#znh12

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Angler gives Aberrant a Beach Ball. Aberrant looks at it with "what am I supposed to do" face, While Angler is like ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡° )

inelegant snort-laughter intensifies

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Can Aberrant speak? Yeah, I know his mouth kinda makes it impossible, but all Face Monsters can make (the scariest) noises (in Terraria). If he tried very hard, he would say anything, right? For example Angler's name. Just how people teach their pets.

Okay, this one’s gonna have a bit of a STORY (not literally, just, like, anecdotal).

My original answer to this would have been “No, he can make noises but not form words” BUT I literally had a dream on September 22 (I keep a log of dreams when I can remember them) that changed my mind.

So, to copypaste directly from that dream log:

…I woke up, then went back to sleep, only to appear in some kind of warehouse. Well, ‘appear’ is a strong word; this part of the dream had me as a third-party viewer with no body, who could not only fly, but also spontaneously shift perspectives at will. The warehouse seemed to store a lot of strange things, most of all lots and LOTS of ceramics of various kinds, in various states of completion (this is actually a recurring theme and I’m not sure why).While I was there, I ran into some older guy with two younger kids, and while at first I had no idea who they were, when they started talking, I got the impression that they were actually Uncle Ford, Dipper, and Mabel from Gravity Falls. It was very difficult to tell outside of voice and mannerisms because the dream wasn’t in Gravity Falls’ style, AND none of them were wearing the clothes from the show.I followed them for a while, when suddenly we ran into… Aberrant. He was surprised to have been ‘found’, but showed no signs of aggression and was, in fact, very in-character. Ford and Dipper were, naturally, not too trusting of him, but Mabel broke that ice pretty quickly, being the sweet girl she is.Aberrant was also somehow aware of me, vaguely acknowledging my presence despite the other three having no idea I was there.After following them for some time, one room we entered turned out to be some kind of strange, large, very cold elevator. When it locked us all in, Ford had an idea of what might be going on, but required everyone to be on guard. He handed out notebooks, and asked everyone (but me, since for the most part he still didn’t know I was there, or at least pretended not to) to keep an eye out and take notes in order to confirm his suspicions.Unfortunately, the lights went out, but Aberrant’s eyes glowed faintly in the dark, and it was implied that he could see perfectly well, as he continued to take notes, which were very wordy and strangely eloquent, ranging from technical observations to internal monologue. However, the room started to get colder, much MUCH colder, to the point of the walls and floor beginning to legit frost up. While the humans huddled together, Aberrant stayed away from them, sitting up against the wall, his breathing slowly escalating to a somewhat panicked hyperventilation.At this point, Ford revealed that he WAS aware of me, or at least had inferred my presence from Aberrant’s behavior, and turned to me to ask, in a very concerned tone, “Hey, is the big guy okay?”  But before I could answer, the lights went back on, and the doors opened.Before the three humans could exit, though, Aberrant quickly held out his arm, and did something I never expected; he spoke, simply saying “I’ll go.”His voice was strange in that it was uncannily in line with the in-game Face Monster vocalization, and wasn’t a clear-cut speech; it came across like my 'mute’ tengu rogue for Pathfinder. Her limitations came from having no tongue, so she could only speak with the back of her throat and what little tongue could interact with her mouth there… And in this case, basically, the way Aberrant spoke implied he could only verbalize consonants that can be verbalized with the very back of the throat and with an open mouth, so R, G, H, K/Q, sort-of-L, a weird sort of “ng” variation of N, and a hissy, H-esque S. Since his mentality makes for a surprisingly wordy individual, he’d rather just write instead of fight with those limitations.Back to the dream, though, is that he was surprised when he exited the building, and so was I when I followed, as we appeared in a bizarre, futuristic cityscape. All the beings who lived there, while mostly humanoid, were in varying ranges of glowy humanoid to straight up energy-beings, in very specific colors.It gave the impression of a planet where the Moon Lord’s forces had won and flourished…I woke up again…

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Isn't weird for you that after defeafing Lunatic Cultist four giant things (that I'm not even sure what they are built of) JUST APPEARS, like, they teleported from somewhere?

Giant horrifying things appearing seemingly out of nowhere after completing some arbitrary prerequisite is certainly weird...

...but not in any way surprising by the time any adventurer gets around to that point in their Terrarian lives.

...Assuming they make it that far...

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Another question (T-T), where did Alex get his/her suit? they made it by themself, or stole from somewhere/someone?

The core of what makes the Hallow so dangerous is how it relies very heavily on manipulating perception.

It’s only natural that a being drawing form and power from the Hallow would be a master illusionist. No physical suit required if your entire body isn’t real.

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How Old Man and Aberrant's their first encounter looked like?

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Actually... I have another question, if you don't mind. Why Greg is a Face Monster? Not like I have a problem with that. It's just, other Starfallen are fully fan characters, they don't appear in canon, while he does (partly, but still). You could create for him totally different appearance, so why is that?

This is a surprisingly complicated thing to discuss in order to frame a deceptively simple answer, and it really goes back to what the intentions were when I originally created each character.

The Keeper was the first one I made, and was for an official NPC contest at the original Terraria Online forums (the winner was the Stylist, btw). I went for something completely off-the-wall and inhuman because that’s just the kind of person I am, and I always want to inject that sort of thematic into the things I work on.

Aberrant came a little while afterward, upon my first discovering the Crimson, and his design decision was literally and entirely based on the simple idea of “self-conscious Face Monster in clothes”. None of this Starfallen nonsense. That was the idea that struck a chord with me, and it was the idea that struck a chord with everyone else around me at the time.

Abomination came afterwards as a sort of counterpoint (a proud monster), but had to be completely original on the account of there being no humanoid Corruption monsters, and also became a personal design challenge to come up with one.

Anomaly’s appearance and basic theme gelled soon afterwards as a mere attempt to ‘balance’ out representation for the three biomes. Anomaly was originally just a bunch of Chaos Elementals in suits and wigs:

…but I didn’t like that over time and couldn’t draw it in a way that felt good, and eventually decided to go with something more otherworldly.

They sort of existed in the same headspace for a while, and my mind occasionally wandered to the idea of them all being related spirits somehow. I even mused with the idea of them being directly in league with one another, holding pseudo-conferences in much more monstrous forms regarding the state of the world. Even Aberrant looked somewhere between Awakened Aberration and this thing for those ideas, but it never really got off the ground because I couldn’t really justify it under them just being representations of their biomes, and not some other kind of entity merely borrowing those biomes, which is where the Starfallen idea comes from.

Starvault/Excelsior came MUCH later, once I finalized the idea of them being Something Else and needing an excuse for them to have not been Giant Monsters All Along, and even he’s not 100% original, just being a suit of possessed (if slightly modified) Hallowed Armor with connections to the Paladins. To the point where when I first had the idea before putting it to paper and illustrating it, I didn’t even sprite it originally because it would have JUST been a player sprite with the Hallowed Set (with Mask as the helmet), and Angel Wings. I made it different because I wanted to.

Over time, anyone who changed from simpler roots did so to reflect changes in atmosphere, intent, and preference. There’s no lore reason; just personal.

Aberrant didn’t change because he didn’t need to.

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Why did you choose Corruption in Fell story? I mean, if there is any specific reason why it isn't Crimson?

There are a lot of things I debated regarding “version” parity for the story, how far back certain things would go in regards to the game as WE know it versus how those mechanics fit my general worldbuilding, which would typically get updated retroactively with new things as new things came out.

Corruption, however, has always struck me as the ‘strongest’ of the three biomes, since it was around long before players started messing with the world and releasing more. It’s reflected in part by the Starfallen in their Awakened states; Abomination is the largest and arguably the most powerful in the raw sense of the word (his difficulty would be somewhere between Frost Moon and Celestial Pillars), Aberrant is the smallest and least powerful (somewhere between Pumpkin and Frost Moon difficulty), with Anomaly being in the middle (Frost Moon).

As for other reasons for choosing Corruption... well... that’ll be revealed in the story... c3c

It’ll be fun when people realize where this story falls...

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Lol, those Moon Lords's designes are based on Predictor and Stargazer, even tho you haven't drawn Selenian. (great art btw, as always).

I gave up on that because my style changed between each one. I had sketches for all four.

But yeah, it was actually back when I drew those designs that I got the idea for Alt-Moon Lords (I consider those races a sort of “created in his image” kind of deal), I just never had the motivation or incentive to go through with it until now.

Anyhoo, thanks!

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There's so many questions I wanna ask about the last chapter of Fell... So, my first question is: how are you feeling today? :-D I'm serious. (I couldn't overwhelm you with all my suppositions, so I hope you'll explain some things soon.) Wanna chocolate? *-* 🍫 You can have it.

I’m feeling pretty good! Thank you!

Having finished my first multi-chapter written work in ever, I feel accomplished, plus I spent a lot of yesterday discussing it with a lot of people. Perhaps I failed because a lot of people had the same questions, and a few people made the same misinterpretations, but pointing around to the hints I was leaving about was fun, to see the reactions.

I also streamed a lighter-hearted closure scene that I’m waiting to post, to let more people read first.

I’ll say this, though; if you have a lot of questions, it may be more pertinent to ask them in a PM, or to ask them during a stream. Mostly for the same reason I’m not going to post any art that takes place post-Fell for a little bit. If you do decide to Ask them here, I’ll be using “Answer privately.”

I’ll say this, though; now that Fell is done, I can pick up Asks again, though I’ve still got a very small backlog. It’s less that I have a lot to do, and more that I’d gotten stuck on one before Fell sidetracked me.

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Hate to bother ya, but I'm super curious. What Aberrant usually do when the Player is not around? Just sitting in his house? Also, has he ever hit another Face Monster with his lantern? No need to answer it. And have a nice day! ^-^

He reads.

A lot.

It really doesn't matter where he is, and he'll either sit in his room to read, or go outside to get out of the way of those who generally detest him. He tries to spend more time outside than inside.

Since the dungeons are the source of most of the books found in any town, and the dungeons go way back and were used as bunkers by stranded space/interdimensional travelers, the available books can range from magic tomes to historical accounts to technical manuals to fictional novels.

Aberrant prefers technical books to outright fiction, as he (ironically) doesn't follow character-driven narratives well. 

Maybe, once he runs out of textbooks and manuals, he'll read fiction out of boredom and find he likes it. But seeing as Terraria's wealth of objectively written work spans multiple times and dimensions, what constitutes their reality is often just as, if not more fascinating than fiction is to us. 

As for the last question...

No.

But he would.

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How do you interpret sprites in Terraria? I'm trying to interpret some by myself but it always looks not right. How do you do it?

That’s a really hard thing to explain as having an objective process, since it’s something that comes with experience.

I’ve been drawing and designing characters for a long time (going on 20+ years), so I’ve developed little techniques and personal aesthetic preferences that I tend to apply to things I draw. It’s not so much me looking at a minimalistic sprite and going “I see all these details in this sprite” and more going “how much of what I know/enjoy drawing can I fit into this design while keeping it recognizable?”

As far as I know, there is no ‘right’ way to interpret sprites. If there was, I’d almost certainly be wrong (in fact, official spriter Jimmarn has told me I am, though also said he liked and supported my interpretations, too).

By personal preference, though... there is certainly a wrong way. *judgingly eyes Jazwares and their insistence on trying to make a majority of their Terraria stuff ‘till now look as much like Minecraft as possible*.*

*I mean, I understand why they did it... Likely for marketing reasons and trying to visually grab the far more numerous Minecraft players rather than trying to cater to Terraria players. From what I’ve seen, though, it fortunately looks like they’re slowly trying to break free from that. *holds up her Actually Not Awful-looking Paladin Hammer toy*

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Anomaly has a cool sword. Didn't expected they could ever use weapons. But what would make Anomaly angry? I mean, angry enough so they could summon their sword. Is sword the only weapon they can summon? Have a nice day! ^_^

As for other weapons, Anomaly would predominantly use a knife in a similar style, though technically the player would use that knife (which has a [appropriately rare]% chance to drop off any NPCs killed after [insert progression trigger here]) to summon them in the first place. Game mechanics.

Fun fact: I never really came up with Starfallen boss drops for the most part, but the sword Anomaly had in that other answer was one of the few I did.

It wouldn’t be particularly powerful, but would have decent attack speed (no numbers, since I don't know balance), provide light, and can autoswing... but its main functionality would be to damage/kill town NPCs, providing an alternative to traps and rotten eggs for truly awful players.

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Heya! I just wanted to say you're awesome and I love your drawings (esprcially the ones with Aberrant :-D). Quick question: what would be Aberrant's reaction to Corruption? Would he like it?

Thank you!

Aaaand...

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Um... Heh, sorry for so short period of time between asks but in naz909's ask you said you tried throwing damage class (which is quite shocking to me). And the question is: do you think that this class should be expanded? Because I'm working on it tbh. Also, thank you for your tip about sprites, you don't know how much you helped me.

It wasn’t so much a serious try as much as it was letting Ambylopia run around in the two Throwing armors while they were relevant and just spamming bone javelins and beenades everywhere. It was fun, but I don’t think I could really dedicate to the entire gimmick to the level of Ppowersteef’s Nageru.

Personally I’m dubious that they made it a separate damage type with armor at all. It’d be kind of cool to expand it with hardmode throwables and armor, but at the same time, it feels really superfluous. It wouldn’t be a major loss if they didn’t, imo.

And I’m glad my wiffly waffly answer was of any help at all! I generally don’t consider myself a great giver of advice, haha. =3=;

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Isn't that weird for you that Nymphs drop Metal Detectors? I mean, why would they need this? Do you have any explanation for this? Have a nice day ^-^

Okay, item drops in this game are one of those areas where I generally give up on trying to fenagle lore. Most things sort of make sense, and others really feel like the devs were just going “we’re running out of ways to make this slightly annoying to get”. Also, I still refuse to acknowledge that a certain meme sword exists and drops off a terrifying, world-ending god.

That said, Nymphs dropping Metal Detectors actually makes slight sense specifically with my headcanon setup, or at least makes about as much sense as Plantera dropping a grenade launcher or an electric guitar, and Angry Trappers dropping freaking uzis.

That being, that the Jungle is so ore-rich, and boasts such unique energy signatures (coming from the temples), that stranded space miners tried to prospect it more than other places since mud’s a bit easier to mine than stone, and also hoping to find whatever was giving off those energy signatures in an effort to get their ships working again. Unfortunately, the angry enchanted plantlife gifted to the Lihzahrd as defense measures by the Dryads decided to mulch them up, which is why you find some higher-tech ballistic weaponry.

To me, Nymphs are basically corrupted Dryads; not Corrupted as in the biome and its associated evil per-se, but simply becoming overcome by negative human mindsets, such as greed or anger (recalling that, in my headcanon, dryads were human souls that reformed from a connection to nature and balance). Since a lot of dryad spirits hang around in the Jungle without taking form, those that do fall and become Nymphs would often wander the world, kill settlers and prospectors in particular, and steal their stuff. Metal detectors are simply something that a player would find most useful upon killing and looting a Nymph in return.

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Since your favourite item is Cross Necklace and you would like to see it combined with Panic Necklace and/or Honey Comb, I decided to make them both! Cannot give a link, but it's here, on my tumblr.

Hey, that’s pretty cool! (link, for exposure)! I think you mixed up the descriptions, haha. And yeah, as you’ve already mentioned, they’re a bit large to be used in-game, but you’re off to a good start!

I’d give pointers, but I really don’t know much about the technicalities of spriting, despite having done some earlier in my forum activity. I mostly just make a file at the in-game size (usually by just taking a sprite off the wiki to use as a size template and shrinking it down to half-size), color-select off existing in-game palettes relevant to what I’m spriting, and experiment until something looks kinda ok, then increase it to 2x size again. Which is more or less why I also don’t give art advice, lol. “Just mess with it until you like it, and if that doesn’t work, try something else until you do, rinse, and repeat.”

I’d have sprited some ideas for it myself, but seeing as additional tinker paths are very popular forum suggestions, I didn’t feel like sifting through the pages and pages of potential Cross Necklace + Panic Necklace/Honeycomb/both/EVERYTHING suggestions to make sure someone else didn’t already try to sprite it in a way I’d have attempted.  All I know is that I’d probably have called the Panic/Cross necklace combination the “Scared Heart” (as a pun on Sacred Heart), and anyone who’s played The Binding of Isaac could probably guess how I’d design it, haha.