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Black Cats art by Rozenn Grosjean.

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Practice by Terry Wei

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#gaga

in the old times of fandom there were many different ways to name a ship. if you were feeling lazy you could just do name/name or namexname. you could have your portmanteaus, à la spirk. you could have your homestuck style TwoNames naming convention. you might occasionally get your more creative names like wolfstar. and some fandoms would be absolutely obsessed with initials and brevity; why have erik/christine when you could be E/C? in 2014 we all collectively discovered creative tumblr tagging systems and so every ship on here was called shit like #otp: i am the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition. in 2018 every ship was called Shenanigans Bros or a random pair of barely connected nouns that were completely inscrutable to anyone who wasn't in the discord server where somebody made it up. in 2024 we have realised our madness of recent years and attempted to throw it back to the good old days, but we have done so without regard for restoring the diversity of the ecosystem and so every ship has a portmanteau regardless of whether the names actually sound good together. by this i mean i just saw a ship poll that just referred to jesus/judas as JEDUS?????????

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v̵i̷e̷w̴e̴r̵ ̶d̵i̷s̴c̴r̴e̶t̵i̷o̶n̵ ̸a̶d̴v̸i̴s̷e̷d̸

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i cannot hate myself into a version of me i will love.

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(Kethna may be something like wild piggies, or possibly more like deer. Cloven hooves. There is so much food porn in these novels. Brust writes what he loves.)

It fuckin breaks my whole ass brain that Steven Brust's Dragera novels aren't wildly popular.

Like, the Khaavren romances are written for a Very Specific type of person, i.e. one who read Alexandre Dumas and said "I like that, but I want that authorial voice dialed up to 17 and also for there to be magic and shit". Paarfi can be a challenge (it's worth it, because ultimately it's part of the whole). But they're so goddamn good. You can see what the books are going for, and they nail it.

And Vlad? Vladimir Taltos gives you 19 easy to read, action-packed novels full of snark and magic and angst and goddamn it there's social commentary to boot. And holy shit, these breezy, funny, quippy books that are fun to read are also building to something incredible that's going to see its end soon - there are two novels left before the series is complete. The last few published have left me in a daze after reading them, trying to wrestle with The Implications.

If you like Murderbot, but kind of wished there were swords and sorcery instead of guns and hacking, Vlad is your lad.

If you've ever asked yourself if it's possible to have a series of epic fantasy novels without casual sexism, then Dragaera is the place to go.

It's got Enemies to Lovers. It's got Found Family. It's got character deaths that mean something. There are reveals, both overt and subtle, that left me stunned (there was one book in particular that had me racing back to my collection to flip through older books because I KNEW I RECOGNIZED THAT NAME WTF HOLY HSIT).

The books are so re-readable, and honestly I would advise rereads because there's a ton of stuff layered in that adds so much to the overall series. You can read them in publication order (starting with Jhereg), or chronological order (I put Brokedown Palace at the front myself, but others might skip that one and go right to The Phoenix Guards). Or you can start with the chronological first book in the Taltos series (Taltos - makes it easy) and dip into the Khaavren romances when you're comfy and want to shake things up a bit.

FYI - the Taltos books will probably also make you hungry. IDK what a kethna is supposed to be, but I want to eat one so damn bad.

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And a jury-rigged opposable thumb! Parallel evolution! Should be domesticated for sure, might replace us as dominant species one day.

The animal of all time.

🗣️🎤What's your favourite animal⁉️

I just woke up, get these lights on, LET'S GO

I love this question, I have a degree in environmental science and ecology which means I spent most of my time in chemistry classes and the rest of the time avoiding responsibility in zoology and evolution (which means I can't have a favorite but here's one of)

Ailurus fulgens, commonly the Red panda, or lesser panda, though they are NOT lesser, they are so unique and adorable

Beautiful, perfect, wouldn't change a thing

Phylogenically, they've been moved around a lot but now live in their own family with a whole bunch of extinct species that also didn't fit, though it's pretty widely accepted they're tangentially similar to raccoons, ferrets, and skunks

Abnormally low rate of mutation and yet extreme genetic diversity between individuals, mild temperament and variable intelligence, they would be PERFECT for domestication but I'm holding up this flagpole with like three other people so maybe one day </33

Behold their loveliness <333

*drops mic*

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[WELCOME TO THE CITY]

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Gav’s Tavern Hi, I hope you like this. It is different from what I usually do. Also it was a lot of work.

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I want to be an evil wizard. but I keep choosing kindness

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“Are you the witch who turned eleven princes into swans?”

The old woman stared at the figure on the front step of her cottage and considered her options. It was the kind of question usually backed up by a mob with meaningful torches, and it was the kind of question she tried to avoid.

Coming from a single dusty, tired housewife, it should’ve held no terrors.

“You a cop?”

The housewife twisted the hem of her apron. “No,” she muttered. “I’m a swan.”

A raven croaked somewhere in the woods. Wind whispered in the autumn leaves.

Then: “I think I can guess,” the old woman said slowly. “Husband stole your swan skin and forced you to marry him?”

A nod.

“And you can’t turn back into a swan until you find your skin again.”

A nod.

“But I reckon he’s hidden it, or burned it, or keeps it locked up so you can’t touch it.”

A tiny, miserable nod.

“And then you hear that old Granny Rothbart who lives out in the woods is really a batty old witch whose father taught her how to turn princes into swans,” the old woman sighed. “And you think, ‘Hey, stuff the old skin, I can just turn into a swan again this way.’

“But even if that was true – which I haven’t said if it is or if it isn’t – I’d say that I can only do it to make people miserable. I’m an awful person. I can’t do it out of the goodness of my heart. I have no goodness. I can’t use magic to make you feel better. I only wish I could.”

Another pause. “If I was a witch,” she added.

The housewife chewed the inside of her cheek. Then she drew herself up and, for the first time, looked the old woman in the eyes.

“Can you do it to make my husband miserable?”

The old woman considered her options. Then she pulled the wand out from the umbrella stand by the door. It was long, and silver, and a tiny glass swan with open wings stood perched on the tip.

“I can work with that,” said the witch.

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At a festival. Small child is lying on the ground nearby with a large rock on their chest yelling MORE WEIGHT!!! GIVE ME MORE WEIGHT!!!

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This is interesting, thank you. Stupid question though: it's still built around being a vampire, right? As in, if you're not playing a vampire, you're not getting the cool powers or interacting with a large chunk of the lore? If you find vampires extremely tedious, it's not like D&D where you just don't play Strahd?

you know what? I'm nailing my colours to the mast:

The default rpg that's used as a yardstick, in my view, is not D&D. It's Vampire The Masquerade 20th Aniversary Edition.

It has everything: Action! Melodrama! Politics! Intrigue! Horror! Romance! Bleak Social Realism!

Still want a fantasy game with swords and dragons? We got that, it's called Dark Ages Vampire!

When pitching me a game, the big hurdle you need to overcome is "why am I not running this in Vampire?" Call of Cthulhu? Vampire has plenty of cosmic-horror tentacle monster cults, just throw a hidden baali cell into your setting. D&D? Play a dark ages game and all be members of a vampiric order. Monsterhearts? That's just standard Camarilla Toreador behaviour! Paranoia? The prince is a malkavian, have fun. Rolemaster? That's just dark ages again, and trust me our mechanics are fiddly and pedantic too.

Being picky and don't want to play a vampire? No problem, there's a splat-book for playing as regular mortals, who may or may not have psychic powers.

Seriously, Vampire: The Masquerade has so much range as a game. Even more if you throw in bits of other WoD gamelines or elements from v5. Mage even has sci-fi space explorers fighting tentacle monsters on the surface of jupiter and I am not joking.

This is not a bit or a funny joke. I genuinely, 100% believe that Vampire is a better Default Game that can Do Everything than D&D and its imitators.

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I don't super want to bodge a workaround to the core concept of "you're a monster always one meal away from rampage/madness/lost to the fairy wairy/blah blah fate worse than death bottom line you suck and the world sucks" just to play a system.

That's what puts me off WoD and Cthulhu. The grimdark is baked in, instead of a module/splatbook/whatever, right? It gets called a horror system everywhere I hear of it. The clue's in the name, I guess?

If I wanted to be considered a monster ten seconds from committing unthinkable perversions and/or to have debilitating flaws in my body baked into the rules, I'd, I dunno, go outside??? It's very rare that I'm able to find these themes cathartic instead of tedious in an RPG. I dunno exactly why, it's not like I avoid horror in my reading, but in tabletop I don't wanna be enforced edgy and I definitely don't want to play with the people who chose to play the edgy game, if I don't already trust them personally.

(Listen. I know it's generalising wildly. I have so few spoons, I have to play probabilities.)

This is from the perspective of a very tired dog whose mileage usually varies, so don't read it as being said with any degree of heat.

you know what? I'm nailing my colours to the mast:

The default rpg that's used as a yardstick, in my view, is not D&D. It's Vampire The Masquerade 20th Aniversary Edition.

It has everything: Action! Melodrama! Politics! Intrigue! Horror! Romance! Bleak Social Realism!

Still want a fantasy game with swords and dragons? We got that, it's called Dark Ages Vampire!

When pitching me a game, the big hurdle you need to overcome is "why am I not running this in Vampire?" Call of Cthulhu? Vampire has plenty of cosmic-horror tentacle monster cults, just throw a hidden baali cell into your setting. D&D? Play a dark ages game and all be members of a vampiric order. Monsterhearts? That's just standard Camarilla Toreador behaviour! Paranoia? The prince is a malkavian, have fun. Rolemaster? That's just dark ages again, and trust me our mechanics are fiddly and pedantic too.

Being picky and don't want to play a vampire? No problem, there's a splat-book for playing as regular mortals, who may or may not have psychic powers.

Seriously, Vampire: The Masquerade has so much range as a game. Even more if you throw in bits of other WoD gamelines or elements from v5. Mage even has sci-fi space explorers fighting tentacle monsters on the surface of jupiter and I am not joking.

This is not a bit or a funny joke. I genuinely, 100% believe that Vampire is a better Default Game that can Do Everything than D&D and its imitators.

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GREEN bean casserole

Tater POT casserole

Gratin potaTOKES

Mac and TREES

SPLIFFing

CornBUD

CHRONICberry sauce

Brussels sprouts with BAKIN'

CharKUSHerie board

HungREEFER seconds?

HAHAHAHAHAHA no.