#whacky wizard powers go

[morbingtime]

Guys inspiration has struck me like the stone that killed Able

For context I drink a minimum of a gallon of milk a week when I’m feeling good so I’m qualified (sadness makes me cut down)

[morbingtime]

DON’T LET THEM WIN

Fictional Weapon War Round 4

Portal Gun (Portal)

Can create two portals so anything can move between them

Surfaces can be treated with moon rocks or space debris to more compatible with the portals

Can pick up and manipulate objects directly in front of it.

Orb (Pondering My Orb meme)

First posted to Twitter in October 2021 and the rest is history

The image is from a gamebook called Middle-Earth Quest: A Spy In Isengard and the artist is Angus McBride

[svartalfhild]

What’s your favorite High Fantasy Story?

Oh boy. What a big question. Buckle in; this is going to take a minute.

Okay, so as you might expect, it's very hard for me to say one particular story is my absolute favourite, especially considering how I engage with the genre across many different types of media, so let me talk about a few different stories arranged by medium.

Books

Obviously the works of Tolkien are high on my list of favourites. LOTR is the ur-story of Western high fantasy.

I've mentioned it many times before, but the Starlight & Shadows trilogy by Elaine Cunningham has always been a big favourite of mine and a very formative read for me when I was a preteen. If you like DnD, elves (esp. dark elves), and/or morally complicated female protagonists, this one is for you. It also has a romance between a wizard and a barbarian and incorporates lots of aspects of Forgotten Realms lore that take inspiration from Norse and Slavic mythology.

Film and TV

LOTR defs makes this list again. I am the Spiders Georg for Times Watched LOTR Movies.

The Witcher. "But Svar, why did you list this here and not under books?" Because the books are full of misogyny. Don't get me wrong, the books have good stuff, but the Netflix series got rid of a lot of the misogyny that I greatly dislike about the books (and games). I also just really enjoy the show in its own right. The Blood Origin miniseries spinoff is super good too and I'm sad it got no attention. Are there flaws? Yes. But I really like the story they're trying to tell and Slavic folklore doesn't get nearly enough interest in Western media.

The Mythica Films. This is a series of five indie fantasy films that are clearly inspired by DnD and they are the best indie fantasy movies I've ever seen. They tell the story of a young disabled woman talented with magic who finds out she's got dark powers and has to run for her life. Matt Mercer plays the main villain and weirdly enough, these movies were the first time I ever saw him, and I was actually wary of Critical Role at first because those movies gave me the odd impression that he's an edgelord, even though he's a very sweet person irl lol.

Honor Among Thieves is brand new, but it instantly won my heart as a favourite. How can it not? It's set in DnD's Forgotten Realms and is about platonic friends raising a child together while also being about whacky heist shit. A story after my silly aspec heart.

Games

Okay, I'mma have to restrain myself and give you top five here, because otherwise we're gonna be here all day.

The Baldur's Gate Saga. Fucking old but truly great. The OG. The 90's graphics might turn a lot of people off these days, which is unfortunate, because they are amazing games, especially with the Enhanced Editions and the new Siege of Dragonspear expansions. It's the story of an unwitting child of the God of Murder, and you can either embrace what you are, struggle against it, or try to ride the line. I personally find the struggle against one's blood and supernatural urges a much more compelling story. It's the struggle to become something other than what you were made to be while also being pulled towards your destiny and have to choose what to do with the power that is given to you. It is the struggle for your soul and the souls of those you love. It is a journey to the Hells and a rise from its ashes, and you have to choose what the phoenix looks like. Also there's a man who carries a miniature giant space hamster everywhere with him and a gnome obsessed with turnips, to name just a few of the incredibly silly aspects of the story.

The Elder Scrolls series. The worldbuilding in TES is amazing for the specific reason that it's such a fucking mess. The folks at Bethesda and Zenimax have taken the unique approach of building the lore like historians collecting a bunch of conflicting primary sources. That's fucking fascinating because it makes the world feel more realistic. The real world is full of conflicting information, especially regarding history, and we all have to decide what we think is true based on the information given to us. Also TES III: Morrowind in particular is the most game of all time. You can tell it was made by a bunch of freaks and it's creatively braver than many of the major RPGs that have come out since. Bethesda just went "what if we did a game about the land of the dark elves, and that land is full of mushroom trees and all the fauna is either some sort of unique reptile, insect, or jellyfish- no it's not underground- anyway, here's an epic story about destiny, revenge, cultural conflict, and the gods being deeply flawed- also there's a bit where you have to kill a giant jellyfish with a fork you got from a lizard man called Big Head".

The Dragon Age series. All things considered, DA is a pretty conventional high dark fantasy story, but it has enough of its own unique twists and interesting writing/worldbuilding to be special to me. Each game has a different protagonist and a different type of story, but there's some themes that are consistent across the series. I would say the central theme of DA is finding the strength to do what must be done, even though you never asked for the responsibility and by rights shouldn't even be here. I think that's really compelling if you're the kind of person who has dealt with a lot of imposter syndrome in your life.

The Pillars of Eternity games. I don't think PoE gets nearly enough love. It has rich, carefully crafted lore that gets into things that other series tend to half-ass, like the linguistic aspects of the worldbuilding. Across the two games, Obsidian really delves deep into difficult discussions about mental illness, the relationship between gods and mortals, the cycle of life and death, ethics in magic, the effects of imperialism, and trying to make huge decisions when the right answer isn't clear. Also the visual style of these games is impeccable, as is the music.

Neverwinter Nights. This is where my love of DnD began. I watched my uncle play this game when I was a kid and I instantly fell in love with its whole vibe. The main campaign might hit different these days, because the story involves a deadly plague and the protag has to recover the pieces of a potential cure while also uncovering cult shit. There's a whole betrayal/scapegoat thing going on that's super tragic. Anyway, pile this one on the list of reasons I grew up to be a DnD obsessed goth.

Other

If you follow me, you're probably familiar with how much I love the DnD actual play show Critical Role. I've been watching since 2016 and I'm forever amazed at the compelling stories the cast and the dice rolls have built across three campaigns now.

Black Dice Society is my other favourite DnD actual play show. It's Ravenloft, so it's a gothic horror/high fantasy fushion. It has two seasons and tells such a beautiful story about the struggle for love and power.

[arkadiaasks]

If writing duels for the current climate of the OCG is too difficult, then why not just keep the actual duels to a minimum? Any introductions to an archetype could very simply be a rundown of the essential combos, most of the plots in the show could be slice of life stories involving making fanart of the cards, watching the anime in-universe, examining the card game lore from the perspective of the characters in-universe and many other things fans of Yugioh would do with each other that aren’t dueling. If they need action, they could have 2-3 episode climaxes to each arc that focuses on each duel of a match and skip over the combos that anyone with incentive to watch would have already memorized over and over again. For tournament arcs, they could put just as much effort into showcasing the actual logistics of numerous events and perhaps bring up time rules so that lp has an actual reason to matter. There are many ways to advertise Yugioh without having duels be the center and still be incredibly entertaining, if not more so!

I know people like the idea of more 'down to earth' normal stuff with Tournaments, being at card shops, discussing lore.

But uh. That would instantly crater ratings for the intended 6-9 year old audience that watches Yu-Gi-Oh! on Sundays for whacky comedy, big robots and cool dragons, as well as magic cards appearing as super power-ups.

Producers have said:

"Duels have to be in the center" "The Duels have to be shown in full most times" "Show has to appeal to attention addled children, not the adult periphary"

There's a reason why every time say, Vanguard tries to appeal to normies, its real fanbase beats it with a stick and kicks it in the side until it starts involving wizard nonsense and starts actually involving the card game.

Either there needs to be a second card game for Yu-Gi-Oh! or you're going to have to accept card text length and combo complexity reverting to 2004~2010 levels, because TV Tokyo, which is one of the four key rights holders, and who along with NAS (the production and licensing company in Japan) are higher on the food chain than Konami, want Duels with Rush Duel level complexity and there must be Duels on the regular.

Please solve the riddle of power creep, short simple Duels with no difficult combos, but do not crater product sales, but the cards are usually the same as Real Life.

[abookishidentity]

Books read and finished in April 2025

--The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde started April 1, 2025 and finished April 3, 2025- 4/5 stars. You know, for a book called The Eyre Affair the stuff with Jane Eyre doesn’t really happen until the last fourth of the book. That was my only gripe about the book. This book was whacky in a very British way. I was into it. It was delightfully weird. I love that there are time cops and time stuff in this book. The main character’s dad popping in once in a while was quite amusing. There are quite a lot of organizations that deal with different stuff. Like vampires and werewolves. That was an interesting surprise. The villain was interesting and nearly omnipotent. Thursday Next is such an interesting name for the main character. I want to follow more of her exploits. I wish the remaining books were at my local library but there is a library nearby that has the series so thats good at least. Interesting world that I wouldn’t want to live in. 

-Upright Women Wanted by Sarah Gailey started April 3, 2025 and finished April 4, 2025- 3.5/5 stars. This was a short book so there isn’t much I can say about it. Queer librarian spies are a pleasure to read about. I’m glad that the main character escaped her home life which seemed terribly homophobic and misogynistic. Shame that her “friend” was hanged by the main character’s dad. Wouldn’t want to live in this world. It’s wild to me how quickly the main character fell for one of the librarians she was with. 

-Early Riser by Jasper Fforde started April 4, 2025- 3/5 stars. What an interesting and yet dystopian world. Wouldn’t want to live in this world in which women are farmed. The dream aspect of this book was fascinating. The need for hibernation because of the cold ass winter was interesting. You know when books come with a glossary? That annoys me usually but for this book I would welcome it. Too many terms to keep track of. This world has corporations and of course they would construct something that would essentially make use of people who are essentially brain dead. I didn’t like that people referred to the main character as “Wonky” since he had a deformed head. This book didn’t hit as much as Jasper Fforde’s other book I read. 

-My Funny Demon Valentine by Aurora Ascher- 2/5 stars. Oh whoops I didn’t do enough research on this book. A lot more spice in a book than I was expecting. This felt like it was for certain audiences which is not me. If the couple in this book was queer then I would enjoy it more. At least they are practicing safe sex. Although, I don't know how safe or comfortable it is to have sex on a piano. Other than the sex, the plot is quite interesting. Its easy to see where its going though. Demons escaping hell is always fun to read. And at least they also like playing jazz together. At the end of the day this is a trash romantasy novel. Some lines felt like this was written over ten years ago. I stopped taking it seriously as soon as Ash said “Well…that just happened.” 

-Emily Wilde’s Compendium of Lost Tales by Heather Fawcett started April 9, 2025 and finished April 12, 2025- 4/5 stars. I love the Emily Wilde books. I deeply respect Emily’s dedication to research and her books. I don’t have much to say about this book as it was pretty good and entertaining. Wendel’s dedication to Emily is pretty sweet. There were moments in which I thought “Whats the rest of this book about?” I like the direction it goes. 

-Toto by A.J Hackwith started April 13, 2025 and finished April 15, 2025- 3.5/5 stars. Sometimes you have to read someone’s Wizard of Oz fanfiction. That’s what this felt like. Toto, being a tiny dog, can only do so much. He was given the power of speech which was helpful. It was kind of interesting that Dorothy lied about being to understand him. I guess she felt that her life was weird enough that her dog from Kansas being able to speak was just the icing on the weirdness cake. I like the additional characters. They were cool. I also like how the main group of characters were written. There was a lot of revolution and politics in this book which was deeply interesting. Although it felt like part of a book somewhat recently. I like that Elon Musk AKA The Wizard was blown up in his drone. I also like that it ends with Dorothy going on adventures with Evaline who was the wicked witch of the west. 

-An Inheritance of Magic by Benedict Jacka- 3.5/5 stars. If one likes magic systems and them being explained in many details then you would like this. I don’t really care how magic systems work. I mean it was a good book, it's just I didn’t really care all that much about the magic. The main character is quite interesting as he’s quite young (20 years old) and kind of inexperienced with the drucraft world. Which is a very depressing world as it's just like the real world in which you need money to do anything. An annoying thing about this book is that the main character has to deal with his rich bitches of relatives. Man if they just left him alone then he wouldn’t have so much grief in his life. It was interesting to read how he got better with his drucraft and his process in doing things. I don’t think I’m going to continue reading this series though. I don’t want to read about the rich bitches again. The main reason I picked this up is because I wanted to read a Benedict Jacka book. His Alex Versus series sounds more up my alley but who knows. 

-Court of Magickers by Novae Caelum started April 19, 2025 and finished April 22, 2025- 4/5 stars. This is the fourth book of the series. It’s a very interesting series. I love how complicated the characters and how diverse they are when it comes to identity and such. We follow one character who i think should have their own spin off series since what they are doing feels quite separated from the other characters. There are seven books in this series (I think) and I wonder if I will read the rest. This book was given to me by a family member who bought the books. It’s an indie author. I was told by someone online that the author has used AI in star work. It appears to be true and starself seems proud of it. Don’t like that. What a shame. Not reading further into the series.  

-The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong started April 23, 2025 and finished April 25, 2025- 4/5 stars. This book is quite cute. Sometimes a little too cute when things work out for the main characters. It’s fine though. The characters have suffered enough. I love the found family aspect of it all. Cosy fantasy is fun to read. I like fantasy elements when everyone and everything lives together. It was a fun read. 

-Interstellar Magachef by Lavanya Lakshminarayan started April 26, 2025 and finished April 30, 2025 - 4/5 stars. This book was pretty damn good. The main character deals with so much bullshit and xenophobia. It’s nice when things work out for her. The other main character was kind of insufferable. But it’s okay because a handful of people told her so and how she wasn’t that great of a person and needed to change. That was good stuff. Anyway, you could tell that the author really cares about food. I like that. Food is very much appreciated in this book. I honestly thought that the whole book was going to deal with the cooking show but the main character gets kicked off first due to xenophobia. What was interesting is when authors don’t have complete quotation marks when their characters talk. Another interesting thing were some of the character’s names. Serenity, Curiosity, Courageous, Good Nature, and etc were the first part of their names. It made things a little confusing to keep track of who was who. There was a character who was a xenophobic bully and she was quite annoying to read about. The main character and the other main character share a kiss and have feelings for each other which is weird because one of them is insufferable and I don’t understand this. Overall a pretty great book though. 

-The Strange Tales of Oscar Zahn by Tri Vuong started and finished April 30, 2025- 4/5 stars. Man, graphic novels always leave you wanting more don’t they? It never feels complete. I picked this up because I finished the previous book earlier than I thought I would and I needed something to read for the rest of my work shift. Anyway, this graphic novel sounded like something I would read novels of. It sounded like urban fantasy. And I think it was? Oscar Zahn is such an interesting character. I want to read more about his background. The artwork was simply gorgeous. It was a good read.

[morbingtime]

Dude this is fire what the magic.

Wanted to draw my wizard's spellbook in a way that would give off the "actually much more distracted and unfocused than he looks" vibe. So I modeled it after what my notebooks looked like when I was a kid in school.

[inconveniententity]

So i found and old voice recording on my phone and im...???

So i had apparently woken up and immediately recorded my thoughts, because this had come to me in a dream

Conectpt idea:

Girl wizard who lives in the sewers. She has a rat familar and her magic is linked to... Triangles???

Or cones? I guess? Basically the idea is that she's this weird sewer girl, but once she puts on a vaguely cone shaped object on her had it acts like a wizard hat that grants her powers.

The problem being, depending on the object her magic varies in its power. Sometimes, for example if its a fragile object, like an icecream cone or a paper hat, her powers will just fail after some time.

She has this whacky not-quite-romance with a person whos... completely normal. Where she always tries to disguise herself as several (conventionally) "hot" women, to flirt with them. It is implied that they always knows its her. But they just... Go along with it.

At some point in time, she thinks she's succeeded in deceiving them and they are on a date(?) , with her being in disguise as this conventionally attractive business woman. But when she tries to initiate something, and her crush refuses, she rips the traffic cone ( current magic item) from her head and asks "does this not make me pretty enough ???"

And her crush just goes," nah, i like you just the way you are."

But she's still upset saying "yeah but you don't like like me." And idk how it all turns out. In my queer mind i also want all characters to be lgbtq+. Anyways... Uh... Have fun with the concept?

[theprinceandthewitch]

Here's a conversation I've been having with @anitachristinita on Discord. She said exactly what I've been STRUGGLING to say about Luz's character for literal months lol.

Here's what I said:

I just wanted to point out some lines from Witches Before Wizards that stand out to me because of what Luz says and receives in FTF:

"Yes, I'm the chosen one! I knew it! I always suspected there was a reason nobody understood my whacky antics back at home. Now I have concrete proof! [Luz looks at the staff she's holding]

"I am a witches apprentice! And I'm going to earn my magic staff the hard way!" Oh boy, look at that. I like how the show practically says TOH is going to be a story where Luz becomes a witch through hard work rather than greatness being bestowed upon her by a higher power!

theprinceandthewitch I also like how the first line also links to Luz's line from FTF: "The only thing I ever wanted, was to be understood!"

theprinceandthewitch I like how Stringbean was given to Luz once she started to be honest and vulnerable with her mother. Because Luz doesn't do this with everybody right out of the gate - not even with her literal girlfriend. But this doesn't actually fix her flaw. Her secret will come to the surface and she'll face repercussions for trying to stifle her own happiness. Because this show has never let her get away with keeping secrets lol. (edited)

Here's her response:

I absolutely adore how details from s1 connect to big things in s3. In s1 it reads as Luz trying to mask the pain she feels from not being understood at home and tries to downplay her actual desire for being understood by using her being a chosen one as an excuse. And since it seems like her fantasies are coming true, she easily rejects that secret want of being understood if it means her dream comes true. Why would she want to be vulnerable and be understood by her mother (who she thinks she wants her to be normal) when she can easily become a witch, prove her mom wrong and everything is great? But by the time we see her in s3 she’s has grown up and matured. She realizes her childhood dream of being a witch isn’t what she thought it would be nor what she really wants/needs in life. Just like you said she learns that she wants to be understood, and that she needs to start being honest and vulnerable with her mom. Considering Luz learned pranks and got the Azura book from her dad, it’s safe to assume he was the person who understood her the most. And knowing that he passed away when she was young, you can understand her hesitation to wanting to be understood by other people. Because the last person who did has passed away and she’s probably hasn’t moved on yet (which can explain her obsession with Azura and wanting to be like her). She wasn’t ready to accept that she wanted to be understood again. She probably thought her dad was the only person that could understand her. But now she has matured and has learned that her mother can be that person too.

But like you said it doesn’t fix her flaw. Because Luz has kept secrets from her friends and girlfriend. The reason why she probably didn’t tell Amity her secrets despite Amity asking her to be more honest and reassures that she won’t be judgemental, is because Luz still had doubts that Amity would understand her. She thinks Amity wouldn’t understand her perspective and will hate her. And the same goes for her friends.

I feel like this says a lot about how Luz views Hunter. Since hunting palismem she has seemed to be more open and comfortable with him.

In hunting palismem they both understood what it felt like to feeling like you have no control over your own future, they both understood what having a interest in wild magic was like.

Luz didn’t tell Hunter about the collector stuff, but she was comfortable with the fact that he knew what happened. Probably because they both understand what it’s like to be tricked by Belos, they were both witnessed the other learning the truth and hollow mind was a shared experience.

In ttt Hunter is the one who convinces her to go back to the isles, because as stated before he is the only one who understands what it’s like to be tricked by Belos. Additionally him saying “please for flapjack” works on her because she was the only other person that is shown to have a close relationship with flapjack. There’s a reason why Flapjack flew to her while he was dying. She understands how much Hunter cared for Flap, but Hunter also understands how much she loved that bird, especially since when he met flapjack, Luz was the one who convinced him he wasn’t dangerous and was disappointed at the thought of him sending the palismem (including flapjack) to Belos who would certainly kill them. They’re both sharing an equal amount of grief over the loss of flapjack and understands each other’s grief. All of this explains why Luz seems to be more open to Hunter than everyone else, because deep down she knows he’s the person who understands her the most

But to add to this point about Luz’s dad. Luz’s dad dying is shown to have affected her personality and her actions. For example, the reason why Luz becomes so concerned over Eda’s curse is not only because she cares for Eda, but also because her father died from an illness.

We already saw how Luz acts when it’s the anniversary of her dad’s death. She doesn’t want to acknowledge the date or her true feelings because she knows there’s nobody near her who knows what happened and she might have been worried that no one would truly understands how she feels about it. And we see how her keeping this stuff in affects people like Amity.

In ttt they make it clear the reason why Luz why is obsessed with Azura is not only because she likes it but it was also the last gift from her dead father who knew what type of book she would love. She doesn’t want to let go of her fixation because she doesn’t want let her father go.

So it’s safe to assume Luz think’s he was the only person who can ever understand her and he’s gone. She might have felt like having another person who understands would be replacing her dad. Luz’s grief from her dad dying clearly affects everything.

I just know her learning about Caleb and Evelyn having a child and Caleb being murdered will heavily impact her.

Now I’m wondering if having Hunter being obsessed with cosmic frontier and dying in the same graveyard where Manny was buried means something more than having Luz and Hunter mirror her parents.

[trulyinspiringmovies]

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore

“Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore” is just boring more than anything and ultimately feels inconsequential.

Newt Scamander is helping a Qilin give birth to twins. Qilin are magical horse-like creatures that will bow to anyone who’s pure of heart and can even look into the future. After giving birth, the mother Qilin is attacked by Credence and dies, leaving behind her two newborns. One is rescued by Newt while the other one is kidnapped by Credence and taken to Grindelwald. This baby Qilin is all part of Grindelwald’s plan to rise to political power.

With each installment of the Fantastic Beasts series, it’s becoming more and more evident that this story does not fit the series. I feel like the Fantastic Beasts series should’ve been about Newt’s whacky adventures learning about new creatures. Instead, we’re gearing up to see the greatest wizard battle in all of history. Newt is, yet again, caught in events that seem too grand for the character. I mean, he’s getting involved in historical events, yet he’s only ever mentioned as an author for a Magizoologist textbook that Harry reads in year one. I would’ve preferred this story to take place in a series revolving around Dumbledore. Anyways, I want to talk about why I didn’t enjoy this movie. This is a movie where we step away from the traditional locations of this franchise, yet it feels bland. The UK and US have unique identities in this franchise, but this movie makes locations like Germany feel boring. The bulk of the first half of the movie is just going through a checklist of things mandated by the studio. We get so many boring scenes just setting up the rest of the boring movie. Newt’s brother, Theseus, gets thrown in jail for a minor thing and breaking him out becomes this whole plot point of the movie. To be completely honest, I think that whole jailbreak scene was needlessly shoved into the plot because the Erumpent scene did so well in “Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them”. I really feel like this movie didn’t need this scene at all. This movie also acknowledges the relationship between Dumbledore and Grindelwald, which is nice to see, but it’s all just lip service. To make matters worse, it’s only tacked onto the beginning of the movie so that they can conveniently remove it when released in more conservative parts of the world. The whole premise of this movie is just dumb to me. I thought the wizarding world operated on democracy. Why is there even a possibility that Grindelwald can rise to power by being chosen by an animal? Why do people consider the Qilin’s judgment to be infallible when bewitching them is an option? Watching this movie was just a grating experience and I’m sure die-hard Potter fans will find more things to hate about this movie. I’m struggling to even talk about this movie because it’s just a nothing movie. I mean, Mads Mikkelsen is a fine replacement for Johnny Depp, but I still miss seeing Johnny Depp as Grindelwald. Other than that, it’s hard to find any reason to praise this movie.

★★

Watched on April 16th, 2022

[raeynbowboi]

How to Play as Belle in DnD 5e

Belle is my favorite Disney Princess, and from my favorite fairytale covered by the Disney company. Which is why it’s a crying shame she hasn’t been properly built until now. I mean, I have built her before, but that was terrible, and I’ve since changed my mind on how best to build her. So, go on. Unfold your menu. Take a glance, and then you’ll, have to suffer through my cringy attempt at humor.

Belle is a perfectly ordinary person. There’s nothing too remarkable about her. As such, it’s easy to write her off as just an ordinary Standard Human. But hold on, there’s her literary version to consider. In the very first version written by Suzanne-Barbot de Villeneuve in 1740, Belle is the daughter of a king and a fairy, making Belle a half-fairy. So, you could also build her as a Variant Human with the Fey Touched feat to give her that fey analogue, or go Half-Elf for the bonus skills.

BACKGROUND

Belle’s background can lean one of two ways, and I recommend shaping her background to the subclass you pick out for her.

Guild Artisan As a guild artisan, Belle can be a tinkerer, metalworker, or alchemist by trade. It’s also called Guild Merchant, and her father is a merchant in most versions of the fairytale, fitting as most peasant girls would likely take up her father’s trade. This puts more emphasis on Belle making things by hand, and gives her proficiency with Insight and Persuasion.

Sage With this background, Belle is a researcher or librarian, recording and preserving knowledge in a vast library or workshop. This feeds more into Belle’s love of literature and reading, and is a good translation of Belle’s hobbies and interests into the realm of Dungeons and Dragons. The Sage background gives Belle proficiency with Arcana and History.

CLASS

ARTIFICER

As tempting as a Lore Mastery or Order of the Scribes Wizard would be to make Belle a magical intellect, I find that the more scientific angle of the Artificer feels more at home with the daughter of an inventor. Granted, if Belle grew up in the setting of DnD, she may be far more fascinated with wizardry and magic, but as a pure translation of her screen counterpart, the logic-driven inventor class feels more appropriate for her. Especially since it can easily allow her spells to be reflavored as whacky inventions created either by Belle or her father. However, if you’d rather play Belle as a dedicated squishy caster with a love for magic instead of science, then either Lore Mastery Wizard or Order of the Scribes Wizard is a perfectly appropriate substitution build for Belle. And if an INT caster isn’t really doing it for you, Belle also works great as a Knowledge Domain Cleric who seeks to understand the universe, or an Arcana Domain Cleric who worships a powerful enchantress and seeks to understand the magical strings that connect all things together in the great glamorweave of magic.

ARCHIVIST (UA)

If Belle chooses this subclass, have her background be a Sage. As an Archivist, Belle is a researcher who uses her technology to gather and store information. The articial mind feature dosen’t specify if the object with the mind can think or talk, however. If it can, Belle can create Lumiere and Cogsworth to store information for her. Or, if the object is just an object that can show Belle information, then have her use Beast’s enchanted mirror to show her things.

ARTILLERIST

As an Artillerist, Belle will gain more from being a Guild Artisan. It’s not quite Belle’s style, but this artificer subclass comes the closest to making Belle an inventor, as she can craft laser cannons, flamethrowers, mobile forcefields, and other things. I did consider the Battle Smith, but that one seems far more focused on Belle herself fighting on the front lines, and that doesn’t really fit her style. Belle is far more at home tinkering and inventing than she is standing over a hot anvil, forging weapons.

SIDEKICK

GNOLL DEFENDER WARRIOR

The new sidekick mechanic introduced in Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything allows us to be joined by a simplified build PC that can be any creature type with a CR 1/2 or lower. I chose a gnoll as these bipedal hyena-like creatures come the closest to Beast’s aesthetic, although the Jackalwere is another great option in its hybrid form, and lets Beast play more with a werewolf type angle. As Belle’s sidekick, Beast can flank her in battle, and so long as he’s within 5 feet of her, Belle’s enemies will have disadvantage on hitting her. Though he also works as an Attacker Warrior, charging ahead to the front lines while Belle stays in the back of the team’s formation to cast her spells from a distance. Just pick his warrior style by how he approaches combat. If you want to lean more into the Artificer angle and make the Beast something she’s built, use the stats for the Stone Giant Statue and make it an Anvilwrought.

Belle’s Spell Library

Cantrips Firebolt Message Ray of Frost Shocking Grasp

1st Level Catapult Grease Tasha’s Caustic Brew

2nd Level Arcane Lock Heat Metal Magic Weapon

3rd Level Elemental Weapon Glyph of Warding Tiny Servant

4th Level Fabricate Otiluke’s Resilient Sphere Summon Construct

5th Level Animate Objects Bigby’s Hand Creation

Ultimately, whether you favor Belle as a tinkerer or a mage, she’ll make great use of her keen intellect in Dungeons and Dragons, and with the sidekick feature, she can be flanked by a bestial creature without having to dip into Beast Master Ranger, or having another player agree to make Beast in order to complete the set. 

[hermitcraftheadcanons]

Hello Internet, welcome to GAME THEORY, where instead of putting a joke here I want to ask you a question. It's time to talk UNDERTALE.

Now I don't think I've ever gotten this many requests to cover a theory, (no requests times no requests is still no requests.) Anyway, across my tumblr dashboard, NO ONE has asked for this. And honestly, I'm disappointed. True loyal theorists will know that Undertale is my favorite game of all time.

Undertale is a game where every character, from goat mom to grind fodder has a sympathetic design and a unique personality, motivations, goals, fears. Whether you're saving or slaughtering them, the game makes you feel something every time you enter an encounter. But to me, one character stood out amongst all the rest. SANS. A skeleton named after the font, Comic Sans. ANYWAYS, Sans is, well, there's a lot of mystery around this guy. And before we get into it, let me put up a very special spoiler warning: UNDERTALE is a game best experienced blind. So if you haven't played it, pause your reading of this and come back after you've finished. I PROMISE YOU, I PROMISE you won't regret it. Alright, so everyone out of the pool and ready for the adult swim? Good. Because I'm feeling pretty determined to get to the bottom of Sans' mystery. So just to recap for those of you who haven't played the game and ignored the SPOILER WARNING, or just need a refresher, Sans is one of the two skeletal brothers who appears in the game. His partner is Papyrus, a loud, goofy trap lover also named after a font. But in the world of Undertale their origins are a big question mark. All you really know is what's given to us by a shopkeeper in Snowdin, who explains that Sans and Papyrus, quote, “just showed up one day and asserted themselves.” Weird, right? What's more is that, well, Papyrus is just kinda the goofy sidekick. Sans is much more complex.

He likes fart jokes, but he's also incredibly powerful and deadly serious. Not only is his boss battle the hardest in the game, he's one of the only characters who has knowledge and power over space and time. He can take shortcuts around the world through ridiculous routes. Even is walking through walls. He also acknowledges that he's only one of infinite versions of himself, making self-aware commentary of the various timelines that you've played through in the game. He can even count the number of times he's killed you. He acts like an arbiter of this world, passing out judgements on the player's actions in the game, even explaining the secrets of EXP and LOVE, or EXECUTION POINTS and LEVELS OF VIOLENCE, just to clarify. In short, he just doesn't quite fit in with the rest of the world of monsters. But then, what, or who, is he? Well, the idea that he doesn't belong in the underworld seems to be correct.

The evidence seems to point to the fact that he WAS, in fact, formerly a surface dweller. In the true pacifist ending of the game, as the group looks out onto the horizon, Papyrus asks Sans about the giant ball in the sky. Sans says, quote, “we call that the sun.” This is important because A, the usage of the word WE, and knowledge of the sun shows that Sans has a kinship or knowledge with other humans, and B, that despite he and Papyrus both being skeletons, or, supposedly, brothers, and apparently appeared in underworld at the same time, they CLEARLY have two very different histories. Why would Papyrus not know the name of the sun but Sans would?

We get further clues to Sans' origins as we hear him say multiple times he wants to "go home" or "go back." He says as much during his dinner date scene at the Mettaton hotel. He notices that the player wants to go home and says, quote, "I know the feeling." He then continues, "maybe sometimes it's better to take what's given to you." As though he ended up in the underworld by accident. AND in a genocide run during his boss fight he says, quote, "look, I gave up trying to go back a long time ago." End quote. And before you say he means going back to the surface world, that's clearly not the full story. His very next line of dialogue is, "and getting to the surface doesn't really appeal anymore either." Key word here is “EITHER.” Yes, he seems to hail from the surface and wants to go back, but based on his dialogue he no longer considers it his home. It's as though the surface world he once knew is gone, as though he's from a different time. It's pretty intriguing. So we're left with a being that appeared out of nowhere, presumably from being from the human surface, but from a different time period, who seemingly has the power to teleport. That's a lot of questions and not a lot of answers.

But here's where things get REALLY interesting. Sans has a hidden workshop that takes a fair amount of searching to find. You could say it takes a lot of DETERMINATION to unlock. Anyways, obligatory determination references aside, as you start to look for this easter egg Sans gives you a key to his room and says "it's time you learn the truth." After some searching you find the workshop which contains items that leave even more questions. A photo album featuring Sans and a bunch of smiling people you don't recognize, a badge, blueprints with illegible handwriting, and a broken machine hidden behind a curtain. In the latest update, one more detail was added. A hand-drawn picture of 3 smiling faces with the words “don't forget.”

So, what does it all mean? Well a lot of Undertale theorists have been linking these details to a feature to a character named W.D Gaster. A ghostly character who never truly appears in the game. Honestly, covering him is a theory all unto itself, and probably one best saved for another day. Even still, none of the Gaster theories I've seen have been able to explain all the details. In particular, the photo album, and the badge. And that's what kept nagging me as I researched Undertale. A badge? That one in particular really stuck out to me. Why would such an oddly specific item to be hidden in the huge easter egg of a room? Something that supposedly reveals the truth about Sans? Badges just aren't important in Undertale. Then it hit me. What if this badge isn't from Undertale? What if this badge is from a completely different series? And was, in fact, the most important badge in the history of gaming? One of the Iskall patreon badges.

Now, for those of you wondering what I'm talking about, the Iskall Patreon Badges are a pivotal item from Iskall’s patreon. You know, the one on Hermitcraft. Anyway, the Iskall Patreon Badges are a really important part of Iskall’s character. So I asked myself; what if the badge in Sans' drawer was ONE OF THOSE EXACT badges? Well first off, it made Undertale connected to my favorite youtuber, thereby making it even COOLER, but that's still a pretty big logical leap. I needed more. Let me tell you, as I started looking, more and more pieces started to fit into place.

In Hermitcraft Season 6, there are three Architechs. (This was before Stress joined in season 7.) These 3 were Iskall, Grian and MumboJumbo. And what does Sans happen to have in his other drawer? A photo album with pictures of Sans with people you don't recognize. Of course you don't know them, they're not characters present in Undertale. And note the word that's used here, PEOPLE you don't recognize. Not underworld monsters. So that's 2 items oddly linked to the Hermitcraft series.

But then, how do the blueprints and broken machine fit in? Well, in the final stretch of Hermitcraft, Iskall is the only one who hasn’t died since the Demise game, so he sells his own body to the highest bidder. Except, it comes with a cost. Everyone is poor. As a result, and with the help of ImpulseSV, the Architechs (minus Mumbo,) are forced to finally kill Iskall, ending his streak since the beginning of demise. I watched this episode in 2020 and I'm not ashamed to admit that when I first saw this scene, I cried. It's DEVASTATING.

Iskall says goodbye to his friends, his co-workers, this character you've grown to love and care about is suddenly promising to sacrifice his life. For all he knows, there is no possibility of him being able to come back after his Demise. It's this incredibly dark departure in the final moments of what was otherwise a fun, quirky, and colorful Season 6.

So what does all of this have to do with Undertale? A LOT, actually. But the first thing you need to know is that the hermits are known for their, let's say, unique written linguistic style.

That would explain the illegible handwriting on the blueprints. And the machine? I think a broken infinity portal is behind that curtain. Now that may seem like a stretch, but it actually explains a lot.

If Sans wound up in Undertale via whacky infinity portal hyjinx, it could provide a reason for why he's a skeleton. He used the machine as organic matter and suffered the consequences. Not killing him, but turning at least a part of him into a pile of bones. That could also explain why Sans has given up hope for going home. Remember the infinity portal is a time machine. By being in the underworld, he's not only in a different place, but based on how he talks, he's also in a different time, with no hope of travelling back to the time he came from. This could theoretically happen. It turned Scar into a wizard and completely disintegrated Welsknight, so the rules are… Flimsy at best.

But the crossovers between Hermitcraft and Undertale continue. In Grian’s episode, (EDIT IN TIMESTAMP) he mentions he’s amazed that Iskall only escaped his demise with a lost arm. He says Iskall had “a lot of determination to not die for real,” and that he’s going to continue to study this. Seems awfully similar to the same experiments happening in Undertale around the trait of determination, no? Especially since so much has shown that Sans was a key player in those experiments.

But I'm sure you also want physical evidence right? Well don't worry, because I have plenty. Take a look at Iskall and Sans side by side. Iskall’s left eye is replaced with a diamond loupe. Sans’ left eye glows blue when he’s mad. Both have extremely chill yet are known for their jokes and, dare I say, laugh.

In short, we have some incredibly strong proof that the Hermitcraft Cinematic Universe, (HCU) is somehow connected to the Undertale world, which brings us back to our initial question, WHO IS SANS?

Well, what if we took it one final step and said that Sans happened to be Iskall from Hermitcraft? Sent through the Infinity Portal at the end of season 6 to go to Season 7, carrying an Iskall Patreon Badge and his photo album. Not only do all the items in the workshop suddenly fit, but so does Sans’ behavior.

Remember, Sans can seemingly travel extremely quickly. And Iskall just happens to have an elytra, a device that allows people to travel hundreds of metres extremely quickly. This even explains why Sans bleeds when you finally hit him. He is, or at least, WAS, a human.

Oh and finally, Sans shares two out of five letters with the name Iskall. That's just a fun one. I thought it was worth mentioning.

But if there was any doubt, we have to look no further than the creator's previous work. Toby Fox, the man behind Undertale is actually DocM77, the creator of every hermit (besides Scar.) Now, if Toby Fox, the creator of Undertale, is also DocM77, creator of Iskall, we know they will most definitely share a universe. Which brings us back to Undertale. 2 faces, with “don't forget” written on it? It's Iskall, trying to remember his 2 friends. In short, Undertale is a continuation of Toby’s version of Hermitcraft Season 6, with Iskall never being able to get home, adopting the name Sans. The pieces all just seem to fit. Now all we need is an appearance from Ethoslab and we’ve got ourselves a true sequel.

But hey, that's just a theory. A GAME THEORY! THANKS FOR WATCHING!

[barrybrunswick]

The Diary of a Wizard – Week Thirty Nine

The Diary of a Wizard – Week Thirty Nine

Hey friend! Welcome to the best blog around for the purest magical mayhem. This week I’m going to have to break a powerful spell which is something a wizard must do from time to time. Of course, things are bound to get oddball whacky, cos that’s what The Diary of a Wizard is all about. YAY! (more…)

[randomfandomloveydovey]

Hehe

I’m really bad at picking favourites, but my closest friends usually have some things in common: immediately plays along when I start doing a bit OR plays the straight man for me, will give you cool rocks they found, good at untangling my messy brain when I’m having a brain fart

If too many things happen at once I get nauseous and communicate exclusively with non-word sounds, originally went to school for forensics then switched to scientific illustration, gets migraines without caffeine (I get them WITH caffeine but not nearly as often or for as long).

Idk, I stop knowing people when I dislike them. They get purged from my brain. It takes a lot for me to dislike someone, had a coworker who explicitly hated me and I miss them sometimes.

- cursed Egyptian amulet ttrpg played by the world’s most self-sacrificing Japanese teenagers

- what if the ninjas with magic, world-ending powers all wanted to be friends and go to therapy, but the oldest man in the world said no

- fun medical malpractice as a frequent metaphor for the intimate relationship between a man who feels abandoned by the world and everyone he knows, swings between feeling like you’re chewing glass and making you want to chew glass to cope

- old lady author is very nosy and has both horrendous and amazing luck, and is also stupid hot and everyone knows it

- affable old white man doctor is somehow the most progressive person on the show, somehow keeps solving mysteries that his cop son can’t. also you cannot even torrent this show in its entirety despite the main character being played by dick van fucking dyke and you have to buy the box set

- Satan is a dork and has his feelings hurted over and over while he tries to become someone he can be proud of

———

- wizard finds two small children wandering around in his forest and decides to make them his agents of anti-chaos

- a bunch of typical college grad-aged dudes have to save the world from a haunted piece of metal, the most twinkiest of whom must bear it; it was his whacky adoptive father that gave him the damn thing without even knowing what it really was

- autistic detective and his horny partner-in-crime who can’t stop waxing poetic about his eyes when he’s supposed to be writing about the cool smart science he can do

———

- man raised in captivity doesn’t know how to navigate interpersonal relationships, makes it everyone else’s problem at the opera house

———

Most pathetic asshole in New Jersey, and knows it.

Tag Game!

Never did this okayokayokayokay

Describe your best friend without using any personality traits.

Describe yourself with the same rule.

Describe your least favorite person you personally know the same way.

Describe the plot of your favorite show(s) badly.

Describe the plot of your favorite book(s) badly.

If applicable, describe the plot of your favorite musical badly.

Tell me what your (current) main comfort character is without naming them.

I'll start: They like Beetlejuice, That's Not My Neighbor (and a character in that game I love them but what's wrong with them), Heathers (AKA JD), and FNAF (more specifically, William). They want to be a forensic scientist, which. Okay.

I like Beetlejuice, Heathers, FNAF, COD men, Good Omens, and House MD, among other things. I want to be a therapist and have changed my major at least three times.

She cheered when Roe v. Wade was overturned. Sorry if you supported that decision, but I do not. Also told me I look weird when I wear binders. And said that white people not being allowed to say the n-word is "racist and discriminatory."

Gay angel and demon fuck around and find out

Two men pretend they aren't gay for each other while committing countless crimes including medical malpractice throughout eight seasons.

Gay angel and demon fuck around and find out: the novel

Five gay people and a token straight attempt a heist against a government. (Do you sense a theme yet? I really like gay things)

And in the end, should someone die?

Ghost Zombie Jesus chaotically tries to marry a teenager.

A guy with a ponytail does a lot of rapping with his friends and then dies.

Unemployed genderfluid demon that's in love with an angel who keeps fucking him over.

(check tags for what the hell I'm talking about in these you can figure out which is which)

@marc--chilton @randomfandomloveydovey @ineffableaddiction @lickthecowhappy @iwillburnthisplacetotheground @dreamcasterpluto (no pressure sorry for tagging you guys luv you (platonically)) and anyone else who sees this shit and wants to!

[freshest-woods-gossip-blog]

 Dear Author—

First of all, you need to know how enormously warm and OVI PROUD for you I already feel about what you’re going to write. 

I’m a bit of a ridiculous prompter, but they’re written that way because I’m hoping something—whether it’s the general outline or just one of the silly little details—will really strike your fancy. Don’t feel like you need to use every suggestion, and if you have another fun idea, run with it! If you look at something I suggested and think "Uh, obviously that would be what happened, it would happen like THIS instead, duh,” YES. Do it that way.

  Please print out a favorite Proud Ovi photo for me and pin it to the wall of your Writing Lair.      Good Things, generally:      

Yes, no matter how completely bonkers my original prompt was, you are invited to put MORE HOCKEY in it. You have blanket permission to write a canon hockey-playing story in which my original batshit weird prompt is a metaphor or literary theme    

Even without hockey, WINTER THEMES  

Team team team. Lots of social dynamics going on, especially in dialogue. The more guys talking over each other, the more I like it    

The positive and the negative ways social culture (of team sports, social class, countries) affects people. This includes my love for little daily habits or thoughts that someone living away from their country of origin might have       

Different people liking different things (including different kinds and amounts of sex, and different people!) and that being OK 

   Things I Do Not Like So Much, generally:   

Gender essentialism (including describing physical traits like muscle development, body hair, and calluses as ‘male’ or a vague “softness” as ‘female.’ Characters can absolutely still admire those traits! Just write about how nice they look and feel on this particular person, or how the narrator personally reacts to them.)  

Unquestioned  stereotypes about sexual identity/sexual role, formalized primary/secondary poly dynamics 

Unquestioned national stereotypes

Unquestioned social class stereotypes 

“Everybody’s gay”/ Everybody already knows/A character’s fears were All In Their Head  

Injury for pure Drama.   

The Prompts:

(Again, yes, you may make all of these about playing hockey. Honestly, please tell me how these prompts are really about hockey. ) 

Nicklas Backstrom/Alexander Ovechkin—Howl’s Moving Castle

 Does the whole countryside believe Wizard Ovechkin eats young people’s hearts, except for one sensible hatmaker, who seeks shelter from the winter cold…only to find the wizard hungover in a castle full of dog hair and unwashed teenage apprentices? Or does our hero bully his way into the castle, remind antisocial Wizard Backstrom to go to his appointments and answer that stack of letters from King Barry about the war, and redecorate in beautiful Russian style?  

I think Don Cherry is the Witch of the Northern Waste either way.

 Good things:

Mix it up! Maybe we’ve got an ice demon, not a fire demon; maybe there’s no demon and more of a Koschei the Deathless situation, or other Russian/Swedish elements, and small or significant changes to the plot 

Demon played by a long-suffering TJ, trapped on a line/in an ash bucket listening to them? 

Whichever one is cursed enjoying the heck out of life as a grumpy old man with a stick. Gimme some thoughts and feelings about aging as an athlete

    Braden Holtby/Evgeny Kuznetsov—Beauty and the Beast  

 Holts is Beauty.  

Pick any setting you like: canon, modern AU, classic fairytale, the whacky AU of your dreams. Just give me them sharing space, slowly getting past that first grouchy impression. 

 Good things:

HoltBelle doing crosswords in a castle library 

All the Caps being touched by the curse—and go as dark as you want with that

At least, like, five more Caps than anyone would want trying to Fix Things. (Picking which Capital is MOST like a singing candlestick is not easy. Might be Schmidt. Nicky and Ovi are a beautiful matched tea set, with all their rookie teacups) 

     Braden Holtby/Nate Schmidt—Books books books books books  

I have JUST NOW remembered that Schmidt's last Better Halves Player Gift Basket not only included the Harry Potter chess set, but ALSO a copy of  The Secrets of the FBI. Please meditate with me on what, and why, is on Nate Schmidt's reading list. 

 They've both given a lot of solid interviews on what it's like to be an athlete and read and learn largely outside of school when the world around you isn't really encouraging that, a subject dear to my heart, so I'd love to see more about that. Anything about reading and exploring and being extremely intense and focused doofs: 

  Does Nate Schmidt carefully Sort everyone in the league into the right Hogwarts houses, and occasionally scream “HUFFLEPUFF!” in delight from the bench at a passing opponent who mostly speaks Czech?     

Does Holtby sometimes surface from a post-loss funk to realize that the last 5 minutes of this pep talk have sounded...suspiciously like Dumbledore quotes?    

I'm really stuck on the FBI thing: how often has Schmidt dragged Braden around a new city reading historical landmark signs, and then spend lunch sitting outside a cafe guessing which passersby are undercover agents? 

Does he have a Double-Secret, Holts-Only-Clearance list ranking who on the team would be the best secret agent? (I’ve been imagining all of these as a tired-but-charmed-and-touched Holts POV, but you can do either, and have Nate slowly becoming passionately convinced Holts would be the bestest James Bond ever)   

I'm also happy to see a judgmental geek rift between Holtby's Serious Business crosswords and fantasy novels that they needed to work through over the years. 

Or, write me a You’ve Got Mail story where they never really started talking and are both feelin secretly a bit lonely on the team, so they go home at night and chat with their BFF on Goodreads who always has the best lists and reviews....  

     Nicklas Backstrom/Andre Burakovsky/Marcus Johansson 

 The most stately and reserved courtship in Vague Historical Sweden is interrupted by a brash, unexpected young suitor.    

Some quick possibilities to help you start:    

  1). Vague Historical Sweden

Nicky, a prince or an heir to something, is resigned to marrying someone proper who he can’t ever tell about his 20-year prank war against Polite Society. So he’s been silent and dead-eyed and thinks that’s how you court somebody  

Mojo would quite like to be married, so he’ll never have to go to another formal ball where people ask him about The Wars. (Instead he will hide in a comfy study, writing more secret drafts of the secret military memoirs he definitely won’t ever publish.) Their match has been Expected for years, but they’ve barely talked and he keeps getting anxious, calling Nicky by either a full formal title or ‘Lars,’ which makes Nicky look even more dead inside, and tripping over things. Many a tactical retreat has been called.     

Polite Society is...pretty sure Andre’s a fortune-hunter. He keeps asking each of them for a dance at every ball, and inviting them to skating parties, and trying very, very hard to be impressive.    

2.)  Award-winning Vikings 

Nicky is a shieldmaiden (please don’t question me. Vague Historical Sweden does gender roles differently), and keeps a prosperous farm. Mojo is maybe the son of the next landowner over, has made a name for himself raiding, and everyone in town agrees they’d be a fine Viking couple.  

 Andre, who was captured on a raid or is a jarl’s kid or something, don’t ask me, also thinks they are a fine Viking couple.  

  3.)  Modern royalty. Space royalty. Magic. Go mad with your power.     

I like happiness, but I’m okay with bittersweet too. As much pining and miscommunication as you like, and any kinks or power dynamics you’ll have fun writing. You can end with a triad, a V, or a dyad if you…really want to, I guess, as long as it isn’t moralistic. The relationships don’t have to be the same, but please no formal primary/secondary poly dynamics, though.  

   You are best.

[crossdressingdeath]

@sinattea:

Strap on because I am about to butt my head into Every. Single. One of your hp posts. Regarding specifically the worldbuilding, it being lazy or incoherent wouldn't have been so much of a problem if jk had just stuck to a different tone in the story. You can totally have a Whacky Wondrous Whimsical Wizarding World where nothing is ever explained and half the things don't make sense and kids just go around having absurdly perilous adventures because EVERYTHING is absurd and kinda perilous. The problem is that she started with Whacky Wondrous Whimsical Wizarding World but halfway through the story decided to make it Dark and Edgy and Serious, but didn't take the time to adjust the framing. She could have revisited the whacky stuff to put it under the new lens of the character growing up. She could have made the "worldbuilding" of the first books obsolete as a plot device, to show that evil is growing so much that the rules of magic itself are changing. She could have just made the story more lighthearted in tone, if not in events (there's ways to make the evil villain going after kids to murder them whacky and whimsical, ask Count Olaf) to fit in with the world. But she never did anything to reconcile these things, and we ended up with a huge disconnect between books. Even between chapters. It's obvious jkr doesn't worldbuild and it's obvious she doesn't outline, and the books suffer greatly for it.

I mean, you wouldn't even have to rewrite the rules of magic; just revisit the worldbuilding and show that Harry either misunderstood or was misled. Like, one example that came up on this blog was the love protection thing; JKR could've revisited it later and revealed that it was actually sacrificial magic, and Harry was told it was love protection bullshit because... well, who's going to tell an eleven year old you can gain insane levels of power through a blood sacrifice (also that gets around the whole "are we supposed to believe no one in the history of the wizarding world has ever died to save someone else from the killing curse" thing)? Or there's the house elf thing; instead of starting out as "hey, this kind of seems like magic slavery" and ending at "oh it's fine they like being enslaved", do it the other way around! As a little boy Harry didn't grasp how messed up it was, but as he grows he becomes more and more aware of how awful it is that wizards have enslaved an entire species! As long as you have the seeds in there from the start you can make that work. You can start wacky and whimsical and make it darker as you go, but you have to actually think about it. It feels like all JKR could think to do to make it seem more serious was kill off a bunch of longstanding secondary characters (but no leads, of course) for as far as I can tell no reason other than to go "Oh, this is serious grown-up fantasy, my characters are dying!" which is... not how to handle character death.

Your recent posts about HP made me realize how much of a mess it is. I've never paid too much attention to it because the series hasn't been a constant interest for me.

But now that I think about all the little things that bothered me about the series it made me think that it even wouldn't be too hard to fix most things, the sorting system in hogwarts is trash Idk why jkr though that it was a good idea to sort 11 year olds by brave, evil, smart and miscellaneous.

And also the world building is trash, a lot of small details aren't explained properly, this wouldn't be a problem if there were few or these instances, but that's not the case. For example some questions that come to mind; Why do some wizards know absolutely nothing about how mugged live? How does the economy work? Why aren't there more schools? Why does the uk have an entire school to themselves? How does the whole wizard government work exactly? Why doesn't Dumbledore perform background checks to his teachers? How do the spells work?

90% of the problems in HP could’ve been solved by the bare minimum amount of actually thinking things through. Like, whenever I see any of HP’s worldbuilding the word lazy comes to mind. It’s just “Eh, this seems vaguely interesting” with zero effort put into making sure it fits with the rest of the setting and doesn’t break the story. And that’s in English wizarding culture, which she actually cared about; everything for the rest of the world is either stupid, racist, or both.

Honestly the only thing I can accept is the UK having an entire school; hell, my main issue is that they don’t have more than one! A smaller school for every country within the UK would make so much more sense. Like... there’s a reason why even places that could fit all their students into one school spread them out: because it’s not fair for some students to have to spend ages travelling to go to a school in an area entirely separate from their home, in this case to the point of being entire countries away! Forget about the number of students, it doesn’t seem to have occurred to JKR that multiple countries’ worth of students in one school would be a logistical nightmare even if they all fit.

[shoesforsaleggdb-blog]

Golden Goose Deluxe Brand Mens Lazarus those Financial Wizard 13

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