#this entire bit is so good actually watch this vod

[drawfee-quot3s]

if you're a bird and you fall into a tar pit, you have. made such a dumbass mistake. 'cause you didn't even have to be down there

- jacob

[betweenlands]

okay, folks! we're home, let's talk about sbk!fool. specifically, the fact that something weird is going on with him. fair warning: this is gonna get long. also there's spoilers.

Fool is kind of a... side character in SBK. he's not directly opposed to OSSHA, but he's not exactly allied with them either. his island partner is Milkman and he's the other Birch Box guy, but he's good friends with Vintage. a lot of what he's done has been attributed to other people.

also, he might just be a huge threat, especially to whatever Olm is doing.

let's back up a little to the part of Avid's ep11 with Fool in it. here's a timestamp.

there's silly music. Kittrix is doing her "i am but a fence" bit. we hard cut to Avid saying "we're gonna need to have the law removed from this situation" and there is no background music. we go further into the scene, Vintage turns to Kittrix as Fool & the Jungle folks are walking off and says "remember that service i told you to sign up for earlier?", and we start getting an ominous synth drone that remains throughout the entire scene. Fool's whole prank slash hitman service is apparently deadly serious business.

this is... really weird. i was there for the Fool stream where this was recorded, and tonally while Fool was definitely being a little bit of a ham, he's also genuinely just like that and was being pretty lighthearted at the time. this scene? this scene is edited in a way that makes Fool seem really ominous, on-par with Avid in the scene an episode earlier where he kidnaps Ruby, and...

speaking of Ruby. their OSSHA clone does not like Fool. here's another timestamp from Leon's ep5, but what's important to know about this scene is stream context again in the opposite direction.

OSSHA Ruby, aka Cloneby and hereby called Tuby because i think it's funny, spent the entirety of their time online during Fool's stream basically stream-sniping him. Fool is not lying when he says they threatened him (even though i kind of had to point that out because it was a little subtle). not only did they show up in-person at Birch to act ominous, they also /msg'd Fool some threatening stuff and kept streamsniping him whenever he tried to go over to Cherry Kingdom and warn Vintage about how weird Ruby was being. this is what led to Tuby showing up at End Kingdom after Fool talked to Leon; Ruby-as-in-the-actual-player was straight up watching stream to know when he left and where he was going.

Tuby has beef with Fool... which is pretty weird considering OSSHA kind of struck a bargain with Birch early on where they could put up "under construction" signs and OSSHA would leave them alone.

okay. so Tuby doesn't like Fool and Avid thinks he's threatening. pretty lowkey so far. for this next part, we've gotta jump around in time, and you've gotta trust me a little -- Fool doesn't upload his VODs anywhere so the only proof i have of these is "i was there at the time."

anyway: this is Fool in the Limbo animatic. notably, this is from the sequence where Olm tells Avid to stop people from falling into the Void.

Fool has different skins for different servers he's on. Skyblock Kingdoms Fool is gold. Fool's PNGtuber is purple, but purple Fool also has a server he's associated with. to be absolutely clear, i am going to make a leap in logic here, bear with me, but this is not SBK Fool. because purple Fool is from Avid Adventures.

deep breath in, deep breath out. here's where stuff gets very "source dude trust me" other than the screencaps i have, so i'm gonna start with the absolute confirmable basics. Olm is the antagonist of Avid Adventures, the command block based adventure map that Avid makes. they are also the antagonist of Avid Adventures, the series about Avid making that map -- they're possessing Avid in that series, in fact, generally being quite ominous about it. i have an entire essay about that but we don't have time for it right now.

Fool, while playing on Avid Adventures, initially only did Dark Path. these VODs are well and truly lost to time, but initially he was doing the Shrouded Isles fully evil, committed to helping Olm largely for funsies. Avid even logged in as Olm to be ominous at him a couple times! in general it seemed like Olm and Fool were kind of wary of each other, but mostly chill -- Fool has a main god he swears allegiance to that isn't Olm, but he's still helping the guy, so there shouldn't really be much of a big issue?

anyway, turns out Olm is really petty. they left him a mean breakup note and everything! (sidenote: Atium's name is entirely my fault. as far as Fool is aware and as far as Fool's lore is concerned, they are a deity of luck, coffee, precious gems, and some other things all totally unrelated to any novels by a certain brando sando.)

anyway then Fool's base gets exploded to bedrock and he respawns in a white void room.

this actually coincided with Avid removing a lot of the shop builds at the original spawn, by the way! lore going forward implies that Olm, either using Avid as a conduit or just in general, straight up thanos style snapped everyone who used to be on Avid Adventures out of existence. one would assume this means this was also Olm trying to delete any trace of Fool.

you may notice that i said that purple Fool is Avid Adventures Fool, not was. this is because Fool does not stay dead -- he respawns! on his boat build next to his exploded base! with every single inventory of every single chest wiped! Olm really did not want him to survive. he and Atium, however, chose life. Atium leaves him a book as well:

Atium's typing style is kind of just straight up delightful, i'm not going to lie. their "blessing" took the form of a Fortune 6 pickaxe titled Atium's Prosperity in rainbow lettering with flavor text reading "A chance at a new life", by the way.

but yeah, uh, Fool and Atium (who is also Fool, it's complicated) just kind of looked Olm in the eye and went "nuh uh," which is insane because this is Olm we're talking about, the dark god most commonly known for destroying an entire civilization in a single night and also constantly telling lies to Nightmares/SBK Avid for funsies. Olm legitimately has straight up destroyed and killed and maybe even eaten other gods before. we have confirmation from Avid that they consumed an entire pocket dimension somehow and that's what led to the creation of Limbo.

and again, purple Fool just kind of said "nuh uh" to all that with the help of his deity, who is also him.

considering it's like 95% certain Olm is in charge of OSSHA at this point, and it's heavily implied that the clones are part of their orders for Avid, there's... a pretty good chance Olm knows Fool isn't exactly someone to take lightly, and that could explain why Tuby is so hostile towards him and Avid is so nervous around him.

then again, maybe it's just because Fool is fun to mess with and good at playing the prankster hitman. who knows?

Atium, probably.

[nonoqy]

i just can't believe antis say george has no personality when he has So much of it. he's so charismatic and charming and knows exactly what to say and when to say it. he talks a lot but he doesn't overdo it he actually Helps the host with his quick wit and funny bits. i think a lot of people that get lucky and get famous fast struggle with being entertaining to the public but george just excels at it. it doesn't even look like he's trying he's just naturally good at it it's almost like he was Born to be famous . like i'm watching this vod and i'm in awe he's in his element the entire time and he looks So confident and sure in himself. GIVE HIM HIS OWN SHOWWW

[tubbytarchia]

todays stream..... im watching the vod in 1.5x speed because i forgot to watch. another long one.................................

jim and oli meet up immediately. they go to jimmys graveyard and olis died a bunch and he called himself mrs canary. blond boyfriends is "one night only" and oli said no flower husbands. they started making jokes about closing tumblr and ao3..... blond boyfriends are dead </3 jimmy then says they dont spend their evenings browsing those sites then oli says speak for yourself im mr wattpad

oli says "put on something sexy" for the talent show because both of them forgot to make skins for it. jimmy says hes not putting on the maid one (oli: i will) then oli suggests they both put on maid skins. grrrrr

(oli: why dont you want to be a maid? why dont you want to be a maid? you loved it you had a thumbnail about it and everything, you loved it, you loved it! stop pretending you didnt love it!

jimmy: i only do it on special occasions...... i only wear the maid dress one time on one series....... i cant do it twice........

oli: yeah but this is a different character, this is blond boyfriend jimmy, its like a whole different action figure!

jimmy: right, right, ill put it on.)

then they ask chat to make oli a maid skin since he doesnt have one. specifically with the same face as jimmys (the derpy face) then they realise they need an invisiblity potion for their talent show thing so they go to steal one from pixs furious cocktail machine. they go material gathering for more talent show stuff and split up.

(he kept making spongebob references. i think im going insane)

they meet back up. on the way jimmy goes to sausages house to steal some milk and he sees saus so he stabs him and runs away. oli found a weird pillager looking base in sausages house and shows jimmy to see how he would react to it. (u know how his voice goes when hes lying? Yeah) then after talking for a bit about who they think is a pillager (lizzie) they split up again.

they meet up again and switch skins to their maid ones,,, then they start practising their dance for the talent show. not a lot happens other than flirting and oli theatening to kill himself if they lose. then they head over to the talent show and oli sings a gay little song on the way. he tries to make it sound less gay but it turns into sounding like a one night stand.

they arrive and sausage admires the outifts and asks if they want to work at the tavern later. oli says yes (only if they dont win) and jimmy doesnt say anything about it. they take their seats and jimmy sits in front of scott. hes standing on the back of the stair instead of the front so scott asks him to move so hes not blocking scotts view. jimmy says not my fault im 6 foot so scott hits him and he ends up landing on the back of the seat in front (which is eloises). eloise hits him back. he gets hit around a bit (notably laughing) then scott pulls his sword out and asks out loud how much of a blockage a grave will be. jimmy then shakes his head and goes please no i dont have any armour on :( and scotts like haha i know. then the talent show starts

mog introduces the show and prays for no deaths. first event with no deaths. please. he reads a poem for his pet sweetpea that died. its actually really good but the fact that its about a minecraft bee does make me giggle. the judges are fwhip, eloise, and katherine. not entirely people who hate jimmy.... he has a chance....... how the judging works is the 3 judges have redstone lamps that are ON and if they turn them OFF they dont like the act. if all 3 lamps turn off you have to leave the stage.

first act is shubble :) she makes cat jokes. i think theyre funny. fwhip turns off his lamp and shubble says "quit the catattitude". eloise also turns off her light. she ends her performance with 1 light on!

sausage goes next...... hes doing a play about boat boys. joel audibly sighs in the audience. sausage is wearing an etho skin and drags joel on stage. saus tries to get joel to say he loves etho but joel just goes I LOVE MY WIFE!! lizzies in the audience and she doesnt react at all. "etho" then goes on to say they have a kid together. then it ends with 2 lights on. (technically 1 but katherine turned off eloises light. then eloise turned off fwhips light but he turned it back on.)

then oli and jimmy go!!! fwhip turns off his light almost immediately but they basically just make puppy dog eyes at him until he turns it back on. they start with their dancing and they get the audience to join in. its much more organised than the rehersals. then they go onto the disappearing act. fwhip turned his light off again but eloise and katherine seem to be loving it. jimmy splashes himself with the invisiblity potion (and accidentally catches oli in it) then runs behind the seats and drinks milk. eloise turned her light off too :( but katherine and the audience really like it. they try to do their drowning act but theres a conduit power which makes it less interesting. they end the performance with 1 light on.....

then its mogs turn! hes. racing people. and jumping very high. then he starts flying. i genuinely think hes hacking and i respect the dedication to the bit. then he starts walking on water. i think he ended with all 3 lights on.

judging time....... notable thing is katherine gave oli and jim a 10/10.

IN A SHOCKING TURN OF EVENTS. JIMMY AND OLI WON. EVERYONE SAY THANK YOU KATHERINE FOR SABOTAGING MOGS SCORE FOR THE BIT.

1st: oli&jim. 2nd: shubble. 3rd: mog. 4th: saus. fwhip gives jimmy his coin and jim says thanks daddy fwhip. jimmy goes home and is very happy about it :) then he ends........ new sos video saturday and next stream is monday :P

long recap again.... this ones kinda all over the place cuz i was typing while watching. i equally love blond boyfriends and also want oli 100ft away from jimmy at all times

man oh man... the adventures of the blonde boy friends

Ok the maid dress......... I'm not too upset by it because I accept Oli joining in with the maid outfit thing as a valid form of helping Jimmy heal. Not that Oli INTENDS to do that (he's too stupid) but... Him insisting "you loved it! You did!" makes me want to throw up but he's stupid. He's his own fucked up thing who I don't see as participating in the Jimmy "bottom of the food chain" bullying culture. He puts himself down on that food chain alongside Jimmy... unintentionally, still, but. Mmmgh. If it were, say, Sausage instead whototallydoesnthaveamaidkink saying this... It'd be another story and I might just throw myself out the window

Oli's fooling around and I still hate his insistence on Jimmy liking the maid ordeal (and even here, Jimmy is voicing the opposite!! sobs) but then he goes and puts on a maid dress too. It might be unsubstantial fun and jokes for him, but at least Jimmy's not alone on that now in a sense... Even the derpy face is the same... And same with "I'm mrs canary now". It's more "haha we both suck" and less "you suck/I suck almost as bad as you". More affectionate and less derogatory

Oli saying he'll kill himself if they lose kinda sucks because Jimmy frequently gets blamed for failures of groups he's part of, and if not, he might just blame himself and apologize anyway. But at the same time if they did lose, I cannot imagine Oli blaming it on Jimmy. He'd only address it as them both being equally at fault. Shared failure... The bar is really low ok

OF COURSE Sausage is there to admire them OF COURSE Sausage whototallydoesnthaveamaidkink is asking them to work at the tavern. Fuckass sorry I'm gonna hold myself back in case any Sausage fans are reading this. Sorry Sausage fans. I don't hate you ok. and Jimmy not saying anything in response even when Oli said yes... he has trauma guys he has such trauma I cant fucking make this up its right there. This is making me so sad. Jimmy choking up.... Even if he were to voice displeasure he'd just be shot down again. Sausage won't take no for an answer and Oli being Oli would probably encourage Jimmy too. Unfortunately. This sucks

There's something about Joel here too but I actually can't talk about it I'm serious even Tumblr will cancel me

I can't tell you how fucking happy I am that they won though so that 1. Oli doesn't kill himself and 2. They don't have to go work at the tavern as is evident is against Jimmy's wishes anyway. He doesn't have to relive his trauma. Katherine you have no idea what you've done I love you Katherine

Also thank you Jimmy for stabbing Sausage. Deserved

[blockgamepirate]

Techno's Minecraft Mondays!

Just wanted to give some more video recs: IMO the best weeks from Techno's POV are

week 1 with ShotGunRaids

week 3 with Ava Kris Tyson (she/her!) (note: this is pre-transition)

week 6 with Jschlatt

week 10 with Phil

Other weeks are also great but if you don't feel like watching all of them, these four would be my recs

Techno made his own highlights videos of weeks 1, 2, 3 and 14:

Jschlatt made a highlights video of week 6:

Phil made a highlights video of week 10:

^ All of these are great, can recommend. Week 10 is basically a must watch tbh, it's the beginning of a beautiful friendship (I actually prefer to watch the full VOD from Techno's POV but I included Phil's highlights video for people who don't have the time to watch the whole two and a half hours)

I also have a handy playlist for all of Techno's MCM VODs if you do wanna watch everything in full, unedited:

If you do though, I have a few potentially helpful content notes (these are from two years ago so they're not up to date but it's a start)

Week 5 Techno teamed with CallMeCarson but thankfully for most of the VOD they aren't together

If any of you would like to skip the Carson content, here's a handy list of timecodes and a summary so you can skip to the good bits:

20:06 Carson leaves

23:52 Carson comes back

28:35 Carson is muted

34:10 Techno joins team 11's call to find Carson

39:12 I think this is when Carson leaves the call?

48:15 Techno joins Carson again

48:57 Leaves the call

1:11:59 Carson comes back

1:14:50 Carson leaves again

1:16:30 And he's back

1:18:05 And he leaves for the last time

1:43:40 Techno attempts to contact Carson one last time but notices that Carson has left the server entirely

Summary: it's basically just Carson bullying Techno as a joke, which he did warn Techno he was gonna do ahead of time, except it gets very awkward very quickly and Techno hates it and asks Carson to stop but he just doesn't stop. Also it involved him spamming Techno with soundboard messages, most famously "Hey, Technoblade!" which became a meme. Also he tried to teamkill Techno a bunch, which led to Techno losing pretty badly in the first game

Techno spends most of the tournament either just doing solo commentary or hanging out in other teams' calls.

The parts without Carson are still great! Special shoutout to that last game where Techno plays hunger games solo

Also a warning for repeated jokes about a particular disease from AntVenom when Techno joins his and Jordan's call during MCM5. It's during Dropper if you wanna skip that

Other notes:

The first three weeks I would recommend maybe not reading the ingame chat too much if you don't wanna see people hating on Techno. Week 2 and week 3 are especially bad IIRC. But if you don't watch other POVs or read the chat you're mostly fine.

Also I wanna give a content warning for like a lot of food talk and also talk about not eating in week 4 (James talks a bunch about food and eats on stream and Techno has a running joke about not getting fed unless he wins)

I won't bother listing all his teammates. If Techno is teaming with someone you don't want anything to do with; unless it's Carson you're probably just gonna have to skip that week entirely.* Carson is the only one who Techno spends long periods of time not talking to, everybody else he's in VC with pretty much the whole time

(* actually week 14 might still be worth watching despite the teammate (Wisp). That one used to be on my recs list and I only took it off just now because of Wisp, but the highlights video really doesn't have that much of him in it and mostly everybody's just in a massive group call so I think it's fine? It's on the first playlist I linked. For the VOD maybe skip to about 1:01:00 and watch from there?)

Anyway I'm not gonna tell you what to do, I still feel fine about watching those weeks despite the teammates*, because the streams are mostly fine out of context as far as I can remember and it's not like I'm giving them views when I'm just watching Techno's POV, but if you don't feel comfortable doing that, that's understandable and you can skip those weeks.

(* this was written two years ago, I would probably skip week 13 now just because I personally can't handle hearing that guys voice anymore, not that there's anything bad in that VOD from what I can remember (it used to be one of my faves rip))

(Hopefully there isn't anything big that I'm forgetting)

[wildpeachfarm]

See the thing is with streaming its going to die regardless, yes companies handing out less contracts is killing it further but its already dying at a fast rate? I'm not a stream hater either btw I really enjoy them but like. For example. 2020, 2021? When school was remote and I only ever worked mornings because of covid hours? I was clocked into that Philza 8hr stream DAILY. I was scheduling my classes around those streams so I could do homework while listening/watching. Went as far as to use my monthly speaking privilge to ask Phil what date British Daylight Savings began so I could keep my schedule clear. The second everything was no longer remote, and store hours went back to normal, I maybe caught 2, 3, maybe 4 streams in that year before I decided enough was enough about QSMP and I LOVE hardcore content.

From a company standpoint I can see why YT may not be interested in handing out streamer contracts anymore. Like Dreamie and a few others they're recognizing the Covid Number Boom is over- but unlike Dreamie, because theyre a corporation, they can't just "stick it out" and "recelebrate milestones". They have a "bottom line" to protect and they're not getting that same sweet sweet ad revenue from streams because of decreased viewer counts. Esp bc people don't just go back and watch vods unless there's a REAAAALLY good reason to. So no ad viewership there either. They're going to go back to relying on videos (and unfortunately probably shorts as well, I hate the tiktok-ification of every socmed site) to keep their ad revenue up, especially with the battle of ad blockers. I see more ad and monitization deals being handed out.

With streams (bc vod watching is lowkey practically nonexistant) not being in high demand bc of time constraints (happening while busy, timezones issues) the demands for videos will be higher as videos are ALWAYS readily available. Someone uploads at midnight your timezone? I mean it'll be there when you wake up, you won't have "missed" anything like you would have a livestream. Get a video schedule set out and you're GOLDEN- the first thing I do when I get home from work is check if a handful of youtubers have uploaded to put on to watch. If not, I rewatch some of my fav vids.

Also psychologically I actually think this is for the better of all CCs as a whole. Streaming, esp for some of the hourly requirements some of these ppl either HAVE to hit to get paid or WILLINGLY put themselves through (Tubbo) you have to wear your persona the ENTIRE time. You have to make sure you don't slip up that ENTIRE time. You have to be entertaining the ENTIRE time. You have to filter yourself because it's all live. To me this just sounds like what I do on a daily basis masking my audHD and that shit is so tiring and it's why I could NEVER be a streamer. If you're recording videos you can control what goes out. You don't have to wear whatever persona you decide to put on for 8hrs for a stream, you can record 3 hours of footage and then be done for the day, and that can either be one video or multiple depending on a lot of factors. Accidentally say your mom's name? Cut the clip. Bit isn't funny? Cut the clip. They will still have to actively filter themselves yes but for a much less amount of time. In the end CCs will have a lot more mind power that they're not using up to take care of themselves. I genuinely think it's psychologically better for them all.

It's unfortunate that the streaming industry is going to collapse this way. But also seeing how the communities heavily affected by streaming are more drama filled than communities w/o streaming, I'm lowkey hoping it's for the best. Pulling the plug like this imo is a mercy kill.

And now I'm gonna wash my mouth out for all that corporate speak I just used. Sorry for the manifesto. And if someone wants to put this manifesto on reddit idc just crop/block any usernames IG

I appreciate the essay-andy-ing these are interesting thoughts! I don't think the streaming scene will collapse entirely but I do think that it will become more advantageous to be a youtuber because people have found that to be the most consistent for many years as a CC rather than streams which require a lot of additional things (like you mentioned)

And I feel like we are seeing quite a few people say they're going to prioritize youtube more in the future which seems to be the beginning of that transition

I am curious if twitch will ever try to keep certain big-viewer streamers on the platform with 'kick-style' ($$$$) contracts.

[year2000electronics]

its so wild seeing trolls band together become an actual big thing, as someone whos seen the original a million times bc of something called a little sister (the script doesnt leave my brain send help) if i may ask: what is the appeal exactly for band together? like what made people like yourself catch on? ive heard is simply velvet and veneer but i thought asking might help me understand

WELL my own personal theory is that like. you remember how trolls 2 was a weird pandemic release right, where in order to make up the bulk of movie ticket sales it was basically the first movie you could buy on VOD for a fixed ticket price. for families of like, 5, or just multiple households in general, only playing $20 was actually a great deal, but for people like me who would only be watching it on their own, i’d be having to pay $20 for the privilege to watch a movie Once at home where i’m not even able to own it digitally after the fact. so a lot of people didn’t see trolls world tour as it came out

but then movie theatres opened up again, and trolls 3 managed to get some good promo in before the writers strike (it was a trailer bumper for BARBENHEIMER) so like. people were actualy motivated to see it more ig. especially with like, going to the movies with your family or going on discounted ticket days. it’s the Experience. there was also a bit of buzz around the fact that wish’s villain song sucked MAJOR ass, so people were kinda turning to trolls 3’s villain songs that had dropped like “ha. ha ha. isn’t it funny how this baby movie for little babies has FAR better villain songs than disney’s big prestige anniversary movie” but there was also buzz around velvet and veneer in general because people tend to really be fans of rubberhose style things imo. so like velvet and veneer really caught on as a phenomenon and a lot of people who saw the movie stayed v&v stans but a lot of people who saw the movie to see if the villains were all that ended up falling in love with the entire thing (like me!)

going back to the pandemic release vs theatre release thing i genuinely believe trolls world tour could have sparked a renaissance of trolls’ image like this if it hadn’t been dropped the way it did. because trolls 1 was a Fine Enough fantasy world but it was just about going to and from bergentown and neither pop village nor bergentown were very cool locales. but trolls world tour had COOL LOCATIONS and REALLY COOL LORE and AWESOME SIDE CHARACTERS which is a lot of stuff band together has too! ike i firmly believe that trolls has more of an appeal now because it’s shifted into a true fantasy adventure series it’s just that the one that actually started this trend was trolls world tour. because people LIKE thinking about the politics of the different troll tribes and they LIKE thinking about the sibling dynamics of brozone and it’s a lot more meat to bite into

either that or maybe people just really like velvet and veneer to a supernatural degree. who’s to say. who’s to say.

[brookstolemybrand]

I was watching the newest Mom Piece VOD and they were talking about not being sure what the moon symbolism in One Piece actually signifies and that got me thinking and I think I have an idea?

Or at least this is the vibe I've been getting and I'm finally starting to figure out how to put it in words

Firstly, let's talk about chapter 1044:

The Sun God, the Warrior of Liberation, appears at night, silhouetted against the moon, while below him in the palace, Kozuki ("Shining Moon") Hiyori plays "the Moon Princess" and talks about the Dawn

Secondly, Pedro and the Nox Pirates in chapter 878:

Perospero: Did you you name the Nox Pirates… to refer to the night? A rather negative connotation to choose!

Pedro: …

Pedro: As they say, there's no night… that doesn't end in a sunrise.

Pedro: To me, Nox is synonymous with… the moment before the dawn.

So I'm sensing a bit of a theme here:

One Piece definitely has a lot of light-dark symbolism, and light tends to be good while dark is bad. BUT, importantly, the kind of darkness that's bad is the darkness of the void, it's Blackbeard's black hole, it's Imu obliterating an entire island, it's turning an entire century of history into a "Void Century"

And it's also Kurozumi ("Black Charcoal") Orochi covering the sky with smoke (and defeated by Hiyori whose name means "Clear Sky"), which is not really "void" but it's definitely another kind of darkness with heavily negative connotations

The Night (Nox) on the other hand, is not inherently bad. The Night is a natural part of the cycle which will always give way to the Dawn.

And I'm gonna take a little bit of a leap here and say that the Night is not all dark, because it's illuminated by the Moon

Which allows me to actually justify the theory about the D not being a letter but a pictogram of the moon!

This is why I feel like it would be thematically appropriate: think of the D as the light that illuminates the darkness and ushers in the Dawn! Like a moon!

I definitely do think that's the purpose of the 月 (Moon) character in all the names of the major families in Wano (except for Kurozumi). And Kozuki is the primary family because their name has the character for "light" in it (Kozuki meaning basically "Shining Moon") and Hiyori in particular is important because she has both the Moon 月 and the Sun 日 in her name, which I think is why she's one of the very few Wano characters whose name is written in all kanji

(Also yes I still have that crack theory that the 月 is just the Wano spelling of D which preserves its actual meaning)

(I don't actually remember if I've talked about that before on this blog or not)

And speaking of the Nox Pirates: the Minks in general are inherently connected to the moon as well, through their Sulong forms

So all of these moon associations would just be an extension of Pedro's words; the Moon (D or 月 or Sulong) is the Light (光) that illuminates the Night (Nox) which is followed by the Dawn

Teach of course is interesting in that he's a D but also associated with the Void... And he doesn't sleep so arguably he's also associated with the night? idk, we'll see where that's all leading to I guess

I do also really like the idea that the D is a smile, partly just because it's funny but also because it is very fitting for this story

[myrmica]

mer, mer, I am trying to pick out important clips from The Team Awesome Meeting ?v=_koDVRp2nHI Streamed live 25/11/22 right before Zam decides to betray

but. instead i appear to be picking ~every time Zam does in fact try to convince Mapicc and Ro to not keep the dupes with words. doing a close-reading of zam's character arc in this stream into your inbox. thanks c:

(proper Directory Clips™ should include new frontiers in stream-sniping! Poafa is physically in Mapicc's room! while he's trying to convince Roshambo to burn the duped stuff!! push him out!! into a hot tub!?!)

42:00-54 do /bans count as "part of the lore" or is that "breaking the fourth wall"? does the legality of an exploit depend on whether you will or have made a banger video about it?

53:31-54:31 Mapicc gives up on 'I can only explain the loophole after you burn the dupes' and tells Roshambo that they only need to destroy certain categories of dupes and can keep the rest; Zam (who's been quiet for a while) backs Mapicc's whole contract argument pretty thoroughly, including the the-other-vaults-are-exempt part...

57:19-49 ...aaaand then immediately after Ro fulfils the contract (ish) Zam starts wondering if that contact is actually 'enough'. (and his vocal tone drifts into the stratosphere, man sounds all high and floaty and very very distressed) (i wanna say 'dissociating' but that might be reading more far in than sensible)

1:15:20-16:19 Roshambo and Mapicc argue about whether Ro should burn one stash of the duped withers; Zam is also arguing he should but neither of them pay the slightest attention to him, like it's actually incredible

1:16:21-30 Zam tries to ask "is it ethical to have thes—" and they cut him off to joke about how "Mapicc should get a wither a week, pocket money"

1:17:03-41 Zam protests an entire twice in a row about Mapicc ordertelling him to take ten duped god apples and sounds, again, so distressed

took me a bit to answer this ask because this intrigued me enough to want to watch through the whole vod myself. added these to the doc along with some additional clips! i've wanted to sit down and go through more of the pre-betrayal team awesome stuff for forever so thank youuuuuuuuuu for inspiring me do that :D

there are so many interesting character moments in here. like obviously because it's the three of them trying to work through a problem, but i love a good old fashioned lifesteal argument more than anything else in the world. it's really interesting how confident zam sounds when he's backing mapicc up prompted with a "you're on my side right?" and how unsure he sounds trying to voice any disagreement. earlier on in the stream, mapicc listing "and they tried to steal zam from us!" as one of the reasons he did something so dramatic against the APO..... and the whole thing sets up the tensions in mapicc & ro's relationship with each other really well too. this stream is definitely a more solid chronological starting point than the following stream where zam is debating with himself or hsh are on their own

[iycedrem]

How it's going:

Came home from work on the morming of the 16th and noticed that some things were moved around that I don't remember touching. (A shelf under my bed and some stuff on my coffee table)

I had a wedding that I was attending that afternoon, so didn't really have time to look into it and just kinda chalked it up to maybe I just like knocked them out of place by accident at some point and just didn't notice. Immediately went to bed.

Woke up and immediately left to go to the wedding. Had a wonderful time, drank a good bit, and got back home around 8pm.

Now noticing things aren't just moved. Somethings are missing. Snoop a bit further and find purposeful damage to a piece of furniture and signs of forced entry on my basement back door. Someone broke into my house.

Notably and weirdly nothing valuable was stolen. My PC, TVs, Switch, Monitors, Tablets, etc. were all fine. To the best of my knowledge they stole: A Bluetooth speaker (annoying but not the worst thing to lose), a knife my Grandad gave me before he died (the one thing i actually really hate that I lost), a half used pack of AAA batteries (rude, also why?), and a junk box I kept behind my computer monitor that was 90% full of old birthday/ Christmas cards that I just couldn't bring myself to throw away. (???)

After filling a police report, proceeded to order brackets to reinforce my basement door, better locks, and some outdoor security cameras.

The problem is, that stuff isn't showing up for a few days and I'm due back at work tonight for one last night shift before a long weekend and I'm worried this might have just been a casing break-in.

So the plan:

Step 1: reinforce basement door.

Not a prefect solution, but trying to force the lock and deal with the wedged 2x4 isn't going to be easy, they'd have better luck breaking the glass, which I'm hopeful is too risky to try.

Step 2: Create the illusion that the house is occupied.

External lights and most internal lights are on. Ace up my sleeve though is the 11 hour VOD of Jerma playing Seaman on my living room TV. It's long enough to cover the entire duration of my shift and it's mostly just audio of someone talking with very few sound effects.

(Note the damaged record console, spot that hid the sound bar was sliced open by whoever broke in)

Step 3: Call upon "The Boys"

My wonderful amazing friends agreed to help watch a livestream of my Webcam to keep an eye out for movement. (A special thanks to @nermish @cefpodoxime @admiralpickle among some other non tumblr mutuals)

Step 4: finishing touches.

A) Set up an alt account on discord so I could watch my own camera stream from work on my laptop.

(Shout-out to @cefpodoxime for this amazing alt pfp that he slammed out in record time for my new laptop account.)

B) Since the camera doesn't have great view of the entire living room decided to rig a noise trap to alert the stream if some one comes up from the basement.

Ended up adding another 4 or 5 cans after this pic was taken and stacked them taller to ensure a good clatter noise. Tested how it sounded on the stream and it was definitely distinctive.

And C) Nermish asked if we could rig up a mirror so the stream security could watch Jerma in the reflection.

So, I give you the final view:

Note the absolutely miniscule reflection coming from the couch in the next room. There's your jerma stream. Combined with the muffled audio that accurately sounds like Jerma is in the next room. This is easily the worst best way to watch a jerma stream.

At time of writing I am 4ish hours into my 10 hour shift and so far no sign of trouble. Will update if something happens or not. But honestly the absurdity of this set up has made the entire ordeal easier to stomach.

[blacktobackmesa]

i think i remember you saying the science team would rewatch the videos together( like the cast commentaries,) and i was curious to see if you would talk a bit about that? like… how they reacted to certain things and scenes, if or how they talked it out, stuff like that… i’ve been wanting to ask this for sooooo long but just now got the confidence to, i love this verse sooooo much !!! its been living rent free in my head ever since i first read the series… its the only way i can think of post-canon i love it so much… ok thats all i hope you have a good day !!!

First I gotta say Thank You and I'm making my first official rent payment for the real estate in here. It has always been the goal to inspire people to think about the team like this and I am SO grateful for every ask sent and conversation had. But YES let's talk about watching

Gordon gave the team the option to watch the VODs and edits on their own, but was convinced to make it a group activity by his friends. This ended up being to precursor to their regular movie nights-- everybody met up in Tommy's basement to watch the edits together over a couple days. (Nobody wanted the emotional whiplash of going into Act 3 unprepared.)

One of the key things that everyone has a reaction to is what fonts and text colors Gordon chose for them.

Benrey likes his text color well enough, but would have preferred purple. He also thinks his font could have been something way cooler. He also thinks it's weird that he and Forzen have the same font, and accuses Gordon of being lazy.

Tommy tells Gordon that he likes his font and color, but it's hard to tell how he really feels. He does say that while his favorite color is actually red, he knows that can be a bit harder to read against a dark background.

Bubby is insulted that he was given Times New Roman, legendary as a default font, but changes his tune when told it's actually Sylfaen. Entirely different! With this, he and Coomer are both satisfied with their captions. In fact, their fonts are in their favorite colors... sort of. Coomer actually prefers cyan, while Bubby likes green.

Gordon actually got Darnold's favorite color dead on. He's started using his typeface, Terminal Grotesque, on most documents and correspondence. He hasn't verbally acknowledged this, but Gordon's noticed. It makes him smile.

G-Man thinks his font is very practical. That's all he's said on the matter.

Other Notable Reactions

Bubby had completely forgotten that Gordon didn't believe him about his name. Upon being reminded, he went "Wait, hang on, hang on. What the fuck, Gordon? Who DOES that?" (Darnold felt validated by this.)

Coomer laughs uproariously at his own jokes and slips of the tongue.

"So Tommy. Benrey said you like mean people, do you... do you have any idea what he meant by that?" "Oh! Well, you know." He failed to elaborate.

The screen going black during the ambush came as a surprise to the team. Everyone remembers actually seeing the events play out, though in hindsight, Coomer questions his own memory. There's a lot about that whole stretch of time that he has questions about, but he knows they can't be answered.

Bubby goes out of his way to point out situations where he was playing a trick or just straight-up lying to his friends. Part of it is for full disclosure, part is to brag about what a funny guy he is.

Gordon is uncomfortable with clips where he is condescending to or impatient with the science team. Benrey tries to diffuse his anxieties by pointing them out directly and highlighting all of his insecurities. He's a great friend. He tries his best.

[jame7t]

Any fancy new plans for streaming in 2023 or just same old same old? (Both are good options your streams are very fun)

yes actually..!! I haven’t done an elaborate production since my first year streaming, and while I kinda really got the ball rolling in year 2, I never put on The Hole Stream. Which, I’m dissapinted in myself about.

And, anyone who’s watched my streams long enough knows I’ve always wanted to do tabletop streams, but am daunted by the task of making them visually engaging (I have adhd) as well as technically sound (if I get rules wrong live they’re going to get my ass in the chat)

Im gonna continue Mojave Mondays for now- I’ll probably complete the entire game with Franq, frocked or not. I also want to play that cold Minecraft mod to completion- and the mod creator actually offered us a server to do so on! Which is cool.

Other than that I want to work on channel branding stuff I guess? I dunno. I need better references of my sona so people can actually make fanart without having to go diving. I’ve realized my ‘about’ section on twitch is clunky as hell compared to everyone else’s just because I like long images. Sad!

Oh, and YouTube. I’m still uploading VODS to the yt channel when I remember to (streamer’s rune is on there now!) and I want to cut together some of the best bits from my fallout play though for an edited series I think. We’ll see!

[friedrocks]

oooooooh please i need to know more about your qsmp pacific rim au

I'VE BEEN WANTING AN EXCUSE TO POST MORE ABOUT IT! Ily anon thank you and sorry it took me a while to reply here we gooo :))

This whole thing stemmed cause I re-watched Pacific Rim, one of my favorite movies of all time after a QSMP vod. And I immediately was like. "Oh my god, Jaiden and Roier as Jaeger pilots." So far I have 8 pages of a Google Doc on this now.

And now there's MORE to do bc MORE members just dropped.

Everyone is still stranded on an Island, one in the middle of the Ocean reserved for a Shatterdome that is used solely for training and repairing/constructing Jaegers. Everyone is stuck due to the sudden appearance of some Kaiju. One uses an electrical attack, sending a shock wave over the island and Shatterdome. Everyone is knocked out for two hours, and when they wake up, all technology/ways of communication outside the island is broken/unusable. Also, no one remembers why or how they are there. They only remember their names, some of the other members, and what Kaiju and Jaegers are. Otherwise, they're stuck and clueless.

Here's some ideas I have for the Eggs so far!

Eggs:

The kiddos are found as Kaiju eggs, in the same order so far. Super small compared to what is normal for Kaiju, so they are taken in for research- not easily, some people say no, but overall the majority vote to bring them in. They hatch about two weeks later, shocking everyone when they hatch to reveal what look like regular, human toddlers- all with white hair, white scales, and small white tails (over time of being cared for, the kiddos' scale colors change to match their parents and such).

At this point, everyone pairs up to take care of the kids. Some are already romantic couples, qprs, or besties. Badboyhalo is still a single parent, however I might work in Skeppy as being his friend/partner who is either on the island in a coma or just not there at all but Bad still remembers him much to the chagrin of everyone else. As for Quackity, I might have Tallulah and Tilín be twins, and have Wilbur and Quackity work that out (who knows how that will end, they're both disasters).

So far, I have options written as far as Egg deaths and what I want to do if I don't want to include Egg death. Cause it's fucking sad, but also. Juicy juicy angst.

Characters:

So far every character is just plain old human (except obviously the eggs, cucurucho, and code).

So far for Jaegers, I have 5, which I feel is a good amount. I didn't want to have too many, I had to narrow down the number of ppl I wanted to see in a Jaeger. I'll list the pairs I have so far here:

• Jaiden and Roier

• Baghera and Forever (siblings in this au)(they pilot a Jaeger formerly manned by Bad and Skeppy)

• Philza and Missa (Formerly manned by Phil and Fit)

• Mariana and Charlie

• Pac and Mike (woah woah!) (also I'm still back and forth about them being pilots or engineers- or hey! both)

Everyone else is either dedicated to Strategy, Kaiju research/experimentation, general tech, or Jaeger engineering/design.

Cucurucho and The Code are also there, I'm brainstorming ideas on them (and the Eggs) being Government experiments of some kind, trying to blend animals and humans with Kaiju.

That's all for now without being too specific.

THANK YOU AGAIN ANON I'M HAVING SO MUCH WITH THIS

The only thing that would be better is if I could have anyone who actually speaks Portuguese and/or French and/or Spanish to help me out. I know a bit of Spanish, but definitely not enough to write it entirely accurately. I also worry that I won't characterize some of the non-Englisj speaking cubitos correctly, due to me not being able to watch them regularly.

Anyways ily and I love Pacific Rim and I love the QSMP my brain is buzzing, my hands are flapping

[ollovae3]

Hi there!

I'm looking to create a clone OC, but I'm worried about power dynamics being an issue between him and a far more "galaxy weary" partner who has seen a lot more of the universe's cruelty.

Do you have any advice on how to make sure the relationship and dynamic stays healthy and equal? I've never shipped a clone with anyone before, so this is all brand new territory for me.

Hallo, Anon!!

I actually figured out words for a minute between homework pages, so wanted to reply while they were still with me!!

But: A. Love the idea and also honored you asked! And B. I think so far this actually sounds totally fine? Honestly your pair sounds like my parents!! My Mom's the "Eeyore" of the two, and my Dad's the "Tigger" as they put it, along with other things, so they're similar sounding!

I think I know where you're aiming your worries, so I'll answer to that, but if I guess wrong please feel free to toss another ask at me!! And none of these are like,,, decrees or anything? Just suggestions for you to take and run with as you like!! If they sound definitive, sorry about that, that's not the tone I'm meaning to give. 😅

If you're worried about power in general, this partner being a Jedi would be a more major concern, but civvies also need to be kept an eye on? Clones have very little/no power during TCW, and if they're AWOL they're at risk of being captured and sent to an unknown fate. I'd advise writing this concern in, even if just in your notes, and have them address that imbalance? For Avi and Thorn, for example, along with boundaries for her as a Jedi (and her being technically non-military/not in command of his branch), they also agreed to let him be the lead for how the relationship proceeds, so he lets her known when he's ready to move forward, or needs space, so that he's got more control over how far he's okay with going in various situations.

If your clone is still serving, I'd run with something similar, so that the civvie isn't like, putting him in danger or making him feel as though he's being dragged around with threat of a report over his head. If not serving, I'd aim that way still, though enjoy adjusting to giving them more PDA/date time 🤣

As for the "World-weary vs Hopeful" dynamic, I'd definitely stray away from old tropes of "clone knows nothing and acts like a child constantly" and "partner has to show clone about anything that isn't a weapon". The clones know things, they've trained for this, he's likely been deployed for a bit and gotten to travel and visit different places, experience new things already! Instead of the mentioned tropes, aim for something more adult. Maybe he knows about grocery stores and street food, but he's never had money so never gotten to actually choose and purchase anything, so when partner takes him along to a corner store, he's excited to get to pick out what to get! Maybe he loves candy, but trading with vod isn't a vast wealth of the one he really likes, so partner taking him out to go and buy a bunch of that candy to enjoy and explore. Stuff like that if that makes sense? Emotionally, those old tropes show up too, so watch out for those. While Clones maybe didn't get a TON of romance experience, they clearly know about it. They'd be more likely to just be awkward about how to go about flirting/asking someone out, rather than entirely ignorant to the concept.

And address the question more literally, while this person may have seen more cruelty, it may be interesting to pit that against how the Clones are raised and what they've seen in battle? Maybe your trooper describes home and his childhood, while partner is listening with a dropped jaw. Maybe they don't get why he's so damn optimistic, why he's so "ignorant to the real world", only to get a verbal smackdown explaining that he's very much aware of the real world, but that he's also witnessed a lot of good, and he fights to protect that, not to try and just beat bad guys?

Sorry for this length, I was trying to sort of "shotgun" answer, since I was worried you may have been asking one of a few different ways? But if I still missed or if something I said is odd/confusing, let me know!! I'm in midterms so my brain is mush atm. 😅

When you write or draw those OCs PLEASE let me see, they sound wonderful?? And for ok there questions, definitely check out CloneHub and Queen-Breha-Organa!! They've got great posts about racism in SW, and discussions about clone OCs/ships!

[grey-rambles]

Hi everyone; it’s been a little while, huh?

As you may have noticed, I’ve been a lot less active on here recently, and there’s a couple of reasons for that, but the long and the short of it, is that I’m not very sure of the future of this blog.

It’s been really discouraging to be on here recently, to be honest. I haven’t had a new follower who wasn’t a porn bot in weeks, I receive very little engagement on any of my writing outside of my already established friend group, and a lot of them have either taken a hiatus or left the platform entirely. It really doesn’t put you in a good head space to want to create when you feel like nobody actually cares about what you’re putting out.

I’m also just... losing interest in this fandom. I knew it would happen eventually when Techno passed, since he really was my favourite, I just didn’t think it would happen this soon. There’s no more lore to get excited over, seems like there’s a bit of a content drought in general, at least with the folks I follow. Wilbur is rarely streaming, and when he is I’m at work, and I just can’t be bothered to VOD watch.

I’m not sure if I’m going to stick around in a more general blog sense, or if I’ll just leave everything up as an archive. Maybe if I fall into another fandom, I’ll pivot to blog about that instead, but I’ve been in several fandoms since I started engaging with online spaces, and only three of them have ever inspired me enough to write, so I doubt that’ll happen.

I’ll update you all if and when I make any decisions. I have plans to finish polishing up the last chapter of First Loves and Second Chances (though I might scrap the epilogue, I’m having trouble conceptualizing how I want it to go), and there’s a couple of requests currently in my inbox that I’d like to put out if I can swing it, but I have no further plans to continue writing on this blog in the future.

Thank you to everyone for supporting me over the past year or so. My DMs are open, if anyone wants to reach out for my Discord handle, an easier and more reliable way to stay in touch! <3<3<3

--Grey

[blockgamepirate]

I have thoughts on the current Chayanne and Tallulah angst

(Under cut because it's probably gonna be long)

Disclaimer: I'm just talking from the point of view of the eggs here, I'm not trying to accuse Wilbur, Missa or Phil (and obviously especially not the streamers) or anything, I'm just not focusing on them

So mostly talking about Tallulah here because tbh Chayanne's side of it is just me going "WAHHHH ;;A;;" because fucking hell that shit is rough. Losing one of your native languages as a bilingual kid is already rough, your absent parent coming home and immediately having a mental breakdown and avoiding you and talking about leaving again is a hundred times worse. There's not much else to say here, it's just a terrible situation. The only good thing about it is that Missa does still genuinely care about Chayanne, even if his own feelings of inadequacy and insecurity are getting in the way of demonstrating that in a way that would assure Chayanne.

But anyway, I definitely get how that must also look like from Tallulah's POV. They've both been waiting for their dads to come back and now Chayanne's finally did and it went terribly, even if it ended sooort of okay (although.... not without issues).

And much of that was about Chayanne changing. And Tallulah has absolutely changed, even if like Phil said she is still the same at her core. She's grown, she's learned to fight, something that Wilbur apparently really didn't want for her (sorry I still haven't actually watched the Wilbur VODs aside from the adoption one ahdjjfkg) she's been through a lot.

And a lot like Chayanne, she's spent most of her life in Phil's care now, and that shows.

So it's more than understandable that she would feel that Phil is just dismissing her anxiety. Sure Phil did lose hope of Missa coming back, but he has so much faith in people he cares about and wants to believe in them. He's paranoid about the Federation and the codes and also just normal everyday dangers, but he has a bit of a blindspot when it comes to his friends and just interpersonal drama. He wasn't ready for Missa's insecurities or how they could affect Chayanne. But it happened.

Phil also does not know how Tallulah and Wilbur's reunion will go (if it ever happens). He's so sure that it'll be great, but he doesn't know that, no matter how much he insists. It could go badly! There could be drama! Even if it's not Wilbur rejecting Tallulah, it could be something Tallulah interprets as rejection or disappointment.

And even if Phil is right and it'll all go perfectly, that doesn't help Tallulah right now, because just telling her that it'll be fine isn't addressing the sources of her anxiety. It just sounds like Phil is in denial or babying her. Which... I mean I wouldn't say that's accurate but it's not entirely inaccurate either. I think his instinct is to reassure Tallulah but it's not what she needs. And his instinct is to trust wholeheartedly in Wilbur but that doesn't help Tallulah either.

(Also, she knows for a fact that Wilbur didn't originally want a kid. She knows that it took a while to convince him to accept her into his life. She was there. She saw the hesitation. All of that was reasonable from Wilbur's POV because it really was correct that he wasn't able to take care of Tallulah the way a father should. He knew it from the start and he was right. But yeah, it's gonna be something that has to cause some insecurity issues for Tallulah.)

She needs Phil to actually address the worst possible scenario, I think. Just entertain for a minute the idea that Wilbur really does abandon Tallulah. What would happen then? Phil would keep looking after her, Phil would still love her. Or if Phil wasn't around anymore, the other islanders would. And if Wilbur did do that to her, she would have every right to be pissed off. It wouldn't be because there was anything wrong with her.

It would be an awful situation, but all the people who cared about her would still be there for her. And she could talk to the other kids who were also abandoned by one of their parents; Ramón, Pomme... am I forgetting anyone? idk. And she could talk to Chayanne too. She would not be alone.

It's not the most uplifting thing to think about, which is why I think it didn't even occur to Phil to even entertain that notion, but I think it would be more reassuring actually? At the very least to let her know that Phil is taking her seriously? And THEN he could tell her that it wasn't gonna happen because Wilbur would never. Idk, that's my hunch anyway.

Also, it's possible that part of this is about Tallulah herself feeling some resentment and anger towards Wilbur, and not knowing what to do about those feelings, because they're not what's expected of her. And this is where Phil's words might have made things worse, because Phil tries to appeal to her dedication to her papi, but what if she feels like her dedication isn't what it should be anymore?

Idk. Those are my thoughts. I'm not gonna call it analysis, I'm not putting enough effort into this to qualify as "analysis".

I'm alsl very sleepy so apologies if there are some weird bits in here