#there's some abilities this class has that have worldbuilding implications

[twentyyearstoolate]

One of my favorite things in fantasy media is the exploration of magic as a utility in day-to-day living. Like in D&D, it's touched on how some spells have applications that adventurers might find marginally useful, but have ground-shaking impact for society at large. Like Plant Growth, for example:

This is a great area control spell, but the second effect has huge worldbuilding potential in any game where spellcasters are even remotely common, and I'm a little sad that it gets slept on. It doesn't take a historian to tell you that kingdoms rise and fall on their ability to procure food for their inhabitants. The implications of this spell that can effectively guarantee a bumper crop make me incredulous about how few court druids there are compared to wizards, even in WotC's own materials - A single person that is capable of doubling the food output of 500+ acres of land every day is a fucking golden goose, far more so than some pointy-hatted old man who can create explosions, and maybe even more valuable than one who could turn lead into gold. You can't eat gold, but you can sure sell excess produce to your neighbors.

And think of the knock-on effects here for storytelling and plot hooks - Druids tend to be motivated by the cultivation and protection of natural resources, and that's in direct conflict with the consumption and expansion of a kingdom, to the point that a circle that once offered this spell to a smaller village to prevent a famine might now withhold their spellcasting services unless the king agrees to turn a particular forest into a nature reserve, but the king needs that wood to build and maintain a navy to protect the kingdom from pirates and warring factions, to construct additional housing for ever more citizens, or even just to survive the harsh winters. Can a party convince the druid that the needs of the kingdom and its people outweigh the need to preserve the forest? Or the king that the forest should be preserved, and there are other means of achieving these ends? Maybe there's another solution that satisfies both parties that you haven't thought of buried in a class feature or another spell, but one of the players will?

And keep in mind, this is just one spell, and it's a spell that shows up in the PHB because it is also useful to PCs. Other spells like Fabricate, even cantrips like Mending, have the potential to drastically reshape what a fantasy society looks like if they're accessible to more than just the PCs or hostile NPCs. And if you're willing to dip your toes into homebrewing, you can make the kinds of spells that nonadventuring casters would have need of. A spell that can sort things based on caster specifications. A spell that can build and paint a row of fencing around a designated area. A spell that summarizes a body of text, or simplifies instructions. The possibilities go on.

It's fun to expand on this further into magic items, the kind that tell stories about their users and/or creators, and make sense as tools that would be useful for both common folk and adventurers. Perhaps one of my favorite homebrew magic items is a ring that the party found on a dead kobold trapper after reaching the far end of a rigged ruin, his skeleton pinned against the wall by a spear in front of a concealed hideout:

Ring of Tripwires - Ring, uncommon This bronze ring has a seemingly infinite coil of thin, clear wire wrapped around it. The wearer can produce any length of strong, semitransparent string from the ring. Any string produced in this way is otherwise mundane. Once per day, as an action, the wearer can drag the ring a few inches over a walkable surface, drawing up to 15 feet of string in a straight line. This magical string is invisible, can be connected to a trap as part of a triggering mechanism, and remains until it is broken or this ability is used again. Any creature who moves into it must make a DC 13 Dexterity saving throw or fall prone, as the string breaks. If it is connected to a trap, the trap also activates. Regardless of whether the save is successful, the wearer knows when the string has been broken.

(As an aside, I love taking the time to put this kind of bespoke treasure on NPCs, living or dead, because there's a very direct connection between the storytelling and the mechanics that makes the encounter come alive, as opposed to the blandness and occasional dissonance of the typical dead adventurer item economy where players routinely stumble across corpses and hoards with useful things, or loot them from hostile creatures, when it raises questions about how they couldn't or didn't use these to get out of a jam - god forbid you use a random table to generate loot, because then you get the party wondering why this bandit chief was carrying a +1 longsword, a wand of missiles and a potion of invisibility, and didn't think to use those items in the fight they just died in against an adventuring group.)

Anyway, back to the point - magic in these settings has the potential to be so versatile and integral in worldbuilding, and if you have NPC casters and don't explore the possibility of the use of magic in day-to-day life, you're leaving so much good story on the table. If you're looking for inspiration, it's never a bad time to peruse the spell lists. Don't just say a wizard did it - find out how. It's a lot of fun.

[inhexe]

small additions to my witches worldbuilding post, which are details i thought i'd included...

witchcraft leads to increased longevity. it's something about magic: the more deeply imbued an object is with magic, the longer it stays clean, shiny, and whole; the same goes for people. the average lifespan of a day-to-day witch, the kind with a coven in your ordinary ozian town, might go up to about 125, 150 on the high end. a ruling witch could easily live to 250-300.

men can be witches, but it is much less common. while magic and its accoutrements are consequently considered a gendered area of life, and it may be considered "feminine" for a man to be involved with it in some parts of oz, it isn't unheard-of. it is also always possible for a man to parlay his magical abilities into being considered a "wizard" rather than a witch. to ozians, "wizard" is connotatively male, just as "witch" is connotatively female. "wizard" has implications of male authority and suggests a strong formal education and upper-class image, given that many famous wizards in oz's history arose from its universities. these associations have only strengthened now that the Wizard (sic) is in power. that said, there are some men who still only use the term "witch" for themselves, and feel more at home in the covens than elsewhere.

witches can arise in the general populace, spontaneously. regardless of a lack of magic in her background or environment, a baby might be born with the ability. there are two big ways that a parent might realize their child is a witch. one is to actually witness the child do magic. particularly strong or willful witch babies might still be in infancy when they force fires to roar up or go out, break china from across the room, and change the colors of their toys. (these are all incredibly minor acts, natural to a witch as breathing.) the other way is to observe the child's development over time. because they grow at a different rate than others, witches typically have very irregular developmental milestones, both mentally and physically. they might seem incredibly accelerated, or incredibly behind. (i'm indebted to ryoko kui for this idea.) while the general ozian population considers adulthood to come at 18 (16 in some rural communities), in families of witches and those long-exposed to magic, 25 is considered the age of maturity.

[mel-addams]

[Image Description: the first image is the cover of the TTRPG Wyrd Street. A pale woman wearing a hooded robe is seated in the center of a candlelit room, looking with shock at her bloody hands. She’s sitting on a torn and bloody rug, a broken chair in front of her. Behind her is Ji Wensdottir, one of the Iconic Characters, casting a protective spell while she looks down at the seated woman. Surrounding them are glowing runes from the spell, a few floating, jellyfish-like critters made from possessed junk, and a large, menacing ghostly figure, floating in front of a broken window. At the top is the Wyrd Street text logo, and at the bottom is the text “Core Rulebook.”

The second image is an illustration of Bing Li, a woman with light skin and straight black hair, partially shaved to reveal rough scars along the side of her head. Her clothing is dark and loose, generalizing her silhouette, enabling her to be nondescript if she had her hood up. The case for a set of portable eating utensils hanging from her waist peeks out from under her hooded tunic, though the knife from the set is in her right hand. Her left arm is lifted slightly, blood magically extending from a small cut into a gruesome tendril. Handwritten beside her is her name, and her RPG class, Heretic.]

~~~

Bing Li the Heretic

Wyrd Street TTRPG IndieGoGo, funding now!

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/wyrd-street-d20-ttrpg-system/x/9982631#/

Wyrd Street cover illustrated by Dana, whose portfolio you can find here: https://www.danabraga.com/

Fuck forced loyalty and imperialism—fled her shitty country when they eventually came to silence her.

Fascinated by and researching taboo magic—figure out why it’s taboo, and what good it can be used for.

Using blood whips and launching poisonous teeth that bud out of your flesh may be grotesque, but it’s not inherently “evil.” It all comes down to how it’s used, same as any other magic.

At level 8 you can become a blood puddle and ooze yourself through small spaces, or move through occupied spaces without being slowed or causing disengagement attacks! Gross? Maybe. Rad? I SURE THINK SO

Again, not to play favorites with a longer post, but I also get to draw her with enough funding! So, for a little more class info: Heretic can also make up to 3 Blood Dolls—simple undead companions formed from human or other corpses (which end up looking human, and you choose their appearance). They can be improved as you level up, too!

A deep dive post from Tyler, with more info on Bing Li and her class design:

https://superior-realities.com/2022/06/24/wyrd-street-tease-bing-li-the-heretic/

And that’s all the Iconics revealed! Wyrd Street’s IndieGoGo ends on the 26th, so go give it a gander, and take a peek at the primer to check out the gameplay!

~~~

- Wyrd Street Masterpost - Ji Wensdottir the Street Preacher - Lo Karlsson the Drifter - Blue Rose the Vigilante - Five Snow Blossom the Dreamer - Osiron the Fortune Teller - Burning Grin the Scoundrel - Bing Li the Heretic - Na Wen the Brawler - Dr. Zuberi Mbogo the Quack

[marvelousmagicalaura]

Wizard101 rewrite idea: What if Morganthe wanted to stop Grandfather Spider?

I’m looking back to what I said the other day about Grandfather Spider and his Children being progenitors of Spiral races, I’m now realizing that would have some fascinating implications about the history of Khrysalis, particularly in regards to the Burrowers and Arachna. And it could lead to a bit of worldbuilding that would make Morganthe a better character.

In the Khrysalis storyline, the Arachna and Burrowers are explicitly portrayed as enemies in every sense of the word. The Arachna revere the Shadow and the Shadow Queen, while the Burrowers damn the Shadow and fight against the Shadow Queen’s minions. However this becomes very interesting once we look in the past of Khrysalis and what exactly the Shadow is. In the ancient history of Khrysalis, the Arachna of the Hive, the Mantises of Sardonyx, and the Burrowers of Bastion were on good terms with each other.

The Arachna were welcome to the Astral shrines that the Burrowers maintained, and the Grand Prophecy’s Obelisks were in Sardonyx. But this race was also held up in the Hive worshipping Grandfather Spider, indulging in his magic and influence. Morganthe’s memories showed that the ancient Spider Magi followed the Grand Prophecy, and searching for its Chosen One. These same Magi taught her Shadow Magic in the first place. In the Solar Arc, the elephant guy said the Arachna were listening to “dark whispers.” Spider and his Children are the only beings with the ability and desire to implant such dark thoughts.

Nowadays, the Arachna’s subject of worship has shifted from Spider to Morganthe. Morganthe is their god and, at least during the Wizard’s exploits in Khrysalis, Spider is feared by the Magi and their warriors. But curiously the Umbra Legion and Morganthe herself continually utter “The Shadow!” in reverence. We all know what the Shadow means, it represents the very god that created Shadow Magic, the first and greatest embodiment of darkness and chaos. So how did “The Shadow” shift from the Spiral’s darkness god to the mere queen of Khrysalis?

It’s most likely the result of Morganthe simply suppressing all forms of worship to propagate herself as both the god and ruler of Khrysalis. But what if this combined with the aforementioned change in the Children’s worldbuilding, and Morganthe’s supposed goal of being the Spiral’s “hero” fighting the forces of injustice. This is my idea:

In ancient Khrysalis, Grandfather Spider and his Children were worshipped by the people of Khrysalis as literal gods. The Rat, known as Father Rat, was worshipped by the Burrowers of Bastion and Hoppers of the Khonda Desert. Spider and the Scorpion, known as Father Scorpion, were worshipped by the Moon Cliffs’s Bees, the Hive’s Arachna, Sardonyx’s Mantises, and any other arachnid or insect race of Khrysalis. The Bat, known as Father Bat, actually wasn’t worshipped by Khrysalis races. Instead he’s worshipped by the creatures of Darkmoor to this day, and mentioned in reverence during Castle Darkmoor. Father Bat created Vampires, Werewolves, and everything that goes bump in the night. He also played an instrumental role in the spread of Necromancy, and is disheartened to witness its stigma as an “evil” magic.

Grandfather Spider has many more children than just the three animals we know and tolerate. He has at least twelve children, and they are vastly above Morganthe’s weight class. They are forces of nature beyond any magic user, and so is Raven’s own Children. The Titans set up the standard for divine progeny, and the Children of Light and Shadow are GOING to live up to that standard. No bitch ass Shonen MC WiZaRd is standing up to them.

Spider and his Children influence events and groups around the Spiral to culminate in their freedom. Wizard101′s storylines would be more complex and interwoven as a result. They’re virtually the Wizard101 equivalent of the God Hand.

Spider is ultimately a force of nature, not one side of a custody battle. He desires chaos and destruction because that's his purpose in the universe. Raven surprisingly is not the one who imprisoned him, but Grandfather Tree.

Grandfather Spider’s influence on the First World’s destruction doesn't only extend to the Titans. His direct shadowy creations and spider spirits had a major role to play.

Morganthe is even more of a parallel to the Wizard than in canon. She went on adventures both as a wizard and a pirate, she made many friends and was betrayed, she collected treasures, and was a hero. But unfortunately, she also witnessed many strange events coalescing across the Spiral. Whether they were big or small, subtle or obvious, Shadowy or not.

Morganthe’s ultimate motive as the Shadow Queen is to prevent the liberation of Spider and his Children. She is terrified of them. She has erased all forms of worship towards them, and made herself out as the Shadow. She wants to save the Spiral from the equivalent of Lovecraftian gods. This stems from the torture, mutation, and mental manipulation she suffered under the tutelage of the Magi and Spider’s hand. But perhaps more importantly, she’s very familiar with their God Hand-esque manipulation of the Spiral Worlds.

Grandmother Raven too influences events in the Spiral to liberate Spider. Manipulating Morganthe is one of those methods of influence, though not to the same extent as Spider’s manipulations. Morganthe hates Raven too.

Tagging @that-wizard-oki and @necrospellbinder. Their insight is so beautiful. I really think this rewrite change would capitalize on the parallels shown in canon and Morganthe’s wasted potential as a good character.

[black-rose-writings]

Limits of Grisha power pt. 1

I’ve been thinking about the limits (or more accurately, lack there of) of the Grisha abilities. Unfortunately this is not a post about them, but about the meta implications of their (non)existence. I’ll make that one soon, though, promise.

If you’re not familiar with the soft vs. hard magic system thing, here’s a basic explanation:

soft magic system - abilities and limitations of magic are not defined, vague or plot dependant. If there are rules, they’re often flexible or have a lot of loopholes.

hard magic system - abilities and limitations of magic are clearly defined. There are rules and they can’t usually be bent too much or only in very specific circumsances. Magic in a hard magic system has to be predictable and consistent.

Soft magic: Narnia, LotR, Game of Thrones/Song of Ice and Fire, Life is Strange, Star Wars

A lot of fairytales fall into that category too. Basically, you can explain almost anything with *waves hands* magic. Protagonists in these sorts of stories are usually not magic users themselves.

Hard Magic: classic example here is Full Metal Alchemist, though for example AtLA is usually categorized here.

Most superhero fiction also falls into this category. The protagonists are often magic users themselves and use that magic to solve their problems. The powers have limits so that the hero doesn’t look too overpowered and to avoid to avoid the questions of “why can’t they just use magic to solve problem X”.

A clasic example of a mixed/hybrid system is Harry Potter. There are some rules, but the rules are flexible and many of the rules are completely unexplained.

Neither system is better or worse that the other, but different places of the spectrum are better for different stories - soft magic systems are usually set-dressing and there is often a lesson at the core of the story. Hard magic systems are usually at the core of the story and can’t be separated from it.

Stories with soft magic system tend to be more character driven/focused than plot driven/focused, and vice versa.

Okay, now back to the Grisha.

The Grishaverse has a soft magic system and it’s a problem, for many reasons.

The first is that the story tries to convince us that it isn’t - calling the Grisha powers “Small science” and references to classes on “Grisha Theory” etc. The second is that the story is heavily plot-driven and at least in TGT, the character growth/development is minimal.

These both imply that the intention was to write a hard magic system and someone fucked it up.

It’s part of the bigger issue I mentioned here. The magic system, just like the rest of the worldbuilding, isn’t fit for the type of story LB wants to tell.

Or, in this case, how we’re expected to read that story.

The way we interpret the stories we read it based a lot on our experiences.

If you read the system as a hard one, you’ll end up constantly frustrated by the inconsistencies in it.

If you read it as a soft one, you’ll expect to see character growth and/or some lesson to be taken from the story and end up horrified by the terrible messages the story sends.

The best way I can explain it is that TGT tries to be too many things at once and fails at everything because of it.

[ato-matsuri]

On Agartha

Been a while since I’ve written a long text post, most of all one about Fate. It honestly inspires a lot of rambling in me, after all. But I don’t think, this time, it’s due to its good writing, the emotions it makes me feel, or anything good. This, my friend, is about Agartha. I should probably prelude that this contains a metric shit ton of Agartha spoilers. If you haven’t seen Agartha, and you’re actually wanting to see the story -- scroll past. But, having played through Agartha completely and rested on the story for a bit, I think I want to repeat what everyone else has for ages lol.

Agartha, on paper, is incredible. A subterranean world built off fantastical story off fantastical story, made by a woman known for her ability to weave story after story, within stories, on the fly, and from a database of every possible Arabian Nights tale. Where the fear Scheherazade has due to Shahryar's endless abuse and fearmongering has stretched even to men as a whole due to literal years of having to survive Shahryar. Where the only leaders were queens, where the only rebellion force was a man so horrifically corrupt that he'd easily fall for the tricks she played. Her intent -- to reveal magecraft forever, removing any power magecraft has, saving her from ever having to fight and face kings -- and die -- ever again. That... sounds pretty good when I describe it that way, huh? Now if only it were executed with any modicum of sense.

From the beginning, Agartha's writing struck me as remarkably odd. It was like I was watching someone desperately try to emulate Nasu's writing style -- but had absolutely no idea what made Nasu's writing so good. Its exposition dumps, rather than being interesting, ended up being thoroughly boring -- as they focused on the mundane, like the fact that moss glows to light up the landscape -- instead of the magical implications of a world like Agartha even existing to begin with. Albeit, with the mystery of Agartha at that time, we can safely assume that there wasn't much to focus on, but then why spend so damned long talking about this stuff?

The worldbuilding, while passable, feels fairly flawed in execution. The idea of a world made the way Agartha was could've made for some interesting commentary about the way men treated (and still do treat) women in modern society, but Agartha not only misses the point, but tumbles head-over-ass into the uncanny valley and makes the whole thing sound like a continent-wide BDSM session. There's barely any actual subtle or well-done symbolism to showcase misogyny in this way -- and while hyperbole can serve a good point at times, the hyperbole combined with the strangely sexual writing of these segments makes it feel less like commentary and more like a badly-done doujin.

For example -- El Dorado was as simple as it gets. Men are slaves/breeding machines/whatever. The whole 'breeding machine' thing is played off extensively, even with Penth -- a minor at this stage, mind you -- comments on using the protagonists as such breeding machines. I'll come back to this later, because this serves as another point.

Ys was a fucking cool concept -- a world ruled entirely by rampant consumerism and chaos. Men, in this world, are still second-class citizens, pretty much the playthings of the women around them. I say that Ys is the best kingdom comparatively, as it was at least more bearable than its other kingdoms, but it still felt weirdly sexual in its writing tone. Of course, following tone, Dahut (who I'll get back to later) smashes men constantly, and is very keen on fucking Guda as well, following a trend. It's played for comedy, mostly, but it's still uncomfortable as all hell. Even so, I note it's more bearable because it's a very slightly more subtle take on the whole 'misogyny' allegory -- these people are using men for basically whatever they want, and tossing them away after. I'd compare it to a few true crime cases of people who murdered, or assaulted women for no good reason at all, purely out of a want that was either denied (for good reason), or that the want itself was to inflict harm. While the allegory still does feel unintentional here, it's at least slightly less unintentional. It was probably mostly just by accident due to Agartha's generally uncomfortable writing style, but the allegory here feels a little more potent when it's not so blatantly a BDSM fic.

I hate the Nightless City, despite it again being a cool concept. A 'utopia' where speaking out at all means death -- where men are in concept free citizens, but in practice fall victim to the law if they look at someone funny. Again, in concept, great allegory. The law does not treat men and women the same -- and while it differs depending on the case which is preferred, the vast majority of the time, women are pretty much shafted by the legal system (see Brock Turner), especially in very conservative areas. Cases can be made for both genders being shafted, of course -- but for the purpose of this allegory, picking out the prejudices of the legal system against gender is a fair critique. But, like everything else Agartha does, these neat ideas fall flat in practice.

They barely touch at all on the allegory, and nobody seems to even realize it in the cast, making me further believe the allegories aren't intentional at all. In due fact, it's as if the writer didn't even realize that this could be read as an allegory. The men's plights make some sense, as they were yoinked out of nowhere into a world that hates them. But the Servants and Guda don't think about it at all past the 'wow men are slaves that sucks' -- barely even considering that this could be an allegory the world's creator made due to their own horrific circumstances. They do point this out, but to my knowledge, it's very late -- when Scheherazade's called on her bluff, only then is it ever mentioned, and only in passing at that. If anything, the fact they point this out so close to the ending makes the ending itself that much more insulting. But before I get to the ending, I think there's something else about Agartha that sets the scene for just how awful it is -- and that's the way the characters are written, and the dialogue that comes of it. For this, I'll split it up into the characters who portray this the most. I'll even describe their personalities in Agartha's context.

Guda: Crouching pervert, hidden Mash stan. A few non-sequiturs of Guda complimenting Mash despite the mood being completely broken by it. Guda's incapable of taking a situation seriously in Agartha, even when the world's basically due to be changed forever. They keep cracking jokes, creeping on Astolfo/d'Eon, and other such things even when people are literally dying all around him. For that matter, I clearly recall the scene where -- for no real reason -- Guda just changes gears with Mash in tow, and starts trying to decipher d'Eon's gender. There's absolutely no real context to this, nor any reason for Guda to do this. Further noted is the fact Guda has worked with d'Eon before, and should've probably realized d'Eon's situation by this point. The Nasuverse has always been a bit, er, behind on gender norms and such, but it's so prevalent in any scene with d'Eon it hurts -- especially in that particular scene.

Astolfo: Oddly enough, the most tolerable person here (sans one other person). Agartha's refusal to take itself seriously works remarkably well for Astolfo. And while Astolfo isn't exactly written well here either, the fact that Astolfo's always been a bit loopy makes them seem, well, more in character. They're responsible for some of the funnier moments in Agartha, with their input composing approximately 3/4 of the, like, seven or eight funny moments in Agartha proper. Even so, Astolfo's appearance sometimes hurts Agartha as much as they help it, probably since Astolfo is a bit of the reason Agartha won't take itself seriously.

d'Eon: Deserved fucking better. The previously mentioned scene was the worst offender by far in my eyes, with it coming out of fucking nowhere. d'Eon's paired with Astolfo as a buddy and fighting partner, which itself could've made for good material -- instead, d'Eon is constantly dragged into Astolfo's fanservice-y gimmicks, and d'Eon themselves are pretty often creeped on by Guda. I'd go out on a limb to say that d'Eon's implied dislike of gendered clothing (see the maid outfit) made their scenes wearing such outfits far more uncomfortable, especially with how distinctly sexual the Agartha humour is. I just hated it.

Columbus: I can't fucking believe I'm saying this, but Columbus was the funniest character in Agartha. And I don't even think that was intentional. Something about how unabashedly horrible he was caught me completely off guard -- I thought he'd end up sort of like Napoleon at a glance, someone whose Spirit Origin was completely changed due to Europe's collective worship of the dude -- but holy FUCK was I wrong. Something about the hilariously cursed faces Columbus pulls, combined with his loud-and-proud irredeemable evilness, made him a blast to watch -- and an even bigger blast to beat the shit out of. His, uh, toothy grin still cracks me up even a few weeks after playing it.

Penthesilea: One of a very large amount of people who really deserved better. She barely ever shows up -- and when she does, she voices her desire to turn Guda and co. into a breeding machine/slave (recall she's like. 16?), and pretty much throws the whole 'reasonable-ish zerk' thing out the window instantly, because Agartha decided to forego decent writing in favour of 'funny berserker hates achilles haha brrrrrr,' therefore losing pretty much all the characterization they could've given her. The lack of 'alternate views' that show her in greater detail make this far worse, which I'll go into later.

Dahut: God, wasted potential out the asshole! A woman who made an entire world that fucked around and needlessly consumed stuff, she's the epitome of such a belief. But that's all she is. I'd be able to forgive this awful writing if Scheherazade, who 'implanted' Drake onto Dahut, was a bad writer -- but she's fucking Scheherazade! Dahut's a completely flat character, who constantly tries to bed (and kill) Guda, and generally likes the idea of needless consumption. That's literally it. Again, could be explained if Dahut had difficulty keeping control of Drake's body and conscience -- but this isn't explored either! She's just a walking, talking missed opportunity.

Wu: God, look at her design. Do I even need to say more?! She falls under the same problem that the other rulers do -- shallow characterization, no opportunities to flesh them out, etc.

Scheherazade: She could've been so fucking amazing. Scheherazade's story is one ripe with interpretations the Fate series so loves to utilize -- and on paper, her character is amazing. It'd only be natural for someone like Schez to be this deeply traumatized after so many days on death's door -- not many could really get through that okay. The incredible storyteller who fears death, kings, and unconsciously, men as a whole -- creating Agartha as a subtle way of ensuring none of them harm her while she prepares her ultimate plan of revealing magecraft to the entire world. However, as with the other Agartha characters, she becomes cripplingly one-note. Bringing her fear of death above all else, she comes off as an unreasonable asshole, constantly freaking out about death and preserving exclusively herself to a fault. While one could argue it's partially due to a Pillar's influence, Phenex doesn't seem to have a hold on her at all -- it's a basic alliance, and nothing more, as the ending shows us. It just leaves her as a one-note death avoider, with no other character traits at all. I'd go into further detail, but I'm saving that for later.

Fergus: God fucking damnit, man. A literal child version of Fergus, who the entire cast constantly expects to sexually harass every woman in sight. He's a one-note flanderization of Fergus, just without the one character trait Agartha gave Fergus. It just makes him... boring, a character whose only character trait is his refusal to hit a woman. Like... Come on. The fact the entire team is so sure this literal child will start trying to hit on women is just uncomfortable to witness, and the fact he slowly starts gaining these traits feels less like him 'meeting his fate' as Fergus, and more like Agartha wants an excuse to sexually harass more of the cast.

The Fucking Ending I'm giving this its own category, because of just how much of a punch to the face it was. In short -- the plan to reveal magecraft is revealed, more jokes are made, bla bla bla. Agartha can't keep a serious mood at all. ...But the final few scenes take it to a whole other extreme.

Wu Zetian comes out of nowhere despite being squashed by Megalos earlier, stuffing Phenex into a pit of her weird water shit, placing Phenex in a state of 'life and death.' Child Fergus then sac's his own Spirit Origin to summon Fergus inside himself(???), thus gaining the power of Caladbolg to weaken Phenex enough for the player to destroy. ...However, Child Fergus just summoned Fergus inside his own body. So, what happens when you put Agartha!Fergus, a one-note sexual harasser, into the body of a child? You get the final scene of Agartha. For some reason, I guess you need more help from others to take out Phenex. To this end, Fergus decides to convince Schez to join their side. I'd like you to recall that FGO!Scheherazade is implied to have the trauma of Shahryar's abuse, sexual and physical, burned into her memory -- not just the whole death thing. In every form of the story, Shahryar abuses her in such a fashion almost nightly. It's to the point where Schez' first line of defence, and much of her skills, are as much oriented around storytelling as they are charm and seduction (moreso the former than the latter, albeit), because her defence mechanism was that as much as it was storytelling, to keep her abuser happy. This is a part of why Agartha is the way it is -- to keep such men away from her. Hell, there's not a single King in sight, save technically Fergus, and Chaldea's d'Eon and Astolfo. Fergus knows this. Hell, he heard this being called out. He's well aware how terrified she is. So, what does he do?

SEXUALLY HARASS HER. He claims she has to live to have kids. That men and women have to live to have kids. He claims that she should live, because he'd smash her. ...Now, that's insulting enough -- moreso, that it's played dead serious. Nobody even as much as calls him on such a shitty persuasion tactic, and nobody even mentions how awful it is to sexually harass a woman who'd been sexually assaulted at best for the better part of almost three straight years. AND IT. FUCKING. WORKS.

SCHEHERAZADE. IS IMPLIED. TO BE INTO IT.

And because of this, she's swayed to join the heroes and seal Phenex away for good -- giggling about how Fergus' worldview was partially correct even as she fades away. The epilogue features Fergus, sexually harassing Scheherazade ON SIGHT -- calling out 'tits on my 12:00' or whatever, as Scheherazade darts off. However, Schez isn't avoiding him due to trauma. She's avoiding it because, while she's into it, she doesn't want to 'die' so fast. This fucking ending highlights among the biggest issues with this damned Singularity. Even Blavatsky coming out of fucking nowhere to Deus Ex Machina a grail and help into Guda's hands -- despite seemingly being slaughtered by Columbus in a (admittedly a bit funny) way to get the base of the Resistance -- means nothing to me compared to the blatant slaughter of two characters at once. Fergus is a total horndog even outside of Agartha's reach, but he even notes he respects his partners' consent, and doesn't overstep his bounds if he makes them uncomfortable. Scheherazade isn't exactly trusting in the slightest, least of all in Agartha - she barely even begins trusting Guda due to Guda treating her with actual respect. Even then, she isn't actively prostrating herself for Guda in that sense, very likely due to the fact that's more of a defence mechanism to her rather than something she'd enjoy, due to extreme trauma. Albeit, Fate writing does leave the possibility in the air for Guda specifically, but that's very likely just due to Guda being Guda and being careful to treat her properly and help her than anything else (and also the whole 'self insert harem' thing, I guess, but that's a hell of a lot easier to ignore esp in contrast to Agartha) And yet, we see that epilogue, that butchers both of them in one fell swoop so badly that I almost ended up hating both of them. Agartha's biggest problem is that it tried to be deep and intriguing, while having the writing quality of the goddamned Valentine's events. It picked all the right characters to have an incredibly intriguing storyline, and fell flat because the author decided that playing sexual harassment, d'Eon's everything, and even the most serious scenes for comedy was more important than telling a story even half as meaningful as the chapters before it. Lo and behold -- to my knowledge, Minase wrote it. Of course he did. He chose the best, the most interesting characters he could find, and made them so fucking one-note that the story lost all its charm in moments. He chose to emulate Nasu without understanding what made Nasu's writing so good. He chose to make Agartha a laugh fest despite simultaneously trying to make it 'deep.' He chose to fall head-over-ass over a possibly interesting allegory into misogyny and fall right into sexualizing it to the point of feeling like a femdom BDSM fic. And go figure the only character he did decently was Christopher fucking Columbus. I have a hatred for Agartha I can't reasonably place anywhere else. Prillya was just as shitty, but I ignored it, because Prillya itself wasn't great, so of course the crossover sucks too. Valentine's events written by him weren't great, but whatever, it's a Valentine's event. Septem, written by someone else, was similarly not great. But it wasn't insulting. It simply wasn't great, and had a lot of wasted potential. But its ending wasn't out of character to the point of being insulting. Its story didn't make incredible mythological and historical figures too infuriating to like anymore. It didn't almost ruin entire Fate characters for me. Not the way Agartha did. I should probably contextualize that Scheherazade is among my favourite mythological figures. I introduced myself to her through Magi (lmao) due to further research into the base stories -- as well as a favourite Magic: The Gathering card, Shahrazad, which forced you to play a game within your game, like how Arabian Nights featured stories within stories.

Even in Fate outside of Agartha, I liked her. Her design didn't make much sense to me considering her character, but whatever, I didn't need to think too hard of it. It's just a design, and despite my hatred of Penth's design, I still love Penth as a character, so I can handle Schez. But Agartha painted her in such a way that all the subtlety and interesting parts of Schez went completely out the window. No longer was there any hidden references to the aftereffects of her life beyond 'i dun wan die,' and there was hardly an ounce of sympathy or kindness in her bones at all. While her being an anti-hero made some sense, especially as she was only a normal person with far above-average storytelling prowess, there was a point when she stopped being a 'good, but terrified person' and started being a complete asshole. And Agartha was that time. If it weren't for her Interlude, which redeemed her considerably, and Ooku, which did wonders for her character despite being written by Minase (as I believe Nasu was overseeing him at that point), I very likely would've never gone for her at all, despite my love of the myth. In Conclusion This rant is just to say that Agartha is bad. Horrific. Insulting, even. At every step where it could've been good, it tumbled head-over-ass into the most insulting, uncomfortable shit you could imagine. It failed to take itself seriously, and paced itself like a comedy event, but simultaneously acted as if it expected its audience to take it seriously. Like a clown brigade deciding to take on Les Mis, it loses all of its punch when every few lines is interrupted by a jab at Fergus, sexual harassment, or something that comes close to being cool before suddenly turning into a badly-timed joke, or suddenly becoming laden with dialogue so sexual it feels straight out of a porno. It's aggravating, awful, and with only brief reprieves of bareable comedy in between long, long lengths of hellish text and awful characterization. The only good part was the gameplay -- which, laden with interesting mechanics not seen elsewhere, was legitimately fun. My take? Avoid all Agartha cutscenes and plot, and just play the gameplay. The gameplay's fun, and if enjoyed on its own, would probably make for a far better experience than observing the story surrounding it. But good gameplay doesn't make up for a horrible story, especially in a game where plot is as important as it is in F/GO. Agartha's a pile of shit in my eyes, but that's ultimately only my opinion, and nothing more. If others have an opinion counter to mine, that's completely fine -- and don't let this analysis ruin your fun with Agartha if you enjoyed its plot. To be frank, I'd be happy if you enjoyed it where I could not. And if you think my takes are misinformed, or if I missed a spot (or overreacted to a spot), that's what the reblogs and comments are for! I'm definitely not the kind of dude who has the final say in matters like this -- this is only what I picked up. Thank you for reading!

[bookwyrminspiration]

Continuing your point from your last two posts, it feels like the elves have basically lost their sense of curiosity and/or any desire to make something new. They know everything, so what’s the point of looking for something interesting? Their world is (supposedly) perfect, so why try to improve it?

Honestly, speaking from my own interest in space, not knowing is part of what makes it so interesting. There’s something under the south pole of the moon, we know it’s there but we don’t know what it is. We’re pretty sure dark matter exists, but we don’t know what exactly it is. We have our theories about what it’s like inside a black hole, but we might never know for sure.

And if you look at the style of their lessons, it’s literally just an hour-long (or however long their classes are) lecture, and then some homework. No questions or projects or even being around other students to talk about what you’ve learned.

Their society is just so anti-innovation and really shows in how they try to keep everyone separated and imply that working in a group to achieve something is bad. One elf is responsible for almost all the technology of the Lost Cities (Dex’s Technopathy mentor, I forget her name). Their government is twelve people with absolute power over everything. They all live in large houses away from everyone, even in cities.

Sorry that got a bit long.

don’t worry, you have nothing to apologize for!! /g

you’re absolutely correct!! They’re not curious anymore. They think their world is perfect, so not only do they not try to improve, I don’t think they believe they can improve. How can you build upon perfection? You can’t. That’s what perfect means.

And the only hands-on classes they have are repeating information that’s already been discovered. Sophie followed alchemy recipes, and she listened to the exact directions from that one gnomes in her gardening class (it wasn’t called that but I don’t remember what it was). There’s nothing new.

I feel the same as you do about space, except my subject of interest is the history of medicine. And part of what keeps me so enraptured is everything we’ll never know. So many texts were burned in the library of Alexandria that we’ll never get back and everything else is like a puzzle that can never be fully finished and it’s fascinating.

You’re very right. They don’t like change and new and innovation. They only build new things when they think it’s absolutely necessary (like Sophie’s ability restrictor). Maybe that’s part of why I like Tinker. She fiddles with things just because she can. And the thing about their houses being so far apart is right. It’s strange. They have very little connection with one another, like there’s nothing of interest to talk about and nothing new so they just keep to themselves.

It was probably all unintentional but it’s absolutely fascinating to think through the implications everything has. I think people always had an answer for Sophie because shannon needed a way to introduce worldbuilding, but it also spiraled into this entire society with no drive to create because they already have everything.

[theoriginalcarnivorousmuffin]

I was thinking of your second point, of how HP world is good worldbuilding in some aspects and absurd from a certain perspective and... isn't our world has absurd "world building" sometimes? Agriculture with millions of death every year and it seems like most people don't even care? if you think about it from a certain perspective, it's a fucking nightmare. Discriminating on the basis of skin _color_ which doesn't even make any real difference? Wtf. And don't get me started about politics.

Well, that certainly got very real and very dark.

This is all true but not exactly what I meant when I called JKR’s world building absurd sometimes.

Had she played it straight, clearly intended to portray the wizarding world as the horrific dystopia I see it as, then it’d be a masterpiece of world building. Granted, it’d be a very depressing story and satire of reality, but as you point out reality is very flawed like that.

There are some deep, deep, issues in our world that always bear keeping in mind or addressing.

My issue comes down to that JKR clearly wasn’t going for that direction. The Death Eaters are obviously bad but we’re supposed to think Arthur Weasley is a cool dude (and not pretty fly for a white guy), Hagrid is a great professor (who doesn’t routinely and gleefully endanger children), Sirius Black is a wonderful innocent guy (and not someone who tried to use his friend to murder a poor discriminated against student for shits and giggles), Hermione Granger is a hero (and not the kind of person whose acts of retribution are horrifying and believes she has the right to overwrite people’s entire lives). 

So we get this very strange rosy tinted glasses from Harry that he desperately tries to tell us aren’t rosy tinted and that the wizarding world is a wonderful place where a quarter of the population is unrepentantly evil but that’s just fine and aside from them there’s no racism against muggles, homophobia, racism period, rape, murder, and once we kill Voldemort everything will be perfect. Harry names his son after the bravest men he knows!

JKR also has a bad habit of introducing suddenly plot convenient devices without fully realizing what such devices would mean. Take the time turners. The wizarding world having access to time machines, being so blithe about them that they’re given to a thirteen year old girl for her classes, should have changed the entire story. Voldemort, as JKR intends him, is crazy enough to try to go back in time and Terminate all of this. If he isn’t, then Bellatrix sure as hell is. You can’t casually introduce time machines into a series, they are the ultimate Chekov’s Gun. And yet JKR does and then they all get conveniently smashed in fifth year so she never has to worry about them again. Well, not until her questionable sequel. 

I consider this very bad world building. Prisoner of Azkaban was great and all but you can’t muck around with time machines unless you really want to get into the implications of mucking around with time machines. Which she clearly didn’t.

That said, credit where credit is due, JKR built a world that the world itself has fallen in love with. It’s creative, it’s fun, and everyone wants to go to Hogwarts. My god, people in the real world play quidditch, if that doesn’t say something about her ability to craft this world I don’t know what does. 

But I sort of talked around your point, didn’t I? Society’s complicated, often filled with awful things. I like to think there’s good and there’s bad but there is certainly a whole lot of bad that we should acknowledge. You could say JKR’s world is like that, except I would give her a lot more credit if that was what she had set out to do.

But everyone besides me would hate her books as Harry Potter written in such a way to convey what the wizarding world really is would be the most horrifying thing in the universe. 

[kinkymagnus]

20, 21, 25!!! for the ask game, please 💖 [also, hiii!!!]

thank you!!!! (also hii!!) i fuckign love video gaem im nerd

20 and 21. Book that would make a good game + Show/movie that would make a good game?

FUCK uhhhh first some reason my first thought was Artemis Fowl but I.... don’t think that would actually work. 

Okay, what’s really interesting is storytelling in different mediums, and one problem with taking a story that is written for a book or a show or a movie, is that it is written for that format. There are some that would make the transition pretty well, even though it might sacrifice parts of the story. Like, it’s harder to get thoughts or feelings a character has without awkward narration, and usually impossible to get good facial expressions or subtle body language cues and that kind of thing. 

I’m mostly talking written/screen to video game, but there are also notable differences between books and tv/movies that are probably why most adaptations are so infamously bad. Things like the amount of information that can be compressed for consumers of the media, the type of information such as inner thoughts/feelings and random worldbuilding details, and pacing. Both mediums have their strengths and weaknesses--the screen can be more immersive, and show you really cool ways of looking at things, and also allow for certain silent dialogue like body language or just more subtle implications (such as background characters behaving a certain way or expressions gone unmentioned) but also they can’t really do things that books can.

Video games have their own strengths and weaknesses, too. The interactive medium allows for all sorts of cool things you just absolutely cannot do in the same way in these other mediums. My favorite is probably environmental storytelling and the ways you can get stories across both purely from the setting around you (like in the Fallout game I forget the name of with the underwater city, or in Breath of the Wild with the ruins scattered around Hyrule, or basically all of Hollow Knight’s storytelling) and from little bits of scattered lore that you have to piece together into your own interpretation of what happened. (Again, Hollow Knight does this amazingly.)

So like, some stories can benefit from that, particularly either stories with a strong setting with good worldbuilding to base that on, or stories that would benefit from adding that yourself (although people might argue on whether it counts as canon or not). 

So the question is to really think about what kind of books, tv shows, and movies can benefit from being directly interacted with and even changed by the player, what ideas can play out through simple environments a player can move around or in small boxes of flavor text to be pieced together, what stories can be conveyed that can benefit from being actively sought out rather than directly fed to the person consuming them. Something like Artemis Fowl doesn’t work, because there’s a set linear narrative and the choices that are made rightfully should be set. While a game completely separate from the Artemis Fowl stories with its own characters simply set in Haven City could be really interesting (such as the life of a LEP officer who isn’t famous and tangling with humans constantly, or even the life of a dwarf or a goblin or whatever, perhaps even with multiple choices of class and species--?) it wouldn’t really be an Artemis Fowl adaption so much as a spin off or addition to the universe. It could be really interesting, as for a cool as fuck city of fairies Haven City isn’t really discussed or explored all that much, but it wouldn’t be a true adaptation. It’d be inspired by, if anything.

I honestly can’t think of any books/movies/tv shows off the top of my head that necessarily would make a good game. 

There are a few I could see being mildly fun--perhaps a sci fi survival game based on The Martian, a Mission: Impossible spy game, or (and I think this would be fun, tbh) a fantasy/mystery retrieval game based on The Librarians or Warehouse 13. I wouldn’t even mind seeing what a skilled game designer could do with A Series of Unfortunate Events, although I’d have no idea where to start. 

The problem is mostly those stories being kind of linear and set. The player can’t really affect them, so to be effective it’d be better if it was a new story entirely merely in that universe, rather than just an adaptation of the original canon. For example, playing Lord of the Rings simply would not be the same as watching it or reading it. There’s no way to really make it organic or have that same amount of emotion.

While it’s not impossible to have a linear set story for a player to follow (See The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, which has issues, but is definitely playable and enjoyable) it’s not really the same if you not only know the whole story but feel like you’re not actually part of it. You can have quick time events to see if Bilbo really got the the ring, or a sequence where you play as Legolas mowing down orcs, but it won’t really be the same. 

Sorry for the long and unnecessarily pretentious answer, this is just something I’ve been really interested in lately so I overthought it like hell.

25. What power-up or ability would you want irl?

Real answer: shapeshifting. This is cheating as it’s more superpower than actually video game related, but like, still.

But answering more properly to the spirit of the question... The things that come to mind for me are Revali’s Gale (just fucking whooshes into the air lmao), Shape of Unn charm (turns into snail and wiggle lol), and Shade Cloak (nyooms through things by becoming a shadow).

Wait, actually, forget all that. I want to be Link from Link Between Worlds, turning into a painting and shit for fun. That sounds rad as hell. Look at me, I’m a cool funky little crayon drawing. Sike! I’m 3D now! 

[rosalind-of-arden]

Paper and Fire reread, chapters 1-3

Here we go with book 2! Once again, I will be looking at the relationship between Wolfe and Morgan, symptoms of Santi’s PTSD, and general worldbuilding details that may be fun for fics. I will probably also end up adding other stuff that catches my eye. Especially where Wolfe is concerned. Because I am predictable like that.

The Artifex describes Thomas as “outwardly cooperative and inwardly quite stubborn” and says that he hasn’t seen anyone like this since Wolfe. First of all, just how many people have you had thrown in prison and tortured for comparison, Artifex? Second, interesting detail about how both Thomas and Wolfe reacted to torture, at least some of the time. (Looks like their response is quite normal and realistic, actually.) Assuming Wolfe was like this more toward the beginning, since the Qualls letter in Smoke and Iron makes it sound like he was less cooperative by the end.

Santi is running interference for Wolfe and trying to keep him away from his class. Assuming they’re using paper notes here, and Santi intercepted it before Wolfe could see it? Or, Wolfe did see it, but Santi won that fight.

This report on Morgan is eerily similar to the one on Thomas. She’s stubborn. Attempts at coercion aren’t working. She’s extremely intelligent and has tried to find her way out of her situation.

So... six months. Three refusals. Morgan has irregular, or at least very long, cycles.

Either Caine is getting some extremely disturbing implications past the radar here, or she had no idea how cycle charting for purposes of conception actually works, particularly in someone with irregular cycles. Or, um, steampunk medical magic strikes again?

Ugh, the clinical language being used to describe the whole breeding system. “proper charts and anaylsis” “time for propagation” “compulsory procedure.” Congratulations, Gregory, you are the creepiest person in this series. Meanwhile, here’s one more horrific thing Keria Morning lets slide.

“The local fashion was to shave all body hair, even eyebrows.” I just want to know if any of our main characters have done this. Jess would notice if any of his friends or dads had no eyebrows, right? Who am I kidding, Jess is oblivious. Important detail for sex club crowd scenes here, folks.

Oh, look, it’s the Artifex trying to kill Wolfe again.

Where, relative to places like the Lighthouse and the Serapeum, is this gigantic High Garda compound, anyway? Jess walks everywhere. But they take a transport across the training ground. Just one exercise area has multiple blocks. I have no sense of direction and I cannot create a mental map of all this. Maybe High Garda compound at the edge of the city, front gates, barracks, etc. within walking distance of other important downtown destinations, then the training grounds continue on a long way past that?

Feng is in charge here, but the other soldiers present seem to be Santi’s people? Or did Botha get reassigned? Or, everyone there is on orders from the Artifex, whether they know it or not, and the Artifex is enough of a dick to want one of Santi’s soldiers to have be the one to report that Wolfe is dead?

So, for ranks, we’ve got Squad Leader, Sergeant, Centurion, Lieutenant, Captain, High Commander, and I’m not entirely sure I have the hierarchy right there, or if I’m missing any. How many of each to a company?

The guns confuse me so much. These have “live stunning rounds” and “half-strength regular rounds”. Are these energy weapons of some sort? Because actual bullets don’t come in “half strength” and guns that fire bullets can’t also fire taser darts. That’s just not how firearms work. For that matter, why do these “half-strength” rounds even exist? If they cause damage, and stun rounds exist, why not just use the stun when you don’t want someone dead and the regular when you do? Having a whole category of ammo just for maiming people seems... fuck, actually, it seems exactly like something the Library would do. Never mind, carry on then.

Desert camouflage Scholar’s robes are a thing. Of course they are. 

So, Wolfe’s hair here: “a tangled mix of black and gray.” There was no gray in Ink and Bone. How long does it take for hair to change color like that? Google is not being all that helpful on this, but it sounds like it takes years under normal circumstances. So, options: 1. It’s not THAT much gray, but Jess is a teenager and thinks it is. 2. Stress and trauma make these things happen faster. 3. Wolfe has been coloring his hair, probably since he recovered from Rome, when trauma set off that particular premature aging process. He stopped with the hair dye due to stress/trauma/not giving a fuck anymore. I think I favor 3 with a generous handful of 2 and a dash of 1 mixed in.

Jess is an adorably unreliable narrator, thinking Wolfe must be there because Santi was threatened.

Wolfe is a gloriously snarky ass. But also, Wolfe is more of an ass when stressed, and by Jess’s observations, he hasn’t been eating or sleeping right. Neither have you, Jess.

Wolfe knows where the books are. “Jess wondered if he’d been told more than they had.” Yes, Jess, at least that much more. Well, ok, he could have scouted it himself, stolen documents, or something like that as opposed to being told.

Glain is ridiculously smart to aim at Jess here. First, he might be compromised and trying to hurt Wolfe for all she knows. Second, even if she trusts him, she’s being watched. If she shows that she trusts him right away, that’s suspicious.

Wolfe, being both heartbreaking and sexy in the same paragraph. He can outdo a teenager (who is probably smaller than him) at getting through a tight space, even when he’s tired and stressed. But he won’t take a gun because he wants his death to be suspicious.

Glows, at least some varieties, are a “milder version of Greek fire” that produces light without exploding. I barely passed high school chemistry, but by that description, I think Jess is even worse at it than I am. Or, um, hey, it’s steampunk magic alchemy, so sure, why not?

No, Jess, don’t immediately listen to the man who has lived in Egypt for 40 years about how to deal with the local wildlife. Never send this boy to Australia. 

Caretaker Wolfe! All this physical contact makes me wonder if he isn’t using his tiny bit of Obscurist ability without even knowing it. Also, Medica training? He probably has Medica training.

Unreadable looks between Wolfe and Santi. Again. Jess, that look and Wolfe not being surprised at the arrest are giant fucking clues that he and Santi have planned this much. Being arrested, under normal circumstances, would be traumatic for Wolfe, probably enough for even Jess the Oblivious to see.

That fucking journal. The angst. The calculation. Trauma as performance art. 

“Leaving you means giving up on a better world”, so... that’s not just romantic angst for the benefit of any Obscurist/Artifex reading. Here, again, everything Wolfe hopes for is pinned on Santi’s career. Back in Ink and Bone, they decided not to run away from or openly fight the Library. Their only hope of changing things is for Santi to reach a high enough rank to have that level of influence. And Wolfe does not have that kind of patience.

[tropesaretools]

Writing Summaries for Ask Blogs

It’s inevitable. If you require any sensitivity readers, or if you are trying to get a general handle if your premise has a problem that can be spotted in the premise stage, you need to write a summary.

This summary differs from a book summary in that the goal isn’t to sell the story to a potential reader. It also can differ from any sort of general summary of events, because the events might not be that relevant to the actual question.

A summary for receiving help must include:

Any necessary objective descriptors such as the ethnicity, orientation, abled/well status, class, gender, etc

The specific plot/worldbuilding/character identity point you are asking about. Note the word specific. Questions like “what are the general microaggressions of [group/ demographic]?” are extremely difficult to answer, are googleable, and chances are have already been answered by the blog

Relevant backstory. Mentioning your chronically ill character was mistreated by doctors when their symptoms began showing up because they were “too young” for them is important. But going into gory detail over every single specialist and misdiagnosis is tedious to read through.

That’s it. If you include the relevant adjectives and setting/leadup, you’re done.

You should question including:

Favourite classes or current profession. Sometimes these things must be asked, because certain jobs and certain favourite classes have huge unfortunate implications. But unless those are the specific points you’re asking about, they’re unnecessary

Hobbies and fashion sense. Again, sometimes these things must be asked (“are there specific fashion considerations for wheelchair users who have some ability to walk/get in and out of their chair unassisted”) but if you’re just tossing them in to show how “well rounded” the character is, chuck ‘em.

Pet peeves and nicknames. Unless you’re discussing certain microaggressions in order to fully flesh out their identity and their relationship to it, we don’t need to know they hate being called a stereotypical nickname. And even then, if it ends up being something like “hates being called by [name of their most popular media representation]”… that’s a given in a lot of situations

These are things that sometimes relate to the plot, sometimes don’t. If you find yourself going “this is on my character sheet as a field, I should include it so they know everything” or “this is what I have used to prove the character is of x group”… cut it.

You generally don’t need to:

Describe every single situation ever. We rarely need to know that the character changed schools x times because something happened each time; just say it was multiple and move onto the relevant portion

Give more than one or two characters’ situations. Sometimes getting into sprawling relationship trees is necessary to get full understanding— but those situations are few and far between. If you’re asking, specifically, about a brother and sister who are away from home, the most we need to know is how their parents encouraged or discouraged the behaviour when they were children… and that can be a single sentence. 

Give the whole sociological landscape. If you’re asking about how classism and poverty intersect, this is something that the person you are asking (the person who has lived this) already knows, or they have friends who know

Explain the basic concepts you are using. Again, this is something the person you are asking will know (don’t ask how many questions I have read where a non-Native person has explained Native concepts to me. Or a non-Asian person explaining Asia. It’s a lot)

This category is broken down into 2 parts:

1- Ask about one thing at a time

2- The person you are asking is an expert

On point 1: It takes a very long time to generate an answer about questions that contain more than one plot point. You are, in essence, asking for a full beta service… for free. Respect their time and ask about a single chunk at once to keep the answering process smooth. If you have more questions later, ask them later. If you want your whole story done, pay them.

On point 2: If you have gone to a blog, especially a sensitivity reader/personal experience blog, and feel the compulsion to explain the basic concepts that are part of their world, you have just insulted their knowledge and placed yourself in the expert position. This leaves an extremely sour taste in the blog runner’s mouth, and lowers the chances of your question getting answered (and/or increases the chances of you receiving a callout instead of an answer) exponentially.

Trust us. We get a lot of asks. Every writing blog does. We know how to answer questions! But you have to be specific in what you’re asking for us to give you a good answer.

Thanks for reading! If you liked this content, please consider supporting me on patreon. It’ll get you access to a bunch of cool stuff!

[scrawnydutchman]

Why “The Ricklantis Mixup” Should be Awarded (SPOILERS)

So for those followers of my blog about entertainment (with a primary focus on animation) may have read before, I made an article about Season 3 of Rick and Morty. The article highlighted some issues the viewing public had at the time (when the latest episode was Pickle Rick), and was all about me giving my take on why people may have been disillusioned with the way the series was going. In it I proclaimed it was possible that the show was running out of ways to surprise us as an audience: that it’s gone so far in establishing it’s own sense of charm and storytelling that audience members aren’t reacting as much as they did when the show first launched and that the show was losing it’s core ability to surprise us. Allow me to refute my statements.

I was VERY wrong.

Because holy SHIT was “The Ricklantis Mixup” a good episode. Before anyone points it out, I know the news of this episode dropping is long past and there’s been another decent episode to come out since then (and another episode dropping tomorrow no less), but I don’t care. This episode is a storytelling masterpiece that deserves to be talked about more. Not only is it hilarious, not only is it shocking, not only is it everything we love about any Rick and Morty episode, but it manages to accomplish in 20 minutes what some television programming fails to accomplish in entire seasons. It truly is groundbreaking in multiple areas and sits with me in a way no Rick and Morty episode has ever done before or since. That includes my all time favorite episode “The Rick’s Must be Crazy”. So let’s break down why this episode is just so amazing into 3 different sections: Worldbuilding, Voice performance and storytelling from multiple perspectives.

1. Worldbuilding

When developing a narrative in a fictionalized world, an important but often overlooked aspect is making your setting believable and interesting. The location in which all the events take place is a character onto itself, and is enriched by the architecture featured, the societal system inhabiting it (if any), and of course the world’s inhabitants. Batman wouldn’t be as interesting without Gotham city, it’s villains and it’s cops. Another point about worldbuilding is that often times in order to do some substantial development you have to step away from your main characters for a time. Let the audience know what’s going on in the universe besides the misadventures of Rick and Morty. This episode does precisely that (but not without a classic misleading teaser from the writing staff). We’re treated to finding out what ever happened to the now disbanded council of Rick’s and the Morty’s left without Rick’s in an episode that is a “Tales of Springfield’ kind of narrative where we just follow the everyday lives of Ricks and Mortys just trying to cope in a new society they’ve created complete with an economy, a democracy, a justice system and prejudice. We get to see what life on the Citadel is like from multiple perspectives from Morty’s living in the Ghetto to Rick’s coping with middle class jobs that undermine their intelligence . . . and a Morty running for president. Not only are we treated to multiple perspectives but we’re also given a mesh of different genres, including a buddy cop homage, a political drama and a buddy road trip adventure following a group of runaway Mortys. In just 20 minutes they manage to establish a convincing and compelling world that eerily mirrors our own in spite of only featuring two kinds of people in it. The irony is this Citadel world is more like city life than the actual stand in city that the Smith family live in. What’s cool about each of these stories going on is that while they seem disjointed and unrelated, they all prove to contribute to a larger overarching conspiracy, leading to the biggest plot twist the show was ever given us. It gets especially grim in the last minute when in just a few flashes we learn how all the characters we got attached to lives changed and they don’t even completely understand why. All along the way we get sprinkles of commentary about prejudice, morality, the meaning of life, what it truly means to be happy, whether or not we can escape being cogs in the machine known as society, and so much more delivered in that signature “Rick and Morty” way where the answer is hilariously pessimistic. It’s the last thing I would have expected from an episode titled ‘The Ricklantis Mixup’ but God am I glad I got it. It makes the universe of Rick and Morty infinitely more fresh and immersive than it would have been had they never gone this route.

2. Voice Performance

So let’s talk about the voice acting for a second. This episode is comprised entirely, ENTIRELY, of different versions of Ricks and different versions of Mortys, with the only exceptions being a quick voice clip of a young Beth and a narrator for the “Simple Rick’s” commercial. That means JUSTIN ROILAND IS 98% OF THE DIALOGUE IN THIS EPISODE. That alone should earn him an Emmy for outstanding character voice-over performance. I can’t imagine how his voice must have felt after pulling off an episode like this. What’s interesting about this is that while you’d think listening to the same two voices for twenty minutes would get incredibly annoying and would make your ears hurt, especially since this guy is most noted for playing comically annoying characters like Lemongrab, surprisingly this episode never suffers from that problem (in my opinion). I think what contributes to this is the fact that despite everyone having the same voice their personalities and overall characters are JUST distinct enough to let us know who is supposed to be who, even if we aren’t watching the visuals. Plus each character is just so engaging that it makes the voices easy to look past. Not to mention all the different accents and speech patterns Justin put on to make this episode work. The overall execution of this episode through dialogue and visual storytelling is excellent, but of course a major contributor is just how natural every character feels. For one man to be single handedly responsibly for pulling that off is no small feat.

3. Storytelling from Multiple Perspectives

So as mentioned before, this episode’s story is told from several different perspectives within the citadel. This further compliments the world built for us because we get to hear different opinions on how it is, and we get to see how different kinds of people cope with their situations. Following each and every character around in this story is a blast, and it involves some genuinely heartfelt moments that immediately creates sympathy within the audience. This show has an uncanny knack for that. We get to visit different locations, see Ricks and Mortys in different occupations, and every nook and cranny of this episode is a distinct parallel to how things are in the real world. Every character also gets their own unique conflict. The Morty cop is so deeply troubled and disillusioned by the abuse done to him by Ricks that in order to survive he got hard and ruthless, not even sympathizing for other Mortys. The Rick cop shows initial implications of prejudice towards Mortys but is revealed to be a by-the-books golden boy officer who learns that everything he was taught will only increase his likelihood of getting killed. We see a Rick assembly line worker struggling with finding his own happiness because he knows his potential is far greater than just assembling packaged processed desserts. We see a group of schoolboy Mortys run away from their prescribed destiny on the small smidgen of hope that they can change their lives for the better. And of course underneath it all is a harebrained scheme from a certain evil Morty to take hold of the citadel . . . and winning. This episode goes above and beyond in creating a believable world with a slew of likable characters, and tells a story in a very progressive and interesting way where everything neatly ties together in the end for, once again, the best plot twist this show ever threw at us. 

Man oh man, WHAT an amazing episode. It goes in a completely unexpected direction, creates a much more interesting world than we could have ever thought, gives us a whole lineup of lovable characters and executes the most mindblowing ending we’ve seen in a long time, performed entirely by one man . . . all in 20 minutes or less. Try to pitch this kind of episode to any other board room and the board would call you insane, but the Rick and Morty team pulled it off. I really hope the time comes when this episode is majorly recognized as some of the best and most effective entertainment tv has seen in the long time.

[bambamramfan]

“Read another book”

One of the most common refrains in left-of-center twitter has been people making jokes about the current political situation via Harry Potter or Game of Thrones (often but not always, liberals with a focus on identity politics) and leftists looking for a fight responding with “read another book!” and denunciations of this sort of pop-culture focused political analysis. (Freddie deBoer was an obsessive of this particular contrarianism.)

My blog started as a 30 part series analyzing the political implications of the Star Wars Prequels, so I’m not exactly neutral in this fight.

But it’s also true that these tweets trying to serve as a rallying cry equating voters for Hillary Clinton with Dumbledore’s Army are repetitive and banal. They seem to be failing in a particular way, over and over again, that does invite some generalization.

And the distinction you want to make is between Immersion vs Analysis.

SMG:

The longer answer is that the memes reflect an extremely pervasive nerd ideology.

Nerdism places incredible emphasis on continuity, so a film that eschews this is incomprehensible. Note how, despite the film being incredibly stylized, the conversation over Fury Road is dominated by plot synopses and descriptions of the worldbuilding. Things like Max's ability to predict the future are ignored. When the ultimate objective is to catalog plot points on wookiepedia, the fact that Optimus Prime disappears between shots is a threat.

There are also elaborate fantasies of Bay as a despotic sexual harasser, which overwhelm and terrify the Tumbler subset of nerds. In this view, Bay is responsible for the theft of society and we can have a pure liberal multiculture if we simply eliminate people like him through advanced twitter shame-campaigns. Reddit MRAs call meme-repetition 'signal boosting'. In Fury Road, Immortan Joe is exactly such a Michael Bay figure: he loves big cars, explosions, and literally holds Rosie Huntington-Whiteley captive. So Fury Road provides a variant on 'Joss Whedon' liberal feminism, where we enjoy Joe's evil - but only so long as he's badly beaten up at the end. Have your cake and eat it.

This is part-and-parcel with the above. Nerds demand an immersive franchise universe (e.g. the 'MCU', the Star Wars EU, the Alien 'Quadrillogy'.) and ideological purity. Oppression cannot be presented as systemic. It must always be a moral threat from 'outside the universe'. Luke Skywalker is 'natural', and Jar Jar Binks is an artificial imposition by Lucas, the degenerate.

(The same phenomenon occurs when a superhero is recast as black, or female. The normal crass commercialism of comic films is suddenly unacceptable, suddenly perceived as an artificial imposition by 'SJWs'.)

It is immoral for Bay to depict a woman as powerless. Megan Fox's character 'dresses like a slut', but not in an 'empowering' way. Even though, in the films, this character trait stands for her misguided attempt to escape poverty by selling herself, class-ignorant nerds vacillate between slut-shaming Fox and demonizing Bay. The skimpy clothes in Fury Road are acceptable because they are imposed by Joe.

As I noted much earlier in the thread, Fury Road's narrative structure is identical to the entire 6-film Star Wars series - but condensed into a single film, scrubbed of objectionable/satirical content, and presented in chronological order so that it ends with the triumph of the liberal rebellion. The meme-elevation of George Miller to greatest living filmmaker is likewise a condensed, inverted version of the ridiculous meme-demonization of figures like George Lucas and Shyamalan.

People who literally do not know what cinematography is now write book-length fantasies about how 'lazy' JJ Abrams is, or devote entire webseries to debating whether Matthew Vaughn is racist. It's a false progressivism based around punishing celebrities' perceived sins - lust, greed, sloth, etc. - via endless twitter campaign.

No nerd has ever gotten insanely mad at (say) Wim Wenders or Jane Campion, and nobody gave a thought about Miller when he made Babe and Happy Feet. But once someone makes a film in a science fiction/superhero franchise universe... God help us all.

And most of these “rallying cry” tweets and macros can be read as the same desire for immersion into the franchise universe. What Hogwarts House are you? Or more politically, don’t you want to be there when Harry defeats Voldemort? Because your fight is just like the fight of the good guys vs bad guys in that franchise.

This is usually bad and I agree with the dismissal of it.

But if you’re using the art for actual analysis, that’s great. That’s what art is for. It presents a subjective truth about the world, that we can use to understand our own circumstance.

For instance, in Harry Potter, you could write about how Slytherin represents a fantasy of the reactionary elite who want membership to be determined mostly by birth, whereas Gryffindor represents a meritocratic elite, that definitely posits some people as better, more important, and worthy of special treatment above others, but instead of merely being based around birth, allow in special exceptions for people smart enough, hard working enough, or charismatic enough.

(There’s exceptions to these, like Slugworth or Diggory, but these are broadly the camps the people from those houses stand for -- with Ravenclaw being the weirdo-uselessly-smart-people, and Hufflepuff being everyone-else-who-has-nothing-but-eachother.)

This makes Gryffindor of course, analogous to Western capitalism. Most people are oppressed, but there is hope for the Hermione’s of the world, etc.

See, I wrote a bunch about Harry Potter, but none of which is about a desire to be in that world. In fact it’s a resignation that we are already in that world.

Do that, and you can write as much about Harry Potter as you like. Hell write a 10 page tumblr post on the way movie Dumbledore says one line, that’s can still be interesting and insightful.

***

(This doesn’t mean immersion is a guilt-inducing sin. Fan fic and RPGs are often about immersion. That’s great as entertainment. Just don’t try to sell it as political activism too, unless you’re critically engaging with the work.)