#i want to write wilbur soot out of the narrative completely

[thedarkladyofthenight]

Okay but Talullah with Philza's hat. Consider

[the-l00ker]

POV: you're me looking at Wilbur Soot "coming back" video, as he explains that he's indeed NOT ADDRESSING ANYTHING AND IS AVOIDING IT COMPLETELY only to be announcing a tour in Australia and a new song like he thought people were gonna be excited about a man who hurt member of the public, admitted to bitting people even the told him to stop, hurt Shelby after she'd withdrawn her consent, admitted to biting Niki Nihachu LIVE and playing it off as "well tell them how horrible I am boo hoo", hitting Technoblade in the arm after his post cancer treatment surgery and laughing about it LIVE, basically screwing over the MCC video production takes because now they can't use him in update videos effectively making the whole event less popular meaning that on occasion less people from charities get money, giving a disingenuous apology, being rude to the people hosting his concerts, stomping on tommyinnit hands TWICE in a video for "ruining his day" / to make fun of him, being egotistical enough to write himself back into the narrative of Dsmp after he died because he basically explained on stream that it wasn't "heading in the direction he wanted it to" and believe it wasn't good enough and most importantly shatter the trust in his ACTUALLY fans that could afford/would go to see him

Because the only fans he has now are 10-15yr old girls who are "ride or die" for any form of man in modern day media, telling people to kill themselves and get r*pe if they initially didn't support their ideologies and who CAN'T EVEN AFFORD TO FLY OUT TO AUSTRALIA TO GO SEE HIM-

[etoilesbienne]

Nice to see that apparently we’ve all read it runs in the family. It was my guilty pleasure fic and i didn’t expect to see other people talking about it. I started reading it like a month after i got into bad and dsmp and i was /obsessed/. It’s one of those fics that changes your brain chemistry and makes you stare at a wall after reading it. To this day im still subbed to it on the off chance that it gets another chapter.

like genuinely its an enamoring fic it has an odd premise but like the author has so much potential in, like, being able to write genuinely engaging narratives. i'm shocked at how much setup is put into the work and you can tell where the narrative is going in a way that's like watching a trainwreck. You know exactly where it is going but the journey of getting there is so fascinating to watch.

anyway i want to ramble about what i liked and what i didn't like in the fic. so. huge reader discretion advised, go look at the other warnings i posted about this fic before reading this (also spoilers for the fic ahead)

like part of its most interesting facets is it is one of the few fics that tackles this sort of heavy subject matter of assault and kidnapping and doesn't really shy away from how genuinely negative it is and can be. like don't get me wrong ive enjoyed other psychological horror before, but it was, like, nice? to see the "pets" all be like genuinely upset and respond realistically to the situation they're in. no "they really like it secretly" undertone.

not a criticism but my favorite part of this story is the random ass normal human names they try to give everyone. they made skeppy have a white ass last name. bbh's name is Bad Halo. purpled doesn't even show up but his name is mentioned to be, like, "nolan purpled but he goes by purpled because his cheating whore of a mom named him nolan and he hates her" genuinely funniest line of the whole fic one of my favorites i can never ever forget it. i need to find all the human names in this theyre so fucking funny.

also badboyhalo? while he IS woobified and made much more demure and defanged, he's still like... that IS badboyhalo. his moments of complete suspicion at every encounter. his doubting. refusal to break the mould and rock the boat out if fear something bad would happen. VERY badboyhalo sentiments. also the fact the writer knew about skephalo divorce. going to be honest, looking at how their other work contains a6d, i think the writer was/is a bbh watcher. and then the schlatthalo. the fact they made schlatt ask to curse? and then bbh laughed when he did? this person understood both of these guys. they did their homework. schlatt isn't a megalomaniac evil villain one note. i don't know if i'd call both of them "in character" per say, but i can definitely say they had consistent characterization and i could understand how their characters got to these versions.

also the technohalo multifaceted concept? techno seeing bbh as too innocent? putting bbh on a pedestal and denying his humanity in that way? WILD. the setup and writing was all there for, like, bbh using his body and manipulating techno to turn against phil.

like the good parts of this fic are such crazy highs and peaks it makes the lows look so much worse.

speaking of which: wilbur soot.

by god is wilbur soot not a character, he is a force of nature and just continuous digging deeper on trying to fix a problem the writer accidentally started. none of sbi really are fleshed out or rounded characters, but wilbur soot is like by far getting the worst treatment. im not even a wilbur fan LOL.

he's supposed to be a schizophrenic serial killer which already isn't a great start, and then you watch the writer realize the issue and try to fix what they've started. this is when schizophrenic medicated slimecicle comes in. followed by badboyhalo looking at the camera and going Not All Mentally Ill People Are Bad. which was just really funny in such a morbid way. but then the writer DOES go in an interesting direction with phil denying his condition and refusing to help him get medicated. however with the slimecicle medicated moment it comes off as a medication = The Good Mentally Ill Person narrative. genuinely i dont know how id solve the wilbur issue without extensive rewriting. he's just a mess.

phil i think is one of the most interesting of sbi, being made into a central antagonist and a genuinely good villain. his scenes have well made tension and poses actual threat and stakes to the narrative. he's a good villain! techno has an interesting arc with bbh but just isn't given enough screentime and doesn't have much beyond "brute to be manipulated" which sucks a little. tommy is tommy. only one of sbi i could see not dying in a fire at the end. wilbur, despite his other issues is a narrative driver with his capriciousness, but the schizophrenia plotline is such a mess that he just is not a person here, he's a plot device more than anything.

more abstractly i do wish they committed and, like, had sex scenes or were blatant about sex happening. like they keep dancing around it but so much of the fic does not make sense if sex isn't what's occurring here. like i get subtlety if the avoidance of sex is what they're aiming for! but its okay to, like, maybe make it more clear whatever techno and bbh have going on is obviously sexual, because that can be used to advance the narrative and make it more clear bbh is using his body to manipulate here, because that'd be a good plot point to continue the themes and motifs of the story. i also just do not know how else to interpret the relationship lol.

my other biggest criticism is make it less misogynistic. the only three named women are the dead samsung smart fridge (who is now a dead mom named samantha), minx the alcoholic witness, and puffy, who is somehow ranboo's mom. like the ableism is horrific here but its so over the top stupid in the ableism, while the misogyny is subtle and just reeks. genuinely why is puffy ranboo's mom that sucks so fucking bad. make her be his aunt or guardian or something. but mom? c'mon.

i rambled way too long lol there's more i can say but this fic is my roman empire. the writer has so much potential but just needs more life experience to understand mental illness and misogyny. also a beta reader to fix their formatting. and maybe make their dialogue more human. shoutout to ranboo giving his name and phone number to tommy after tommy literally fucking tells him he'd "make a beautiful corpse" CRAZY exchange. no human would do that.

[nuetellarose]

Self promotion time because I'm way too nervous sometimes. I'm Rosalina, I'm a mcyt fanfiction author, I've been in this fandom since late 2020 early 2021 (Wow I'm old.) I mainly focus on writing about C!Tommy and the other SBI boys. I have five work in progresses and two finished works that I wanted to share here! You're free to just scroll away though. I currently am doing crossover series but plan to post my original ideas soon.

Hero of Winds and the Three Princes of the Sea.

This fic was actually one of my first works in the fandom. It's basically a retelling of Nintendo's Wind Waker with Technoblade as Link and a few changes I made to the story to fit the narrative.

Status: Complete. Rating:T. Words:32, 516. Chapters: 13/13.

The Calm Before The Storm. The beginning of Breath of the Wild with SBI but I made it sadder than it needed to be. One of my longest stories ever, I think I did a really good job with it and I'm happy with end result.

Status: Complete. Rating:M. Words: 45,616. Chapters: 15/15.

Aftermath. Basically the sequel to Calm Before The Storm, where the actual story of Breath of the Wild is told with my own twist. By that I mean I added way more angst to an already dark game.

Status: Work in progress. Rating:M. Words:28,421. Chapters:17

Exiled Princes of Twilight. Bench Trio as Link and Midna. The role of the hero is shared by Tommy and Tubbo as they try to return their home to normal they need to help Ranboo return home.

Status:Work in progress. Rating:T. Words:46,946. Chapters:14

The Composer of Time. Ocarina of Time with Wilbur as Link and Ranboo as Navi. I'm trying my best to get the chapters out as fast as I can but there's a lot of lore I'm trying to get chapters out as fast as I can.

Status:Work in Progress. Rating:M. Words:5,900. Chapters:4.

The Secret World of Wilbur Soot. One of the lighter stories I have! If you've seen Ghibli's The Secret World of Arrietty or read the book The Borrowers then basically I used those stories but used SBI.

It's mainly Wilbur and Technoblade centric!

Status: Work in progress. Rating:G. Words:7,009. Chapters:7

We Solemnly Swear We Are Up To No Good

You can really tell who's my favorite huh? This a Harry Potter au with Techno having to participate in the Triwizard Tournament/M.C.C against his will and his older brother being a jerk about it.

Status:Work in Progress. Rating:M. Words:8,048. Chapters:4

That's all of them!

[blockgamepirate]

Technoblade’s purpose in the political narrative of the Dream SMP

I can’t sleep so I decided to finally write the post I’ve been struggling with for literal months, except way more casual because I can’t be bothered anymore and also I’m sleep deprived.

So the thing is: to me the DSMP storyline has always been primarily political, probably because I was introduced to it through Wilbur who was definitely going for political, and also because I’m just generally interested in political narratives right now. Obviously I appreciate the character work and the personal relationship stuff, that’s what makes it more interesting than just dry allegory, but when it comes down to it, this story is about politics to me. So that’s the angle I’m going to approach it from.

Also not to spoil the conclusions here, but I’m an anarchist, that’s my lens.

(Obviously all of this is about rp from here on out unless otherwise specified)

Basically the situation as Techno joins the server is this: L'Manburg exists as an autonomous nation and is de facto independent although not officially recognised by the Dream SMP. The self-appointed president Wilbur Soot decides to hold an election and rig it in order to consolidate his power over the nation he founded and he gets his VP Tommyinnit to join in on the plan. Their scheme fails and they end up voted out instead. The new president, Schlatt, immediately establishes himself as an authoritarian figure and exiles Wilbur and Tommy.

A couple of points on what the election arc demonstrates:

1: the appearance of democracy can be used for distinctly undemocratic purposes.

2: even if the elections aren’t rigged, the electoral system could be massively flawed and end up favouring a party that in fact didn’t have the popular vote

3: even if the winning government (the coalition in this case) has the majority vote, that doesn’t guarantee that they’ll actually act according to the popular will.

4: the supporters of the losing parties basically just have to let the majority overrule their wishes, espcially since apparently L’Manburg doesn’t have an established role for an opposition, yikes. That’s actually a MAJOR oversight in the system but I’m not gonna go into that too much.

5: frankly as an anarchist I am just deeply cynical towards representative democracy, and just because you have a token appearance of choice and consent doesn’t mean that it isn’t a hierarchical and authoritarian system. And to be fair, from my point of view this applies even to so-called liberal democracies and progressive parties. Full disclosure: even if L'Manburg was the ideal example of a representative democracy (which it very much isn’t) I would still be opposed to it because I fundamentally do not believe in top down systems, even electoral ones.

6: despite all these flaws, all the characters seem to implicitly accept the electoral system as legitimate. There’s criticism against the actions of individual characters acting within the system, such as Quackity calling out Wilbur for trying to rig the election, but nobody is questioning the system itself.

So at this point I’m sitting there, watching all this go down, and thinking “man, this would be so much more bearable if there was an anarchist point of view being represented in the story.”

And hey, look who IMMEDIATELY SHOWS UP.

Okay, I’m not gonna lie, early installation Technoblade is not the best representation of anarchism. I was mostly rooting for him out of sheer contrarianism initially. I didn’t really even care if it would be another Killmonger/Magneto/Zaheer situation because I’m used to reading against the authorial intent when it comes to these things. Sometimes any representation is better than no representation, even with political ideologies. That’s not to say that him just straight up spouting this hobbesian notion of a “dog-eat-dog world” didn’t grate on me, obviously it did.

That kind of worldview of humanity needing authority in order to prevent chaos and conflict is literally antithetical to anarchism and is the favourite talking point of authoritarians, the least anarchist people there are. It’s literally what people use to argue AGAINST anarchism. I think it’s mostly because cc!Techno obviously wasn’t particularly educated on anarchist thought and was just basically having fun roleplaying with his friends at this point. Which is frustrating but fair enough I guess.

Cynical ideas about human nature are pretty deeply rooted in the mainstream, unfortunately, most people just consider it common sense. And like I said, it’s a huge talking point in the propaganda against anarchism.

(… even though in fact these arguments were originally used against proponents of representative democracy. Hobbes himself was very much a monarchist, the idea of letting normal people vote for their representatives would have been terrifying to him. Like surely the world would descent into a free-for-all war, all against all. Imagine letting commoners have OPINIONS, the horror.)

So yeah, that stuff was pretty ehhhhh. It was basically what I’d expected though: cc!Techno isn’t an anarchist and we just don’t get accurate representation from non-anarchists, ever. What I dared to hope was that Techno’s character would at least stay consistent about his opposition to ALL governments. I was pretty sure that he would, even though it seemed like the majority of the fandom at the time was convinced that he would switch over to Schlatt’s side or something. It would have been a really shitty twist, I would have ragequit immediately. I mean what would have been the entire point of his character then? He might as well have been a random mercenary. Why even have his character be an anarchist if you were just going to make him work for a government?

(ftr this is kinda my biggest problem with the Hypixel Skyblock revolution event lol, honestly I think that was a worse depiction of anarchism than early DSMP Technoblade. I mean the speech was good, but… still became a government official, tho. booooooooo, cringe)

And yes, I was rooting against L'Manburg, obviously, and I would have even if it had meant having to deal with another badly written anarchist villain character. I never understood why people saw L'Manburg as the good guys, they were nationalist and exclusionary and their whole existence was based on trying to scam people for money.

I mean they were definitely funny, they were great entertainers. I have no problems with people rooting for them because they’re fun to watch; I did that for a bit too. But people were starting to get really into the story and talk about Wilbur and Tommy, the corrupt politicians, and the country that literally excluded people based on nationality as the heroes, unironically, which was wild to me. And when Wilbur started his “villain arc” well: people called it a villain arc, as if he hadn’t been pretty much a bad guy from the beginning, constantly just out for money and power and taking advantage of the people around him and then pretending to be the victim when challenged. I mean yes he got worse, but I wouldn’t call it a villain arc, more like just a mental breakdown arc.

More importantly, to me L'Manburg represented so many things I hate about the status quo in real life, and seeing the fandom mostly unquestioningly accept it as good just pissed me off. Still pisses me off tbh. I mean, to be diplomatic I could say that I understand the emotional attachment and the way L'Manburg was built up mirrors a lot of how real nations are built and how they create a sense of patriotism out of symbols and a sense of honour and loyalty, and it’s actually really fascinating how it even works in a Minecraft roleplay. Says something about the human mind I guess. Doesn’t mean I have to like it though.

Anyway, I just wanted to see literally any kind of opposition to power, even if it had to come from a character that was unquestionably a villain, which I fully assumed Techno would be. Because political narratives so often just leave us out, or at best barely mention us. And even from a narrative point of view, adding an anarchist perspective to a political story just objectively broadens its scope and actually challenges people who are used to only arguing along the lines of conservative or liberal, welfare state or privatization, nationalism or multiculturalism, etc. Even if the original work dealt with it poorly, at least it would give me the excuse to rant about it on Tumblr, which is kinda why I revived my old Minecraft sideblog for this. (That and pig!Techno fanart.)

Also how can you have a story so fundamentally about power without its counterpoint: the rejection of power?

(Yes, Dream SMP as a whole is definitely a narrative about power, it’s a huge theme for Wilbur, Quackity, Dream, Eret and the Badlanders at least, as well as obviously the anarchist characters from the opposite direction.)

So yeah, the build up to November 16th for me was mainly about the anticipation for what Techno would do, how would Techno’s character respond to the seemingly inevitable formation of a new government. THAT was the point of interest for me, that was what I was the most invested in. Would we get an actual anarchist opposition as a new side to the conflict or would they just awkwardly drop that whole angle? Or even have him team up with Schlatt like a complete sellout? There was so much potential but I worried they might just waste it.

And I was right to worry since apparently in the original script Techno wasn’t supposed to do anything, he was just there to help fight Schlatt and witness the explosion along with everyone else.

And WOW that would have been so incredibly boring

Not even just from the political perspective, just talking about the narrative in general terms here: imagine November 16th without Techno’s plot points. Not only would it have been boring for Techno’s character but it would have been equally boring for basically everybody but Wilbur and Philza. An anticlimactic fight followed by a big explosion that pretty much everybody had seen coming already. Yes, the button room scene is dramatic and heartbreaking… for Wilbur and Phil. But nobody else was there to see it. For everybody else, it was just a big explosion. It would have been such a huge disservice to anyone watching the other POVs.

Techno’s intervention gave everyone an ACTUAL climactic fight, it allowed characters other than Wil and Phil to witness some actual drama happening and to participate in it, rather than just waiting around for the explosion, while also foreshadowing the explosion. Even better, it provoked SO MUCH discussion in the fandom AND gave a perfect hook for future conflicts to arise. Wilbur’s end was tragic but it was, at the time, final. L'Manburg would have still suffered a catastrophe but it would have been left with just the same exact antagonist as before: Dream.

And at this point Dream’s core goals had barely changed, just his approach was now different. Yes, that makes a difference for the plot, but it doesn’t really change much in terms of ideological conflict. Especially since there really isn’t that big of an ideological difference between Dream and Tommy, because arguably neither of them are particularly big on ideology in the first place, they just have conflicting goals and use different tactics to achieve those goals (well, the tactics aren’t always even that different *cough Spirit cough*).

Techno’s conflict with Tubbo and especially Quackity (and honestly most of the other characters in general) brings in so much more depth to the story, just by introducing another angle, not to even mention how much it brings to focus questions about power and violence. These are themes that exist in other characters’s storylines too but nowhere in the same way or as central as with Techno.

I’m getting kind of ahead of myself here, though.

The real twist of November 16th was the fact that Techno WASN’T a straight up villain, actually. It was a twist to me anyway, because with all my cynicism I just didn’t see it coming, I didn’t expect him to actually start making reasonable criticisms. I didn’t expect him to drop the hobbesian arguments entirely and start making points that actually sounded like anarchism.

I have to assume that cc!Techno must have seen some of the criticisms of his character and been inspired to adjust because the difference is pretty notable.

(Sidenote: I’m just forever kinda sad that Techno’s “I may seem like the villain here” monologue was cut from the video and most people never heard it.)

And I felt SO validated by the way, because it works so well in the story! Everyone is mostly content with the restoration of a status quo of some sort, Schlatt is gone, this is supposed to be the good ending, and then Techno calls them all out and turns the narrative around completely: This was just a coup d'état. This was just the previous political leadership retaking power by force. Why is everyone celebrating the same exact system that lead to Schlatt’s authoritarian rule in the first place?

What he does there is force the audience to question the narrative they’ve been presented so far, that they’ve accepted without a thought. It might not convince them, but they can’t just ignore it either.

Whatever you wanna say about the discourse around Techno on that day, in the ideological narrative THIS IS THE IMPORTANT PART. Not who betrayed who or when is political violence justified, that’s about personal relationships and morality and it’s mostly all more relevant to the aftermath than the event itself. In my opinion, the REAL point in the moment is that the characters and the audience were comfortable with the ending only to be presented with a completely new perspective on the events.

It also recontextualises the finale, including Wilbur’s actions! It’s a much more ambiguous end to the Pogtopia vs Manburg arc and to Wilbur’s original run as the head writer. Wilbur’s “even with Tubbo in charge I don’t think [that ‘special place’] can exist again” is vague enough to be dismissed as just part of his paranoia and internal conflict, but with Techno, there’s a concrete question: what if Tubbo, given the same powers as Schlatt, will turn out to be just a new Schlatt? And suddenly you have to wonder what Wilbur meant by his words too. And was all this foreshadowing something about L’Manburg’s future?

Okay I’ve only made it to November 16th and there’s so much more DSMP to talk about but the post is getting too long and I’m starting to lose my energy. Will I ever make a part two? No idea. But I’ll try.

Standard disclaimer: I’m not the spokesperson of anarchism, other anarchists might disagree with my reading

[roxytonic]

what is the mangoball "cheater cheater" fanfiction? (a personal overview)

hi everyone,

lately a very specific social media AU DreamNotFound fanfiction on Twitter has been making the rounds. i'd like to make an introduction to the work based on my observations--i don't think we've seen anything like it so far, barring highly textual chatfics and the like.

at the time of this writing, i've caught up to entry #108. the author is prolific!

so what is this fanfiction?

the fanfiction is called "Cheater, Cheater" and is written by the ostensibly single author, mangoball (mangobaii in typing). it revolves around George as he breaks up with Sapnap and hits a rebound and potential relationship with Dream. it includes plenty of side characters, including but not limited to, Karl Jacobs, Quackity, Corpse, Wilbur Soot, and Tommyinnit.

you can find it on twitter here, but i highly recommend using the ThreadReaderApp page instead for full-size images:

what works about the fanfiction?

unofficially categorized, the story itself is a comedy-satire slice of life with a few blips of absurdity. off the top of my head, mangoball writes in references to DreamSMP and surrounding MCYT, and there are some fourth wall breaks, which are all framed in an absurd way.

in the story, the side plots corresponding to the side characters are just as vibrant as the one around George's fallout with Sapnap and his later rebound to Dream. not spoiling them, but they're fun. the story events themselves are moderately simple--the bulk of the work is made up of character interactions, which, as we find, range from globally yassified characters to complete divergence from individual personalities.

i think the reason why the mangoball fic works is because it's a nice convergence of comfy things under a very thin, easy-to-read format. if we actually go to the thread, we see that it's 100% composed of phone-sized screenshots of messages. there's not much text with each tweet in the thread, so it's short and digestible.

therefore, both the form and the function of the story work together to create a double-whammy of a very light read.

what does it's potential categorization as a light read pose for it as a work?

i don't think there is any problem with light reads in the fandom. it's optional reading, and if you do wind up reading it, you'll blitz through it easily. stan twitter will obviously take well to it since the characters are yassified, though budding readers might find it accessible too.

however, there are a few flaws i want to point out:

1. it's vaguely formulaic and/or familiar to me. i mean, given enough time and effort, i could deconstruct the humor (absurd claim to another person + agreement from the other person? further OOC-ness?) but generally speaking it's content and tropes don't "feel" new. i don't know what specifically i've read that would cause this familiarity, though. (on the other hand, this means that it's going to be a safe read.)

2. i feel like i have to suspend my disbelief a bit higher. this is more of a personal issue, so you might fare better than i have, but generally i feel like i'm a fly on the wall looking in. i haven't felt that in a while so it took me a few minutes to settle into the groove of it and start rolling.

3. this somewhat ties into point #2: the author needs to be very judicious about how they use the fourth wall break and self-references to absurdity. off-hand jokes are super obvious, because there is such limited text/narrative bandwidth to the individual screenshots. fourth wall jokes can tire out quickly, and at worst, fail to suspend the reader's disbelief.

i remember seeing one character call attention to their collective habit of narrating what they're doing ATM (because there's no italicized text or stage text in the work, it's all dialogue). it's funny for sure, but it drags me out of the story because it's too true. suddenly i'm thinking, "wait. why isn't there flavor text and italicized descriptions and videos of things happening IRL?" (there is some audio and a few pictures but that is not the bulk of the work.) if the characters know their narratological limitations, it becomes uncanny.

4. you're probably not going to find powerful themes and motifs. we have no idea what's intended or not. on the other hand, if you're going by "Death of the Author", then all bets are off.

note that i said "themes and motifs"--things we can extract and synthesize from the text. the wonderful @bothersome-edgar has made some great strides on identifying and categorizing key aspects of the characters, and i highly commend him for doing so. check out his work here: https://bothersome-edgar.tumblr.com/post/669498983742324736/putting-this-here-so-i-know-what-to-write-tomorrow

what other thoughts do i have?

i really love BadBoyHalo and Quackity in this story. i totally relate to BadBoyHalo's awkwardness when interacting with people online (i don't sound like i'm 50 years old though!!!) and his latent craziness, though i'm not violent. Quackity is the anchor that keeps the story and character interactions from flying apart from the absurdity of it. he's realistic, and reacts to the craziness in the story realistically.

Karl is growing on me and George is just really fluttering around. like a moth. and Dream is a lit Ruben's tube matched to dubstep. love is in the air, i suppose :]

[jayleoi]

I don’t like that Wilbur’s back in control of the writing.

he’s an experienced rper yeah, but he’s very control freakish about it. If wilbur doesn’t write it, its not canon. But also, if wilbur writes it, it’s undeniable, 100%, true canon. Unchangeable.

he has a way of controlling other people’s narratives and actions, which goes against basic rp etiquette.

we see that when techno outright says he doesn’t like the family dynamic, but wilbur keeps pushing it. Or that when he said he has “plans for Phil’s wife” without any input from Phil.

also, he writes exclusively with his own characters in mind, which doesn’t fit the way collaborative rp should work at all. He has a way of making himself (and Tommy if we’re being generous) the main character.

I mean, at the beginning of the smp, and back during the old l’manberg and pogtopia days. there weren’t many people getting involved in lore when wilbur was in charge. some people, like Jack and Nicki, even got left completely out of lore. nicki wasn’t even told about the 16th. And techno said he had to fight tooth and nail with wilbur for the ending that he wanted for c!techno because wilbur wouldn’t let him have it.

i liked the lore much better when he wasn’t writing, because it felt a collaborative effort between all the ccs.

Old l’manberg stans are gonna get pissed, but I also think the lore in season two is objectively better, and fits the medium better than it did in season one.

im not saying he shouldn’t write at all, but he needs to take input from other ccs and try to include them without outright controlling their character‘s actions.

theres another issue of wilbur shoehorning himself where he doesn’t belong into all this new lore. I think this whole, clunky, weird, repetitive, las Nevadas burger van stuff is the prime example.

Quackity could easily make las Nevadas a story on its own without wilbur soot, and I think he was going that way before wilbur started writing again.

like, all the cinematic, beautiful lore quackity was doing got really derailed once wilbur introduced himself back into writing.

There was a cool setup of a revived Schlatt, but I honestly believe that got dropped for whatever the fuck is going on with wilbur and the burger van.

its fine that wilbur wants to be involved with las nevadas, but the way he’s going about it is super weird.

it’s almost, like, meta. Wilbur competing with quackity with the burger van, is like a weird parallel to how wilbur is clearly competing with las Nevadas for the dominant narrative.

I think he needs to let other people do lore without him. when he stepped away we got way more story lines and character development than when he was in control he can write lore, but the lore doesn’t have to revolve around c!wilbur (and c!Tommy).

all this being said. I don’t dislike Wilbur or his writing, I just don’t think it fits the medium of the smp and can be excluding to other and smaller ccs. TL;DR : Wilbur’s writing is good, but not good for the medium.

[netheritenugget]

The Dream SMP Mind Control Problem: How Mind Control Sucks But Also Doesn’t

I like the theory that the reason Technoblade is violent is because the Egg is the Blood God, and he can always hear it demanding to be fed.  But only to a degree.  I like the idea better that his disdain for organized government, and his desire for freedom, is a completely different character trait unrelated to The Egg.

Because his character's deepest wish has always been absolute freedom from the control of others.  And to blame his violent efforts to achieve it on the Egg’s mind control kinda cheapens that (not to mention it also retcons Chat being the canon reason he’s violent, which was much cooler).  Especially since The Egg has entirely different values than Technoblade does.  It’s definitely not in favor of individual freedom.  I want to see Technoblade change his ways by his own choices, not get de-Egged and suddenly say "The Egg made me do it.  Heated gamer moment ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ " It would be much more compelling to watch him vanquish his inner demons of his own will.

Likewise, having a character, through his own agency, reduce a nation to a smouldering crater in the ground in revenge for an attempted execution, is far more interesting and compelling to me than just having his excuse be "Egg bloodlust" and then have everyone forgive him.  It’s a cheap way to make him everyone’s friend again.  I don’t think content creator Technoblade would appreciate this decision being made for him in the narrative.

Which is also basically my opinion on whether or not I like the theory that Dream is still possessed by a Dreamon. It kinda pulls the rug out from under the story, because it's always been about black and gray morality, and people being the cause of conflict, not the supernatural. Adding dreamons to the mix changes the biggest moral from "power corrupts and nations fall, the only universal language that can save us all is love" to "we just needed to yeet the Dreamon out of the Big Bad and we achieved world peace.  Poggers."

Let's talk about the narrative can of worms that is dreamon possession, while we're at it, because I have similar opinions to the Technoblade Egg Theory: mind control as an excuse is cheap, if used to solve problems.

Perhaps the writers found a way to write this anyway that made sense. Perhaps Dream really is possessed, and Good Dream is still in there.  Perhaps every single evil action he's done since the Dreamon Hunters episodes Fundy and Tubbo made was because of the dreamon.  Perhaps Dream didn't want to break Wilbur, gaslight Tommy, manipulate Tubbo, threaten to kill Tubbo, and do...  Whatever the heck he's doing to Ranboo's poor brain at the moment.

What then?

If it's done right and Dream gets a sufficiently difficult redemption arc, (🤢 Ew, Dream redemption arc...) it's still kinda...  Awkward to expect other people to forgive him immediately.  How is everyone going to feel about the trauma he caused while possessed?  Even if he’s a genuinely nice person, that won’t bring L’Manberg back, and he shares a face with the dreamon that did that to them.  Being nice won’t fix what he did to Sapnap and George, Tommy and Ranboo, and poor Wilbur Soot.  Are we ever going to be 100% sure he was never in control over himself?  Are we, the audience who hated him, supposed to pretend nothing happened and let it go just because Dream is good now?  That sounds suspiciously convenient and unfair, and I think the other characters would think the same thing.  It sounds like it could be an interesting source of drama, having them try to blame exorcised!Dream for the things his dreamon did, much like how people projected their frustration onto Ghostbur in the beginning.  I kinda want to read a fanfic about that.  But I don't want to watch it in canon.

So I'm gonna assume you think I hate mind control.  No.  I do not.  I actually quite like the version of mind control that Badboyhalo has been writing so far, because it's really interesting in how it meshes with the previous storyline.

Badboyhalo is a very different villain than Dream and Technoblade.  Because in some ways, this is an entirely new storyline.  It is allowed to have a completely different antagonist and moral to the story.

Bad as an antagonist and the main script writer, is still managing to carry over some of the same "power corrupts, love is stronger" message while also being brainwashed, because he’s managed to choose both sides of the coin.  Bad himself told Quackity that after he shook the initial brainwashing, he didn’t want to go back to the Egg, he hasn’t wanted to be the Egg’s minion since he figured out he was being manipulated.  But he made a conscious decision to go back to The Egg, in hopes that it can help him save his Skeppy.  Because his love for Skeppy was more important than the SMP, his own humanity, and himself.

Which means his current mind controlled state is not being used as an excuse for getting him back on everyone’s good side, it’s a consequence of his frantic attempts to get Skeppy back to normal again.  He is choosing to hurt people because Skeppy and what The Egg promised him are fundamentally more important to him. And even if he were theoretically no longer brainwashed, he might just go right back to The Egg anyway if he still thought it could get him Skeppy back.  Now that is some tragedy!

Is what I’m saying clear?  That the way The Egg operates with Bad’s core values as a character is more narratively compelling because of how it was set up, instead of being used as an excuse for villain insanity? How Technoblade and Dream's characters are people with their own free will, and it's more interesting that way?

Food for thought I guess.

[ranboo5]

the writer!cc!wilbur defense squad never rests 😔😔😔😔 no wilbur did not manage to actualize other people's (niki and eret's most notably) arcs into the writing of season 1 and that's a shame because they were all really good and I wouldve loved to see more of it but consider, 1) wilbur is One guy and his character is Much more ingrained into the geopolitical climax than he is with the emotional impact on the chacracters around him, 2) they very clearly write their own characters. Wilbur writes Tommy's, Tubbo's maybe, Techno is involved in his own writing even if Wilbur hadn't expected him to do much, Phil had come in with a set goal but ultimately it was improv my dude. The Theseus speech is a whole script Techno had for himself he didn't fight tooth and nail for it, he wrote it himself, that's how roleplay works. 3) his cursed lore? Is very clearly not Forced onto people? We dont view them as gospel if the actual content creator simply said they didnt want to do that and then didnt? If Phil said "i dont want a fucking Samsung fridge in my lore" he just would have said so? The fridge is now in the dump? Fundy fully embraces having a salmon for a mother and has said interpreting his charcter as trans is completely okay ? Techno said he didn't want the sbi family canon and guess what? It's gone! Wilbur is Phil's only child! It's that easy! They don't Have to fight Wilbur because they're friends and Wilbur's not a head writer for a tv show they have to keep checking in with! He's not paying their bills!

Wilbur was the main writer because he was a massive part of the current main conflict and it needed Structure. Once it was done, he handed off the script and vibed! There are so many characters on the smp now and he is friends with the content creators behind them. They are not strangers. He is not a studio network telling them to pull in views by rehashing the entire plot. He Is Not Going To Take Away Your Meow Meow's Character Arc

- vaguepost anon

Wilbur being One Guy is kind of the problem? Like yeah he's One Guy which means he can't write the whole RP and world, and he doesn't, but the framing of him as a Main Writer implies that there is a dichotomy between Real Lore and What Wilbur Didn't Write, which we have seen in action even recently, and that's concerning

Also yeah Techno has talked about how he had to hash the whole thing Out with Wilbur abt having a main role in the finale. Like yeah he wrote that himself but he had to put his foot down abt it. I think yr also underestimating th impact of how Mr Soot wrote SBI into it; it really ended up kneecapping Philza's character introduction and he's redoing it but it's not like. I'll elaborate on thsi in the last para here hang on

I have no doubt Mr Soot wants to help the RP but he is not doing it any favors by assuming that he can write 12 streams of Main Writer Things ahead of time; that perpetuates the concept that there is A Narrative

Like I think there's a gray area between "Mr Soot's engagement w/ the DSMP has 0 problems" and "Mr Soot is a studio network telling them to pull in views by rehashing the entire plot" and I think that's where. He is? Like I don't think he's Trying to be controlling and like he's Good At Improv which is a whole thing that makes it More Confusing when many ppl have expressed esp under him (not only, but esp) that their plotlines have been No'd instead of Yes And-ed

And like okay last para where I talk abt this. Honestly I think it's less an issue of Mr Soot and more of ppl perceiving his word as authority, which they Do. Like if you think people actually stopped holding SBI as canon? If you think Philza's character introduction and the conflict w/ how he wanted to take his character didn't kneecap his perception? As a Philza enjoyer I have some news for you :pensive: Mr Soot isn't like a fucked up evil guy or whatever in or out of character he's just lost in the concept of being able to manage the wider progression of A World (which I think is an issue of finding balance in the leadership role he finds himself in as a more experienced RPer, which is a hard balance to find) and the issue is magnified a thousandfold by the fact that people take his word as authority and it has demonstratably negatively impacted the DSMP's writing and fandom engagement

[undertalethingies]

Slightly More Coherent Concept For My DSMP x Undertale AU

Characters:

Ranboo as Frisk

Wilbur/Ghostbur as Chara

Dream as Flowey

Tubbo AND Eret as Toriel

George as Napstablook

Techno as Sans

Tommy as Papyrus

Jack as Gaster AND Dogamy

Niki as Dogaressa

Puffy as Grillby

Fundy as Monster Kid

Sam as Undyne

Bad as Alphys

Schlatt as Mad Dummy

Quackity as Mettaton

Philza as Asgore

DreamXD as Annoying Dog

Skeppy as amalgamate?

I AM SO TEMPTED TO MAKE JACK ALSO BE BURGERPANTS

Sam AND Tommy as Muffet

//

Relationships:

Eret and Philza were platonic life partners, but Eret left Philza after Wilbur and Dream died

Tubbo, Tommy, Dream, Techno, and Wilbur are brothers adopted by Eret and Philza

Tubbo and Tommy are best friends

Eret is the only parent still in Tubbo’s life

Ranboo and Tubbo become besties after Ranboo falls

Jack is somehow connected to the SBI dynamic

Sam has basically adopted Tommy

Wilbur is Fundy’s dad

Wilbur/Sally is canon

Karlnapity is canon

Skeppy/Bad is a thing somehow

Tommy and Dream are sort of friends? But it’s not healthy and both of them know it

Techno and Tommy live together but it’s super tense

Puffy has also basically adopted Tommy

Philza and Sam are close friends

Sam and Bad are close friends 

Quackity and Tommy are chaos buddies

Oh god I need to cast BP

//

Things I want to preserve from DSMP:

Sleepy bois inc

Ranboo is lowkey adopted by Technoblade

Wilbur is morally grey

Jack and Niki are besties

Tubbo has nukes

Fundy is Wilbur’s kid

Tommy exile???

Quackity and Tommy are friends

George and Dream are friends 

Ranboo fucking loathes Dream

Techno and Tommy’s relationship is hella strained

SBI’s dynamic in general is hella strained

Tommy and Wilbur are brothers

Tubbo and Ranboo are besties

Eret betrayal pog

Jack crawled out of fucking hell and no one cared

Puffy is Eret’s knight 

Puffy and Bad are enemies

Red Skeppy??

Fundy and Ranboo friendship pog

Sam has associations with Dream

Sam Nook

Schlatt/Quackity

Karlnapity is here even though I’ve got no idea what Karl and Sapnap are doing

Karl is still somehow a time traveler (goner kid maybe?)

Ranboo’s memory is unreliable as FUCK

Skeppy/Bad is a thing somehow

Eret was at one point going to adopt Fundy

//

Things I want to preserve from Undertale:

Chara and Frisk narrative parallel pog

Chara is morally grey but NOT evil

Gaster has some nebulous association with the skelebros 

Gaster has association with Alphys

Asgore and Toriel are on BAD terms

Napstablook is related to Mettaton

Papyrus isn’t fucking stupid

Papyrus knows more than he lets on

Sans is the judge

Alphys’ anxiety has anxiety

Sans and Alphys are friends

Asgore and Alphys are friends 

Grillby and Sans are friends 

Every character is morally grey and none of them are completely irredeemable 

Time travel

The six human souls

Frisk and Chara both have the potential to do very good things or very bad things and neither is treated as absolutely right or wrong

Papyrus is kind

Don’t fuck with Sans

Mettaton is smarter than he lets on

Mettaton and Alphys

Gaster followers

Monster Kid

Sans is a mysterious bastard

Alphys and Flowey

Chara and Asriel are siblings

Sans and Toriel are friends

//

Things I want to write out (for various reasons):

All Undertale ships

Schlatt being evil 

Techno saying SBI is non canon 

Egg

L’Manburg

Prison

Discs 

Papyrus wanting to join the royal guard 

//

How to resolve this?:

Long ago, there was a war between (a) and (b)

The (a) won, sealing the (b) underground with a magic spell 

Many years later, a young Wilbur Soot climbed a mountain

He fell into it, and met Dream, Philza, Technoblade, and Eret, who were the royal family at the time

Philza and Eret aren’t romantically involved, they just decided to live together and adopt kids for some reason

Wilbur got along really well with Dream and Technoblade

And later with Tommy and Tubbo too

He met a nice fish and had a kid with her (Fundy)

But…

The prophecy was hanging over his head

It had to be him, right?

He’d come from the surface, after all

He starts planning

Dream is the only one he tells, because Dream is the only other person who he thinks would understand his decision 

Dream is hesitant at first

But he agrees

So Wilbur stages an “accidental” explosion, which kills him

And Dream takes his soul, and they go to the surface

But they can’t do it

Not just Dream or Wilbur

Neither of them is truly prepared to kill in order to free the (b)

So they die

Sapnap is probably involved somehow

And they stagger back to the underground with mortal wounds

And Philza mercy kills them

—

Philza, distraught by the loss of his sons, declares war

Eret and Tubbo leave for the Ruins

Techno leaves a while later, as Philza holds his remaining children tighter 

Tommy is now the only one still living with him

But Tommy’s never been the favorite child and he knows it

He misses Tubbo

So he leaves too

And Philza tells him to never come back

—

[pog-through-the-suffering]

ive . never made an original post on this blog besides being completely head full of thoughts regarding the dream smp these past months so, 🎉here’s to my first og post

The Traitor!!!

(yeah i know it's already been a day and none of this stuff is new hsjfhj just let me be a drama queen that really likes analysing characters)

can i just say before i get into it that i love the descent into pretty much grey morality for most of the "characters" involved in the smp. like. pretty much nobody is morally correct! other than niki nihachu because niki can do no wrong :) also i'll be referring to the characters... of these people? and not who they are

now, i've got a couple people that i think are traitors and i'll explain them a little further down but here's some things i noted when i was watching the vod that might be interesting owo

dream says, quote, "[you] may have traitors in your ranks" which,

could be a double jebait; he knows there's a traitor but he wants to sound like it's up in the air

there really is no traitor and this is just a ruse to get pogtopia to implode on itself

the traitor still hasn't made up their mind on whether or not they will betray pogtopia

and i think the last one is the most interesting, at least from a semi-meta perspective, to have a traitor that's not fully into the role and doesn't decide until last minute. idk, something about the angst really fuels me :)

either way, here's my predictions on who could be the traitor ranked (more or less) most compelling to least compelling, and i'm not accounting for realism because... this is my tumblr post and i get to pick how i order things :) i'm hiding the (long) analysis in read more because... i just realized how much i have to say and i am Not concise.

tl;dr

tubbo, while unrealistic, makes for an interesting twist and, for angst reasons, would also be cool to write about if he betrays pogtopia

similar to tubbo, tommy betraying is unrealistic, but for angst reasons would also be cool

technoblade is kind of obvious, but the continuity (if he’s the traitor) would make me pretty happy.

wilbur soot would be a little null, since he’s already planning on blowing everything to smithereens either way, but would be another step in his spiral downwards (jeez how far can this guy go) so i’m not mad.

georgenotfound would not be super surprising per say but would continue with his general characterization as an arbiter of chaos (i’ll maybe elaborate in a different post) it would be :)

badlands folks would... not be surprising. they never formally aligned with pogtopia, and aside from sam never really... offered their help? concretely, at least.

fundy already used up his secret traitor card.

same with eret, i love her, but his betrayal wouldn’t be super impactful. plus, they’re more aligned with badlands?

niki nihachu... i said i won’t care about realism but i sincerely cannot in canon imagine this. but if she did... oh the angst would be *chef’s kiss*

hbomb, ponk, purpled, itsalyssa, punz, other people? they never really were involved with this season aside from like,,, maybe helping schlatt hunt down tommy and wilbur right at the beginning. so the betrayal wouldn’t. matter.

tubbo - look, ik i said i don't care about realism, but the chances of this actually happening are... pretty slim. i love tubbo. i support tubbo. but they... like, the confused "no?" when he first came on VC with tommy makes me think it probably won't be him, unless they're really that good at acting. which, i mean, i guess would make for a fantastic surprise. but there's something deeply compelling about this kid, who largely has been relegated to third in command/less important than his friend, and who has been treated like a work horse a lot of the time (being asked to farm netherite for this upcoming war, being forced to decorate what ended up being his fucking funeral, otherwise grinding for shit in the earliest war only for it to get ruined by dteam), fucking snapping. plus, it's not like tubbo hasn't demonstrated his penchance towards chaos. also, i think there's something to be said about the lingering effects of manipulative authority/paternal figures and how that would manifest in tubbo, but that's a post for another day.

tommy - okay, yeah, maybe i just like kids my age popping the fuck off because of terrible parental figures, but shhhhhh. for real though, i think it would be really interesting for the person who up to this point has largely been the moral compass or otherwise the hero of the smp. for him to turn out to have always been as bad as the "villains" he's fighting... i dunno. also, something about him betraying because he's so fucking done with the people who are supposed to protect and lead him? mghhghh. but i like this probably mostly for the pop off factor LOL

technoblade - i mean... this one's a little obvious innit? i'm not mad at this, for sure, because techno's always made it clear he is ultimately here for chaos and anarchy. plus, i'll be able to stew in the dynamics of dream and techno fucking the server up LOL. all that aside, if techno turns out to be the villain i will be happy about the (now) fired chekhov's gun. like, i appreciate the continuity between "schlatt suggests techno is a pogtopia spy when he joins" to "techno admits he's just an anarchist" to techno's accidental or forced, depending on how you read it, betrayal of pogtopia by killing tubbo, and it all culminating in techno's final betrayal. while not the most surprising, it would be narratively fitting. and that's always nice isn't it? when things end with a nice bow on top-

speaking of nice bows on top, wilbur soot! i mean,,, as the man has said himself, there's really nothing more he can do to betray (if not pogtopia) tommy's values. the bitch wants to blow up manberg! and that's super fucking sexy. i love his corruption arc, it's *chef's kiss.* so... is he gonna be the traitor? probably not. but something about being driven to the very brink, that you've got nothing else even after you want to destroy it all that you seek out your former mortal enemy to cause even more pain and destruction... very compelling, very nice.

speaking of brunet british twinks,,, georgenotfound. even if george wasn't really on the smp or never formally betrayed manberg, i think they kind of accepted that he's on their side. and while this wouldn't necessarily a surprising twist, this would continue with dteam's (accidental?) characterization of themselves as arbiters of chaos. maybe i'll write a whole nother post about that, stay tuned :)

any of the badlands people - i mean... i love them. i love what they stand for. but they never really aligned with pogtopia, did they? so one of them, any of them, except maybe sam, would make for a pretty weak sauce twist. like, perhaps with skeppy? and it continuing the trend of enemy between tommy and skeppy? but really the most compelling is sam in that he agreed to help tommy but as a final reveal he doesn't join tommy's side when tommy does whatever with the creeper head.

as for weak sauce twists, fundy being the traitor would be pretty fuckin' weak. i'm sorry! he already used his secret traitor card, and everyone knows, once you've used it once you can never (until the next season) use it again.

other characters on the smp... yeah, i love eret! i love her! he's fucking fantastic! their gay castle? best fucking build! but like i said, already used secret traitor card. plus, she's part of badlands, so i don't think his betrayal would be surprising. and niki nihachu,,, i know i said i wouldn't care about realism, but i honest to god cannot imagine her being the traitor. i guess if she was there'd be some nice angst about her realizing that everything is shit, no matter where you turn, pogtopia's being run by a fanatical JD, manberg's run by a dictatorial senile goat man, badlands isn't even strong enough to have its own territory. so, what can a woman do when she has nothing left to lose? but for real, within canon it just... wouldn't really make sense to me. hbomb hasn't been involved in the plot, punz + ponk + purpled + alyssa + others haven't really been involved in the plot aside from. like chasing down tommy and wilbur that one time.

and... yeah! those are my thoughts :)

[spacedykez]

oh right i was gonna. send an ask in. crap okay- for the writer ask game; 15, 23, 33, 35, 55, 62, and 87 (random)

(writing ask game!)

15. where do you share your writing? sigh. im tired of linking things nixxxx i just made two long posts with tons of links today /lh but that does mean the links are easily available! here’s my ao3 and here’s #paciFics.

23. how do you deal with writers block? badly. ususally by simply Not Writing. very bad practice. lately (as in the last few months) my strategy has been scoll #whump prompts or @/prompts-in-a-barrel to get myself in the mood and then write a shorter thing inspired by that. unfortunately as you can see from my ao3 i have a tendency to lose interest in longfics and once i do i just. never get back to them. sigh. hyperfixations my beloved and beloathed

33. do you start with the characters or the plot when writing? i mean, that depends. sometimes i get fic ideas that are "this character does this" (cough branzypierce) and sometimes i get fic ideas that are just "oh, this would be a cool thing to write (magic by moonlight). branzypierce fics have been All character, but also quite a bit inspired by quotes actually. bleeding out in your arms tonight literally came to my mind when i read this:

35. tell us about a character who’s very different than you who you love a whole lot

oh gosh okay well i mean most of the characters i latch on to are because i see myself in them at least a little. double life pearl, i suppose. i feel the abandoned thing a bit because i do tend to feel very lonely especially since i wouldn't say i have very many friends irl, but really she's not like me at all. then again, i've never been in a death game! but for all i joke about violence i really would never hurt anyone. somebody'd stab me and i'd apologize.

55. do you have any abandoned WIP’s? What made you abandon them? well. a question i accidentally answered! okay so i have several longfics lying abandoned (but trust me they don't leave my mind i feel guilty constantly) including scott's eternal winter, which was e1!scott turns evil and instead of corruption covering the world, it's ice/snow. i have tried to write the next at least five times and i have the outline and chapter titles i just. Can't find the motivation.

alone was pure torture (no, literally. i mean. like. that was the fic) i left it because i never really watched the dsmp enough to have a good characterization of anyone and also it just felt. i don't know. too much. people say a lot of tommy fics are torture/trauma porn or something like that and i just felt like it was too angsty.

the legend of the stag siblings i feel bad about. i just think i rushed the plot and it wasn't as well-written as it could have been and also i just. Lost motivation. if i were to pick it back up again (which i do still love the concept) i would rewrite it quite a bit.

and then on this topic i have two like 3000 word oneshots i never published. one is an owl house fic that i could probably post and just say it's incomplete, it's completely readable, i just had more plot planned and then got sucked into mcyt again. and the other is an old basically ventfic (the closest i've ever written) with o!scott. the problem was that i used it as an outlet for my emotions and that worked too well so i never finished it because by the time i hit like 3k words i wasn't in that headspace anymore and i couldn't bring myself to try to get back into it to finish the story.

oh. long answer whoops. um well they haunt me okay. im terrified magic by moonlight will join them cause so many people like it and i don't want to let them down and- okay. shush paci.

62. what’s the weirdest reason you’ve ever shipped something? because i hate my streamer. one guess as to what this is referring to. yes it's ace race x sally. i am starting to be unironically here for the narrative of the wilbur soot ace race saga god help me.

87. does your writing style change depending on the genre you write?

well, i mean i don't know? i only really write fantasy/fanfiction but i would say probably yes? like i do enjoy experimenting with different styles sometimes. my favorites have been Journal, Yin And Yang, bleeding out, and Flicker just because i tried really out-there and obvious style choices and i do really like them. you haven't read journal, yin/yang, and flicker i'm sure.

but journal was an experiment in writing first-person pov, yin/yang was one of my first times writing this sort of opposites-symbolism thing i really like where it's sort of playing with antonyms (light/dark, order/chaos) and since then i've sort of improved on that to add more metaphor/description to my fics. and i'm still SUCH a sucker for good comparisons like this. bleeding out was fun because i added the parentheses to create this growing sense of dread and tension (i really think it worked). and flicker was all about description which was a fun excercise!

on this sort of topic, my writing style wasn't that different but antlers was SO fun to write and i can't tell you why without spoiling it but i LOVE it so mucchhhhhh