#no one's really a 1 for 1 here so i'm mostly playing with archetypes and characters

[zarvasace]

Pathfinder Chain 2.0

Masterpost

In which the LU boys are interpreted as having lived their lives and adventures in Golarion, as seen in Pathfinder 2e. Post/Mid-Godsrain. Will include art (mostly for character designs) and fic (specifically Febuwhump 2025.)

For some context in case you are unaware: Pathfinder is similar to Dungeons & Dragons, in which characters have numbers and you roll dice. It is generally played with a group of people each with their own character, but here I'm giving them all the numbers and using them as a basis for fic. It is a high-magic setting built on a foundation of Tolkien-inspired fantasy.

First appearance: Jan 8, 2025

Tag: #pathfinder chain (old designs use this tag, as well)

Previous Pathfinder Chain post, with old art.

Main fic series on AO3

Other works

Warriors frolicking art

Sky being adorable art

My previous Pathfinder Chain was made attempting to model the existing characters in the game as closely as possible, so we saw a lot of rangers and fighters and really only the one spellcaster (two, if we're counting Shadow.) These new character sheets have a different philosophy in mind, one that attempts to put the characters in the existing Pathfinder world and mesh their stories and gods with the lore. By that logic, there are more spellcasters, and I'm attempting to indulge the high-magic kitchen-sink god-bothered fantasy feel with these designs and stories. I'm very happy with them so far!! I'm planning to talk about the designs here, mostly, and reveal story details in fics.

In the update from 1.0 to 2.0, some of my decisions about ancestry and class changed, but plenty stayed the same. I've actually created character sheets this time, however, so I'm very excited to talk at length about those. :) For anyone interested in learning more about my choices, asks are open, and so is 2e.aonprd.com, the free, licensed online database of Pathfinder rules. I’m using Free Archetype and they’re all level 5.

Without further ado, may I happily present my second-version Pathfinder Chain, to be updated as I complete details and show you all the art that I'm working on!—

Four - halfling aiuvarin, artisan, thief rogue, ancestors oracle

Hyrule - sprite ganzi, nomad, phoenix bloodline sorceror, living vessel

Legend - elf beastkin, free spirit, thaumaturge (wand/weapon), sleepwalker

Sky - songbird strix, chosen one, exemplar, fighter

Time - human changeling, feybound, warrior muse bard, chronoskimmer

Twilight - awakened wolf, farmhand, untamed order druid, curse maelstrom

Warriors - keen-venom vishkanya, guard, commander, medic

Wild - human duskwalker, amnesiac, dragon instinct barbarian, wandering chef

Wind - azarketi sylph, sailor, rascal swashbuckler, air kineticist

All intro posts complete as of 1/15/25

[coyote-if]

hi there.

i just finished the demo and i really liked it. especially the characters and the world. small funfact: when i first found this IF i assumed, that we play as fully animals, not shapeshifters.

anyways, i have a question:

1.) will MC´s personality at some point get locked in aka choices want change the stats anymore? another IF i played had the personality bars for the first few chapters and at some point locked the personality and turned the bars into description (like "Most of the time MC is reckless.")

disclaimer: following is not meant as critique:

im honest, im conflicted about personality stats. on the one hand they offer more variety, meaning the same choice can have a different response depending if the MC is e.g. reckless VS cautious. on the other hand if you have a character in mind (in my case a logical/sincere/cynic/friendly MC) it can feel railroady to keep up the wanted personality. e.g. at some point we can tease K about how easy it must have been to caryy us to safety. here i had 55% sincerety; i chose the tease option since i assumed it was a flirty option. suddenly the personality changed to sarcastic. in that case it was probably because i didnt chose enough sincere-options, but i always "fear" that at some point i want to take a specific choice, but that one would completely change my MC´s personality.

again, this is not meant as a critique and having personality stats wont be the cause to not playing the game.

potential spelling mistake: shouldnt it be can´t ?

anyways, thank you for your answer.

That was kind of intentional. I didn't want to treat it as a curse or as something apart from the MC if that makes sense. I wanted to treat the characters' shifted forms like an equally important and big part of them.

My plan (and take this with a pinch of salt since I'm not sure how to code it best yet) is that the personality stats will have a number of lock-in points where I will save the stats so that they can evolve over time and that those who see it might remark on a previously hostile MC warming up to them for example. But you are never going to get locked into a certain personality and there will always be room for the MC to change or to act in a way they normally wouldn't if you feel the circumstances call for it.

When it comes to the behavioral archetypes I wouldn't worry about it. I don't plan to have any kind of skill checks with the personality stats where you need to be above or below a certain value for success. They are mostly there for flavor text so if you have stats that tend to be along the middle line you won't be put at a disadvantage.

(And yes, that's wrong. Thanks for pointing it out, I'll change it with the next update 😊)

[morganski-19]

Bobby reuniting with his family - 9-1-1 8x11 Spoilers below

I really liked this storyline for Bobby. I think adding in the dynamics between him and his estranged family was a nice change of pace compared to his other storylines. It also connects the backstory we learned about Bobby from season 7, which was nice to see that get brought up and not just permanently forgotten.

And the dynamics between Bobby, Charlie, and Ann were very interesting to see. I had this thought before the episode about whether or not they were going to do a story inspired by the Prodigal Son, and they did, just not the way I had thought.

I had initially thought it would be interesting to see the two brothers play out the Prodigal son story, as they both had their loyalties to a different parent, and were both the son that stayed and the Prodigal son in a way. However, that's not exactly what happened.

What really happened, at least in my interpretation, was that Charlie was the father, Bobby was the prodigal son, and Ann was more the role of the son that stayed.

I mean this because it's very clear that Bobby is the prodigal son in this instance because he left Ann and Charlie on his own terms and placed that no contact between them.

However, the story differs from the traditional story because Charlie, who would typically represent the son that stayed, was welcoming to Bobby in the same way that the father was in the story, where Ann was resistant to it much like the son that stayed.

Which I think is very interesting considering the last time we saw Charlie and Ann in the flashbacks in season 7.

Because Charlie, now that him and his mom have left his dad, could grow to replace his father's role. Since his mother is so eccentric in her profession and life, he can fulfill that role of stability and wisdom, trying to keep her extreme on level ground. And we kind of see that in this episode, where he's trying to bring Bobby back into their family and forgive the distance between all of them.

Where Ann doesn't want to reach out because she doesn't feel like she should or have to. And is confrontational toward Bobby.

Seeing Charlie be that open, loving, and grounded archetype was an interesting dynamic to see, as it wasn't one that I thought we were going to. However, it was nice to see that him and Bobby still hold so much love for each other, and that Charlie will always be open to welcoming Bobby back into his home.

Now, we get to the parent reconciliation portion of the episode, one that I have an interesting perspective on.

But before I get into all of that, I just want to make it very clear that I do not support 9-1-1's effort to forgive shitty parents. Nor do I think that Ann should have been forgiven by Bobby. I just am sharing a different viewpoint.

I said in my general thoughts post that I think out of all the characters, Bobby forgiving his mom makes the most sense. And after some thought, I found out the reason why.

It's because she's dying.

Now, do I think that just because shitty parents are dying, that means they should be forgiven, no I do not.

I do however know how that knowledge of someone dying can affect a person, and how despite the actions they have committed, you still grieve them.

Which is the perspective I'm sharing here.

When someone, specifically a parent, who has caused you pain dies, it's an interesting experience. It can be a relief, it can cause anger, it can cause grief. It depends on each individual and how they react to those feelings that a death such as this brings.

And with Bobby, when he deals with grief and similar emotions, it always ends up with him trying to find forgiveness, and mostly that forgiveness for himself.

So because Ann is dying, and because Bobby is a character that is constantly surrounded by situations of "what ifs", he would probably have carried some guilt in the event of his mom's death. And would have probably gone through the same motions he does here.

Forgiveness can also be multifaceted. Here, Bobby is getting rid of those "what ifs". He is forgiving himself (even when he doesn't have anything to forgive, but he doesn't always believe that) for never trying to make amends with his mother.

My only problem with this is that Ann herself got to see that forgiveness in life, which I don't think she should have. I think this whole story with Bobby could have been very impactful if it was in the aftermath of Ann's death.

Overall, I liked this story and thought it was a very nice change of pace from Bobby's typical stories.

And Bobby and Athena are finally going to have a house, thank god.

[hiloveitsalright]

I really like the Tokrev characters but I'm mad about the girls. Like. They're all characterized by their relationships to the male characters. Every. Single. Girl.

Rants on the main girls below the cut.

First of all Akane - do I need to explain? Girl died long before the plot, she's only there as tragic backstory to both Inui & Koko. So what is she like? Seemingly sweet... but we see her through flashbacks that are heavily hinted to be Kokonoi pov, so can it really be trusted? What does she even like? What does she do in her free time? Who knows!

Next, Yuzuha - I love her. Really do. She's already more tangible than Akane, but she's also mostly characterized by her brothers... but that can be put aside, since the BD arc is about abusive siblings. I'm not a professional of that topic, but it those sorts of things do seem to make people more agressive to threats / protective of their loved ones. She's backed up in a corner and has to take care of both and that's a great characterization in my book... but also we almost don't hear of her after that arc. Which I feel the right to point since both Hakkai and Taiju stay relevant :/

Senju - she's a bit of a wilcard, and i give you that, she's not completly written as a male character's extension. But she's also the 'girl raised in a boys' family' stereotype, and while she plays a critical role in Haruchiyo's tragic backstory, her own arc could have been more... interesting? Just throwing ideas here, but digging more into her guilt and superhero syndrom could have had a bigger impact... I just think Wakui could have done way better for the potential she had.

Hina - really love her, she's a total sweetheart, but she really is the gf archetype. She mostly exists as motivation for Takemichi (& Naoto) and we don't really see her out of that context - and don't get me started on her plot relevance being due to another guy's interest in her! She's the catalyst for the whole story, and that means she starts as plot convenience. She's not a badly-written character, don't make me say that, but she still feels like some kind of dream gf that's mostly used to show the main character's determination.

(Maybe it's even an intentional choice? If that's the case it's a genius move, and if pusged a bit further I would have gone insane watching Takemichi chases the idea of Hina / the idea of a perfect gf / the symbol of a life he hasn't wasted. Plus that would build some more obvious parallels with Kisaki and it would have been so fun!)

And last but not least -

Emma.

Emma, my beloved. Her whole character is a blank canvas. She likes teddy bears, fashion, the karaoke, and her one (1) friend Hina. She likes her brothers. She likes Draken. She's introduced as Takemichi's 'other girl', and those misunderstandings keep happening the whole show, even after it was cleared up. Her whole personality is based on her crush on Draken and on the fact that she's her brothers' sister. She doesn't exist outside of that.

(You know the "dead wife" trope and all the discourse on sexism and killing off female characters for the sake of male characters' development? Ring a bell?)

I don't recall a single scene where Emma is not defined by the guys around her. Even her death isn't about her, but about hurting her brother through his sister. And then it's about Izana dying joining his siblings, and Draken dying and joining his love.

They really deserved a better treatment.

(once again I'm not saying that tokyo revengers is bad, or baddly written, i'm just saying there are a couple times where you realize that yeah, this has been written by a man.)

[red-man-of-mustache]

Starting Over

Waow, I sure have been absent a lot lately huh? More than usual, but also more fierce in trying to say "I'll be back" or not go on hiatus.

We've had a good run. Mario and I. Literally ten years. On and off yes but still, a full decade of me writing the guy and enjoying every second of it. I still say he's one of the muses that came most naturally to me.

It's been a while since I've had a full day of replying to things, getting asks out or musing ... and truthfully, I'm done. This time, I've come to realize that my muse is so far away that I don't see this being remedied. There will be no more coming back from the brink of hiatus hell, no more popping back in to revive the flame. It's over. My run with Mario is at it's end and it pains me to say that really. At least, portraying him. I'll always be a huge fan of his media.

That's the TLDR. If you'd like the rest of my thoughts they'll be below the cut so as to not clutter the dash. Mostly reminiscing and clarifying why I've come to this decision.

I've made Ganondorf his own blog. He's not going down with the plumber.

Any questions, thoughts, anything really, my discord is available upon request. Just reach out in messages. ^^

One thing about Mario is he's, in my opinion, timeless. Certain aspects of his media are products of their time but still the message, the overall goofiness, and the content within can be enjoyed when or wherever. I remember being a kid and my first foray into his world. It was magical. I fell in love with the simple mechanic of running and jumping to get where you needed mixed in with the other things that came about when the situation called for it. Then I discovered his other escapades into certain genres, chief of all being RPG's. Legend Of The Seven Stars, Paper Mario, and the M&L series. We all know how excellent these titles are for expanding on most corners of this universe with admittedly surface level characters.

But, that's what I think makes this particular franchise beautiful: simple motivations and character archetypes that cascade to make the plots of these games we all love. Mario is a hero. Wherever he can, he will help. The Mushroom Kingdom receives most of his attention naturally but he's not foreign to traveling, getting into a bind and helping people locally. We see parts of him peek out along all his adventures: he's brash, aggressive, passionate, and so many other shades of human.

This inspired me way back when to role-play him. Specifically however I was spurred to come here, tumblr, to be him by my Girlfriend. Usually I'd shrug off specific requests for characters as I have a need for things to flow naturally but I followed her request and never looked back. Ten years later, I'm still typing on this blue wall of a site.

The ups, downs, and all arounds of life have all taken me in various directions but I always would come back ready to be a goof again amongst like-minded people.

Not this time however.

There's just.... something in the air. I don't have the will to force out another reply or even crop another icon. I don't have it in me to muse over the games like I used to. And it's not to say I'm soured to the media. Quite the contrary actually. I bought Brothership day 1 and although I believe there's pacing issues (A la Dream Team) I'm hooked.

I don't feel at home anymore dwelling on this blog.

That's not anyone's fault. And that's okay really. We need to be able to look ourselves in the eye and say when things aren't working out. Being afraid of starting over has held me back in a lot of areas in life, specifically with interpersonal relationships. Not anymore.

I won't be starting again with Mario however. This chapter of my life has come to a close. I hold Mario and by extension my writing as him very close to my heart. Yet, I just don't have it in me anymore.

I'll be honest: I wish to bring joy to people with what I do. It's as much for me as it is you, the person reading this. I can't fake that. I have been for a bit actually. That's not okay.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm using Mario to fill a void in my life.

These kinds of thoughts don't "get to me" per se but why am I asking myself such questions? It all comes full circle to the simple act of logging on and writing for him. I can choose not to be here as I've unfortunately been doing. I can choose to step away and recuperate. What I can't choose however is where my heart lies.

So this is goodbye. Goodbye Mario and all the things I've conjured around him. We had a great run. The spirit of it will live on while I play his games and cheer him on.

This blog and it's predecessor represent an especially tender part of me. Both of them will stay up as a testament to that. I believe I've contacted most of the people I speak with regularly before making this public but if you have any questions OR want further clarification just reach out. I think I've rambled long enough here.

I love you all. Being Mario has been a feeling I'll never be able to replicate or capture ever again and honestly? That's a good thing. These fond memories will live on and I can come back to look at them whenever.

[inventors-fair]

Now It's Your Time: Turn Contest Winners

Hey folks, @abelzumi filling in commentary this week for @spooky-bard this week. Our winners for this week are @hanavesinauttija, @xenobladexfan and @yd12k, so let's take a looksee!

~

@hanavesinauttija — Stolen Moment

Ending the turn is always best written out unless you're that one foil version of Time Stop from...tenth ed? Anyway, seven mana is a good place for it, and the flexibility of this card in being either a "don't do that" spell or an extra turn spell is really clever, and I'm just as impressed as Bard here. This is definitely a mechanically-oriented card for the Taimmy players, because lord knows that nobody else is going to know how to use this card right the first time. If there's little to no constructed application, someone is still going to jam this into a Commander deck, and someone further is going to use this to screw over an opponent in limited. Lord knows I've seen these effects used to someone's advantage... Specifically the turn-ending part, I mean. Extra turns are always good.

But this is just, again, a particularly clever way of blending these concepts together. The moment is indeed stolen, oui? The moment can be yours for the taking, or theirs for the losing, and either way you've got a card that'll exile itself with the means to have one of two powerful effects. I'd love to see this played against someone who's trying to combat-trick their way out of your attack, only to then get slammed down to earth one turn later. I think it would be okay to have it worded "End the turn. Then if you cast..." etc, just to make it clearer, but maybe that's just me.

~

@xenobladexfan — Timely Trickster

Definitely see the whimsy in Bard's selection with this one, and also a propensity for blue in these winners—small sample size, but regardless. My personal qualm says that at the very least the second ability should be worded like Geyser Drake, but yadda yadda, it's the sentiment that counts, and Bard's not as pedantic as me, and for the record I do actually like this card from both perspectives of whimsy and funky mechanics. As a 2/1 flier, you're out of your goddamn mind for one mana, but that's a heck of a downside. Mostly. Unless everything has flash. As a flash player myself...

But no, this card's synergy support is solely for constructed. In limited, there might be a flash archetype, but otherwise it's just hampering your curve in favor of aggression. Flashing things in is awesome, though, and jam-packed instants can really turn the tide of battle! Even more than a 2/1 flier for 1 mana can, I mean. The downside of this card being mitigated by the puzzlement of its upside is really striking to me. A head-scratcher f'sure. I also do genuinely love the annoyance in its whimsy. This creature ain't messing around—you're operating on faerie time now. Speaking of which, happy Pride, everyone!

~

@yd12k — Soul Sale

Flavor text is a 10/10, so let's jot that down. Now I should read this card... You kinda left a power and toughness on this one, bub. Unless that's the price tag. I'm joking, I'm joking, this is actually quite funny. And a good way to show that you're about to go nuts with your combat. For two mana, maybe it's no Not Dead After All, but you've got enough of a cantrip potential to have your attacks be profitable to say the least, no pun intended. I like the swinging notion that this card brings. It could've definitely been a +2 instead of +1, but that's just the power of these kinds of sorceries at common, y'know?

At common! I've been doing a lot of random pauper stuff right now, and man, this being a fantastically thoughtful common combat tricks makes my limited heart soar. It's no P1P1 but it's something that you'd definitely want to pick up on the aggro side of things. And there's the sacrifice strategies on top of that as well. It's a neat little trick, one that I'd say makes it clear that the time of death matters as long as you're the one in control, and this card definitely says that you should be in control, or else you're in grave danger.

~

Runners soon as I'm done writin' em! @abelzumi

[skyefeys]

so fun fact, i'm playing the aa trilogy with a friend right now, and apollo justice with another friend. and second fun fact, i love voice acting. anyway here's a fun little breakdown of ten of my favorite voices to do, in no particular order!

1. cody hackins

i've been told i do a very good young-boy-in-anime voice. it's just very fun! originally he was very back-of-throat and kinda fucked up my voice to do, so i moved it forward more to not kill myself. it sounds virtually the same!

2. dee vasquez

i love the badass, cold woman archetype for voices. i gave dee a lower, vaguely gothic, vaguely transatlantic voice. she's one of those characters who changes tone as she gets mad and lets her demeanor slip, so that was interesting! typically i had her speak slowly and quietly, so when she's worked up, she gets faster and louder, and goes from that low-throat crooning to a more full voice.

3. alita tiala

i made alita vaguely russian, for some reason, but i went with it, because i fucking love accents. this fact will become clearer as this ranking continues. anyway, alita is another character who talks differently as her facade slips. initially, she has a timid, hesitant voice, with a very faint accent. when she gets angry, her voice becomes more stern and confident, and her accent comes out more!

4. lotta hart

accents, man. lotta's especially fun because you can just go fucking crazy with her, there's no restraint on her accent she's so extremely southern. her voice's pitch is pretty regular, so if i were to ever voice nicole, i'd probably give her a slightly higher voice for contrast - and because nicole has a sweeter personality, while lotta is more rough-around-the-edges.

5. olga orly

again: accents!! i literally didn't think i knew how to do a russian accent before her, but then i jumped into it and found out i do, somehow?? anyway, olga's fun because she has two completely different voices. her fake identity is higher pitched and timid, and thickly accented. her regular voice is just a bit higher-toned than my regular speaking voice, and she talks in a much faster and rougher way.

6. truly wright

truly just has a higher, cute voice, and that's fun! hers isn't complicated to do, either; i just pitch up. it's good that she's easy and fun, considering she's around all the time. maya is harder, mostly because she's a delicate balance - i don't want to give her a voice as high as trucy's, but i don't want to give her a voice as low as the one i do for ema. speaking of which...

7. ema skye

i haven't gotten to ema's case in the trilogy yet, but most likely, her voice will be a smidge pitched up from my regular talking voice. as for apollo justice ema, i gave her a lower-toned voice - similar to my own talking voice, maybe a bit lower. this is a nod to not only the fact that she's far more cynical than when she was younger, but also the fact that she can do a CONVINCING impression of kristoph gavin, so her voice must be in the lower range. i think about that a lot. aa4 ema also has a tone to her voice like she's not trying to put up any niceties - she just says what's on her mind. in that sense, she's a bit monotonous - but VERY emotive when she talks about science.

8. miles edgeworth

proZD has a video where he describes the voices he does for every ace attorney character, and he describes edgeworth as "not british, but he wishes he was". this is something i have in mind whenever i voice him. i'm not great with guy voices, since i can't go that low, so i focus on things like intonation and accents. edgeworth doesn't have an accent, per se, but he has one of those vague ways of speaking that i can only really describe as "fancy accent".

9. will powers

i like will's voice because i gave him a pretty unique way of talking as compared to everyone else. i'm self-taught, so i don't really know a lot of vocal terms, so bear with me while i explain this as best i can. will's voice comes from sort of closing my throat, and talking from the bottom half of my mouth. it creates this gentle, shyer, and nasal voice. and speaking of nasal...

10. wendy oldbag

now, i wouldn't say i'm GOOD at oldbag's voice, i could use some practice, but it's fun as fuck to do. it's EXTREMELY nasal, it sits right behind my nose. i find myself scrunching up my face whenever i have to voice her! and as a fun little detail, she's one of those people who pronounces the h first in words like what, why, and of course whippersnapper ;]

bonus: the judge

i don't get to voice the judge a lot, since he's one the three characters my friend has claimed, lol. however, this is my apollo justice friend, so they're not always there for me and my other friend playing the trilogy. my friend does a judge voice that i can only describe as slightly more civilized goofy from nicky mouse. now, i can't recreate perfection, so i went in a completely different direction with my judge's voice. i leaned more towards his anime voice - slightly husky, but not to the extent it is in the anime.

[sangreprince]

Headcanons: Zagreus, The God

Who Zagreus is as a god is a complicated question, but one that boils down into a semi-simple answer: He is the god of blood, sweat, and tears. In other words, determination. This is gonna be broken into a few parts to avoid yapping so people can easily find the lore they're interested in.

1. Overview & Sources

2. Abilities

3. Personality / Alignment

4. Following

1. Overview & Sources Borrowing from his etymology first, I'm sourcing mostly from Dionysos by Karl Kerényi. A lot of what he is as depicted by SSG comes from that and I'm similarly drawing from those sources. There's other conflicting information out there such as some of the materials in the Greek Epic Fragments by Martin L. West, but I personally won't be referencing it since I don't believe much of that was sourced for his character in this specific portrayal. That said though, I do recommend people check it out regardless as there are some things in there that also seem to be the basis for what SSG establish (Such as some lines cited by Timothy Gantz). That said, I also borrow (what I can) from the Sisyphus epic as detailed in the Aeschylus, which you can find online under West as well. Mainly this pertains to not only his nature as the Son of Hades but also his specific function within the Underworld. My portrayal is kind of a mix of those sources, heavily inspired by the tones SSG set in their own interpretation of the mythology.

Because we don't actually know a lot about the historical Zagreus and some of the information is conflicting, especially regarding Orphic tradition and his relationship / identity with Dionysos, most of my portrayal is going to be a mix of filling in the blanks with my own narrative based off of (primarily) the sources given. There's a lot of mixup there regarding Zagreus and Dionysos that I won't really be touching for the purposes of this blog. That said, I strongly believe in being authentic and respecting the source material! If you know of any good sources. That said, if anyone has any ideas or thoughts regarding this please let me know some source materials I can go over!! Mediterranean history and mythology is something I'm going to try and respect and acknowledge, even if some liberties are taken for the sake of distinction. Comments should be open for this so if you've got sources, feel free to paste them below!

I'm using these two sources alongside the story established by SSG to sort of form my own narrative with Zagreus. That said, if anyone wants to read them I'll source them here!

Kerényi, C. (1976). Dionysos : Archetypal image of indestructible life. http://ci.nii.ac.jp/ncid/BA52740670

West, M. L. (1990). Studies in Aeschylus. In De Gruyter eBooks. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110948066

2. Abilities.

Zagreus is Hades's son. He is undying, unable to die except by extremely unconventional means that would sever his link to the cycle of life and death itself. But that isn't to say he can't be killed. He is still partly, even if only by a small margin, mortal. This allows him to be vanquished by any conventional means that would otherwise kill a regular human. Even if he's a god, he bleeds. He can be bested.

'Zagre' has its roots with 'zoë' and 'zoön', the Greek words for 'life' and 'living thing' respectively. I take this to mean he can be killed as any living thing can, a narrative the game-play supports. Taking a 'Yes and' improve approach to that, I also feel like part of what makes him formidable however is his influence over the blood of living things. This can extend to the ability manipulate the blood in an individual's body to a number of effects, such as making wounds that never heal on their own or stop bleeding. This would reflect the casting ability he has, and possibly was even one of the sources of inspiration for SSG in regards to that mechanic. Secondly, taking that prescient I'd like to think he could also control the flow of blood in a living creature to varrying effects. Heightening senses, accelerating heart-rate, even using the blood of living things to heal himself. But nothing on the level of say, water bending. His power is a lot more subtle than that.

Additionally, his name (and even Artemis in game) suggests he's a fantastic hunter. And that, I think, is where much of his actual formidability comes from. An exact translation of his name would be something like, 'catcher of game' and I think that's appropriate. He is a fighter trained by Achillies and a hunter favored by Artemis that cannot die. What makes him frightening as an enemy is the fact that, no matter what you do, he's just going to come back. And every time he does, he gets a little bit better at fighting you. And that should be terrifying, were it not the fact that Zagreus can be reasoned with. It would be a nightmare if you couldn't avoid him simply by laying down your weapon and engaging in a dialog. In as much a way that he is a god and an unstoppable force, he is still his own individual with principles. Among said principles is mercy, understanding, and compassion.

But to those that don't heed that? Zagreus is and should be frightening. Because he is stubborn. In that way he is Hades' son. And he will never stop until one day, eventually, he bests them. It isn't a matter of 'if', but when.

3. Personality / Alignment

As a god, Zagreus is... Fairly outgoing. He doesn't believe himself above anyone else, living or dead. In much the same way his name derives from 'living things', he's very compassionate towards mortals and doesn't place himself on a pedestal regarding them. If anything, he views his power as a god as a responsibility, a trait his Father instilled in him after much effort. In this way, he uses his power and influence as a god in service of the living despite being a chthonic god of the Underworld. But from a distance. He knows that power can corrupt, and his influence carries weight among the mortals that acknowledge him. So he prefers to be more of a distant but dedicated figure, one who only intervenes when inaction would be detrimental to all parties involved. Including his conscious.

For the same reason, he doesn't to reveal his nature as a god too often to those that don't already know. He understands that others might perceive him differently as just another being with their own agenda and morality if they view him through the lens of a god. They might think because he is a god and thinks these things, his opinion should be held with more regard than somebody else's. And Zagreus just doesn't believe in that. And more than that, it often introduces a power dynamic he simply isn't comfortable with in most instances.

4. Worship Zagreus is often misunderstood by mortals. Often, they see that him and Ares are close and, considering his affiliation with blood, make him out to be somewhat more of a sacrificial deity than he is. Mostly they perceive that he's the good of blood without contextualizing that he's more than that in a literal sense. Zagreus's domain more subtle, less 'blood and conflict' as it is 'blood sweat and tears'. He's portrayed as a stubborn, defiant, persistent and I'm inclined to believe he's the of god of effort and 'bleeding for your passions' so to speak.

While this does have relationships with conflict and battle, as you would naturally expect,  it's hardly what he represents on the whole. In regards to most of the people that follow him, he almost has this bitter and hesitant relationship. He doesn't necessarily endorse the collection of people who see him as a sort of god of passionate violence and bloodshed which. Is only a partial truth, and one he isn't fond of.

Ironically, a lot of the times the mortals he actually admires don't' even worship him at all. To an extent, Zagreus actually prefers this.  He doesn't seek worship. So when people actually come around and understand him and pray that fit that niche of being stubborn and passionate people who bleed for their convictions and invoke his name? He's' probably one of the easiest gods to talk to individually, as well as work with on a practical level due to his compassion and natural intuition.

[the-gentleman-pining]

Decided to rewatch OFMD S2 eps 1-3 and actually jot down my thoughts as I go! Oh what fun! Ngl this is mostly for me babes but if you enjoy it that's neat ❤️

Episode 1: Impossible Birds

Stede bearded in his dream could just be playing to swashbuckling archetypes for funsies, but is it some lingering wish that he was more masculine?

Con O'Neil truly graceful about it with the sword huh

"WHERE IS HE. WHERE'S ED?" Stede seeing Izzy as the thing that is keeping Ed from him when he's the one that left lol ok

His idealised version of Ed doesn't hold him accountable either. My mans doesn't want to face what he did at all!!

His first words to Ed in his letter are reassuring him that the crew are safe, as if he doesn't remember that Ed marooned them and left them for dead on purpose??

I know it's meant to be funny but Jackie was a bit of a sex pest toward Swede at first and the power dynamic was a bit 🫤 Glad he was into it in the end!

WHY DOES WEE JOHN SLAM THE HEAD OF THE ONE WHO GOT STABBED INTO THE TABLE INSTEAD OF THE ONE WHO STABBED THEM?? 😂

Stede truly is unphased by people being assholes to him and I just,,, respect it.

Ricky your vibes are strange and unsettling

Who in their right mind would have an ocean wedding in the golden age of piracy?? I know they probs didn't know it was the golden age of piracy while they were in it but STILL

Ed looks so dead behind the eyes 😭 Just going through the motions eh buddy?

Dressed up like the book Blackbeard I see. God he's trying so hard to inhabit this character.

I would die for Archie. Truly the himbo we need in these depressing angst riddled times.

Jim asking someone else how they're bottling things up?? Hello?? Who are you and what have you done with Jim?? Aren't you the bottling up Master? Olu bewitched you too good and now you've unlocked Feelings 😔

"He's actually a good guy" Stede babygirl did we actually forget the marooning???

I have so much I could say about how Izzy and Blackbeard's relationship has deteriorated hhhhh,,,, Izzy is a problem child but I'm so glad the story is crashing towards his character actually growing and changing. In season 1 he at least got the crumbs Ed would throw him like "I need you here", now he's only getting abuse and maybe he's throwing himself at it because he recognises he had a part to play in reaching this point and believes he deserves it.

Fang's delivery on "how you doing Izzy" will keep me warm and fed all winter. Masterclass in approaching someone, truly tender and genuine but not too pressuring. God.

That second "unhand me" hhh the panic of realising you're going to start crying if the situation continues

Con is gonna rip my heart out and eat it this season if I'm not careful

Labour exploitation Jackie what a girlboss x

Why does "you'll be having a lot of breakfastseses together" sound so ominous though 😭 Smeagol Jackie my worstie...

Stede doing Blackbeard Voice is adorable but damn he really doesn't believe that he made Ed's life better. Like how??? Why doesn't Stede equate happiness with better? Ed was explicitly happier around you ya dingus!

Swede deserves his married bliss so much. The crew can be so mean to him!!

"What am I to you" and "I have... love for you" are said so softly I'm gonna be sick,, Izzy you fucked it by wrestling this man into this particular coping mechanism and your tenderness is coming wayyyy too late. Heartbreaking tbh cause the guy didn't know how else to help Ed and now he's realising it could have been different. Sick and twisted little dynamic I'm eating it like good soup.

Definitely supposed to be taken that Izzy didn't realise "talk it through" was a Stedeism as he said it but godddd you idiot dude

Once again god bless you Archie I'd die for you

Fang I want to rescue you hhhhhh my hot topic fashionista must be so dehydrated from all these tears!!!

No way in hell Ed expected anything else out of Izzy's mouth than something about Stede, but god I wish the guy had just payed attention to Frenchie shaking his head. The catharsis of saying the quiet part out loud wasn't worth your leg, man.

"Start by cleaning up that mess"... yeah we def see Ed is killing people himself again but outsourcing the Big Job on Izzy makes sense. He's also exactly the kind of self sabotager atm that would know Frenchie won't do it, and he's looking for reasons to Be Worse.

Indigo heist my beloved. Fuck those hammies up!! I love how loud Black Pete was omg 😂

Oh fuck off Ricky I know you're a S1 Stede mirror but you're doing it detestably

Roach why is your instinct to immediately put the blue dirt on your face darling

Zheng Yi Sao completely unphased by Jackie is giving me so much delight

Sexy Dutchman 😭😂 Jackie never change

I love that Zheng Yi Sao is taking the whole crew on just to have her lil Olu moment, get it girl

TENDER JIM IM SO HAPPY FOR THEM THEY'VE COME SO FAR. I LOVE THEIR BIG SMILE 😭 (also Archie is so wholesome what is she DOING here???)

Ed oh my god you're not alright at ALL

Frenchie's quiet "sounds like a plan" is just so... painful. The acting this season is off the charts.

When Roach asked if they were in soup now I thought he was referring to the ocean as soup I'm an idiot 😭

[cosmicrescendo]

so sanrio has like a couple MG franchises and one of them is like reallllllly long (7 seasons). so I decided to watch the fourth season. let's talk about about Jewelpet Kira Deco (2012).

I did like this show, but.....

I have this word I use whenever I describe a particular metaseries/franchise entry that ticks the required boxes to be considered a proper entry of X......but without new commentary or perspective. It generally comes off as very relaxed because it has Nothing To Prove, No Establishment of Its Own Unique Identity, it's just here to give you More X and then clock out. For shows of that type I end up liking, I describe these shows as "Mellow".

Kira Deco is that mellow entry for Jewelpet. It is Definitely More Jewelpet, and there are arguably a lot of unique things about it (the human kids are 4 boys and 1 girl sentai team which leads to plots that could only happen because of that, there's no romance between the human girl and another character, opts for a cozy village setting than a school, Jewelland as a Expansive Diverse Land or Earth, has the return of Jewelpet antagonists since '09) and I think these aspects set it up to be a exciting entry! But.....the execution......leaves things to be desired.

Let's talk about The Themes first. Jewelpet is about growing and pursuing your dreams, as a General Theme all entries seem to touch upon. Kira Deco has an emphasis on "decora", or essentially accessorizing, and like, it's implied to help bring out people's inner shine but like. They don't really *do* much of anything with that concept in KD at all. Which is a shame, I love how a lot of similar shows use the concept of fashion and acceroziing as a way to navigate self-expression and identity. And also like, Pink's role in the team is to bring out the inner shine of others, so like, LOL? Which brings me to my next point.

I do like the KiraDeco5. but......I feel like the fact that we didn't get many if at all episodes where the episode is focused on the dynamics of two human kids outside of the very obvious Midori and Retsu Is Really Noticable, and Bizzare. I do like KD does bring back partnerships a little by having the kids live with different pets (since theyre so big compared to the pets and Jeweltown archeiture can only handle them being all in one place in very limited spots) and even some episode where its a human + non-partner Jewelpet, but I definitely feel like the bulk of the episodes are mostly Jewelpet-focused with the KD5 as support cast. And unlike Sunshine where the supporting human cast at least have interesting wrinkles in their characters beyond their template archetype .....I feel like the KD5 didn't really get that, unfortunately(theyre just Sentai Red, Fat and Easygoing Yellow, Playboy Blue, Kid who wants to be Seen as Mature Green, and The Girl(tm) Pink) .

I did criticize Tinkle to be too human-oriented that it left the Jewelpet content left to be desired, I suppose Kira Deco actually has the inverse problem, so Jewelpet-oriented it leaves human content to be desired. I do think 09 has a good balance, and Sunshine completely side steps this problem (mostly) by its absurdity yet geniune approach.

The show starts hitting its stride in terms of its own type of humor after a few rocky episodes (you'll notice that the show does pluck a few Sunshine bits/characterizations early on as if to keep the ball rolling), and I do think there are a lot of fun episodes in here. But it definitely is Just More Jewelpet rather than feeling like a fresh spin.

But in terms of things I like I can definitely gush about............I really like our villian team for this show. (Save for Opal, but I really love haughty ojou-sama types) It seems like they finally figured out they dont have to depict Jewelpets as overtly mean or cruel to make them antagonists so they're a lot of fun. Kohaku and Tour as villians was a lot of fun and I'm kind of sad they weren't introduced a little earlier into the show to play around with that concept more.

Look man. I know I said I hated the Waniyama/Waniko bit in Sunshine, but like. I kinda love Coal/Koriumi-sensei. Like Coal is your typical henchmen who's easily humiliated and kinda sulky. But it's Not Lost on me that the time the gang exposes Coal to All That Is Good In The World, it's firstly by giving Coal a more feminine haircut, which Coal seems Really Into. Koriumi-sensei is a disguise that Coal personally chose, we see her going out as Koriumi even when she's not directly trying to spy on the gang, buying and admiring dresses for herself in "her private time", and overall a lot more confident and more in tune with her sexuality (not elaborating) when she is Koriumi. And in the MMO episode, Coal specifically decides to present a ideal self in game as a small, feminine, and frilly girl. (which is a interesting contrast to Koriumi's usual mature sexiness, but I'll mull on that later someday).

Koriumi-sensei is well-liked by her students to the point that they come for her for advice, Io has a longstanding crush on her, when she disappears the whole class searches for her for a long time! (And when she is revealed to be Coal, Io's only qualm is what name he should call her now). Like obviously It's Not Perfect (even if she's liked within canon, the audience is supposed to find some humor in the concept of a overtly Sexy Jewelpet) but like. Is this not what I wanted to see (fashion and "decorating" yourself to explore one's self-expression and becoming a happier person, letting your shine out) more overtly in show's themes? Yes. Coal is the Jewelpet of Endurance and Preservation because you gotta endure your shitty job and preserve through the bad relationship with your father so that you can eventually Transition.

Time for the good and the bad things that I haven't already mentioned yup yup:

Good Things:

No romance between Pink and another member of the KD5

Some of these kids can fight so they use it for really fun sequences other Jewelpet media probably couldnt do

Ruby/Retsu's relationship is stupidly funny

I think the partnerships in this show feel A Lot Different than the typical Jewelpet partnerships

I fucking love Opal in this. I'm very predictable

Very bizzare but fun characterizations for some of the Jewelpets (Nephrite as an assassin is fucking crazy in the best way)

Eh Things:

The "main plot" and the main villian honestly feels like a total Afterthought to get to the shenanigans' in a quite graceless way. I think it could've been easy to have the antagonists just be school-bully level nuisances if you weren't really into it, no?

Really wish "upset that she was continually rejected by boys for being plain and rebounded to decora to pick herself up" wasn't The core character bit/trait for Pink? I see the intent with the character but its really annoying when every 3rd joke w Pink is "no bf lol" especially when KD isn't even interested in romance to justify it

Wish BlueKnight also had a better or at least a Secondary bit to his name......

[seismic-lawns]

Gladiator Big Talk: Foundations, Blue

So on the gladiator discord, (Gladiator is a competitive singleton format using the Timeless card pool on arena and you should check us out, it's great) I do a series of long, hastily written thoughts on every single new-to-arena card and call them Big Talks. Foundations is a very big set, so I've decided to move them over here! Some notes:

This is comprehensively talking about every single new-to-arena card in the main set of Foundations. If I don't bring up a card, it's probably because it's already in the format or in Jumpstart Foundations, which I'll cover later.

I'm sorting this by collector number, which, for this set is somewhat baffling, so Ctrl+F is your friend if you want to find a specific thought.

Each card is also a link to it on scryfall, so you can follow along without having the full set open.

Without further ado, let's start off with Arcane Epiphany:

Arcane Epiphany: I think we have much better options, and I'd be surpised if you would be going for this option specifically, but I'd be glad to be proven wrong 

Archmage of Runes: 5 mana is just a metric ton for a guy that's not idiotic, protected, or having an immediate impact on the game 

Bigfin Bouncer: Vibes Report: D-, come see me after class, these vibes are rancid, dude looks like he would shove me into a locker in 6th grade and also jesus that nose(?)

Cephalid Inkmage: This creature is super interesting, but ultimately it does a couple different things that are just done so much better by others that it’s not really worth trying a super inefficient creature for it.

Clinquant Skymage: Today I learned what “Clinquant” means - It does not mean “a flying creature that is playable in gladiator” for what it’s worth, but rather glittering and/or tinseled. Neat!

Curator of Destinies: If I had a nickel for every creature that FoF’d or Steam Augury’d, I’d have a decent number of nickels. If I had a nickel for each one that’s good today, I don’t think I’d have any, including this one unfortunately. 6 mana is just a ton when 1 mana more gets you things like Atraxa, and you already have options like Dream Trawler if you do want to hard cast a 6 drop.

Drake Hatcher: 2 drops with vigilance and prowess are legitimately hard to be so bad they can’t find a home, and this one has a pretty good effect too so I think it’s a shoe in for u based blitz and tempo decks. 3 toughness with prowess is also a very exciting statline, as it means someone will dodge bolt by casting any noncreature spell.

Elementalist Adept: I don’t think this is anything, but flash and prowess really pique my interest and make me want to think about playing blitz and flash decks more. Vibes report: C, dude’s outfit is too monochrome to be fun at parties imo

Erudite Wizard: The problem with the “Draw two” archetype is that the bar for how good your payoffs need to be to be gladiator/constructed playable means they essentially will never go at common or uncommon and be playable in gladiator. If it’s any consolation, this one looks like it’ll be bad in limited as well.

Faebloom Trick: I think this card is surprisingly good especially for being an instant, but I don’t think there’s sincerely a home for this in Gladiator. It’s a very good limited uncommon, but it is still mostly just that.

Grappling Kraken: I really love this effect, but I’m allergic to this effect at 6 mana, so I think I’ll pass. If this effect ever comes around at 4 mana I will be very tempted though.

High Fae Trickster: I am a huge fan of cards like Tidal Barracuda and Yeva, that give you flash on things and still contribute to the board, and this does it the best by a good margin. If you’re not concerned about countermagic but you are concerned about interaction otherwise, this is an absolute slam dunk. That said, the fact that it’s a lot worse into countermagic might make it really only worthwhile in a post-Mana Drain world.

Homunculus Horde: This isn’t even good in Ux Draw-twos, mainly because it just always folds to even the thought of a wrath and doesn’t contribute to the board in a way that actually appeals to winning games. It also often takes a turn to get going at least and that’s a tough sell on a 2/2 with no protection or other text.

Icewind Elemental: Vibes report: C+, this could be much higher but I really wish it had another type to show how goofy it is, like Elk.

Inspiration from Beyond: Any more ways to put Time Warp into my hand is going to catch my eye, and one that can do it twice is extra spicy. The 7 mana flashback is a ton, however, even if it is gravy on an already helpful plate.

Kaito, Cunning Infiltrator: This card's kinda not ok when you're even remotely ahead, and when you're close to parity it does a lot of work. Making 2/1s as a pretty cheap - ability and the fact that a couple fliers getting in refunds that loyalty really boosts my standing on the card. This might make me try doing WU skies again

Kiora, the Rising Tide: The good news is that this is flooting on a 3 cost body, so it can be reanimated quite easily and fills up the graveyard well, and that’s the big appeal I see. That said, it also is there so it can make an 8/8 and it’s quite vulnerable if your goal is to use it for that purpose. All this is to say that you shouldn’t be counting on the 8/8 even if threshold is trivial, but the card can be good without the attack trigger if you’re set up for it.

Lunar Insight: I’m a little cynical of this card, but I think there’s a home for this if you can consistently draw 3+ cards with it. If paradox ever becomes a more played deck, then this will be a choice quantity based draw spell.

Mischievous Mystic: I am very glad for this card to simply be the best version of the “draw two, make a dude” cards, and it plays very well as a piker flier and as a token producer. Emrakul’s Messanger was a little nice, but having the resultant bodies actually be able to kill the opponent puts it a step above, truly.

Refute: Jeez, billy, why'd your mom let you have two futes? This card seems aight, this ain't like saruman's trickery but it is a cancel with significant upside

Rune-Sealed Wall: Double the scryfish, 1.5x the cost! That said, scryfish have never been all that, and it continues here. Vibes report: C+, not doing anything special, but quite cool.

Skyship Buccaneer: Very limited-coded. We have 5/5 fliers for 5 these days, y’know?

Sphinx of Forgotten Lore: Tired: This needs to ambush something to be good, and it’s so hard to do that with 3 toughness. Wired: This evasive 3/3 that snapcasters on attack also gets to come in after my opponent commits to a wrath!

Strix Lookout: Better storm crow is still very bad, so Vibes Report: A, the dude’s got lil goggles! omg look at him all cute n happy :3 :V

Uncharted Voyage: Strictly worse than another unplayable limited common, so welcome back to Vibes Report: B-, it’s very cool to have a removal spell that’s not so negatively poised, and instead is still depicting a progression, just, somewhere new. I think that’s neat.

Aetherize: It’s exciting to see this card land here for the first time, but it’s always a bit awkward to actually use. It is useful as a replacement for settle in non-white control decks to still act as a blowout when you can’t have the more well-known option.

Extravagant Replication: It’s cool to see cards like these make their way onto arena and into standard, but it is very bad and you should not play it.

Fleeting Distraction: Cantrips can only get so bad, and while this one does require a target, it also has the benefit of being active on the board while also being a cantrip. I don’t think this beats out the big 2 of Opt and consider, but it’s still quite good if you’re going deep on the slot.

Time Stop: I haven’t seen much of Discontinuity lately, but Time Stop is an incredibly fun card and everyone should play it at least once in their life. Is it good? Probably not, all things considered, but god is it fun.

Starlight Snare: I’m gonna be real: seeing “When this Aura enters,” as a complete phrase on a Magic card makes my eyes hurt for a second right now, but I’m sure I’ll get used to it. Bad Vibes Report: D for it though.

Arcanis, the Omnipotent: I don’t think we’re gonna see a great resurgence of Paradorks anytime soon, but this is the kind of card that pushes the deck one step further to really shine as a density based combo deck. That said, it hasn’t aged particularly well in the last 2 decades.

Dictate of Kruphix: I really don’t think we need or want to go deep on Howling Mine effects, but this does keep us moving in that direction. I think it’s almost defensible in a flash deck, but until Mana Drain/Dig Through Time are not major players in the meta, more ways to give your opponents cards and by extension flexible options is more bad than usual.

Flashfreeze: There are cards that fall into the camp of “ok if you know exactly what your opponent’s on in the finals of the season,” and then there’s cards like flashfreeze, which are bad even if they’re going into their preferred matchup.

Fog Bank: This falls into a subset of cards that don’t do anything but buy you a bit of time each turn, and while that can add up, you buy the same time better with just a counterspell or removal spell.

Harbinger of the Tides: This card is a classic, and I really love the mechanic of “pay 2 more for flash”. While I don’t think the merfolk typal deck is at its peak, this is a good thing that the mana for casting it represents a lot of things, like a mana drain, aetherize, subtlety, etc.

Mystical Teachings: I like this card’s vibes quite a lot, but it does suffer from costing roughly a million mana in this format. This format is just too fast for this card’s ideal play, where you get a legal target for it, then immediately cast that legal target, but the options of Mana Drain and Tainted Pact cost a ton of mana to get that going for. The card’s still playable, but the game has gotten much faster since it last was in a new constructed format.

Sphinx of the Final Word: I remember when this card was first printed and there was a lot of hope for it, but it just fell flat because it was 7 mana in a format where getting to 7 also meant being able to cast good eldrazi. Here, it’s even worse, where you just have to contend with things like Dream Trawler and give me a reason to play a 7 mana dolt instead of a 6 mana cooler one.

Confiscate: There’s an unfortunate truth that this kind of effect sucks to play below 6 mana without some restriction, but also is just not good enough for a constructed format below 6 mana, and that means cards like Confiscate just ain’t it unless they’re a classic Mind Control, which is to say at 4 mana.

Rite of Replication: I actually like this card a little bit more than I should, but it’s partially because I like cards like Doppelgang so seeing another version of the effect does make me raise an eyebrow for GUx ramp decks.

[lauren-no-why]

💎📌💔 for Lord Huron?

💎 are there any fun facts or trivia that you would like to share?

Ooh ok yes. Fun fact, Peter Mendoza is an absolute treasure and I really am bummed he didn't have more of a role in Vide Noir. He played Alex, Johnnie's brother/World Enders leader, and of course he didn't even have a single speaking line. Which is a DAMN SHAME because he's a fantastic actor! Mostly he does live theater which crushes me as I am not in LA and can't go see it, but he had a lead role in the second season of Perry Mason (HBO) as Mateo Gallardo. He's a big champion of bringing Latino voices and stories to film and TV. He's also a real sweetheart - I think I may be the only person who has done fanart for him ever and he freaked out in the best way when he saw my drawing of Alex and shared it with everyone he knew, haha. Treasure your small time, up and coming actors and let them know how appreciated they are!

📌 how did you find your hyperfixation?

A friend of mine (@leucrotta, you've done this to me and I thank you) and I were doing memes on another social media site that involved linking songs/playlists back and forth for our favorite characters/stories in an RPG we were in. Meet Me In the Woods was the song sent to me and boy did I love that and have to go listen to more.

And as much as I liked Strange Trails a lot and rocked that album for a while, Vide Noir is the one that really got its hooks into me thanks to Ancient Names pt. 1. The implications of some kind of strange, vaguely cosmic horror thing going on made me really want to know what the heck was going on in this song. I'd also seen The World Ender music video by then and had noticed that Hurricane was specifically written as "(Johnnie's Theme)" so I was like ok, clearly there are characters and related stories going on in here, there must be a write up somewhere. Went to reddit as the first line of searching, where the wiki was linked, and I basically just read everything on the wiki until I had absorbed it all over the course of like a week as my nightly reading. So yeah, that's how I became well and truly obsessed, haha.

💔 tell us about one of your LEAST favorite characters and why you dislike them.

Mmm, most of the characters designed to be unlikable I still find super interesting as characters. I mean, I joke about hating fuckboy stalker Buck Vernon who can't let a girl go, but like, I don't actually hate him at all, it's just entertaining to make fun of him.

I think the only real contender here is Andrew Winthrop. Fuck that guy. But he's super fucking dead as is his entire corporation now as far as we know. I absolutely love The World Ender as a story of anticapitalist and anticolonial revenge. That's the kind of fantasy I'm super here for.

Winthrop himself is barely a character though, he's really just an archetype. But I'm ok with that. I will hate him regardless.

[skulltopcomputer]

I Have So Much To Say About Transmasc Jake English

Disclaimer: This is one reading- I definitely don’t think you have to interpret Jake this way, both gender and character-wise. Also, this is just for fun (I swear). Although I am interested in working in the confines of canon for as much as possible, I'm not trying to "prove" Jake is transmasc, I'm sure Hussie wrote him as a cis man. Content warnings under read more.

Content warning for discussions of transphobia and misogyny (if I need to add anything else let me know).

Just for context, I believe Jake realized he was a boy very early in his childhood. Thematically, it would be most appropriate shortly after Grandma English dies, so basically, as long as he's been old enough to understand the concept of "gender", he has known he is a boy. (I have a lot of ways that I think transmasc Jake would interact with the text of Homestuck, but that's all you really need to know for this post).

Also I’m going to talk about “the narrative” a lot here, which I'm mostly using to mean the perceived author of Homestuck, that is, the person who writes the narration, controls who to focus on and how the plot plays out, etc. I say "the narrative" instead of "Hussie" because 1. Hussie is a literal character within the comic and I'm not referring to them there and 2. I don't think they intended everything I'm going to say "the narrative" pushes here, even if their vitriol towards Jake was very much deliberate. It's important to have a term for this as Hussie's background as the specific type of Internet Poster they were greatly impacts how Homestuck is written- in Jake's case, how the reader is made to perceive his character.

OK onto the actual analysis.

(One of) the whole point(s) of Jake is that he conceptualizes himself in certain ways that aren't reflected in the reality of his actions. Specifically, he thinks of himself as some grandiose, charismatic action hero, even though in reality he’s just kind of a nerdy teen who watches movies all day. There are many reasons he views himself that way, but most relevantly to this post he’s raised solely on media to influence his worldview, and therefore both consciously and unconsciously assimilates the roles of movie character archetypes onto how he thinks of real people. This is easily mapped onto Jake’s perception of himself as a “man”, as (most of) the men he knows are the rough-and-tumble, kick ass adventure type. He thinks that since these are traits of men, and since he is a man, he must inherently be that way as well- even though in actuality, he's done very little to show it.

By the narrative’s standards, Jake makes a lot of mistakes as someone who wants to be considered a “man”. He idolizes female heroes alongside male ones (most likely influenced by Grandma English’s being his first model of what a hero should be), even going so far as to dress like them. He’s not ashamed of his attraction to men. In fact, he's open about his attraction to what the narrative considers to be abnormal (I know in the real world, an attraction to "blue women" would be regarded as incredibly tame, but considering what Homestuck considers a furry it's safe to say the standard of deviance is rather low. I think the emphasis on Neytiri is meant to accentuate Jake's affinity towards blue woman as "weird", especially as the narration highlights her nonhuman anatomy and she's repeatedly described as "furry"). The narrative punishes him for these traits, often in ironic ways. He is given a skimpy, uncomfortable, god tier outfit meant to objectify him (reminiscent of how women are objectified in the movies he likes), he messes up his relationship with Dirk so bad he convinces himself he's not attracted to anyone*, and he is embarrassingly awkward with the real-life blue alien girl he meets. Sincerity, especially among male characters, is often unforgivable to Homestuck.

*To clarify, what I think is happening when Jake says he's not "capable" of romantic attraction is that he's trying to convince himself he can't feel attraction, because he doesn't want to have a relationship where he hurts people/other people hurt him that bad ever again. I don't think it's "wrong" to interpret him as aromantic, and I especially don't think aromanticism should be treated as a "punishment". I just don't think of him as such.

Jake’s whole SBURB adventure is the narrative repeatedly, humiliatingly tearing down Jake’s perception of himself by placing him into situations wherein he is shown to fail to uphold it, both internally to the characters and externally to the reader. The “charismatic” part of his persona is all but demolished in his conversations with Aranea, as well as his relationships with the Alpha kids in the void session. In the Game Over timeline while Gamzee is fighting Terezi, all Jake can bring himself to do is politely ask him to stop. His most damning blow comes in his confrontation with Crockertier Jane, as he fails twofold at what a “man” would do in his place- he doesn’t want to fight her, and he doesn’t want to have sex with her. His admission of “not wanting to be a man and not wanting to punch her in the face” at BGD’s pestering is the narrative finally succeeding at pressuring him into admitting he’s too weak for the standards of masculinity imposed on him, or put another way, that he’s not a "man” at all. (Relevantly, BGD functions as both a Dirk [a character praised for his adherence to masculinity] analogue and Jake’s internal monologue, proving Jake is aware and ashamed of himself in the moment and that he thinks his friends would most likely judge him too). Once the narrative has proven Jake has failed at the standards of masculinity, it forces him into what he, and the reader, would understand as positions typically held by female characters in media (objectifying him, assaulting him, etc.).

Jake is often treated as “silly” and “stupid”, both outright and insidiously. He's the kid who grew up on an island, isolated from society, and therefore doesn't understand how the world "really" operates. He also shares Caliborn's unspecified "learning disorder", which in the narrative's terms, is just another reason he's out of touch. The more characters who think of him as stupid or ignorant, the more Jake's autonomy is diminished- how can he claim to know anything about his identity when he so disconnected from reality? Jake's continual crying falls into this too, as large displays of emotions are often conflated with stupidity, or at the very least irrationality.

All of this is so resonant for me as a transmasc person, especially since Homestuck is so influenced by internet culture. I was never a forum goer but I did a lot of digital self harm on Reddit and the sentiment that transmasc people are stupid, fanciful, confused teen girls that only want to be men because they want to imitate characters in media is (was? I try not to go on Reddit anymore) very common in those types of spaces. (This is amplified if you read Jake as autistic [as I do] as the “confused autistic teen girl” is unfortunately a very prevalent transphobic stereotype). Anyone who did not live up to a very specific caliber of toxic masculinity (wearing only masculine clothes, being attracted exclusively to women, repressing grand acts of emotions, etc.) was labeled as faking, and often subject to misogynistic harassment. I hope by now you can see how this connects to Jake.

(One of the reasons) why June's conversation with Jake in Act 6 Act 6 is so important to resolving his character is that June tells Jake that there's more than one way to be a man. June introduces a new type of masculinity to Jake, that of a "side kick", evidently referencing Robin, as he contrasts this archetype with "bat man". She recontextualizes his outfit meant to objectify him as something this character would wear. Robin- and therefore this role of the "side kick"- is still very much a male character who is allowed to be male even though he's goofy instead of a chiseled, emotionally repressed paradigm of masculinity. Jake shows a lot of joy at inhabiting this idea.

In summary, transmasc Jake is an extrapolation of the themes of how the narrative punishes Jake for not meeting the expectations of masculinity put upon him. There are other reasons why I view Jake as transmasc, but this is the most important one to me, as it's the most poignant. There are few stories that portray the experience of growing up on the internet, fewer specifically with a transmasculine lens, and even fewer that discuss the hardships of doing so in both cases. Ironically, the narrative's contempt towards Jake made for a more realistic, and therefore more evocative, experience for me.

Of course, not all transmasc people are going to view it that way, so please don't generalize. I like seeing negative experiences reflected in media, but not all people do.

This isn’t even the tip of the iceberg concerning both transmasc Jake and especially Jake analysis in general so hopefully more posts to come. Also, despite the fact I didn’t go into them much as characters in this post, know I am a staunch Jane and Dirk defender (crockertier Jane is not really representative of Jane and BGD is not really representative of Dirk. I also don't think Jake is perfect or anything). They are also both transmasc but that's a post for a different day.

[bigklingy]

Great breakdown. I've got my own thoughts, but do note that these are simply my opinion. While I do agree the NA translations played up Amy's affection and, perhaps more notably, made Sonic seem far more dismissive of and annoyed by her, I do think some blame lies on the Japanese side for Amy's portrayal in the 2000's, specifically Sonic X. It's sad because Sonic X has a few really sweet Amy moments (Episodes 9 and 52), but on the whole X's Amy was much more of a "bratty tsundere" archetype than she was in the games, and this began to influence her game counterpart between Heroes and 06. (While it's more obvious in Unleashed, Amy is surprisingly good in 06) I need to do a lot more research here, but Sonic X (2003) did come out after the Shukugan no Shana light novel (2002, the anime wasn't until 2005), and Shana influenced a LOT of tsundere love interests in anime of that era (despite the original Shana being a much more nuanced character, apparently). Violent tsunderes seemed pretty big in 2000's Japanese media and they may have changed Amy to fit the trend, especially seeing as Sonic X seems to have been the first time Sonic was truly popular in Japan. (I visited in the late 2000's and you could find Sonic and Sega merch all over Akihabara. When I visited again in 2024, Japan was a baren wasteland for Sonic) On the other media. I personally don't think Sally's popularity had much influence on the games, as they were being made in Japan. I personally think the Sonamy vs Sonally ship war is pointless, because the only universe where they both exist in is Archie, and Amy is... definitely off the table for Sonic there for the reasons Molinaskies said. Though I will say, her uncomfortable backstory was mostly due to the writers being forced to do a Sonic Adventure 1 adaptation in a continuity that wasn't built for it (not only were Sonic and Amy at the wrong ages, which the age up wish was trying to "fix", but they had to fit Station Square into a post-apocalyptic world where humans were mostly extinct) Once Ian Flynn took over Amy started being written with a lot more respect, even pre-reboot, but he had the unenviable position of not being allowed to remove Amy's crush on Sonic (Sega mandated) when Sonic already had a long-established romance with Sally and still keeping Amy likable somehow. He eventually settled on "Sally makes Sonic happy and as long as Sonic's happy, I'm happy". One interesting thing is Europe/UK though, as it feels like the only spinoff continuity of the 90's to include Amy and in some of it she's oddly true to canon. The Fleetway comic was eventually forced to remove a lot of her quirks and downplay her love for Sonic by executive mandate (thinking that'd make her a better "role model for girl readers") so she ended up diverging a lot there, but I wonder why Europe was more keen to include her at all, vs America.

hey, i'm a new sonic fan (really digging your writings btw!!!) would you mind explaining a bit of this tag of yours? i get the feeling youve been in the fandom for a while haha X)

hello, I am SO sorry for the late response. I am terrible with my asks and kind of disappeared for much of the winter. Some might say this particular hedgehog was hibernating! That said, welcome to the fandom!

You are right! I've been here since 2012, but I've done many blasts to the past to learn about the things before my time lol.

This is gonna be an off-the-cuff answer, so bear with me, but this ask was in reference to this post where I mentioned some "questionable Amy Rose characterization." In short, it's only within maybe the last eight or so years that North American Sonic has been in decent sync with Japanese Sonic, as a franchise. While there are still plenty of localization differences between these two realms (from characterization to plot/lore implications), they are largely on the same page, now. This wasn't always the case.

When Sonic first appeared in the 90s, there was essentially a version of him for every "video game region" (North America, Japan, and Europe). Sonic was characterized very differently depending on where he was. Again, super off the cuff, but American Sonic was a super cocky, sassy speed demon who made fun of his enemies and had no fucks to give. Japanese Sonic was still arrogant and sassy, but a lot less flashy about it. European Sonic, I am the least familiar with, but I know him to be somewhere in the middle of NA and JP. NA and EU also have their own cast of characters on top of the official characters we know.

To the core of your question about Amy, Amy chasing Sonic is a trope in JP media between young lovers and was largely meant to be shown as a game between the two. Amy also reads as a lot more "cute and endearing" in Japanese iterations of her in the 2000s.

However, NA Sonic, as a franchise, played up her romantic feelings for Sonic to an absolute extreme for laughs, but it ended up with some really dubious results. Amy's NA characterization makes her out to be more of an active aggressor. Words you might see floating around about this include "stalker," "fangirl," and "obsessed." These things led a lot--like, A LOT a lot--of people to dislike or vehemently hate Amy Rose.

Some iterations of this aren't so bad, but the ones people really point at are Sonic Battle (she mistakenly believes that Sonic intends for a robot named Emerel to be their son), Sonic Heroes (Amy's reason for hunting Sonic down is to "get him to marry her"), and Sonic Adventure 2 (Amy says that she will only free sonic from his prison cell if he agrees to marry her; she is unsuccessful and frees him anyway).

To be clear, I FIRMLY believe that the latter two examples I gave were meant to be understood as jokes and that IS how Sonic takes them. People also point to a moment in Sonic 06 where she says she would choose Sonic over the fate of the world, but I also firmly believe that people misinterpret her meaning (more on that here). However, the fact this is a hill I need to die on shows that it wasn't made clear enough by the American writers. And anyway, this really starts to simmer down around 2008 with Sonic Unleashed.

The general consensus in the fandom, to my knowledge, is that this happened for two reasons. 1) Amy's crush combined with Sonic's (at the time) purposefully ambiguous feelings for her made for the type of gag humour that was big in the 2000s, and 2) Sonic already had a highly popular love interest in Sally Acorn, a NA-exclusive character from the 90s cartoon (Sonic the Hedgehog/SatAM) and the Archie comics that largely acted as a continuation of that cartoon's story.

Sally was so much "in Amy's place," as it were, that the NA instruction Manual for Sonic CD (Amy's introductory game, mind you) deliberately refers to Amy as Sally.

I'm not super well informed about Archie Sonic, but Amy has kind of a bad rep in those comics too. She has a uncomfortable back story (she uses magic, basically, to make herself older so she can join Sally's freedom fighters and be with sonic), is consistency depicted as overbearing and mean, and I've even seen people complain about the way she's drawn (she always has this unbecoming, large mouth that makes her unpleasant to look at).

However, the Archie comics underwent a total reboot in 2013 (the comics ended in 2017), and my understanding is that Amy's characterization is dramatically improved from there on out.

Again, SUPER off the cuff. There were a lot of micro details I skimmed over. I 100% encourage you to go on the deep dive and draw your own conclusions, but I hope this gives some good background to get started!

In summary, NA Amy Rose (and, to a lesser extent, Amy Rose in general during the early 2000s), is kind of rough to watch. SEGA over-corrected a little bit around 2012 by taking her down the hyper-independent route, but settled on something really solid for her in 2017 starting with Sonic Forces and the IDW comics.

[zydrateacademy]

Current Activities in Gaming #226

Alternative title: My Christmas sale haul. I'll start with something that wasn't even on sale but still bought it at the same time as the others; Rogue Trader. Pretty much along the same lines as BG3, I don't expect to ever beat RT. There's also a lot of reports that Act 4 and beyond are a buggy breakable mess, which is similar to how BG3's act 3 becomes a lagfest for me because I'm still in the process of saving up for a new CPU/Motherboard so I can run newer games like Starfield. Quick aside about Starfield: The one saving grace of not being able to play it right away... I hear it's a fairly lackluster game. Perhaps by the time I am able to play it at all, the modding tools might be out and help liven it up. I certainly expect to get a ReShade because it LOOKS like dogshit from most screenshots I've seen. I don't want to play in a brown mess.

Back to RT; Much like BG3 I am finding myself doing some alt hopping to see how other class/archetype combinations behave. I also want one of everything; A heretic, a dogmatic, and the "iconoclast", a word I'm not familiar with but mostly means "helpful and supportive".

I have 20 hours played but have only gotten past Act 1 just last night on my "main" file. My main girl is a crime lord soldier, whose main job is being the team's backline sniper. She's very good at it, and when she CAN hit, she's the most likely to crit into very high damages. But she's the least capable of AoE. Her sniper can sometimes hit an enemy directly behind my target but that's it.

Next on the list is Evil Genius 2. Don't know much about it, screenshots and reviews remind me one of those "Dungeons" games I had where I had a bunch of minions build various functional rooms in order to do dastardly deeds. But if Zero Punctuation is anything to go by it sounds like EG2 spends too much time on the room building part and not enough on the dastardly deeds. Not sure if I'll like it but hey it was on sale.

We got Sipho next, which acts like Stage 1 of Spore but more robust. I played a few rounds of it and I'm still not sure I understand how to really build my own creature. Controlling them seems sluggish too, and I wonder if that will be more smooth as I get more parts.

Next up is Death Must Die, a survivor-like that follows the same Diablo-esque mood of Halls of Torment. If you liked Vampire Survivors I recommend both of these. Death Must Die is fun but it currently has a problem where one build is vastly superior to others, based around the "Mayhem" trait, if you can get it, it adds permanent damage for that run. I once got it up to 416% so I killed the map's boss in about seven seconds. That's gonna be nerfed.

We got Dome Keeper, which acts like that old digging game I can't recall the name of (but it was iconic for its era, I just didn't play it myself). You kinda play a bit of minecraft but your dome gets attacked every couple of minutes so you need to use the resources you get to upgrade it and fight them off. It's cute, finding it a bit difficult though.

Keeping the same theme here, Graveyard Keeper. Same developers as Stardew Valley which I really liked and most reviews state that if I enjoy Stardew than Graveyard follows a lot of the same beats. I just wish I could mod my bearded chud fellow into a girl but that doesn't seem to be available. Didn't play it for very long, I'll get around to it some day.

I -finally- got one of those Vampire Masquerade visual novels, a genre I don't usually care much for because there's not enough "game" in them. Sometimes one will add RPG elements and that catches my interest more. Right now I have "Shadows of New York", which I believe has a gal PC. I think the other ones you switch around like five different characters. I installed it but didn't play it.

I have Vectorio which I can't even get past the tutorial. I should probably refund that one. It's haunted my wishlist for so long but I have no idea what to actually do.

Got Hard West 2. Looks like another XCOM-like, as Rogue Trader is. Not installed yet. Low priority.

Startup Panic, another game dev simulator like. Not installed, low priority.

Crossroads: Anniversary edition has been on my wishlist for fucking ever but it's been locked to mixed reviews because apparently it's buggy to the point of unplayable for some people, and I'm just hoping I get lucky. The christmas sale finally put it on sale to an acceptable price so I nabbed it. Not even fully sure what kind of game it is, just an inn manager sort of thing.

Noun Town Language Learning. Installed but waiting for them to add Norwegian. I could get in there now and start a little bit of Japanese. One of my favorite things about learning other languages is watching movies and occasionally catching to see if the subtitles are accurate or not, which I can typically do with German even though I'm no longer remotely fluent in it (took German classes for a couple years in high school, those days are long behind me).

But I'm on a Norse lore kick lately and I want to be a little "closer" to it by learning Norwegian.

And that's a wrap!

[unfriendlyamazon]

had a rough night so i thought on ygos at whispering rock psychic summer camp

CAMPERS

🧿 yugi - surrounded by the dark aura of an all powerful 5000 year old demon, sits in the sunshine and makes daisy chains for his friends. he kind of replaces lili, in that he goes to this camp every year and finds it pretty boring. his grandpa is the retired head of the psychonauts, so yugi's grown up around all of this stuff and it's lost a lot of the glamor for him.

🧿 joey - last minute addition to camp (aka he snuck in). he's mostly good at pyrokinesis, in that he can set things on fire (less good at putting them out). reads every issue of psychic tales, knows all the lore, very scared of the woods.

🧿 téa - perky go getter determined to be the best psychic she can be. has spent just about every summer here with yugi and gone the opposite direction, dreaming of making it into the psychonauts.

🧿 tristan - psi-blast sharp shooter and local cutie. yes, he's replacing the cowboy kid. his family is really rooting for him to be a psychonaut, especially his dad. tristan is less sure that's what he wants to do, but hey, camp is fun.

🧿 duke - literal clown run away from the circus. they use their telekinesis to do tricky slight of hand. their dad was using their burgeoning psychic power to zazz up the circus. very loud and obnoxious, constantly showing off, very happy to make friends.

🧿 seto - absolutely determined to be the best psychonaut there ever was. a little bit of a baby sasha nein, very interested in the testing and experimentation part. spends a lot of time in the psychoisolation chamber. pretends not to care about camp activities but gets extremely competitive over them.

🧿 ryou - like dogan, ryou wears a tin hat and worries occasionally about accidentally blowing up someone’s head. tends to go off by himself in the woods. animal lover, has been seen talking to the psi-cougars. kind of a weird kid... but he's really sweet.

🧿 serenity - her hydrokinesis powers means she spends most of her time down by lake. highly competitive camp kid. do not play red rover with her, and god help you in a relay race.

🧿 marik - supposedly camp is helping him with his murderous alter ego ("melvin") that's manifested recently. hard to trust anything he says, because he's a liar. both his siblings are at camp this year which is extremely embarrassing.

🧿 rex - obsessed with cryptids and ancient animals. spends his time exploring the caves around the camp and getting chased by psi-bears. actually pretty harmless, except for that time he tried to summon the ghost of a dinosaur.

🧿 weevil - uses his psychic powers to control and talk to bugs. laughs maniacally while creating shapes out of swarms of bees. local bully gets pushed into lake.

🧿 zigfried - because why not! very german, very annoying. talks to animals and gets them to do what he says, which is put on cute outfits and act out his operas. a control freak of a director when skit night comes around.

COUNSELORS

🧿 mai valentine - she shares milla's vibe and i love to see her in 70s clothes, so she has the party room and teaches levitation. she plans most of the camp activities, as she believes in healthy competition. surprisingly level headed, despite outward appearances.

🧿 keith howard - in charge of basic braining, definitely enjoys torturing children. tells crazy messed up stories around the campfire and no one knows if they're true or not. if anything bad happens at camp, it’s really easy to blame him.

🧿 rishid ishtar - takes his job as caretaker very seriously. is maybe the only one who realizes putting a lot of unstable psychic children in the wilderness is asking for trouble. he's focused on teaching precision and control.

🧿 solomon muto - former head of the psychonauts. basically cruller but i'll do away with the fragmented personalities. used to be a big deal, now he's retired and runs the camp store, and pretty much no one recognizes him, which he's happy with. he'd much rather spend all day relaxing and talking to his grandson.

🧿 isis ishtar - inspector from the motherlobe whos heard some concerning things about what's going on at the camp. came to investigate, always pops up exactly where you don't want her, loves to annoy her little brother.

i'd probably excise the main plot of the game and focus on psychic summer camp adventures. there might be something sinister happening around camp, and it's possible a few campers could get brainnapped (and play with a dwindling party). the jumping into people's heads thing is kind of the whole game, so maybe the camp counselors are getting brainwashed and the kids have to jump in to help them regain control. but mostly it's kids running around trying to set each other on fire and taking camp games way too seriously.