#stem player

[chiquilines]

My everythings

[moonsglare]

i’m in a mood for takes of varying temperature rn but i will forever believe we were ROBBED of meaningful interaction between raiden ei and the traveler. like who else on this fuckass continent do we know is circumstancially the most similar to traveler if not ei? ei was a twin and she lost her sibling as well. ei was forced to take her own journey of divinity and archonhood alone as well. maybe the reasons for the loss aren’t entirely similar but it remains that ei is the only one to know what it’s like to lose a twin, someone you can’t fathom literally existing without. that you’ve never had to exist without until it was forced onto you. like god i wish traveler and ei just sat down and had a nice long conversation about grief and how to navigate it instead of whatever the hell ei’s first story quest was… maybe ei confessing that being too late to save makoto is her greatest, most painful regret and she encourages traveler to keep searching and don’t lose hope for their reunion with their sibling. ‘succeed where i failed’ or something like that. arghasgag hoyo committed ROBBERY with ei’s character i swear

[the-knight-of-destiny]

On Fantasy High, Redemption, and Agency (General Spoilers for Junior Year, sort of?) Also this post about FHJY is long as fuck, as all of mine are getting. In short it's my understanding of how Brennan Lee Mulligan sets up the teenage villains of Fantasy High.

Fair warning, this is LOOOONG below the cut.

Y'know when I said I wasn't going to talk about Ratgrinder discourse? I lied.

So Brennan as a DM has a very specific narrative language for how a villain is 'redeemable' and it primarily has to do with the level of agency a villain has in their actions. This isn't particularly hard to notice when you look at our very own (and fan favorite) reformed villain squad.

Starting with Ragh, while he was in his right mind for most of his villainy in Freshman Year, he really didn't do too much other than beat people up and be a bully? While he worked with Daybreak on some level, he wasn't anything more than muscle and not very in on most of the plans. There was also some implication of grooming and manipulation from Daybreak to Ragh.

Zayn as an example also helps build this thesis, while he also hasn't done a TON evil he's generally a bit more discerning than Ragh. However he builds the understanding of how Fantasy High looks at it's redeemed teenage villains, when Zayn is found as a ghost he explicitly calls out Daybreak as being the only reason he's still housed, were he not to go along with the Freshman Year scheme he'd have been sent back to his abusive parents, the foster system, or homeless as like, a fifteen year old boy.

But the actual silver bullet to understanding this is Aelwyn, to preface. Aelwyn fucking sucks in freshman year, way worse than Ragh or Zayn. She's also responsible for way worse than any other teenage villain in the series. She's arguably committed worse than Dayne Blayde or Penelope Everpetal, but there's an important component to her redemption in Sophmore Year, something Brennan has her stay conscious despite making death saves to explain.

In tears Aelwyn notes that Kalina was actively threatening to kill her had she not complied with the Kalvaxus plan.

So there's a running theme here, Ragh didn't seem to have much of an idea of what the wider plan even was and was just muscle, Zayn was under significant threat to his personal safety (and unbeknownst to him, also under threat of death, a threat that actually gets carried out), and Aelwyn was literally convinced she'd be murdered for not complying.

This tracks with the teen villains who DON'T get redeemed by the way, Dayne had no qualms about casually murdering his classmates with a great sword, Penelope didn't seem to mind the idea of throwing her best friend Kalvaxus for a power play. They both get killed because they don't seem to really care what happened, were fully complicit, and had no form of remorse at all.

This leaves us with our code to cracking if Brennan sees the Ratgrinders as possibly worthy of redemption (IMO, signs point to yes, but it's complicated.) We know the Ratgrinders are being manipulated heavily by Porter (I have so many more thoughts about Jace's place in this but that's for a whole other post,) however they don't have Ragh's excuse of being mostly in the dark.

Kipperlilly and Oisin for sure know exactly what's going on, and the rest (sans Buddy) probably do too. The actual question is how much does Ankarna rage affect one's reasoning, and the thing that's interesting about how the Ratgrinders have been set up is that question is sincerely ambiguous.

Signs point to the corruption needing some sort of genuine anger or frustration to latch onto, but this is my first hot take here. This isn't really that damning? Pre-Rage Kipperlilly said some concerning things, in private confidential counseling. She (at the time) understood her fixation on Riz was a problem and perhaps not fair. Oisin probably was mildly frustrated or saddened a girl he had a crush on didn't notice him, but to cast Pre-Rage Oisin as a full on Biz Glitterdew incel is, in my opinion, unlikely. Ruben was already seeking attention but wasn't anything worse than a mildly annoying teenage boy, etc.

These aren't exactly 'good' feelings but they are pretty normal for 14-15 year olds. Pre-Rage Ratgrinders really aren't that much worse than Pre-Character Development Bad Kids, let's not forget that they too definitely act out in really mean, unfair ways at around the same time as Pre-Rage Ratgrinders (Fig and Fabian, most notably.)

As for agency though, they clearly have a bit more of it than previous teenage villains, and are a bit more aware of their actions. They're not under direct threat of violence like Aelwyn or Zayn (though the way Porter and Jace act around them may make that threat implicit.) and they don't have Ragh's excuse of being seemingly largely in the dark.

The Ratgrinders I feel are an intentional test for the Bad Kids (and the Intrepid Heroes as players) because they're significantly more antagonistic than previous teenage villains. Heck, even ones that turned out totally evil. Dayne's kinda chill to the Bad Kids initially, Penelope is a bit backhanded but she isn't outright mean. If you count him, even Johnny Spells humors Riz and is relatively lax to him. Ragh's honestly way more harsh for most of the first half of Freshman Year, Zayn's initially more rude and confrontational to them too.

That said they're both being influenced by a much worse adult (Like everyone in the Reformed Villain Squad) and have a rage god clouding their judgement to an unknown degree. If we follow previously established patterns, they're salvageable by the story's own logic.

The test is for the party, it's easy to forgive Zayn when he openly cries and apologizes immediately when finally confronted about his place in the villain plot, it's easier to forgive Aelwyn when she openly puts herself in harm's way and almost dies to save Adaine.

It's going to be harder, emotionally, for both the player characters and the players themselves to forgive the Ratgrinders and recognize they're also victims in some sense when the Ratgrinders have been actively fucking with the Bad Kids for the whole season, and taking an obvious amount of satisfaction in it.

The challenge Brennan has set up for the party, I feel, is a test of their character. Fighting a possibly ascended god Porter is gonna be a lot easier without a whole other party of enemies in the fight (and even much easier if you can convince some to fight alongside you as a part of heroes.)

[alchemistc]

I'm still really fucking sad about 911 but we have two weeks off and the Avs just committed on-ice murder against DeBoer and the Stars with a goalie who's never played a playoff game before, so. Sorry in advance if I get out of pocket about my team for a minute.

[rivilu]

While I do like the idea of companions romancing eachother and it having some impact on the game, if I catch anyone in this fandom guilting others for ''breaking up'' a pairing by choosing to romance one of the two characters again, I'll be turing into a hermit, exclusively engaging with the games themselves from within a cave in the Himalayas until the fanbase dies for another 10 years

[diaspoqueer]

Post 95: Lesbian Representation

AmbersCloset (Amber Whittington)

Amber Whittington is a youtuber, activist, influencer and host. She is known for her skits on YouTube and work with other masc/stems/studs on her YouTube and Instagram. Amber is also a former basketball player! She identifies as a lesbian and a stem. Whittington is biracial and black identified. I enjoy alot of her skits, she and her friends are funny.

[freakinator]

boosfers whole thing made me realize something, in addition to power, all the antagonists of the series all have Some kind of connection to wealth and riches

[rolandkaros]

by farrrr my most toxic trait is that the more popular something is the more i start to hate it even if i used to like it

[aroaceacacia]

I wonder how they made the purgatory 2 teams ... like with purgatory 1 you could tell they were tryign to break up most of the pre-established relationships for the sake of drama. but with purgatory 2 there are multiple team-ups of people who really really wanted to be teamed together - for example, etoiles, who joined purgatory 2 specifically to play with kenny, got to be teamed with him. plus iirc they did do team balancing to a certain extent (and also didnt team any purgatory 1 players with each other). so I wonder if they went the MCC/block wars/pandoras box route of "google form that asks you who youd like to be teamed with"! I feel like that would account for some of the interesting/unexpected decisions especially amongst new players (eg. Rodezel, who really wanted to be teamed with Bad)

[darklight-owl]

Ralph breaks the Internet frustrates me so much because aside from the obvious "first movie good second movie bad" they could have done so much with the worldbuilding of the Wreck it Ralph universe and they just blew it for product placement and unfunny memes. Can you imagine if they had gone to coolmathgames.

[the-real-sigrid-borg]

once again posting for the venn diagram of one (me) who is s fan of both Starkid and Sanspants;

I feel you could draw some very interersting comparrisons between Gragg Piss and The Prince from Cinderella's Castle.

[lkluvsu]

thoughts about jules x pedri

it’s been a bit i forgot to answer this ask even after i texted pedriandgavi about it 😔 so here’s a treat (this is all her btw not me) from the dms

On a general and non-rpf note I think they’re very, like… nuanced. I think they met for the first time and pedri was this arm and kind presence who was never far from laughter – just this KID with a charisma you couldn’t help but be drawn in by. He had energy, a hunger to play, was still the brand of in love with football that had him kicking a ball around on the field any chance he got, while others around him clustered in groups. Once they got on the field, the talent was everywhere. Pedri was everywhere, sliding balls through tight spaces, seeing things before they were even there, making jules work for it with a smile tucked at the corner of his mouth as though jules offered a new challenge to him he didn’t know he’d been aching for; he became one for jules in turn, someone to match and disarm. When they got teamed up, there were sparks of combability – moments when they synced up and football felt as easy as it had done when he was a child and playing among kids who didn’t quite have his talent, who didn’t quite keep up, and that’s what they rendered their teammates to whenever they linked up. Jules was excited to get to know him, how he worked – to build those link-ups up to something lasting and overpowering, to teach and learn and make.

Jules branded him a younger brother; saw others tease him and saw him take it with ease, never rise to the bait, and got intrigued. Started calling him platanito to get a rise out of him, but faced a pedri who just smiled crookedly in turn, delight dancing in his eyes as though it was a term of endearment, and with anyone else jules would have dropped the nickname immediately, would curse the lack of fueled up response and move on, but he realizes after a while that Pedri’s maybe wiser than he is, more insightful; that the teasing nickname does taste sweet every time he slides it over his tongue, tacks it to pedri’s skin in greeting. Endearment. He’s endeared.

They talk more, the insightful side of pedri comes out more, and pedri becomes someone he can depend on not just on the pitch but off it. they make jokes, chase each other, kick lazily after each other’s ankles; he lets pedri drape a small but strong frame over his own back and half-drags him onwards, with him. likes knowing pedri has become his to protect, in games for work and outside because pedri lets him, trusts him.

Then pedri gets injured. And again. And again. And he’s suddenly older and more mature than he ever should be; torn open and raw with layers of emotion exposed for everyone to see that he has previously kept so tightly knitted to himself. Sadness, anger, fear and grief and DEFEAT all spilling out of him. Jules finds himself turning his back on him in the locker room after the final relapse, ashamed of himself for not stepping up, ashamed for the way he can’t – doesn’t know what to do. Falls into faulty step with him on the way out later and breathes a sigh of relief when pedri leans into him a little, draws comfort as though he knows better than jules does that jules will give it, will give pedri anything, that pedri has become that important to him without him even noticing it.

By now I think they just… KNOW each other and trust each other. While they don’t interact a whole lot in front of cameras, it’s there, and it’s all mixed up laughter and focus and it’s obvious they have each other’s backs.

[sleeplesscubes]

WAIT NO!! ITS BLUE! NOT PURPLE! NOOOO!!!

[viric-dreams]

Shame there isn't a more dreamy background, since the Royal Beth is my least favourite menace area, but it'll do.

[nosferatufaggot]

When I draw jr school AU Eileen, I'm giving her highlights in her hair. I'm gonna look up all the girly things girls do and doing it for her. Because I'm a firm believer that Eileen gets FRIENDS SHE DESERVES! She gets a supportive friend group in jr/high school! She's loved by her friends! And they have sleepovers! And they do each other's hair! Like, her and the other cheerleaders or Fair City High School are like the most idealized version of being on a team. You're all friends. No drama. Super supportive. Needing to coordinate together bonds you in a way other things don't. They fundraise for the school together and everyone is nice and like half of them got football boyfriends. THEY DON'T CARE THAT SHE HAS A SPEECH IMPEDIMENT AND NEVER MAKE FUN OF HER FOR IT!!!!!! Like, Eileen deserves everything and that's what I'm gonna give her.