#thank you <33333333333

[thedragonagelesbian]

Does Wyll learn ranger skills from Cyrus? When does Wyll start taking an interest?

What’s their relationship like post dance? How do they act with each other in camp? Around the others?

Romanced Cyrus banter????

<33333333333

1) Yes, Wyll is keen to pick up on some of Cyrus' survivalist, tracking, and hunting skills. Not all devils leave a clear trail of fire behind them, after all, and while Cyrus isn't exactly a 'sneak in the shadows' type ranger, his efficacy and resiliency in combat are things Wyll admires and studies. And while we're not there yet, Cyrus will be giving him some paladin pointers in Act 3 too :)

Also on their next level up Wyll is going to grab silence and Cyrus is going to swap silence out for lesser restoration. There aren't a ton of ranger/bard spell list overlap, but those are both on it, and it's fun to imagine Cyrus teaching him the spell.

2) As soon as Wyll figures out he's a ranger, I think there's a part of him that goes 👀, but the real interest comes when they first meet Raphael. Seeing how collected and poised Cyrus is when dealing with a devil is impressive enough. When Wyll comes to Cyrus' tent that evening with his whole neat banshee anecdote & life lesson prepared, Cyrus is... not really sure how to respond, and eventually settles on 'I appreciate the concern & the effort but I'm fine??? You don't need to do this for me.' For Cyrus, it's coming from a place of wounded self-sufficiency, but for Wyll, it's the first moment of being told he doesn't have to be the BladeTM. Especially since this was the long rest after Mizora transformed him (iirc), not having to perform or put on a brave face is an unexpected relief.

3) They both know that their duty & obligation to stopping the Cult of the Absolute has to come first. Not much has changed about their behavior on the field (except the fact that Wyll basically only uses his bardic inspiration for Cyrus...), and they're pretty reserved about the relationship around others. A knuckle kiss here, a formal address there, Cyrus is still nervous enough about the whole 'being with someone again' thing to want to keep it relatively private.

That said, as soon as they're alone in camp, they're all over each other. They're effectively sharing a tent at this point & sleep/trance in each other's arms, and there's really no hiding the matching rings or the soft protective glow of the bond that sheathes them.

Also while not in the question, I think the entire rest of the party has assumed that they've been together since the tiefling party asfoijasdpf. From the moment they met Wyll, everyone clocked the fact that Cyrus is just. Not nearly as much of a prickly defensive ass around Wyll compared with everyone else (leading to a great line from Karlach where she's like "wow you're an asshole but hey, if i won over the blade of frontiers, i'm sure i'll befriend you too"). So it doesn't really seem like anything has changed post-dance, except that Cyrus starts being more outgoing with everyone, not just Wyll & Lae'zel.

5) fake banter machine goes brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Lae'zel: Wyll. I hear things are progressing nicely with your new paramour.

Wyll: Yes! Cyrus and I have found considerable solace in each other.

Lae'zel: Then you are both owed my congratulations.

Wyll: That is unexpectedly sweet of you, Lae'zel. Thank you.

Lae'zel: But be forewarned: if you break his heart, I will be waiting for you the next dawn.

Wyll: Wait--

Lae'zel: The duel will be to first blood--

Wyll: What?

Lae'zel: Or to the death, should Cyrus request it.

Cyrus: I will not be requesting it, or any other duel of any kind.

--

Gale: You know, Cyrus, I hardly mean to poke my nose into the amorous dabblings of others, but I cannot help but notice that our present surroundings are rather lacking in romantic decorum, so if you do wish to outsource some celebratory preparations, I would be pleased as punch to lend some magic to your anniversary.

Cyrus: My... my what?

Gale: Well, unless my calendar has failed me--and it is hard to tell the passing of days in this darkness--tomorrow marks one month past our triumph over the goblins and our subsequent fireside revelry.

Cyrus: Does it? I hadn't been keeping track.

Gale: Oh... Is it Wyll who is planning something, then?

Cyrus: Planning what?!

Gale: Or is it not customary for elves to celebrate one-month anniversaries?

Cyrus: ...Wyll and I have only been together for a week.

Gale: ...Are you certain?

[ato-dato]

yk i never understood when people said things like "i want to eat your art", then i came across your page and now your art is my breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert and snack (among many other eating times i can't recall rn). it's a whole ass restaurant and i wanted 2 thank you for feeding me and all the others :))

Im a business woman working like a dog day and night to feed the kids. You're the kids.

[teddybeartoji]

no matter how loud and how big of a yapper i come off on here (or make myself seem ig) i need a lot of quiet time and i don't feel very sociable on a lot of the days but i just want you all to know that it doesn't mean that i'm ignoring your asks or replies or mentions!!!!!!!!! they mean the world to me and i appreciate them sooo so much and i do love talking to all of you and talking overall it just sadly takes a lot out of me..

[signed-sapphire]

Step 1: Knit something comfortable and cute to keep your friend comfortable and warm!

Step 2: Build a pillow fort filled with blankets!

Step 3: Pick up your friend!

Step 4: Give the clothes you knit to your friend!

Step 5: Put they in the pillow fort!

Step 6: Bring all they friends to watch a movie at the pillow fort!

End of the tutorial!

I seriously almost cried when seeing this. Aled, you are so incredibly wonderful and amazing and an incredible artist and a lovely friend and I am so glad to have “met” you.

Keep doing what you’re doing. You’re going to do amazing things.

I really can’t express in words how much this meant to me. Just some comfort and knowledge that I have people who support me? Ahskajaksj this feels cringe but I’m posting it anyways. This is so heartfelt? I CAN’T EXPRESS IT BUT THIS MEANS A LOT

THIS GIVES ME THE SAME FEELING I FEEL WHEN I WATCH BLUEY. SO, SO… safe. And happy. You know?

Love you, Aled 💛

(Bonus! Doodle of the lovely hat and scarf you knitted)

^Alt. versions with just the scarf or just the hat bc I love them all

[a-pirate]

VIVIAN KING || 76/?

[qulizalfos]

hello liza i hope ur concussion gets better soon pls don't die ❤️❤️❤️❤️ ily ily sending you heated blankets and spring water okayyyyyy 💕💕💕💕💕

HELLO BEE MY BELOVED thanjk you so much!!!! as of right now i can confirm that i have not died yet (or gone into a coma?[thanks for that google<3]) and do not plan to<333333333 but fr i am feeling a lot better!!!!!! ilysmmm i recieved the blankets and water btw and i am cherishing them forever MWAH

[ddarker-dreams]

happy birthday!!! -ur readers

have a great 22nd year of life <3 keep at it :3

[siphoklansan]

Sup sippy!! I have a question concerning your oc’s, what type of Choi thing style do they wear outside of school? What’s their favorite foods? And will that third spot be filled soon👀 cause it looks like a cool oc

THANK YOU FOR THE ASKKKKK(;´༎ຶٹ༎ຶ`)<3333333

I have to admit, I have to search up streetwear fashion to know what style my two boys would wear— and honestly it’s REALLY predictable😭😭 Anan had to wear sunglasses because he’s not about to scare all the people/tourists away💀 As for Charin, he’d usually wear something oversized but also simple and comfortable!

Anan LOVES street food! Because back at the palace, he had to eat all those fancy-schmancy stuff :(( it’s that he doesn’t like it ofc! But when Charin gave him like some chicken skewers from a market…bro suddenly wanted to go outside for some shopping🕺

Charin likes boat noodles! Bonus points if the restaurant adds lotus roots in em👀✨ But tbh, he’s obsessed with any noodle dish like bro’s gonna gobble it all down-

AND UEHEHEHEUEUHEE THE THIRD SPOT OF MY OC POST YEAH? It’s going to be a big project— and I posted a teaser of that character around two times already? But I lost the first post I made on her :((( here’s the link to the second one though!! I still have a lot on my plate for this account, so the big project will take a LONG LONG TIME. Unfortunately it won’t be filled any time soon :(((

[thedragonagelesbian]

1 (because I think I got here late and would love to know more about Cyrus Generally as well), 5, 26, and 31

1. Tell us about your Tav! Name, class and subclass, race, pronouns. Do you have a headcanon for where they're from? Their family? Are they a Dark Urge? Or did you choose an Origin Character? Was it an easy decision?

asdfkpofjsaf i know my cyrus posting is. inscrutable at times, especially since he was originally a Dragon Age 2 character, so here is the definitive primer on bg3!cyrus

Name: Cyrus Hawke

Race: Wood elf

Class (main timeline): Paladin in Act 1; Paladin/Barbarian multiclass for Acts 2 & 3

Subclass (main timeline): Devotion in Act 1; Oathbreaker/Wildheart (bear) for Acts 2 & 3

Class (came back wrong timeline): Paladin/Sorcerer

Subclass (came back wrong timeline): Devotion/Shadow (mod) in Act 1; not sure if he'll end up breaking his oath in the same way in Act 2, but the plan is to take most of his sorcerer levels in Act 2 since the shadow sorcerer mod has some fun mechanical interactions with the Shadowlands

Where are they/their family from: Cyrus was born to Leandra Amell, the runaway heiress of a noble family in Evermeet (Faerun's equivalent of Valinor, isolationist elven paradise), and Malcolm Hawke, an eladrin warlock who had scorned his archfey patron. Because Malcolm was being actively hunted by his patron, Cyrus was born and spent his earliest years on the road.

Malcolm was killed by his patron when Cyrus was quite young (<20, baby by elven standards), and Leandra passed away a few decades after that. At the time, Cyrus was still very much a juvenile for an elf despite (in accordance with D&D lore) looking like an adult by other humanoid standards. He ended up in Baldur's Gate immediately following his mother's death and spent ~50 years there as an orphan in the Lower City.

Cyrus self-identifies as a Baldurian, but his actual relationship with his hometown is much more complicated. When he lived there, he loved many of its people and wanted to protect them, whether from the opportunism of the Guild, the overreach of the Flaming Fists, or the cruel indifference of his orphanage's headmaster. But that sense of expectation and obligation, especially to the other orphans, was often strangling. Cyrus grew quite accustomed to sacrificing his own happiness and desires to take care of them.

When he saw his first opportunity to leave the city without feeling like he was abandoning people who needed him, he took it without hesitation.

Durge vs Origin: Cyrus is an origin character. I didn't even consider going Durge for him. From playing him in DA2 and spending basically the whole summer yelling about him, he was already a very well-established character in my mind, so I didn't really want/need the extra story and world tie-ins that durge offers.

I also knew pretty quickly that I wanted to play him, rather than coming up with a new OC. This is because he is my most specialist boy ever, but also because for my first playthrough, I wanted to get into the game itself, rather than spending too much time thinking about who this person is and what their connection to the world is.

5. Do you remember the first humanoid enemy your Character killed? Was it the first person they've ever killed, in your opinion? Would they have been bothered by it?

It was the looters in the cathedral right off the beach-- he persuaded the ones outside to fuck off, but failed the roll for the ones inside the building itself, and they were automatically hostile when I had Astarion pick the lock.

I think he was bothered by that particular set of deaths just because 80% of the time, he prefers to de-escalate and resolve situations peacefully... in those other 20% of cases, though, he is quick to draw blood. Threatening his friends, hurting innocents, and being a careless or cruel authority figure are all great ways to encounter the righteous paladin fury simmering behind that affable, easy smile.

So, no, it wasn't his first kill. I think that honor probably went to a bandit who attacked him and Leandra when they were traveling alone after Malcolm's death. It was very messy, poorly executed, and terrifying, leading to the scars Cyrus has on his cheek and throat. The encounter also drove him to learn swordplay and defense so he could be ready the next time around.

26. What was your favorite enemy? Did your Character have any memorable fights or moments in combat that were ripe for headcanons and interpretation?

Even if Cyrus smited Minthara into oblivion, I am fascinated by her and her women's wrongs and her evil paladin wiles, and I look forward to learning much more about her when I do a more morally dubious playthrough.

As for the second question... god, I wish I had a better answer! Bc I love this question and thinking through the relationship between combat mechanics and narrative, but... the Act 1 combats didn't have as much personal/emotional investment as Acts 2 & 3 for me. Also, because I was playing on explorer mode, those emergent moments of super close calls and near (or actual) deaths didn't happen very often.

When I do my paladin/sorcerer run though (on regular difficulty this time), I will be very curious to see when 'strength of the grave' triggers for the first time (drop to 1hp instead of 0 once per long rest). Violently flirting with the line between life and death is sure to be very stressful for him :)

31. Does your Character have new or old phobias or superstitions that affect their story?

This is super low-hanging fruit, but Cyrus is very sensitive to how his body is modified, so the whole tadpole situation is. Immensely yikes. He tries not to ever use the tadpole powers, even in benign instances such as sharing thoughts and feelings with companions. He'll only resort to it if he absolutely has to. If I remember correctly, the only times he used it in Act 1 were to free Shadowheart and to interfere with the goblins' interrogation of the dead mindflayer.

And, of course, the Dream Visitor's suggestion that he should be encouraging and inculcating these powers is politely but firmly rejected.

[swordsmans]

different anon and not outing myself as a homestuck hut I DIDNT REALIZE YOU WERE ZOMBIESTUCK I LOVE YOUR ONE PIECE FICS AND I LOVED ZOMBIESTUCK

ya! technically buttercumb coined the term zombiestuck for their small troll oneshot (which is why mine was called freightstuck) but i made the human-centric zombiestuck during the megapause (moved from tumblr to ao3 during the gigapause) and almost all of what's now zombiestuck lore was originally mine :3

thank you so much!! i'm really happy you're enjoying my one piece fics!!!!! <3333 the crossover between old homestuck fans and one piece fans never stops making me laugh LOL i think there's a venn diagram of people who are really into long, emotional series with complicated worldbuilding and (including you) there are at least four other people i know personally who fit into the middle

[buthappysoverrated]

I'm obsessed with the tags you leave on our Rosie episode posts. I would make this podcast even if you were the only listener lmao, they crack me up so much. Appreciate you!

halkjdshfiuavlahjljahvlkjh thank you <3333

Your podcast is always great though!!! More people should listen to it! I always learn so much and it's super interesting to hear your thoughts!

Rosie the Reviewer

[payphoneangel]

This passage for the DVD commentary 🥲🥲🥲

BIRDIE!!!! KILL ME DEAD!!!!

Ok this is going to be SO LONG but there's a lot to unpack here.

for anyone curious this is the fic I will be talking about and the ask is based off this post.

oh where do I even BEGIN with this one. Okay. Okay so for this voicemail I had a few ideas I wanted explore.

Dean's relationship to alcohol

Dean's relationship with Jack

Dean's anger

So before we get into this, i think it's important to mention that, at least to me, one of the most frustrating things about Spn is that: It loves to beg the question, but it rarely ever answers it.

What I mean by that is the show will introduce these concepts and ideas. It will say, 'hey you ever notice X?' and I go, 'woah yeah I did notice X! What about it?' and they go, 'uhhhh idk. nothing. why are you asking? shut up.'

So for example, in Hammer of the Gods, Kali has this super great string of lines where she talks about the constant centering of western ideals. She begs the question (to the narrative), Why is the christian god the most important, most powerful god? Why is He the one who gets to be The Great Creator, while every other God is watered down to a Monster of the Week? Is that ever answered? Is it ever unpacked? To my memory, no. The show just continues on as is. They acknowledge the opposition to their argument, but do nothing to refute it.

And they do this all. the. time. with characterization.

Dean's relationship with alcohol

So Dean is canonically an alcoholic. It's shown all the time, far past the 'Red-blooded All American Man loves drinking beer' type of beat. Like we're shown time and time again that Dean struggles with substance abuse, specifically with alcohol, but what is the show trying to say ABOUT it? It seems bad, in the broadest strokes. There's plenty of scenes showing Dean drinking, breaking things, driving, yelling at people, being violent. But, to what end? Once again, to my memory, Dean never gets to heal from this problem, or grow past it. You get the occasional throwaway line, like Sam chastising Dean for drinking on a case at like 10 am (you'll have to forgive me for not remembering what specific episode).

So, in my fic, I wanted there to be consequences for this. Because consequences are the soil through which characters bloom and grow. I wanted Dean to be able to see and feel and understand that yeah, this is bad. this is bad for me and it's bad for everyone around me.

By fucking up on a hunt and then fucking up the post-hunt, that's a direct consequence for him. That's a motivation for him to realize that something needs to change and that he needs to do something. (not saying that canon Dean was unaware of these revelations, but more so that the narrative didn't care to focus on them) I wanted to give him space and opportunity to do that.

2. Dean's relationship with Jack

I think one of the things the show does well is depicting the complexities of family dynamics. It's the complex father show! It's the fucked up brothers show! It's the show that went on so fucking long the brothers became fathers themselves! This is the show about viscous cycles!!!

and im going to be honest, the whole dynamic with Jack is weird. it really is the 'the most noble death in spn is to die for the winchesters' motif taken, imo, to it's most extreme. Hey guys, let's do a filicide (part 2 tbh rip emma). Jack as a character just like, to me it's just evidence of how committed this show is to NOT changing or evolving. Early seasons begs the question, 'when is a monster not a monster? When it used to be human? When its your brother? your son? When is a monster deserving of death? when it's done terrible things? or because it simply has the capacity to?' That's something Sam and Dean have to grapple with! And tbh I don't like the conclusions that the show comes to, which is 'if you are different, you are a monster.' (evidenced by how none of the special children were redeemed or just outright killed. and then Sam went on to just. stop having his powers and just got over drinking blood like okay.)

And then 8-10 years later we get Jack and oh okay we're doing this again. Alright.

So I wanted to ease back a lot of the uhhhh crueler stuff between Dean and Jack. And give them some space to heal and be on better terms with each other. A lot of their bonding happened 'off screen' in Cell service, which I tried to imply with the college plot line, the references to conversations they've had, and how Dean starts using they/them pronouns for Jack, but never really addresses how/when/why that convo happened.

But something that I DO like is the Jack/tfw parallels throughout the show! How does Jack remind Dean of Cas? of Sam? of himself? And I wanted to keep that martyrdom complex that all of tfw has in here. But that's when Dean realizes he fucked up! Kids shouldn't be almost dying for their parents!

And we see that when Sam steps in between Jack and Dean. That's Dean's moment to realize I am doing to Jack what my father did to me and I do not want that. I wanted it to be a bodily safety thing. I wanted Dean to see Jack beat up. Because how often has Dean used his own body as a shield? He knows what it feels like. I wanted him to have this moment of horror of oh. We taught you self-sacrifice. I taught you how to be a tool.

3. Dean's anger

So we have ^^^all that. And we have this moment where Dean is drunk, and he fucks up (or in his eyes fucks up) and Jack has to save him. And he's mad. But why is he mad? What is he angry at? WHO is he angry at?

Rage is very common on the show. In a lot of the high drama moments, we see a lot of anger. Dean breaking everything in a motel room, the violence, the throwing things. And in the show, I think anger is used as a catharsis in a lot of instances. SPN, to me, is an escapist fantasy about being put into situations where the only possible option is violence. The most correct and justified reaction to this impossibly unfair situation is to be violent and angry. And i think part of this is that men are taught to be violent and angry, but also shamed for their violence and anger (it's a whole double-standard thing, but i digress)

I subscribe to the idea that anger is a secondary emotion. Essentially, anger is a response (a call to action, even) to another emotion.

In a lot of the show, the emotion under anger is unfairness. So so so much of spn is this idea of 'it's a shitty situation but you have to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, grit your teeth, and get through it. because that's your job.' and that's fucking unfair!! That's something to get angry over!! And they do.

(Another common emotion preceding anger in the show is grief. And the grief is here. Oh, how it's here. Why was Dean drinking in the first place? Because Castiel is dead. but that's more of a theme for the fic as a whole and not this particular scene so im going to leave it here)

But to me, a very common precedent to anger is fear. You're scared, so you get angry. Anger protects.

I draw on personal experiences for a lot of my writing. Nothing is ever a 1:1 situation of my experience, but there's ghosts of myself in everything I write. This voicemail was one I drew on from an interaction I had with my own father.

One time as a teenager, on a really really hot day, I forgot my water bottle when I went to band practice and I passed out. Oops! I woke up, got sat down in the shade, a water bottle was found for me to drink. I was fine. However, the teachers didn't want me to drive myself home. Which sucked because I lived pretty far out of town. I call my dad. No answer. I call again. Nothing. I leave a voicemail.

I manage to get home (thanks to my stepmom who then left my dad a voicemail saying she grabbed me). But when my dad gets home, he's pissed. He had forgotten his phone in his car when he went into work that day. When he got in the car to drive home, he listened to my voicemail explaining what happened and asking for him to come pick me up (and then my stepmoms). So i'm sitting in our kitchen, and he's just chewing me out for being careless. and I remember thinking, why are you mad? It's not like I intended to get heat exhaustion. And then the more I listened to him, the more I realized. He wasn't actually mad at me. He was worried about me and upset with himself. He felt awful that he hadn't had his phone and couldn't help me when I needed him.

His kid was in trouble, he had been careless, now the kid's hurt. Maybe, had the kid been smarter, and let the monster kill him remembered to pack a water bottle, neither of us would be in this mess.

He was scared about what happened, and that fear came from feeling a lack of control, which then manifested into anger. Anger at himself for being useless, and anger at me for putting myself in that situation. What do you do when you're scared for someone? You get angry. Anger protects.

It's a sad song i think many fathers sing. I found it fitting for Dean.

4. All together now

So Dean's struggling with alcohol, even more so after Cas dying. He's struggling with Jack, and what to do about Jack, and how to be there for them when Dean's the reason their dad is dead. And then we get to this hunt where Dean is so so far from performing at his best and it's a tough fight and he's blaming himself for everything going wrong and then he's this fucking close to being the reason Jack dies, too. And oh, how it all that fear and self-loathing and grief come bursting out of him through anger.

and he feels so out of control! Cas is gone, Jack's hurt, Sam's hurt, and Dean is useless!! So he gets mad! but it's not out of unfairness. It's not out of an impossible situation. It's because Dean was drunk (and takes everyone's lives and well-being personally).

But that begs the question: is it really his fault?

Isn't that what genre he's in? Isn't he in the complex father show? the show about being angry? The show about family being hell?

That's not what he wants, though. That's not who he wants to be. He wants to be good. He wants to be good for his family. For Cas. For the people around him. Hell, maybe even for himself.

So maybe it's not his fault, but if he really wants to change, it is his responsibility to fix.

so maybe, just maybe, given some time, some space, and a narrative that cares,

maybe he can be what who he wants to be. Maybe he can have what he wants.

[vero-niche]

📚

ask game: fandom faves - 📚 book

oh man. *the adhd urge to list at least 50 titles while being ashamed not to have completed any physical books in the past..... too long* i'm absolutely going to sit here for 20 minutes trying to decide on a book so i'm just going to say one title from my scattered piles of books that i've started reading recently :D which is Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle

[conduiitz]

The world has ended, and in the blast a new species of humans rose, Conduits. With the power to control elements they now must find a way to survive together with both humans and monsters living in the dark. But when Luca woke up after the blast, he’s not only changed, he also lost his best friend Luke who was with him before the breakout. Alone and confused in a world in ruins, Luca must now do anything he can to find Luke again. 

Read it here!

[ariadnewhitlock]

// Credit to @skiptomy / @eldritchaccident for the artwork!! Absolutely in such adoration of this. I will never be able to thank you enough.

[ddarker-dreams]

thought i would try my hand at making god darling. i think your writing is neat