#the other is a murderous monster

[rookdaw]

monster X monster hunter

[feralforestgoblinn]

Back on my Symbrock shenanigans.... it's been a minute. Or a year. Or several. Something like that

Uncensored on Patreon (body horror channel)

[spacedace]

Fuck whatever DC is doing with the al Ghul's characterizations and story lines, I've decided that from now on the al Ghul's are gonna be DC's version of the Addams Family instead.

Now I don't mean just give the various al Ghul's the exact personalities of the various Addams and call it a day. That's boring, that erases all the interesting parts of the al Ghuls, that's just using "find & replace" and not actually adding anything. I mean give them the vibes of the Addams Family.

Keep the al Ghul's as the al Ghul's with all their scheming and machinations and world domination attempts but give them all the unhinged energy, the casually insane view of the world, the deranged levels of love and devotion for family. Make them that group where objectively they are batshit insane but also you cannot argue with the fact that they are indisputably the most stable and functional family in the entire universe.

They're creepy, they're kooky, they're mysterious and spooky. Ra's many opulent homes and impenetrable fortresses are a museum and the al Ghul's really are a screa-um whenever people come to see-um (or when they lay waste upon their enemies in a surprise attack that has been planned for months and is just the first domino in a series that will ultimately lead to achieving a far greater goal).

They all love each other and want each other to be happy, they express this primarily with stabbing and murder attempts (its fine, death is a thing that happens to other people).

And forget the League of Assassins being a cult. Just make the whole vast globe spanning organization a collection of cousins/aunts/uncles/dear old friends ect. No one (not even the al Ghuls, if they cared to keep track of such things) is sure who is actually related to them and who just got absorbed into the ever expanding family tree based on their vibes being right.

(Is Sensei Ra's father you ask? Well he's certainly someone's father - probably.

Anyway have you heard about Cousin Cheshire? Despicable poisoner of a young woman, capable of the most horrific things imaginable - yes she is the sweetest dear. Like I was saying though, she just had a baby!

Everyone in the family is just so excited to throw a baby shower to celebrate! Ubu has really gone all out with the spike traps, he does so love getting to welcome a new addition to the family.

Talia of course has cultivated a brand new strain of the most toxic plants imaginable to make a brand new kind of necrotizing poison. You know, as a nice little romantic gift for Cousin Cheshire and that young man of hers. It really is so important to make sure you take time for you and your partner to go on dates and have a few pitched battles to the death on dark rooftops in the pounding rain when you have children.

Now there is some to-do about it all of course, you know how family get together can be. Everyone is arguing over who should get to give little Lian her first weapon and what it should be. Nyssa is pushing for grenades but Ra's is insisting on a sword - he's traditional like that you know - but Dusan has the vote so far on throwing knives. You know the kind that have the little divots along the edges of the blades them to make it easier to get the poison you dip them in to stick.)

I'm just saying that the al Ghuls should be a delightful cross between the Bond Villains they were originally conceived as and the lovingly unhinged Addams Family. It just feels correct in my heart.

(Again keep the interesting aspects of the characters and the nuances of who each of them are like their drive to save the world through destroying humanity and their strong environmentalist leanings and their constantly playing 5D chess and everything, but like, take away the racism and the cartoonishly evil for no reason bullshit and give them some fun feral energy to go along with it).

[pinnithin]

yknow i didn't necessarily start my wyll origin run with the intent of romancing astarion in mind but the more i play the more i find their similarities amusing when it comes to like, the surface level personality they present to strangers in act 1.

wyll is a compulsive flirt. you see it in dialogue with shadowheart and lae'zel - he just tosses out a couple lines that clearly aren't supposed to go anywhere (asking lae'zel if she believes in love at first sight, blatantly reusing the same flirtation attempts with shadowheart) and i see this as part of his Blade of Frontiers persona. obviously a traveling vigilante would have no time for romance or relationships, but he's socially aware enough to have learned that people respond well to a certain level of rogueish charm. especially if his reputation precedes him. he can safely and positively engage in surface level flirtations with the people he interacts with because the person doing the flirting isn't real - at least not to him. he often says the Blade is his best self, but to him its an ideal he strives to achieve, not the person he really is. and i imagine that includes the ability to give discouraged people positive attention in a nonthreatening way. its safe. its superficial. he doesn't have to follow through.

this is overshadowed somewhat by astarion's tendency to flirt with anything that has a pulse, but the perspective they both have on it is pretty similar. theyre both coming from a place of not actually being interested in the recipient of their attention - whether that be through astarion's ulterior motives or wyll's lack of capacity for a relationship - but they both still put on this front because it's habitual. it's worked for them and it's gotten them through the varying degrees of social contracts they find themselves in. so they wind up trading lines easily because they've studied from the same script.

anyway what im getting at is bumping these two personalities against each other can definitely result in wyll and astarion committing to the bit so hard they accidentally wind up in a relationship. like, you're safe, you know the rules, you're speaking in a language i'm familiar with but we both understand that neither of us expect anything back on an emotional level. wait when did we start confiding our deepest secrets with one another. what do you mean you trust me.

[maegalkarven]

I keep thinking about Durge, who, even after defying Bhaal, is never truly free from their father's legacy.

Because yes, the Urge is gone, the cursed blood of Bhaal doesn't call to them anymore. But body remembers, even if mind doesn't. Body knows what it did, it knows what it was created for. It's instinctual, bone-deep reflexes of a person raised to be the perfect murderer. It's little twitches and how easily opponents fall: foes and former allies alike.

It's small glimpses of the past, because mind doesn't remember, but the body DOES. It's the eerie familiarity of darkest corners of Baldur's Gate, it's people recognizing Durge on the streets, people they don't remember but who remember THEM.

It's the feeling of being haunted by your own self.

It's the body of Ketheric, the bloody mess left of Orin, Gortash's lifeless frame. It's the knowledge you're the last one, what this tragic story of conquer started with you and ends with you.

It's the feeling of emptiness where bubbling joy once was, the blood on the blade what brings no feelings. It's being charming, or kind, or honest, or gentle, or honorable, but at the end of the day still being the best in the art of murder - and who are they if not Bhaal's unholy blade?

Godless and fatherless, struggling to reimagine themselves.

Especially when memories come; they never return fully, never in the whole picture. But glimpses, the shards of existence what was once theirs cut deeper than any ritual blade would.

I keep thinking about Durge weighted down by the grief of the world, guilt of the world.

Alone: without a god, a father, a sister, a partner (Gortash, bc these two were absolutely insane for each other).

Alone and with whole life ahead; lost and confused and with hands bloodied.

Hero, people call them. They don't feel like a hero.

[s-wordsmith]

Something I really need Stranger Things fic writers to know is that no one in rural America was locking any doors in the eighties apart from the government and businesses. I remember when there was a big stink about "we gotta start locking our doors now how am I supposed to remember that every time I leave the house." People didn't lock the doors when they were home until at LEAST the mid-aughts, a lot of people STILL don't. "Oh we can't get into so-and-so's house/car because we don't have the keys!" You do not need the keys, just open the door. "I'm alarmed because I went over to so-and-so's house and their front door was unlocked so I instantly knew something was wrong." It would be much weirder if it was locked. If I showed up at my friend's house and the door was locked I would immediately assume something was wrong. If I lived in a town regularly invaded by monsters and patrolled by mobs of government agents/Russian spies/jocks with guns, I would assume my friend was currently being hunted.

[cerealforkart]

Finally had time to listen to the Kingdom Dad Monster episodes today!

[fuckmeyer]

girl please, Charlie Swan is Team Werewolf and you know it

[fumifooms]

I think some inherent comfort of the party’s relationship, of why they’re so tightly knit and wholesome, is that it’s kinda the embodiment of "people that care for each other unconditionally, so much so that you could be the biggest freak on Earth and they would still not turn their back to you". Like, Laios’ whole character arc is that he was scared of others and their judgement, that he should hide a big part of himself and his interests to be tolerated if not accepted… But showing himself to others was the road through which the party bonded and got closer, and by the end of the story Laios literally turns into his monster because it was his biggest wish and everyone sees it and also he eats his human body a lot. After that he runs to the woods and is so scared of everyone not wanting to see him again, but y’know what. It’s fine his party still loves him, and aghhhh ouch my heart

I think also, Izutsumi was central to the party having a found family feel. The party was mostly made of work colleagues acquaintances, but adopting a stray/teenager that has no one on the way in your grand adventure really makes the whole family vibe skyrocket.

[mrsthunderkin]

A teensie shading practice with Bart post workout/class

[gildedmuse]

I'm probably cool just dying now. Seeing these dorks with their crews is just the pentacle of my life.

[y-rhywbeth2]

Random thought of the day: It would've been very awkward if anybody got bitten by a werewolf at Cazador's place.

[sundybundy]

can i be real for 5 minutes I'm so sick of everyone acting like james is an incel sex pest but I'm also so sick of everyone pretending like he isn't a misogynist............ like I don't think he Hates women but there are lots of things in the game I can point to regarding his weird feelings about women

[sleepy-crypt1d]

going a little insane thinking about that one echo in moxxi's heist that's jack calling his mom on mother's day- a call she very much does not answer- and how much the sadness in his voice when saying goodbye says about him

[radioves]

its quite shrimple actually

[cathatrtic-scream]

wenclair this. wyler that. both are good. but wrong.

clearly the dynamic is meant to be the parks and rec meme with Tyler saying this is my girlfriend Wednesday and this is Wednesday’s girlfriend Enid.