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mostlysignssomeportents · 7 months

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Brinkwhump Linkdump

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me in TUCSON (Mar 9-10), then San Francisco (Mar 13), Anaheim, and more!

Once again, I find myself arriving at the weekend with a giant backlog of links, triggering a linkump, the 15th such dumpage, a variety-pack of miscellany for your weekend. Here's the previous editions:

https://pluralistic.net/tag/linkdump/

Let's start with the latest incredible news from KPMG, the accounting and auditing giant that is relied upon as a source of ground truth for a truly terrifying share of the world's economy. KPMG has a well-deserved reputation for incompetence and corruption. They first came on my radar in 2001 when they sent a legal threat to a blogger for linking to their website without permission:

https://memex.craphound.com/2001/12/05/reason-4332442-not-to-ask/

The actual link was to KPMG's corporate anthem, which remains, to this day, a banger:

https://web.archive.org/web/20040428063826/http://chkpt.zdnet.com/chkpt/uknewsita/http://anthems.zdnet.co.uk/anthems/kpmg.mp3

Don't miss the DJ remixes (and the Nokia ringtone!) that the internet thoughtfully provided when KPMG decided that it didn't want the world to know about "Our Vision of Global Strategy":

https://web.archive.org/web/20011128153057/http://corporateanthems.raettig.org/

Now all this is objectively very funny, a relic of the old, good internet from one of its moments of glory, but KPMG? They were already enshittifying, even in 2001, and the enshittification only intensified thereafter. Nearly every accounting scandal of the past quarter-century has KPMG in it somewhere, from con-artists selling exhausted oil fields to rubes:

https://www.desmog.com/2021/06/03/miller-energy-kpmg-auditors-oil-fraud/

To killer nursing homes that hire KPMG to audit its books – and to advise it on how to defeat safety audits and murder your grandma:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/09/dingo-babysitter/#maybe-the-dingos-ate-your-nan

They're the architects of Microsoft's tax-evasion plot:

https://www.propublica.org/article/the-irs-decided-to-get-tough-against-microsoft-microsoft-got-tougher

And they were behind Canada's dysfunctional covid contact-tracing app, which never worked, but generated tens of millions in billings to the government of Canada, who used KPMG to hire programmers at $1,500/day, plus KPMG's 30% commission:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/31/mckinsey-and-canada/#comment-dit-beltway-bandits-en-canadien

KPMG's most bizarre scandal is literally stranger than fiction. The company bribed SEC personnel help its own accountants cheat on ethics exams. The corrupt officials were then given high-paid jobs at KPMG:

https://www.nysscpa.org/news/publications/the-trusted-professional/article/sec-probe-finds-kpmg-auditors-cheating-on-training-exams-061819

I mean it when I say this is stranger than fiction. I included it as a plot-point in my new finance crime novel The Bezzle (now a national bestseller!), and multiple readers have written to me since the book came out a couple weeks ago to say that they thought I was straining their credulity by making up such an outrageous scandal:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

But all of that is just scene-setting (and a gratuitous plug for my book) for the latest KPMG scandal, which is, possibly, the most KPMG scandal of all KPMG scandals. The Australian government hired KPMG to audit Paladin, a security contractor that oversees the asylum seekers the country locks up on one of its island gulags (yes, gulags, plural).

Ever since, Paladin has been the subject of a string of ghastly human rights scandals – the worst stuff imaginable, rape and torture and murder of adults and children. Paladin made AU423 million on this contract.

And here's the scandal: KPMG audited the wrong company. The Paladin that the Australia government paid KPMG to audit was based in Singapore. The Paladin that KPMG audited was a totally different company, based in Papua New Guinea, who already had a commercial relationship with KPMG. It was this colossal fuckup that led to the manifestly unfit Singaporean company getting nearly half a billion dollars in public funds:

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/feb/24/incredible-failure-kpmg-rejects-claims-it-assessed-the-wrong-company-before-423m-payment-to-paladin

KPMG denies this. KPMG denies everything, always. Like, they denied creating "power maps" of decision-makers in the Australian government to target with influence campaigns in order to win contracts like this one. Who knows, maybe, this one time, they're telling the truth? After all, the company whose employees gather to sing lyrics like these can't be all bad, right?

The time is now to lead the way, We share the same the idea That may win by the end of the day. Our strength is here to stay. Identity, one energy, One strategy, with sympathy. These are the words that will lead us into a new world.

https://everything2.com/title/KPMG+corporate+anthem

You may find it strange that I'm still carrying around the factoid that KPMG once threatened to crush a blogger for linking to its terrible corporate anthem, but that's just my "Memex Method," which helps me keep track of literally everything that seemed important to me through most of my adult life:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/09/the-memex-method/

One of my favorite quips from the very quotable Riley Quinn is that "leftists are cursed with object-permanence" – that is, we actually remember what just happened and use it to think about what's happening now. The Memex Method is object permanence for 20+ years worth of stuff. A lot of those deep archives never see use, but there's a surprising number of leading indicators buried in the stuff that happened in years gone by.

Take James Boyle's 2014, XKCD-style comic about the experience of driving a notional Apple car:

https://www.thepublicdomain.org/2014/11/07/apple-updates-a-comic/

Apple, it turns out, spent the next decade working on just such a car, and while that car has now been canceled, Boyle's comic correctly anticipates so much about the trajectory Apple's products took. It's uncannily accurate – real "don't invent the torment nexus"/"cyberpunk was a warning, not a suggestion" stuff:

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/torment-nexus

But no matter how many times we insist that the torment nexus shouldn't be created, the boardrooms of end-stage capitalism continue to invent them. Take HP, the poster-child for enshittification, edging out even KPMG in the race to turn everything into a pile of shit. After years of tormenting people to punish them for wanting to print things, HP has announced a new service that so mustache-twirlingly evil that it lacks verisimilitude:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/02/hp-wants-you-to-pay-up-to-36-month-to-rent-a-printer-that-it-monitors/

Here's the pitch: HP will sell you a printer that you don't own. In addition to paying a monthly fee for your ink – which you pay no matter whether you print or not – you will also pay a monthly fee just for having HP's printer on your premises. You are absolutely, positively forbidden from using third-party ink in this printer, and must use HP's own ink, which sells for about $10,000/gallon.

But while you aren't allowed to use this printer in ways that are bad for HP's shareholders, HP is absolutely free to use the printer in ways that are bad for you. When you click through the signup agreement, you grand HP permission to surveil every document you print – and your home wifi network more generally – and to sell that data to anyone and everyone.

What's more, HP reserves the right to discipline you with punitive credit-card charges if you disconnect this printer from the internet, on the basis that doing so makes it harder for them to spy on your printer.

I'm sorry, this is just more torment nexus shit, the kind of thing you'd expect to drop on Apr 1, not Feb 29, but I guess this is where we are. I can only conjecture as to whether HP's businesses strategists are directly taking direction from my novella "Unauthorized Bread," or whether they're learning about it second-hand from a KPMG consultant who converted it to Powerpoint form and charged $1,500/day for the work:

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-near-future-tale-of-refugees-and-sinister-iot-appliances/

All of this cartoonish villainry is the totally foreseeable consequence of a culture of impunity, in which companies like HP and KPMG can rob, cheat, steal (and sometimes even kill) without consequence. This impunity is so pervasive that the exceptions – where a rich criminal faces real consequences – become touchstones: Enron, Arthur Anderson, Theranos, and, of course, FTX.

FTX was arguably the largest-scale corporate crime in world history, stealing more than $10 billion dollars, mostly from rubes sucked in by hype and Superbowl ads. When news that FTX founder and owner Sam Bankman-Fried was convicted of fraud and was in for a lengthy prison sentence made a huge stir, because criminals like SBF usually walk away from the wreckage with their hands in their pockets, whistling a jaunty tune.

One of the very best commentators on cryptocurrency scams generally and FTX/SBF in particular is Molly White, whose Web3 is Going Just Great feed is utterly indispensable. White's newsletter, "Citation Needed," dives deep into the wrangle of SBF's sentencing:

https://www.citationneeded.news/issue-52/

Bankman-Fried's parents – prominent law professors at top law schools – helped brief the court this week on their son's punishment. According to them, SBF faces 100 years in prison, but should be sentenced to 5.5-6.5 years at the most. Why? Because he is a vegan, who is not greedy, and feels remorse, and cares for individuals (recall that SBF presented himself as the avatar of the batshit "effective altruism" philosophy while privately admitting that he used this as a smokescreen).

The most bizarre note in the 100-page filing is SBF's mother declaring that her son is an "angel of mercy," apparently unaware of the grisly meaning of that term:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_of_mercy_(criminology)

America's prisons are a travesty and I wouldn't wish them on anyone, but that's not the argument SBF's parents are making; rather, they're arguing that their special boy doesn't deserve the treatment America metes out to poorer, less white people who merely steal hundreds or thousands of dollars. A crook who steals ten billion should be handled the way a casino handles a whale – with concierge service.

The problem is, there are so many of these remorseless, relentless crooks that there's no way we could scale up that white-glove treatment when we finally round 'em all up and make them pay. Writing for The American Prospect, Maureen Tkacik tells us about the ransomware attack that shut down America's pharmacy system last month:

https://prospect.org/health/2024-03-01-zoomer-hackers-shut-down-unitedhealthcare/

The attack brought down Change Healthcare, part of the monopolist Unitedhealth, which serves as the "pharmacy benefit manager" to a vast swathe of American pharmacies. PBM is one of those all-American finance scams, a middleman garlanded with performative complexity put there to make you feel stupid for asking why independent pharmacies all have to pay rent to this malicious, unaccountable – and now, manifestly incompetent – gang of crooks.

Tkacik's breakdown of this scam – and how it rendered Americans' ability to get the drugs they depend on to go on breathing – is characteristically brilliant. Tcacik is fast emerging as my favorite Explainer of Scams, a print version of John Oliver or Adam Conover. You may recall her work from my post last week on how private equity has taken a wrecking ball to America's hospitals:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/28/5000-bats/#charnel-house

I always try to finish these linkdumps with some upbeat news to carry you through the weekend, and this week brought two genuinely wonderful – and totally underreported – pieces of amazing news.

The first is that Starbucks has sued for peace in the war against its workers' unions. Hundreds of Starbucks stores have unionized in recent years, but not one of them had a contract. Instead, Starbucks had waged dirty war on their own workers, from denying gender-affirming care to unionized employees to simply shutting down whole stores after they voted to unionize:

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/14/starbucks-union-company-threatens-that-unionizing-could-jeopardize-gender-affirming-health-care.html

But the workers held fast and after years of this, Starbucks has caved, promising contracts for all unionized stores and an end to its campaign of terror against workers seeking to unionize more of its stores. In a postmortem for Jacobin, Eric Blanc rounds up "seven lessons from Starbucks workers' historic victory":

https://jacobin.com/2024/02/starbucks-sbwu-contract-bargaining/

This is the kind of listicle I can get behind. According to Blanc, the Starbucks unions won by deploying worker-to-worker organizing, a tactic that many of the new unions that are shaking up formerly impossible-to-organize jobsites are using (Blanc has a book about this coming from UC Press called "We Are the Union: How Worker-to-Worker Unionism Can Transform America," so he should know).

Other tactics that made the difference for Starbucks unions: new digital training and support tools and partnering with established unions for support and infrastructure. Blanc also calls out the success of "salting" – the venerable but largely disused tactic of union organizers applying for a job at a non-union shop in order to organize it.

Blanc also mentions government policy, including the outstanding work of NLRB general counsel Jennifer Abruzzo, a shrewd and committed tactician whose understanding of the technicalities of labor law have let her push for bold measures. For example, in Thrive Pet Care, Abruzzo is arguing that when a company refuses to bargain in good faith for a contract with its union, she can step in and order them to honor the terms of a contract at comparable unionized competitors until they produce a contract of their own:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/06/goons-ginks-and-company-finks/#if-blood-be-the-price-of-your-cursed-wealth

Abruzzo is one of several smart, competent tacticians in the Biden administration who are working to kneecap corporate power. Another is Rohit Chopra, chair of the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, who just announced another bold, important initiative that will help Americans fight corporate corruption and get a fair deal:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-03-01-public-option-credit-card-shopping/

Chopra is taking aim at credit-card comparison sites that purport to show you where you can get the best deal. If you're an affluent person who doesn't carry a balance, this might not matter to you, but if you're an average working stiff, high interest rates can gobble up a massive share of your paycheck. What's more, credit card margins are higher than they have ever been:

https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/blog/credit-card-interest-rate-margins-at-all-time-high/

The most expensive credit cards come from the big, monopolistic banks, but you wouldn't know it from the leaderboards produced by Credit Karma, NerdWallet, LendingTree, and Bankrate. All of these sites take bribes from the big banks to list their credit cards above those offered by credit unions – who are typically 10% cheaper than the big banks' cards.

The new CFPB rule prohibits this fraudulent ranking, but the Bureau is going even further. They're using their administrative powers to force banks to report their rates to the Bureau, which will publish them on a publicly funded, neutral website – what David Dayen calls "a public option" for shopping for credit cards.

This policy makes a perfect bookend to the last CFPB initiative I wrote about here: a rule that forces banks to allow you to transfer your account to a rival with a couple of simple clicks, importing all your history, payees, and everything else you need to switch to a better bank:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/21/let-my-dollars-go/#personal-financial-data-rights

Combine that ease of switching with reliable information on which banks will give you the best deal and you get something that will directly transfer millions and millions of dollars from giant, wildly profitable banks to low-income people who've been tricked into paying them punitive interest rates.

So that's it, this week's linkdump. I promised you I'd end on a high note, and I did it. The world may be full of all kinds of terrible things, but workers and regulators are scoring big, muscular victories in battles where the stakes are real and important. Have a great weekend – we've earned it.

And remember!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/02/macedoine/#the-public-option

Image: Stacy (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/notahipster/4402860361/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

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leonspretty · 2 months

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windows of opportunity

in which lance is a disaster romantic and misses every opportunity to ask you out

masterlist

pairing: lance x reader

tags: fem! reader, disaster romantic lance, blue paladin lance, oblivious reader, oblivious lance too, reader isn't a paladin she just, like, helps(?), very very tiny bit of angst, happy ending, fluff, mutual pining, flirty banter, no use of y/n, lance calls reader ‘pretty’ as a nickname, cheeky little taylor swift reference if you squint.

notes: as a huge hopeless romantic, missed opportunities with a happy ending and mutual pining but thinking the other doesn't reciprocate is my obsession. i also know i said the first one would be keith but then i thought of this and it fit lance more i think.

wc: 2.3k

“Rise and shine, work hard, carve out your name, Take aim, pull the trigger, hit the bulls eye for fame, Know the value of faith, an' family, and don't you complain, Open wide, your windows of opportunity" — Kate Denson's "Windows of Opportunity”

To say that Lance liked you was an understatement. He was obsessed. Not crazy obsessed, but obsessed in the way that you consumed his every thought.

Luckily this didn't extend to during fights, but even then he would still be acutely aware of where you were at all times, making sure he could hear your voice over the comms, often talking over Coran just to flirt with you.

You were no different. Having known Lance since before joining the Garrison, your feelings for him have come and gone repetitively. Each time you'd confide in Pidge, declaring that you were over him after seeing him treat someone else the same way he treats you, claiming that he'd only ever see you as a friend, he'd do something that would make you retract anything bad you'd ever said about him.

Yours and Lance's feelings were obvious to everyone and it bewildered them how you both thought they were one sided.

The kitchen was quiet, Hunk, Keith and Pidge holding conversation while each did their own thing: Hunk baking, Keith tracing his blade and Pidge on her computer. Peaceful.

"What if I say something and she thinks I'm weird and never talks to me again?"

Keith and Pidge immediately groaned while Hunk remained silent, watching as Lance walked past all three of them, interrupting their conversation and train of thoughts. He threw himself onto a chair at the table across from Pidge who had already gathered her things and gotten up to leave. "Nope, not dealing with this again," she said as she left.

"She already thinks you're weird, I'm surprised she still puts up with you," Keith says from the spot next to where Pidge was. Lance glared at him in response, ignoring him.

"I think you should just try. If her face when she looks at you is anything to go off, I'm pretty sure she likes you too." It was a usually useless statement that was many times returned with "You're lying," or "I would've noticed." This time however, Lance turned to face Hunk and instead said,

"I was on my way to ask her out just now but she was training with Shiro and was in a zone and I didn't wanna disrupt that cause- where are you going?" Lance cut his rant off with a question directed at Keith who was leaving the kitchen.

"To train," was all he replied with.

"So you're finally going to do it? Why are you in here then?" Hunk asked.

"Yeah I am. I'm sick of wondering if she feels the same so I'm just gonna ask. I've never had a problem with it before so why should I now?"

From there, Lance vowed to himself that he would ask you out as soon as possible. He didn't want to spend any more time not being able to call you his than he had to.

You heard your name being called from down the corridor as you made your way to the showers. Training with Shiro was one thing, training with Shiro and Keith was another when you weren't out in the field anywhere near as often as them. It also didn't help how Keith had mentioned he had come to you two to escape Lance's apparent rambling about you. It had thrown you off and to make up for it and stop Shiro's teasing, you had put even more effort in than you normally would.

Turning around, you saw Lance running to catch up to you. Despite wanting to turn and make a run for it to the showers to avoid any embarrassment, you stopped and waited for him to meet you.

Huffing slightly, Lance met up with you and stopped to take you in. You were beautiful. Even when you were clearly sweaty and exhausted. He had to shake his head slightly to keep his thoughts from turning dirty. "Finished training?"

"Yeah, was just heading to the showers, wanna join me?" you said with a smirk, knowing that your question could be taken a couple different ways.

Recognising your signature smirk you used whenever the two of you would 'harmlessly' flirt, Lance played along. "Of course."

"Was there something you wanted to talk to me about?" Lance froze up briefly. He had wondered if Keith had overheard him say that he was going to ask you out and had opened his big mouth to you. You quietened his thoughts by following up with, "You look like you wanna say something. If its to tell me I smell, I know, Shiro and Keith are not easy opponents."

"Yeah you do stink, but I hope you kicked Keith's ass." Lance joked. "Anyway, I just wanted to ask you the best way to ask someone out." Your smile dropped for a second before replacing it with a forced one. You knew he didn't like you and he wasn't yours to lose so why should you keep someone else from experiencing what you could only dream about.

"Oh, well, it depends who it is. Personally, I like when it's done in a way that shows the person really knows me, like with trinkets or using inside jokes as a way of showing their feelings rather than just saying it. Allura though, she'd probably like to be taken somewhere nice, so when you ask her out maybe do it on a planet with a nice skyline or sunset or something." You knew it had to be Allura he was planning to ask out. He'd been flirting with her ever since you all met her. It was only a matter of time. You felt the unwanted tears build up - you had to get away, and fast. "Oh look, we're at the showers, thanks for walking with me and good luck on asking Allura, I'm sure she'll say yes." You were out of sight in seconds.

Lance stood facing the door speechless and confused. Where did Allura come into this? Why were you so quick to leave? He had only asked how to ask someone in hopes to lead up to him actually asking but instead his window of opportunity had closed before he even let it open.

His next window was clear. He had his speech planned out, knew exactly what he wanted to say and how. Now was the perfect opportunity. You were the only one on the bridge, sat in his seat seemingly just relaxing. Why you were doing that here instead of in the lounge he didn't know but he decided to ask later.

You hadn't noticed Lance's presence until you head a "Quiznack" be muttered under his breath as he tripped over his own feet, luckily managing to catch himself. You sat up and turned to face him. "Finally falling for me, Sharp-shooter?" you joked, internally cringing at the use of the word 'finally'.

If Lance had noticed your slip up, he didn't mention it. Instead, he rounded to the front of the chair you were in and dropped to sit on the floor facing you. "You wish. No. I just wanted to talk to you about something."

"How did it go with Allura?" Truthfully, you didn't want to know, but you were sure you'd hear about it from one of them soon enough so why not get it out of the way.

"How did what go with Allura?" The confusion on his face was obvious.

"You were gonna ask her our remember? You literally asked me how to do it like two days ago." You mirrored Lance's confusion.

"Oh." Silence. "Oh! No! I wasn't planning to ask her out! I actually wanted to ask you-" his voice, which was already turning very quiet was cut off by you sitting up and squinting at the window.

"What was that?" You asked yourself aloud. Lance mistook that as a question for him.

"I said-" he was cut off again when you quickly got up and ran to the window.

"Quiznack!"

"What?"

"Alert everyone. Get to your lions. Now."

At that, Lance looked outside to see multiple Galra ships appearing. He groaned internally. To you the groan was about having to go out and fight. For him, the groan was because yet another window of opportunity had shut.

Keith really just wanted to lay down. Not necessarily sleep as that had never come easy to him, but he was exhausted. Instead he had to listen to you whine about how Lance doesn't share your feelings. When he had asked why you were coming to him about this you had said that everyone who wasn't Lance was busy and she didn't want to bother them. At that moment he wished you hadn't found him sat in the lounge. As much as he cherished you as a friend, he was quite frankly sick of hearing about Lance. When there was a knock at the door of his room, of which you had followed him into and immediately flopped onto his bed mid rant, Keith rolled his eyes and opened it. He was glad it had at least got you to be quiet since you also wondered who it was.

"Hey have you seen, oh hi pretty, Keith have you seen-" Lance stopped talking. When he'd said hi, he wasn't thinking, it was natural instinct. When he realised you were laid out on Keith's bed, his brain caught up to his mouth.

You, on the other hand, were blushing. It wasn't the first time Lance was calling you pretty. In fact it's what he called you 90% of the time. But it was the timing. You had just been complaining about how he doesn't think of you except from if he has to or if you're talking with him then he calls you pretty, offhanded. You were going insane.

"What's up?" Keith asked Lance, aiming a sly smirk at you as if he could tell you were going crazy over both seeing the person who was the main character of your rant and at the name said person had called you.

"Actually I was looking for her but if you guys are busy..."

Keith took this opportunity to both get rid of you so he can lie down and also get back at you for talking his ear off. "No, no, please, take her, I'm sick of hearing about you."

Lance ignored Keith's comment, turning to you, "Can we talk?"

Your eyes went wide as you sat up, your heart immediately dropping. Had you done something wrong? Had he overheard you talking about how much you liked him? Was this the end of your guys's friendship? You'd rather have him as a friend than nothing at all. You just nodded and said bye to Keith as you left his room.

The door closed within milliseconds of you leaving the room. It was just you and Lance now. Alone. "Come on," Lance smiled and started walking to his room.

Arriving in his room, Lance's nerves began to pick up. This was his chance. Again. He promised to himself that this is it. He wasn't going to let another interruption keep him from telling you how he feels.

Being in his room alone with him was nothing new, so why did you feel so nervous. "Come sit down, pretty." Lance patted the spot next to where he had just sat on his bed. You plastered a smile on your face and sat down.

"What's up? You never ask to talk, you usually just... do."

Lance let out a snort at that, giving you a pointed glance. "Oh and you don't?"

"I never said that."

The light hearted joking relaxed you - it's what you were used to between the two of you.

Your previous nerves about what Lance had to say dissipated as the two of you continued to joke together a little longer.

"Lance. You didn't come find me just to hang out. I know you. What's up?"

He had been putting it off, nerves creeping up the closer he came to confessing and so he sought comfort in your company as it was. Lance nodded and cleared his throat, turning to look in your eyes. "Every time I've tried to talk to you about this, something interrupts me: you rushing off to the showers, then the galra finding us. And then you thought I asked Allura out which is crazy because yeah she's-"

"Lance." You cut him off, not wanting to hear about how the princess of Altea was perfect and dreamy. "Come on."

"As I was going to say, before someone rudely interrupted, again-"

You laughed and stuck your tongue out at him quickly and jokingly.

"Hey! Anyway, yeah Allura is cool, I mean, she's a princess. But she isn't you." He paused, but realised how that could be taken, he continued, "I don't want Allura... I want you pretty girl. And it has taken me way too long to finally tell you. There have been so many missed windows of opportunity, and I refuse to miss any more. It's you. It's always been you, and I'm sorry I led you to believe otherwise."

You were speechless. A confession wasn't even on the list of things you had expected to come from this talk. The smile that grew on your face was unstoppable. Not trusting yourself to let out a happy squeal, you threw your arms around the man who had just told you he chooses you.

The sudden force took Lance by surprise, but he was fast to wrap his arms around your waist and fall back onto his bed, pulling you down with him. You lifted your head to look Lance in the eyes. Lance took this as his chance to finally make things official. "Will you be mine, pretty?"

The smile you didn't think could grow any wider, did. "I will always be yours, Loverboy Lance."

notes: i low-key kinda don't like how this ended up but i tried. it's also only slightly proof-read because i wanna move on to a keith fic now. also, if you saw this before, i reposted it cause i wanted it after my masterlist stuff so its still the same just reposted. reblogs, comments and likes are always appreciated. i also may make a taglist so let me know if you wanna be on it!

@cafekitsune made the dividers here!

thank you for reading!!

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alicelufenia · 10 months

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Thinking about the recent change to recruiting Minthara and how a lot of people may be disappointed to find her not at Moonrise for various reasons

I haven't done it myself, but several guide videos detail that it's still, kinda an exacting thing that doesn't quite fit normal gameplay flow.

UPDATE: I have since tested it out, and tl;dr, it works as described! See this post if you wanna skip to a successful recruitment, or read on to see how it works.

UPDATE 2: One last catch, if you do opt to knock out Minthara this way, DO NOT Long Rest afterwards unless the Kill the Goblin Leader quest has been flagged as complete. You can deal with Priestess Gut anyway you like, so long as the whole camp doesn't get alerted. Dror Ragzlin should be saved for LAST since his fight has the best chance of alerting the whole camp and will aggro a ton of goblins regardless. Make sure you can handle both Minthara and the Ragzlin horde without long resting in between.

1) Perhaps most crucially, you need to knock her out when she is Temporarily Hostile, a condition the game doesn't explain well at any point. Basically any time combat is initiated through dialogue enemies will not have this condition, will be considered "fully hostile", and knocking them out still flags them as dead. The way you get this condition is by committing "crimes" in line of sight of an NPC. If they are temporarily hostile, knocking them out and taking a Long Rest will reset their aggro to normal.

2) the most common ways people would LIKE to knock her out; after talking to her at the goblin camp, or even better, at the grove battle, both initiate combat through dialogue, making her fully hostile instead of Temporarily Hostile.

3) the Kill the Goblin Leaders quest still says she's dead even if you knock her out with the Temporarily Hostile condition, which feels like a bug. I haven't seen Halsin's new dialogue for resolving the conflict without killing the leaders, so maybe that would work as a soft confirmation that you successfully knocked her out. Regardless, if you try to complete the Kill the Goblin Leaders quest and draw aggro from the whole camp before knocking her out, Minthara will be fully hostile too.

4) so the way to knock her out is to attack the goblin near her, triggering a "you've committed a crime" response that puts her into Temporarily Hostile condition, and then knock her out. Which again, involves NOT TALKING TO HER when her dialogue would initiate Raid the Grove (since refusing triggers a fight), which if you already freed Liam, is THE FIRST TIME you talk to her

Also for Paladin players, remember killing NPCs who aren't aggro, even if they're "bad guys", will break your oath, so you need to non-lethal the goblin next to her too (any reinforcements that initiate combat on sight should be fair game tho) Dunno how that works with Vengeance, maybe they get a pass but I wouldn't risk it.

Please let me know if I am flat out wrong about any of this, I just wanted to get this topic out there because I know a lot of people (myself included) are looking forward to good playthrough minty recruitment, and I don't want people to fuck it up accidentally.

#bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 minthara #minthara #minthara baenre #minthara bg3 #as the person with the post with the highest notes about Minthara being recruitable (that I know of) I felt I should say something

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thebiggerbear · 2 months

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Six Sentence Sunday - 7/21/24 - Soldier Boy x Reader

A/N: I decided to do something a little different this Sunday. I wanted to share excerpts on my WIP's (series/mini series) that are currently open/posted. I was going to put all of them in one big post but that ended up not working out for various reasons so I separated them all onto their own individual posts.

So this scene is an excerpt from a future chapter of Keep Me Inside. Another preview but I'm truly trying to strike a certain tone of in Chapter 1 and get it right because that is going to kick off everything and once it starts going, it's going. So, that's why I've been working at it as long as I have even though it's already written. The following isn't much but I didn't want to give too much away from this upcoming scene. I took out any specific spoilers. A lot more than six sentences, I admit. All unbeta'd.

Please let me know what you think in the comments below.

Warnings: language

Series

Works Taglist: @avada-kedavra-bitch-187; @rieleatiel

Jensen Taglist: @samanddeaninatrenchcoat; @deansbbyx; @lyarr24; @rebel-paladin; @deans-spinster-witch; @bts24

Series Taglist: @deans-spinster-witch; @syrma-sensei; @deangirl96; @beskarfilms; @siampie ; @everysage; @globetrotter28; @roseblue373; @hobby27; @stoneyggirl2; @bambiegaze

Soldier Boy Taglist: @birdiellie; @heartlessdelusions; @nancymcl; @brightlilith; @muhahaha303; @just-levyy; @solacedthistest; @deansimpala; @foxyjwls007; @onlyangel-444; @faephoria; @believeinthefireflies95

“Are you for fucking real? You’re telling us to back down? From him?” MM demanded, gesturing in Ben’s direction. You could see confused expressions on Hughie’s, Annie’s, and Frenchie’s faces. Kimiko arched a questioning brow over at you.

“I need you to trust me, MM. Put the gas away and stand down.” Your gaze snapped back to Butcher. “Please,” you added in a quiet plea. He narrowed his eyes in suspicion, studying you.

You felt Ben come up behind you. You almost hated how attuned your body was to him now. “Do as she says and no one gets hurt. Don’t and I blow this place to hell.” You saw everyone on the team tense in preparation.

“Pull the trigger, don’t pull the trigger, I don’t care. But you’re letting her go first,” Butcher growled.

“Oh, nice,” The Legend quipped. “Just let him go off like the Fourth of July in my building, yeah sure. I let you know your girlfriend is alive, she ruins my eighty thousand dollar couch, and this is the thanks I get.”

“I’m not his girlfriend.”

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

You and Butcher both had said it at the same time.

“Man’s still in fucking denial,” MM muttered.

“Seriously,” Hughie whispered, shutting up as soon as Annie sent him a glare.

“Bien sur.” Frenchie shook his head, exchanging a glance with Kimiko who shrugged.

Ignoring everyone else, Ben’s eyes were for Butcher alone as he placed a hand on your lower back, smirking over at him. “I’m not holding her here.”

Please let me know if you would like to be tagged for this series.

dividers by @firefly-graphics

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#keep me inside #keep me inside preview #thebiggerbear writing preview #soldier boy x reader #six sentence sunday

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mlmxreader · 2 months

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Waterloo | Danse x transmasc!reader

『••✎••』

↳ ❝ Can I pretty please get a paladin Danse with prompt 22? "Y'know, jealously used to be subtle." With a transmasc reader.... Thank you for your service 🙏🙏🙏❤️ ❞

: ̗̀➛ a chance encounter leads to Danse getting jealous, and he isn't exactly the best at controlling things like that.

trigger warnings: ̗̀➛ jealousy, swearing.

•───────────────★•♛•★──────────────•

To say that Danse was unhappy would have been an understatement; with his power armour in the shop getting fixed, he was forced to wear "civilian clothes", as he called them, and made it no secret that he despised it.

Even if he did notice your eyes on him more than usual; studying the strong body beneath thin fabric. The thickness of his arms and legs and how they jiggled when he moved; how his large stomach hung over the waistband of his jeans when he used the hem of his shirt to wipe sweat from his brow.

His large and broad shoulders; the scruff around his jaw that matched the dense hair on his chest - only part of it visible thanks to his few undone top buttons. He did wonder if you knew that the hair trailed all the way down. He knew you looked at him, he just didn't know why.

Why would you give him your attention when there were people all around waiting to throw themselves at you?

You just gave him all your attention, and for what?

Sure, he was attractive - fat, strong. and hairy. A big burly man who looked like he could lift a whole car with just one hand. Strong and capable.

But someone like you?

Danse thought that the mercenary - as much of an insubordinate civilian as he was - would have been more your type.

But then, you and Danse were not so different; you came from an island across the sea, and had tried to defend your home from the raiders who belonged to the eastern side of it. A soldier, a man of war. Born and bred for it just as he had been.

The name of your home still rang so musically whenever you mentioned it to him - Cymru.

As he looked at you now, he clenched his jaw; you were talking to a very handsome man who spoke your language almost as well as you did. He was tall and lean, dark brown eyes and dark hair, and a bright red dragon tattoo on his forearm.

Danse knew that he could not compete, so he stepped in, clearing his throat as he glared at the man and scowled.

"This is official Brotherhood of Steel business, civilian, I suggest you move along."

The man did as he was told with mild complaint, but you smacked Danss on the shoulder as you scoffed. "What are you playing at, butt?"

Danse shrugged as he tried to feign ignorance as best as he could. "I didn't think you would want to be bothered by a civilian."

You cocked a brow, doing your best not to laugh loudly once you realised what was going on. "You stupid sod... y'know, jealousy used to be subtle. Not so in your face."

You watched with amusement as he realised he had been caught; his cheeks turning a bright shade of pink, followed by the tip of his nose and the tips of his ears. Danse swallowed hard, stuttering and stammering to try and conceal it, until you kissed him gently.

Such a mountain of a man, and you were bringing him to his knees. He had lost the battle and you had won the war.

He had heard of a war being won with just one battle. When a commander and Emperor had fallen at the hands of a Duke.

He smiled a little - if you were to be that Duke, je would be the commander, and happily give up to surrender to you.

"You are a silly bastard," you chuckled. "Don't you get it?"

"Get what?"

"All you have to do is ask," you told him. "And I'd be yours."

Danse frowned, lowering his voice as he coaxed you against a wall; he put his hand at the side of your head, leaning on it in hopes that it would make people less likely to try and listen in.

"Aren't you worried?"

You shook your head as you planted your hands on his chest, just shy of gripping the brown and black plaid shirt to tug him closer. "About what? Everybody at the Brotherhood knows I'm trans, no one gives a fuck... nobody gave a fuck when Dane came out as gay - why would they care about us?"

Danse shook his head, licking his lips as he swallowed thickly. "Not the Brotherhood. Everyone else."

"No," you admitted, smiling. "If I'm to face my Waterloo, I want it to be you."

He let out a shaky breath, nodding slowly. "As long as you're sure."

"I am," you assured with a curt nod. "Now, are you gonna kiss me, or am I gonna have to go and find someone to flirt with again?"

"Please don't," he murmured, drawing just close enough for you to catch him in another quick kiss.

Oh, he had certainly lost the war, but he loved it; he felt like he had won the second you kissed him so sweetly. Giving up the fight was something he would never say no to when it came to you.

You hummed, gently tugging at the open flap of the top of his shirt. "You really do not fucking like this, do you?"

He shook his head as he smiled a little. "Civilian clothes aren't exactly comfortable."

You shrugged, daring to glance up and meet his gaze for a moment before grinning. "So, why don't we get a move on, find somewhere to bunker down for the night, and you can get it off?"

There it was again. The brief sting in his chest that left him feeling giddy and excited, like he was floating on the back of a stingwing as it soared through the air.

Fuck.

His stomach was in knots, and he knew he had never felt so excited before. Trying not to seem too eager, though, Danse nodded as he reached for your hand, surprised you would let him hold it.

He still wasn't sure why you were giving him your attention.

Maybe he should forget about it - maybe it was as simple as you liked him. He could live with that. Especially given how right your hand felt against his; his fingers so thick and so warm against yours as he swung his arm a little bit just to see you smile.

Fuck, he could get used to that. He really could.

༺═──────────────────────────────═༻

thank you so much for reading, but if I may, I'd like to borrow some extra time from you, as well; you see, Mahmoud needs help to rebuild his old life after his home was destroyed, along with his entire life, by Israeli forces. due to this, he is having to flee the Gaza Strip and relocate and rebuild his life; as of right now (03:52, 21/07/2024), his goal is set at €10,000, and he has managed to raise €4980 of that. if you could, please consider donating to help; even if it's just £1 or £2, it would go such a long way into helping to build not just a home - but a livelihood, a life, as well. if you can't donate, then please consider sharing, instead.

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mirkwoodshewolf · 11 months

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A departed farewell; Eddie Munson x reader

*Author's note*

To all out there, HAPPY HALLOWEEN!! Okay so this one is kinda heavy but after getting reintroduced to the great film known as The Crow, this little fic was born and I wanted to post it up on Halloween night. But there is also some heavy warnings which I will say below, so to the faint of heart or those at are easily triggered, I won't be hurt if you decide to skip this fic. Have a happy Halloween (and if you don't celebrate it, have a good day/afternoon/evening).

Warnings: Eddie's death scene, drug use (not just weed, I'm talking hardcore drugs shown and mentioned here), depression, angst, some fluff, Vamp Eddie(? You decide), death.

Taglist:

@plethora-of-things

@waddles03

@psychosupernatural

@gay-and-ready-to-cry

@jd-johndeacon-or-jackdaniels

@queen-paladin

__________________________________________________________

Dustin Henderson and Steve Harrington walked out along the wooded trails all the way to Reefer Rick’s boathouse. In his hands, Dustin held some wild flowers that he had picked before he had Steve drive him up here. They stopped before the boathouse and Dustin placed the wild flowers amongst the pile of already decaying flowers that had been placed there throughout the year.

“I still can’t believe it’s been over a year since it happened.” Dustin said weakly. “He didn’t deserve any of this. And he deserved to have a proper burial. Why did I have to break my damn leg?!”

“You didn’t break it. But you can’t blame yourself for what happened Dustin. You didn’t know Eddie was going to do what he did.”

“I just……I just still can’t believe he’s really gone. He of all people didn’t deserve what he got. I mean the people we lost when all this started, they didn’t get any of the shit that Eddie got. This town—hates him. Still hates him. They really think he did all of this and we can’t change that.”

“It sucks, I’ll admit that. But small minded people can never be changed, no matter how hard we try. At least we know the truth that Eddie Munson went out a hero. A hardcore, metal hero.”

“Have you and Robin tried talking to (Y/n) recently?” asked Dustin.

“Do you really need to ask?”

“Right, dumb question.”

“As her twin brother I know we’re supposed to rag on each other at times, but now I really mean it when I say it. She looks like she’s been through hell, chewed up and then spat back up. She’s not sleeping, she’s barely eating. And what’s worse are the drugs.”

“You mean…..”

“I wish dude, she’s been at the hard stuff. Don’t know where she’s getting it but I’ve seen the syringes and rubber bands. I can’t stand to see her in that much pain. She needs help but everytime I try to talk to her about it she—”

“She was right there with him when he died Steve. Those bats literally held her back just so that she could watch as they devoured him alive. On one hand I don’t blame her for falling like that, hell if I were in her place and I saw Suzie die like that, I’d probably fall that hard too.”

“Don’t you ever say anything like that you little butthead! I don’t ever want you talking about drugs again understand?!”

“On the other hand, she isn’t grieving properly. And that’s on all of us, we were too focused on how we had to move on with the rest of the town after the earthquakes happened that we completely ignored (Y/n)’s feelings. And it’s not just your fault Steve.” Steve shook his head, stroking his fingers through his hair anxiously.

“I’m 12 minutes older than her. I’m her big brother, and—I wasn’t there for her. Not ever since we entered high school. These last couple of years we’ve managed to rebuild our sibling bond but now I……I’m losing her again man.” Tears started to build up in Steve’s eyes. “I can’t….I can’t lose another person.” He thought back on Max and how he had failed to keep her safe.

She was a sarcastic child who suddenly came in when she and Billy came by but after reading her note, she had admitted to him that he was the big brother she had hoped Billy could’ve been for her, and it all happened ever since he stepped forward to keep them safe when Billy came looking for her. Sure he got his ass beat but he was willing to keep himself in the line of Billy’s rage and not let any of the kids get a single punch. Now—now when she needed him most, he failed her.

Dustin looked up to see that Steve had buried his eyes behind his right hand and saw how his shoulders began shaking as he choked on his sobs. Dustin gave Steve a one armed hug.

“We’ll get her back. We’ll get them both back.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“I’m not. But it’s all that’s going through my mind. And I’m not gonna rest until we finally find a way to kill Vecna and send that son of a bitch straight to hell.”

“You’re a tough kid Henderson, hell of a lot tougher than me.” Steve ruffled his hair then the two of them left Reefer Rick’s boathouse and drove back to town.

*Halloween 1987*

It was Halloween night and unlike in the years before, Hawkins wasn’t celebrating Halloween this year. There was no yearly town hall Halloween party, no trick-or-treaters going out and about to get candy, not even the high schoolers dared to try and host a party of their own.

At Forest hill trailer park, the crack that had spread from this part of Hawkins had actually driven most of the trailer homeowners to leave Hawkins all together. Most took their RV’s and fled, while others just packed whatever they could and skipped town or ended up homeless and were currently staying at a shelter on the other side of Hawkins.

A hand suddenly shot up from the cracks and began crawling out from the earth. Groaning and grunting in agony as he pulled himself out from the red light of the Upside town glowing from beneath the earth. Once he was free, he lay there on his back exhausted and stared up at the night sky. The stars shining like diamonds high above the abandoned trailer park.

Suddenly the man heard a meow and when he opened his eyes, a long haired black cat stared down at him with piercing green eyes he could make out from the light of the full moon.

“Loki?” the cat let out a purr as his eyes squinted but then he licked the man’s finger before nuzzling into his hand. He lifted his hand and stroked through the cat’s long soft fur and asked. “Wha—what happened here?” suddenly something flashed before his eyes. A flash like seeing the tv suddenly go static after a power outage. He gripped his forehead before he found himself standing up and walking forward.

He stumbled about, falling a couple of times but as his vision kept flashing he kept standing back up and trudged onward. He saw himself standing on top of his trailer, shredding on his guitar. A swarm of bat-like creatures surrounding him and two other people, he then found himself falling down once more but he also saw himself falling, this time off a bike and he had been attacked by one of those bat creatures.

He saw himself stand up wielding a spear as well as a trashcan shield with nails sticking out and he stood up getting into the same position as he saw himself in that vision. He then saw the girl from before coming toward him calling his name.

“EDDIE! EDDIE!!!”

“(Y/n)?! What are you doing here?! You weren’t supposed to come back!”

“I made a promise Mr. Frodo! A promise! Don’t you leave him Samwise Gamgee. And I don’t mean to, I don’t mean to.” She told him. He shook his head and found himself saying as he heard himself in his vision say.

“Into the fires of Mount Doom milady?” She nodded and together the two of them stood as the bats swarmed around them before charging head on, the two of them using their trashcan shields to block off the attacks.

He copied his fighting movements of spear and shield, as he saw the girl, (Y/n) use a bottle of hairspray and with a lighter, she had created her own flamethrower to burn any bats that came near her. He then felt and saw himself being choked by one of the bats and felt himself being pulled to the ground.

His arms and legs were pulled outward and he saw the bats beginning to feast on his flesh. He saw and remembered the pain of their teeth piercing his skin and digging out chunk after chunk of flesh. All the while he could hear (Y/n) screaming out his name as she was forcefully held back by the bats. Their tails wrapped around her arms, legs, neck and stomach, even as she pulled to free herself, they pulled harder until suddenly they dropped dead.

She crawled over to his bleeding body whimpering out his name and picking him up into his lap.

“No, no, no, no, no, no, no baby! Teddy-bear! Don’t you leave me don’t you die like Boromir did!”

“Bad huh?” he choked up. Soon another voice spoke up, this time a younger man’s voice assured him.

“No, no you’re gonna be fine we just need to get you to a hospital okay?”

“Okay.” He choked up. Together (Y/n) and the young man tried to pick him up but the pain in his body was too great as he pleaded.

“I-I-I think I just need a second, I need a second, okay?”

“Okay, okay we—we’ll give it to you.” (Y/n) assured him as she rested his head on her lap, stroking through his hair. He looked up at both (Y/n) and the young man and strained out as blood started coming up his throat.

“I didn’t run away this time right?”

“No. No baby, you-you didn’t run. Though I wish you did. Whatever happened to having no shame in running?” she asked him.

“You both are gonna have to look after those little sheep for me okay?” he told them.

“No! You’re gonna do that yourself!” the young man said but he found himself saying along with his vision.

“No man. Say you’re going to look after them. Say it Henderson.” He saw as the two of them were sobbing over him. (Y/n) took his left hand and raised it up to her face, the blood along his arm seeping into her hands but she didn’t care.

“I’m gonna….I’m gonna look after them.” Henderson choked out. He then found himself looking up at (Y/n), only at her even through his hazy vision as he asked her.

“And you…..fair Ravenna.” She choked out a sob. “Please smile for me…….please.” with as much strength as he could, he managed to move his index finger along her jawline. She kissed the back of his hand and gave a small, sweet smile. “Good…..cause I…..think I’m actually going to graduate. I think it’s my year sweetheart—Hen-Henderson. I think it’s finally my year……” he remembered feeling the blood starting to rise in his throat, preventing him from speaking full sentences but he did manage to make one last statement before he fell silent.

“I love you guys.”

“I love you too.” Henderson wept.

“This belongs to you Eddie Munson, and always will.” He felt her hand cup the side of his face, watched as she leaned forward and felt the soft touch of her lips on his bloody ones. Even with the taste of iron that was now seeping between her lips, she dared not move as she kept the gentle, loving kiss going until she separated from him.

And it was at that moment he had felt himself slip into darkness.

He remembered who he was. He was Eddie Munson, three-time senior of Hawkins High. Dungeon Master of the Hellfire club, and the love of his life was (Y/n) Harrington.

Eddie stood up and walked towards a trailer that had somehow miraculously survived the earthquake. He opened the door and knew that no one was home as the place had been ransacked and just left behind for anyone to have. Loki followed him inside, racing into the bathroom and hopped on top of the sink.

Eddie stared at himself in the mirror as memories of him and (Y/n) together flashed through his mind. Them cuddled on her bed when he’d sneak over to her house. The times they’d both try to cook something only to end up nearly burning the trailer down and his uncle having to stop the flames from spreading cause the two of them would be panicking too much.

Seeing her read all her favorite fantasy books from Tolkien to C.S Lewis and even J.M Barrie’s Peter Pan. Him hovering over her as she would be sitting on a chair while she read and kissing her neck and face, pleading for attention. And even though she tried to fight it, giggles would come out from her lips until she ended up succumbing to his will and they’d end up making out, or even going further beyond that.

The love he felt for (Y/n) both filled him with joy and agony. How could he leave her like that? He knew that she had many people in her life abandon her. Her parents, her friends, even her own twin brother had left her behind. He was all she had and he left her. His anger rose until he snapped and punched the mirror with his bare fist, breaking it in half.

His knuckles bleeding until he saw them heal up in the blink of an eye. He turned to Loki who merely looked at him and slowly blinked before letting out a throaty meow. Eddie dug through the cabinets and drawers of the bathroom until he had found some white base makeup and black lipstick. He dipped his fingers into the white base, rubbed his hands together and covered his face in white makeup.

With the black lipstick he drew down from his eyes what almost resembled tearstains, as well as covered his lips black and even drew a line upward at the corner of his lips. He stripped out of his torn and bloody clothes and managed to find a skin-tight along-sleeved black shirt, a long leather jacket, black pants and some old black boots. He donned on the new look before turning over to Loki who raised a paw at him letting out a small meow.

Eddie rubbed Loki’s head before picking him up and walked out of the bathroom.

“I blame myself for wrecking your home Loki. I’ll bet it hasn’t been easy for god knows how long it’s been. But I’m going to make this right.” Loki meowed and as Eddie sat him down, Loki ran out the trailer and he followed the black cat.

At the Henderson household, Dustin had been pretty much kept under his mom’s tight thumb. He wasn’t allowed anywhere unless it was school and back home. Hell he was lucky if he was able to even get to visit Max once if not twice a week just to see how she’s doing or if anything had changed (even though nothing had. She had been in her coma for over a year now).

As rain now began to pour down heavily on this Halloween night, he looked at his old Ghostbusters proton pack from three years ago and thought back to simpler times. He wished that those days would come back, long before the whole Upside down and he and his friends were the four weirdos who loved to play DnD all day and night at each other’s houses.

He heard a gentle rap at the window and when he turned around he saw Loki sitting right outside his window.

“Loki?” he remembered seeing the long-haired black cat over at Forest hill whenever he’d go to visit Eddie. He opened the window and allowed the drenched cat inside. “I thought you had gotten caught up when the Upside down opened up, guess (Y/n) was right to name you after the Norse god of mischief.” Loki let out a meow. “Oh yeah, think you can let me dry you off?” Loki let out a merp (a mix of a meow and a purr) and Dustin left to get a cat-sized towel that his mom uses on their cat whenever he got out.

When Dustin returned with the towel, he gently dried off Loki then allowed the cat to lick himself clean.

“What are you doing all the way over here anyways?” Loki paused and turned to the corner of Dustin’s room and there he saw a figure hidden within the shadows. Dustin jumped back fearfully and Eddie said.

“You know you gotta learn to shut your windows Dustin Henderson. You never know what freaks lurk in the night.” Dustin narrowed his eyes as he heard the voice.

“I can’t believe it…….Eddie?”

“Nice to see you again butthead.” Dustin took large strides across his room and embraced Eddie, tears falling down his face. Eddie hugged the young boy back and Dustin looked up at him.

“How did—I mean how is…..I saw you die. How are you alive? Does (Y/n) know? When did you get back? How long have you been alive? What happened?”

“Henderson, you’re rambling like a mad man.” Eddie stopped the young boy’s frantic question asking.

“Sorry.” Dustin said meekly.

“I honestly don’t know how it happened. One moment I was dying in (Y/n)’s arms and next thing I know, I’m crawling out of a gateway from hell. I don’t even know if I’m really alive or not.”

“What do you mean?” Eddie walked over to Loki and stroked down his chest before trailing his finger towards his right paw. He knew that Loki once had been attacked by another stray cat and his right paw never fully healed, so now anytime someone goes to touch that paw, he’ll bite since he had been declawed by his previous owners.

After Eddie got a nasty bite and Loki went over to sit on Dustin’s dresser now, his tail twitching.

“Eddie what the hell did…..”

“Just watch.” Eddie showed Dustin how the nasty bite wound now began to close up, just like what happened to his knuckles after he had punched the mirror.

“Holy shit.” Dustin muttered.

“But that’s my least concern right now. I need to ask you some questions. How long has it been since that day?”

“It’s been over a year. It’s 1987 now, Halloween. Of course no one really celebrates that holiday here anymore ever since the gates opened and split Hawkins in four ways.”

“I take it we didn’t kill Vecna?”

“Nancy, Steve and Robin definitely laid one on him. But there wasn’t a body after Nancy gave him one last shot to the chest. Will even says he can still feel him, that he is weak but bidding his time.” Eddie looked down grimly. “We…..also lost Max. I mean we sorta did but she hasn’t woken up yet. And I’m sorry Eddie, I’m really, really sorry. But the town put all of this mess onto you.”

“No surprise there. Last anyone knew of me, I was wanted for Chrissy’s and Patrick’s murders. Once the satanic freak, always the satanic freak.” Eddie plopped down onto Dustin’s bed.

“I’ve tried to get Hooper to work with the government to clear your name but they’re still in the processing phase, which is basically them saying they’ve got too much on their plate right now to deal with this specific request.” Eddie perked his head up. “Oh yeah, apparently Hooper was alive in a Russian gulag and Joyce brought him back along with Murray the conspiracy maniac.”

“All be damned. One of the only cops in this town I actually liked back from the grave. Guess we have that in common.�� There was a brief moment of silence before Dustin said.

“Eddie……” Eddie looked up at Dustin and knew what the kid wanted to say.

“There’s nothing you can say Henderson. What happened, happened. Me being associated with you had nothing to do with my death.” He stood up and walked over to Dustin. He placed two firm hands on Dustin’s shoulders, looked him square in the eye and continued, “It was a shitshow there’s no question about it. But the fact that you were the first and only one to truly believe I wouldn’t do this besides (Y/n), I couldn’t ask more of a friend. Hell even a little brother. But don’t go getting a big head about it, okay?” Dustin slightly chuckled as tears fell down his face. He wiped them away and choked out.

“I’ve missed you Eddie.”

“Missed you too yah little shit.” Dustin immediately held onto Eddie as tight as he could. Eddie rested his head on top of Dustin’s as he patted the young man’s back.

“Eddie, there’s something else you should know.” Eddie separated from the hug and Dustin told him, “It’s about (Y/n). She…..she’s really spiraled ever since you—well you know. And I’m scared she’s going down a path she can’t come back from. It’s more than just shutting herself in or not talking to us. Steve told me she’s been getting into drugs. And I don’t mean the light stuff.”

“And what has Steve done?”

“He’s tried everything. And I know he doesn’t want to admit it, but she’s not just hurting him emotionally. I saw the faint scratch marks on his left cheek. I know she’s not doing it on purpose but…..I’m scared we’ll lose her too if she keeps going down this path.”

“I’ll get the info I need from Harrington. But this meeting never happened, understand Henderson?” Dustin nodded.

“Thank you Eddie. Love you man.”

“Love you too butthead.” With a loud boom of thunder and a bright flash of lighting, Dustin found himself once again alone in his room.

Over at the Harrington’s place, Steve was cleaning himself up in the bathroom. Once again he and his twin had their daily screaming match of (Y/n)’s wellbeing, this time she had given him a hard punch to the nose and he had finally managed to get the bleeding to stop.

He walked into the kitchen and got out a beer, needing to take the stress out of him.

“Might wanna take something a bit stronger if you wanna take the edge off after a fight, trust me.” Steve jumped back but saw no one there.

“Who’s there?” Steve called out.

“Surely you know, after all this isn’t the first time I’ve snuck into this house.” Steve’s eyes widened and he immediately raced up the stairs and opened up his sister’s room and saw Eddie stroking his hand along (Y/n)’s acoustic guitar which sat at the corner of her room.

“This-this—that’s not possible. How are you—”

“Henderson asked me the same question.”

“Wait you saw Henderson? I swear if you’re one of Vecna’s tricks I swear to god……”

“One way to prove it’s actually me is that back in 81, I snuck in here to be with your sister after she had failed the SAT’s. Poor thing was so devastated she wouldn’t come to school for nearly a week cause it happened to be the time your parents came for their daily check in and she had a screaming match with your old man. So I came here that night and stayed with her. Then you barged right on in and said to me ‘Get out of my house freak! And don’t show your face around here again!’”

“Jesus Christ…..it really is you.”

“Nice to know when it comes to your sister you’re not that clueless anymore Harrington.” Eddie couldn’t help but mock with a smirk.

“If you’re here to mock me for being a horrible brother I already know that Eddie.”

“No, no I didn’t come here to gloat or to mock. Henderson gave me a brief summary on all that happened, but I want to hear your perspective.” He fully turned towards Steve holding up the locket necklace he had given her for a 16th birthday present their junior year. “What happened to my best girl?” Steve sighed heavily. He sat down on (Y/n)’s bed and confessed.

“(Y/n) was amess. At first it started off with her barely eating, then it was the constant nightmares of seeing you die over and over again. Then I noticed how she’d end up disappearing at night. I didn’t know where she was going until I caught her sneaking back in and her nose was bleeding. But not in the way where she’d been in a fight, and I didn’t want to believe it but I swear I thought I saw some white powder under her nose. Then it was the injections on her arms, I’ve been trying to get her to get some help but she’s lost it Eddie. Your death seemed to really fuck her mind up.”

“Jesus Christ.” Eddie mumbled solemnly.

“Now I don’t blame you, no way in hell am I blaming you. I just….It just pains me to see my twin sister like this. It’s like I’m feeling her pain like some weird twin telepathy if that shit’s even real. But I can’t stand to see her in that much pain, and for her not to know that she still has people here for her. Hell Henderson was there when you died too, and she’s acting like he wasn’t. You don’t think he’s feeling the same pain as she is?”

“She always did tease that we should’ve just grown a pair and shared custody of the twerp.” Eddie softly chuckled.

“She’s always struggled with depression ever since middle school. Our parents chose to ignore it and kept telling her to get over it or smile more. You’re not depressed, you’re just being dramatic. When she met you, that was probably the first time I’ve ever seen her truly happy.” Steve walked over to an old picture of her and Eddie together at the junior prom. “Deep down I guess I also grew jealous of just how happy she was around you, and not me. Now I see that it was because of my selfishness that I drove her away. And even when I got our relationship back to the way it was before, I knew she’d put you over me in a heartbeat.”

“Your wrong.” Steve turned to him.

“What do you mean?”

“You remember how we were on Lover’s lake to find that gate where Patrick was killed?” Steve nodded. “And you remember how you were dragged under the water, and I told you that Wheeler didn’t hesitate to dive in after you?” Steve nodded again. “She wasn’t the first. In fact, the second you went down, your sister dove in straight after you. Even for not being the best swimmer, she dove straight in after you. She does love you Steve. Like you said, twin telepathy is a serious bond. Now old King Steve, he wouldn’t have dared try to help (Y/n) in her grieving stage. But you’re not him anymore, you’re her twin brother Steve Harrington. The one she always believed was still somewhere deep inside of you.”

Steve scoffed but Eddie came up to him and placed a hand over his chest.

“You’re still trying, still fighting for her. But before you can save her, you have to save yourself. Not just for what happened to me, but for all that happened. That includes Mayfield.” Steve’s eyes slightly widened. “I’ve seen how you are with her Harrington. Ever since that mall fire, I’ve seen how you’ve come around to check in on her, how you’ve always tried to be there for her at school, and how you’ve been with her since I found out about this Upside down and Vecna shit. How can you even try to help your sister when you’re clearly not ready to forgive yourself?”

Steve couldn’t believe it but Eddie Munson was actually making sense. Ever since he had been knocked back into reality since all of this began, and ended up forming a bond with the kids who started it all, he’s been trying to be the big brother he naturally was to the kids who began it all. He knew none of the adults (minus Joyce and Hooper) wouldn’t understand and that the kids needed someone to protect them whenever no one was around. So he ended up becoming the ‘babysitter’ as he was deemed at first.

And at first it was an annoying title but now, ever since their first big failure, he began to truly understood why he was called that. He felt a strong need to protect these kids because who else was going to when Joyce had moved, when Nancy decided to try and return to her normal life, who else was there to talk to about all this stuff? Only him.

“She’s been dealing with Daniel Thompson.” Steve told him.

“Daniel. If there’s any drug dealer that should be in jail it’s that prick. At least Rick and I never dealt to pre-teens.” Eddie hissed as he felt his teeth starting to grow a bit sharp before they receded. “Does he still live in Hawkins?”

“After the earthquake he moved over to the next county about 20 minutes’ drive from here. You know what, screw it.” Steve raced over and grabbed his keys as well as his bat with nails. “C’mon.” Eddie followed close behind them and Steve started up his BMW and drove out of his driveway and through the storm to get his sister back by any means necessary.

With Eddie’s abilities, they were able to track down exactly where (Y/n) had gone to see Daniel and to Steve, it looked exactly where a drug dealer would live. A very run down apartment complex in what appeared to be an unsafe part of town. The rain still pouring down as Steve grabbed his bat.

“So what, you gonna come with and we bust his ass open?” Steve asked.

“This isn’t West side story Harrington. Daniel isn’t one to be messed with especially if he’s using with her. You go in there ready to bust his ass in, he’ll have you shot dead before you can even blink.”

“So what’s the plan?”

“Just follow my lead.” They exited the car and crept towards the fire escape on the side of the building. Steve then watched in shock as Eddie leapt up and across the railings of the fire escape with ease.

“That would normally scare the shit out of me but I’ve seen freakier shit than that to be surprised.” He climbed up the fire escape until he stood by Eddie as he looked into a darkened room. He placed his hand along the window and said.

“She’s in there. They’re both high as kites right now.”

“How can you tell?”

“I can smell the burnt spoons and blood inside.”

“Blood? Eddie are you—are you some kind of vampire or something?”

“Or something.” Eddie slowly opened the window and slipped inside like an assassin on a mission.

Once he was inside the room, he saw (Y/n) passed out on the bed while Daniel was up against his headboard staring up into space after getting his high. Eddie scoffed before letting out a low whistle that seemed to stir them both from their high. (Y/n) let out a groan and opened her eyes slowly raising her head while Daniel looked on ahead.

“What the…..fuck?” As Eddie continued to whistle, he noticed a lightbulb just hanging above him and trailed his head around it like a dazed man. He then once again felt his canine teeth grow into fangs as a sudden primal instinct came over him. He slowly walked towards them then once he got to the bed, he let out a leopard-like roar, baring his fangs which scared Daniel but startled (Y/n). “JESUS CHRIST MAN!! You nearly gave me a fucking heart attack!”

“Are his…..eyes glowing red? Damn his costume is like…..all in.” (Y/n)’s tone was slurred. Eddie couldn’t believe that this was the woman he had fallen in love with. She had fallen so far and so fast ever since his death, but he was going to make it right. But first he had to get her away from Daniel for good.

“Just the morphine yah dumb bitch. This is just some….freak looking for some kicks.” It was then Daniel withdrew his gun out from under his pillow. “Time for you to get out of here psycho. I ain’t got no more stuff, me and the girlie here used it all up.” Eddie withdrew his fangs and his glowing red eyes turned back to his normal dark brown as he pulled up a chair and sat down. He pressed his palm against the barrel of the gun and dared him.

“Take your shot Thompson. You got me dead flank.”

“You are seriously fucked up.” Daniel said. (Y/n) laughed in her high as Daniel continued, “Like you really need psycho-therapy help you sick fuck.” It was then Daniel pulled the trigger making Eddie jump back holding his hand in pain.

Daniel stood up and cheered in his victory on a bullseye but after his brief cries of pain, Eddie soon began laughing as he showed them both his hand and he then let out a cheer as the bullet hole healed instantly. Daniel’s joy soon turned to panic and fear as he muttered.

“Jesus Christ.”

“Jesus Christ. Stop me if you’ve heard this before; Jesus Christ walks into a hotel.” Daniel shot Eddie in the shoulder which made him lurch backward a bit but he recovered and started walking towards him, continuing with the taunting joke, “He hands the innkeeper three nails and asks,” another shot rang out this time to Eddie’s stomach.

(Y/n) got out from the bed staring at the figure in fear. At the second gunshot she ended up tripping over the bed sheets trying to get away but for some reason she couldn’t help but stare at the figure before Daniel.

“Don’t you ever fucking die!?” Daniel demanded.

“Can you put me up for the night?” in a flash, Eddie had forced Daniel to point the gun down at his own leg, the gun went off firing straight through Daniel’s femur, blood splattering everywhere. Daniel cried out in agony, clenching his bleeding thigh between his hands. “Hurts doesn’t it? When someone takes advantage of your weakness? Imagine what she’s gone through before you coaxed her into your web. In fact I’ll let you feel it.”

Eddie extended his hand and placed it over Daniel’s eyes and with a deep growl, Eddie allowed Daniel to feel every ounce of pain both he and (Y/n) felt on that day. Daniel let out a scream before he fell still and stiff as a board.

Once Daniel was taken care of, Eddie heard the bathroom door shut. He dropped the gun and slowly walked toward the bathroom. He opened it and saw as (Y/n) was waving her arms back and forth meekly holding what appeared to be an old razor. Her screams of fear piercing the bathroom echoing as she pleaded for her life.

“STAY AWAY FROM ME!! STAY AWAY!!” Eddie grabbed both her wrists and got the razor out of her hands. He pressed her back against his chest as he dragged her towards the mirror, her wailing making his heart ache but he had to fix this. He had her stand before the mirror, one hand holding out her arm that had been filled with old and new puncture wounds, while his other hand held her across her forehead.

“You once said; What is grief if not love persevering? It is okay to cry and mourn for those we lost,” she then saw as the veins in her arm suddenly began to move and she felt the morphine slip down her arm. “Drugs however is not the way to grieve.” (Y/n) soon felt her mind starting to clear up and when she turned to the man, she swore she was seeing Eddie looking at her. He cupped her face between his hands and he said to her, “your brother is outside willing and ready to help you.”

(Y/n)’s lip trembled as tears poured down her face and she fell to her knees as she wept hysterically.

“Harrington!” Eddie called out and soon enough Steve came in and immediately he knelt down beside (Y/n) and held her in his arms. Even as she felt him drenched from the rain, (Y/n) gripped onto her twin brother as tightly as she could all the while weeping out Eddie’s name. As Steve rocked his little sister back and forth, he looked up at Eddie in sorrow but also gratitude while Eddie looked down at the sibling solemnly.

Eventually (Y/n) passed out from her hysterical sobbing.

Steve had taken his sister to the hospital to help get whatever else could’ve been in her system and she ended up sleeping all throughout the night, all throughout the rest of the next day up until it was nearly sunset. She stirred away to hear machines beeping and the sound of voices speaking over intercoms.

She looked over and saw Steve along with Dustin talking with one another in a hushed manner. When Steve noticed (Y/n) waking up, he came over to her saying.

“Sleeping beauty awakes. You okay?”

“A bit.” She said groggily. “Where am I?”

“You’re in the hospital. Had to bring you here to get all that crap out of your body.” (Y/n) leaned up against her pillow shamefully.

“I am so, so sorry Steve. I am so sorry and ashamed of what I did. I know it doesn’t excuse me for my behavior, and I don’t expect you to forgive me. But I…..” Steve stopped her heartbroken confession by hugging his sister as tightly as he could. “How can you forgive me so easily? I thought you’d never wanted to speak to me again?”

“I was never angry with you for turning to the drugs. I was upset because I was afraid you were losing your way.”

“I did lose my way Steve.”

“But you found it again. And I swear, I’m gonna be there for you every step of the way. No matter what it takes to help you get back on your feet.” The Harrington siblings smiled at each other softly as they embraced one another as (Y/n) said.

“Thank you Steve. You really are the best big brother.” After a few visits from the kids, as well as the older members of Hellfire, (Y/n) would soon be on her way to recovery. After speaking with her doctor, he prescribed that she would need to go up to Indianapolis to their rehab center where she would get the coaching and help that I needed.

She and Steve signed a few forms and it was settled that after a couple of more days here for observation, she would take the first bus up to the capital for her rehab treatment.

Later that night as the hospital had closed down their offices to visitors and the night shift staff were doing their rounds. (Y/n) lay there on her bed watching the Golden girls on the tv. She was just about to fall asleep when she felt a cold brush of wind blow across her cheek, she turned and there she saw Eddie’s silhouette appearing from her window until he finally made himself known to her.

“Hello milady.” He greeted her with a warm smile and a gentleman’s bow.

“Eddie?” she softly whispered as her heart meter began to spike. Eddie raised a finger to his lips softly shushing her as he walked up to her.

“Guess when you say your heartbeats faster everytime I’m in the room, you’re not lying. But it’s best we don’t alert the staff about my presence sweetheart.” He stood at the foot of her bed.

“Is it…..is it really you? Were you there that night? Or am I going crazy again from the drugs?”

“It’s not the after effects of the drugs, nor is this a trick from Vecna. I am here sweetheart.”

“I…….” (Y/n) was speechless. “I’ve thought over a million, trillion things to say when I’d—” her breathing was shaky as she gasped softly, “How?”

“I had a mission to help three grieving souls who needed my words of wisdom. And you were the last one that needed saving.”

“So you’re…..you’re leaving again?” she asked sadly.

“Sweetheart I’ve heard and now seen just how my death has affected you. But there’s something you must understand. The Eddie Munson you once knew and loved has become someone entirely new. And I can’t let him near you until I’ve figured him out for myself.”

“But I…..I just got you back. Eddie I…..I see it happen every night when I sleep, and everytime when thunder rumbles, I’m back down there with you. Seeing those things rip you apart, not able to free myself or save you. Why must you leave me again?”

Eddie walked closer to her and hovered his upperbody over hers. He leaned towards her left ear and whispered to her.

“This belongs to you, and always will.” He came back up, cupped the left side of her face. His dark brown eyes staring down at hers as he leaned in closer to her face and captured her lips with his in a soft, hidden kiss. (Y/n) raised her hand up and stroked along Eddie’s face with the back of her hand and buried her hand underneath his curls.

As the clock by her bed chimed midnight, Eddie separated from the kiss and took her hand into his.

“Where can I find you again?”

“You know that place between sleep and awake? That place where you still remember dreaming?” he asked her. She softly nodded, “That’s where I will always love you. That’s where I’ll be waiting.” He told her in a soft, loving manner. His eyes soon glowed red as he told her, “Sleep now meleth nin, sleep.” A feeling of exhaustion came over her as she soon fell asleep. “Sleep until dawn.”

Eddie placed into her hands her necklace he had taken from her room and rested her hands over her chest. He gave her one last look, almost as if he were taking a mental picture to keep forever in his mind before he forced himself away from her bedside and with the last chime of the clock, and a wave of the curtain, Eddie Munson disappeared from the hospital.

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roserysttrpggarden · 1 year

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Hi there~! It's been a long time coming, but here it is, my attempt at reworking the 5e warlock, due to my dissatisfaction with the version presented in One DND (5.5??) feature a whole host of reworked and altered options so you may be the best devil worshiper you can be, the rest of this post shall go over some of the changes made along with my intention behind the changes.

The base class.

For starters, eldritch blast is now a class feature. Simply put, every warlock takes eldritch blast, doesn't matter if you're focused on support, damage, or you're a weapon wielding hexblade, eldritch blast is such a good option, so I might as well give it as a base class feature. Similarly the agonizing blasts ability to add your charisma modifier to its damage rolls was added for similar reasons, skipping over the spellcasting, pact boon and invocation changes, the contact patron feature from the One DND UA was added for thematic purposes, and eldritch master was reworked to instead allow your patron to concentrate on a spell, which yes, does allow you to concentrate on two spells at one (At disadvantage)

Spellcasting.

The One DND warlock features the rather unique ability to choose between intelligence, wisdom or charisma as its casting stat, while I enjoyed the concept I decided to take it a step further by tying your spellcasting ability to the otherworldly patrons themselves, essentially using their spellcasting stat in a way.

Additional changes include you getting your 3rd-level slot at 6th-level as opposed to 11th, cause the highest most dnd campaigns reach are around 10-11th level, and it feels bad having to wait all the way until then just to cast three spells a day, some other changes of note include the warlock being able to ritually cast, and the spells gained from their otherworldly patron are now automatically prepared, rather than added to the warlock spell list. Which i'm not sure why they did that? Unless they though it'd break warlock somehow.

The Pact boons.

Basically every pact boon got upped in power, such as pact of the blade and pact of the chain, alongside them growing in strength when you reach 5th-level, in addition, two new pact boons were added. The first being the Pact of The Gunpowder, based on the Pact of The Trigger by MonkeyDM, its an eldritch blast/cantrip focused pact for those who want to truly commit themselves to the eldritch blast lifestyle, alongside the Pact of The Idol, allowing you to sacrifice your hit dice to perform various features.

Eldritch Invocations.

A selection of (Mostly new) invocations were made for this document, my favorite would have to be the ones given to the pact of the blade. Admittedly in the rush to get this out by the deadline I chose to cut back on the invocations in particular, but who knows, maybe when I get to revising this someday I can add even more invocations to the list.

Subclasses

All of the subclasses were revised in one way or another, but for the sake of time i'll go other three in particular: The Hexblade, The Horror and The Undying. The hexblade is a rather infamous subclass within the DND community in no small part cause of how strong a 1st-level dip is for many characters (Cough, paladin) but the more I looked at it, the more I found myself bored of it. Don't get me wrong the 5e hexblade is rather powerful, but it just doesn't scratch the itch of the cursed item patron, and with hex warriors main drawing being ported over to pact of the blade, reworking was a must. The horror (Originally called the undead) I generally don't have to many issues mechanics wise, in fact it's one of my favorite warlock subclass, my only gripe is cause of how much if steps on the undying toes flavor-wise, speaking of which, the undying is possibly the subclass I had the most fun reworking, transforming it into a tanky summon focused as opposed to....Whatever the original was trying to accomplish.

Along with the revision of old subclasses, three new subclasses are included: The Arcanist, The Dragon and The Evergreen. The arcanist is a pact with a powerful being of magic (Such as an archmage) it allows you to learn wizard spells from your pact magic feature, manipulate your spellcasting and eventually imbue spells into trinkets, the dragon are for those that simply want blast their foes away, you can create bursts of draconic energy, absorb elemental energy and even assume the form of a dragon, lastly the evergreen is for those that couldn't decide if they wanted to be a druid or a warlock, allowing you to create a garden around yourself that damages enemies, alongside implanting magic seeds within your foes and protecting allies within your garden against spells, similar to an ancients paladin.

New spells

Because I like making more work for myself, a handful of new spells are available at the end of the document, so I apologize if they're a bit on the lower end quality wise, but I hope they'll be at least somewhat interesting.

That's about all I wanted to talk about in relation to this rework, keep in mind everything in here is untested, and I encourage anyone reading this to leave any thoughts or constructive criticism they may have. With that in mind, thank you for reading, go out and make something cool.

#dnd homebrew #dnd5e #5e homebrew #dnd #homebrew 5e #5e #dnd warlock #dungeons and dragons #dungeons and dragons homebrew #dnd 5e homebrew #homebrew class #homebrew #5e warlock #warlock

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blackjackkent · 18 days

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As I have done for the last two major patch drops, here's a collection of things that stood out for me in the Patch 7 patch notes! :D

There's quite a lot of them - and this isn't even close to the whole list of changes, so definitely check out the full patch notes here if you're interested.

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First of all, the things I'm actively excited about:

Introducing 'Evil Endings': Brand new cinematic endings for the truly villainous playthroughs. (Exciting! I've started pondering what my next BG3 liveblog will be - though I might switch to another game for a while first after Rakha is done - and I am starting to lean towards reworking Alexis, my bard, into an evil-run Minthara-mancer. So... intrigued to see more of this in the future!)

Added our very own Mod Manager, which lets you browse, install, and use mods created by the community. (I don't know details about the existing modding process but the new system seems like it'll be pretty intuitive so - hype!)

You can now start Custom Mode games using Honour Mode mechanics when starting a new playthrough. You'll be able to do this via the 'Ruleset' dropdown. (Neat! I may do this as well on my next liveblog playthrough - not the difficulty changes but just forcing me to stick to my choices with one save.)

The kuo-toa that promised to build you an army will now support you in the final battle. Unless they all died in Act I. (Amazing. I'm unironically in love with this addition.)

The help that the Gondians promised for the final battle will now arrive in the form of a friendly Steel Watcher. Apologies from Zanner Toobin for the delay.

Added a dialogue option asking for a kiss in more paths of Wyll's epilogue dialogue.

A bug that had been preventing Wyll’s romance greeting from triggering has now been fixed, so players in Act III who have a stable, loving, and committed relationship with Wyll will now see his romance greeting triggering correctly.

In Act II, Minthara will now react to you having knocked her out in Act I.

Made the romance scene at night with Wyll in Act III unskippable if it triggers to avoid accidentally skipping it and not being able to finish the romance arc.

To improve her chances of survival, Hope now has a new passive called Last Hope that grants her Death Ward for free when she enters combat.

Fixed a bug causing Dark Urge characters to get renamed after using the Magic Mirror. (This threw me for such a loop when I accidentally did it with Rakha.)

When playing as the Dark Urge, if you invite her, Alfira will now actually join your party as a controllable character if there's room for her in your party setup. Temporarily, of course.

Fixed several issues with the portrait that Oskar gives you. Principally, the image on the portrait will now be that of the active character claiming the reward, regardless of their position on the Party Line. (THANK THE GODS. I'm still not over having so many feels about Hector commissioning a portrait of Karlach to have after she was gone, and Oskar cheerfully handing him a painting of Jaheira to look at instead. XD )

Karlach will now tell you her backstory if you reach the point of no return in the Shadow-Cursed Lands even if you didn't confront the paladins of Tyr.

You can now return Mol's eyepatch to her when you find her in the Guildhall.

Fixed the Monastic Robes stretching into a violent-looking point when you wake up on the beach after falling from the nautiloid. (Thank god - this happened all the time with Hector and it drove me crazy. Hopefully this means it's been fixed in other parts of the game too.)

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And then the changes and bug fixes that made me laugh:

If Dror Ragzlin finds himself inside the spider pit [in honor mode], he'll try his best to befriend the spiders residing there with a new spell called Arachnid Compulsion so they can band together to fight the real enemy - you.

Malus Thorm has a new Legendary Action called Grasping Appendage. ( Oh dear. 😬 )

We noticed some of you hiccoughing bubbles, so the action for washing yourself with soap and sponges is now called 'Use' instead of 'Consume'.

You can no longer cheese the Leap of Faith trial at the Gauntlet of Shar by just clicking the final platform and letting your character pathfind their way there. Shar threatened to smite us if we didn't fix this one.

Fixed Minthara's body sometimes turning invisible on the Level Up screen. (We sorta liked the floating-head-and-hands look, but hey.) (Eyyyy, I ran into this in Rakha's run and it made me laugh a lot. XD )

Added a new idle animation for Minsc at camp - Boo may or may not have taught him some tai chi.

Karlach will no longer brush the shaved side of her head.

If you're in holographic form in the epilogue, Wyll won't automatically assume he's talking to Lae'zel.

Companions should now be more sympathetic to Astarion fleeing from the sun.

Fixed several issues (related to resurrecting characters via Withers, restructuring the party at night, and automatic camp night scenes) that would trap you in an eternal slumber, unable to end a Long Rest.

Fixed several occurrences of Wyll still having an exclamation mark above his head when he already told you everything he had to say.

Minthara does, in fact, now have something to say about Orin after you kill her.

Fixed the fade-to-black after Karlach's scene in Avernus at the end of the game, which would give you a very brief glimpse of Game Developer Land.

Fixed some issues with Long Rest: Loading a save made during a Long Rest could cause a crash and you could sometimes get stuck in a Long Rest forever and ever, amen.

Fixed a blocker related to Orin's dagger, which will now respawn near the altar if you hurled her into a chasm and a cultist picked it up before you did. (Because it's bound to her, it would zip back to her corpse in the chasm, lost forevermore.)

Monks' Clench of the North Wind spell now targets up to 2 characters at Level 9. They just have to clench a little harder.

Priestess Gut will no longer hit herself with her own conditions. Silly gob-gob.

We've suggested to Yurgir that when he's invisible he should take advantage of it and actually try to move around a little so that he's harder to find.

Fixed some technical names showing up for each of Ansur's limbs. Naming them all 'Ansur' was the ansur.

Raphael can no longer steal souls from creatures that narratively don't have souls, such as Undead and Constructs.

Kled doesn't have Dror Ragzlin's Legendary Actions anymore. Dror's not one for sharing.

Fixed how the Chest of the Mundane handles item stacks higher than its maximum. (It should no longer gobble up your enormous coin stack and spit back a measly 21 cups in return.)

Prevented summons and followers like Glut from being able to consume Noblestalk. Yes, your Mage Hand probably ate it. No, we don't know where its mouth is.

When Withers resurrects an avatar, the Dream Guardian will no longer immediately prompt another nearby avatar to loot them for a tadpole. Similarly, dead, dismissed avatars will no longer trigger this same prompt. Some decorum, please.

When multiple characters in the party discover a trap or hidden item, only one will comment on it. We figured you don't need four people telling you to watch out for the same trap at the same time.

You can now swap out party members by speaking to the companion you want to replace even if the one you want to replace them with is Wild-Shaped. What your companion will think of you replacing them with a sheep is another story.

Fixed multiple spots where Perception checks were being made through solid objects.

Elminster should no longer react to crimes that don't affect him. (We distracted him with some Stilton.)

Fixed an issue on multiplayer where Gale would briefly appear to be in his undies for the client if the host has the Donate UI open and Gale is wearing magical robes that he can consume.

Fixed a bug that would let you waltz your way through destructible walls without actually destroying them. (You could attempt to attack the wall and your character would pathfind right through it in search of a comfortable spot from which to take a swing.)

Bald characters with the Wet condition will no longer have darker scalps.

You can no longer loot the underwear of non-recruited companions when you knock them out. (Justice for Minthara's dignity! \o/ )

Fixed a split screen issue where Invisible characters would sometimes not render at all for a second player joining the game. We need them to be invisible, but not that invisible.

Fixed a bug where your party members would very quickly change out of their armour and into their cosy camp clothes when you talked to them after having left the Astral Plane. We don't really blame them for being so desperate to hit the hay.

Fixed an issue where resurrecting a mind-controlled Nightsong would cause enemies to become allied to you.

During the final battle, backup companions being called upon with ally abilities will now appear with some clothes on for the occasion.

You can no longer use the Active Search feature to bypass the booby-trapped display case in Ramazith's Tower and pick up the key inside it. Smarty-pantses.

Improved Lumbar support: Lumbar will now stand still after you paid him to hit him.

Fixed a bug where interacting with the crate full of explosive toys in Rivington could cause you to get stuck in an endless loop of crime dialogues (being interrogated and sent to prison) and/or in combat with temporarily hostile NPCs.

Fixed a bug where dropping or selling certain items looted from the Lower City graveyard could cause NPCs to react as though you'd committed the crime of moving a corpse.

Fixed Cordrane the Recent being able to raise a zombie in Sorcerous Sundries when he shouldn't be able to, like when he's dead or Silenced.

Shadowheart is now more engaged with the flora and fauna at camp. (I don't know what this means but I hope it means she plays with the owlbear and Scratch.)

A camp night scene with Shadowheart will no longer trigger if she's not in the party and, uh, also dead.

Fixed Gale's 'splosion sometimes not showing correctly, meaning you'd get a Game Over without knowing why.

Fixed your player character introducing themselves with the wrong name when talking to Mizora.

Fixed Avatar Lae'zel behaving like a companion at the end of the tutorial and telling you (or telling herself) to hurry.

Kagha will now be imbibing if she's at the tiefling party. (I didn't know Kagha could even COME to the tiefling party. O.O Is this if Halsin's dead? )

Fixed Abdirak's self-flagellation idle animation. (Game dev must be a weird job sometimes. :P )

Ward Magmar and Ward Pistle, the duergar at Grymforge, will now make a snide remark if you're playing a small race.

Shadowheart and Lae'zel will now have new equipment if it was taken during the nautiloid escape and they have travelled sufficiently far to realistically acquire it before getting recruited.

Benryn will no longer follow you to camp or leave with you through a waypoint while you're in the process of escorting him out of the burning building at Waukeen's Rest.

Fixed Korrilla being killable in the goblin camp prison after she kills Priestess Gut. This was causing her to spawn as a corpse later on in Act III.

Fixed a bug where leaving the Shadowfell could resurrect an unrecruited Shadowheart and have her turn up at your camp anyway. She just liked the cut of your jib.

Karlach's death scene no longer ends abruptly when a non-gith player chooses to leave with Lae'zel.

Fixed a bug where, if you promised Cazador to bring Astarion to him and Astarion was in your party, you could go to Astarion at camp and tell him to replace himself in your party.

Zanner Toobin will now trigger the self-destruct sequence correctly instead of suddenly forgetting he was supposed to be in a panic because of the Steel Watcher Titan.

Told Devella to be more patient and wait until the end of the dialogue before she moves on to Basilisk Gate after being saved from Dolor.

Jogged Nine-Fingers' foggy memory - she will now recognise you when you bring Jaheira to her after she asked you to.

Shadowheart no longer sometimes still thinks that Viconia is alive after having killed her. Poor thing.

Wulbren will no longer comment on Toobin's daughter being dead if Toobin is not present.

Gave Sticky Dondo more lines to yell to sell his wares in the Guildhall. (Thank fuck tbh.)

Fixed player characters and the Narrator talking over each other when interacting with Minsc's relics in his hidden chamber. (MINSC HAS A HIDDEN CHAMBER? I have some hunting to do with Rakha lmao.)

You can no longer open the barricaded doors at the Crimson Draughts apothecary from the inside. We forgot barricades are supposed to work both ways.

Yoinked Sceleritas Fel's hat back from Helsik's desk.

You should no longer potentially see the great empty void of Game Developer Land after starting the epilogue.

Added more lines for Jaheira and Minsc to exclaim during the battle with the Stone Lord.

Fixed a bug where it was possible to get stuck in a dialogue with the Emperor about killing Gortash if you clicked on Gortash's corpse with Karlach (which starts a dialogue, after which she leaves the party and goes to camp) while, with another character, you also clicked on Gortash's body and sent his gauntlet to Karlach via the context menu right before her dialogue ended and she left the party. Yep. You can read it again if you want.

If you fail a pickpocket attempt at High Hall, your allies will no longer become hostile towards you. We reminded them that the fate of the world lies in the balance and that you play a pretty big part in it, thief or not.

Fixed Gortash's title potentially reverting back to 'Archduke Nominee' when reloading a savegame after the ceremony.

Wyll will no longer talk about hunting down Mizora when she's, like, right there.

The 'Embrace Your Potential' quest will now close if you choose to squelch the Astral-Touched Tadpole beneath your toes like a sentient little grape.

Jaheira's journal could at times say she had something to talk to you about, but then she wouldn't discuss it. She's a bit less tight-lipped now, so you know what to do in the city.

Someone pulled the ol' switcheroo on the Eldritch Knight and Battle Master subclass icons. We've switchereed them back.

Fixed a bug where examining a character and then examining an item would merge both character and item into a monstrous model in a single Examine window. The character would also be T-posing and naked.

Removed the turrets from the ground floor of Wyrm's Crossing since they weren't supposed to be there in the first place and never worked.

Fixed an unreachable fruit porridge in Wyrm's Rock. Makes you wonder how it got there in the first place.

Moved an unreachable book ('On the Greater Healing Potion') at Last Light. (Unironically this has driven me crazy on every playthrough.)

If Minthara's camp trousers get blood on them, the spatters will now be spread across them more tastefully rather than concentrated between the legs. (Holy shit.)

Kerz, the half-orc hireling, was wearing clothes that didn't fit properly. We found a tailor and everything's looking spiffy now.

Fixed some particularly intense and alarming-looking smoke coming out of the chimney at the Rivington General.

Gave a skirt to the chicken lady who mentions a skirt.

Companions in Wild Shape at camp will no longer perform their idle animations as though they are still humanoid.

Fixed the animation for the Crawling Claw's footsteps. (Fingersteps?)

Fixed Brynna's clothes clipping through her arm and revealing her armpit. She informed us she was not, in fact, begging for a tickle.

Fixed the Graceful Cloth and Mighty Cloth looking like crop tops on male halflings.

The magicians outside of Sorcerous Sundries were yelling and casting spells so loudly that it was hard to hear your companions over them if you spoke to them nearby. We've toned this down and cleaned up the mix.

Added death vocals ('uurghghhh's) for dragonborn and half-orc NPCs.

Fixed the name of a decorative pot in the Colony, which was lying about being a cookpot.

Tweaked the spikes on the artefact in the dialogue where it passes from Shadowheart over to you so it doesn't look like it's impaling you.

Fixed your hand clipping into your face while smearing poo on it.

Told Wyll he doesn't need to hold his sword threateningly close to the chest of small races during his recruitment dialogue.

Fixed Mizora's body popping when she comes to pay Wyll a visit at camp. Save the popping and locking for the club.

Fixed Volo's hand clipping into your head while he performs his highly professional and sanitary surgical intervention.

Fixed the Dream Guardian's leg getting all jittery when they kneel down to let you stab them. The facade of stoicism breaks a little when you can see their legs turn to jelly.

Fixed a bug where biting off Crusher's toe and then defeating him in a fist fight would result in a cinematic where the toe was still present. An embarrassing inconsistency in an otherwise realistic chain of events. (I noticed this on Rakha's run and was judging you so hard, Larian. XD )

Fixed Shadowheart sometimes turning her head concerningly far over her shoulder during her recruitment dialogue at the Emerald Grove.

Fixed minor pops when playing as Avatar Shadowheart if the artefact explodes and kills Lae'zel. (This can happen???)

Fixed your character snapping their body backwards and wibbly-wobbling around as though trying to pass beneath a cursed limbo stick in the cutscene where Kar'niss approaches you in the Shadow-Cursed Lands.

Fixed the chalice that you hold when talking to Jaheira at Last Light vibrating suspiciously after you set it down on the table.

Fixed a Reconstituted Duellist's line getting cut off prematurely. He really, really wanted you to hear him finish saying 'come to my inner chambers'.

Dark Urge characters who have not cured themselves of Bhaal's influence or who have embraced Bhaal at the end of the game will no longer appear in Karlach's final scene as though they didn't just stalk off on a mad hunt for blood.

During Gortash's inauguration, Ravengard's head, sword, and legs will no longer leave his body suspended in the air behind him when he walks down the steps. (😱 )

Fixed a cinematic bug where the submersible would approach the Iron Throne and, the moment it arrived, would nope out and appear to reverse back to the surface.

#bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 patch 7 #patch 7 #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 patch notes #honestly waht i learned more from the patch notes than anything else was that i still have a lot i haven't found in this game yet XD #this was fun as always to put together #larian seem like fun people

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