marks.

he’s kinda just,,, a little quiet. he still openly reacts to people. which is much more than game!neku gave on the first few days. the point of the game is to see him grow. i’m not quite sure how the anime is going to pull off the same emotional pay off.

like,,, in the game you watch him go from a full on moody asshole, convinced he doesn’t need anyone else. he doesn’t want to talk to people for ten minutes, let alone have them drag him around for a week, interacting with them every day. but he grows. he changes. he learns that the world doesn’t start and end with him. he learns how to connect with others. he learns how to let others in again. if he was given the choice joshua gives him at the end of the game at the begining of the game, he’d have shot josh without hesitation. that’s the reason joshua chooses him. anime!neku gives me the vibes that no matter where in the story he wouldn’t shoot joshua. he clearly cares about the others during week one and,,,, i dunno, this point will probably get better.

various other things:

777 he gives them a level 2 keypin???? i mean i guess they’re not doing the reapers controling the walls but then it takes away the point of beat having a keypin in week 3 because neku will already have one/know what it is??? also 777 and the tech might be the members of the band? which,,,, :( i want bj and tenho

the picture of shiki and eri why did they cut shiki looking at the picture of her and eri? it’s important to her character and character arc. but they just,,,, drop it??? i don’t-

scanning here’s the thing, i’m fine with how scanning works in the anime. but i’m concerned about later weeks.

how is tabbo noise going to work? there’s no noise symbols floating around so they can’t float towards them while other noise symbols just hang around.

how is scanning joshua going to work? it’s harder to touch someone to scan their mind and have them not notice than it is to mentally scan them while holding a pin and standing about. (even if that person knows exactly what you’re doing bc he’s god or whatever- but that isn’t the point)

ok i’m done, thanks for reading if you managed to make it through my rambles <3

[calpalsworld]

Not "autistic anon," but also autistic, (being called maybe ableist made me want to put this out there before go to bed) i thought Zane was depicted that way purposefully by the writers. He has stereotypical traits like taking things literally, and has an actual humor switch. The writers have done things with Zane before like have him lose bodily autonomy (during that one Wu's teas short) and did something with his voice be it making him unable to be understood or talking too loud and the forced pirate voice by Jay. (what you're doing isn't too different from that, right?) I thought it was just a little iffy to distort his body and memory bc that could be interpreted as something not that I'm sure what exactly, it's some kind of disability. I dunno. I'm not good with putting this to words. I hope this makes sense.

Sorry I went to bed but now I’m awake 😭

Also I ended up totally spilling all my thoughts here rather than only specifically replying to you please forgive me context: my scary zane concept design, & my ninjago rewrite i refer to a lot 

Im a little confused but I think I get what you're saying? You're saying the Ninjago writers absolutely DON'T write Zane well (you listed examples of this) and you don't want me to fall into the same trap?

I had the opposite logic earlier. I thought: If Ninjago writers made Zane have stereotypical autisitic traits while also being a dehumanized robot, I may as well embrace it, say he is autistic blatantly, while also making him do funny/cool non-human robot things, so its clear as possible the two aspects of his character are literal and separate and not a metaphor for each other. But you're right! I do have a choice and I dont have to embrace things! :)

Like there were a couple ways I was gonna reject the original, for example, I never wanted Zane to have a funny switch, and I hated how other characters could fuck with Zane and he didn't even care 😬. I want to change that stuff. So youre right, if I am changing shit like that, it would be counterproductive for ME to GIVE him MORE traits along that theme. 😬😬😬 I should try to feel less obligated to portray Zane like he originally is. I still like the concept of "scary zane" (for reasons i explain below the cut) but I might tone it down a bit like with the claws and weird proportions and shit. I’d def make him look more skeletal and undead. That was my original intention, but i didnt execute it as good as I could have.... idk if anyone could tell thats what he was supposed to be like...my bad! But rn I dont wanna redesign him I wanna draw other stuff like normal alive Zane. Sorry LMAO 😳. Like I said in some earlier asks I think, I think Im gonna focus rn on how I should portray season 1 normal not dead Zane so thank you and feel free to share any other Zane thoughts ^_^ SOME OTHER THOUGHTS:

Also I Wanna Argue Some Stuff But I Understand its a Weak Argument Since All of This Context was Just In My Brain (so don't take this as an argument, just as me rambling): I don't want messed up things to happen to Zane and for it to just be ignored. I think if Zane is going to have fucked up things happen to him, as all characters must, its best for it to happen during a season where he actually addresses his feelings about being a robot (learning to accept that he will always be himself, regardless if hes "human" or the "original" or whatever. (thats how I always interpreted his emotions)). But I wouldn't have the other Ninja be very phased by Zane's looks because the whole point is they already love who he is (seasons 1-3 were about getting to know Zane) and now Zane himself just has to learn the physical, robot part of him is okay. Its about person-hood rather than humanity. Because the season focuses around Zane's soul, and because he lost his original body, I feel like I could mess around with his current, temporary body and have fun and make it scary. Because that body should be irrelevant. I understand it possibly being upsetting for an autistic character to be designed like this, but other people I talked to see it the opposite way. They find it comforting for him to look so different but still be himself and be so loved. SO IM ABSOLUTELY NOT saying its wrong to be bothered or to hate it or to feel any way. Just that I personally think it would be cool for Zane to be portrayed with a little spice lol, so thats why I like scary Zane for season 4.

Another Thing I Wannna Say But Is REALLY Hypocritical: (this isnt directed at anyone I just REALLY want to say this) I know I say "this is Zane but scary, he looks like fnaf" so he's obviously dehumanized, but I always felt like "scary" is more of an objective fact. Its an instinct. But what's "not human" is subjective. I think there is a problem with saying anything different from "average" human is dehumanized because that could extend to real people. Lol I know its bad for me to compare FNAF-ass Zane to real people, but I mean he could be real. People can have exposed teeth, and people can be shaped weird. And when someone first sees a person who looks like that they'll probably think "woah those features are scary" by instinct. And that surprise doesn't make someone ableist obviously. But bring that person’s humanity into question is NOT an instinct, and is fucked to shit. This is kinda a bad point for me to make since its about the fictional FNAF Zane I drew, and I am NOT implying ANYONE was thinking like this. [especially not the original asker anon who I am totally forgetting about at this point OOPS]. But I just thought it was an opinion of mine I couldn't go without mentioning when talking about dehumanization and disabilities.

^^^ I think you (anon) understand what I mean and might’ve said the exact same thing as me if you were writing a long ass response? I think this because you started to bring physical disabilities up and you said it was "a little iffy." ^_^ So we agree, but I don't see Zane's relation to real life disabilities as "a little iffy" I see it more like "complicated"? IF THAT DIFFERENCE EVEN MAKES ANY SENSE?????? I feel like a lot of things about Zane are really just complicated and need the right context, rather than the concepts necessarily being wrong -- NOW THAT I THINK ABOUT IT! THATS THE WHOLE REASON I DO THIS STUPID REWRITE! XD thats why a lot of my rewrite SO FAR has been the same concepts and plot beats, but different dialogue n specifics and such. I like a lot of concepts in Ninjago but I dont think they were presented correctly.....! :( So I guess all we can do is wait and see if I make Zane offensive or not....???

Also something about the memory part - yeah i agree i was surprised no one thought that was weird to make jokes out of his memory issues..... BUT I am like 100% firm on making his memory take longer to come back because I think its stupid how quick Zane was able to recover from literally dying. Like its just dumb to me. Hate it. (also bc memory & soul mechanics is ummm kinda important in my rewrite.... for reasons). Another memory thing btw, I was going to make his original amnesia come from hitting his head in an attack against the Skulkin when they stole his dads corpse, rather than his dad fucking choosing to make him forget. (its a sweet & iconic scene, but Um, WHY?!!!?!?!?!?) He has to follow data recovery instructions he finds in his dads diary. I think in that context it makes moments of memory loss somewhat different for Zane's character? Instead of loss of autonomy associated with disability, its a literal violent loss of autonomy associated with being traumatized by physical force. Idk how to phrase it exactly but I think that makes some vibes different?

Sorry, I think I got really distracted, and I don't know if I responded well to your points. Because uhhhh I think I agree with your stance actually? If I understand correctly? Fuck Ninjago writers for making the robot lose autonomy (a stereotypical robot theme) while also making him seem clearly autistic (NOT A HAPPY THEME FOR AUTISTIC PEOPLE) and not addressing it. And also auuugh Zane with a weird body is a difficult topic - kinda sussy pretty iffy.

Lol anyway idk if this made any sense and I REALLY rambled on you. but this was nice 👉👈 more Zane criticism pls love you and i love zane. i hope u dont feel mad at me because then it would be weird that im saying that lol. if you do feel mad at me tho you can send another ask (ILL TRY TO JUST LISTEN NOT RAMBLE NEXT TIME) but assuming ur chill rn, love you thnx

Take this page, don’t mind cole’s ass.