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mochegato · 3 years

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Hope on Board

Chapter 21 – Missed Opportunities

Chapter 1 Chapter 20

“You’re not going to be able to make it? I put it on the calendar and everything. Physical and digital,” Marinette pouted.

“I know,” Dick groaned in frustration with himself. “But I’m telling you in advance this time. I can’t make it. I’ll watch videos. I’ll give you extra back massages. I’ll hire a personal instructor. I’m sorry.”

“Dick… we rescheduled this twice so you could make it.” Marinette knew her voice was getting exasperated and angry, but she couldn’t help it. This kept happening. He kept missing everything. At this rate, he was going to miss the birth as well.

“I know but this is… This is really important, Mari,” he begged her to understand. This could be the missing piece they needed. He had to go.

“And this,” she indicated her belly, “isn’t?” She was giving him a hard, challenging look.

“That isn’t… I did not say that,” he answered indignantly.

“No, I know. That wasn’t fair,” she conceded quickly. It wasn’t Dick’s fault he was going to be gone and he was getting better. He was letting her know in advance he wasn’t going to make the birthing class. She collapsed against the counter, her shoulders slumping in defeat. “I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.”

Dick let out a long pained sigh. “I know this is frustrating. I’m frustrated and upset. I can’t control the timing for this, for any of this. And it’s all happening at the same time and it’s all converging and I can’t control any of it.” Dick’s voice got increasingly aggravated as he spoke and his gestures wilder. He hated the timing of all of this, but he needed to be there. They had finally been able to track a talon and he needed to trade off with Wally to keep up the tail. He was the leader. It was his family he was defending. He had to go.

Marinette sighed and squared her shoulders. This was just as trying on him as it was on her and she desperately wanted him not to suffer because of things he couldn’t control. She cupped his face to bring his focus back to her. “Yeah, it sucks and I hate it. But we just need to remember we love each other, right? We love each other and we want to be together.” she gave him a long, luxuriant kiss. “The universe is messing with us. We aren’t going to let it win.”

Dick observed the determined, loving look in her eyes. Her confidence grounded him. Things were bad now, but they would get better. He would stop this plot and then things would be better. He rested his hands over hers and smiled. “We’re going to take on the universe huh?”

Marinette nodded, eyes shining with mirth, “And win. That part’s important.”

Dick chuckled indulgently. “Of course. And win. Together.”

“Together,” Marinette nodded. “As long as we work together and communicate and we’re honest with each other, there’s no way the universe can bring us down.”

It took almost the entirety of Dick’s over a decade of training to hide the wince that resulted from the ‘honest’ comment. It was like her comment was designed to cut even though he knew it wasn’t. It still hit hard. As soon as this was over he could come clean. He would be honest. And there wouldn’t be any more secrets between them. They just needed to hold out for a few more weeks… or months… God, he hoped it wasn’t longer than that. Instead, he smiled and nudged her nose with his. “I love you.”

Her responding smile was absolutely brilliant. “I love you too, Bluebird.”

<><><><><>

“I’m so sorry I’m going to miss it.” The remorse in Marinette’s voice was clear even over the speaker. She was still in the office working on a few last minute issues with Lucius on issues with the fabric.

“It’s okay, Marinette. I understand,” Dick calmly assured her.

“Yeah, we get it, Pixie Pop. Your show is coming up really… long time from now,” Jason teased, a mischievous glint in his eyes, reveling in the chaos he was unleashing.

“It isn’t long. It’s short. Really short,” Marinette ranted, the words spilling out quickly. “Only a few weeks. Can you believe it’s just a few weeks away? I should have everything done and be working on details now. Rachel, do not emulate this. I expect you to be better than me.”

Lucius chuckled. “Every inventor and creator I know does this. This is always what it is like right before a debut. You’re doing fine.”

“I’ve seen what you have so far, it looks amazing already,” Stephanie assured her. And it did. She was completely blown away with what Marinette had done.

“No kidding. You made me willing to wear designer clothes,” Duke agreed.

“Do you need anything Marinette? Do you need me to bring over something to eat or drink? Did you take your vitamins today?” Dick fussed. He knew how she was when she was working and it was already dinner time. If he knew her, and he did, then she didn’t even realize how late it was yet.

“Thank you, Dick. I’m fine. You guys just enjoy your night together. And yes I did,” she assured him. Despite not being able to see her, Dick knew she had a smile on her face.

“Okay, I’ll let you get back to work, but I’ll see you at home tonight, right? You’re not going to spend all night there working on it?” Dick asked pointedly.

“Don’t worry Mr. Grayson. I’ll make sure she doesn’t work herself too hard. I’ve already ordered food in for us and a company car to take Rachel home after dinner and another for Marinette at 9, so she has to leave by then,” Lucius assured him with a chuckle.

“You two do realize I’m not a child, right?” Marinette snapped.

“Of course. You’re an adult. An extremely self-sacrificing, prone to self-destruction adult. You’ll fit right into the Wayne family whenever Mr. Grayson finally wakes up.” They could hear Lucius’ smirk through the phone as well as Rachel’s giggle and Marinette’s squeak.

“Rachel!” she exclaimed a few octaves higher than normal. “Do not encourage him!”

“Absolutely encourage him,” Stephanie called out loudly.

“Rachel, you’re supposed to be on my side.” They could tell she was trying to be offended but couldn’t quite pull it off. “You know what? Don’t you have homework to do? You should be doing your homework.”

“I already got my homework done before I came here and the essay that’s due Monday,” Rachel answered easily.

“Oh, well that’s… very well organized. Good job, Rachel,” Marinette admitted grudgingly.

“Well, somebody here should be,” Lucius teased.

“And you! You know what, you don’t need to be here. In fact, you’re not welcome here anymore. You can go home. Call a car for yourself,” Marinette growled playfully.

“Might I remind you, this is my office,” Lucius responded, completely nonplussed by her comment.

“You might, but it won’t change my previous statement.” Lucius’ laughter rang clear through the phone, a clear indication that Marinette had punctuated her retort by sticking her tongue out at him.

“Lucius, stop flirting with my girlfriend,” Dick implored with a smile.

“Mr. Grayson, if I wanted to flirt with your girlfriend, she would no longer be your girlfriend,” Lucius responded smoothly.

“Oooooooh, damn,” Duke laughed. “So that’s what total destruction looks like.”

“Lucius,” Marinette admonished him, “don’t say true things like that to him. One of us being a nervous wreck with a tendency to spiral into anxiety induced death spirals and nightmares is enough.”

“You okay, fam?” Tim asked cautiously. He looked over to Dick to see how much of what she had said should be taken seriously and judging by the frown on his face, all of it except the Lucius part.

“Yeah, I’m good,” Marinette answered in an overly confident, chipper voice. They could just picture the toothy, too wide grin on her face and twitching eye. “Just another few weeks and it will all be over,” she continued. “One way or another,” she added quietly.

“I know you’re dreading the end of our association when you’re sought out by every major name in the business, but I think your future husband is more than happy to have you out of my influence,” Lucius teased. “Until he realizes there’s another year on the contract.”

“Yeah, okay. On that note, I’m going to let you get back to work so Marinette can get home and in bed at a reasonable time. Lucius… I’m keeping my eye on you,” he said in a stern voice that anyone else might have taken as serious.

Lucius laughed. “Understood, Mr. Grayson. Have a good night.”

“Love you, Bluebird. Have fun, guys.” Marinette called out to them.

“Night Marinette!” Jason, Duke, Stephanie and Tim yelled to her.

“Love you too. Night,” Dick said before hanging up. He tapped the phone against his lips with a concerned frown. He wasn’t doing enough to lessen her stress. She was still too stressed and it wasn’t good for the babies. Maybe he could give her a massage tonight. He plastered on a smile and turned to the others. “Let’s get this movie started.”

“Is she always like that?” Duke asked after a few minutes.

“Like what?” Dick tried to give him a confused look but Duke just raised an unimpressed eyebrow at him. “Yeah, lately, yeah. Stress from the show. When the show is over she should be much more relaxed. Adrien seems to think this is completely normal and expected for her.”

“Cass and I would take her out for another girl’s night if we thought it would help, but at this point, I don’t think there is anything we can do but not add to her stress,” Stephanie grimaced.

“What a thought, not adding to Pixie’s stress,” Jason glared at Dick, a look that Dick didn’t miss.

Tim looked awkwardly between Dick and Jason. “So… going back to what Lucius said, you thinking about proposing to Marinette?”

Dick looked away from Jason and blinked a few times, trying to get his mind to switch tracks. “I have a ring, but not now. Not yet. We love each other, but I don’t think we’re there yet. There’s still trust issues,” Dick shrugged.

Jason scoffed and took a drink. “Have anything to do with you abandoning her regularly with no notice and sketchy ass excuses?”

Dick glared at him. “Probably,” he growled, knowing full well that was exactly what it was. All of their problems boiled down to the Titans and him focusing too much on figuring out the Court of Owl plan. All the missed appointments, all the missed life events, all the broken promises, were all because of Titan activity.

“Have you thought about just… telling her?” Tim asked carefully.

Dick drew in a deep, frustrated breath. Of course he had. They all pushed him to tell her constantly. Bruce had even given his blessing. He could just tell her and alleviate a lot of their issues, but he refused to put that on her while she was already under so much stress and according to the doctor, it was dangerous for her to be under any. He couldn’t control the fashion show but he could control this. He wasn’t going to endanger the twins and Marinette just to make himself more comfortable.

She already got so worried about him from the injuries he came home with. She would get that adorable, heartbreaking concerned frown and furrowed brow every time she looked at them, and since some of them took weeks to heal, she had that expression every day, several times a day for weeks. After one particularly bad fight with Double Dare, she had nightmares for days about him getting hurt and then the babies getting caught in an attack. He wasn’t about to tell her he did that regularly and induce nightmares every night while she was pregnant.

“You know, you’re going to have a couple kids with her pretty soon. It might be important information for her,” Jason prodded.

“If Grayson doesn’t want to tell her, he has every right not to,” Damian interjected.

“Thank you, Damian,” Dick responded, silently, momentarily thankful he didn’t have the same protective streak for Marinette that the rest of the family had acquired.

“He knows her better than the rest of us and if he does not find her trustworthy, that insight should be respected,” Damian finished, returning his attention to the movie.

“What?” Dick exclaimed looking back at Damian in shock. Was that really what Damian was getting from this? Is that why he thought Dick didn’t want to tell Marinette? “That’s not… Damian that is not why I haven’t…”

“She should know if she’s going to be doing this alone,” Jason interrupted. His voice was hard and accusatory, as it often was with Dick lately.

Distantly, Dick heard someone gasp and shuffle around, but he was far too focused to process it. “She won’t be doing it alone,” Dick growled back. Jason had been exceptionally hostile lately, more so than even Adrien, but the insinuation that Dick would abandon his family was going too far. “I’m going to be there for her and the babies.”

“I can’t hear the movie,” Damian warned them.

“Shut it, Imitation’s Imitation,” Jason snarled before rounding back on Dick. “Are you? When does that start? ‘Cuz you sure as Hell haven’t been so far.”

“Jason,” Stephanie tried to interject.

“I’ve had…” Dick started.

“Yeah, yeah. Vigilante business, which has always been more important than making baby appointments, more important than being there for Marinette. You need to figure out if you’re Nightwing or a father.”

“I’m both,” Dick gritted out through his teeth.

“But which is more important?” Jason argued

“Being a father, of course,” Dick yelled out.

“That’s not how it looks right now. How many appointments have you missed? How many events? You abandon her constantly for things that other people could easily handle and eventually, she’s going to figure out that you don’t actually work for WE, and what’s your plan for that? Or is that plan? Let her figure it out and walk away from you so you don’t have to be the bad guy?”

“Shouldn’t your loyalty be to Grayson? You’ve switched loyalties rather quickly. One look from a pretty woman and as expected you turn your back on your family,” Damian snarled, finally turning away from the movie.

“What the fuck do you think she is? She’s family. She’s carrying your niece and nephew. They are our family, all three of them even if Dickhead walks away from them. They are still our family and they deserve some consideration too,” Jason yelled back.

Damian opened his mouth to respond but Cass moved next to him, shaking her head. Damian grunted, but acquiesced, letting Dick and Jason fight it out between themselves.

“What is your obsession with me leaving them? It’s not going to happen. I’m not going to abandon them!” Dick howled.

Jason shook his head and gave a bitter chuckle. His voice suddenly back to an eerily normal level. “You’re right. You always are, Golden Boy. ‘I’m not going to’ would imply a future event. You already have abandoned them.”

“Fuck you! I have not.” The lowering of Jason’s voice only made Dick’s anger surge. He was acting like he won an argument, like it was already over. It was far from over. “I’ve been doing everything in my power to protect them. Whatever the Court of Owls is planning it is going to be huge and devastating, and we now know it includes Gotham. I’ve been doing nothing but investigating them for months to stop them. I’ve fought talons, I’ve tracked down associates, fuck, I’ve gotten captured by talons and had to get saved by Garth and Donna.”

“They should have kept you,” Jason grumbled, heading to the door. “I’m going to go check on Pixie Pop. It’s getting late, someone should and naturally, that someone won’t be you.”

Dick seethed as he stared at the door Jason left through. How dare he? How dare he! He had no right to suggest not only was Dick abandoning them, but that he wanted to. Abandoning her was the last thing he wanted to do. He didn’t want to leave in the middle of dates. He didn’t want to miss the babies kicking. He didn’t want to miss entire weeks of development. He didn’t want to miss snuggling with Marinette. He didn’t want to sleep without her. He did all of that because he was protecting her, because he loved her. He couldn’t just pass off all of his responsibilities to someone else. He was the team leader. He had to be the one to make the decisions.

“You okay?” Tim asked gently. He wanted to make sure Dick was okay, but wasn’t looking to incur his wrath. Jason had said everything that needed to be said, now Dick just needed to calm down and consider the words.

“He doesn’t understand. He doesn’t understand what it means to be a leader, what it means to be a father,” Dick growled.

Tim looked away and gave a heavy sigh. He wasn’t listening. He decided he was doing the right thing and he wouldn’t listen to any other opinions. He’d dedicated himself to this course and he wouldn’t be swayed. He’d gotten better about it in the last few years, but still had miles to go. “Maybe,” he granted, turning to look Dick, his eyes hardened to steel, “but he does know what it means to be abandoned.”

Chapter 22

Tags:

@dickinette-february @demonicbusiness @ichigorose @iloontjeboontje @ladybug-182 @toodaloo-kangaroo @dast218 @golden-promises @trippingovermyfeet @emimar7 @laurcad123 @lady-bee-fechin @thewitchwhowaited @redscarlet95

#maribat #dickinette #Dickinette February #platonic jasonette #platonic adrienette #Hope on Board #Knocked Up AU #prompt - talon

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flufffysocks · 3 years

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let's talk about andi mack's worldbuilding

sorry this took forever to make! i've been pretty busy with school stuff and i kind of lost my inspiration for a bit, but i ultimately really enjoyed writing it! i wish i could've included more pics (tumblr has a max of 10 per post), and it kinda turned from less of a mini analysis to more of an extremely long rant... but i hope it's still a fun read!

i've been rewatching the show over the past few weeks (thanks again to @disneymack for the link!), and i’ve been noticing a lot that i never did the first time around. this is really the first time i’ve watched the show from start to finish since it aired, and it honestly feels so different this time - probably a combination of the fact that i’m not as focused on plot and can appreciate the show as a whole, and also that the fandom is much, much smaller now, so there’s a lot less noise. so the way i’m consuming this show feels super different than it did the first time, but the show itself doesn’t - it’s just as warm and comforting to me as it was the first time around, if not more so.

i think a lot of that can be attributed to andi mack’s “worldbuilding”. i’m not quite sure that this is the right word in this context, to be honest, because i mostly see it used in reference to fantasy and sci-fi universes, but it just sort of feels right to me for andi mack, because you can really tell how much love and care went into constructing this universe. for clarity, worldbuilding is “the process of creating an imaginary world” in its simplest sense. there’s two main types: hard worldbuilding, which involves inventing entire universes, languages, people, cultures, places, foods, etc. from scratch (think “lord of the rings” or “dune”), and soft worldbuilding, in which the creators don’t explicitly state or explain much about the fictional universe, but rather let it’s nature reveal itself as the story progresses (think studio ghibli films). andi mack to me falls in the soft worldbuilding category. even though it takes place in a realistic fiction universe, there’s a lot of aspects to it that are inexplicably novel in really subtle ways.

so watching the show now, i’ve noticed that the worldbuilding comes primarily from two things - setting and props, and oftentimes the both of them in tandem (because a big part of setting in filmmaking does depend on the props placed in it!).

one of the most obvious examples is the spoon. it really is a sort of quintessential, tropic setting in that it's the main gang's "spot", which automatically gives it a warm and homey feel to it. and its set design only amplifies this:

the choice to make it a very traditional 50s-style diner creates a very nostalgic, retro feel to it, which is something that's really consistent throughout the show, as you'll see. from the round stools at the bar, to the booths, to the staff uniforms, this is very obvious. the thing that i found especially interesting about it though is the choice of color. the typical 50s diner is outfitted with metallic surfaces and red accented furnishings, but the spoon is very distinctly not this.

instead, it's dressed in vibrant teal and orange, giving it a very fresh and modern take on a classic look. so it still maintains that feeling of being funky and retro, but that doesn't retract from the fact that the show is set distinctly in modern times.

of course, this could just be a one-off quirky set piece, but this idea of modernizing and novelizing "retro" things is a really common motif throughout the show. take red rooster records. i mean, it's a record shop - need i say more? it's obviously a very prominent store in shadyside, at least for the main characters, but there's no apparent reason why it is (until season 2 when bowie starts working there, and jonah starts performing there). a lot of the time, though, it functions solely as a record shop. vinyl obviously isn't the most practical or convenient way of listening to music, but it's had its resurgence in pop culture even in the real world, mostly due to its aesthetic value, so it's safe to say that it serves the same purpose in the andi mack universe.

the fringe seems to be nostalgic of a different era, specifically the Y2K/early 2000s period (because it's meant to be bex's territory and symbolic of who she used to be, and its later transformation into cloud 10 is representative of her character arc, but that's beside the point). to be honest, exactly what this store was supposed to be always confused me. it was kind of a combination party store/clothing store/makeup store/beauty parlor? i think that's sort of the point of it though, it's supposed to feel very grunge-y and chaotic (within the confines of a relatively mellow-toned show, of course), and it's supposed to act as a sort of treasure chest of little curios that both make the place interesting and allow the characters to interact with it.

and, of course, there's andi shack. this is really the cherry on top of all of andi mack's sets, just because it's so distinctly andi. it serves such amazing narrative purpose for her (ex. the storyline where cece and ham were going to move - i really loved this because it highlights its place in the andi mack universe so well, and i'm a sucker for the paper cranes shot + i'm still salty that sadie's cranes didn't make it into the finale) and it's the perfect reflection of andi's character development because of how dynamic it is (the crafts and art supplies can get moved around or switched out, and there's always new creations visible).

going back to the nostalgia motif though, the "shack" aspect of it always struck me as very treehouse-like. personally, whenever i think of treehouses, there's this very golden sheen of childhood about it, if that makes sense. i've always seen treehouses in media as a sort of shelter for characters' youthful innocence and idealistic memories. for example, the episode "up a tree" from good luck charlie, the episode "treehouse" from modern family, and "to all the boys 2" all use a treehouse setting as a device to explore the character's desire to hold onto their perfect image of their childhood (side note: this exact theme is actually explored in andi mack in the episode "perfect day 2.0"!). andi shack is no exception to this, but it harnesses this childhood idealism in the same way that it captures the nostalgia of the 50s in the spoon, or the early 2000s in the fringe. it's not some image of a distant past being reflected through that setting; it's very present, and very alive, because it reflects andi as she is in the given moment.

some honorable mentions of more one-off settings include the ferris wheel (from "the snorpion"), the alley art gallery (from "a walker to remember"), SAVA, the color factory (from "it's a dilemna"), and my personal favorite, the cake shop (from "that syncing feeling").

[every time i watch this episode i want to eat those cakes so bad]

these settings have less of a distinctly nostalgic feel (especially the color factory, which is a very late 2010s, instagram era setting), but they all definitely have an aura of perfection about them. andi mack is all about bright, colorful visuals, and these settings really play to that, making the andi mack universe seem really fun and inviting, and frankly very instagrammable (literally so, when it comes to the color factory!).

props, on the other hand, are probably a much less obvious tool of worldbuilding. they definitely take up less space in the frame and are generally not as noticeable (i'm sure i'll have missed a bunch that will be great examples, but i'm kind of coming up with all of this off the top of my head), but they really tie everything together.

for example, bex's box, bex's polaroid, and the old tv at the mack apartment (the tv is usually only visible in the periphery of some shots, so you might not catch it at first glance) all complement that very retro aesthetic established through the settings (especially the polaroid and the tv, because there's really no good reason that the characters would otherwise be using these).

besides this, andi's artistic nature provides the perfect excuse for plenty of colorful, crafty props to amplify the visuals and the tone. obviously, as i discussed before, andi shack is the best example of this because it's filled with interesting props. but you also see bits of andi's (and other people's) crafts popping up throughout the show (ex. the tape on the fridge in the mack apartment, andi's and libby's headbands in "the new girls", walker's shoes, andi's phone case, and of course, the bracelet). not only does doing this really solidify this talent as an essential tenet of andi's character, but it also just makes the entirety of shadyside feel like an extension of andi shack. the whole town is a canvas for her crafts (or art, depending on how you want to look at it. i say it's both), and it immensely adds to shadyside's idealism. because who wouldn't want to live in a world made of andi mack's creations?

and, while it's not exactly a prop, the characters' wardrobe is undoubtedly a major influence on the show's worldbuilding. true to it's nature as a disney channel show, all of the characters are always dressed in exceptionally curated outfits of whatever the current trends are, making the show that much more visually appealing. i won't elaborate too much on this, because i could honestly write a whole other analysis on andi mack's fashion (my favorites are andi's and bex's outfits! and kudos to the costume designer(s) for creating such wonderful and in-character wardrobes!). but, i think it's a really really important aspect of how the show's universe is perceived, so it had to be touched upon.

[^ some of my favorite outfits from the show! i am so obsessed with andi's jacket in the finale, and i aspire to be at bex's level of being a leather jacket bisexual]

and lastly, phones. this is a bit of an interesting case (pun intended), because the way they're used fluctuates a bit throughout the show, but i definitely noticed that at least in the first season terri minsky tried to avoid using them altogether. these efforts at distancing from modern tech really grounds the show in it's idealist, nostalgia-heavy roots, so even when the characters start using their phones more later in the show, they don't alter the viewer's impression of the andi mack universe very much.

so, what does all of this have to do with worldbuilding? in andi mack's case, because it's set in a realistic universe and not a fantasy one, a lot of what sets it apart from the real world comes down to tone. because, as much as this world is based on our own, it really does feel separate from it, like an alternate reality that's just slightly more perfect than ours, which makes all the difference. it's the idealism in color and composition in andi mack's settings that makes it so unmistakably andi mack. even the weather is always sunny and perfect (which is incredibly ironic because the town is called shadyside - yes, i am very proud of that observation).

the andi mack universe resides somewhere in this perfect medium that makes it feel like a small town in the middle of nowhere (almost like hill valley in 1955 from "back to the future"), but at the same time like an enclave within a big city (because of its proximity to so many modern, unique, and honestly very classy looking establishments). it is, essentially, an unattainable dream land that tricks you into believing it is attainable because it's just real enough.

all this to say, andi mack does an amazing job of creating of polished, perfect world for its characters. this is pretty common among disney channel and nickelodeon shows, but because most other shows tend to be filmed in a studio with three-wall sets, andi mack is really set apart from them in that it automatically feels more real and tangible. it has its quintessential recurring locations, but it has far more of them (most disney/nick shows usually only have 3-4 recurring settings), and it has a lot more one-off locations. it's also a lot more considerate when it comes to its props, so rather than the show just looking garish and aggressively trendy, it has a distinctive style that's actually appropriate to the characters and the story. overall this creates the effect of expanding the universe, making shadyside feel like it really is a part of a wider world, rather than an artificial bubble. it's idealism is, first and foremost, grounded in reality, and that provides a basis for its brilliant, creative, and relatable storytelling.

tl;dr: andi mack's sets and props give it a very retro and nostalgic tone which makes its whole universe seem super perfect and i want to live there so bad!!

#andi mack #buffy driscoll #cyrus goodman #jonah beck #tj kippen #tyrus #ambi #bex mack #analysis #film analysis #disney channel

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gingermintpepper · 3 years

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After thinking it over for a bit, I've decided that I might as well do a proper underrated 3DS game rec list. I'm a bit of an ATLUS junkie and that's gonna be pretty disgustingly apparent in this list, but it's not my fault that they released hit after hit and all of them were duly ignored.

Due to tumblr's 10 image limit (and my struggle to keep motivated to do one thing for more than three hours) I'm definitely gonna have to break this up into parts and I'm fairly certain one of these lists is just gonna be MegaTen games lmao but I'd like to let people know about these excellent titles and see if I can't at least get people interested in them so they can get more traction.

So, without further ado:

Some 3DS Games that were criminally slept on (part 1)

Monster Hunter Stories

God, where do I begin with this game. Well, the basics: It's a JRPG spinoff title of the now widely successful and popular Monster Hunter series featuring a different take on interacting with the varied and intricate monsters populating the world: Riders.

Yep, instead of hunting the beasties, you play as a young rider who's completed their intiation ritual and can now bond with 'Monsties' as they've cutely labelled the usually ferocious monsters of the wilds. The great thing is that you still fight Monsters--tons of them in fact but this isn't a paid review and in my humble opinion, the most impressive thing about this game is the visual style. The landscapes, the armour, the way they redesigned and 3DS-ified the classically hyper realistic and monstrous beasts to not only be absolutely adorable but still capable of being intimidating when the time calls for it, the stellar animation of special moves and combination attacks--it's delicious, nutritious, stupendous, I can and will consume it like it's part of my recommended caloric intake.

It's very akin to Pokemon in the way its basic gameplay premise is set up, however, instead of catching--or even indeed befriending--the Monsties in the game, you rummage through their nests and steal their eggs, later hatching them and getting yourself a brand new lightly kidnapped monster pal!

Other general things about the game:

Pros:

The armour and weapon sets for both male and female characters slap along with the general character customisation options. They're incredibly diverse (though limited in body type) and you can switch around traits and features whenever you want from your house.

The POGS--these porkers are everywhere and they serve as tiny little achievements for exploring every odd and end of the world. Also they have little outfits. They're so cute. 🥺🥺

You can actually ride the Monsties. All of em. Or, at least the ones that you have available to be your buddies. They all have exploration skills and traits that not only make exploring much more interesting but encourage you to swap out your active Monstie and play around with your options a bit.

Y'all breeding Monsties is complicated and I live for just how intense and ridiculous you can get with optimal builds for these things.

The story is really competently put together! The characters, character designs and even the internal conflict with your starting trio of characters is really compelling along with the mystery of the blight that's infecting Monsters across the world. It's not anything worth awards but it's compelling and it makes you care about the characters if that's what you're in the market for.

Amazing sound design, expansive world, everything about the presentation of this game oozes that Monster Hunter charm even if the art is cutesier than usual. You'll never get bored of its stellar visual presentation!

Available for around twenty quid on the Google Play store, so if you want, you could actually get the full game on your smartphone or tablet. Note though that it would be a battery nuker.

Cons:

If you're on a regular 3DS, frame rate drops are a given. This game kinda pushes the visual capabilities of the 3DS to its absolute limit--a lot like Okamiden did back on the DS.

One save file :( It's pretty much for the same reason as above but still.

If you're playing as the girl, you can't get male armour and vice versa. Since there's only one save file, you'll never be able to have all of the armour sets in a single playthrough and that's criminal because both of the sets for the genders are absolutely breath-taking, thank you.

I 👏can't 👏make👏my👏 own 👏Palico👏

Multi-player for this game is pretty dead seeing as it's almost five years old by now and never got much press or traction. Usually this wouldn't be an issue - this game is 99% singleplayer and you don't really need to fuss about with multi-player to have fun, but if you want to collect all the Monsties, you'll need it since the only way to get Glavenus is through pvp achievements. :/

Final thoughts: Play it if you find yourself getting tired or disappointed with 3DS Pokemon games but still want something that feels as fantastical as Pokemon. It outshines the 3DS Pokemon games at every turn and I will never be over just how thoughtfully put together and fully realised these games are. Of course, if you've ever played Monster Hunter, then you know just how intensive these games are with the lore, biology, cultures and world of their Monsters but seeing that translated into JRPG format was just very sobering and it's a game that, to this day, continues to awe me with just how much love and attention went into it.

Last note: If you're still unsure about it, there's a demo available on the e-shop of the 3DS that allows you to play through the entire initial area of the game. Your data does carry through to the full release and to give you an idea of how much I've been able to squeeze out of it - my playtime for that demo is currently sitting at 22 hours. Make sure to get a hold of that Cyan-Kut-Ku!

7th Dragon III Code: VFD

The title may sound intimidating but the premise is not! A mysterious disease called Dragon Sickness spread by the Dragonsbane flowers that have cropped up all around the world. You and your team are recruited by the Nodens game company after you display extraordinary prowess in their hit virtual reality game 7th Encount. As you go through the adventure, you are tasked with finding out the truth behind the Dragon Sickness and asked to stop both it and the Dragons that are destroying the world.

This game is fun. It's another turn-based JRPG however, in this game you create all of your characters yourself from the myriad of classes available to you from the jump. Different classes of course have very different specialisations - Samurai focus on high powered cutting damage with their swords, Duelists are summoners who can influence the element of the battlefield as well as summon monsters from each element, Agents can hack into your enemies and inflict a barrage of nasty ailments, just to name a few - and you are given three teams of three characters each to experiment with different team comps and find the balance that works for you. There's also a wide variety of Dragons to hunt and kill in the game, which directly affects how infected your world is with the Dragon Sickness causing Dragonsbane. Along the way you will also come into contact with many interesting characters, concepts and confrontations that will make the task of saving the world all the more imperative.

Pros

1. The character creator and differing classes give way for tons of experimenting and playing around with your own unique approach to combat and carrying out your missions. Granted, 'character creation' is generous, it's little more than palatte swaps but the classes are really where VFD shines. Eight main classes may not sound like a lot, but the expaniveness of the character skills, their synergy with their fellow classes and the uniqueness of some of the classes in and of itself allows for so much flexibility and creativity in approaches to even tougher bosses. It also encourages the switching about of your party members to really finagle with the options available to you.

2. God this game is pretty. The locations, the character art, the creature design - all of it is gorgeous and this game capitalises on every bit of the 3DS's presentation limitations as it can.

3. You can romance anything and everyone - yes, you can even be gay/lesbian/poly in this game. In fact, one of the main characters - Julietta - is gnc and he's a constant source of joy as well one of my personal favourite characters, right behind Yuma.

4. Exploration is very very forgiving as the game has healing spots and teleport nodes all over the world to allow for quick, seamless travel between quest points without feeling like anything is too much of a hassle. There are also special enemies that allow for quick grinding as well as quick farming of money. In general, the game does a really good job of making sure that the grind is never unbearable or inconsiderate of your time.

Cons:

1. This is the fourth game in a series the West has never seen any other title for, and from the looks of it, will probably never see any other titles for. Because of that, there are some elements that may seem confusing or revelations in the plot that may seem to come out of nowhere.

2. While the visuals are great, the OST of this one is pretty short making for a lot of reused soundtracks that can get really annoying if you're like me and need your audio to be interesting or consistent so it doesn't distract you too much.

3. This one isn't really a con but it is divisive: This game gets pretty difficult at times. A few of the main dragon enemies including and especially the final boss can give you a serious run for your money in the annoy-o-meter in terms of the kind of absolute JRPG fuckery they can pull out of their magic bag of bullshit movesets and while I generally enjoy that kind of thing, I know it's not for everyone. Most regular combat shouldn't be too tricky once you have a team comp that works well together but you also need to pay attention since the same team that carries you to victory one time might be worth beans against another dragon.

Final thoughts: This is... a really good game. Interesting story, really interesting characters, pretty world and a battle system that really makes you sit down and think. There's also a demo for this available in the e-shop and while your data doesn't carry over - you do receive multiple perks for carrying over your demo data including some exclusive items that, while not game breaking, do help a ton in the early stages of the game.

This isn't a final list by any stretch of the word; I only have the energy to do these two right now, but the next games up for coverage are Ever Oasis and Stella Glow! If you're interested in my full plan of games I want to cover here then my current lineup includes: Theatrhythm: Curtain Call, Project Mirai: Deluxe, Culdecept Revolt, Alliance Alive, Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology, Etrian Odyssey V, Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker and Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse.

Finally, if anyone has played any of the games I mention, cover or plan to cover PLEASE REACH OUT TO ME, I AM SO LONELY IN MY FORTRESS OF SAND. On a serious note, I'd love to hear what other people who've played these games think!

Thanks for reading,

-Ginger

PS: @feralpeacock Because a million years ago, on my first underrated games post, you asked that I remember you. :D

#ginger rambles #ginger talks about video games #monster hunter stories #monster hunter #code dragon iii vfd #video games #3ds #underrated games #These take so much energy to make holy shit #There are so many more amazing 3ds games I could talk about #But I legit just don't have the braincells for #Also I know Apocalypse probably has the biggest audience that played it out of all the games listed #But it's criminally underrated because it was different #So it's probably going to get it's own little review thing #Yeehaw

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tbzhours · 3 years

Text

the most magical places

haknyeon x you royal au, strangers to lovers au, fluff, a pinch of angst, implied smut

[summary] you like to see the snow in other countries but this one time, you didn’t get to see it until you met haknyeon [words] 4.8k

[notes] hello, dee @atbzkingdom! i am your theb secret santa! i feel like i haven’t been a good ss because we know each other and it’s so hard to not reveal myself;; i think we got slightly closer up until here and i really hope we can interact more into 2021! here’s my gift for you! i tried to match what you like and what you experience from our secret santa interaction! i hope you like it and i wish you a lovely holiday! love you ♡

and also special thanks to the creators of this ‘december to remember’ project! the owner who messaged me deactivated but i feel like this little project brought many of us closer to each other! have a safe and warm holiday, everyone! see you next year ♡

It was cold as you shivered by the food stand, picking out a warm bread to eat. You took a glance at the sky, wondering why there wasn't snow yet in this town because every year around this time when you visited, there was always snow. Could it be luck? You couldn’t tell because you’re from a country where it stays warm all year. Maybe the heat wanted to stay with you but you shook your head at how ridiculous your thoughts sounded.

“It’s supposed to snow tonight.” Haknyeon suddenly announced behind you. You turned around and watched him walk up to you. Your eyes were awestruck, they couldn’t leave him as you could see stars in his eyes, along with that smirk. Somehow, you didn’t feel cold anymore when he seemed to be waiting for your reply.

He turned away from you to the vendor, ordering a soft warm bread like yours then he noticed you still hadn’t looked away or said anything. He faced his body the same way as yours, watching the people dance at the center of the town square while the musicians played christmas melodies. The scene looked very animated, vibrant, full of excitement. It was very different from your town but the energy was there. You could hear it as your eyes turned gentle.

“You don’t look like you’re from here.” Haknyeon commented, taking a bite of his warm bread. He noticed how different your clothes were, perhaps the design that wasn’t commonly worn in his town.

“I’m not from here.” You finally said, almost too excitedly. Your cheeks tinted up when he suddenly laughed.

“No wonder. You couldn’t stop looking at me just now. No one does that here.” He joked, biting into his food again.

“I did that? Ah, sorry about that.” You tilted your head away, looking at the ground with the tip of your toes twisting behind your other foot.

“It’s alright.” He assured you then he smiled widely. “I’m Haknyeon. What is your name and your origin?”

You told him your name and the town you were from. “It’s just a whole day away by boat.”

He repeated your name and town softly, eyes moving to the side as if he was trying to imprint them into his mind. He sighed through his nose with a cold air appearing in the air. His lashes blinked as he looked back at you to ask, an assumption because it was common during this time of the year. “Are you here for a vacation?”

“I guess you could say that.” You smiled, dashing looks at the ground to shy away from his stare. “Where I’m from is summer year round. Every winter, I’ve been traveling to other towns to see the snow, like here.” You looked up at the sky, sighing in disappointment. “But it hasn’t come yet.”

“Have you forgotten what I said?” He teased in a whisper. “It’ll snow soon.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” You didn’t know why his words sounded so reassuring but your lips resembled his. “So, what do you do?” You asked. You noticed it since he predicted the forecast. His hair was wet and wavy, split right in the middle where the two ends covered his temples. His winter outfit was just like any other men in town where his brown cloak was long enough to cover his knees to keep warm. At a quick glance, you couldn’t tell what he does for a living.

“If I tell you I’m a royal guard at the palace, would you believe me?” Haknyeon asked, grinning widely when the crowd got louder from the fun. Everyone was gathering at the middle of the square and the festive cheer made you look before you gasped back at him.

“You’re a royal guard from the palace? And you’re allowed out here?” You were surprised but you sounded mellifluous to him. He took your hand, pulling you toward the dancing crowd because it was part of the song where everyone dances together.

“Of course, I am. It’s not some typical fairytale you read about. Now come on, you have to experience this if you’re here for a vacation.” Haknyeon laughed when he looked back at you. “I’ll teach you how to do this too. It’s quite easy.”

Haknyeon was right: the dance was easy to follow. You glanced a few times at him when he wasn’t looking because he was looking at your feet to see if they were moving the same as his. As you both danced along, hand-in-hand, you learned that the royal guards at this town were allowed to come out during non-working hours, which were from sunset to sunrise, and sometimes, they can switch duty hours if they want to. As for you, he learned that you’re a drawer, a painter to be exact, though you couldn’t bring your tools over as you wanted to take a break to focus on the travel. Hearing your passion, he hoped to see some of your work one day.

It wasn’t until you told him you needed to head back when he asked if you were okay with him walking you. He was at your side as your hands were hidden inside your pockets minutes later after leaving the town square.

It was quiet as you were holding onto the bag of your bread. Haknyeon couldn’t help to burst a tiny giggle when the bag kept making a sound.

“Make sure to eat that when you get back. It’s probably cold right now.” Haknyeon said.

“Thanks, I will.” You smiled shyly at your moving feet when it got quiet again. You could hear your feet clicking on the ground, making a steady beat when he got curious.

“Say, did I ask where you were staying?” He asked, realizing that you were leading him when he offered to walk you home.

“I have a friend whose family owns an inn. I’m staying there until I go back.”

He nodded, humming along. “That must be nice.”

“It is. His family is very welcoming and he has a beautiful partner, though they’re out of town right now for business. He gets lonely sometimes but he has a son who keeps him busy.” You glanced at him before you noticed he’s been listening with his eyes. He smiled before you continued, “I can show you where it is. It’s just down this way.”

When you both reached the Inn, which was next to a few shops that were closed for the day, Haknyeon stood in front of you and asked, “I forgot to ask, when are you leaving?”

“In about a week.” Your lips slightly curved to one side. “Why?”

“It’s just-” He paused, suddenly hesitant but he continued anyway. “I don’t know when we will meet again but if you have time, there will be a winter ball at the palace in two days. I think you might enjoy how beautiful the night looks with all of the lights and snow.”

You calculated the date in your head. “The 24th of December?”

“Yes, at sunset.” Haknyeon chuckled softly. “I wish to show you so you have to come and see it.”

“I’ll think about it.” You smiled at him, knowing you both would have to part now.

“Then… Have a good night, (Y/N).” His cheeks were rosy when his smile bloomed. You adored how warm his voice was. It made you want to make him stay but you held back.

“You too.” You smiled back. “Thank you for tonight.”

Haknyeon soon walked away, heading home but he turned around and made sure to tell you again, “Look out for the snow.”

Haknyeon gave one last long look with a lingering smile still on his face. He really hoped to see you at the ball as he walked away and disappeared when he turned a corner.

You finally walked inside the Inn from the cold, but you weren’t shivering. Hyunjae noticed you there and waved at you with a greeting. “Hey, how was the festival?”

“It’s supposed to snow tonight.” You told Hyunjae, ignoring his question before walking up the stairs with the blushes on your cheeks. He didn’t see it but he blinked at himself for a second before he nodded with a shrug and a smiley frown on his face.

Right then, he looked at the window at his side and he couldn’t believe his eyes. It was snowing.

The next morning, Haknyeon could stop thinking about you. You were all up in his head in the middle of his private fencing lesson with Juyeon, the prince of the palace. They rallied at each other but Juyeon hit him the most. Once he won, he was smiling in surprise, almost goofy when he took off his mask.

“You’re really out of your mind.” Juyeon shook his head at Haknyeon.

Haknyeon followed his smirk, taking his mask off too as his wet hair fell to the sides of his forehead. “Am I, really?”

“Yeah.” Juyeon nodded close to him, fixing his own hair. “You never lose like this.”

Haknyeon chucked, shaking his head. “It’s just someone.”

“Just someone?” Juyeon teased. “You’re becoming like me.”

“I am not. You’re something else.” Haknyeon laughed then he mimicked how Juyeon reacts about his future lover. “Do you think she likes me? Maybe I’m just going insane, for her.”

“Hey!“ Juyeon shouted at how exaggerated he was. They both dropped their swords as he started to chase him around the room. Haknyeon’s laugh echoed when Juyeon threatened, though his voice became laughter when the chase got longer. “Tell me about this person before I demote you!!”

You couldn’t stop thinking about Haknyeon too, so you told Hyunjae all about it, about how you met this royal guard who asked you to the ball and how handsome he was. Even his way of words caught you staring. Hyunjae was glad to hear because every time you came to visit, you had always gone out alone, except when you hung out with him and his family.

“You need an attire to go. Did you bring anything fancy from home?” He asked, turning back from the front desk after giving a key to a returning customer. He didn’t remember seeing any attires from your last visit as you were sitting in a chair behind him. You just awkwardly smiled at him.

Hyunjae shook his head and asked his mother to take over before he led you to his room. His little boy was still sleeping on the bed as he passed by to open the closet for you.

“You can pick a few things. I’ll wait out of the room. Just knock.” He smiled and walked out.

It took you a few seconds to finally look through some of the outfits he had, and some that his partner left behind. Slowly, you got a few on at a time, letting Hyunjae and his son decide when he woke up.

His son shook his head many times each time you came out in an outfit that wasn’t his taste. Hyunjae awkwardly laughed and shrugged so you went back in the room until you found the one. The two nodded when you came out and you sighed in relief. You couldn’t wait to see Haknyeon.

That day quickly came. As you walked toward the crowd entering the entrance of the palace, your heart was racing. There was snow everywhere but the walkway was cleared out and once you were part of the elegant crowd, you noticed how the lights that led the way were shining brightly. Many people were laughing in cheers as they headed toward the palace. It made you wonder if Haknyeon was also waiting to see you.

Inside the palace, it was wide and spacious. The designs around the room were very gold and bright. The king was already waving from his balcony but the prince’s was still left empty. It almost made you feel awkward walking by yourself because everyone had their own partner. Yet, you still walked around the place, hoping to find him.

As for Haknyeon, he was with the Prince, Juyeon, waiting for him to get finished with dressing. When Juyeon turned around from the mirror, Haknyeon smiled cheekily. Juyeon’s attire was a white suit with a few golden harnesses hooked over his shoulders and down his chest. Haknyeon was in his royal guard suit, which was also white, except he didn’t have his sword with him.

“What do you think? Do you think she will like it?” Juyeon asked.

“I think…” Haknyeon had his fingers at his chin, tapping as he thought for a while. Juyeon sighed then Haknyeon whispered, “She’s gonna fall so bad for you.”

“Thanks.” He turned back to the mirror to check on his hair and face with his eyebrows furrowed on one side.

Haknyeon laughed at his funny expression then he stood next to him in front of the mirror and sighed loudly. “I’m serious though. You’re getting married to her and I can see how much she already adores you.”

Juyeon turned to him and patted his shoulders but held onto him as if he’s been holding in his distrust about his engagement. It wasn’t arranged but sometimes he just needed someone to give him assurance. He held his head down and peeked a smile at Haknyeon. “Thanks. Thank you for not mocking your future king, but I don’t need you by my side tonight.”

“What do you mean? I have to.” Haknyeon tilted his head, confused. Juyeon sighed when he let Haknyeon go.

“I’m saying, you should go enjoy the ball too. It’s not like you get to every year. Beside, there’s someone you can’t forget.” Juyeon explained but Haknyeon was still speechless. Though it was his duty to be close to Juyeon at every event, he didn’t know Juyeon would allow it, but Haknyeon would gladly follow Juyeon’s words because he was going to be the next king of this town. Juyeon smiled at him and gave his last order for the night. “You’re off duty tonight. Go have some fun.”

“I won’t let you down.” Haknyeon played along as Juyeon laughed and shook his head.

And so, Haknyeon walked down in his royal guard attire, not needing to change. He waved at a few guards who were also off for the night though some had to solely stay within the palace for security. Some holiday carols were being played in the background as he walked to each side of the main floor, greeting some people he knew. Each time the conversation ended, he peeked around just to see if you were around.

For a second, he was going to lose hope. He was smiling quite uneasily, though understanding but when he turned around, he found you through the crowd.

You could see how surprised he was when he saw you. His lips turned into a big smile as he made his way to you. He didn’t know how long you had been looking but there was a tiny bit in him that you’ve been looking for him too.

His hair was brushed straight down over his forehead, unlike his natural waves from the other day and to top it off with that white outfit, you couldn’t find any words to tell how different he looked. He looked like a new person, but with those eyes, they were the same from the way they looked at you that night.

“You made it.” Haknyeon said after his eyes gazed into yours for a second. There went those stars again and you grinned widely.

“I did.” You closed your lips into a soft smile, shy with your confession. “You look quite different today."

"Well, thank you." Haknyeon chuckled softly. He never thought he’d ever hear you compliment first that he found you a little cute. He noticed your attire. It was really elegant, much like other people in the room but from you, it was much more to him. "You look beautiful too.”

“Thank you.” You smiled shyly with a hand wiping at your thigh.

Haknyeon peeked behind you, as if someone was looking at him. You didn't follow his eyes and stayed until he looked back at you.

The music changed because Juyeon and his to-be wife became the eye of the room as he led her to the center of the room.

“That’s Juyeon, the prince of this palace. He’s becoming king soon, and that’s his love.” Haknyeon looked at you and you both stared at each when he continued, “He’s not so sure of their love for each other, but when you look at them, you can tell.”

It was as if you could hear his heart beating when those stars appeared again. The moment didn’t last long when people started to move back to give room for the dance floor. Haknyeon quickly took your hand so you both wouldn’t be apart. He held your hand close to his chest and when everyone stopped moving, he let your hand go. You curled your hand, still wanting to hold his.

“You must be close to the prince then.” You commented, smiling a small one.

“I am.” He grinned, watching the two lovers dance the first official song of the night. He sneaked close to you to whisper a funny joke. “I keep running away from him so now I’m his most wanted royal guard.”

“You’re quite the stealer then.”

“The stealer of what?” Haknyeon asked, meeting your eyes again. The stealer of my heart. Your heart kept dropping each time he did that. You got distracted when the song changed. His eyes widened and his face bloomed excitedly. “You cannot miss this chance to be dancing in the palace.”

“Why?” You asked, curiously scared.

“There’s a myth that every lover on the dance floor falls in love when this song comes on.” Haknyeon took out his hand to you and you didn’t know if you should trust his words. His smile seemed promising that you wouldn’t mind letting him hold your heart. With him, you weren’t as scared as before. He finally asked. “Would you like to take this dance with me?”

You wanted the myth to be true, so you took his hand without any regrets.

Haknyeon walked you to the dance floor, following other couples. You both dance together for a moment as you warmed up to follow his steps since you weren’t familiar with the song. He held onto your hand firmly each time you slipped. Your face burned up whenever you found him smirking.

“Don’t you do this every year?” You asked since he’s been in the palace for a while, you didn’t know how long.

“No, this year is special because the prince is finally getting married.” He was still staring at you because that’s what dancers do. Maybe you weren’t quite the dancer when you looked away, scoffing lightly at his wit.

“You must be lying.”

“It’s much more of a joke.” Haknyeon chuckled then he smiled. “At least I made you smile.”

Now, you started to realize it was your heartbeat from before, and not his. It was loud and you didn’t know how to make it go away. You held onto his hand tighter nervously.

You suddenly remembered what he told you the night you both met and quickly changed the subject. “Anyway, you mentioned lights and snow. I don’t see it here.”

“That’s because we’re inside the walls.” He sneaked a whisper to your ear. He could feel the heat coming from your face, that maybe you wanted to get out of here with him. He moved back and set your locked hands down. He nodded his head away to one side, “Come on.”

Haknyeon took you to a balcony in the palace where he’d always go to watch the lights, no matter what season. It always looks beautiful at night and he had to admit, it was the best view of the town.

It was chilly, of course, but he was right: you had to come see the lights from the town and how the snow complimented it. Star bloomed in your eyes and you couldn’t stop gazing at the beautiful sight, except you felt like something was missing. The stars. You couldn’t see them at all and all you saw was a future of your upcoming last day here.

You sat on a bench from the balcony while he was still gazing at the sight. You had a frown on your lips when he turned back at you.

“Why the sad face?” He asked.

“I’m leaving this town soon.”

“You still have a few days.” He smiled reassuringly, then he leaned onto the stone rail and set his hands in his pockets. He sighed, resonating with you. “It’ll be nice for you to live in a country that has all 4 seasons so you don’t always have to move around to experience them.”

You smiled softly, feeling thankful. You were usually okay with leaving when it was time to, but because of Haknyeon, he made you want to stay.

Haknyeon suddenly laughed, joking, “What if you missed the boat because I wouldn’t mind to stall you to miss it.”

“You’re very funny.” You shook your head with the same smile glued on your face, rejecting his silly joke.

Haknyeon crossed his arms and tilted his head when something came to his mind. “Since you won’t let me stop you, how about I take you somewhere magical? No duties, just you and me.”

You thought this view was already magical enough but you also wondered what else was there?

It got colder when you both reached the beach beside the boats where you took. You could see all three things: the lights from the town, the snow that piled upon each surface, and the stars across the ocean. You wondered if he had read your mind when you were still awed at half the night sky.

“Isn’t it magical?” Haknyeon asked excitedly as he followed you from behind after you ran toward the water.

“Are you some kind of wizard or something?” You asked, turning back at him with a smirk on your red cheek. “Because it is.”

“I can show you more places before you leave.” Haknyeon offered, one of his hands holding onto a coat that he made sure to grab on the way out of the palace.

You were walking backwards but it slowed and you stopped to look at the snowy sand. “I’ll think about it.”

“Going solo.” Haknyeon walked up to you and set the coat over your shoulders. “Let me know if you need any recommendations.”

There were so many thoughts going through you. He stood next to you as you both admire the sky longer.

Haknyeon walked you to the Inn after the little night adventures and when you both reached there, you didn’t want to let him go.

“Here we are.” Haknyeon announced as you turned around to face him. He was shivering and his cheeks were pale but pink. “I hope you enjoyed tonight.”

“I did. Thank you.” You smiled. “Tonight was wonderful.”

“I’m glad.” Haknyeon's voice got softer. There was hesitance again. His eyes lingered at you, longing for more but it was already time to part. “If you ever need me while you’re still here, I’m right at the palace.” You nodded at him then he proposed farewell. “Have a good night, (Y/N).”

“Good night, Haknyeon.” You tendered. Your smiles were filled with sadness that you didn’t want him to turn away. Before he could, you called out his name again. His eyes were large at the sound of your blaring voice. You sighed softly, hoping he wouldn’t reject your request. A moment went by, staring into each other’s eyes with so much longing before you pleaded. “Stay with me.”

So Haknyeon did, until sunrise. As he kissed you that night in your room, you confessed to him, ”You know, I was going to pretend that I didn’t know this town well and thought it would be fun to have you show me around...”

“So you already know the best places in this town?” He asked, surprised with an astonished smirk on his face. You nodded your head once with a playful smile then before he collided his lips with yours again, he chuckled, “You’re magical.”

Haknyeon took you to places he enjoys going to, as well as you showing him hidden places in case he didn’t know since he’s mostly in the palace during the day. Your night outs were adventurous, like running hand-in-hand in the fallen snow, biting into each other’s food, riding his white horse on the palace grounds, and kissing in the hidden alleys. Haknyeon never knew you could take him to places he had never been, like your heart.

When you caught him staring at one of the food stands at another festival at the town square, you grinned against the breeze. Your nose was getting red and he couldn’t help to laugh about it. He pulled you closer as you both selected the food you wanted.

It was finally the day you were going to leave and it’s sentimental because it’s probably the first time you both met when the sun’s out. Haknyeon stood in front of you with so many words he wanted to say to make you stay, especially trying to reason with Juyeon that he had to really go that morning.

Love makes everyone so insane, Haknyeon recalled the prince’s words, and he was right, because look at where Juyeon was now.

Haknyeon smiled at the thought but gazing into your eyes, he might think he’s the one going insane this time.

“Will you come visit again?” He asked, rubbing your hand in his.

You’ve visited many places but there were not that could beat this place. “Of course. You are my favorite place.”

“I wonder what your country looks and feels like.” He chuckled.

“Why don’t you come visit me?” You teased him how he always did with you.

“I can when I talk to Juyeon again. He wants to keep me here.”

“Like how you do with me.” You giggled but you knew that couldn’t happen. You didn’t want to leave your country forever yet. Even though you could see a future with Haknyeon, you still needed time to think about how this would work. You sighed a long one, releasing a white breath from your nose. “I’m going to miss you so much.”

“So will I.” Haknyeon pulled you into a hug, his hand cupping behind your head while the other still held onto your hand. You closed your eyes, inhaling his scent one last time before you both pulled back after a long while. You were about to bid your goodbye but he pulled something out of his pockets. He opened your palm and set a ring necklace there. The ring rested softly on your skin while the necklace fell off the side of your hand. His eyes couldn’t leave the ring when he confessed, trying not to choke on his voice. “I got you this. I just wanted to make sure no one else proposes to you before I do.”

“Are you trying to stall me?” Your voice curled up into a grin. Your eyes were teary but no tear fell. When he met your eyes, the stars never left him.

“I wish.” Haknyeon chuckled, his eyes softly blooming with the sunrise at the ends of the ocean. He could tell you missed home from the crystals in your eyes. He closed your hand and held onto it tightly, rubbing his thumb on it as he smiled reassuringly, “I will properly propose to you when we meet again.”

You held in your tears but you managed to smile widely, just as Haknyeon always wished you could when you’re with him. “I love you.”

“I love you so much more.” Haknyeon gave you one last kiss, holding his lips against yours as if his life held onto it. Instead of saying goodbye, he told you, “See you again.”

You both parted for the last time and until he was no longer in sight when the boat moved away, you painted him in your head and marked him there like you would on a paper.

You took the ring off the necklace and slipped it through your ring finger, how perfectly it fit. This wasn’t a goodbye because you would see him again. It wasn’t now but it was soon. You just couldn’t wait.

#the boyz #the boyz scenarios #the boyz imagines #haknyeon #deobiwritersnet #tbznetwork #tbz scenarios #tbz imagines #tbz #juhaknyeon #ju haknyeon #royalty au #royal au #fluff #implied smut #note: the goodbye/see you again was insp by mr.sunshine

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reynauldapologist · 3 years

Note

What darkest dungeon mods do you like? I'm think abt doing another run. Confide in me your secrets.

i use a lot of different ones for different runs, and they all impact the game in radically different ways, so i’ll break them down into categories to make things easier:

aesthetic/non-impactful mods:

[these are either skin mods or only change a very small aspect of the game]

Remove Narrator from Endless Loading Screen

this does exactly what it says. you no longer have to listen to Grampy Darkest give his dissertation on why he’s the Most Evil and Fucked Up Guy around every time you wanna hop back into the farmstead.

Perfect Faster Dungeon

CANNOT RECOMMEND THIS ONE ENOUGH!!! i have no clue how i ever played this game without it. it increases walking speed, combat pacing, scouting, and end screen results without choppiness or awkward animations. this is perfect if you’re a weirdo like me and you’re trying to grind for all of the achievements or if you’re a longtime player or if you simply have a need for speed

Unofficial Palette Expansion Pack

hands down my favorite skin mod ever! it gives each base game class five new palettes to choose from. the recolors are subtle, but very well-done and visually unique, and they blend right in with the rest of the game. if you value immersion from your mods like i do, you’ll really like this one. there are also palette expansion packs by the same creator for the flagellant, shieldbreaker, and musketeer

Jester On-The-Run

i installed this one shortly after starting my all-jester run. i adore the design and how well it blends into the game’s art style. i almost like this one better than his canon skin, it fits his backstory much better

annnnd since i was neck-deep in crusaders and ONLY crusaders for a little while, i ended up installing quite a few crusader skins, which i’ll now dump here:

Warden Crusader Skin / Deus Vult Skin Set / Crusader Soul of Cinders Skins / Accurate Templar Crusader Palette / Crusader Knight Skin

class mods

[note: i haven’t had the chance to mess around with these in an actual run yet, i added these to my longest save after i had already beaten the final boss]

The Veiled

i haven’t had the chance to utilize the veiled much in my expeditions, but a lot of love and effort went into this mod and it really shows. he uses similar mechanics as the flagellant - the closer to death he is, the more powerful he becomes - but cranked up to nine. he has great healing and offensive abilities, as well as a decent debuff skillset. this mod has fantastic art, of course, and would probably fit right in with a good mark team

The Commandant

it might take you a little while to learn how to properly use this guy, but once you do it’s well worth the effort. he’s a great debuff/stress healing support class if utilized correctly, but he can dish out some heavy damage of his own if you have a little patience. cool aesthetics and a unique concept elevate this class quite a bit for me

The Stargazer

this dude is the definition of a glass canon. super low HP, but high dodge and the potential to deal out some serious damage. he has two states, each with four abilities (kinda like abom!), that he has a 40% chance of switching between, making him a decently versatile class, if a little unpredictable. he was made with the intention of being a color of madness specific class, in the same way that the flagellant was made for the crimson court. i was first drawn to his aesthetics tbh, i adore all the work that went into designing this mod, from the design to the unique animations and sounds

script/gameplay mods

[these mods fundamentally change the gameplay]

Bigger Balanced Roster - Max 99

does what you would expect: increases your roster to 99. i use this for my completed save, so that i can test out different comps and class mods to my heart’s content. i wouldn’t recommend this for a serious run, because it totally destroys a core aspect of the game’s difficulty lmao. i haven’t encountered any bugs with this one and i still receive 1-4 lvl heroes in my stagecoach regularly

Crusader Only

here it is. the mod that took over my life for six months. does what it says: ensures that only crusaders show up in your stagecoach and eliminates all non-crusader class-specific trinkets. i didn’t encounter any bugs with this mod at all. this creator has also made [class]-only mods for all of the other heroes, including a bunch of different combos (like crusader-arbalest only, shieldbreaker-flagellant only, etc). check out their work if you’re interested in Testing Your Patience Abilities

Eternal Fanatic

typically, once you’ve killed the countess, the fanatic will cease spawning. this is great if you're a normal person with a healthy relationship to video games, not so great if you’re a completionist and a cautious scaredy-cat and have successfully avoided him during your entire Crimson Court run. activating this mod on a save means that the fanatic will begin spawning again, albeit with a slightly lower chance. once you’re sick of him, you can deactivate the mod and play normally once again.

Last Man Standing

aka Reynauld Goes Beast Mode. this mod restricts you to one hero - Reynauld - and forces you to use him and only him for the entirety of your run. all eight of his skills are active at once and buffed to the gills, he has seven total armor/weapon upgrades, and he can carry three trinkets at once. but that doesn’t mean this will be an easy endeavor. as you might have guessed, you can’t toss rey in the sanitarium to deal with pesky quirks or diseases or stress-heal him in the hamlet. you just have to tough it out. i would highly recommend you use this in conjunction with the Perfect Faster Dungeon mod above. unfortunately, this mod is rather buggy in its current state. ive had problems with reliable quest spawning and many of his skills don’t function the way their description says they should (such as his added riposte). im including it anyways because it’s a really cool concept and has a lot of potential! i’ll be keeping an eye on it

and that’s everything i regularly use! i hope this was helpful & good luck on your runs :)

#and if anyone has recommendations for other mods i should try send them my way!#wyrdposting

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bltngames · 3 years

Video

youtube

The Balan Wonderworld demo came out yesterday. If you haven’t been keeping up with this, it’s a game by Yuji Naka and Naoto Ohshima, two of the original creators of Sonic the Hedgehog. A lot of that original team has gone on to do solo work outside of Sega, but this is the first time two former members of Sonic Team have gotten back together to make a new game.

If the demo is anything to go by, Balan Wonderworld (which I keep trying to type as “Balan Wonderland,” because it has a much nicer rhythm to it) is a game that lives deep in the shadow of NiGHTS into Dreams and Sonic the Hedgehog. It is very clearly trying to be an “Old School Sonic Team” experience, which it... sort of succeeds at, for better and worse.

This feels like a game they ripped straight out of 1995, warts and all, and remastered it with modern-ish graphics. I say “modern-ish” because in broad strokes, I think Balan looks pretty good. The character designs are charming, the level themes are interesting, but if you really stop and look at the game, it’s honestly pretty ugly, with simple lighting, limited detail and blurry textures.

One gets the impression maybe that’s because Balan is on everything -- Playstation, Xbox, PC, and even Switch. The gross texture work could be to squeeze the game down for Nintendo’s handheld, but apparently it runs extremely poorly there. On the PS4 Pro, it sticks pretty closely to 60fps, though there are occasionally hiccups here and there. Nothing worth fretting over, honestly.

But how does it play?

This is where the shadow of Sonic the Hedgehog looms large. Balan is designed to be simplistic to a fault: You get one button to control your character. Or, more specifically, every button on your controller will do the same thing (for the most part). This is right out of the Sonic handbook, as that game was also designed to be operable with only one button, as well.

Now, what your one button does can change. Scattered around levels are different costumes for your character to put on, and each costume has its own unique ability. The full version of Balan promises 80 different costumes, and there’s probably half a dozen in the demo. Each one serves a unique purpose, and some of them don’t even have the ability to jump. Which is fine, mostly, because you can carry a stock of three costumes with you that you can swap between sort of like the team mechanics in Sonic Heroes. Once you finish a level, those costumes get added to your dressing room, allowing you to customize a loadout of costumes at any checkpoint.

On paper, that much sounds fine. But this is where things start getting weird.

Costumes are not freely available to pick up. The jewels that hold costumes are locked with a key. This creates an obvious gameplay loop: find key, unlock costume, use costume to solve puzzle, right? Right.

Except that, at least in the demo, most keys are only a few feet away from any given costume jewel. On top of that, keys respawn. Crack open a costume jewel, grab the costume, but hang out for a little while and eventually the key will reappear. In doing this, you can stock up on keys early on in a level, smoothing out the process of acquiring new costumes as you go. I’m not sure why Balan does this. The time between key respawns is a few seconds too many -- just enough that it starts to feel tedious. But, as far as I can tell, there is no penalty for farming up a bunch of keys from the first key spawn point, either. It’s the worst of both worlds. If it was trying to be convenient, keys would spawn more quickly, but if it was trying to plan puzzles around acquiring keys, you can completely side step that by just waiting it out and hoarding keys early on.

You’ll not only want to hoard keys, but hoard costumes, as well. If you’re unlucky enough to take damage or even die while wearing a costume, it’s gone. You can build up stocks of costumes so you’ll always have spares to pull out of the dressing room, but that requires you to specifically go out of your way to get duplicates and bank them. If you don’t, you might find yourself at a puzzle that requires a specific costume that you simply don’t have anymore. When that happens, your only recourse is to backtrack in the hopes of finding a crystal that contains the costume you need, and characters in Balan aren’t exactly fast moving.

The chances of you losing a costume seem pretty low, admittedly. Balan Wonderworld doesn’t really seem like it’s aiming for anything resembling difficulty. Enemies exist, but only in very small numbers, and they’re easily dispatched. Most of the game is more about exploring the dream-like environments and playing around with the various costume abilities in order to solve basic puzzles.

You aren’t working against a clock, there isn’t a scoring system, and you usually aren’t being graded on your performance. Talking it over with some others, the vibe is that this could be a good game for young children. It requires little in terms of controller dexterity and is generous in every sense of the word.

The primary complaint against that, I guess, is that Balan Wonderworld is a weird game. Like, “Elsa and Spider-man Finger Family Youtube Video” weird. Every level is packed full of gently dancing ghosts that phase out of existence once you get too close to them. They’re all the creatures your costumes are based on, but they don’t exist as NPCs in the world for you to touch and interact with. Like I said, they’re ghosts, and they disappear the moment you get within a few feet. Those same ghosts will suddenly materialize when you touch certain checkpoints, throwing you something of parade. They interrupt the level music and everything just to play their own special celebration song. Move more than a few feet and they will fade back out of existence again, taking their special parade song with them, never to be seen for the rest of the stage.

It lends a strangely “uncanny” feeling to the game. I think the dancing characters are meant to add a sense of carefree fun, but they look like people wearing mascot suits, doing the same basic scripted routine over, and over, and over, for eternity. They don’t look like they’re having fun, they don’t appear to be choreographed to the stage’s music, and yet there they are, eternally dancing the days away. It’s kind of eerie. They were performing before you got here, and they'll keep performing after you leave.

The demo pits you against a single boss, which is notable for being someone who has the same powers you do, but combined and amped up. Seeing the same costume motifs come up in the boss as they draw from the same abilities that you have is actually a really fun idea, and the game rewards you for getting creative and swapping between costumes when you deal damage.

Balan Wonderland is a very odd game, and I’m not sure what to make of it. It took me a while to start wrapping my head around its aesthetic and vibes. It contains shades of something like Super Mario Odyssey to be sure, but it feels like it’s trying to elevate itself above that. Again, it’s a game living deep in the shadow of NiGHTS and Sonic, and in particular, it feels like it borrows NiGHTS’ penchant for putting artistic expression at the top ladder rung. Balan often feels like a very inscrutable sort of game, but in a way that seems to be reaching for some kind of greater meaning beyond simply gameplay. Everything in Balan feels like it might be conveying a message of some sort, even if it’s not immediately apparent. Its ideas do not come from a vacuum.

But here’s the deal: even though a lot of people couldn’t grok NiGHTS into Dreams, I did. I love that game to death. But with Balan Wonderworld, even I’m often left scratching my head. Despite its dead-simple gameplay, it may be just a little too high concept for its own good.

But at the end of the day, it’s not a game I hate. It’s strange, and charming, and even if it feels sort of impenetrably "artistic," at least that makes it interesting. The simple gameplay works its magic, making it an easy game to drop in to even if you don’t necessarily understand what you’re looking at.

Like, what’s the deal with the “Isle o’ Tims” between levels? It kind of has the vibe of a chao garden from Sonic Adventure, but the individual “tims” creatures don’t seem to have statistics or anything like that. You feed them so they crank a wheel, which builds a tower that helps them crank the wheel better. It turns in to a bizarre sort of perpetual motion machine. To what end? I don’t know. And what exactly is Balan himself, anyway? Some of his visual cues call to mind character designs for NiGHTS, but he appears to be a different sort of creature altogether. There’s a rather lengthy intro FMV, as you can no doubt see from the Youtube embed, but it’s more about swirling colors and hyperactive animation than conveying what’s going on or who Balan is. How much of this is even really happening, and how much of it is purely metaphysical? It’s very unclear.

I’ll be interested in seeing how the full version of Balan Wonderworld fares. I get the distinct impression that this will be another NiGHTS -- a game beloved by a core audience of hardcore fans, but shunned for being “too weird” by the populace at large.

I’m not quite sure which group I belong to yet.

#balan wonderworld #square-enix #arzest #yuji naka #naoto ohshima #NiGHTS into Dreams #Sonic the Hedgehog #demo #Playstation #video #writing #preview

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criesinmultifandommess · 3 years

Text

DSMP Model AU

something different from what I usually post :)

I don't really know much about modelling and fashion, so apologies if some of this is wrong or I'm missing something

lotsa words under the cut, you've been warned <3

Dream wants to create a fashion show :D

there's Dream's company known as Smile, the L'Manberg company, and a few freelancers that caught Dream's eye

Smile: Dream, Sapnap, Punz, Bad, Ant, Sam, Skeppy, Callahan, Purpled

L'Manberg: Wilbur, Niki, Eret, Fundy, Jack, Tommy, Tubbo, Ranboo

Freelance: George, Hannah, Schlatt, Quackity, Foolish, Puffy, Ponk, Techno, Phil

spans about 4-6 months in planning

something something scandal about Dream hiring Eret, Niki, Karl, Ant, and Puffy for LGBTQ+ brownie points uhh yeah American media is an absolute shitshow anyways all of them defend and support Dream (some nicely, some not-so-nicely, some very passive-aggressively)

the show itself takes less than an hour to do; 75 thousand people attend, even more watch it live

after party gets wild. almost no one remembers what happened that night, but it was wild (the interns were sent home early, dw)

they all trade numbers at the end to keep in contact, as they should

just a lot of forced friendship, screams, and chaos, nothing new

Models

George: an up-and-coming model; has an Instagram account that almost that a lot of people follow but he rarely posts; freelance

Sapnap: Dream's first model and followed him into the fashion world; likes to credit himself for getting Dream to where he is now

Wilbur: is a model for fun; works as a freelance musician but also accidentally created the L'Manberg company so yeah

Niki: also a model for fun; works at a flower shop in her downtime; part of the L'Manberg company

Eret: has been modelling for a while; was freelance for a while before getting picked up by the L'Manberg company; Wil likes to threaten to kick them out because they were the first one to agree to model in Dream's show but it's all lighthearted

Fundy: modelling is alright but playing pranks on the other models/photographers and recording them is much better; doesn't play pranks on any hair/makeup artists anymore tho bc one artist got so fed up they switched his outfit with a maid one and posted pictures; he still gets a lil nervous when he's getting his makeup done; accidentally called Wilbur his dad once and no one lets him live it down; part of the L'Manberg company

Hannah: likes to wear eco-friendly clothing; went through a phase of weaving roses into her hair regardless of what she was wearing; she still does that but dialed it down to only one rose and color coordinates the rose with her outfit; freelance

Designers

Dream: head designer, obviously; Sapnap dared him to wear a paper plate with a smiley face on it at a show/interview but it backfired because Dream's popularity skyrocketed and he made it his brand; parents passed down their company to him

Punz: does not care about dressing himself but will judge others; part of Dream's company

Schlatt: close to the L'Manberg company, but isn't a part of them; flirts with just about anyone; has several hidden stashes of alcohol scattered around the set that no one has discovered yet

Quackity: yes, he still wears the beanie; in a constant rotation of make chaotic clothing, flirt with pretty people, be depressed over pretty people, get angry for being depressed. rinse, wash, repeat forever; very afraid of Techno because he took an unflattering photo of him and is scared of it being used as blackmail; freelance

Foolish: likes to use gold and green/emeralds. a lot. very inspired by Egyptian clothing; has a little totem charm for luck; freelance

Hair and Makeup artists

Puffy: tends to dote on the interns; hangs around Niki, Sam, and Foolish; has styled hair for both companies before

Karl: works under Mr. Beast but close friends with Quackity and Sapnap who begged Dream put in a good word for him

Photographers

Ponk: when not working, likes to flirt with Sam; always has a lemon in his pocket and won't tell anyone why; freelance

Techno: technically freelance, but works closely with the L'Manberg company; very close to Phil; used to be a designer and clashed with Dream a lot, but he found he liked photography more; this doesn't mean Dream and Techno don't bicker when they see each other, oh no, their conversation is filled with insults

Agents/Managers

Bad: used to work under Dream's parents before Dream took over; more like an assistant for Dream himself rather than a manager, what with all the things Dream asks him to do

Ant: agent for Dream's company

Phil: technically a freelance agent/manager, but works closely with the L'Manberg company; very close to Techno

Technicians

Sam: unofficial head technician; part of Dream's company

Skeppy: manages the camera footage: part of Dream's company

Callahan: doesn't say anything, which is why Dream likes him (jk); fixes problems quickly and silently tho; part of Dream's company

Jack: can normally be seen wearing headphones; somehow is the dad friend and chaotic friend at the same time; part of the L'Manberg company

Interns

Tommy: joined the L'Manberg company because he looks up to the members and their associates (but he won't tell them that)

Tubbo: joined the L'Manberg company to follow Tommy; jokingly starts a new company called Snowchester with Ranboo and a pig plush they named Michael

Ranboo: technically working under the L'Manberg company, but then again, Dream has also offered for Ranboo to work for him... but does he abandon them or give up on an opportunity hmm

Purpled: is he working for money? is he held against his will? who knows: seems to appear and disappear without a trace; intern for Dream's company

Excerpts

George Davidson, more widely known as GeorgeNotFound, is a handsome British model that's been taking the world by storm. A magazine once described him as "you're either in love with him or want to be him", and, quite frankly, it's true.

Clay Craft, also known as Dream. The charming CEO of his parents' company, Smile, and starting up his very own fashion show. Rumor has it that the show will not only feature his own employees, but will also include some showstopping names from L'Manberg, as well as some very talented freelancers.

Wilbur Soot, the leading model and creator of L'Manberg. Though his company may have been started on a whim, no one can say that L'Manberg is unsuccessful, as it quickly rose in popularity, much like the man himself.

Smile is one of the best fashion brands out there, if not the best. With their wide range of products and people, Smile makes sure that every customer leaves with a smile.

"L'manberg?" Dream chuckles. "What a stupid name. L'manchildberg is a much better fit." "At least our brand isn't just a smiley face one of my friends drew on a paper plate." Wil snarks back.

You know, when Schlatt first asked Wilbur to model for him all those years ago, neither knew that their popularity would pick up, Wil would open his own company, and they would catch the eye of Dream himself.

George didn't know what to expect when his agent told him that Dream was interested in having him in his show, but watching one of the most famous designers fall to the floor, dying of laughter over a deez nuts joke was nowhere near what he could've imagined.

Celeb News @/CelebNews L'Manberg technician Jack Manifold leaks that his company will be participating in Dream's fashion show! The question on everybody's mind is: who will be in it? Mack Janifold @/JackManifold NO NO NO I DIDNT LEAK SHIT @/JackManifold https://www.youtube.com/thislinkaintreallmao YOU IDIOT Jack Manifold @/JackManifold OKAY MAYBE I LEAKED SOMETHING Wilbur Soot @/WilburSoot GODDAMNIT JACK

Celeb News @/CelebNews Dream goes in depth about his vision for his show and drops a few names you might recognize! https://www.youtube.com/ihavenoideahowtwitterworks Dream @/designerDream Replying to @/ :)

Celeb News @/CelebNews Has one of the most famous designers cut his fame short? According to an anonymous source, Dream may have hired some of the people on his show for "representation" instead of talent. Technoblade @/Technoblade bruhhh Sapnap @/Sapnap and you know this how? Are you Dream? Didn't think so

Dream @/designerDream None of the people in my show have been chosen for "representation". All of them are very talented and amazing in their own right, and they are more than just their sexuality or their job. Karl Jacobs @/KarlJacobs Replying to @/ am i just a person who does makeup to you D: Antfrost @/Frosty_Ant if i say im straight will i be kicked out of the show Red Velvet @/Velvet_Cake @/Frosty_Ant we were never dating, we're just really close best friends :) Eret @/The_Eret can't believe I got into the famous Dream's fashion show because I like all genders! Puffy @/CapnPuffy lmao same! Niki @/nikinihachu lmao same!

#dream smp #dsmp #model au #au #alternate universe #yes im a writer but i can only write headcanons lmao #or little snippets #dream #modelling #designers #hair and makeup #photographers #this acc was supposed to be for hcs and aus #but i got caught up in lore n shit #whoops ig

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defensefilms · 3 years

Text

Do We Owe Mike Budenholzer An Apology?

Much of the storylines coming out of the NBA finals are about Giannis Antetokounmpo and what this win means for him, and rightly so, but the wider storyline by fans and analyst should also feature a healthy dose of mea culpa’s from all involved regarding Mike Budenholzer.

I am no exception in this regard. I remember specifically saying that Monty Williams was the better head coach and that he was the great equalizer for the Suns. Monty Williams could only manage 2 wins in the finals and they both came in the opening games. From there Coach Bud was the one making the better adjustments.

If we’re being fair, Coach Bud was one of the most maligned coached throughout the 2020/21 season, with many claiming Bud would be fired should the Bucks collapse in the post season again.

Two things lead to the pressure Budenholzer may or may not have been feeling going into these recent playoffs.

The first was the Eastern Conference finals in 2019. The Bucks would win the first 2 games against the Nick Nurse led Toronto Raptors and wound up losing the series 4-2. Many sighting Budenholzer not adjusting his 4-out1-in strategy to utilize other Bucks players. The second was the 2nd round of the 2020 bubble playoffs in which the 1 seed Bucks were beaten 4-1 by the Heat, who were the 5th seed in the East.

Those 2 events shifted the perceptions of Coach Bud negatively. Even as recently as game 3 of the 2nd round of the 2021 playoffs where Bucks fans were calling for Budenholzer to be fired during game 3 against the Brooklyn Nets.

My issue with Coach Bud and you can read it all here, was whether he had enough layers in his playbook to utilize players other than Giannis.

Net rating is a statistical metric which measures a player’s performance by tracking their offensive rating minus their defensive rating. It’s a way of tracking how much better or worse a team is with or without a player.

Long story short, the Bucks net rating in 2019 without Giannis was at 10.6 and 3.1 without him on the court. That paints a picture of a very Giannis-dependant team. However that was in 2019. In 2020/21 the Bucks has a net rating of 5.6 with Giannis and 6.7 without Giannis.

Stats show that Coach Bud was steadily getting over any Giannis dependency and to be fair to Coach Bud he may have dispelled fears about this in the Eastern Conference finals against the Atlanta Hawks, when the Bucks closed out the series without Giannis.

Even in other regards, Coach Bud has had the right influence on Khris Middleton.

Under Jason Kidd in 2017/18, Middleton averaged 20.1 points, 4.0 assists, 5.2 rebounds on 46.6% in field goal percentage and 35.9% three-point field goal percentage. On average he would attempt 15.5 shots per game.

In this championship run, Middleton averaged 23.6 points, 5.6 assists and 7.6 rebounds. He was now attempting 19.7 shots per game and 43.8% from the field and 34.3% from 3.

Middleton’s development and stepping in to his role and the midrange shot-creator and designated closer, is something Budenholzer has been mostly responsible for developing him in to.

To add to that Budenholzer didn’t always have PJ Tucker and Jrue Holiday on his roster and Tucker’s floor spacing along with defensive versatility were key to the Bucks playoff run. Jrue Holiday’s contributions were absolutely critical and he is no doubt at the core of that improved net rating, to be fair the Bucks have never had a third option as good as Holiday and people forget that Jrue averaged 23.7 points per game in 2017/18.

You have to also consider that when you measure Budenholzer up against his peers who were able to win championships with a homegrown star player drafted by the franchise, he actually measures up very favorably.

It took Phil Jackson a full two season to win with Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen and Bud was in his 3rd season as a Buck before winning as well. Greg Popovich took over as Spurs head coach in the 1996/97 season and in the 1999 post season guided Tim Duncan, David Robinson and the Spurs to their first championship.

If you compare him to even elites and historical greats in his field then Budenholzer might just be right on schedule.

So to be fair, Budenholzer has earned some apologies but it won’t be enough to keep him in the seat log term. Giannis is only 26 and winning another championship in his prime will definitely be a priority for the Bucks.

If Budenholzer wants to truly exterminate and do away with any doubts he has to keep the Bucks in championship contention but furthermore, he has to smooth out some of the details of the Bucks half court offense. He’s made better use of Khris Middleton but to be fair the Bucks have 4 players in Jrue Holiday, Khris Middleton, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Brook Lopez that easily become mismatches when defenses try to switch.

The difficulty in scheming for the Bucks is that not every team can line-up the same way against them. Defending them is so personnel specific that I don’t think any team can truly adopt another’s strategy to stop the Bucks even if they do similar things like defend Giannis with a center. Most shooting guards are not 6 foot 8 inches tall like Middleton, most point guards are not 6 foot 6 inches like Jrue Holiday and matching up with Giannis is a whole different kettle of fish.

In short, we need to see the Bucks getting and making easier shots on a routine basis for Coach Bud to truly silence his doubters.

#nba #nba champions #milwaukee bucks #mike budenholzer #giannis antetokounmpo #khris middleton #jrue holiday #brook lopez

2 notes · View notes

inventors-fair · 3 years

Text

Shareholders Meeting (Generosity Commentary)

This was absolutely new territory for me, 100%. I used to be a Sen Triplets player, for cryin’ out loud. Who would I give my opponents anything, ever, for any reason? But that’s the beauty of this, though. Being a Magic player and running design contests means I have to see beyond what I might want to play with right off the bat. And I do have my manipulative tactics from time to time. Has anyone seen that Modern deck that synergizes with Suture Priest/Blood Seeker, Hunted Phantasm, Forbidden Orchard, Sickness in the Ranks, and Blood Artist? It’s jank but I love it.

When talking about these cards, there are the usual questions about design and likes/dislikes, but there’s the most important question, and one that’s gonna come up a lot:

Is there any reason this card HAS to enter under an opponent’s control?

The main issue I saw with a lot of cards is that there wasn’t always a reason for them to be under an opponent’s control, instead of just having an effect that could exist on the card regularly. For this commentary, I’ll be calling that a “Control Factor.” Also, some cards that were potential winners/runners will be marked as Judge Picks.

Let’s take a look.

@aethernalstars — Labyrinthine Towershell

Likes/Dislikes: This is an oddball design first and foremost. I can see the inspiration from the art, and while I don’t play WoW I can get the gist of what that place is, what the world is, through your design, so that’s nice! Shroud being what it is, though, and considering an opponent gains control of it, I’m not sure why that was chosen over hexproof. Just so an opponent can’t get rid of it with targeting effects? I can see how this would slow them down. I’m not sure why blue/red are the colors for this card. It feels mostly blue/green. Is the red because of the control? Additionally, I feel that even with the color weight this card is severely undercosted; you made a powerful ability, which is good! Just needs balance.

Control Factor: I’m feel that this could have been a hexproof creature with “Whenever a creature an opponent controls” etc. to affect their board that way. What’s the flavor of an opponent gaining control of this? Why not just have the turtle as a kind of maze guardian? It’s a strong ability and contender.

Nitpicks: Second ability should probably be an “as” ability and not an ETB trigger, and needs “an opponent of your choice.” Or see Xantcha’s oracle.

~~~

@askkrenko — Maheer, Trusted Advisor (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: I had a headache trying to figure out what this card would do practically on the battlefield. And you know what? I had a field day and I loved it and wow, this card is a competitive player’s dream. The resource management, the potential loss, the incredible decisions to be made, the way that this has to be utilized for optimizing life loss and card advantage and deciding who gets what where... Wow. I can imagine this card being in some competitive cube and/or actually severely affecting eternal formats and/or limited. Impressive and difficult. For two mana I’d say it’s pushed, but pushed ain’t broken. Probably.

Control Factor: Yes, the switching of control for life loss and the flavor of a lying advisor traveling across the battlefield works both flavorfully and mechanically.

Nitpicks: “Activate this ability,” not “Use.”

~~~

@dabudder — Bounty Board

Likes/Dislikes: Fight is a difficult ability sometimes. And this card has repeatable fight, colorless fight, and ramping. I feel that that’s just enough to be a break. Arena and Triangle of War are old as butts, and nowadays I don’t know if there would be that much of a precedent at such a low cost. If you have a good enough board state even in limited, this card becomes a gold-giver in exchange for destruction at two mana. I do like the flavor, and the flavor text ain’t bad. Probably still too big a risk.

Control Factor: I like the flavor but I don’t understand it entirely. Who is on the bounty board? Your creatures, or your opponent’s creatures? If it’s yours, why are you playing a card that puts a bounty on them? If it’s your opponents, wouldn’t YOU get the reward for fulfilling the bounty?

Nitpicks: “Gold” should be capitalized, and probably be “Treasure.”

~~~

@deafeningsandwichpeach — Ancient Sea Gate

Likes/Dislikes: I feel that unfortunately this card is fundamentally broken, and not in your favor. Yeah, they skip a draw step, but now you’re giving an opponent a land that can activate a Emmessi Tome for two mana every turn. At that point you’ve lost a land drop, you’ve given them card advantage at the cost of a single draw step, and you are immediately and woefully behind. The mechanics of this card as they are now are interesting, absolutely interesting, and absolutely unplayable.

Control Factor: Mechanically I kind of see what you were trying to go for. Flavorfully I don’t understand at all.

Nitpicks: None. (Well, I mean, the border for lands that make colored mana should match, but that’s not your fault at all.)

~~~

@dimestoretajic — Xantcha, Enlightened Infiltrator

Likes/Dislikes: Once I could read this card, I understood its intentions. It’s a strong callback to Xantcha, so you know, kudos for that. And also, this card only works in multiplayer, which is a bit of a problem. If you only have one opponent, then you play this card, you activate the 0 and draw/lose life, and then you have to attack her until she gets to ten because that zero ability literally can’t be activated. If you’re the only opponent, then nobody can be targeted. Was that intentional? If so, kudos for making a complex card but un-kudos because that feels super unintuitive. “lowest numerical value” also doesn’t entirely make sense to me, because it’s not a “negative ten” ability, it’s “remove ten loyalty counters” as an activation cost.

I feel that there could be a risk-reward potentially associated with this card, or you could add the must abilities into the activations themselves, but it’s hovering in between clunky and unplayable. Assuming the best, that you’re in a 3-4 player game, you have a insanely-difficult-to-remove clock for three mana that draws you a crapload of cards. Which, you know, some people could like! But it’s the kind of card that doesn’t make you friends.

Control Factor: Yep, checks out. See above notes on opponent targeting in 1v1, though.

Nitpicks: “0″ abilities don’t need a plus or minus. Was this a card creator limiting factor? If so, ignore my ignorance.

~~~

@emmypupcake — Volatile Mixture

Likes/Dislikes: It’s a cute bauble that swings around and hurts people, checks out. Colored artifact with a relevant ability, sure thing. How does it play? ... Well, I was doubtful and then I read it again. Wow, I really misread this card. So you’re playing hot potato for a whole lot of turns. Okay, that’s fun. That’s fun! Yeah, I totally messed up when I read this the first time. I think that this card is pretty interesting in concept. I think that it could kind of be just a tax, though, and it’s entirely possible that it just never goes off during a game and everyone is spending two mana to ensure that they don’t get stuck. Or, for three mana, you’ve made kind of a worse shock. It’s a perfectly fine card that probably needs a more volatile gimmick. What if it flipped coins or something? I don’t know, I’m spitballing. Hm, but no, ignore that, I’m liking the flavor of having to keep it under control. Shame that it just doesn’t have a guaranteed explosion.

Control Factor: Fun enough to use the wording, juggles well, forces decisions. Checks out!

Nitpicks: “Volatile Mixture enters the battlefield under target opponent’s control.” Could also Xantcha that wording.

~~~

@evscfa1 — Contract of Peace

Likes/Dislikes: There’s nothing fundamentally wrong with this card’s design, but it feels clunky to say the least. Four separate abilities that are tangentially connected, the weird activation, the static... I think, more than anything, I don’t get it. What’s the contract? What’s the peace of a one-sided battlefield? Is it ironic, with a bribery type of activation? What do the Treasures have to do with peace? This card could be printed but again, I don’t understand why it would exist, or the world around it, or what sort of set it would belong in. “Disjointed” is a good word for this card. A singular design that doesn’t feel like it meshes with any flavor or archetype. All cards are submitted without context, but the best cards imply context, and that’s where I feel the mark was missed.

Control Factor: Is an opponent being forced to sign a contract? Again, the “why” of this card feels obfuscated.

Nitpicks: “15” should be written out as “fifteen.”

~~~

@fractured-infinity — Sleeper Agent’s Gambit

Likes/Dislikes: I loved this card until I didn’t. On the surface, you have a fantastic flavorful design with great flavor text and a new, silly ability. And then, for three mana, you essentially ensure that your opponents are going to have the most frustrating time of their lives. In limited, this card is an early-game decimator, and that’s...well, it feels a little harsh. Two targets (creature you control + opponent) and the multicolored factor aren’t that hard to get around, and once you do, my gut says that this card is more frustrating than fun, especially when you consider some of the creatures that you can give to your opponent. How could it have been improved? Well, consider: what if it was an aura? It could be put on a creature then given to an opponent, and it had those abilities. “Gambits” are calculated but still have a risk, like a non-indefinite strategy. I want to like this idea but I’m still getting frustrating over fun. Look at Necrotic Plague, for example. In kind of the same vein, y’know?

Control Factor: Perfect.

Nitpicks: If all else fails and you wanna keep this card, the wording could be a little more streamlined: “Target opponent gains control of target creature you control. That creature gains ‘This permanent can’t be sacrificed’ and ‘At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice a creature.’” For your future, make sure “can’t” replaces “cannot,” and that punctuation goes inside quotes.

~~~

@fumblehawk — Gwafa, Monopolous Merchant

Likes/Dislikes: Out of all the things I expected, a different take on Gwafa “MF’in’” Hazid was not one of them. So the card itself! It’s cool. It’s a little weird, but it’s cool. I like the idea of drawing cards as payment for forcing gifts. The tax effect is something very interesting to consider with how much this card kind of wants to get rid of cards, and you can end up giving things that tax all players, and even make some kind of freaky Zedruu deck. I mean, this feels MADE for Zedruu and Grand Arbiter and all kinds of EDH decks. The thing is, this card doesn’t feel too different from the OG Gwafa, and I don’t know how to feel about that. There’s nothing wrong with revisiting legendary creatures, of course, but the effect... I don’t know, I’m iffy on it. This is a strong submission but I feel that there could have been a different method of execution.

Control Factor: Checks out!

Nitpicks: The “draw a card” should be a separate sentence, just like, “They do the thing. Draw a card.” Secondly, it’s “Spells your opponents CAST cost” etc. Small note, but...this card is really small. Consider downloading Magic Set Editor or finding a better way to export your cards, if you can?

~~~

@gollumni — Gift of Humility

Likes/Dislikes: Don’t be humble, you finished your final! Congrationulations! So this card. It’s a’ight? So here’s the thing. Nine Lives + this card. HA. Hilarious! Delusions of Mediocrity! Illusions of Grandeur! Nefarious Lich! There’s a lot of mean and dumb and fun synergies with this card, and the thing is, well, I know you were in a place when you submitted this. So I’ll excuse the lack of flavor text and whatever and just say that, like Harmless Offering from Eldritch Moon, this card has potential and still nobody’s gonna want to open it from a booster pack. Unless it becomes massively competitive in some stupid Esper Lich Control deck.

Control Factor: Yep, that’s the point of the card!

Nitpicks: Get some sleep.

~~~

@hiygamer — Tibalt, Chaotic Menace

Likes/Dislikes: It’s interesting how many legendary cards people submitted for this contest. Hm, guess we did have three as example designs. Regardless! So the activated abilities are the best part of this card. I do like the tension between a random player and a random player who’s not Tibalt’s owner. In 1v1 this can get really tense. Ditch a card at random, flip a coin, aaaand... Nope, you’re stuck with him. My main complaint is the second trigger. “The number of loyalty counters that were on him as the turn began?” There are so many memory issues potentially associated with that. The more triggers that go off and the more factors that go into calculating that, the less reasonable that ability becomes. This card isn’t bad, and I know why you wanted that ability, but there has to be a better way of making that happen. I’d workshop that a bit. And also, if you’re using MSE? Consider changing individual text sizes because wow this card is hard to read.

Control Factor: Yep, makes sense that he’s going around wrecking face, and the complexities are totally fine.

Nitpicks: I’m pretty sure the first ability should read “You must activate at least one of Tibalt’s abilities each turn if able.” Then “whenever” is just...weird and gets into Judge Tower territory.

~~~

@hypexion — Jenny Spellshare

Likes/Dislikes: So let’s start off with the fact that I like this card’s abilities a lot. That’s... Well, honestly, I don’t even have to qualify that. It’s a powerful Bant commander with crazy group-hug abilities and LOTS of token copies that, while powerful, can be mitigated into some nasty stuff. You got wheels, eggs, control cards, draw limiters—like, imagining setting up things like Hullbreacher and the ilk and going nuts with copies. So yeah, fun Commander card and could even be interesting in limited! My two minor complains that stop this from being really great: One, a faerie creature without flying hasn’t been printed in a non-supplemental set since 1995. Two... “Jenny?” “Judith” at least has Hebrew origins, but man, that name threw me off. I do have a friend named Jenny who plays Magic, funnily enough. Yeah, heh, just something to consider. Kinda takes me out of the world. Consider flavor text?

Control Factor: Perfect for what you want to do.

Nitpicks: What is UP with that line spacing? Did you hit shift+enter? I’m talking about between “cast” and “Whenever.” Or did that just go to a separate line. In any cast those should DEFINITELY be separated. ... Wow, don’t we all love nitpicks. This is probably the nit-picky-est one I’ve done in a while.

~~~

@i-am-the-one-who-wololoes — Xymik, Who Gifts Pain

Likes/Dislikes: So, yeah, Xymic is a name I want to hold me up against a brick wall and weight its body on me, midnight on Halstead street, neon blurs in the air. That is a sexy name. ... Cards? Cards. SO. It’s pretty good. I can see this being part of either a supplemental Commander set OR equally a standard Grixis-themed set, which we haven’t had in a while. Really sucks that Ikoria was both not great gameplay wise and also released in the middle of a pandemic. For this card, personally, I initially thought “well you can just merge them” but I see what you did, clever clogs! Donate a permanent, make ‘em chuck a card. Multiplayer, send a permanent around the table, make ‘em lose life! Huh, this is actually kind of awesome. Small personal factors: I would pump the P/T a little, perhaps, for a four-color card; this could be as much as a 5/3. This does feel more like a Demon than a Devil to me, too. And, a tiny bit of flavor text could go a long way. Could you also have the second ability read “spell or permanent?” It’s niche, but...

Control Factor: Perf-a-rooni.

Nitpicks: None!

~~~

@justincase-1012 — Fire Ant Infestation

Likes/Dislikes: Conceptually, this is cool. Ant infestations done flavorfully are neat, and I like the aspect of you not having to continuously deal damage because you can hit once and then pseudo-populate. On second thought reviewing this card, I think that that’s surprisingly flavorful. Once the ants get in, the rest of the ants can just pump in more freakin’ ants. There are wording nitpicks I’ll get to later, but the gist of this card is that it’s very strong and requires a balance to also make the damage from attacking tokens not hit you too. You know what, I’ll give it a tentative seal of approval. I don’t really get why it’s a 1/3 and not, well, a 3/1, and I’m not sold on the flavor of an “infestation” being a creature. “Fire Ant Colony” could work? Not super flavorful, but it’s in progress. Also, MAJOR issue: There’s a card called Fire Ants with a different ability. Named tokens of previous cards absolutely exist, see Future Sight spellshapers, but this one is way too similar. “Fire Ant Drone” maybe.

Control Factor: Yup, does what it’s gotta do.

Nitpicks: Wording time: “...that player creates a 1/1 red and black Insect creature token named Fire Ant with “At the beginning of your upkeep, Fire Ant deals 1 damage to you.”” And see above notes on that token name.

~~~

@koth-of-the-hammerpants — Temporary Loan

Likes/Dislikes: There is a fundamental flaw in how this card works when you have two extra mana. So, you play this turn four, and now it’s turn five on your go. You drop a three-mana creature, then give it to an opponent, then they give you a random permanent, then you immediately pay UB and sacrifice what they gave you to get your card back. So this card effectively becomes “Whenever a permanent enters the battlefield under your control, you may pay UB. If you do, target opponent sacrifices a permanent” in the most roundabout way. In short, this card is not fun, especially with lands that you can tap for mana in response to entering. under your control.

Control Factor: Flavorfully understandable, see above mechanical notes. Not worth it.

Nitpicks: The “If you do” clause is a run-on sentence and should end with “...a permanent they control and you gain control of it.” “Sacrifice” and “Gain” should be capitalized. And, um... “Time’s up my friend” should definitely be “Time’s up, my friend.” with a period. Because otherwise it sounds like the friend is Christopher Walken in Pulp Fiction.

~~~

@mardu-lesbian — Grift Horse (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: My eyes could not roll out of my head any harder at that name. Stellar work. So! This card! Wow. “Gimme the goods, then I’m gonna wreck shop.” For a four-mana potential fun removal gimmick and an indefinite steal, this is a surprisingly powerful card. “Gimme Ugin, aaaand...here’s a horse. AND BOLT THE HORSE.” Also, I had to double-check, but good wording on that second ability! Scab-Clan Giant, yeah? In short, this does sort of kind of become a rough removal card and more or less wrecks shop with an opponent’s bomb, but rares are supposed to be powerful, y’know? I can’t fault it for that. I’d love to see this in limited, I’d love to see some EDH bullcrap go down with making an indestructible horse or whatever, and hm, what would the art be? Maybe an Eldrazi horse, actually, with tentacles coming out of the mouth. Horse Horror? Yeah, this opens the question: “how powerful can red’s indefinite stealing be?”

Control Factor: Shifty Thrifty Grifty.

Nitpicks: If you’re using MSE, you can adjust the flavor bar offset. Also I’m officially challenging you to draw this horse.

~~~

@misterstingyjack — Mercenary Contract

Likes/Dislikes: So...okay, so you’re turning a creature you control into a mercenary for your opponents? Kind of? You’re getting gold for the things they’re doing, makes sense. I guess. This card’s kind of hard to work around. It’s a lot of text, too. So the thing is, I don’t really get why you’d have to give something to an opponent for this flavor to work. Enchant a creature you control, it gets a buff and has to attack, and whenever it attacks you get a Treasure. Spreading things around doesn’t make the most sense in the world, honestly. But I do get it, and I think I understand the gameplay prioritization you were shooting for. I’m being a little harsh on the card because I feel that in a printed set it could just be worded/printed differently. Fundamentally, it’s not the strangest thing in the world.

Control Factor: See above notes about flavor. Main problem is that why is your contract sending it to work for an opponent? Wouldn’t the opponent have to sign something? Contracts are hard.

Nitpicks: “Whenever enchanted creature attacks or an ability of enchanted creature is activated, if its owner does not control it, that player creates a Treasure token.” See Illusionist’s Bracers.

~~~

@nicolbolas96 — Slimeknife,Mercenary Thallid

Likes/Dislikes: Step one: play Pandemonium/Warstorm Surge. Step two: get literally a 1/1 creature or token. Step three: infinite cards/ETB triggers. That last ability has a LOT of random infinite combos it can do, and I kind of like that, but it’s really asking to be abused. But that’s not a bad thing. Kind of. There are probably more ways to deal damage and whatnot. So the thing is, this card does give the tokens to your opponents, but...why? What major flavorful purpose does it serve? Dowsing Dagger created Plants because it symbolized the undergrowth that the creature had to cut through. Hunted creatures made tokens because they were, well, being hunted. What about Slimeknife? That ability really doesn’t feel like it needs to be on this card, and this card honestly could be a rare. It’s a GREAT deathtouch commander, probably one of the best if it existed. Doesn’t excuse that disconnect, though. ... And yes, “Fungus Assassin” is awesome.

Control Factor: Ultimately, not necessary. The card works better without it.

Nitpicks: “Creature tokens,” not “token creatures.” See Aven Wind Guide. Also, check the comma in the name?

~~~

@nine-effing-hells — Overeager Adjutant

Likes/Dislikes: I’m kind of worried about this card. A one-mana 3/3 with haste is pretty nasty. Goblin Guide and Monastery Swiftspear are already challenging enough, with Vexing Devil also thrown into the burn pile. The question is whether or not the drawback of 1/1s that can’t block and the card disadvantage will be good enough to stop an aggro build. In theory, there would come a point in limited where your opponents are drawing extra cards and playing creatures the Adjutant can’t get through, or you’re doing some nasty removal... But a strong aggro player running something like Burchett’s Gruul build or a devastating Human midrange build will use this card to their advantage. Questions of flavor come up, too. How is eagerness creating tokens? Drawing cards is a maybe, but the things that are being done don’t feel connected to, say, the attacking or you having creatures enter.

Control Factor: I don’t understand flavorfully where the humans are coming from and why they can’t block this creature.

Nitpicks: None.

~~~

@real-aspen-hours — Gift // grift (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: Well, it’s a split card. And it’s a good split card. And it does good things. So, I won’t beat around the bush, the nitpicks are really what doomed this card. There’s just a lot that I had to excuse to make it a judge pick, which is kind of a bummer but against the other submissions, it stands out. So let’s leave that for that section and talk about the good things. I love the rhyming split card names. Frankly, I want to have a future split card contest just to see the weirdness that people come up with. “Gift” is a perfectly acceptable upshifted Harmless Offering, and wow, “grift” is one of the most powerful and frightening cards I’ve seen in a while. It’s reminiscent of Skyclave Apparition, but with the Treasure advantage. This card can 100% take over games and worth playing in nonred decks for that alone. It might need to be four mana, possibly even five, but I do like it a lot.

Control Factor: Yep, “Gift” does it, and actually “grift” too. Heh, it’s neat.

Nitpicks: 1) Grift needs to be capitalized. 2) Your submission was missing rarity. 3) I capitalized “Sorcery” for you but in your original submission both were lowercase. 4) Both rules texts were missing periods at the end. 5) “Nonland” is one word. 5) “Its,” not “it’s.” 6) “Treasure” needs to be capitalized.

~~~

@shakeszx — Alder Hahn, helpful recruiter

Likes/Dislikes: So this is pretty obviously a Commander-oriented card, and that’s alright. I was iffy about some of the flavor stuff, but actually, the “my men always collect” line aligns nicely with the Treasure token creation. Attacks OR blocks—that’s a good catch. Makes 1v1 matches not too overpowered, and you can get some awesome control in. Giving defender tokens to players, or forcing them to block bad attacks... This could be a pretty fun card, honestly. The more I think about it the more I’m down for it. It’s outside of my ordinary play style, but there are symmetrical effects and bribery fun stuff that could make this a funky little card. Not a fan of the name at all, though. “Helpful Recruiter” doesn’t tell me anything about, like, why he’s recruiting, or who his men are, or his motivations, or whatever. The flavor text is great but “helpful” is just...ech, I’m overthinking it. “Recruiter” too, though, like, is he forcing them to be recruited? It feels more like reconnaissance or Mafia-style forced brutality.

Control Factor: Bingo, we’re gettin’ boys.

Nitpicks: Capitalize all important words in the name. Also, the second ability could be “Whenever a creature you own but don’t control attacks or blocks,” right?

~~~

@thedirtside — Burden of Parenthood

Likes/Dislikes: A mythic Nettlevine Blight-ish self-replicated token giver of awesome proportions that means players have to carefully strategize their creature interactions over time? Awesome. I like how if they get two of them, then... You... Oh, wait, it’s... Ha, um, there might be a lil’ flaw here. So, Opponent has a Squire, you play BoP. Their first upkeep, they get their Squire token. You do yours. Their second upkeep, they stack the triggers: “I’m going to have the Burden upkeep trigger resolve first, giving me a copy of my Squire. Then, the first token trigger will resolve, and I’ll sacrifice the second token I created this way.” So all this card does until you get rid of it is allow them to carefully make a token then sac a token each turn. Was that intentional? If so, well, why? Kinda falls apart when you take into consideration Magic’s #weirdness. Also. What does this have to do with parenthood. I’m genuinely stumped what the flavor is supposed to convey. Is this like...people being forced to give birth to putrescent goblins or something??

Control Factor: This part does check out, yeah. However, the contest specified that you weren’t supposed to use effects that gave each player something.

Nitpicks: There shouldn’t really be “target” there. “Nonland” is one word. The base power and toughness should be “1/1″ instead of “1.”

~~~

@walker-of-the-yellow-path — Questing Grail (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: ETB ability, fantastic, okay, we’re conveying that you’re giving someone a challenge your creatures are going to tackle. Attack trigger, fantastic, they’re getting the thrill of the hunt and the charge. Damage trigger, the blood is being spilled and the opponent is considering how much they want to then increase the damage all around and the risk of combat. This card makes combat so complicated, and so much more thrilling, and wowza this would make for some insane limited games. I have two issues. Firstly, this needs to be legendary for the love of God this needs to be legendary. It would fit the flavor, and then the three separate triggers wouldn’t be a pain. As much. Secondly, the last ability. So, are you supposed to get a blood counter on it for each creature that deals combat damage? Because unless something has first strike, it’s going to all happen at the same time. Multiple counters, or just when you get hit for the first time? The intentions are unclear. So I would phrase it to say “Whenever one or more creatures deal combat damage to you, put [a OR that many] blood counter[s] on Questing Grail and their controller gains control of Questing Grail.” Aside from that, this is some Eldraine-y Knight-y Bloody Greatness.

Control Factor: 10/10.

Nitpicks: None!

~~~

@whuh-oh — Gilded Egg // Prized Hatchling (JUDGE PICK)

Likes/Dislikes: This card is a pain in the butt. I love it! So, let’s see. The ways in which you have to ramp up to getting this card specifically under your control is really weird, and measured, and you have to take care of some careful calculation. The sorcery speed is super important, though, and I’m glad you added that in. And man, hatchling counters? Ludevic would be proud. On the flip side, a 2/4 flier in green is pretty rough. I don’t know entirely how I feel about that part specifically. The Food token, ha, that’s glorious. The mana generation, though? WOW. Alhammarret’s Archive makes a whole lot of cool infinite stuff possible, but it’s not easy, I’ll say that much. The mana with the food, like—Wow again. I am Wowed.

Control Factor: The tempting offer and the opportunity is really well-done. Plays nice with the flavor of the sought-after prize.

Nitpicks: Tsk, go back to Modern Masters (2013) witcha “is indestructible”-lookin’ self, CHUMP. ... Ahem. Sorry, I got possessed by the ghost of someone from 2013 elated to open a Vedalken Shackles.

~~~

@wolkemesser — Eden

Likes/Dislikes: Alright, there are...a few points to start from.

Mechanically: if Eden’s controller is doing anything but adding a single mana with this card, then they are bad Magic player, or they have an exact and direct answer to the token being created, because poisonous 3 and a “lose the game” token (with evasion) are so utterly broken that there is no way you’d want an opponent to gain control of them. Even in a 3+ person game, what happens to you? Play Eden, give it to someone last in the order, they give your next opponent a skulking deathtoucher, and then you lose the game. This can happen as early as turn one. In 1v1 this card has no real purpose other than to be used once and basically never again unless someone is forced to use it. In multiplayer games it’s a death sentence. You’re losing a land drop from the deck for a card that won’t ever be used in a way that’s advantageous to your gameplan.

Contextually: In what set is this card supposed to exist? You use both Skulk and Poisonous, retired and unpopular mechanics that don’t appear on the same token even if they do have a possibility of being together. In what environment would this card be played?

Flavorfully: So this is the real, Biblical garden of Eden? Or at least it’s supposed to be? Why are there multiple snakes being made, then? Satan entered the body of a single snake, not a snake that grew more powerful, and the garden entirely was more than just that one tree, granting knowledge, not power. You’ve made a garden of temptation, not paradise.

As a final note after all that rambling, if it was indeed read: On the most technical level, and I hate to say it, the Bible is...Christian IP, basically. There is no Magic world in which Eden could exist because of that. Some religious symbols have also become fantasy tropes such as angels and demons, but the concept of angelic protectors and demonic lords have existed beyond specific religions. This is a specific and sacred religious place. From a strictly professional perspective, err on the side of caution when submitting in the future.

Control Factor: Technically fulfilling.

Nitpicks: The token should be “black and green,” not “green and black.” For the first ability, why strictly from the hand when Crucible of Worlds and whatnot exist?

Tune in next week, when... Well, did you see some of the synergies and combos that I mentioned above? Keep them in mind. Thank you all for your submissions.

—@abelzumi

#mtg #magic the gathering #custom magic card #contest #generosity contest #commentary #entries #inventor's fair

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ash-etherwood · 3 years

Note

Top 5: writing memories, songs, characters that are not blank rune, runes, food

♡

Linda I love you but are you trying to kill me … that’s so many Top 5’s! But alright, I’ll do my best! (Answers will probably switch between German and English RIP to every non-German-speaker who follows me and wants to read this for some reason I swear I’m normal)

WRITING MEMORIES

5.) The entire time I spent finishing my first (second?) longer writing project It was the year 2012 and it was a cyberpunk story about my friends’ and my edgy self inserts riding dinosaurs, fighting aliens and being badass. The plot twist in the end was that my character was secretly evil and wanted to kill everyone. (Things to show your therapist) The final boss fight made zero sense and also everything was incredibly weird and stupid. But sometimes I still think about those times when I sat in my grandma’s living room at night, eating chips and listening to Vocaloid covers while thinking this story was the coolest shit ever. Truly simpler times.

4.) Researching something about universities in Texas for OvF on a rainy Saturday afternoon I have no idea why this memory is still sticking with me to this day (I think it was around 2016 or something?), but I remember that it was just a really nice day and I felt really at peace at that moment?

3.) The entire writing process of Bathroom Blues It was such a spontaneous project and I still have no idea how I managed to power though it in just a little under two months! Also it was just incredibly fun seeing you getting excited over new drafts and I loved coming up with new plot points and Halloween costumes for everyone with you. :-D Truly a summer worth remembering.

2.) FINALLY uploading the prologue and intro chapter of WWBL Not really a writing memory, but that moment was … so sexy and magical. Seriously, you have no idea how long I had been waiting to finally start that story, waiting for the Steckbriefe to roll in and see people react to the prologue and generally the idea … I even made one of those countdown graphic thingies for the designated upload date! 8D At that point I had planned that story for about six months and just … yeah, that felt powerful to me.

1.) Writing the prologue for WWBL When I first started the draft for that prologue I was sitting at the window in my favourite hotel in Winterberg, Sauerland, wore my dark green flannel, had the window wide open breathing in the cool mountain air and allowed myself to listen to my WWBL playlist for the very first time. God, that felt so amazing. I even have a photo of it (which somehow makes it look like I have the biggest football shoulders in the universe) my sister took that night. God I miss Sauerland. )’:

- - - - -

SONGS

My apologies to every favourite song of mine that I forgot about, I have a whole playlist of them, but I think these are some of my oldest faves … (Honorable mentions for Don’t Mess With Me and Not That Big by Temposhark, Goodbye by Apparat, Me And The Devil by Soap&Skin, Heart Heart Head by Meg Myers, Pain and Animal I Have Become by Three Days Grace, Beautiful Crime by Tamer, Gravity Of Love by Enigma, In Flames by Digital Daggers [thanks Phi u_u] and Murder Cries by Snow Ghosts AHHH FUCK IT I could’ve just made a playlist,,,)

5.) Vater Unser by E Nomine Starting off with some weird shit, won’t we? I’ve been in love with this song since fifth or sixth grade, when I was just starting to develop an actual music taste and although I have many favourite songs by E Nomine, this one has to be my absolute fave. Every time I can relate it to a character it makes me love said character even more. (Also I think about it every time my mom forces me to go to church for Christmas so … yay? I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t even be able to remember the Vater Unser if it wasn’t for this song. 8D)

4.) Wires by The Neighbourhood I think this is the newest all-time fave on this list, I found it in … 2015? Thank you, Youtube AMVs. Yeah man, this one is just … on so many playlists it’s not even funny anymore.

3.) Heathens by Twenty One Pilots An edgelord classic but like … it’s on EVERY playlist of mine. Every single one. It’s just so good. The first time I heard it was on the radio tho, when I was having breakfast with Jessie and I forced her to shazam it because it immediately stuck with me,,,

2.) Imaginary by Evanescence My first Evanescence song ever and the first step towards becoming who I am today I think. This song has like … such a big history for me, man. It single-handedly turned me goth in 2008 and I have never really thanked it for that.

1.) Eternal by Evanescence Might be my favourite song of all time. The number of dramatic RP scenes I have written with this in the background … man. Oh, also this song is the reason for one of my oldest internet nicknames, ‘eternala’, which subsequently shortened into Etschuh and then Tschuh, my main nickname until 2017, when I came out as trans and finally found an actual name for myself I was comfortable with!

- - - - -

NON BLANK RUNE CHARACTERS

I know this was probably supposed to be about fandom characters but I can literally not come up with a single character right now that I love with a special burning passion and that is not my or one of my friends’ OCs so you’re getting OCs now. u_u And boy do I have a lot of those.

5.) Jackson Tracey from atroCITY (mine) This little piece of shit kept me company for a pretty long time and is still very close to my heart for some reason, although I haven’t drawn him or really thought about him in detail for a while now. My favourite thing is how I only realized what a horrible person he was after I stopped regularly working with him but honestly good for me. 8D His storyline and personality is kinda convoluted and tbh I’m not really sure how much of it is canon anyway (atrc was always a little weird about canon rip) but yeah. He’s an obsessive stalker piece of shit who pities himself way too much and he is also a semi-immortal demigod who likes knives. I hate him but he also helped me a lot with some gender and sexuality stuff so thanks I guess.

4.) Mayoko Imai from Century Riders DXPrototype (Maus’ and mine) Mayoko is a magical girl protagonist with a cool cyborg arm prosthetic and her main character trait was that she was basically a reverse weeaboo, a Japanese girl who was obsessed with American media, culture and comic book heroes! I actually love her concept a lot and she also had a pretty cool character arc in her story (which Maus and I wrote together and actually finished btw!), although it could use a lot more … polishing from today’s point of view. But I love her anyway. She always wanted to do the right thing and be a hero and got broken pretty cruelly and her ending is kinda bittersweet I guess? Ahh there’s just so much nuance to it … anyways, CR3 also stuck with me for a very long time and I enjoyed the time with her a lot. :3 (Her name had a cameo in Another Incident btw heehee)

3.) Tessa *insert extremely long chain of unnecessary first names here* von Lean from Nobody Is Perfect and Infernal Temptation (belongs to one of my old school friends) Tessa is just … a hand full. I love to hate her. She is badly written and developed and just OOZES mentally ill teenage girl’s idealized self-insert power fantasy, but she just … man, she was a big part of one of my most drama-filled high school friendships which I love looking back at so much. Tessa has fucked so many of my characters … good for her tbh! There are actually two versions of her, one is just a ‘normal’ teenage girl and one can shapeshift into a cheetah, but both of them are very close to my heart. I should really adopt and redesign her some day.

2.) Judy Khayat from Original vs. Final (mine) Look, I love all my OvF-characters and every single one of them is special to me in their own way, but Judy is just … the most complex of them all I think? Man, she went through so much … she is actually one of my oldest (semi)-active characters (I created her in 2009) and her latest version is from 2016 but I should really, REALLY revise her again tbh. She has a very complicated backstory that I didn’t handle as carefully as I should have, and anger issues and religious conflict and depression and PTSD and then Vance of all people becomes obsessed with her for no reason and decides to traumatize her even more … yeah. God I really love her but I seriously need to work on her. A LOT. I should also finally rename her tbh … let’s just see where she takes me next.

1.) Okami (I don’t even remember if she has a proper last name rn lol) from Split Realm (mine) Yeah, that bitch is just my favourite OC. She’s also very old, probably from around 2009, and initially was a magical girl with fire powers who I played in an RP with my friend Flauch but boy did she grow up! Holy fuck. Okami is a horrible person but I love her so much. She is so violent and full of anger and pain and sadness and treats everyone around her like shit and she is in love and she is a demon but also apparently the personification of the concept of Chaos but she just wants to be a teenager again and run away with the love of her life and ahhh it’s all so hopeless for her … also she turned out gnc af with time passing and pretty much went through a gender/sexuality crisis in real time with me, her creator, which is always fun. :^D I haven’t drawn her in a while tbh. Should really do that.

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RUNES IN BLANK RUNE

I’m just gonna go with the arcs here, okay? Also this entire answer might look completely different if you asked me again tomorrow, you know how indecisive I am with Blank Rune shit ahha,,,

5.) Jera Look. I know I’m boring and stupid. But I just love Tave and Liam having their disgusting little foreshadowing talk, okay? I can read it over and over. I just love my horrible little shit crime boys. Also Rhy and Phillip are there. (’:

4.) Isa This one is here because it was the first arc I witnessed in real time which gives it a very special place in my heart and it also … hit pretty hard at the time. But having read Fehu it’s become even better now! It’s just such a wonderful, tragic romance between two horrible, ruthless boys and I … I’m not immune to Rhy, sadly. :-/ Just like Phillip.

3.) Wunjo We still haven’t seen everything that leads up to Wunjo yet, but we DO know more than we did initially (wow shocker) and it’s just always a fucking blast. Also, it has the first mention of Ash’s real name … the first Rhy POV (which what the fuck!! I always feel like we had one before but we didn’t!! Wild) and it has crazy blood-soaked murder Tave, my beloved. :///3

2.) Eiwaz You guys have heard me fanboy about Eiwaz so many times already. Eiwaz-OT3 (and Kain) my beloved!!! It’s just SUCH an amazing starting point and there are so, so many things that tie back to it and every time we find out about a new one my heart makes a little jump … und es beginnt von Neuem indeed.

1.) Gebo One of the most painful but also the most beautiful arcs yet in my opinion. It’s been hyped up for so long and boy did it deliver. God, my heart still hurts when I think about that last scene. Also all the dialogue … the golden lines we got … and it’s an arc without Rhy! Crazy!! :-D I just love the relationship between Ash, Astrid and Jakob so much. God fuck I want what they have. Just maybe without the murder suicide,,,

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FOOD

5.) Diese Sonntagsbrötchen wo die Verpackung so plopp macht, wenn man die Folie abzieht Better than normale Brötchen for some reason. Most of the time. See 2.) Look man, I just really love a good breakfast …

4.) Chocolate cupcakes with cream cheese topping One of the first things from a certain baking book I tried when I was getting into baking back in 2019. God they are so tasty. I don’t make them often so I don’t get used to them too much and eating them still feels special but ahhhh I love them so much!

3.) Grünkohl mit Kartoffelbrei und Mettendchen One of my favourite things about autumn/winter and one of my biggest comfort foods. God I love this shit so much. I just put … mountains of Grünkohl and Kartoffelbrei on my plate every time and I will just warm it up for four days straight until there’s no more left. It turns me into a fucking caveman. I’m not even big on eating meat but … yeah. Everything is different when there’s Grünkohl.

2.) Normales Brötchen mit Butter und Scheibenkäse aber ich bin beim Frühstücksbuffet im Hotel Oddly specific but that’s just how it is. Sorry. Nichts geht über Brötchen mit Käse.

1.) Chilli-Knoblauch-Nudelauflauf My beloved. My comfort food. I eat it literally every second day. At least one hour in the kitchen every time. Fresh ingredients. My only vegetable intake. And I’ve been doing that for three years. I just love it so much, man. I cook it for everyone who visits me. Chilli-Knoblauch-Auflauf cured my depression.

#ask #crimsondaisy #2.4k works of me talking about myself under the cut rip #thank you tho!!!

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hglog · 4 years

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PBTA Spelljammer GLOG Thing?

Recently, my father dug up his old Traveller and MegaTraveller books for me, and after having a lot of fun reading through them, I can definitively say I don’t ever want to GM the system. But it got me in a space-gaming mood and my mind turned to two things. First, the Uncharted Worlds game I was once a player in, which seems to have borrowed a lot of the good aspects of Traveller and put them into a PBTA system, which I love very much. Second, the AD&D setting Spelljammer which is an amazing science-fantasy fever dream that I’ve unfortunately never gotten to experience firsthand. Naturally, I decided I’d make an RPG. And, ever since I discovered it, GLOG has basically consumed a large part of my mindspace whenever I think about RPGs.

Now it’s about a month later, and I have a lot written, but even more still to write. My biggest issue is getting my thoughts organized. I’m always a lot neater when I know other people are going to see my work. So, in a hope to make things more coherent for myself, I’m going to let you in on what I have to far.

What I like about Spelljammer

Science fiction minus the science

Practically any science fiction trope you can think of fits into the setting, but when it comes to the actual science, it’s this weird-ass mix of a classical Greek and medieval alchemist understanding of the cosmos.

You don’t have to worry about players “um, actually”-ing you about what happens in the vacuum of space, because it’s actually not even a vacuum!

Magic = FTL

Despite the previous point, its science is actually still relatively “hard” when it comes to internal consistency and logical consequences to its different laws of reality than our own. The magic, on the other hand, is magic. My headcanon is that the speed of light imposes a hard limit, but magic is the one thing able to ignore it.

While people could theoretically pull off a no-magic spacecraft launch (if they had a few thousand more years of technological development), for the most part, if something is in space, it’s probably because a wizard decided they wanted it to be in space.

Weird-ass spaceships

Since a spaceship is “anything you can put a spelljamming throne in,” you get a delightful mix of regular boats, classic pulp sci-fi or space opera spaceships, weird organic tentacled things, and whatever else strikes your fancy.

What if a dragon died and all the kobolds that worshipped it somehow got enough spell slots to just pilot its corpse into space and start fucking shit up?

Sadly, Spelljammer doesn’t offer a lot of customization, instead just relying on a wide catalogue of weird ships used by different aliens.

Wizards

What I like about PBTA

Adaptable to basically any setting

There is a great wealth of hacks I can draw from

These two points go hand in hand. I haven’t, however, been able to find a specifically spelljammer-inspired PBTA hack, so that’s why I’m doing this.

The PBTA games I’ve read through in creating this (so far) are Uncharted Worlds, Dungeon World, and the original Apocalypse World.

Encourages little preparation

My biggest challenge in running a game that’s interstellar in scope is my instinct to pre-prepare everything, which is already problem if I think I need to make an entire country, let alone an entire planet. But now we’re talking not only a planet but every planet.

While you can do worldbuilding as the GM for a PBTA game, you can also not do any, and let the players do all the work for you upon character creation. Dungeon World is especially good at this.

It’s fun

I’ve enjoyed every PBTA game I’ve been a player or a GM for, no exceptions (so far).

It’s extremely easy to teach people

Most of my friends are not as into learning new systems as I am. But most of them have already played at least one PBTA system, and if they haven’t, it wouldn’t be as much of a hassle as say, AD&D or Traveller.

What I like about GLOG

The four-template class blueprint

If PBTA character sheets are streamlined, I don’t even know what I’d call GLOG character sheets.

I don’t know if I’d shave my classes down quite as much, but I’m definitely taking notes from GLOG’s designs.

GLOG spellcasting

This is one of the things I like most about GLOG.

Spell dice to power FTL? Maybe 1 die per 30 light years or whatever, and the sum determines how fast the trip can be made? Doubles and triples can be malfunctions or space pirate attacks or something.

A shit ton of classes

I think I’d like to limit it to 10 or so classes, but I’m definitely going to get inspiration from some of the weirder GLOG classes along with the classes fighters/wizards/rogues.

An emphasis on interesting problem-solving

I think this is more just good game design than GLOG itself.

Encourages taking a weirder spin on fantasy lore that’s often taken for granted

Again, this seems like it’s just good worldbuilding, but a lot of GLOGgish writings do this, and I’d like to follow in their footsteps.

What I like (and dislike) about Traveller

I don’t like how obtuse it is

Reading the book sort of overwhelms me. It’s like they didn’t even try to make it accessible. It’s just endless black text on a white background, tables and diagrams strewn about haphazardly, and no art, not even just at the beginnings and ends of sections. The cover is a black void to symbolize the state of my mind after reading three pages.

When it comes to spaceships, I like a lot of crunch and granularity in their design

Something I found myself wishing for when playing Uncharted Worlds was a more involved ship design process. While they did clearly take notes from Traveller, it’s nothing like the original.

I don’t know what it is about spaceships. Characters I like simple and streamlined, but I guess reading through power plant matrices and choosing software and balancing it all on a budget gets me into the headspace I actually believe a spaceship creator would be in, whereas I don’t think the creation of a person usually involves that sort of design process.

I'm neutral on the crunch for everything else, but I think it's at odds with PBTA sensibilities

Plus, as I sort of mentioned in the PBTA section, I want my mostly 5e-playing friends to be willing to test this with me.

I like the psionics

I really like psionics, and I think Traveller properly captures the feel that I like for them.

However, I’m not a fan of “anyone can test their psionic abilities and then roll to maybe get powers.” I’m going to have a psionic class, which a character can start in if they want to have psionic powers, or they can multiclass into later if they want to discover their psionic potential later on. If they don’t want their character to have latent potential, they can just never take any levels in the class.

I dislike the highly-defined setting

I know it’s supposed to be adaptable to most sci-fi settings, but the books reference their own universe and history so much that it doesn’t really feel that way.

How do I synthesize this all into one game?

Setting-wise, I’m mostly drawing from Spelljammer, as well as Star Wars, Numenera, and my own imagination. I don’t want to define many specific planets or empires or sectors or whatever since I prefer most of the worldbuilding work be done by players during character creation. Also, if you know of any very low-science space fantasy fiction that I should read, please send it my way.

I do have very specific ideas about how I want spaceships and space travel to work, which I think need their own post later. You might get a pretty good sense of what I’m going for from the Spelljammer and Traveller sections, though. My plan is to take advantage of something like Traveller’s very granular and in-depth ship creation to let players make their own completely batshit Spelljammer-style spaceships. I think a ship needs its own character sheet.

I’m doing the PBTA thing where each class has a character sheet. I haven’t decided whether I’m doing the standard 6 stats or making up some weird ones. The former is definitely easier to sell to people but I think the latter is cooler. Also, since you need a spellcasting class to have FTL what do you do if nobody picks one? I don’t want to get in a situation where I have to tell them “one of you needs to switch classes,” that just feels bad and could create animosity. A solution I’m slightly leaning towards is having only one of each character sheet, then making sure there’s always one fewer non-spellcasting class option than there are players, so by pure mathematics someone will end up able to power the ship, and I don’t need to force anyone to change on my own. The issue there is then I can’t have more than 3-5 non-spellcasting class options depending on party size, and I’d prefer a larger and more varied class pool. Another option would be to have magic hirelings available, but I want spellcasters with the ability to do FTL to feel like these big, weird, and powerful personalities, so having them just available as hirelings sort of it cheapens that in my opinion. Maybe it’s not actually important that the party always have access to their own interstellar travel? I could see the PCs being like a bunch of interstellar hitchhikers. Very Douglas Adams.

That’s just about everything that I don’t think needs a separate post. I hope you enjoyed it, and if you have any thoughts about this potential horrible chimera of a system I’d love to hear them! You can reach me here through Tumblr or at Robot_Face#7919 on the OSR discord server.

#Spelljammer #PBTA #GLOG #tabletop #dnd

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freetenshi · 3 years

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Who Will Save the Earth?

Many people are concerned about the damage that they believe humans are doing to the earth and the life it supports. According to some environmental experts, human actions are threatening species with extinction and damaging the biodiversity of the planet as never before.

Will humans ruin the earth? Or will they ever be able to live in closer harmony with nature?

Will human efforts succeed?

Many experts are confident that humans can protect the earth and live in harmony with nature. Some researchers argue that for human efforts to succeed, changes must be made in a number of areas and at the same time. Such changes would include:

Improving how land, forests, wetlands, and oceans are managed.

Adopting different agricultural practices and energy sources.

Switching to a food system that supports a primarily plant-based diet that includes a moderate intake of meat and fish and reduces overall consumption and waste.

Accepting that a good quality of life does not depend on having ever more material things.

What do you think? Is it realistic to expect governments, businesses, and individuals to cooperate on such an unprecedented scale? Or do you think it is more likely that deep-seated greed, selfishness, and shortsightedness displayed by some would stand in the way?—2 Timothy 3:1-5.

A reason for hope

The Bible gives us assurance that the future of our planet is secure. It explains why human efforts are not enough to save the earth, and it describes the real change that must be made. It also identifies how this change will come about.

Why human effort alone will not save the planet. Jehovah * God created the earth, and he assigned humans the responsibility of caring for it. (Genesis 1:28; 2:15) They could succeed in their assignment only if they looked to their Creator for guidance and obeyed his instructions. (Proverbs 20:24) Instead, however, they rejected Jehovah and pursued an independent course. (Ecclesiastes 7:29) On their own, humans do not have the ability to care for the earth, and any effort they make will have limited success at best.—Proverbs 21:30; Jeremiah 10:23.

The change that must be made. God intends to stop humans from ruining the earth. (Revelation 11:18) He will not reform the governments and earthly society that are harming the planet; he will replace them. (Revelation 21:1) For this reason, Jehovah declares: “Look! I am making all things new.”—Revelation 21:5.

How that change will come about. Jehovah will replace human governments with a heavenly one called the Kingdom of God. That government, under the leadership of Jesus Christ, will then administer earth’s affairs.—Daniel 2:44; Matthew 6:10.

God’s Kingdom will educate humans to live by God’s righteous standards. When humans recognize their Creator and heed his guidance, they will be able to live in harmony with the natural world. (Isaiah 11:9) The Bible describes how God’s government will enable its citizens to enjoy an excellent quality of life, one that is sustainable for the planet. It will do the following:

Provide food for all.—Psalm 72:16.

Restore natural resources.—Isaiah 35:1, 2, 6, 7.

Ensure a balanced relationship between humans and animals.—Isaiah 11:6-8; Hosea 2:18.

Prevent environmental catastrophes.—Mark 4:37-41.

You can expect that God’s Kingdom will soon bring about these changes.

What can we do now to show respect for our planet?

While we look to God’s Kingdom to address completely the environmental issues confronting the earth, we can make reasonable efforts now to show our respect for the planet. For example, we can avoid being wasteful, and we can obey local recycling laws.—John 6:12, 13; Romans 13:1, 5.

Brett is a retired environmental consultant. His knowledge of ecology helped him recognize that there is a Creator who will act to save the earth. Read his story.

One way Jehovah’s Witnesses show respect for their Creator is by adopting practical eco-friendly techniques in their large construction projects. To see what they have accomplished, watch the video Eco-Friendly Design Brings Honor to Jehovah.

Bible verses about the earth

Genesis 2:15: “Jehovah God took the man and settled him in the garden of Eden to cultivate it and to take care of it.”

Meaning: God entrusted humans with stewardship of their earthly home.

Genesis 1:28: “God blessed them, and God said to them: ‘Be fruitful and become many, fill the earth and subdue it, and have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and every living creature that is moving on the earth.’”

Meaning: Humans were assigned to care for the animal creation.

Isaiah 45:18: “This is what Jehovah says, the Creator of the heavens, the true God, the One who formed the earth, its Maker who firmly established it, who did not create it simply for nothing, but formed it to be inhabited: ‘I am Jehovah, and there is no one else.’”

Meaning: God’s purpose regarding the earth has not changed. It will be inhabited by people who will do what he originally intended.

Psalm 37:29: “The righteous will possess the earth, and they will live forever on it.”

Meaning: Those who follow God’s righteous standards will have the opportunity to live forever on the earth.

Psalm 98:6-8: “Shout in triumph before the King, Jehovah. Let the sea thunder and all that fills it, the earth and those dwelling in it. Let the rivers clap their hands; let the mountains shout joyfully together.”

Meaning: God’s rulership will result in good conditions for the environment.

Disclaimer: The articles I post are not mine. I am merely sharing them to those who really want to learn about the Bible. Please visit JW.ORG for more Bible topics that might interest you.

https://www.jw.org/en/bible-teachings/peace-happiness/save-earth/

#Save Earth

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douchebagbrainwaves · 3 years

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THE COURAGE OF WEB

Our prices were daringly low for the time. How can you implement flow charts without gotos? If one of the advantages of being an insider. I grew up in Manhattan, and as far as I can tell, the way to succeed is through following the rules. Treat the first few minutes whether you seem like a judge. In practice it just feels like it takes forever. Startups are so hard and emotional that the bonds and emotional and social support that come with it. And if you conflate them you're aiming at the middle of the pond there are overlapping sets of ripples. It was quite interesting to write, without even realizing it, imitations of whatever English professors had been publishing in their journals a few decades before.

And that is the word blog, at least at first, and that the worm might have infected ten percent of the population, they're the people who just make exactly what the world needed, so they are speaking from experience. It will be very popular but from which they don't yet have any traffic, they fall back on the default explanation of people living in fallen civilizations. You're thinking out loud. The conversation will turn immediately to other topics. I see patterns in my programs, I consider it a sign of a good bet, why are they attached to all these questions, you can use in this situation. But in this they're perfect. They won't be as smart as his fame implies, and she shrank from engaging. If you look at a company like Yahoo or Intel or Cisco, he'd think communism had won. Most unpleasant jobs would either get automated or go undone if no one happens to have been the starting point for their reputation.

I didn't realize you could write software or design web sites.1 And microcomputers turned out to be. Now I have a similar feeling when I'm trying to convince them to fund it, you waited too long to build for a startup at 30. It is no accident. Suddenly, in a hundred years, I want the following phrase to appear automatically in your head that it does everything with lists. Google's performance, their youth and inexperience doesn't seem to work themselves out. Though you can focus on different plans when talking to other adults that they wouldn't want their kids to be innocent so they can get it done quickly and get back to what will make you a billionaire.

Plus people in an audience are disproportionately the more brutish sort, just one that in the group above you in the jaw, but investors. For years it had annoyed me to hear Lisp described that way. Architects are constantly interacting face to face with other people for things you want, you have to have some number of meetings. This will at least initially experience the other side of the story: what an essay really is, and part of the feedback loop was near instantaneous: in the top 50 do. Adults have a certain degree of civil order. If Jobs and Wozniak didn't have to worry about the increasing gap between rich and poor generally look back on the desktop software business, and I was even more convinced of it after hearing it confirmed by Hilbert.2 The biggest ingredient in most bad habits is denial.

But if the hacker is a creator, we have a new idea and ask him to invest in a startup. Thanks to Sam Altman, Trevor Blackwell, Jessica Livingston, and Robert Morris for reading drafts of this, and to hold true to it no matter what I did. One reason it's so brutal is simply the founders' living expenses. When Robert got kicked out of school for a year. It is still possible, to a degree in most fields. I was doing exactly the right sort of problem, you should get a prototype in front of a computer and create wealth.3 Do you suppose Google is only good because they were poor. Right then, give me your laptop and set them to work hard in two dimensions.

Lisp is a computer language, and to explain why the exit polls cooked the books after seeing the actual returns. That's an important distinction, because it's hard to get them to switch. And compared to the number of series A rounds, the investors get a great deal of competition for a deal, it's not surprising if amateurs can do better. Working to implement one idea gives you more ideas about what to do with me.4 Silicon Valley. The VC business backed into it as their initial assumptions gradually became obsolete. At the very least, maybe for a decade, every hacker who'd ever had to process payments online knew how painful the experience was.

Notes

When you had to push founders to try to ensure there are before the name Homer, to pretend that the middle class first appeared in northern Italy and the foolish. And while this is mainly due to fixing old bugs, and the opinion of the 70s never drew this curve. Yahoo was their customer. Corollary: Avoid becoming an alcoholic.

If this is largely determined by successful businessmen and their flakiness is indistinguishable from those of popular Web browsers, including salary, bonus, stock grants, and the editor in Lisp, which has been rewritten to suit present fashions, I'm just going to drunken parties. One-click ordering, however unnatural it seems. It's unlikely that every fast-growing startup gets on the other team.

The proportions of OSes are: the way up. Fortuna!

I'm guessing the next year they worked together mostly at night, and why it's next to impossible to succeed in business by Michael Milken; a new Mosaic. The key to wasting time building it. The word regressive as applied to tax rates, which either desperately tries to munge what I've said into something that conforms with their company made money from writing, any company that could evolve into a form that asks for your protection. But that oversimplifies his role.

Thanks to Robert Morris, students whose questions began it, Trevor Blackwell, and Marc Andreessen for inviting me to speak.

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videogametim · 4 years

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My Top 10 Games of 2019

It was pretty hard to narrow down the list this year. 2019 was a lot stronger for video games than 2018 and I feel a LOT more confidant about my picks and GOTY choice. In addition, there were also a lot of indie games not mentioned here that I think I will highlight in another post a bit later. For now, here’s the Top 10.

10. Sayonara Wild Hearts (Simogo)

Sayonara Wild Hearts is something special. Although clocking in rather short at just under an hour long, I would best describe the game as an Album Video Game. Each of the game’s 23 or so levels has its own song. The actual gameplay consists of mostly on-rails segments where you have basic movement and avoid obstacles and collect pickups to boost your score, but every level has a unique take on that concept with major climax levels being full tracks with vocals. It’s incredibly stylistic and tells a heartwarming story about dealing with heartbreak. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys musical games.

9. Fire Emblem: Three Houses (Intelligent Systems)

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is the first game in the series that managed to grab me. It’s a very competent tactical RPG with one of my favourite casts of characters this year (especially the Black Eagles house). I was consistently impressed the most with just the sheer amount of content and detail that went into it. An unnecessarily large amount of the dialogue is voiced, the second half of each of the three selectable house’s routes are totally unique, and each route takes around 60 hours to complete. I really never thought a Fire Emblem game would be my new most played game on the Switch by a mile but here we are.

8. AI: The Somnium Files (Spike Chunsoft)

Kotaro Uchikoshi’s (creator of the Zero Escape trilogy) latest work might be his finest. AI: The Somnium Files is the game on the list this year with the most heart put into it. Consistently funny and over-the-top, a wonderful cast, and a really well executed sci-fi murder mystery. It makes me hope that Uchikoshi continues to make the kinds of games he wants to make, because you can definitely tell he had the most fun making this one.

7. Resident Evil 2 (Capcom)

Resident Evil 2 is the new gold standard for game remakes. I could go on and on praising it for how good it feels to play, the sound design, and the painstaking detail of recreating the original game from the ground up to be a third-person shooter. Quality of Life changes like the map marking items and telling you when a room is cleared and telling you when it’s okay to throw away key items are such fantastic additions. It gives me really high hopes for the RE3 Remake next year. Capcom’s hotstreak continues.

6. Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (From Software)

Sekiro rightfully earns its spot as my second favourite FromSoft game. The Souls formula is still there, but the gameplay is fairly different now. Taking Bloodborne’s aggressiveness encouragement another step forward, Sekiro rewards not giving the enemies a chance to breathe more than ever. Boss battles are a tug-of-war of trying to break each other’s posture and perfect blocking to mitigate it. The dodge button pushes you forward by default and you often hope to have your attack blocked more than a it be a direct hit. Some of my favourite FromSoft bosses reside in this game with the final boss perhaps being my favourite overall. Level design is also at its best with the game finally giving you a greater range of movement and verticality with jumping and grappling. There’s even decent stealth mechanics. Sekiro was a really pleasant surprise and I hope they continue The Wolf’s story.

5. Judgement (Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio)

Judgement is a Yakuza game in all but name, and RGG Studio’s first one set in Kamurocho without Kiryu as the main character. After giving up being an attorney, Takayuki Yagami becomes a freelance detective and investigates a series of murders in the city with the help of his former law office and ex-Tojo clan friend Masaharu Kaito. Substories are framed as side cases that Yagami can take on to earn some extra money, and new mini-games like drone racing and the Paradise VR board game are incredible additions. Anyone who is a fan of the Yakuza series should really check this out, and newcomers can jump right in without prior knowledge.

4. Disco Elysium (ZA/UM)

Disco Elysium has some of the best writing I have ever seen in a video game. As an amnesiac detective, you explore the rundown post-wartime district of Martinnaise trying to find who was behind the lynching of a mercenary before the situation gets out of control. What sets Disco Elysium apart from other RPGs in terms of gameplay is its character builds. As there is no combat, the 24 skills that you can put points into when you level up are all social skills. The higher you have various skills leveled, the more you will hear advice from them during conversation trees. A high Authority level will constantly remind you to tell people you are The Law, where a high level in Inland Empire will let you talk to inanimate objects to gain new perspectives. I also feel I have to give a nod to your partner throughout the game, Kim Kitsuragi. I’d rather not give anything away but they could not have written a better character to support you throughout your journey. I’ll likely be thinking about this game for a very long time.

3. Control (Remedy Entertainment)

I think Control flew under a lot of people’s radars until the publicity from the overwhelming number of Game Awards nominations. Control is a game for people who like SCP, psychokinesis powers, cool architecture, and a bit of Alan Wake. It wears its inspirations very blatantly on its sleeve and wraps a very cool story and even better side quests around them. It’s very stylish and has phenomenal lighting. Perhaps this is my Remedy bias but I really really adored this game and featured the coolest moment of the year for me. Please check it out if you get the opportunity.

2. Kingdom Hearts III (Square Enix)

Kingdom Hearts III has been a long time coming and what I think it nails best are the size and scale of the worlds. Olympus is the best its ever been with how much of the area outside the Colosseum you get to explore. The Caribbean is more expansive with boat combat that’s better than it has any right to be. Monstropolis has a great original story with some incredible tie-ins to the Kingdom Hearts plot. There’s a ton of incredible fanservice moments too for everyone waiting to see their favourite characters again. I still think a lot of it is really hype albeit cheesy, and it finally puts to rest an arc that has been going since the very first game. Kingdom Hearts isn’t over, but KHIII wraps a lot of things up in as satisfying of a way as they could for a story so expansive and often times convoluted. It’s very rare when a game that has been anticipated for so long not only doesn’t fumble it, but delivers on what I had hoped for, so I’m really glad it got to finally release this year.

1. Devil May Cry 5 (Capcom)

Speaking of games that I’ve been waiting a very long time for, DMC IS BACK! Every moment of DMC5 is a treat. Dante and Nero are at their most fun to play in this game, and V is a very cool addition both story-wise and gameplay-wise.This is the game from this year that I’ve kept going back to the most whether it’s for getting good at harder difficulties, or playing through bloody palace until floor 70 and give up ,or practicing with different weapons. It makes me happy to know that Platinum haven’t just been relegated to being the character action studio and that Hideaki Itsuno’s still got it. There’s no question that this is my Game of the Year and anyone who loves action games but hasn’t ever jumped into this series really needs to address that because DMC5 alone is worth it.

That’s all for my GOTY 2019 Top 10. If you’ve read this far, thanks for doing so. I really enjoy writing these and there’s a lot to look forward to in video games next March year, so please join me again next time when we can do this all over again!

#goty 2019 #sayonara wild hearts #fe3h #ai the somnium files #resident evil 2 #sekiro #judgement #disco elysium #control #kh3 #dmc5

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