#talking about the secondary characters in the last adventuring party inspired me to write it down

[adaines-furious-feast]

I know nobody cares but this can’t live in my head

I have an OC. I’ve never had an OC for a fandom before but this is maybe the best character I’ve ever made so I thought I’d share her here because I have nowhere else to share here. 

Dottie Cruller. This is long. I’m sorry.

Dottie, or Doughrethy Cruller, is the daughter of Lady Donetta’s younger brother. She is a person shaped doughnut. Her parents both died in a boating accident when she was six and she was adopted by her aunt and uncle – mostly because they couldn’t get her aunt’s inheritance if they abandoned her.

Dottie is 15 at the beginning of the campaign. She is a bard with a love for history and really learning about the politics of the world. Her favourite question is “how would everyone react to this”. So her bardic inspiration comes in the form of “remember in xyz battle when this thing happened”. She’s the kind of nerd that really admires the cool kids, so she really likes the princesses, but she also asks for plausible deniability when they’re up to something because Queen Caramelinda is her favourite person. She gets an acceptance from the queen that she doesn’t get from her aunt and uncle.

Dottie is disabled. She needs a walking stick and has chronic pain. It’s really a role of the dice at the start of every day as to whether that’s going to limit her movement or not.  

The original idea or trope I was playing on for Dottie was the “we must sacrifice someone pure and innocent to succeed” kind of thing. It dates back to Ancient Greece and is still used today. But what if that sweet innocent sacrifice had the strongest will to live?

I have mentally played the whole ACOC campaign with her which I know is not how this works but I tell myself stories to get to sleep and this is one of them.

So Dottie starts the campaign with very low self-esteem, mostly because she is frequently reminded that she is not part of the royal family and if she doesn’t make herself useful she will be thrown out. But as, first, her bardic inspiration is useful during the ambush – her uncle tells her explicitly to stay in the carriage but that doesn’t happen – and then in Comida where her understanding of the political map of the world comes in useful she starts to get more confident.  

She is also... very good at lying. Because she’s always thinking about what other people think, so she’s great at masking. That and she grew up in close proximity to the best liar in Candia, though didn’t realise his biggest lie until too late.  

So after the tournament, she makes a show of going to the Cathedral to pray partially because she does believe in the Bulb and wants protection, and partially because she knows how this will look to people. After her truly miraculous survival in the Cathedral ambush, she does multi-class as a cleric, though not a healer. Dottie is all about trying to understand the world and her place in it.

Dottie believes she is unlovable. Not only to her aunt and uncle – her aunt has never been cruel to her, but she’s never been loving either – but to anybody. And especially to the Bulb. Because when you’re six years old and your parents are both killed in an accident, you’re told that the Bulb needed angels, the Bulb needed them close to it, they’re in the loving embrace of the Bulb. But when you were also in that accident, and didn’t die... well, doesn’t that mean that the Bulb doesn’t love you? You’re not even good enough for the Bulb. And while, when she was six and sitting after her parents’ funeral pondering this, a very nice citrus yellow lady told her that wasn’t the case and she was lovable, that fear always been internalized in her. Then, after battle after battle where she really should have died, but didn’t, it feels more and more like not even the Bulb loves her.

Dottie’s birthday takes place during the trip back to Castle Candy, and is forgotten by everybody. Which is understandable given, you know, a war just broke out. And she doesn’t mind too much. But a Sweet Sixteen has got to be important in Candia. So when she gets back, and finds in her chambers a box with a label wishing her a happy birthday in what looks like Queen Caramelinda’s handwriting, she’s so sure this is a good thing. Except for the watersteel razor blades under the box lid. She doesn’t die, but is unable to cast magic until someone else uses a staff gifted to her by Captain Chedder – for saving the life of a cheese sailor – to do a greater restoration.  

After Jet’s funeral, Caramelinda reminds her quite bluntly that Dottie’s not her daughter. A conversation with Jack is the first time since her parent’s funeral that she’s said aloud that the Bulb doesn’t love her. At this point, Dottie doesn’t know if her aunt is alive or not. She’s assuming the worst because everything else is the worst. At that moment, her entire family is dead. The only family she has by law is an uncle who is a traitor and has told her for the past 10 years she doesn’t matter and the royal family will just throw her away. And while her head knows that’s wrong, she’s now wondering if maybe he knew more than she did. She knows the Rocks are hurting, but now she’s wondering if maybe she doesn’t matter as much as she thought she did after all.

When it comes to Saccarina, Dottie doesn’t immediately flip to her side, but given she feels distant to the Rocks and is trained to be a political advisor, she happily sees a role for herself beside the new queen and accepts her as the queen. Dottie also doesn’t feel like she would stand out as being “broken” in Saccarina’s court. It wasn’t that the Rocks were abelist, but she didn’t see people like her there. She does in Saccarina’s marudas. However, Dottie doesn’t spend much time with Saccarina, as she’s captured in Buzzybrook. She’s unable to move fast enough to get back to the portal.

She finds out that her uncle has told everyone that she was kidnapped by the Rocks, and he is very worried about her. She begs Grissini not to take her back there, and actually manages to win him over when she saves his life during an ambush that is quickly foiled, but there’s not much he can do. At Castle Candy, Calroy plays the role of worried guardian for all of five minutes, long enough for Grissini to leave, before placing Dottie in the care of the church, where she’ll be an assurance for them that he plays his part of the bargain.  

Dottie has not spent the past 10 years learning how important it is to be two faced to fail on the final exam. She dutifully plays the part, and actually manages to get the nuns fooled long enough to catch some gossip, that her uncle may be trying to sweeten the deal – no pun intended – with a certain gluten-filled emperor with a marriage. Dottie considers going along with it. She hasn’t heard anything about Saccarina in this time and for all she knows they’re all dead. Being close to the emperor wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing. She sends a Sending spell to Grissini, disguised as a prayer to the Bulb, asking for advice. His advice comes on the night of the siege on Castle Candy, before the Rocks troops have been spotted, when he comes into the tent where she is being held and tells her in no uncertain terms that this would be terrible and while that loaf of bread is a war hero he would be a terrible person to have to spend any amount of time with.

Dottie wouldn’t play a major role in the siege. She is one person – two with Grissini. But she does take Grissini out of the fight against the Rocks, so that’s good. The only grudge she really has at this point is against her fucking uncle, but confronting him doesn’t go so well and he manages to escape. At least until the King finds him.

This is the first time Dottie learns about Cinnamon, and is horrified. She becomes even more horrified when she learns about how Cinnamon got so big, mostly because this is going to be pretty hard to smooth over politically. But Dottie still pledges herself to Saccarina after the battle. The Queen is going to needs someone who knows how to sweet talk people and, while she doesn’t intend to be quite as deceitful as her uncle, she learned how to be manipulative from the best. If you’re going to upend an entire religious system, you’re going to need someone who knows how to talk good.  

Does Dottie ever get over her belief that she is unlovable? Yes, because Grissini shows her that isn’t true. He is the first fatherly figure she has had since she was six and, even though she’s almost an adult now, she welcomes having that fatherly figure in her life.  

She also gets the title of Marquesa of Muffinfield when her aunt is found dead (whether the wound is self inflicted literally or just metaphorically is never determined). It’s something that Dottie held at great importance after the escape from the castle because she was not going to let her fucking uncle take her birthright. That anger at him was the only thing that kept her going.

Anyway, that’s Dottie. Nobody has read this long, I know, but if someone has, I hope you like it. I love her, she’s the best character I’ve ever written. I love the idea of having a character who is every part the trope of “innocent sacrifice” who keeps living and is convinced that god hates her because she keeps living. I also love Grissini’s character, and mourn the alternate universe where he ends up an ally, because I think it could have happened.

[fangoffenrir]

TAGGED BY: @selina-taylor​

TAGGING: @lady-silver-hair​ @samuraiofice​

* GETTING TO KNOW THE MUN :

NAME : Jeff

NICKNAME : n/a

FACECLAIM : Karkat Vantas

PRONOUNS : male

HEIGHT : 6′5″, but I’ve got scoliosis

BIRTHDAY : June 8th

AESTHETIC : idk probably nerd shit

LAST SONG YOU LISTENED TO :  Temposhark - Don’t Mess With Me

FAVOURITE MUSE (S) YOU’VE WRITTEN : I definitely have kept Fang for the longest, and I value that history both in his original iteration and where he is now.

* GETTING TO KNOW THE ACCOUNT :

WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO TAKE ON THIS MUSE : Fang started out as 12 year old kid who was a type of psion called an Erudite, which is supposed to be a savant and could pick up powers from other psions or mages or something containing them by touching it, in a d20 modern sort of “polymorphed dragons rule the boardroom” game where we got to level 9 or 10.

In the session that the party got TPK’d, we were being entertained in the penthouse apartment of a vampire information broker and Fang (well, at the time, his name was Frederick Escher) had sneaked away to check the host’s study and wiped dust off an ornate mirror, critical failed a save vs death, and died on the spot. The rest of the party died because the fighter insulted the vampire and the bright idea to jump out the window to run away didn’t pan out so well when the vamp dispelled featherfall... Anyhow, we cut to an amnesiac Fang waking up next to a shattered mirror in a now-burning house right before the end of session- this being the introduction to the Crusaders, which would be a much more episodic campaign, Fang being knocked down to level 1 (albeit with some natural power).

As the campaign was episodic, there were these 2-3 week gaps in-game between assignments where my character was essentially unaccounted for and I decided taking to forums and rping what he’d do on his own time would be a good way to nail down characterization of how a Frederick learning under different circumstances, having weapons forced on him rather than being deprived them (until he stole a silver and pearl .32 rimfire Remington-Elliot derringer nobody makes ammo for from the same room he DIED IN) and being made a child soldier on purpose rather than by circumstance, and he managed to just stick as my main muse for this secondary hobby I developed.

WHAT ARE YOUR FAVOURITE ASPECTS OF YOUR CURRENT MUSE: As I said before, I love the history Fang has picked up through the years and how that adds up to what he’s able to do now and the potential for different adventures that come from that.

WHAT’S YOUR BIGGEST INSPIRATION WHEN IT COMES TO WRITING: Much of it comes from various Dungeons and Dragons lore, but I draw from other parts of fantasy, such as the “The Black Company” series by Glen Cook.

FAVOURITE TYPES OF THREADS : Adventures, intrigue, sharing lessons, superpowered fights, or just small talk- they’re all pretty good.

BIGGEST STRUGGLE IN REGARDS TO YOUR CURRENT MUSE: Well, probably that Fang progressing down a certain open-ended path for YEARS leaves him pretty overpowered when interacting with a lot of mortal characters. However, some primary character traits for him are self-restraint and easy to acquire loyalty, and this often leads him to act as sort of an asset rather than acquiring more of his own. The other big one is communicating across threads, without dropping drabbles and out of character statements to a small or nonexistent audience, certain things about him that aren’t immediately apparent or the mildly dishonest ways he goes about disclosing some things to keep people trusting him, at least until they are in too deep or he has to make a move.

[peterdavidsonfutureworks-blog]

Limbo Trailer Final Update

So after a lot of difficulty due to various reasons I finally managed to get into the Foley Suite at uni yesterday and spent all day recording all of the sound effects that would be supporting the voice lines.

While we were in the Foley Suite we came up with some pretty inventive ideas for recreating sounds that would usually not be doable, for example, I used a piece of metal and ran it along a corrugated rubber tube to create the sound of the buzz saw revving up.

Here is how I created some of the more difficult sounds:

Running/Jumping on Grass - Tapping feet in a pile of cassette film tape.

Boulder Rolling - Chair wheel rolling on hollow wood.

Boulder Smash - Dropping one cinder block onto another.

Buzz Saw - Running a metal bracket along a vacuum cleaner tube.

Cart Crash - Dropping the padded end of a metal desk leg onto some wood.

Climbing Metal Ladder - Tapping 2 fingers on a hollow metal pole.

Creaky Light Sound (Unused) - Rocking a rusty scooter back and forth.

Lever - Twisting a typewriter mechanism.

Tyre Bounce - Hitting the vacuum cleaner tube with some wood.

Metal Scraping - Dragging a hollow metal pole along a sandstone tile.

The other sounds for example jumping sounds on wooden floor were made by doing exactly that.

When I got home I realised that I had no sounds that could be used for the scene with the water. I initially had planned to do this by getting 3rd party sounds from an online sound bank, but after seeing some of my friends using their phones to record some sounds in the Foley Suite I realised that the sound quality wasn’t actually as bad as I had first thought, so, I filled up my bath tub with a shallow layer of water and used that to walk/run in to create splashing footsteps sounds. I also then recorded the sounds of the water draining away to create the effect of water flowing. I had to play around quite a bit in audacity to remove some of the background noise which comes with using a phone microphone to record but that was fine and didn’t take much time at all.

There were some sounds however that would have just been impossible for me to record myself, for example I had planned to record some glass smashing sounds in the Foley Suite but after thinking about it more I decided that I wasn’t confident that it would be safe. The mosquito buzzing sound was also way too difficult to create as there was no way I was going to find a mosquito by chance and have my recorder ready to go. Also the electric shorting out sound is too distinct of a sound and I didn’t think I had the ability to recreate this to give the same effect as the real thing would, therefore these sounds were taken from online.

I was really trying my best to not use sounds from online as much as I could, seeing as my project is predominately voice lines, however I can not create my own music that would fit this so perfectly so I borrowed the bicycle track from Pokémon Alpha Sapphire (and referenced of course!) to create the happy journey feel to the trailer. 

Speaking of references I had planned to do some more research into how you correctly state them but after asking some of my course-mates last night I understood it quite quickly. Although I was having trouble finding the initial author of the Pokémon track I used so I just referenced the company that made the game.

When it came to editing the actual sounds I had some previous experience with audacity thanks to using the program in Secondary school, A-level music tech, and also just some personal projects and messing around at home. However there were some things that I had to use youtube tutorials and guides for, for example cutting out background noise and echo from sounds.

For that I used this video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10FFKl_0GSA

I needed to know how to cut out these sounds because the microphone which I was using to record my voice lines at home, as much as I love it, picks up so much background noise from random things so It had to be done or else I would have a tonne of static sounds in the background of my voice lines and the quality would have just been overall poor.

Luckily for me I have a friend who is doing a uni course which involves video editing using Adobe Premiere Pro, so any questions I had about using the software was a simple task of just asking her what I should do or how I should do something, this saved me so much time and hassle of trying to find specific answers on youtube or google (Thanks Mai). However I did have trouble adding in the still image of the references at the end of the trailer and she wasn’t available to help me, so, I managed to find this video for that 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SPzZMcRG1k

For help and reference for writing the script I looked at quite a few examples. At first I had planned to tell a story using the premise of the boy in the trailer talking alot about his journey, however after initially trying this I realised that the trailer itself cuts between scenes very fast and suddenly so this format didn’t really feel good for what I wanted, so, instead I went for some quick lines where they boy explains what is happening to him at that specific point in his journey and this seemed to fit much better to the flow of the trailer. After realising that I needed short quirky lines I looked at games like “The Stanley Parable” which does a great job of telling a story using narration about what a character is thinking at that time.

I also watched a lot of comedians that use one liners as their style for some inspiration because of the fast delivery. Milton Jones and Steven Wright were some of my personal favorites for this and I tried to have some of their style help me with my project. However after initial tries I had decided that my script didn’t even need to be comedy, even if it had some comedic value, because I had shifted to more of an adventure theme.

Overall I think the project was a success and also a nice challenge to take on. Looking back I would have actually liked to try and create the classic old school disney theme that I had initially planned to do when we were handed the brief, but I am proud with what I managed to create and the sound recording was actually really enjoyable, whether it was actually recording the sounds themselves, or thinking of ways to create more abstract sounds. Had I had oppurtunities I would have liked to recorded some more complex sounds in the Foley Suite, but, like I said in my earlier blog posts I had some unfortunate reasons for not being able to, however these would have just been a silver lining for me personally.