#though without the same sliders she might look a bit different

[morrigan-sims]

📞RING, RING📞

500 years late to the party, but I finally did @literalite's telephone cas challenge.

[film-in-my-soul]

Hey!! For the a ship, a trope, a sentence ask game: How about Icemav - accidental secret realtionship with "you guys walked in on us in the locker room, more than once, how did you not know?"

Maverick is nervous. He knows, realistically, that he shouldn't be. DADT had been repealed, Slider did a whole coming out thing for his niece the year before, hell, Maverick's seen Wolf with his hands down Holly's pants. But still, this is different. This clarifies that what he's got with Ice is here to stay, not a relative (well-loved as she is) or a hook-up when it's easy.

A hand slots into Maverick's, a body saddling up next to his in the bar booth. The hand is large, familiar, and heavier with the weight of the ring he'd slipped down Ice's fourth finger without complaint. It slides away just as quickly, old habits worn into the other man, but Maverick doesn't complain, not when Ice puts that same hand on Maverick's thigh.

"Could feel your leg shaking all the way from the door."

Maverick scoffs. "Sure you could."

Ice knocks their shoulders together and doesn't leave space between them when he settles again. It makes Maverick smile, opening his mouth to tease again when Slider's loud and unmistakable voice draws his attention.

"Alright, break it up, love birds," he slides into the space across from them, Hollywood hot on his heels.

"Where's Wolf?"

Slider rolls his eyes, and Hollywood winces.

"Might have accidentally told him the wrong day. He and Cindy took the kids to dinner."

Maverick kicks the other man under the table and doesn't look sorry when Hollywood yelps. All his previous nerves slip, and he pushes menus towards the new arrivals, waiting until their food's put in and they have drinks to try and broach why he and Ice have gathered them.

When he can't manage, picking at the corner of his bottle, Slider sighs.

"Alright, you two gonna tell us what this is all about? Cause if I gotta learn Maverick knocked up some Admiral's daughter, I'm making you pay my part of the bill."

And somehow, Slider's ability to shit talk right through a thick atmosphere has Maverick's tongue loosening.

"Ice and I are gettin' hitched." He doesn't even need to drag Ice's hand out with the simple silver engagement band, the man at his side doing it himself with a raised brow like he's daring either of the other men to say something about it.

They don't, though arguably it's worse than if they had. Hollywood spits out the beer he'd been sipping, and Slider's jaw drops damn near to the table.

"You-"

"I'm sorry, what-"

"When the hell did all this happen?" Slider settles on, waving a hand between Maverick and Ice. It makes Maverick's brows furrow, but Ice drops his arm over his shoulder, too, so what minor irritation had been forcing that expression smooths out, leaving only blatant confusion.

"What the hell do you mean?" There's a bit to Maverick's tone.

"Hey," Holly says, finally done choking, "it's not that we're not happy for you guys, hell yeah, marriage and all that, but... just... isn't it a bit fast?"

It's Maverick's turn for his mouth to slacken. He'd say they're fucking with them, but honestly, Hollywood's a shit liar, and Slider would have made some crack about them being married already.

"Are you both saying you didn't know?" Ice asks, drawing Maverick's eyes to him. He's unsurprised to see an equal amount of surprise pinching Ice's lips into a downturned line.

"I mean... we haven't seen you both in a while." Slider hedges, shrugging, and Maveirk's had just about enough. He throws up his hands.

"We've been together since '92!" comes his exclamation, "You guys walked in on us in the locker room more than once. How did you not know?"

Slider is the one who chokes this time, and Hollywood, flush high on his cheeks, probably remembering something he ought to have forgotten grimaces.

"Whoops?"

Maverick feels even less bad slamming the toe of his boots into the other man's calf a second time.

What a bunch of idiots.

[the-ace-with-spades]

Weird take but Carole and Mav get married a couple of years after Top Gun.

It starts very simple --- Carole doesn't want to move out of the house she and Goose rented in Lemoore though the military programme but she can't stay there more than three months after the funeral because she is a widow and VA can't really prolong the lease for non-military people without a military spouse. She wants Bradley to have a stable home and keep the friends from other military families Bradley already made and she quite frankly can't afford anything as good as the military housing within the same budget out privately somewhere in the area.

Mav is living in a bachelor pad that looks like the cheapest student house share one has ever seen so he says, hey, let's transfer the lease onto me and we'll just try to pay for it together. And then he moves into the spare room they were previously saving up for Baby No. 2 that will never come to be.

It makes some things easier too --- Mav can take care of Bradley while Carole looks for a part-time job that can align her hours with Bradley's future preschool hours as he's not in one yet since she was a stay-at-home mom since they moved to Lemoore. She is a qualified teacher (art/music) but there aren't many schools around and she has barely taught before b/c she finished her degree and got pregnant not long after and with them moving around different bases, she couldn't find a job as anyone but a temp teacher. It's easier to cook for three than for one and they can switch with the chores depending on who is home at the time.

This rises some eyebrows in their circle of friends and military acquaintances --- Mav moving in with his best friend's widow not long after he died and helping her with taking care of his best friend's kid --- but everyone who is closer to Mav knows he still feels guilty about Nick and that Carole and Bradley are the closest thing to family Mav has left so it's kind of brushed off.

Ice and Slider, who have kind of gradually became a family fixture too, coming to dinners and helping with Bradley when both Carole and Mav are busy, have a bit mixed feelings about this.

Mav and Carole do seem awfully close. And even with Slider knowing that it was Mav who originally introduced Goose and Carole to each other, they seem almost too synced up for it to be completely platonic or new. Mav is very natural as a parent-adjacent, too, and it might turn Ice into a gooey puddle of lovestruck idiot, but it also makes Slider a bit too aware of how fast the switch from Mav-the-fun-uncle to Mav-the-helicopter-dad was made.

If Slider was honest, he'd admit it's the jealousy speaking. He had a crush on Goose when they were in the USNA that was kind of hard to comprehend but the crush on Carole is even harder to comprehend because, well, she just lost her husband and he should not be thinking about his tragically-dead friend's widow like that, but also it's a bit weird that he had a crush on both people from one marriage. He's carefully balancing on what's appropriate and on how to make it easier for Carole and yet Maverick just slides into her life in a blink-and-you-missed-it moment. Maverick has no qualms about showing Carole affection, smothering her in hugs and cheek kisses and bringing her jumpers when they sit in the cold breeze in the porch and taking Bradley who had fallen asleep from her arms and swaying him around in his, never held back by some unspoken rules. Especially that Slider kind of sometimes sees those moments when Carole is looking at him, shyly, too, like she's battling with herself about how inappropriate it'd be if Slider had those feelings and she had those feelings back. They have the little coffee dates or he takes her and Bradley, just the three of them, shopping or to a museum, or he gives them a ride when their car doesn't start in the morning, and Carole looks at him with those huge eyes of hers all bright and bubbly and Slider---Slider can only think about how inappropriate it'd be.

Ice is, well, Ice, so he's being a bit emotionally constipated. He's in Denial, with capital D included. Maverick and Carole might be in sync but the two of them are the ones bickering like an old married couple. The locker room banter in present every day and Slider can swear that if they weren't in public, they would have fucked at least three times already after their so-called 'arguments'. He talks about Mav way too much, too, always thinking about what they can do for him and Carole, and where to take them and Bradley next. He's become addicted to Mav's surprisingly good cooking and have stopped eating spaghetti outside of Mav and Carole's house because it 'doesn't taste the same'. He takes Mav to clubs and bars to relax when he has a heavy week and it's as close to dates as Slider would put them. He's a bit weird about Carole being affectionate with Maverick, too, but in a different way --- he always looks away when she kisses Mav on the cheek or when they cuddle up on the sofa with Bradley lying across their laps. He always puts his nose in Mav's hair when they hug goodbye but barely gives Carole a pat on the shoulder. He teases Maverick every time of the day, too, but he's always smiling so softly when he does it, melting even more when Maverick grumbles in response instead of starting a fight. Whenever Maverick isn't looking, Ice looks at him like he's about to vanish from his life at the wrong word. He looks at him like that would be his life's biggest tragedy, too.

Despite all that, he still claims he 'doesn't like Mitchell like that' and that even if he did, Maverick wouldn't be interested, even though they both know Maverick is bi.

It kind of gets a bit weirder when, after almost two years since Goose's death, Bradley starts calling Mav 'dad'. It gives both Ice and Slider a heart attack, when Baby Goose says during their usual walk to the park that, Dad is taking me to the aquarium with Mom next week, maybe you can come, too. And Carole and Mav don't react aside from making the usual excuses of they might be busy, baby (like either Slider or Ice could ever say no to any of the three of them).

Mav, later, explains that Bradley was having some difficult time explaining who Maverick was in their family dynamic to his pre-school teachers and so they went with step-dad and so Bradley picked up on it and started using it sometime a week before the park trip. It was an obviously big change but he was still remembering and calling Nick 'dad' too, so they've decided whatever Bradley is most comfortable with will be what they'll go with.

It's a logical explanation, to both Ice and Slider, even if it'd sound a bit icky to anyone who didn't know Carole, Mav and Goose's dynamic well before. It also makes Slider wonder what he'd be if the step-dad title was already taken, even if the thought is shoved back deep into his mind as soon as it surfaces.

Ice is, well, still Ice, so he alternates between getting red in the face every time Baby Goose calls Mav dad while they're doing something cute and between getting incredibly quiet about it. Slider would bet that he is having an identity crisis as he's both always hated the idea of having his own kids and now he doesn't and because the person who is changing his mind is Maverick, of all people.

Then Ice and Slider get deployed for four months and when they come back, first hot rumor on base they hear is that Mav bagged his best friend's widow.

Obviously, at first they think it's a rumor but then the gossip girl of their squadron (their XO) confirms that Mav's file has been updated so he has two dependants, his wife and his now officially adopted son.

Slider feels like an idiot. Ice is sulking but he's in even bigger denial, saying he's been expecting this and that Mav and Carole were a good couple and would make each other happy and that they were already making a beautiful family with Bradley. It gets very awkward, very soon, especially that Mav and Carole don't say anything about it when they meet again.

In the meantime, Carole just had been made redundant after the school she was teaching hired a new full-time teacher who could work more hours and didn't have a kid to pick up from pre-school everyday around two. The payout she got from the Navy after Goose's death wasn't much and she could keep on being in and out of work for some time but Mav's deployment was getting closer and closer too and they had to revise all the possibilities. One being that Mav might not come back, too.

So they got married, on paper, no ceremony and with a city hall employee as the only witness. So she and Bradley could have some safety net if worst came to worst. So she could take Mav's newly signed life insurance and health benefits of a military spouse. So if the situation were reversed, Mav didn't have to struggle to get Bradley's custody.

[one-boring-person]

Ok. A little different but I was thinking about Top Gun and I was wondering if you could do an Iceman x Mavericks little sister reader where they meet at a local bar near the base and slowly start falling in love

I hope you like this!😊💛

You Beat Me To It.

Tom "Iceman" Kazansky x reader

Warnings: swearing, alcohol consumption (moderate)

Masterlist

As cliche as it sounds, it had all started with an unfortunate accident in the popular little bar near the airbase. 

It was a busy night in the small place, as it usually was, the room filled to the brim with pilots, RIOs, ground staff and civilians. Music blared somewhere overhead, garish lights illuminating the area in their own peculiar way, casting an odd glow over every person there. People gathered and collected around the bar itself, the tenders never kept idle, money flowing in from a variety of hands, the alcohol and beverages keeping spirits alive throughout the bustling room. It had been here that Iceman found himself.

Slider had insisted they went on that night, despite his own reluctance; it had been a long day at the base and all he had really wanted to do was to sleep and rest. Of course, he knew there was no arguing with his RIO, the young man far too persistent for his own good, so naturally the pilot had found himself dragged into the busy bar, a beer shoved into his hand almost instantly. It hadn't taken long for the girls to start flocking to him. 

Iceman knew he was good-looking, so he wasn't surprised that he was quickly engulfed in a crowd of eager women, all of which flirting and baying for his attention, though he could already tell none of them would tickle his fancy. He kept them entertained, joking with them and keeping them on their toes the entire time as he peered at them over his sunglasses, which he insisted on wearing inside, smirking as they swooned over him. Hands seemed to be everywhere, pressing at his shoulders, chest and stomach, feeling over the muscle in his arms, creeping up his neck until he batted them away with a pointed look. Eventually, he had tired of this, however, and went to push out of the gathered group. Misjudging himself, Iceman had then collided with someone else, a surprised yelp escaping the person as moisture spread between them.

Turning to them, Iceman had been ready with a sharp quip, finding himself tongue-tied when he actually saw who had bumped into him.

"Careful, big guy." Is all she said before she collected her composure and left, heading towards the other end of the room, where some others from the airbase were. 

Frozen in place momentarily, he had watched as she went straight to Maverick and Goose, the former slinging an arm around her shoulders as she approached, grins appearing on their faces.

From that moment onwards, the two seemed unable to avoid meeting each other in the bar.

Not even a week later, Iceman had been sat at the bar, thankfully alone for once, slowly drinking from a beer bottle in front of him, the pilot deep in thought. Once again wearing his sunglasses inside, Ice never realised someone had come up beside him to order drinks until they spoke to him directly.

"Last I checked, the sun tends to stay outside." She had commented, tapping her fingers on the countertop as she waited for her drinks.

Looking up, Iceman had once again gone to say something sharp, only to be surprised when he immediately recognised the person standing beside him. 

"Maybe it's not the sun I'm protecting my eyes from." Is all he can manage, pretty stuck under the intensity of her gaze, a somewhat familiar feeling he had when talking with a particular pilot.

"No? What, then?"

"When I've figured it out, I'll tell you."

She had given him a quick smile, then, thanking the bartender as he gave her the drinks, before leaving, returning to the group of aviators she was with. 

Everytime after this moment, every conversation between the two had been started by a sarcastic or teasing comment on his choice of eyewear, both of them often finding themselves at the bar at the same time. It had been after their fifth time meeting that she actually stayed with him for more than a minute, placing herself into the stool beside him as he fought off a couple of persistent girls, her face creased into a barely concealed smirk of amusement. When he'd finally gotten rid of them, she'd passed him a beer with a knowing look.

"You ever gonna take those off?" She had asked him, gesturing to his sunglasses, sipping her own drink.

"Only when you finally tell me your name." Iceman had replied, smirking at her. In their last few meetings, he'd found he'd started to enjoy her company, often looking out for her when he first enters the bar.

"You only had to ask." She shrugged, holding out a hand, "I'm (Y/n)."

Taking her hand, he told her his name before reaching up to remove his sunglasses. 

"Well, I can see why you always have a fan club." (Y/n) acknowledged, smiling at him to show she meant no harm.

"Thank you, but they're a right pain." He laughed, placing his glasses in his breast pocket.

"I can tell." She chuckled, sipping her drink.

"You often come here?" Iceman inquired, curious as to her reason for coming.

"Yeah, pretty often. I meet up with my brother here." She casts him a look, "You might know him. Pete Mitchell? I guess you'd know him as Maverick."

Iceman had done a double take.

"Maverick? He's your brother?" 

"Yep. And before you say anything, he's just as annoying out of uniform as he is in uniform." (Y/n) rolled her eyes, gesturing to the pilot across the room.

"I thought he might be." 

Following this meeting, it wasn't too hard to arrange a repeat of it, the two finding that they enjoyed themselves a whole lot more than they thought they would. Of course, as soon as Maverick had found out his sister was hanging out with his rival, there had been some trouble.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?!" The young pilot had snapped at him a couple of months after he and (Y/n) had first met.

"What are you talking about?" Iceman had responded, looking up from the beer in his hand to acknowledge his fellow pilot.

"My sister, you asshole! What's your deal with her?"

"My deal?"

"Yeah, your deal! What the hell do you want with her?" At this point, Goose had come up to stop his pilot from going too far, laughing it off as he always did.

"She's my friend. I don't want anything with her except that." He had told Maverick, though he knew it was a lie: he had developed a particular affection for the girl, finding her presence very enjoyable to be in at all times.

"Bullshit. I know what you're like, you want to get laid." Maverick had been quick to spit back, this comment feeling particularly unfair.

"No, I don't. (Y/n) and I are friends. Suck it up, dickhead." Iceman bit back, scowling at his fellow aviator angrily now, standing up so that he loomed over him.

"And even if we were more, that's none of your concern, Pete." (Y/n)'s voice cut through their argument, the girl coming to stand beside Iceman, an action that clearly irritated her brother.

"He's not good for you, (Y/n). Stop hanging out with him." Maverick tried to reason with her,

"No, he's my friend, and you don't control me." 

"Come on, (Y/n), I'm just looking out for you." 

Sighing, (Y/n) had then done the one thing that stuck with Iceman for months to come.

"No, you know what? Fuck you, Pete." And with that, she had kissed Iceman on the lips, right in front of her brother. 

It hadn't been a particularly long kiss, or a particularly passionate one, but it had left him wanting more, his lips tingling with want as she pulled away after a second. And Maverick's face afterwards had been totally worth it. 

(Y/n) had quickly left after that, leaving Maverick to go sulk with Goose, Iceman fighting with his morality, before he also got up and followed her from the room. Catching up to her just outside, he had taken her arm in his hand gently, pulling her into him. Without letting her speak, he had kissed her again, glad when she had reciprocated, heart skipping a beat when their lips had moulded together almost perfectly. For what felt like years, they had kissed, neither wanting to let go, not until they had to, at which point they'd pressed their foreheads together and stood still, breathing heavily into each other's faces. At that moment, their relationship had become much closer.

*

In all honesty, he wasn't expecting her to turn up. 

(Y/n) had been distant in past months, but that was understandable - her brother lost his best friend, so it made sense that she'd want to be there for him to help him through it. Unfortunately, that had meant that interaction between her and Iceman had been sparse, though he had managed to ask her along to his graduation, which he was very much looking forward to. He was certain he'd won the Top Gun trophy with Slider, and he wanted her to see that.

So when he notices her sitting at the back of the crowd as he takes the award, he feels a burst of pride flare to life within him. With her slight absence in recent weeks had come a revelation, a revelation that he intends to tell her today, whilst the confidence of this win is still rife in his body. Nerves run rampant through him, worried that it will go wrong, though he is mostly sure of what he wants to say; somehow, this is worse than flying a plane into battle, the reaction here totally unforeseeable for him for some reason.

As the crowd gathers to congratulate everyone, he politely pushes through them to the back, focused on (Y/n) as she waits for him, a smile on her face. Quick to reach his destination, he laughs as she swiftly runs to him and climbs into his arms, holding him tightly.

"Congratulations, Ice. I'm so proud of you!" She says to him, looking up into his eyes with a broad smile, pressing a kiss to his lips.

"Thank you, (Y/n)." He grins back, unsure of whether or not now is the right time.

"Reaching up to play with the hairs at the base of his neck, (Y/n) seemingly considers something, before she leans up to whisper to him.

"I love you, Tom."

His heart nearly stops at her words, body filling with happiness, relief flooding his mind at the thought that she feels the same way.

"You beat me to it. I love you, too, (Y/n)." He hums back, pulling her in for a deeper kiss.

[remmushound]

NOTICE before we get to part 13 of my Bay/Rise crossover! It has been a while since I’ve watched ROTTMNT in its entirety, and as such my timelines may be out of order to what was actually occurring in the show at the time. Any inconsistencies between my fic and the shows canon should simply be taken as part of an alternate reality. The fic takes place directly after Battle Nexus: New York. @brightlotusmoon @errorfreak88

“Put your odachi on the ground slowly…”

Leonardo had to think. The grip on his attackers blade was firm— he could tell even without looking. The pressure was steady and holding strong. It was down at an angle, so the attacker was taller that him. Stronger too, probably. Leonardo naturally fell into a self-induced state of calm to keep his mind calm and breathing steady.

“That would require me reaching for my Odachi.” Leonardo said slowly.

“Did I stutter?” The voice was slow and calculated. No hint of a foreign accent, so not a Japanese soldier as most ninja. The words were clear and straightforward, with the faintest hints of Brooklyn being repressed by a confident aura radiating almost like pure heat. Definitely from New York, but more subtle than most on the street.

Leonardo laughed weakly as he slowly reached for the odachi on his shell, making sure his hand was visible the entire time. “The problem with reaching for my odachi is I could do something like this.”

Leonardo grabbed the handle of his odachi and swung it out widely, but his wrist was caught quickly. A firm hand slammed into the crook of his elbow before bending his arm backward and forcing him to drop the odachi to the ground.

“Nice try.” 

A sharp kick to the backs of his legs had Leonardo on his knees, then a kick to the back had him on the floor. A pressing weight on the dome of his carapace held him there.

“That’s enough.” This second voice was softer, kinder. Similar to the first in accent, clear and easy to understand and with that same faint, underlying Brooklynn. “We’re not here to fight him!”

“He was attacking April.” The first voice said again.

“Hey, your señorita there was attacking me!” Leonardo snapped back. He wondered if the kind voice could be Raphael or Michelangelo? It seemed too soft for Raphael, though...

“You okay Angelcakes?”

Leonardo latched onto the third voice, the only one so far with no hint of Brooklyn at all. No New York accent being denied nor embraced— how could you do either to an accent you never had? Or maybe he did have it at one point and it just got garbled into the raspy, mellifluously-excited voice.

“I’m fine Mikey.” April said as she was helped to her feet. “Thank you.”

It was Mikey’s voice?

“Any time baby doll.”

Mikey, definitely Mikey. Now that he was hearing it again Leonardo wondered how it wasn’t immediately obvious. Hearing Mikey flirt just felt... off.

“Did he hurt you?” The first voice again— now that one could be Raphael, Leonardo mused. The accent didn't quite fit what Leonardo would have expected, but it was close enough that he might be able to get used to it.

“Just some shoving, Leo.” Was April’s answer. “Mostly startled me is all.”

Leo. So the first voice was Leo and the third Mikey. The second voice… it couldn’t be Donnie, could it?

“These guys ain’t so bad.”

Now that voice was definitely Raph. It was so deeply Brooklynn that it almost hurt— the embodiment of ‘I’m walkin’ here!’ And so much more of New York culture. A voice you could hear in a crowd anywhere around the world and recognize which city it belonged it.

Leonardo was able to lift his head just enough to see the fourth turtle enter the room. He was big— maybe a bit bigger than Raphael but not by much. Leonardo saw the lack of spikes and the spots and the shell, and recognized the patterns as a box turtle. We’re they all box turtles?

“Friday the Thirteenth got his ass kicked by little pipsqueak here.”

The massive box turtle gripped Michelangelo in a vice-hold against his plastron while Michelangelo struggled for his freedom.

“MMMGN! Lemme gooo!” His feet kicked against Raph’s plastron but did nothing to help him.

“Mikey!” Leonardo tried to struggle against the weight on his back.

“Don, go check on Casey.”

“Roger.” 

Leonardo caught the barest glimpse of Donnie as he walked by and maneuvered his way around Raph. Taller, but skinnier. Leonardo didn't dare underestimate the strength of the green giant, however— he was taught better by his own Donatello’s freakish nerd strength.

“Now if I let you up, are you gonna place nicely~?” Leo whispered into Leonardo’s ear.

“Depends if you plan on not being such a jackass.”

The weight increased.

“You leave him alone you big bully!” Michelangelo whined as he struggled about like a fly in a spider web.

“Yeah you shrek-looking ass bitch!”

There was the sound of Mikey cracking up laughing, and the heartfelt sound only encouraged Leonardo further.

“Looking like Pickle Rick on steroids ass bitch, looking like Splinter fed you one too many Flintstones Gummies, the chemicals in the water turning the turtles into bitch ass mutants ass hoe —“

Leo yanked Leonardo by the scruff of his neck to stand. “Are you done?”

“You know, my Raph’s not here I can probably go all day. You’re so fugly the creature from the green lagoon musta fucked Barney the Dinosaur and you’re the baby.”

Raph just shook his head while Mikey all fell over clutching his stomach through laughter tears. Leo looked back at his brothers with the slightest hints of embarrassment before he slammed Leonardo into the wall.

“What are you doing here?”

“Leo, cut it out!” Donnie returned from where he had been checking on Casey, putting gentle hands on Leo’s shoulder to encourage him to drop Leonardo, which he did.

Leonardo only laughed as he looked between the four gathered mutants. There wasn’t much difference between them— all of them a similar size with the same, bulky shell as Michelangelo. All definitely box turtles. Their masks, of course, were a dead giveaway as to who was who, but other than that they could easily be interchanged and Leonardo wouldn’t care enough to notice.

“Now onto… you.” Leonardo turned to point at Raph accusingly, “You’re lucky I wasted all my good green jokes on Yoda here, so why don’t you just cut it with the RBF and let my brother go?”

Raph huffed a warning to the confident slider before looking to Leo for a signal. Leo motioned for Raph to let Michelangelo go and Raph obliged.

“There. Was that so hard?” Leonardo smirked as he opened his arm to invite Michelangelo to hold onto his side, “Now, you jolly green giants: Let’s talk Krang.”

[aharris00britney]

ASKS 19

It’s 6am and Brandon woke me up when he got up to go to work so now... i answer asks bc i cant sleep. 

@mileyzangel said: Can you please make a Harley Quinn hairstyle from both Suicide Squad and Birds of Prey?

I went and watched Birds of Prey the other night and it was really good. Brandon went to sleep I think tfgvhb. But I doubt I’ll try doing her hair from either of the films. @enriques4 is working on one for her Birds of Prey look if you are interested in that <3

Anonymous said: is tiny living worth it? im leaning towards the gameplay although i love cas. is the gameplay as bad as people say?

I honestly don’t think the new beds do anything. They’re... there. Lmao I think the CAS and buy items are very nice. If we get some cc murphy beds then that would make them a lot more usable tbh.  

Anonymous said: how do you and ayoshi keep making some fantastic collabs?? y'all are literally the first people i go to when I make a fresh install and I can't wait to see what you do next

Anonymous said: AxA CC KINGS!!!

Anonymous said: you guys didnt have to snap like that on AxA

Anonymous said: I LOVE EVERY SINGLE PACK U AND AYOSHI DO PLEASE KEEP MAKING MORE

Anonymous said: another iconic ah00b x ayoshi collab YAS LESSGOOOO

We put a bunch of cc ideas (hair and clothes) in a discord server we have together and then work on the stuff together on call usually so each item is the way we both want me. Like for example i’ll be meshing the Ivy top while he works on texturing the ribbed version.  We also only do collabs when they happen, we didn’t plan AxA 2019 or this new set, mainly just made cc starting in May and wrapped it up in July to release in August. Then this time we started making stuff late December and got most of it done by the time I got done with my break. Having a planned collab/deadline makes stuff less stressful and the stuff usually turns out better imo

Anonymous said: hi! ur sims are so prettyyyy what skin texture and eyes do u use?

Anonymous said: hi! wcif the eyes of the sim in the edit that Dogsill edited for you please? thank you!

Anonymous said: Hi! I really love the way your sims looks so, I was what skin and eyes you use?

I actually am changing my default eyes so I need to update my resource page soon ;n; but the skins they use are all listed for each sim on the resource page here

Anonymous said: you always name axa packs by the year but this one was named after a season those that mean.... 👀

We are wanting to do something in the fall, just not sure how our lives will be then ya know? There’s a chance that this will be the AxA 2020. Since we weren’t sure I didn’t want to label it that if 2 AxA’s release this year lmao

Anonymous said: what game is the pokemon thing you're playing!? pls help a guy out i'm in love with the art style

Pokemon Sword and Shield (I have shield) for Nintendo Switch. I’ll prob post more pics once I get some new shinies :P

@kristabunny said: lol is it bad that when I saw your Santana hair I read it as Satan Hair XD

tbhhhhh it was lowkey referencing that lmao. I made the hair in October for a speed meshing video and since it was around Halloween I was like “lemme give her an almost demonic name” also Santana from glee is a queen

Anonymous said: Tbh I absolutely adore your female cc but I LIVE for your male cc!!!

Thank you! lmao the only thing I can take full credit for is the AxA male hairs. I mesh the clothes for packs but ayoshi does the texturing for them.  

Anonymous said: Could you have a go at the updo Dua Lipa has on the cover of her Future Nostalgia? The high bun with a flick in it and the strands of hair down the sides. Thanks if so :)

I’m not the biggest fan of the hairstyle tbh ;n; but we will see. (Physical is a serve, just saying)

Anonymous said: So ive never played pokemon before until my friend gave me a copy of pokemon moon. I love cats so of course my starter was a litten, but i had no clue about evolutions or anything like that. I was heartbroken when my cute litten turned into some big man cat :(

omg noooo ;n; yeah Litten is a cutie... incineroar is... well I got used to him tbh and kind of like him now? I absolutely hate scorbunny’s evolution (and most of the SWSH starters final evolution) so I think that made incineroar slightly better in my eyes. My shiny litten will be staying a kitten however :)

@multifandom-slytherin said: Hello! I love your cc! Would it be possible for you to make the bangs from your Bree Hair a separate accessory that you can put with other hairs (for example the BG low ponytail)? Thank you so much!

Anonymous said: have u considered making or allowing someone to make an acc version of your handmade bangs?

I have thought of doing accessory bangs tbh, I just like... don’t like using accessory bangs myself. So I’m not sure if I’ll end up doing it. I might try it for myself and see how many hairs they work with, and if it is a decent amount I’ll release. 

Anonymous said: First off I want to say how amazing all of your hairs and collabs are! Second I was curious if you ever thought of going back to your old hairs and updating their thumbnails / display indexes so they matched your stuff now?

I really really wanted to have all my 2019 hairs updated by 2020. It was only January 2019-April 2019 that needed updated (thumbnails and display indexes). But I just lost motivation for doing it. I will focus on it next time I have a big break from school. Also planning on updating select stuff from 2018 and 2017. 

Anonymous said: please put Sophia Barker in the gallery. PLEASEEEEE it's the most beautiful sim I EVER seen! >:3 PLEASEEE!!!!!!!!!!

She should be on there? I think? Make sure you have CC enabled and if you can’t find me through the gallery her tray files are here

Anonymous said: Hi! After the recent patch I started having a small issue with Bree hair(without bangs), when I zoom out it looks like a completely different hair, something similar to that one basegame hair that's layered with tips pointed outward but longer. Thought I'd let you know, maybe others have had a similar issue or maybe I need to change a setting or something. Love your work so much!

Really surprised this is the first time someone told me about this lmao. The hair should be updated now on SFS/Patreon <3

Anonymous said: I tried to look around for this on your "Asks" portion before bothering you (so sorry), but do you have a link perhaps for all the lips you use on your models? Are they in game or a cc you create? Thanks so much! Love all of your work! I'm super new to cc stuff and I found yours like 2 days ago and have been going nuts with downloads lol 

like presets? None of my cc models use a lip preset. I do use this slider on some of them though. For lipsticks, that is listed for each model on my resource page <3

Anonymous said: i’ve been looking for a hair like lexi that i actually like forever and now i find it but it’s for paterson peeps and i’m like actually broke and i’m like :/

im sorry ;n; at least it wasn’t too long of a wait? :/ I hope you liked the hair

Anonymous said: I can't find your jisoo ponytails in your downloads?

they’re in my retired section... may they rest in peace. scroll to the bottom of my downloads and youll see ‘RETIRED.’ click that for the retired download page. 

@eclypt-0-sims said: Hi, I recently started making MM hair and I know you're probably an expert at this but; every time I go into CAS to test a hair, all of my accessories clip with the hair. Like the hair texture would cover some glasses if my sim was wearing glasses. I don't know how to fix it, someone told me to delete an eye weight in blender but I don't really understand weight painting that much, any suggestions? love your content btw

this is a late as hell reply i’m sorry. I think that you have texture where the glasses texture would be. Hair texture should only be in hair section or hat section (if you don’t want it hat compatible). Here is a UV map layout that I use for making hair textures. It shouldnt have anything to do with weights

Anonymous said: Do you use reshade when you take previews for your cc? and also is the tropical punch ombre overlay a palette or did you make it?

I do use reshade when I take cc previews. It adds a bit of saturation to my sims and gives them some shadows under their chin/clothes. Nothing major. Also, myself and @imvikai came up with the tropical punch palette together.

@little-eris​ said: You probably have answered this before but who drew your tumblr icon? I’ve seen the same art style with other simmers 👉🏼👈🏼 it’s super cute!

thank you! here is their twitter 

Anonymous said: The male sim in your Tiny Living review looks soo familiar; was there inspiration from anyone IRL? The person he reminds me of isn't even famous so I don't even know! He is very pretty though *-*

He was a gallery sim that I just revamped a bit so I’m honestly not super sure lmao. But he is very attractive yes I agree

that concludes this ask ceremony please collect your things and move to the exit to your left. fvghbjn if you sent something I didn’t answer and it was off anon I’ll get to you soon (person who asked what beards I used for AxA... I see you)

[daybreak-academy-fanfic]

Daybreak Academy: Chapter 88

Uncle Eraqus

Summary: In which Anora and Brain have an off campus Thanksgiving feast with the latter’s uncle. Word Count: 1,686 First | Previous | Next ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆ ⚬ ☆

It was right in the middle of history class when Anora got a text from Brain.

'Are u doing anything tonight? Wanna meet me by the gates for a Thanksgiving feast off campus? I know a real quiet place by the lighthouse. Wear your jogging pants- I'm not going to let you leave until you gain three pounds.'

Anora only wished that she could have seen her face after reading it. The young woman looked up at her teacher before carefully typing her response. Thank goodness that the keyboard on her slider phone was a quiet one. Too bad that she was generally a pretty slow typist.

'what if i'm not hungry?'

After sending the text off, Anora set her phone in her lap and tried to write some notes down. Brain must have been in the middle of class too- his text came back to her roughly ten minutes after.

'Ur nothing but skin and bones, madam. If I don't stuff you up, my uncle will.'

Anora almost had to force herself from questioning why Brain had an uncle. But, still. If this was going to be a Thanksgiving feast, would more of Brian's family be coming along? A small spike of fear hit Anora's head when she asked him just as much.

'Don't worry pretty girl. It'll just be you, me, and uncle E. Like I said, the buffet is a quiet place even on its worse days. It's got separate rooms like a karaoke bar. It's pretty cool.'

'i don't do karaoke'

'It's not an -actual- karaoke bar. Just trust me. Or don't. You don't have to come if you don't want to. I'm kinda just throwing it at you anyway.'

Anora lightly nibbled at her lip as she thought it over. It wouldn't hurt her to get off campus for a bit. She wasn't really expected to join in on anyone else's Thanksgiving dinner. Brain had also appealed to her social avoidance side too- there would be a lot more people in the cafeteria tonight. Some family members joining their kids on a free meal provided by the school. She knew for a fact that Mog's family would be coming- and that included both parents, a brother, a handful of cousins, and a persnickety aunt or two for good measure.

Come to think of it, she probably wouldn't have had dinner at the cafeteria tonight anyway. Still making sure that the history teacher wasn't going to notice her texting, Anora carefully typed her reply back to Brain.

'do i have to wear a dress?'

The bell that signaled for class end went off before Anora got a reply. She didn't even look at her phone until she got to the next class.

'Of course not. Wear what you've got. E's not picky and I literally just mentioned jogging pants. I'll wait until 6:30 for you at the gates.'

After reading through the message, Anora gave a little nod to herself and tried to focus on the rest of class. If there was one difference between Ephemer and Brain, it was that Anora didn't particularly feel like she needed to impress the latter. Hypocritical as it sounded- considering she was the one that told Ephemer he didn't need to impress her to keep her love for him. Most of her dresses were better suited for the summer anyway.

But she should still dress, nicer, though. Meeting with your significant other's (rebound or not) family was a big deal. She didn't want to give Brain's uncle the wrong first impression. Not that she'd be able to talk enough to form a good impression to begin with…

After classes were over, Anora went up to her dorm and started to go through her winter coats. The one she usually wore, a very warm double down jacket, was a bit ratted from years of use. She had to dig real deep in her stored away clothes for the fancy things. The young woman let out a happy noise of discovery when she found her maroon colored peacoat. It would match well with what she was already wearing; a long sleeved, light brown colored tunic shirt and dark washed jeans. It was respectable, but not too dressy.

She didn't waste any time in meeting Brain at the front gates. He was casually leaning on the brick archway before noticing her. When he did, he stood up and adjusted his hat a bit.

“So all your girl clothes are hiding in winter wear.” Brain mused as he looked her over. “Sounds like the opposite of every other girl I know, but it sounds about right for you.”

Anora suddenly stopped dead in her tracks. “Is it bad?”

Brain shook his head. He took a step or two closer to so he could take her hand and gently kiss her knuckles. “Not at all.” he gently purred. “You're just more unique.”

The blush on Anora's face came quickly and without restraint. Brain chuckled a bit at her before calling up a taxi. As the taxi headed on down to the lighthouse located outside of town, Brain tried to make a bit of light conversation with Anora.

“I'm not trying to scare you, but you should know what kind of guy my uncle is.”

Anora turned to him and raised an interested, but wary, eyebrow at him. Brain laughed at it for a moment before going on to explain himself.

“He's the principal at one of the main Departure County public schools. The same one that Ven came from.”

“Oh.” came the rather small answer. A snort escaped Brain's lips in return.

“Don't worry,” he assured her, gently taking her hand to rub her thumb over it, “I'm just teasing. He'll love you.”

Still giving Brain a wary glance, Anora carefully nodded her head and said nothing further. The drive to the lighthouse was spent in a still silence. When they were close enough, Anora could see a man that, at a distance, looked a lot like Brain. As Brain helped Anora out of the taxi, she continued to study the man. She must have stared for two long because he looked right at them. But he didn't call them out. Instead, Brain politely guided Anora by the elbow to the man and even tipped his fedora at him.

“Long time no see Uncle Eraqus!” he happily greeted the old man.

The man gave a nod of his own. “It's been a long time since we've met...”

“Brain.” Brain finished for his uncle.

“Brain...” Eraqus repeated with unease. “So it's official now?”

“Yep.” the young man boasted, grinning at his uncle with a cheeky certainty. “Well, no. A lot of the school paperwork still say I'm 'Blaine', but as far as anyone else knows, I'm the one and only Brain Renzhen.”

“Certainly is a unique name.” his uncle warily agreed. With this out of the way, Eraqus turned his attention to Anora.

“I don't believe we've met before.” Eraqus politely said to Anora. “My name is Eraqus, young lady. I am the brother of Brain's mother.”

Anora shrunk a bit, but offered him a smile and nod of acknowledgment.

“She's not much of a talker.” Brain laughed. “It takes a bit of getting used to for this little bird to sing.”

“Well, if that's the case,” Eraqus offered, “The let's go secure a private room for just us three. I'm sure it would be a lot better to the more socially anxious.”

Anora gave him a small smile in thanks, and with that the three of them entered the buffet. It was a rather cozy place, with amber lighting and the smell of freshly baked bread faintly hinted in the air. The individual rooms were separated with a sliding divider. Anora still sat a bit closer to Brain as the relatives started to talk to each other. The two seemed to have a rather amicable relationship. But the hardest part Anora had to wrap her head around was that Brain hardly referred to his uncle as uncle. Instead he called Eraqus by his first name only. It took time for her to realize that he was doing the same for his aunts as well. From what she could gather, he had two; one older than Eraqus, and one younger than both Eraqus and Brain's mother.

“Do you have any plans for winter break?” Eraqus asked Brain at some point.

“Not really.” the young man mused as he reached for his water glass. “I know Mom wants me to come home. But that means Beli and Chika are going to be there too with their small armies.” Brain took a sip of water before adding, “Thanks for not adding to the gaggle of cousins, by the way.”

Eraqus gave a rather bemused chuckle. “Not yet, anyway.” he teased. “There's one young man that I've been keeping my eye on. He's not much older than you two, but he could benefit from a more kinder household.”

“Are you going to take him to Christmas or New Year's dinner with you?”

“I might.” Eraqus agreed with a sigh. He then turned to Anora and said, “What about you, Anora? Do you have any plans for the break?”

Anora jumped a little, surprised to be a part of the conversation, before carefully shaking her head.

“Daybreak is one of the better campuses to be on during breaks.” Eraqus told her with a nod. “It's a shame that it can't provide housing for its recently graduated students. Assuming that a Tenth Year didn't buy an apartment in town already. Has the food quality improved any since we last had an all state school conference? Urd still swears she got food poisoning from the meatloaf they served.”

“Doesn't Miss Urd get sick off of anything that wasn't served on a gold plate?” Brain lightly snickered. Eraqus gave a small snort of amusement.

As Brain and Eraqus then went into a conversation that slightly mocked whoever this Urd lady was, Anora found herself lost in her own thoughts. What was she going to do for winter break?

[keijitranslates]

[KH side story translation] the beginning of Other Diamonds

“Riku!”

Sora runs up like he always does, kicking up sand as he approaches, which wakes Riku up.

“Noisy as always, aren’t you, Sora?”

“Because you’re being lame and just laying on the ground when we came all the way out here.”

“Unlike you little children, I’m tired.”

Sora and Riku were a year apart. Only a year. Even though they were so close in age, pointing out the difference was always enough to shut up Sora when he was being kind of annoying. Sure enough, Sora pouts and wrinkles his face.

“Did you need something from me?”

“Nah, nothing really.”

Sora grabs his knees and sits next to Riku.

“I mean, Riku, all you do lately is sit and look at the ocean.”

“You say that as if there’s anything else on this island to look at.”

Riku peers at Sora’s face. He must’ve been doing some sword play. Wakka and Selphie can be heard yelling as they play in the distance.

This inlet is a little far off from where everybody plays, and not a lot of people come here. Even the waves crashing against the shore sound a little more calm.

“You know the ocean’s never going to change no matter how long you look at it, right?”

“That’s not true.”

“Hmm, I wonder…”

Sora tilts his head.

“What are you two doing?”

A smile appears on Sora’s face as he turns to look at who the voice came from.

It was Kairi.

“Nothing really,” Riku says, slowly turning back and smiling a bit.

“Ah, you’re doing nothing, are you?”

Kairi sits next to Sora.

“Nothing sure is boring, huh?” Sora says to Kairi, looking for a kindred spirit.

“I think it’s nice to sit and look at the ocean every once in a while.”

Not getting the answer he wanted from Kairi, Sora pouts again.

“Hey, Riku, wanna do the usual?”

Sora turns toward Riku.

“Hmm?”

“A beach race!”

That was a short race Sora and Riku would sometimes run around this inlet. They’d start at the inlet and run to the paopu tree at the top of the cliff. The rules were simple – just touch the paopu tree and run back.

“Again?” Riku asked, exasperated, and shrugged his shoulders.

“What do you mean ‘again’? It’s been forever! I think the last time we did that was, uh…”

“Three days ago,” he stated, even more exasperated.

Just three days ago they had raced, and the result was Sora’s crushing defeat. But Sora would never stop trying until he won, no matter how badly he was beaten.

“If I were to keep losing like Sora does, would I keep on trying until I win?” Riku had thought about that sometimes, but wasn’t sure if he would.

“Yeah, it’s been a whole three days!”

Kairi chuckles as Sora stands up assertively.

“If you insist. Just once, though.”

“Hooray!”

Sora does a little jump as Riku reluctantly stands up.

“I’ll be the referee,” Kairi says, walking to a higher spot from which she can see the start line.

“The usual rules apply. Take any route you want. First one to tag that tree and make it back here wins.”

“Yeah, yeah, got it,” Sora says, nodding at Riku’s explanation.

“If I win, I’m captain!” Sora declares.

In response to Sora’s proclamation, Riku glances at the logs lined up on the sandy beach. Riku, Sora, and Kairi had gathered them together. They were trying to build a raft right now with those logs. In order to go somewhere that isn’t here – to go somewhere else, beyond the sea.

“And if you win…”

Sora tries to continue, but Riku interrupts him with a thought that came to his mind.

“I’ll eat a paopu with Kairi.”

Sora physically stops in his tracks, surprised by Riku’s blunt assertion.

“Huh?”

“Deal? The winner gets to share a paopu with Kairi.”

“Wha, wait a minute…”

Sora gets flustered.

The paopu tree. There was a special legend about its fruit.

“The two who have shared the fruit of that tree shall be tied together for eternity.”

I know who Sora wants to share the paopu fruit with. And, perhaps, who Kairi wants to share it with as well.

“Ready? On your marks!”

Oblivious to their conversation, Kairi’s voice echoes over the beach.

“3, 2, 1…go!”

Kairi kicks off the battle. Riku runs straight across the tree bridge, but it looks like Sora had opted to run along the beach route. Riku knows that the beach route is actually faster if you run it quickly enough. The bridge has gaps and running smoothly across the beach is much faster than jumping the trees.

Sora practically ran for his life on the beach. Riku knew that Sora would get serious in response to that challenge. But he can’t take back the words he’d impulsively let slip out of his mouth.

At that time, he’d suddenly remembered that drawing in the cave.

Sora surely doesn’t even know I know about that drawing.

Riku takes the leap from the tree bridge to the watch tower and looks down at the beach. Sora looks like he is running behind.

Riku takes one big, deep breath and jumps up to ride on the slider. If he keeps up this pace, Sora probably won’t overtake him.

The difference between 14 and 15 is still pretty big, and when he’s fought seriously, Riku has never lost to Sora. Sometimes he did lose, but it was either on purpose or because he was annoyed and not really putting effort into it. Sora hasn’t noticed that, but Riku thinks Kairi might have. He also thinks that, someday, he might lose to Sora.

For instance, right now, with how he was winning the battle for how much of Kairi’s heart he occupied.

Riku sent sand flying up as he landed on the beach from the slider. Sora is still behind him. He jumps to the rocky area, and as he goes to touch the paopu tree, Riku jumps up higher to the palm tree growing at his side, where he waits for Sora’s arrival.

Sora finally jumps up from the ground, and, confirming that he touched the paopu tree, Riku jumps to the wooden bridge.

Kairi is just beyond their line of sight, and Kairi is staring at Sora.

I probably won’t lose to Sora today, either, but I’m sure I will someday. If that’s true, then…

Sora runs in a daze.

That’s definitely why I can’t beat Sora.

“Whoooo!”

Riku had lost, just by a couple of steps.

“I did it!” Sora yells, falling down on the beach. Riku looks down at his face.

“Sure is like you to get all worked up over who’s captain, Sora,” Riku tells him, calm and composed.

Sora then puffs his cheeks, sulking.

“Uh, a-about that thing you said…” Sora asked.

“That thing I said? Oh, about the paopu fruit. It was a joke. You should’ve seen the face you made…it sure was funny,” Riku says, as Kairi runs up to the two.

“Congratulations, Sora!”

Sora answers by raising a fist, as if he didn’t have the energy to face Kairi.

“What were you two talking about?”

“Secret,” Riku answers, jumping to leave the inlet towards the cliff. He kind of wanted to be alone.

“Where are you going?”

“Also secret.”

Kairi tilts her head a little, staring at Riku, who’d answered bluntly.

“And you won’t beat me next time, either!” Sora shouts.

“Yeah, yeah, sure.”

And Riku climbs the cliff.

People don’t tend to come up the cliff. Riku stares fixedly toward the horizon.

There’s no way I can lose to Sora.

He wasn’t sure how long he’d convinced himself of that. Probably since he’d noticed how Kairi felt. Because of that, he’d convinced himself that there’s no way he could lose to Sora at something else – like that race they’d just had.

I’m jealous of him.

I can’t desperately push myself like he did back there, and I can’t smile like him either.

Why am I the only one who’s a year older?

He might not have felt that way if he were the same age as them.

I can kind of feel a pain deep in my chest.

The wind felt nice, but he was still in a bad mood.

If Sora weren’t here – or if Kairi weren’t here – I’d probably get along fine with whoever was here. But right now, I don’t know what I should do. This world is so cruel that I dream of both a world without Sora and a separate world without Kairi.

The wind blows through.

Is this wind coming from the sea?

Or is it coming from the sky?

The sea and the sky in front of me are the same as always – and this world will never change.

Riku closes his eyes. Even with his eyes closed, the image of the blue of the sea and the sky is burned in.

I wanted to be pulled out of this unchanging world.

 “The door will soon open.”

Riku opens his eyes, responding to the voice that came out of nowhere.

“Who are you!?”

However, there’s nobody there. All he could hear was the cries of the seagulls and the sound of the waves.

“The door will soon open.”

He heard it once again.

I have heard this voice before.

Yes – I know whose voice this is.

 “You understand the darkness within you, don’t you?”

“And what of it?” Riku yells, to the voice coming from the darkness within him – to Ansem’s voice.

“Then why won’t you submit to it? Just go ahead and destroy Sora, or Kairi.”

“Like hell I would!”

When he comes to, his surroundings are pitch black.

I can’t see the blue anymore. I can no longer see the sky and sea I remember fondly.

(Because I feel a bit bad just posting something so long without this, you can find the novel at the following link!  It has a lot of other short stories that aren’t quite as interesting but still fun to read if you know Japanese, and of course some Shiro Amano illustrations - though none for this story in particular: https://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/4757521529)

[al-n-cartoons]

The Multiverse in a Blender, Chapter 2 Part Four

       Mable, still proud of her on-the-spot rhymes, handed the microphone to her twin. 'You've got this!' She mouthed. Dipper inhaled a calming breath, and began.

       "So our world has changed, let's put that to rest,

       Of this my sister would likely attest,

       Sent to a town for some exclusion,

       But there we found an odd inclusion,

       A Demon of thought, of mind, of body,

       Burst out of the sky, words loud and haughty,

       A question-possession!

       Stored away and bubbled,

      Yet even after, my life is much troubled,

       Oh no...." he sang, his voice becoming empowered and unbound.

       "Yeah, sing it, Dip!" Mabel exclaimed, the others making similar comments.

      "If he dares show even a trace,

       I'll smack my books right in his face!" The group cheered, clapping for their new friend.

       "Oh, things couldn't be worse,

      When your job's to save the universe."

       Steven and Ben sang as one, the chorus pausing momentarily, Steven and Rex continuing their strumming motions.

      "But I don't care what our problems may be,

       As long as you are here with me." Ben fluttered his lashes at Steven in mock-flirtation, causing Steven to choke on the song with a sudden burst of laughter.

      "We don't care what the our problems may be, so long as you are there with me.

       So long as you are there with me!"

      When the song ended, Mabel tackled her brother in a bone crushing embrace, causing him to give a startled cry as he collided bodily into Rex. "HUG PILE!" She roared. Steven, already hugging Connie, gave a shrug, both offering up an extra arm to adjoin themselves to the coagulating group of bodies.

      Bubbles approached her brother, arms wide and smiling as though her lips were intent on overtaking her face. Dexter, being none-too fond of physical contact, put his hands up to block her. "Hey, Dexter's not hugging!" Bubbles complained loudly.

      "That's fine, not everyone really likes being glomped on." Steven reminded. Bubbles pouted, giving a little 'hmph' when the shorter teen flashed her a triumphant smirk.

      "Meany face." She muttered.

      After nearly a minute, it was Bliss who first retracted, having realized the time. "Oh, gosh! When did it become so late?! Girls, Dexter, we need to hit the sky if we're going to be home by dinner."

      Dexter groaned audibly, "Not again."

      "Oh, yeah, me too." Zak realized, ignoring Dexter, "I told my parents that the meeting would only last an hour." He turned to Dipper and Mabel, "Would you guys be able to get home on your own?"

      "We love in Chica-." Dipper stated, but was muted by Mabel.

      "We would LOVE to stay the night!" She said, beaming. Ben gave a snort at her self-inviting, although she probably had noticed the box of sleeping bags under the table. Either way, she was a rather amusing person to have around.

      Buttercup turned to Ben, "Was there anything else we needed to know, greenie?" She asked in an abrasive, demanding tone. Blossom flicked her shoulder.

      Ben blinked, having not expected the event to be cut so short, but quickly nodded, "We made some communicators, they function like a radio, but look like flip phones."

      Rex took out a medium-sized box filled with baggies, each including the identical phones. They were a little bit too big to be ordinary phones from the era of flip phones, and also a bit too new-looking. Other items in the bags included an earpiece, a flash drive, what looked to be a piercing, and a thin pamphlet.

      Mabel shook her brother's shoulders a bit roughly, saying to him in a hushed squeal something about gift bags. Rex passed one bag to each person, excluding himself, Ben, and Zak. "We also wanted to try and come up with names for our group, but we might just do that next time." Zak said. After a few more hugs, the five siblings and Zak departed, leaving the group much smaller than it had been before.

      "Speaking of dinner..." Rex began, looking to the various confections, snacks, and other treats stretched along the table, "none of that's going to do it for me."

      "Pizza?" Danny offered

      "Chinese?" Mabel contradicted.

      "A nice salad bar?" Steven asked hopefully. "I'm a vegetarian, by the way." He added.

      "So that eliminates hotdogs, chili, tacos, and most pizzas." Ben mused, all too helpfully.

      Rex shook his head, "Guys, guys, need I remind you whose home you're in?" He asked.

      Dipper quirked a brow, "This is your home? It looked more like a militarized YMCA, to me." He regarded the walls, disbelief displayed on his features.

      "Eh, my room's on a different level. And building. Same city, though." Rex explained, "But seriously though, I prefer home cooked to take out."

      "Agreed." Connie added.

       "I live in the next city over." Ben told the group, although the comment felt rather random, "Technically, this city and my city are the same one, but I couldn't figure out how to really combine them, so instead their basically identical...geographically speaking."

      "Who's cooking dinner?" Connie asked.

      Steven motioned to himself, "I can do it, but would anyone like to hel-"

      "DIBSSSSS!" Mabel exclaimed, a bit too loudly. Dipper waved to her, then mimed someone turning down a slider, as though to render it silent. She blinked, then eventually nodded. She turned to Steven, "Sorry if I was a bit too loud." She apologized.

      "No worries," he assured, "trust me, I'm used to far worse."

      "So...everyone's staying the night?" Ben asked. "I'm on a mental health break, because I-"

      "Tried to tell your partner about the retcon, we know." Rex cut in. "I helped you pass out those recordings, remember?"

      "Oh, geez, really? I told the gems and they all believed me right away. They said that it didn't make sense for the Diamonds to have gone so long without demolishing or going to war with so many other 'foreign entities'." Steven remarked, a bit flabbergasted.

      Ben faked a cough into his hand, "cough-High Breed-cough cough-Incursions and Vilgax-cough."

      "Yeah, those things didn't really mesh well. Should we be worried about them clashing?" Steven asked.

      "Probably." Ben replied flippantly.

      "Anyway, I'm here for the week, but Connie needs to get back to her university in a few days."

      "You can stay at my place after tonight, if you'd prefer. Keep me company while I'm off work, you know?" Ben offered.

      "We need to get back home sooner then later, probably tomorrow-ish." Dipper added, much to Mabel's disappointment.

[gaast]

It’s weird to think about the kind of role that Animal Crossing has played in my life.

I can’t remember exactly how it started. I think in the waning days of the GameCube, I got a re-sold copy of the original, which I played a bit, but I was too young to get much out of it. What I do remember is getting a re-sold copy of Wild World. Wild World was a constant companion from then on for a long time, in that childish way that came from Pokemon having been my constant companion until then (and, of course, it still is).

Although my memories of that time have faded, likely because I engaged in copious time-traveling, there’s some things you can’t forget. The hours spent hoping you’ll find a good item in the shop, the days hoping you’ll get the visitor you want, the mornings seeing Lyle outside your home and running away s fast as you can. Talking with villagers. Fulfilling requests.

Something beautiful about that childhood experience is that I can’t remember what I was trying to do in the game. I don’t think I was trying to do anything in particular. I was just trying to engage with a game that kept giving to me. It was frustrating, because I like having structured games and can’t make my own fun that well, but I kept going back, for hours and hours and hours.

Then I stopped playing. Animal Crossing punishes you for not playing. The longer you go without playing the game, the worse you know it’ll be. After long enough, you become resigned to having the dreaded rafflesia in your town. You don’t power it back on.

I didn’t play City Folk, but I got New Leaf as soon as I could. It just felt right. I had grown a lot, or rather maybe changed a lot, in the 7 years between Wild World and New Leaf. I was in college, not middle school, but I had also long since started to identify as queer, and I also actually had groups of friends. I was on this site. New Leaf and Tumblr are intertwined for me in ways I cannot describe. That’s how it is when you live with things like these.

New Leaf gripped me hard for months. The graphics were finally where they needed to be. The amount of upgrades you could work toward was phenomenal and never-ending. You could set the Beautiful Town and Night Owl ordinances, so I could actually play after class. I memed with friends. Visited their villages. Dressed cute. Needed to dress cute. Expressed myself in ways I never could in real life, if only because I lack the money and space to decorate an entire room so it looks like a cafe, and another entire room so it looks like a ship, and another entire room so it looks--you get the idea.

I fell into New Leaf hard, but I also fell out of it hard, and, except for a brief period a few years later, around the Welcome amiibo update but, I believe, before it, I never really went back. Even when it becomes part of your routine, sometimes you let your routine slip away. The more anxious I got, the less likely it was that I’d “make the rounds” in New Leaf. That’s how it is.

So now, with New Horizons, I’m playing by myself on my own little island. I’m queer and trans and I have a particular set of aesthetics and wants and goals. I don’t want to mess up the island’s natural beauty. I want to dress cute. I want to fill my house with items that not only speak to me but that evoke me.

We focus a lot on personal expression when it comes to Animal Crossing. But it’s more than that. Tom Nook and the Able Sisters have been with us for a long time. So have Redd, Blathers, Saharah, K.K. Slider, Gulliver, and even, now, the Nooklings. They’re familiar to us, old friends.

To open Animal Crossing and New Horizons, K.K. Slider appears before you in a spotlight and talks about how nice it is to make friends in a beautiful world.

The games grew over time, and we met characters like Kicks and Leif and Isabelle. We’ve also slowly said farewell to some, like Tortimer. More than that, though, is that we’ve seen villagers come and go, not just in the churn of villager turnover and adoption, but also even as characters present in the game files.

Each villager has one of eight personalities, and the things they say don’t vary within each personality. You usually have at least 8 plots to share in your village or on your island. In New Horizons, there’s 10. You grow familiar with these personality types fast, but you also learn that, despite their personalities being the same, each villager is different, responds to you differently, interacts with you differently.

And these differences remain the same between games. Unless I’m totally mistaken, by chance, Jambette has been my neighbor since Animal Crossing (she’s not in Wild World). I could turn on it, or New Leaf, or New Horizons, and Jambette would be there. In the former two, she’ll express shock at seeing me--it’s been a long time, croak-kay! But after that, she’ll talk to me as she always had, friend-to-friend. She might even ask me for a favor.

So yes, you can make your village your own, micromanage it as much as you want, wear whatever you want, decorate your home however you want. We talk about that a lot, but we don’t spend as much time talking about how the villagers themselves inflect this world, along with the other, more functional NPCs. How characters have grown and changed over time, and how the villagers themselves always live their best lives, going as they please, behaving how they feel is best, and doing their best to be both themselves and your friend.

K.K. Slider’s messages are serious. Animal Crossing wouldn’t be what it is without its villagers and their unique AI that often makes them seem... flighty, to put it kindly. There’s a lot to do in the Animal Crossing world. You’re welcome to connect to the Internet and share in those experiences with friends. But, barring that, you can always just sit in the sun next to Hopkins, or go jogging with Cobb, or shop for clothes with Patty.

No matter how long you go in between play sessions, no matter how infested with weeds and even empty your village may get, there are always people ready and waiting for you to come back, and they’ll be so happy when you do.

[momo-de-avis]

Do you have any writing tips for someone that is definitely not a writer but wants to be better at writing anyway? That might be too vague so I'll say this, I have a lot of trouble getting an idea that isn't either something really small that doesn't make a narrative or something gigantic and complicated that I dont have the will to take on. No middle sliders in my life.

You have an issue my boyfriend has, he has great ideas but either believes they’re just something too small for a long narrative or so long and complex he doesn’t know how to plot them.

I can’t tell you what the right way is, because everyone is different of course, but I think there’s two ways you can go about it to try and figure out which might help you best.

First of all, take notes on every idea you have. I’m serious. However small it seems, just write it down. Even if it’s something as trivial as ‘man eats an apple while staring at a tree’, whatever. I find that, when something really tiny like that pops into my head with that thing of ‘dang, I need to write this’ but it just seems way too trivial for me to care, it’s because of how I’m visualizing it. I’ll tell you this, this one time I was having a cup of coffee near the library after a break and I saw this woman in the gardens looking at a tree, and that’s what gripped me in that moment. It was really stupid, but the thing I saw was what made me explore that for some reason. I thought she looked sad, I don’t know why, it just looked really sad, and it looked like that sad woman just casually looked up at a cypress tree like she wanted to see something pretty on a shitty day. Later on, must have been years, I was trying to write a scene where a character was supposed to compose a text for school about why she mattered and the only thing that came to mind was that woman looking up at that tree. I’m telling you this because the littlest thing can really help. If you get that unexpected pang of ‘damn, this is cool’ or ‘wow, this is really pretty’, take the chance to write down the what and why at least. Because you never know! 

Now, as for development, there’s two ways to go about it that might help you. You can explore the character-driven side of narrative, or the plot-driven. These are, I’ll be honest, two things I have a hard time distinguishing but I mostly follow character-driven.

Plot-driven stuff generally has people planning beforehand (hence why I suck at it lmao). Some people follow the 3 Act structure, or other ways to go about it with planning (this is a good place to check out a few). As the name says, the plot is the star. There is a narrative you want to develop. There’s a central plot with probably very little sub-plots, but that one plot is the main goal. Most likely, one protagonist or two, both with goals that they will achieve or not at the end.

Character-driven, though... the characters make the story. It’s really hard to explain, so I’ll explain how I do it. I essentially have to have the characters very well established. Who they are, psychologically. Once I know them, I let the story flow naturally.

This has helped me a lot because most of the times I have a premise, not a plot, and on my first draft (not even a first draft, more like preliminary exercise lmao), I just try that approach to try and understand who these characters are or what I want them to be, so that they can move the story. Eventually, what happens is I have the inciting incident settled, the lowpoint as well or just something in the middle that is a plot device, and the ending established, but as I progress, since I know the characters, new things emerge like, completely new conflicts and reactions that just occur to me as I progress. But this is my method, it’s how I work.

For me, personally, sitting down just TRYING to find a plot, or an extra for the already existing plot, is tiresome and it drains me. So I just go ahead and do something and see where it goes. I follow the character instead of the plot (ask stuff like “what would she do if a stranger bumped into her on the subway, what should do if she witnessed this or that, what would she say if someone asked her this and that”, and go from there).

Another thing is: find your voice. I mean mostly style. I find that most of the times people struggle with this because they are struggling with finding their style, because once you get your voice established it might become easier in developing your story. For example, I always loved bullshitting my way through stuff if it involves words lmao, and when it came to creating long stories, I had an issue with planning. I remember at school my teachers would have us write a detailed plan of our story before the actual story, and we were forced to turn them both in for grading, which fucking sucked, because I don’t plan.

Then I read Virginia Woolf and learned about this neat little thing called ‘stream of consciousness’ and thought, fuck you, 9th grade teacher. Stream of consciousness is essentially a style where the author focuses on one small detail, seemingly trivial, and then develops an entire fluid string of throughs that interconnect with each other however contrasting they are (why the sentence “Mrs. Dalloway thought she’d buy the flowers herself” is so remarkable, because for the WHOLE BOOK, Woolf debates about many things, seldom being flowers. Hell, one of my favourite short stories is her meditating on a fly that lands on a bowl of milk).

So what I learned with this was: bullshitting your way out of purple prose has an academic word for it! Great! This also validated a lot my lack of planning, meaning that every time I drivelled instead of following a step-by-step plot I was actually building something worth a damn, because that exercise of developing a string of thoughts that are born from one shitty thing is something that can happen inside a novel. 

So you see, finding my style, in this case, helped me find my voice and it became very easy ever since to juggle my methods with my ideas. This is my experience, of course, and it’s worth what it’s worth, but this little thing is what helped me establish that, I might have an idea, but if I let it flow, it might grow into something.

Of course, there’s that last advice: read more, watch more TV shows and movies within the genre you’d like to explore, etc etc, but I think it always goes without saying.

And one more thing: no story, for me, is too small or too long. It has its own natural length. Sometimes, we have ideas that are naturally shorter. It just means they’re short stories, or novellas, or novelettes. When my boyfriend told me he had that same problem -- that he had ideas he just didn’t know how to develop into full books -- I told him: then they’re short stories. And that’s fantastic. 

The thing is, being a writer isn’t like something immutable, you’re not the same always, you know, you’re not always in this place, with this style, writing about this thing. You keep changing, keep finding new voices, keep exploring new angles, just continuously growing, as with any other artistic field. So maybe right now, those might be short stories, but who knows in the future? 

I was reading American Gods and Neil Gaiman apparently republished it a second time, a much longer version his former editor had told him to cut down, and at the beginning he quotes Stephen King on why he did it: cause there were small bits in it, sub-plots if you will, editors are keen on thinking they don’t add to the main plot, but they build the story as a whole, paint the colours needed for the setting, the ambience, the narrative outside the main plot, and both authors felt their concepts, their ideas, weren’t complete without them.

My first advice when someone has an idea is always this: write it down, however it is, with whatever you have. It might be one paragraph. It might be 400 pages. Whatever you have, it’s just a first draft, and the goal of a first draft is getting it down on paper, not turning it into the finished work. It’s the first step.

And if it’s gigantic? Make it gigantic. This is Miss Only Writes Gigantic Shit speaking. I mean monstrous. Especially first and second and even like, third and fourth draft (man I have a lot of drafts), it’s so brutally long I seriously have to take a step back and think “bitch, slow down”. Eventually, I chop down stuff. Scenes that don’t add anything, repeated stuff, scenes that establish what is already established -- just stuff that misses the eye. 

Just to say, let the story have its natural rhythm in the beginning stages. Writing is like baking, as I say: you need to set it aside and let it settle for a while, and then when you come back to it with a clear head, you’ll be able to compose it better. Eventually, it drives you down misery road and actually have to do the dreadful thing of leaving stuff out -- it’s sad, I won’t deny, looking at this one character and saying “goodbye, you were a good one, but I have to put you into the Unused Character Pile, maybe one day you’ll find your light, but not today, and I’m so sorry, but where you are right now, you’re useless lmao”. It’s a step that comes eventually, but it’s not needed in the early stages.

But in the end, it all comes down to motivation, I think. So first and foremost, I would say... find your motivation to write whatever you have. You could read more into the genre you’re thinking of, or you could try and write small vignettes of the story you have in mind (just pick a scene and try writing it down, just to see). You could try a challenge of sorts, like picking up a concept, a word, a sentence, and try developing it. Create a habit too -- don’t mind that “write every day” stuff, do it whenever you feel like it, whenever you get that tingle of ‘damn I feel like writing’, just answer that call. And always believe in your ideas, and I say this because I find that a lot of lack of motivation comes from ‘my idea sucks’ or ‘it’s been done before’. Your ideas are yours alone, so explore them as much as you can.

I used to have a website saved that I lost and this is the closest thing to it I found, but try this out for like a first plot, or just to generally get an outline of your idea. It has HELPED ME TREMENDOUSLY when I have a new idea that just makes me think “Great! now what the fuck do I do with it?”

I hope this helped, anon!! And sweet, sweet writing, my friend!

[crystalelemental]

FE Fates Replay - Part 1

Introductory segment, starring the better cast!

I did keep to the plan and am running Female Corrin.  I gave her the light purple hair.  It looks surprisingly nice on her.  Everything else was kinda standard.  I thought about alternate hair styles, but honestly her default looks the best.  I will say that I think the grids they use are stupid, though.  They list girly as one of the qualities in expression types, but one of the options furthest on that slider just had her eyes closed all the time like Brock, so I’m not sure that’s...girly, exactly.  My boon/bane layout is Clever/Unlucky, which translates to big magic but no luck.  Luck should always be your bane, kids.  I do find it annoying that they replaced the obvious descriptions with these new terms.  It’s not hard to figure out what’s what, but I know the stats and their associations.  If you’re new to the series, you might have no idea what Robust is.  Is that HP or Defense?  If it weren’t for keeping them all in the same order, I wouldn’t know.  It’s a similar thing to changing up class names; it’s really kinda pointless and only serves to confuse.  My subclass was Samurai, because I like the idea of Vantage and Swordfaire, which I feel is harder to find on her through the castles than all the other really good options.  Also I already have cards with Renewal and Luna, and it’s not gonna be hard to find Aegis/Pavise, so these two seemed like more interesting options.  With character creation out of the way, let’s get started!

The prologue is mostly just the now-standard in medias res tutorial.  Only, they had you side with the Hoshidans, because they’re totally not trying to sway your judgment here.  There’s not much to comment on, but I will note this, because it’s interesting: every time the Hoshidans talk about Nohr, the words “scum” and “filth” seem to come up every time.  They seem completely incapable of referring to the Nohrians as anything else.  Also, it’s absolutely hysterical to me that Xander nearly one-shots Ryoma, and Ryoma needs to activate Astra just to make an attempt at keeping up with damage output.  I think we all know who the better brother is here.

Chapter 1 is another simple tutorial, this time with Xander.  Not gonna lie, it might be Heroes influence, but I like Xander.  He’s nice.  He’s tough on Corrin, but is invested in helping her improve as a warrior to escape the fortress and be able to go out like she’s wanted.  He’s a good brother.  Who I thought was older, but may not be.  Unclear.  The other siblings are okay.  Camilla hasn’t really done a lot, Elise is just adorable, and Leo also hasn’t done much but prove that he’s kind of a klutz who’s like “there’s more to being strong than just slapping hunks of iron together!”  We also get a brief introduction to Flora and Felicia, who are pretty fun.  Nothing substantial on them yet.

Chapter 2 is a bit more interesting.  You finally meet the dad, Garon, who is a transparent villain that’s really not interesting at all.  He gives Corrin a suspicious sword, and tells her to kill off their prisoners from Hoshido.  The map itself...honestly is still mostly tutorial, this time for weapon triangle matchups.  It even gives you free healing in the center of the stage.  It’s more about developing small tactics and seeing how the different weapon types match up now.  I still don’t care for tomes being lumped in with swords and having a universal weakness.  I greatly prefer magic being outside the weapon triangle, and having its own matchups.  Still pissy about that...  Anyway, Corrin refuses to kill defeated prisoners, and Garon orders Xander to take care of it, so he gets involved.  Leo’s quick thinking keeps everyone out of trouble, and lets the prisoners, Kaze and Rinkah, survive.  Honestly, I do kinda like Leo after this map.  I forgot how clever he can actually be at times.  The whole family being against their father’s orders to kill the defenseless is also nice, though it makes you wonder about Garon himself, you know?  I know he used to be a good king, and suddenly changed, but like...when did the change happen, anyway?  How long was the family raised by good king Garon, and how did they not notice the drastic and immediate shift?  Corrin’s pretty nice here too.  Callie made a good observation for the series as a whole: “For a lot of these stories about kingdoms, the focus is on who’s in power, but the Fire Emblem lords tend to be way more concerned about how to help their people, and it’s really nice.”  I would agree, and Corrin does keep this trait.  She’s very concerned about establishing peace again after the war, and wants citizens on both sides to be safe.  Corrin’s alright.

Chapter 3, the doofening.  Hans and Iago, the other transparent villain idiots, are introduced.  Xander makes mention of Hans being arrested a few years back, which I guess alludes a bit to time frame for Garon’s transformation.  Law and order was properly upheld until “a few years ago.”  Without a proper scale we can’t say how long that was, but Xander was old enough to be on the job upholding the peace, so I’d assume no more than like...4-5 years, maybe?  Basically, the Nohrian siblings should’ve been old enough to recognize the sudden and drastic change.  Anyway, after your defiance of the king last chapter, you’re given a new mission and told you won’t even need to really fight this time.  Your objective is to scope out an abandoned fort near the Nohr/Hoshido border.  Gunter, Jakob, and Hans will be going with.  Corrin arrives, finds that the fort is filled with Hoshidans, and makes the sensible decision of “whoops, it’s not abandoned, better report this and not engage in needless conflict.”  To which Hans, predictably, runs in and kills a guy, then run into the fray and gets himself killed in like two turns because he’s inept.  Now...hear me out.  This guy’s plan was to kill one soldier, then charge in.  During this, Corrin shouts that Hans is disobeying orders, and acting independently.  In a sensible situation, this should be an easily resolved problem.  Corrin and the others actually following her orders stand back, or accost Hans themselves, and parlay with the Hoshidans, who have no intention fighting.  Instead, you engage them needlessly because Hans ran in.  So...okay, I guess.

You clear out the map, and get an introduction to Saizo and Kagero.  They’re not exactly compelling, beyond Saizo being kinda sexist here?  He dismisses Corrin as just a girl who couldn’t possibly know how to fight, but as soon as Xander shows up is like “Ah, this must be their real commander.”  Fuck you too, buddy.  Camilla’s actually hilarious at this point.  She decimates Saizo’s allies, and Corrin is momentarily taken aback by her usually gentle sister’s ferocity.  Elise is just like “Oh right, you’ve never seen her on the battlefield.  She’s just like this.”  It’s kinda great.  Kagero notifies Saizo that Ryoma is on his way with support, and Xander finally, FINALLY makes the sensible call to just fucking leave.

Oh, but of course it’s not that easy.  Hans is still alive somehow, despite rushing into enemy territory, having no support from us, and getting immediately blasted as he ran toward a heavily fortified post.  He also, somehow, knocks Gunter into the bottomless pit.  Corrin is outraged and demands answers, doing some weird body morphing dragon stuff in the process.  Not gonna lie, I forgot she did this, and it does look pretty cool.  Hans tells her was only doing it under the king’s orders, then he runs off.  Your weird evil sword tries to throw you into the pit as well, somehow, but wait!  Lilith is here, and she’s apparently a baby dragon creature that saves you!  You’re brought to a pocket dimension that the dragons can access, and this is how My Castle is established.  I will bitch endlessly about My Castle soon, I promise.  But for now, we’re just as quickly sent back out to where we warped in, and are immediately knocked out by Rinkah.  Nice.

Overall I’d say there’s nothing too egregious yet.  Chapter 3 is the least sensible, but I’m willing to waive some of the decisions as just pushing the plot along.  The only real hang-up I have is about Garon, who I just feel like should’ve been found out a long time ago.  Like...immediately, perhaps.  The Nohrians presumably had years with their true father, being raised with the moral compass they all have, yet the guy changes overnight and no one really questions it?  It’s a bit far-fetched, even by this series’ standards.  But, I guess we have to get the board set up somehow, or maybe Xander keeping the peace around the kingdom was on his own initiative and not the king’s orders.  Who knows.  Anyway, part 2 will happen eventually.  I’m mostly getting to play when Callie’s bored of the game, so expect some slow progress, but our next update point will be after the Hoshidan tutorial chapters.  Stay tuned.

[rayonfrozenwings]

Starfall and the Wild Hunt - a acotar/tog fan theory

Ok Guys… another theory… is coming…If I could animate I would make you a pretty video with me talking over the top, but I can’t - so it’s just lots of words.

Preface

Well it WAS Halloween here in kiwi land. (when I started writing this) And it got me thinking about it being the kind of night when spirits can pass through to our world. And I saw a post about faerie gates on tumblr Faerie and wyrd - both have an etymology to the word fate Same word the same/same type of thing Click goes my brain

Wyrd gates/Faerie gates

Ooooo I think

Then I remember on Calanmai where Rhysand said that - all creatures/beasts? get to walk the earth on that day - or some jazz like that. (I thought it was just in reference to Amarantha letting people out but what if it’s something more?)

So I started to wonder if Samhain in the TOG series was a later version of some more ancient ritual… because Elena is allowed to have a physical presence on that night.

REMEMBER I THINK TOG AND ACOTAR ARE LINKED SOMEHOW - SEE THIS ERILEA POST, @sparkleywonderful​ had some great points and I’m going to expand on one of them, use them in my discussion “think - Sliders; and parallel worlds.”

Ok. So now i’m on the thought path of …. what holidays are there in TOG/ACOTAR that could be linked….

Hopefully you are still with me…

Starfall and The Wild Hunt

Is Starfall a reference to “the wild hunt” in folk lore/mythology.

The wild hunt collects souls that are to be taken to the underworld.

We know that the night court is at- the end of the earth/world -

We know that Rhysand is referenced to as a Hades type in ACOMAF when he took Feyre away for 1 week out of 4 a month. (Hades and Persephone myth)

So if we view Rhysand as Hades and the night court as the edge of the underworld, we would be looking at the wild hunt and those it hunts/captures descending into the underworld.

The Wild hunt has many different leaders.

It’s never confirmed who is actually leading the hunt. But we know that the hunt is to take souls/spirits/people who are out when they shouldn’t be - to the underworld.

Here is a snippet from a wiki article:

The Wild Hunt is a European folk myth involving a ghostly or supernatural group of huntsmen passing in wild pursuit. The hunters may be either elves or fairies or the dead,[1] and the leader of the hunt is often a named figure associated with Woden[2] (or other reflections of the same god, such as Alemannic Wuodan in Wuotis Heer (“Wuodan’s Army”) of Central Switzerland, Swabia etc.), but may variously be a historical or legendary figure like Theodoric the Great, the Danish king Valdemar Atterdag, the Welsh psychopomp Gwyn ap Nudd, biblical figures such as Herod, Cain, Gabriel or the Devil, or an unidentified lost soul or spirit either male or female

The Wild hunt also “abducts” people to the underworld or fairy kingdom.

Seeing the Wild Hunt was thought to presage some catastrophe such as war or plague, or at best the death of the one who witnessed it.[3] People encountering the Hunt might also be abducted to the underworld or the fairy kingdom.[4] In some instances, it was also believed that people’s spirits could be pulled away during their sleep to join the cavalcade.[5]

Is this is why Amren hates starfall? @sparkleywonderful had a thought that perhaps starfall marked the day Amren arrived in Prythian. This post. I’m wondering if Is she afraid of being taken with the wild hunt? Does she think the Wild hunt will see her for what she really is and therefore does not want to risk it. Will this also mean that since Amren used her power in ACOWAR and is now just a “high fae”; she will attend starfall?

Obviously with a lot of these type of stories there are different variation depending on the myth you look at - and some of these variations are just as time passes and stories are told orally, changes are made. Others are what was tales were common to a certain region. So it is very hard to make direct links connecting all myths. But the general Idea is cool - I like the Idea that Starfall isn’t a “pretty holiday” and is a bit more sinister/creepy.

Some don’t view “the wild hunt” as a bad thing and could this be a category our inner circle fall into. Is this what Rhysand thinks of starfall?

Grimm believed that in pre-Christian Europe, the hunt, led by a god and a goddess, either visited “the land at some holy tide, bringing welfare and blessing, accepting gifts and offerings of the people” or they alternately float “unseen through the air, perceptible in cloudy shapes, in the roar and howl of the winds, carrying on war, hunting or the game of ninepins, the chief employments of ancient heroes: an array which, less tied down to a definite time, explains more the natural phenomenon."https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_Hunt

Now I’m going to switch back to Throne of Glass Keep thinking of Starfall and the Wild hunt, in the back of your mind.

In Throne of Glass On Samhain (Halloween) Elena visits Celaena, she says she is not a ghost.  But She is also terrified that someone will find her (Celena says “is it the gargoyles - Elena neither confirms or denies this”) and says she doesn’t have much time. Is she afraid of the wild hunt? Is it because she is a Spirit walking the earth when she shouldn’t be. She says the hounds will find her. And Celena hears howling as she runs back to her room. (ch25TOG)

She also says that they are guarding a gate to another world - is this a gate to the underworld/hades? Dogs are known to guard entrances to the underworld (cerebrus), and we know that the clock tower is a pretty nasty “rift” because during Celeana’s battle with Cain, “spirits/demons” come out of it to torment her while she is in a state of delusion from the poison Kaltain gave her. (Also Rifthold, Ah! Times Rift, both weird “coincidences” from TOG)

In Queen of Shadows, Lorcan calls them Hounds/Dogs when he accuses Aelin of giving them his scent - side note he also refers to her, affectionately, as a bitch.

The wild hunt are known to hunt at different times depending on the tale/myth. But the general consensus is that they come out during winter - from the autumn solstice until the spring solstice. So it is possible that the “wild hunt” and hells dogs are linked.

In Welsh folklore, the Cŵn Annwn or "Hounds of Annwn” ride through the skies in autumn, winter, and early spring. The baying of the hounds was identified with the crying of wild geese as they migrate and the quarry of the hounds as wandering spirits, being chased to Annwn.

Source: Wiki article about “the wild hunt”

The idea of the Wild Hunt, hunting spirits on Samhain, and Amren being afraid of Starfall (this happens to coincide with Nynsar another holiday in spring) In british tradition of the wild hunt it is said that it lasts for 9 weeks ending on Easter (spring time in Britain), They are also known to hunt on holy days and from christmas until the twelfth night.

Then I investigated the Leaders of the Hunt…

And came across this in a wiki article:

Wales: Arawn or Gwyn ap Nudd, the Welsh god of the Underworld.

And I thought - hmmmm Arawn looks an awful lot like it could sound like Erawan.

So I looked up Arawn.

And he is king of the “otherworld”,

Click Click goes Renee’s Brain

He has hounds.

In one myth he is said to do this task with his wife (who turns out to be Hecate in modern paganism).

Hecate - a woman/goddess known for associations with dogs and keys and gates and opening gates. A motherly figure. A triple faced goddess. (I am not touching that theory)

So I also thought of EOS and a couple of Moments - because if I think that Erawan is the Leader of the hunt and therefore king of the “otherworld/underworld?” then his hounds are his “wild hunt”.

The ilken are called his “blood hounds”.

The hounds hunt Lorcan and Elide The ilken can break Lorcans shields (ch9 EOS)

Maeve is also associated with wolves/hounds. Maeve used to have the wyrd keys. Maeve is Erawan’s wife, and a co-leader of the wild hunt or another Victim of the Hunt, trapped in Erilea I haven’t decided. She’s a tricky character to pin down.

Maeve is called the bitch-queen (symbology of being a leader of dogs not just an “affectionate” term) though Hecate as a mother goddess also has these links.

The gods and goddesses who are trying to get home and are using their scions to do so, are terrified of Maeve. Anneith herself “fled” from maeve in EOS on the beach, Elide makes note that there is no tap on her shoulder to guide her. This supports the idea that Maeve is a part of the wild hunt, or at least a threat to Anneith.

So a quick summary of the points so far …

Arawan and Maeve are Leaders of a/the Wild Hunt

With the Loss of the Keys they are unable to “hunt” and move between worlds - though wyrd gates - to collect their spirits/ghosts/victims. Some of these victims are “trapped in Erilea”.

If they are Trapped In Erilea - the hunt are also  “trapped” . And trapped with the prey that that took from other worlds.

Amren hates starfall because Starfall is the night the hunt returns to the underworld with their catch. And she doesn’t want to be seen and taken. Perhaps this is because she escaped the hunt before and perhaps that is how a “arch-angel type of character” ended up in Prythian (a greek myth type of world) ACOMAF

Anneith Flees Maeve because Maeve would recognise her and there is a fear of being taken. EOS

Elena is scared of the hounds taking her away on Samhain. TOG (some rifts are said to open without keys - I cannot remember where or when though, it seems like something a stygian spider would say)

The guardians of the portals to other worlds are hounds - just like hounds guarding the underworld. Aka Cerebus?

So are Erilea and Prythian parallel worlds that the “wild hunt” runs through to collect the souls/spirits/and take them to the underworld/otherworld.

Rhysand explains that Starfall is spirits traveling. ACOMAF

And if this is the case

(remember it’s a theory, and I am not a scholar in “the wild hunt” or “welsh mythology” etc etc.just a tog/acomaf/sjm fan who loves seeing parallels in literature)

Then perhaps…

There are multiple versions of the gods because of parallel dimensions

we get reoccurring characters in different guises because of parrallel dimensions e.g. sin eater/bone carver - storytellers/the suriel, baba yellowlegs/the weaver

Perhaps each of SJM’s worlds are similar e.g. the geography matches but there is a subtle difference - and they are not the same because they each draw on a different mythology (prythian - Greek mythology, TOG - Welsh mythology, Amren’s world - Biblical) (kind of like “his dark materials” series and the use of parallel worlds in that. written  by Philip Pullman - another great book series, omg links to the subtle knife and acowar could be amazing but i’m not going there right now).

The world of Prythian and Erilea are similar because they have a time difference or one moment/point of difference that separates them (aka @sparkleywonderful ‘s sliders reference on the Erilea post also His Dark Materials and use of ice age to differentiate parallel worlds from Northern Lights and The Subtle Knife)

The Wild Hunt travels through wyrd gates to collect souls/spirits and takes them to the underworld. Possibly traveling across worlds through WYRD GATES.

Hecate (maeve) as the keeper of the keys opens and closes the gates for the leader of the hunt.

When Hecate (maeve) takes the keys the hunt can no longer continue - maybe the “prey and the hunt” are all stuck in the same place. What happened when Maeve and Erawan first came to Prythian? Are his brothers other versions of gods - if Erawan is king of the underworld/otherworld what would his brothers be kings of? (I am not going down that path today)

Stuck in Erilea

So they inter-breed or act as gods/goddesses in Erilea. Erilea has not seen these people before - no-one is like them. We can get “powerful magic uses” as descendants from other worlds. It also explains why the Fae are so different in each world and why our “heroes” power in TOG is so unique.

For Example - Elain + Lucien have children - generations pass (or not) and then this person is taken by the wild hunt from Prythian. Maybe Mala “a goddess” is taken from Prythian and is stuck in Erilea… Mala has the powers of that union to pass down to her children. E.g. flame and fire and light…a daughter of Fate  @iamthebonecarver - what do you think?

Or raw magic - can do anything, blue eyes like sapphire, black hair. Sounds an awful lot like a Feysand child or descendant - hmmm and a certain Dorian does have those qualities…

We know that the 12 gods and goddesses who appear to Manon and Aelin in the Witch Mirror in EOS are just trying to get home (to their world).

But if this is the case then perhaps each world has it’s own “mother goddess”, and Maybe Erilea’s mother Goddess is pissed off at another World’s mother goddess. Because there is a lot -a lot - a shit tonne! Of similarities between Maeve and Aelin and Hecate and the triple goddess motif. I’m not going into it because I have not researched/looked into that avenue yet. And I’m not sure I want to. I’ll just say that weird coincidences between wielder of keys/ wolves-dogs/ artemis-deana-anneith vs hecate.

OK if you stayed with me. Thank you and I’m done for the most Part. I’m not writing up a big summary. 

But basically - Parallel worlds - Wild Hunt vs our faves - a cluster F*ck of mythologies from everywhere all thrown together. :)

This all started with me having a look into STARFALL I thought talking about starfall could be fun and not too serious… *sighs* And then STARFALL as a representation of the wild hunt in Pyrthain could be cool… and I got away on myself.

*throws hands up*

All I wanted to say was that Starfall could be the wild hunt. I thought of this because I read a book series called the spiritwalker trilogy by Kate Elliott a few years ago (it’s good - I recommend it, first book is Cold Magic) and it had similarities that popped into my head.

So yeah. It’s a theory. A cobbled together theory - that would probably be better explained via video. 

A parallel worlds theory which would mean that Sarah’s quote about how the world’s in TOG and ACOTAR aren’t the same - but perhaps you could step through a wyrd gate to see them - would make sense. ALSO DID YOU KNOW SHE WINKED!!! SHE DID A WINKY FACE!!! SJM is Cheeky! haha.

Twitter quote

“Replying to @BookishlyAmber (on twitter)

.@BookishlyAmber TOG & ACOTAR are in the same Megaverse. So you could technically open a Wyrdgate between their worlds. ;) #ACOTARParty”

A DAMN WINKY FACE!!!!

Ok and I am Done for Today! Done!

So Book recommendations from this theory

Spiritwalker Trilogy - Kate Elliot

Cold Magic

Cold Fire

Cold Steel

His Dark Materials - Phillip Pullman

Golden Compass/Northern Lights - depending on where you are in the world

The Subtle Knife

The Amber Spyglass

Also the lovely

@paperbacktrash

just told me Philip Pullman has a new book out! What?? - *Renee adds to the tbr pile*

Thank you to some people who have inspired/talked with me - seen me take notes - had a little discourse etc etc.

@sparkleywonderful - for reading my theories and commenting and that sliders reference!

@paperbacktrash - all the greek stuff :D and letting my thoughts run away with me. 

@rowaelinsmut and @propshophannah … this one is a parallel world theory, not a same world theory - I don’t know if that is better or worse because I still made a link and it’s not really crossover but still >.< please don’t hate me for finding a possible link. 

@iamthebonecarver, @crownedwithstarz for our shared fangirling/theorising

@rhysand-vs-rowan for the Aelin/Elain name thing that could still mean something - because SJM did a damn winky face.

xx

Renee

[goldenboisimsauce]

WIKI ROSAS: for @vintageplumbobs Bachelorette  Challenge!

SIGN: Cancer FAVS: Latin Music, Stu Surprise, Violet (even though she wears a lot of red!)

Wiki is still questioning her place in the world, and who she is. Despite this, she seems to give off a fun loving and Charismatic vibe, has a Good Sense of Humour, and can be a little Flirty. She has a few tattoos and piercings, all these had been done out of impulse but without regrets, she’s quite the Daredevil!

However she’s had her fall outs with dating guys in the past, all which really ended very badly for her and didn’t leave her quite the same.. As a result she’s developed some anxieties and can be described to be a bit Neurotic at times. She keeps her feelings about love to herself because of this.

As someone always looking for ways to move forward and grow, Wiki has finally decided to be follow what her gut has been telling her all along: that maybe she’s been looking for love in the wrong place..? Maybe she can find a home in someone like Daya...?

CC:

Top: EcoSpace Bralet Top V2

Bottoms: Art-Sims Black Skinny Denim with Tied up Shirt

Piercings: Winry on MTS, Piercing Set (Snakebite piercings are under bracelets, Piercing Set Update.zip)

Dragon Tattoo on Ear: MMSims Face Tattoo Set

Hair: Pandelabs Retexture Cazy Haley

She doesn’t have any other CC, 99% the rest of her outfits are BG compatible..! And I took out my custom sliders for her so I’m 202% sure she’s vanilla in that situation, but does use the sliders that came in the Late Night patch. My defaults are Kurasoberina’s Primer Plus and BrntWaffles Pinstruck Eyes, so she might look different if you use different defaults.

Have FUN!!!

(private download tho :p)

[saejsystem]

Figured I might as well redo alter introductions since things have changed and I never finished.

Here are our mains.

Kat. This is me. I am the host and the original of our system. I used to identify with the body, and look how it looked in the innerworld... But I don't anymore due to an incident in the innerworld. I am the same age as the body however.

Bailey. This is our primary protector. She was the first alter who showed herself to me. She's smart and outgoing. Witty and funny. She's absolutely amazing and I dont know where I'd be without her.

Summer. This is our system secretary. She handles everything in the innerworld, and kinda acts like a mayor in the city that is our innerworld. If I ever need to go inside to handle some stuff, she's always offering to switch with me. However, for the most part, she gets extremely busy with stuff in the innerworld.

El. She is our emotional alter. If ever we are overcome with sadness... Or its just too much for one of us to handle... El will take on the sadness and "steal" our memories of the feeling of sadness/what caused the sadness in order to help us deal with it. Usually when she takes the sadness, she comes out to process it. Most people find her rude, but that's usually because when she's out she's dealing with something for us.

The middle image is our body. It's a little bit of an older picture. Roughly 3-4 months old. Since then I changed my hair twice, first went to purple, and now my hair is many different colors(purple, pink, and blue).

Rowan. This is our system caregiver. She primarily takes care of the littles, and handles any alter who may be an age slider, or is just in a rough spot. She's impossible to get mad at, and everyone in the system absolutely loves her. She's basically the system mother.

Pandora. This is the past host/secondary host. For a few months Pandora assumed host position when I was unable. Then when I returned to full health she and i developed a system where there were two hosts. Due to some recent events in our life, though, she dropped from her hosg position and has been lingering in the innerworld for a while.

Bram. This is our second system protector. In the innerworld he teaches psychology to college students(NPCs). While he understands in the outerworld he is not certified to be a psychologist, and has done none of the necessary training... He still assumes the position as system counselor and helps council any alter who is in need in the innerworld. We do have a therapist outside the innerworld that we go to as well(DBT. I love it).

Feira. This is our system gatekeeper. She's very intense and stiff. She dislikes anyone in the outerworld, as she sees them only as harmful to our system. She sees everyone as a threat and finds outside friendship meaningless. Despite her harsh views, she still takes care of the innerworld. Managing the world itself and how it looks/is organized. She also controls the alters(when they show themselves or when they integrate, etc). She's basically the "admin" of our system, in gaming terms.

This is just the beginning of our alter introductions, so stay tuned. DISCLAIMER: No faceclaim images are my own. All images used(other than "the body" images) were found on pinterest.

[downtroddendeity]

SHARE WITH ME the thoughts and predictions on gameplay improvements...... I am Interested

ALL RIGHT SO. This is… really long, so, cutting it.

Things we know for sure about remake changes based on released info:

There are three difficulty settings

They’re adding a feature (I think only in easy mode?) where if you knock out enemies with Strike you can insta-kill them and get the XP and cash reward without fighting them

They’re willing to mess with order of events enough to change available party composition for at least one boss fight (there’s a Mist Spider screenshot with Marco in the party)

Enemy turn panels now have icons indicating what enemy they are, as well as where they are on the grid(THANK GOD)

Sound/music/voice volume sliders

Minimap

Possibly more if I spoke a word of Japanese and didn’t have to rely on incomplete translations

Things I’m pretty sure about, based on stuff that’s been released:

This was screenshotted from a status menu: icons for all the status effects, plus what looks like fire/ice/lightning. My bet is these are resistances, which implies that enemy attacks are going to have elemental attributes now- before, the game just treated it as magic damage or physical damage.

I couldn’t tell during the stream, but it looks like they’ve effectively switched the screens in the combat interface. The turn order now appears on the bottom screen, which hopefully means that when you’re changing turns/using Turn Break you can select them with the stylus.

The “condition” button here might just be the same old “Help”/skill description button we’re used to, but I’m hoping it means we can get a list of buff/debuff/status information for enemies and allies.

Stuff I think is likely:

The reason Rosch is always underleveled is because for some ungodly reason people you can’t add to your party get no XP. This is a really easy fix which would markedly increase Rosch, Gafka, and Eruca’s usefulness at various points.

Strike- that is, the ability to knock out enemies on the field- had a really wonky hitbox in the original, making it so you’d often juggle enemies four or five times before they got knocked out. I’d bet that one way or another, that’s not going to happen as much, though I suspect there will be different tweaks at different difficulties.

Giving enemy attacks elements and adding elemental defense is going to require a massive equipment rework and rebalance. I’m actually all for this- RH’s equipment balance is all over the place, and by about midgame a lot of equipment seems to be distributed completely at random, resulting in a lot of stuff being useless. Aht’s equipment is particularly bad: upgrades for both her weapons and armor (at least, ones that give her the magic and defense boosts she needs, rather than relatively useless ATK and MDEF) are thin on the ground until SH Ch. 6, when you get access to the ridiculously powerful Promised Knife and like five better pieces of armor shortly after each other. You can go to a lot of work grabbing a rare, unique steal from a boss and then find it’s worse in every way than the thing you picked up in a treasure chest five minutes ago (*glares at bear*). You can easily get Stocke’s second-best armor in SH Ch. 4, resulting in him taking a fraction of the damage everyone else takes for the entire rest of SH, and the best armor is only available as a rare drop from a random enemy in the final dungeon, so you’re probably going to keep the other one on him for the entire rest of the game. I think odds are excellent they’re going to straighten the mess out, in part by putting elemental and status resistances on more equipment.

Building off that last bit, I think we’re probably going to see a huge jump in enemies using debuffs and status effects, and the success rates of both in general. In the original, you could go through the whole game and never see a successful Fear, Curse, or Petrify. Debuffs had such a low success rate that you could often ignore them entirely from the enemy side, and you never wanted to use them on your side because that was a turn you could be having Eruca cast G-Frost again instead of doing a crap-damage phys hit that might make her next spell do more damage. I suspect we’ll see enemies weak to more status ailments than just poison and sleep, and maybe some skill set changes so there are ways to inflict the other ailments other than items.

I will not be surprised if enemies now have elemental resistances as well as weaknesses, somewhat reducing the efficacy of my favorite tactic, Will o’ Wisp spam.

More enemy manipulation of the grid. I expect we’ll see more formation attacks and effects, and probably either the ability for enemies to move and act in the same turn or a bunch of abilities that move the user on the grid when they’re used.

Speed buffs and debuffs get a boost, possibly directly rewriting the turn order the way enemy summons do. They’re essentially a waste of a turn in the original- you might get a single bonus turn for your efforts before the fight ends, but the odds of getting two before everything’s dead (which would actually make it worth it) are pretty much nil.

My personal wish list:

Ability to scroll through lists quickly with the left/right buttons.The lack of this is a grade-A pain in the ass in the original, especially when trying to select skills or use items.

Better scene skip function. The current one a) is never indicated anywhere in the game, b) will only skip one scene at a time, and some nodes have three or four EVERY TIME you visit them, and c) can occasionally cause you to miss scenes, because changes to events are registered as part of an old scene instead of a separate one. So, e.g., you can accidentally permanently miss the scene where Stocke scares the crap out of Hedge because you tried to skip the conversation with Garland before it. (I’d probably do a button you push that toggles skipping all scenes you’ve already watched but doesn’t affect new ones.)

Reevaluation of some skill sets. All the ladies have physical skills which you will probably never use because they don’t have the stats to make them worthwhile. Seriously, there is no point when you ever want Raynie to use Rush.

Reevaluation of some damage numbers. There are two separate bosses you can kill in two turns before they can even move by pushing them into a Volt Star Trap, and a third you can kill in four turns if you lead with Dancing Death/Heat Blade on the cannons in front of it, then push it into a Volt Star Trap. You can beat every one of Gafka’s skill boss fights in one round by popping Sky Hammer. Eruca gets G-Frost at level 32 and it’s her highest single-target damage all game.

Shuffling some nodes around, whether by promoting random events to nodes or strategically adding additional choices with bad ends. There are some points in the game where it’s annoyingly difficult to reach things because if you jump back in time, you have to go through several dungeons and/or boss fights to get back to where you were and it’s a pain.

Reevaluation of when you get some skills. Aht only picks up Frost Star Trap at the bottom of the Imperial Ruins… and there are no enemies after that that are weak to ice and can be moved, rendering it effectively pointless. On the flip side, Burst Light murders absolutely everything and negates all need for strategy while Eruca is in the party once you get it, and the pact for that is available before you even meet Master Vainqueur.

Final dungeon rework, so you get Eruca back halfway through instead of at the end. Seriously, it’s stupid to have one of your party members gone for the entire last three dungeons, and you really don’t need an extended “save the princess” thing to want to get on with the plot at that point. If anything, plot tension would be heightened by getting her back and then continuing along with her. 

Improve Raynie’s bonus skills. The only remotely good one is Sleep Break, and even that’s not exactly something you spam in every fight. Resist Boost in particular is pretty much a waste of a skill.

Improve Raynie’s MP. She’s a black mage, why does she have worse MP than Marco?

Eruca’s Mana Bursts get changed from physical damage to non-elemental magic damage to use her stats better. Preferably Aht’s Imperion too.

More variety in Mana Burst effects. Most of them are just “heavy damage to one/all targets,” so there’s often not a lot of reason to use them over anything else (especially when Turn Break is a unique effect). The only interesting ones are Marco’s (multiple buffs, target all), Aht’s Lucky Breath (fill someone else’s MB), and Rosch’s Seyfried (launch everything into the air).

Eruca gets Frost. I think Mana Shot is supposed to do the same damage as a basic elemental spell, but in practice it doesn’t seem to, and it can’t hit weaknesses. And there’s a pretty good chance that if you’ve been skipping monsters, she might not have G-Frost yet when you get her, so her DPS is kind of crap.

Better armor for Gafka. For a character who’s clearly supposed to be tough and tanky, his armor sucks, especially early on- I usually end up giving him defense accessories just so he doesn’t die the first time some goblin mages sneeze in his general direction.

For that matter, Aht and Eruca also have armor problems- it’s often best to use armor that’s allegedly “worse” because their armor upgrades prioritize MDEF over DEF, but they have naturally high MDEF and terrible DEF.

In-game display of enemy steals (and possibly item drops). I’m not asking for a full-scale Etrian Odyssey bestiary here, but it’d be nice to not have to keep a running list of which enemies I’ve robbed just in case one of them has good loot.

One-on-one boss fights rebalanced, so there’s more to the strategy than “change turns and heal until you’ve got a bunch of turns in a row, then nuke them, taking off all their health in one round.”

Press B to walk/Press B to run toggle. Someone who can read Japanese might be able to tell me if this was in the config menu in the stream, but it’d be really nice to be able to turn off auto-run in the sewers.

A decent magic bonus on Historica. It’s kind of ridiculous that there’s an Endgame Sword of Plot Importance restricted to the main character with a special superboss fight to upgrade it… and the magic bonus is less than the Sorcery Epee you bought from a shop thirty levels ago. Like, no, screw that, I’m not taking a 27-point hit to Stocke’s magic stat when he doesn’t have any physical skills that even begin to compete with G-Fire/Heat Blade/Will o’ Wisp for DPS.