#plus family trees and connections to npcs

[livewiregoth]

Tamagotchi Ps plans plus rambling

I've kinda rambled about my plans for the Ps here & there, I felt like explaining better here since I keep bringing it up

As some may have noticed I'm trying to raise every available tamagotchi from the base device(as in no pierce DLC characters) that doesn't need to connect to another device. From checking the wiki page there's 22 characters with only 18 of the characters available for me.

I have a note to help me keep track of who I got already(after mistakenly getting a double first time was due to messing up, second was an accident/forgetting) & if you count the character I'm raising now after marrying off Gen24/Knighttchi then I have 6 characters left.

I'm working on Kuchipatchi, Monakatchi & Mametchi for the boys(currently trying to get Kuchipatchi) while I have Yumeitchi, Himespetchi & Kiraitchi for the girls. I'm not sure when I started this(possibly gen3) but I tried going up the list of characters backwards(tried getting Amiamitchi before Yukinkotchi cause of this) but then some things got mixed up. Eventually I made a list that had them in order of who has more care misses & depending on how things went in order of appearance with the ones I liked more going last cause save the ones you like for last.(I know Monakatchi has care misses & Kuchipatchi doesn't but we're drawing near the end & I like Monakatchi's appearance more)

Once I finish up raising everyone(I'm able to) I'll just mess with Kabodeviltchi/Pumpkin Deviltchi for a while & then raise Sonictchi for a while before deciding on if I want to shut the Ps off or not.

I think the main reason I wanted to raise everyone instead of sticking to ones I liked is cause the device gives you a reason to. Each tama has puzzle pieces that unlock places & you need to raise each tama at least once. Also feels slightly like an achievement like the care badges for the Uni which is probably why I trudged though that despite the Uni making me feel burnt out though I feel fine when it comes to the Ps for some reason.

I'm not sure where I was going cause I forgot while looking stuff up to explain that Tamagotchi take 4-5 days to raise.(going off my pictures saying when my tamagotchi got the 4th puzzle piece that were used for the family tree) Despite this I might take a day more sometimes to marry them off, part of it is cause I want to make posts/technical blog diaries of what they're doing. It sometimes takes a while cause I get held up on doing stuff so it takes a while to make posts before marrying them off cause I want to make a post about them being married off too. I took out the note cause in the end I rambled enough about what I'm doing.

Point is I got a few more weeks left cause of raise the final 6(maybe longer if I take too long to post shit) & then I'm not sure what I'm doing past Pumpkin Deviltchi & Sonictchi.

Aside from caring for Pumpkin Deviltchi & Sonictchi I have no other plans once I raised everyone I'm able to. I might keep playing after I've raised Sonictchi for a while but there's a likelihood I'll just take the batteries out & take a break(well besides raising my Pix until I've had enough) before turning my On back on & try to get all the genes for the MixingMeet's tamadex.(They tried to make marrying off fun by having a little pokedex on the site that keeps track of what genes you got from the available NPCs you can find on the app)

It feels a little weird realizing that everything is coming to an end soon. I mean given the amount of tamagotchi I have left it's not really ending soon but at the same time progress wise I'm nearing the end. It just kinda feels weird realizing despite how much time I have left it's almost over once I finish off these 6 & do whatever I want.

I think it's also cause I don't know what I'm doing after this. A part of me wants a break but another part of me wants to keep going cause the Ps & the On are fun even if I just have them on in the corner part of the time. I guess I'm just going to rest for a while & then think about bringing stuff back if I feel like it.

[mawluzk]

o-otero.... with young rumarin

[thereisabearonmyceiling]

here it is, by popular demand (like 2 people told me to do this, blame them) and because i am a man of my word:

The (in)Complete Terrible Horrible No Good Awful MCYT Cinematic Universe Family Tree

SOME NOTES

- this is done mostly from memory (plus the occasional glance at the dsmp wiki, that shit's complicated) and so i might have missed some things

- i am aware this looks less like a family tree and more like a map of the subway. i did my best, deal with it

- "canon" covers anything that was mentioned/referenced by the creators ever, no matter how ridiculous

- as far as headcanons go, i tried to include the most popular ones/the ones that would make the most sense (like characters who are the same species being related). some are a bit of a stretch and also some of them contradict each other, but i had to make this work somehow cut me some slack. most of these aren't my headcanons, they're just ones i've seen floating around a bunch

- assume a general /rp for the entire thing, especially where romantic relationships are concerned. i don't ship real people and this is supposed to be a lighthearted bit of fun, don't take it too seriously

- there are a grand total of 63 characters on this thing, or 62 if you don't consider the dragon egg to be a character. 46 of them are actual mcyts (48 if you consider drista and mumza to be mcyts). the rest are either mobs/npcs or other characters played by the same people

- i drew this with crap glitter pens because that's what i had on hand. i tried to make it readable (would have digitized it but i don't have my tablet on me and it would be too much effort anyway), but in case i failed there's more detailed notes under the cut (as well as some explanations)

- if you want to make any additions go right ahead, feedback is also welcome but if you find a spelling mistake keep that shit to yourself

ok here's the stupid amount of notes:

(from left to right. sort of)

ethoslab - docm77: doc has said multiple times that etho is his dad. this is a joke but we're taking it as canon here

doc - awesamdude: creeper dudes

sam - foolishgamers - ponk: they have a sort of love triangle going on i think

foolish jr & finley: foolish's totem kids

foolish - captainpuffy - michelle: papa puffy adopted both of them

puffy - nihachu: canonically were dating at some point. no idea if they are still

puffy - dream: popular hc that puffy is dream's mom

dream - drista - dreamxd: dream and drista are siblings and xd is probably related to them somehow, i mean just look at the guy

dream - georgenotfound - dreamxd: idk which one of them george is into, maybe it's both

george - shubble/shrub: shroom people

shubble - katherine elizabeth: (empires) nature wives

dream - ranboo: i haven't seen anyone hc them as family for a bit, but it was a thing at one point and so i'm counting it

ranboo - tubbo - michael : they're married. michael is their adopted son

ranboo - ranbob: ranbob is ranboo's descendant in tales from the smp

tubbo - captainsparkles (is it sparkles or sparklez?): i used to see a lot of posts about captain being tubbo's dad, again idk if it's still a thing

dream - fundy: is their wedding canon to the dream smp? unclear. is it canon to this chart? absolutely

fundy - yogurt: fundy's adopted fox child

fundy - eret: failed (?) adoption attempt. i'm counting it

eret - herobrine: canonically related

herobrine - joehills: is joe related to herobrine? are they the same person? is herobrine hels joe? is it the other way around? i don't know, but something sure is going on here...

eret - karl jacobs - quackity: according to the dream smp wiki, eret used to be engaged to karl and quackity. i did not know this

karl - quackity - sapnap: fiances

sapnap - badboyhalo: bad is sapnap's dad

bad - skeppy: this is the only one with 'other' because i don't know what category to put 'their canon lives are directly connected to each other' in. the wiki said 'life source' but i don't have a colour for that

quackity - purpled: i know these two are bussiness partners at most but! technically and legally speaking, if purpled is a minor then quackity would sort of count as his legal guardian. no i'm not grasping at straws shut up, and also ignore the fact that the dsmp doesn't have the same laws we do

purpled - punz: mercenary bros

purpled - xisumavoid: clearly purpled bedwars and xisumavoid creator of bedwars are related. or at least enough people think so for me to put it on the chart

xisuma - evil x: are they brothers? is one of them a clone of the other? are they both clones? who cares, it's going on the chart

wilbur soot - sally - fundy: fish fucker #1, fish, and fox son

wilbur (technically ghostbur but i couldn't fit him on the chart) - friend: he also fucked a sheep apparently

the entire mess of the sbi family dynamic. is here. includes a fridge

wilbur - grian: button eyed chaos brothers. just look at them side by side and tell me they aren't related

grian - grumbot - mumbo jumbo: grian and mumbo created a robot son for the purpose of winning an election. they then left him in a box in season 7. they aren't good dads but they are dads, and that's all that matters here

grian - pearlescentmoon: something something sun and moon siblings

grian - dragon egg: he yoinked the dragon egg and now he's gotta raise a baby dragon, what more is there to say

geminitay - dragon egg: she also yoinked the dragon egg and wants to raise a baby dragon, but for much nobler purposes (at least i think so. i should really watch that episode)

dragon egg - ender dragon: the actual owner of the dragon egg, could all these people please stop taking it it's very rude

ender dragon - illumina: dragon hybrid illumina is a thing and i totally didn't just really want to have a speedrunner on here, i would never tamper with this very serious scientific document like that

gem - fwhip - mythicalsausage: wither rose alliance are also siblings. empiresblr said so

grian - jimmy solidarity mr gaming: jimmy has a cod head. grian's head is a cod head. i thus conclude they both have cod genes and are therefore related

jimmy - ldshadowlady: royal fish siblings

jimmy - ijevin - slimecicle: it is my personal headcanon that all minecraft slimes originate from one single massive megaslime, and are thus all related. also for the purposes of this bit of the chart, jimmy is now a slime hybrid instead of a fish one

jimmy - scott smajor: in 3rd life? flower husbands. in empires? fishfucker #2. yes jimmy is back to being a fish

lizzie - joel: they are married! also fishfucker #3 (last one, thank god)

joel - scott - wilbur: someone on my last post said to make the fishfuckers relatives. here you go, i hope you're happy

scott - xornoth: kind of brothers in another life maybe? good enough for me

xornoth - joey graceffa: it might be a one sided relationship but it is a relationship and so it goes on the chart

scott - zombiecleo: this one is probably the biggest stretch but it's their hypothetical 'widows alliance' from 3rd life. no it didn't happen, and even if it did i don't think it would belong on a family tree, but it's here anyway

cleo - bdoubleo100: if bdubs dying would make cleo a widow then that means bdubs and cleo were married in 3rd life, and that's just a fact you'll have to deal with now

IN CONCLUSION

i am tired, this took way too long, i don't think it was worth it, please reblog this so at least i don't feel like i completely wasted my time. if any ccs see this i am sorry, especially if i called you a fish fucker. good night

[knightowl725]

pierce: 7, 59, 68 + kidar: 12, 19, 65 + eli: 30, 41, 46

Pierce

7. Which party member do they understand the least?

Out of the current underdark crew, Gwen for sure! Rich lady?? Magic lady?? Why would she marry someone she’s not into?? She’s rich?? Do what you want??

But really he just has been distracted and hasn’t had a chance to talk to her and get to know her.

In the Moth Squad for sure Fyn. Despite having a lot of overlapping experiences in military life and war, they’ve never talked about it. Also dying. I think they are both avoidant in the same ways, focusing on others when possible to divert attention. Plus I think Pierce had a deeper understanding for Fawks and Jolene because they are more upfront and ‘loud’ personalities, so it’s not that he doesn’t get Fyn at all just that they haven’t really gotten into it.

59. What is a quiet passion of theirs?

Tattooing!! He really found his grove and a love of art and the mortal form when he started tattooing. He started it because he was worried about sailors getting infections from the people not being sanitary, so he used some rough artistic skills and his experience as a non-magical healer to get started. Now he really loves it and is lowkey thinking about going back to it.

68. What was the best moment of their life?

RIP Pierce honestly. I think he has a hard time accepting joy, but if you asked him he’d probably say when his owl Ollie flew for the first time. He found her orphaned amidst her dead owl family, starving and sick and took her in just because. When she flew for the first time, he felt so proud of her and so grateful for how strong she became.

Kidar

12. have they ever been in love?

LMAOOOO Nope. Kidar come from an NPC when I was a DM and in that campaign she was lowkey into this very bi, very ostentatious baron who was also highkey into her. But not really LOVE just potential.

But as a PC she has not! She grew up around her half-orc/orc tribe and wasn’t into any of them, lived in a forest with only sentient trees mostly, and has only spent a few years in mixed society. She would be open to love, probably, but she’s just not worried about it. She would be surprised to find someone compatible. 

19. What haunts them? what doesn’t?

Kidar is haunted by the life she lived as a barbarian. She’s not proud of the killing and looting she did back then, even though it brought her no joy like it did her peers. But she’s also a realistic person in her own way, and she can’t change the past. She knows better now, she has a different life, and it’s her responsibility to make right the world she scarred. 

She has some trauma around The Big Fire and nearly being killed by her tribe, but it’s just lingering at this point. She stands by her choice to stand up to her tribe, and she would have gladly died defending that forest. So she’s not really haunted by it, though it pops up in some situations. She is sometimes haunted by why she was allowed to live after the damage she did, but she’s doing her best to be worthy of it.

Otherwise she ain’t bothered by shit!! Kidar is really enjoying her life.

65. What is holding them back?

Not much! I think the only thing holding Kidar back would be her struggle to ‘fit in’ with most folks. She was too wise and practical to get along with her tribe back in the day, but she’s too uneducated and chaotic to get along well in civilized society. She’s at a weird middle ground, and I think she is lonely for it sometimes. She doesn’t really think it’s possible to find people that will ‘get’ her, but she’s also accepted that she can have some buds and teammates and enjoy life regardless. She has complexities to her, but at her core she’s a simple person. She’s got food, a roof, safe company, and a killer axe. Life is good.

Eli

30. What do they seek out from others?

Safety in approval. And that is all I can reveal for now!!

41. What are they attracted to in other people?

Eli is attracted by trust and people she can read, either powerful people she can use or authentic people who won’t use her. In her own way she trusts dishonest, power-hungry people because she knows they want power. Likewise authentic people are honest about what they want without motives, so they too are people she can confidently read. If she cannot read someone, she stays away.

Though often once she believes she’s figured someone out and has them bought into her persona, she loses interest.

46. What do they deprive themself of?

Herself. While she lets it slip more in Waterdeep now that she’s away from her hometown, Eli deprives herself of a genuine connection to herself. She doesn’t believe she is worthy of love or even affection, unless she can provide far more in return. She views everything as a transaction, so she stays as in-tune with everyone around her as possible (again: safety). That comes at a cost in that she rarely considers what she actually likes or dislikes or wants or needs, beyond sometimes silly things like throwing a party or a pastry treat. Even then, those are important parts of her personality as understood by those around her. 

[katatty]

Characters

Part 5 of my Custom Neighbourhood Guide

While working on your neighbourhood you most likely already have an idea of the families and sims that will be living there, and how they relate to each other. Now’s the time to flesh those characters out! This section of the guide will cover creating sims, characterisation, relationships, and the question of whether to include townies and/or NPCs. 

(As always do take everything I say in this guide with a grain of salt – every creator is different and my own preferences & opinions might not be your own. But hopefully there’ll be something useful in here for everyone.)

Making Sims

You can create you sims in either Bodyshop or Create a Sim. There are advantages to both! Many people find Bodyshop easier to use and it has slightly more tools available, plus it will allow you to save copies of your sims easily. CAS sims won’t be able to be saved without first extracting their appearance in SimPE – however it will allow you to do genetic mixing more easily, and with debugging mode on will enable more of the catalog, such as career outfits and alien skins. Whichever one you use is really just down to personal preference.

When creating sims to populate a neighbourhood, it’s generally good to have plenty of genetic diversity. You might choose otherwise, for example if you are closely basing your neighbourhood on a real-world location with a less diverse population, but a good rule of thumb is to try to include at least one sim with each of the available hair colours, eye colours, skin colours, etc.

Different players will have different tastes when it comes to sim faces. I have bad facial recognition and like extreme, cartoony features. Other players might prefer prettier sims! Again, this is something that’s entirely up to you. Almost all players, however, like to see sims with unique and recognisable faces, so try and avoid simply using templates when creating sims. Pick at least one “unusual” feature, perhaps a large nose, beady eyes, a slightly upturned mouth - anything to make them stand out! Another possible idea is to combine existing templates for more interesting results.

It’s also worth looking at the some Custom Sliders! Sims made using these will still work in a cc-free game, and they open up a lot of new options, like asymmetrical features, buck teeth and elfier ears. Honestly, I am not the greatest at face sculpting, so I’ll link to a few resources and tutorials on it by other people:

Sims 2 Sliders - index of all sliders

Pooklet’s Method - a “randomisation” method for making interesting faces

The final detail for you sim will be their hair & outfit! Resist the temptation to pick the cutest items in the catalog – think about the personality, occupation and interests of the sim you are making and try and give them an appearance that suggests that. Desiderata Valley is actually a great example of this being done well – most of the inhabitants dress in a way that reflect their chosen hobbies. Remember that many players LOVE giving everyone makeovers so don’t get too attached to their appearance! This is another reason to place more importance on getting across their characterisation rather than focusing on making everyone look cute.

Characterisation 

To me this is one of the most important aspects of a sim! Aside from their physical appearance, there are so many things that can help flesh out and define a sim:

Bio – This is one of the least subtle as it is literally what you tell the players about your sim, so make it count! I like my bios to be short and snappy, and try to include fun facts, personality traits, or info about the character’s values and motivations.

Memories – I’ll go into more detail about editing memories in the next part, but memories are one of the easiest ways to show a character’s history. Who taught them their toddler skills, if anyone? When did they have their first kiss? Did they ever run away from home? Take a look at the full List of Memories for more ideas!

Storytelling images – Another good way to show a family history!

Aspiration – This is one of the things that most defines a sim. They might be a very typical sim for their aspiration, like the Curious brothers, who are very much classic knowledge sims! Aspiration doesn’t have to define them, however, and there’s no reason they have to follow the classic stereotypes. Maybe they’re a family sim in love with two people, like Widespot’s Mary Hart? Maybe a shy, grouchy romance sim like Nina Caliente? Take a look at Rockethorse’s Alternate Reads of Aspirations and Dinuriel’s Psychology Version of Aspirations for some “outside the box” ideas.

Personality Points – Bear in mind that more extreme personalities will result in more interesting behaviour from a sim! In my view it’s worth giving each sim at least one extreme personality trait (such as being a mega-slob or a outgoing chatterbox) to help define them.

Zodiac – This will effect chemistry, which is the only real gameplay effect, but players into astrology might infer some character traits from this!

Interests – This mainly effects the conversations sims will have, but again will give players ideas about their personality. A refined sim might have a lot of interest in culture. A high interest in crime could point towards a potential criminal career, or maybe in law enforcement. Eco warriors might have a high interest in environment, politics and animals.

Hobby – Similar to interests, this can flesh out what a sim is all about, and in some cases can even give them new traits and abilities. I particularly enjoy giving sims points in the film & lit hobby so that they’ll walk around with a book in their hand.

Skills – It makes sense for a sim to have a few skills, especially if they are an adult or elder! As a general rule I give sims skills corresponding with the point they are at in their career.

Many of these things, like interests, skills and hobbies, will be assigned to a sim when they are created, but these can easily be changed with testing cheats, SimPE, the Simblender, or the Batbox if you have a strong preference for what they’re into! There are other things you could consider too, like turn ons, sexual orientation, vacation memories, skill badges, etc.  

This is my own preference, but when defining a sim’s personality I think it’s importance to give them both some positive and negative traits, and keep the details ambiguous enough that there is plenty of room for player interpretation. Donna Fusilli, for example, can be interpreted as a victim, villain, or something in between. She’s a mob boss’s wife, they have a low relationship and it’s implied she married for money, but she also does love him, and has turned down the opportunity to have an affair according to her memories. She has a good relationship with her kids but is thoroughly detested by her mother-in-law, and the reason for this is up to the imagination of the player.

Then again, perhaps you prefer more clear-cut good guys and bad guys? That can work, too! Bear in mind though, that the player might not agree with the roles you have cast them in. Don Lothario and the Caliente sisters seem to me as though they were intended to be villains by Maxis, but many players like to give them more sympathetic backstories and motivations. Remember that the characters you are creating should be giving the players prompts and ideas rather than dictating any one “correct” interpretation.

Relationships 

Another important part of a sim is the relationships they have with other characters in the neighbourhood! How big is their family? Does it only consist of their household, or do they have other relatives living in the neighbourhood? Do they get on well with their family, and who are they closest to? Who are their closest friends? Are their friends in the same age group, or do they get on better with a different age group? How long have they been friends? Are they married, single, do they have a love interest? Multiple love interests? What about enemies, or rivals? Is there anyone in town that they dislike, or who dislikes them?

One-sided rivalries or crushes can be particularly interesting! When I made Europa, for example, I made all of the elder females dislike Viola Rochetti – implying (along with her biography) that she was the subject of a lot of gossip.

For most neighbourhoods the interwoven network of relationships will comprise a lot of the plot. Pleasantview has its tangled love web, Veronaville has its bitter rivalries, Strangetown has its complex family trees… the only limit is your imagination. When creating a sim I like to work out what their connections are to the rest of the town very early on – there shouldn’t be any sims included with no relevance to the neighbourhood plot and no links to the other residents. (Unless perhaps they’re a hermit or recluse? In which case, carry on.)

You might find it helpful to scrawl out some family trees or relationship maps on paper, especially if the set-up you are envisioning is complicated!

Townies and NPCs

When setting up your neighbourhood you will have taken steps to avoid generating unnecessary townies and NPCs. However, perhaps you want a few townies around so that the dating options in the neighbourhood are more varied? There might be some NPCs you can’t avoid generating, and maybe you want to customise them to fit in better with your neighbourhood?  Perhaps you’d like a few non-playables to play a role in the plot, like Kaylynn Langerak? Most sharable neighbourhoods contain a few townies and NPCs, and even Meetme’s uberhood templates contain a few “plot relevant” townies, like Crystal Vu.

You may even want to include a complete townie and NPC pool. There are pros and cons to doing this; some players prefer fewer character files and like being able to choose whether to add townies themselves, whilst others might appreciate having less work to do, and being able to play a more customised neighbourhood which feels fully populated. Quadington University and Tumbleton are a few examples of this! Creating multiple versions of your neighbourhood with and without townies and NPCs is also an option.

Something I haven’t seen done but am interested in trying myself in a future neighbourhood is townie-owned community lots! According to some testing by @dramallamadingdang, it’s possible to have a townie purchase a community lot and run it as an owned business. This could open up some interesting possibilities, like shops that can sell just about anything, restaurants with more selective menus, staff that you can pick out and customise yourself very easily... could be fun to experiment with!

There are quite a few ways to go about making and customising townies and NPCs, and the method you use will depend on your game configuaration and exactly what you want to do with them. Personally I create townies in CAS and townify them with the Simblender. I let NPCs generate through normal gameplay then change their appearance using SimPE. I’ll link a few tutorials/resources below:

Alternate Sim Surgery Plugin 

How to Use Sim Surgery with SimPE

Modifying a Sim's genes

Extracting & Packaging sims

Clean custom neighbourhoods + townie creation

NPC and Townie Maker

Make your own hobby sims

Make Your Own Default Townies, Downtownies, Dormies, and Adoptable Pets!

[downtroddendeity]

[9:18 PM] [redacted]: pls opine about the various religious stances of the RH characters

[9:18 PM] [redacted]: and/or nations

[9:18 PM] [redacted]: on tumblr, if you please 

Didn’t see this on Discord at first, and then it got long, and then sleep happened, and then it got longer. Oops.

Anyway.

The game is surprisingly lean on information about religion for a story heavily featuring a theocracy, but what we know from canon, pretty much in its entirety, is:

Alistel is super-big on ~the Prophet Noah~, they believe he’ll provide them with mystical protection, and an NPC calls him “the only saintly being in this world”

Noah’s teachings have never actually been written down, but he led a rebellion at a young age and started a magitech theocracy in the mountains

Hugo talks about “the mountains where the high gods dwell”

A lot of people from Granorg seem anywhere from confused to dismissive about Alistel’s religiousness and don’t really know who Noah is

Shamans have the power to communicate with and guide dead souls to “the heavens” and Aht tells Stocke “only you can meet God, anyway”

The royal family are descended from the Imperial high priests

The Boundary Tree in Celestia is considered sacred and some Satyros NPCs complain about the fact that Rosch has parked there

A Beast Mark (whatever the hell it is) is a “ritual tool,” the Gutrals have a religious ritual of stringing beast claws onto a necklace, Holff Ruins are considered a holy place, and fetching a Beast Mark out of the ruins is a ritual to prove the tribe can trust you

Past this is where I get into headcanon:

Granorg doesn’t have an official state religion, but bits of the religion of Empire have stuck around in a few institutions, and the royal family has a handful of religious duties of a “go out to this place and do this thing once a year and everyone parties” nature. Some monarchs have taken things like “make an offering of wine and flowers at the family catacombs at midwinter” seriously spiritually, others have just kind of done it because people would get mad if they didn’t. There was a lot of debate when Protea took the throne about whether she was required/allowed to do various rituals because she wasn’t royal blood; she threw a tantrum when she found out and insisted on doing all of them for a while, then settled into a routine of doing only the ones that seem like fun and ignoring anything that sounded boring. When Eruca offered to take over those, Protea threw another tantrum and forbade her from doing it, because she decided it was an attempt to undermine her. (Eruca’s been doing as many as possible on the down-low anyway. The palace staff pretty much all know and collectively look the other way.)

Noah’s sect grew out of what was essentially an Empire cult. It held that the Empire was brought to power by the favor of the gods, and its fall was a punishment for losing respect for them. The usual formulation was that the royal family’s line was spared due to their devotion, and therefore they, and through them the nobility in general, have been blessed to carry on the Empire’s legacy. Some monarchs have encouraged this belief because it served their ego or because it was a useful political tool. Noah, however, said that he’d been contacted by the gods, and they told him that the nobility had failed and grown decadent, oppressive, and complacent, and it was his duty to restore humanity’s divine legacy to the people. His movement attracted a mix of the most disaffected, plus a bunch of scholars and researchers who were angry at the monarchs’ broad research bans on thaumatech and anything that looked like a related scientific or magical field.

Noah’s highest tenant was “all people are equal, unless appointed by the gods,” so Alistel was established with no noble orders and a ban on slavery. Noah himself was the only person universally agreed to fall into category 2, though Viola and Hugo were also often included. (Hugo considered having “Noah” announce Hugo as his divinely-appointed successor, but felt that would be too likely to draw suspicion and make people demand to hear Noah say it himself.) They also consider the pursuit of knowledge, especially the pursuit of lost knowledge from the past, to be a holy duty, which has caused their tech level to skyrocket (even if Fennel’s mad because he’d rather branch out into more interesting thaumachine designs than “humanoid” but nobody wants to let him because the Empire used humanoid ones). Hugo’s rhetoric started from places Noah’s might have, and then bent it in directions Noah never intended it to go, sometimes to the point of outright reversing it. (Hugo’s various “I am a god” rants were basically the ultimate blasphemy in Noah’s worldview.)

Cygnus is a hodge-podge of basically every religion on the continent, since it has such a high refugee population. A lot of people who live in Cygnus for long enough end up with a grab-bag of superstitions, rituals, and beliefs from a dozen different cultures.

The Satyros are the culture with the most widespread knowledge of the actual mechanics of mana and souls, since Granorg’s rulers kept a lot of information about that difficult to access as part of the thaumatech ban. Their religion is somewhat pantheistic; all living things have souls, all souls are a part of God descending to the earth, experiencing a lifetime, and then returning to the heavens, and dead souls trapped on the earth suffer until they’re led back home. As mana is the stuff of life, it and the parts of nature that produce it are sacred.

Gutral religion is very focused on grand gesture rituals where you have to do a difficult task to prove something; lots of tests and ordeals and coming-of-age ceremonies and “make this thing to mark your change from one state to another” and different rules for what you’re allowed to do before and after.

As for some of the characters:

A whole lot of Stocke’s experience of religion in Alistel has consisted of him trying as hard as possible to not look like he's really uncomfortable and doesn’t want to be here. On a completely non-spiritual level, he respects Noah’s leadership ability and many of his principles, but he’s just not a religious person. As this is not a good way to make friends in the Alistel armed forces, especially when you have an accent, he mostly tries to be as quiet about this as possible and pretend he knows the prayers and songs everyone else grew up with. Rosch has a pretty good idea, but was surprised to discover while maudlin-philosophical-crisis-of-faith drunk that Stocke is absolutely sure of the existence of souls that persist after death, is kind of confused by the idea that anyone could not think that, and does his BSOD blank-out thing when asked why he’s so convinced of this.

Rosch grew up in Alistel, but he was never Kiel-level devout, and his interactions with the reality of military life and Alistel’s internal politics have also taken the edge off a lot of the “WE ARE THE BEST AT EVERYTHING” that a lot of Alistellians end up with, as well as dampening enthusiasm for “NOAH WILL PROTECT US.” Not that he disbelieves, but he feels divine protection probably has an easier time if you help it along by not being an idiot, and he’s been through enough to recognize Hugo as a manipulative demagogue and suspect there was probably some spin-doctoring going on. The fact that Hugo had been making it up whole cloth was still a shock, though.

Sonja’s family has been researchers for a couple of generations, and while she can say all the words, she mostly got the “SCIENCE IS AWESOME” side of things from her parents and a lot less of the “oh and also divine mandate, blessings of the gods, holy legacy, I guess.” She and Stocke have exchanged more than one exhausted look behind the backs of people who won’t shut up about “PRAISE NOAH.”

Eruca I mentioned above: she’s latched on a little to her family’s spiritual traditions both as a form of connection to everything about her family that’s she’s lost and as a part and reminder of her duty as a princess.

Aht’s young enough to not entirely understand Satyros theology, but she can parrot the basic tenants if asked. Even though she’s a shaman, she hasn’t been pushed into any sort of major spiritual study, both so she has time to just be a kid and because there isn’t currently another shaman who has time to mentor her.

Raynie's your classic Cygnus kid- she’s got a lot of superstitions that she doesn’t really know the original justification for or meaning behind, but a lot of people around her followed them when she was a kid and they still make her feel better.

Marco is from way out in the countryside, in an area that technically changes hands regularly but has enough fertile farmland that nobody actually wants to march an army through it and ruin the entire reason they’re trying to capture it, so mostly all that changed for them when it changed hands was which direction the merchants they sold food to in the next town over drove their carts. His town had its own set of traditions, but they were heavily agriculture-based and he didn’t particularly like his town, so he doesn’t observe those, and his reaction to most new beliefs so far has been “academic interest.”

[sleepymarmot]

MEA liveblog #7

Spoilers!

Multiplayer

This interface is a mess. I move my mouse onto "exit lobby" and it turns into "kick player". Buttons just jump around and transform all the time.

And the APEX mission shit needs to be fixed. When you select a mission to play, don't direct me to lobbies who play the same enemy/map/difficulty but not as the mission! Join lobby, see "custom", exit lobby, select "custom game", re-select mission, join, end up in the same lobby, rinse, repeat...

At least I can end up second when I join on wave 5 as a human vanguard lol

F Human Vanguard card!

Tempest

Non-custom weapons of different rank shouldn't exist as separate items in the inventory! Unlocking a higher rank should upgrade the old item like in ME3! This stupid inventory system exists solely because of crafting! If you need inventory limits so much, let them apply only to the crafted items! I've already complained about rewards being lost with no warning if the inventory is full and it's still bullshit! 

I crafted the N7 chestpiece! 25% shield on kill (of course), 5% damage resistance, 2% shield restoration, 2% health&shield regen speed, 2% max shield. I called it "N7 Slayer X". And turns out, it was dad's armor...

Oh right, it needs a new color scheme!

Havarl

I like this ex-STG, he's talking properly.

I don't like the sound effect from Annihilation -- it's like water in my ears!

Hey Peebs, how do you immediately know where the next piece is as soon as we pick the current one?

Kadara

Here's the bar fight. Animation is not bad but has no energy.

Told the asari dancer that I'm done here and she needs to talk to the dude herself, but the quest still sends me back to him -_-

Tempest

So, Kesh was adopted?

Okay, Kalinda is 100% Marjolaine. Peebee's personal storyline is even more copy-pasted from Leliana than Drack's is copypasted from Wrex.

Aya

So many sidequests again!

The Moshae's words about the definition of victory! That's the smartest thing I've heard in this game in hours.

It's really weird to hear her talk so sweetly to me... When we first met she didn’t seem to like me.

When Vetra said people were staring at her, I couldn't resist suggesting they're just all in love...

I suggested taking people who sold their Aya slots onto the Nexus. That's not even charity -- the same ambassador gave me a task to convince angara to come there anyway! So this would kill two birds with one stone.

For the visitor who wanted contact with his family, I had to reload. The options didn't even seem too different... Got it right for the other two: gave an honest professional answer about health issues, and a confident casual answer about finding work.

Great, now I have to head back into the city to buy stuff... This is literally a fetch quest lol

Eos

Omg, the Architect is in orbit now!

The Roekaar fight in an old settlement was very chaotic and fun with Flamethrower/ED/Lance, though it'd probably be easier to just charge

Tempest

Aaaand Jaal gives me his loyalty mission. It's funny that I'm going to do my own love interest's mission last...

Jaal's LM

I continue to be unimpressed with the Roekaar being pure antagonists. :/

Didn't shoot the guy, told Jaal he was badass.

Why are loyalty missions so short?

BTW Ryder just looks wrong in N7 armor... She's not Shepard, that's not her allegiance or her story.

Tempest

Jaal, just as we're leaving Havarl you decided to invite me for a visit down there?

Turian ark

Avitus has very stylish armor

For fuck's sake, Bioware, why do you hate gay men so much?

I convinced Avitus to take the mantle. It was a very sentimental decision for Ryder -- because her situation is very similar. Her SAM and the connection he had with her father are unique, but she didn't think of that in that moment.

Nexus

"Better to find your wings as you fly" Easy for you to say, Sarissa, your predecessor wasn't a loved one

Tempest

I'd agree with Peebee about relationship and baggage, but of course I felt obligated to take the romantic option

(I don’t think there’s an option to agree with her, though, so it’s only for the best)

Voeld

Liam, Vetra, don't fight!

Whoops, sorry for leaving you to die in the purification field, Vetra

...I liked the old color scheme better. Green light looks more alien, but less pretty.

Nexus

Final memory -- here we go!

My theory was that the Archon was somehow Ellen, but that made so little sense I didn't even write it down :D This is simpler.

BTW there's finally Shepard's gender we had to select in the beginning -- in translated subtitles :D Didn't hear it even once in the audio -- could it be Bioware actually took their foreign audience into consideration? :O

Honestly, it's weird that the Reapers info is so secret... From the OT I got the impression that Shepard was yelling about it to everyone at every opportunity...

Fine, fine, you made me emotional with Liara's message.

Shit, I was expecting this decision...

I feel pretty sad now. That's all?

Peebee's LM

Oh, so that's why she lives in an escape pod :D I thought this was only a characterization thing, not a Chekhov's gun!

I said I wasn't mad, though I was a bit. But I mean Ryder *is* mad but also having the time of her life so...

Shit I just shot Kalinda instinctively lmao

Ok I replayed the entire sequence and Idk. This is really the hardest choice in the game...

I'm tempted to say "Yes, literally" :D

Since it's so hard to reaload, it's fair game to watch videos before deciding for myself. Okay, "Yes, literally" is way too harsh.

Alright, this Ryder is not going to make Peebee sad, but I've already planned a Renegade-ish playthrough with a Ryder who values knowledge over everything, so... :D

(Btw, I love that MEA's brand of a more ruthless protagonist is not "uncontrollable brute" but "intellectual snob". As tedious as this game is, I'm already super eager to play character who has those values & takes urgency of tasks seriously.)

This mission is enjoyable and the choice feels maybe the most meaningful... But it has all the classic Mass Effect problems. Kalinda sends a shitload of people to murder us, we murder them, but when she's helpless and we have a finger on the trigger all of that suddenly doesn't matter. Sidonis all over again. Sure, murdering people begging for help is bad in a lot of ways, but she did just try to kill us, a lot of times... Plus, why the fuck can't Ryder jump over and catch the Remnant thing?! That needed to be a second, Paragon interrupt after the Renegade "shoot her." And Ryder is a goddamn biotic, as is Peebee, as is Kalinda! Peebee, Pull is your first goddamn skill! It'd actually be completely plausible if the artifact had shields and/or armor and therefore immune to Pull or Singularity -- but not giving the characters even an idea to try is just stupid!

Tempest

Inviting Peebee to live with together made me revisit my room and inspired me to make some changes. You know what, I'm going to play music in my quarters and change into the short-sleeved pajamas. It's my own ship, why do I walk around it in street clothes? The jacket is stylish but too much to wear at home. I wish we had a "formal" outift for Nexus/Aya/other hubs in addition to the "casual" clothes we wear on the ship.

Shit I went to read someone's post about Peebee's LM and caught a spoilers about the romance post-LM

Addison is right, getting pregnant in that situation was irresponsible

Ah the continuity in this game. "Found more outposts"? I have every possible outpost and all planets at 100%!

"On hold: Place an outpost" bitch where

Voeld

What, there's still a cold hazard?! What was the point of the vault, then?!

Whoa, so the angara believe exaltation not just kills their people but destroys their immortal souls? Wow! That should have been said by a major character during the main story, not by an easily missed NPC!

Oh great, I died and the game refuses to load the last autosave

Dear game. Why did you create four autosaves for the same second. All glitched. Half hour of gameplay lost... God please let the last manual save work. I was sure I saved in between, but just now my PC decided that we still have daylight savings clock change when we do not, and the timestamps on all recent saves are messed up. This especially sucks because I'm trying to rush Peebee's romance because I don't know when the sex scene comes up but I want to make sure it's not when my mom is home while I play it on her PC lol

Tempest

Fuck, that was cute! And Peebee did tackle Ryder, as promised! :D I wonder what she says through Zap in the platonic version...

Addison please don't say the baby screams "like a banshee". I fucking jumped.

"Before you say anything: no PDAs" :D

Level 50! Time to craft myself a powerful new Dhan. I've been running with rank three all this time...

I love that whenever you ask about Kalinda and then return to the general dialogue tree you say "Let's talk about something else" and Peebee responds "YES. Please."

Voeld

Alright, so: the kett leaders are dissatisfied with the Archon because he hasn't reported to them recently, the communication with the kett homeworld(?) might be disrupted in general and the Scourge might be to blame.

Tempest

Damn, SAM has a pretty insightful speech about death! The only thing that can't be rationalized after experiencing it, which is why it fascinates. I actually haven't heard it explained this way before.

My movie night quest hasn't progressed since I brought Jaal his device...

Eos

Ryder watching and playing football with two giant guns floating near her hips... omg

Elaaden/Kadara

What? I'm completely confused by all these identical salarians.

I don't understand this choice. He promises to give us the intel if we let him go... what proof do we have besides his word? And how would arresting him stop us from getting intel from his computer etc?

Reloaded to see both options, chose to arrest him

Havarl

I'm not hugging Jaal's mother wtf

Ryder has surprisingly good facial animation when Jaal shows his mementos

In theory Ryder should like Jaal for being such a nerd but the only thing he makes me feel is mild irritation. His interest in "taking things apart" is an informed quality just like his supposed emotional openness. It's not reflected in his dialogue or storyline at all.

And now I'm finished with all quests in the ally category. I wanted to finish the game asap, but now that we know the patch is coming on Thursday, I'll wait for it.

Multiplayer

Extracted from Silver for the first time as Human Vanguard (level 8, rank IV)! It was against Remnant, so Observers and Destroyers were the only problem. Nullifiers are ridiculously easy for a melee character -- like Ravagers, but without acid.

Got Krogan Vanguard from a pack. Will I have to tolerate the Rage overlay?

The first game with Kroguard was going well, he's got a stong melee even though he's slow... and then wave 6/upload/Kett killed us all :(

Completely unrelated to anything, but I just realized that if you pick the romantic option in the escape pod with Peebee, they don't actually have sex. Call me stupid because that's what Peebee's initial condition is, but I thought Ryder's response changed her mind! When Ryder said "Let's not rush things" I interpreted and meant it in the emotional sense, as "It'd be dishonest to hide that I have a crush on you, but you don't owe me anything, and if you don't ready for a Serious Relationship and Grand Romance yet that's fine because I'm not either, so let's just hook up and leave reflection for later" -- which I thought was pretty sweet and interesting? Because this whole relationship to me was built on the fascinating contrast between Peebee's emotional reservations and casual/flirty attitude, and conversely, on Ryder very consciously respecting Peebee's emotional space. Maybe I just fundamentally don't understand sex and romance lmao. But if character A propositions character B, character B says they have feelings for character A, and the scene promptly fades to black, I assume they do the do because that's how these things are filmed? Only in comparison with the other option, which is actually pretty explicit, it became obvious to me that's not what the director meant. I'm pretty disappointed because I thought it was a good subversion of Jack's "either sex or romance" thing in ME2. And it messes with my headcanon/characterization... I guess I'll have to retcon it into one of the two options. I'll probably go with casual, not romantic in that case. But I just read that Peebee will tell you she's glad you said no, so... :/

Multiplayer

Failed a Silver APEX mission agains the Remnant as a human vanguard :(

Got an asari sentinel!

The patch is here, but I can't launch the game now :( This needs some work.

Ugh, I stop playing for two days and have no motivation to pick the game up again...

[jumpchain-drop]

Chapter 3.6: 0.28 Years

Year 1, day 105: We’ve spent the last month building a hut out of what we had available. We got the wood from the Wooded Hollow that wasn’t a long walk away. The stairway that connected the doors hadn’t been bulldozed yet, so most of the trouble was maneuvering the planks on the Plateau side of the door. Terra had a little issue with cutting down trees, but we told her those buildings in Treasure Town didn’t come form out of nowhere. Considering all we had were dirt, wood, plants, and rocks, we put together a pretty comfortable place; the worst part was the temperature drop at night. For food, we bought a couple jars from our neighbor, Honey B., who was a very sweet lady. And also very cute. Don’t tell Terra.

When I wasn’t putting a shelter together, I was pondering the mysteries of the universe. Namely, how to better get around places without spending notes. The tunnel leading to the Pine Grove that had the front gate of Witchyworld wasn’t there; it had been made by the HAG-1 going either to or from Cauldron Keep, but that hadn’t happened yet.

(Terra recalled seeing the HAG-1 as a button in the Gear section, but it was naturally one of the most expensive things available and would’ve taken literally every point she had.)

But there had to be ways that NPCs got in and out of places that players didn’t have. Even leaving aside how Mumbo could move between his huts to be wherever Banjo and Kazooie were, even in the not-remotely-connected Banjo-Kazooie worlds, the most standout example would be Witchyworld. Despite the Pine Grove by all measure being cut off from literally everywhere else, as its ways of access were created by the HAG-1, the park closed due to numerous safety violations – which meant it had to be getting customers for those violations to hurt. Plus it had customers even in-game with the Boggy family as little as a minute after the closed park reopened (who then went home to Hailfire Peaks possibly before that world was even opened due to it being two levels after the world with the move you needed to finish their task), and the enemy mobs were employees, minions of the witches that the moles would not allow into the silos.

And then there was the theoretical existence of McJiggy’s fast food, which became less theoretical when Honey B. gave me their phone number for call-in delivery when I asked.

So obviously these people were capable of moving around the island as they liked. But how? I’ve yet to be able to figure it out. Was everyone in this world like that Watson meme from a Sherlock Holmes game where they forgot to give him a walking animation? It vexes me, and I can’t figure out how that doesn’t violate physics even for a cartoon universe.

Also, contrary to my expectations, Terra could not use any of her moves to open Glitter Gulch Mine back up, so my idea for quickly finding Jiggies and Notes went up in smoke.

I suppose I have a house, food, and my family, and that’s what’s important… but I don’t want to be like this, stuck in one place, for ten years. Even aside that’s no way to find Jiggies, that’s no way to live in general.