#'this should be more realistic like game of thrones'

[atlantic-riona]

sorry not sorry but some of y'all need to remember that you're reading children's literature

[simon-newman]

TIL I learned that the initial plans for Smaug in the Hobbit movies had him with four legs and a pair of wings like an actual dragon should be:

Supposedly the original design was still used in the first movie original cut and only changed to show winged forelimbs in the enhanced version.

what we ultimately got is the bat-like front limbs that serve as both arms and wings.

NGL. I still love him but there's this tiny voice at the back of my head saying "this is a wyvern".

Now. Why was the change made?

The official answer is:

"Originally, the dragon we envisioned was bigger. The idea was to get the fear through his bulk. In fact, if you go back and look at the first film and the scenes that he was in, he was actually a four-legged dragon because we just had him stomping through Erebor in all of those flashback scenes," Letteri said. "But we realized that once you saw him performing -- we especially got this from watching Benedict perform. He got down on the grown and starting slithering around like the way Tolkien described Smaug in the books, which is as a big worm. Once we saw Benedict doing all of that, we realized you can't have him be this four-legged creature with wings on him back, he needs to be two legs and his wings need to be his arms properly, as you would expect a creature to be like a bat or a bird."

So in order to make him move like Tolkien described they had to make him not fit the Tolkien's description of having four legs.

They made him less accurate to make him more accurate?

Plus. The excuse that he will be slithering around means he can't have four legs?

This is Fatalis - the most powerful monster in the Monster hunter franchise. It's an Elder Dragon with uniquely Draconic design.

Most regular MH monsters are some kind of a wyvern with four limbs. Elder dragons are different and like Fatalis many have six limbs.

Uniquely - Fatalis is the classic European dragon in terms of design - something that set him apart from other monsters in the franchise.

It is a monster and destroyer of kingdoms.

And he slithers around.

He can move in two ways - by lying flat on his belly and pulling himself forward with wings - in this case the forelegs are held close to his body.

The other method is to actually use the front limbs instead of wings. This gives him multiple means of movement depending on the situation and intentions.

He has a few more animations where he just lies flat or jumps forward - both ending with him flat on the ground and able to stand up easily. Those are attacks that intend to crush enemies with his entire body.

Four legs don't interfere in the slightest with all those movements.

The excuse is weak.

It is just my theory but seeing the recent push for "realistic" design for dragons I personally blame the Game of Thrones.

It began airing too late for the first movie to be changed as the production was likely in a very late stages.

Second one tho? Yeah. I could see how they implement the idea based on G.R.R. Martin's design.

For REALISM.

Of a mythical, flying, fire breathing monster.

I'm just waiting for "realistic" dragons appearing alongside creatures like gryphon and pegasus with the same excuse being made.

...

Thank you to listening to my rant.

[elbiotipo]

Maybe Game of Thrones really is a great piece of media, I don't know (it wasn't so great in my opinion, I watched some episodes and dropped and everyone thought I was crazy), but if the author claims it's more realistic than Tolkien then he should expect his work to be scrutinized even more. If he claims it represents a more "real" version of the Middle Ages, then well, let's take a look and see if it's true. If he says that fantasy authors don't think about politics, economies or sex, well, let's see if his writing holds up in that case. And if he says that the Dothraki are based in real life cultures like the Mongols and the Plains Native Americans, well let's see how much of that is based in historical realities and how much is racist caricatures.

So far he hasn't been satisfactory in any of his claims. Por la boca muere el pez.

[15-lizards]

love what you do! do you think you could expand on the winterfell region or the or bolton/umber region fashion?

I am a firm believer in patterns for men. Ignore the show no Lord of Winterfell is going to wear old leathers like a plebeian. They have fine fur cloaks, carefully made brooches and clasps, and thick fabrics that may not be comfortable but are clearly patterned and well made (no one ever said serving cunt was easy) Ned should have been rocking the fit on the left when Robert showed up and Jon should’ve been eating bitches up on the wall like the fit on the right

I am also a firm believer in big fancy wide sleeve supremacy. And big fancy hat/kokoshnik. Since silk and satin and thin fabrics aren’t feasible in winterfell, the women focus on embroidery, beading, and fur to make their clothes look pretty. Perhaps the sign of the most affluent bitch in winter fell is how big can their headpiece get and how heavy can it get from beading and decoration until it’s hurting your neck. The more slouching the better.

Bolton cool blood-core aesthetic is sadly hindered by thick extra layers of clothing that leave you puffy like a marshmallow. Bc I doubt there is much central heating in the Dreadfort. Probably not as much decoration on the clothing for minor nobles, but Roose and his crew still have some. All in red of course. A lot of high collars, long sleeves, and tight jackets with fur cloaks over the shoulders there’s no shirtless sword practice here take ur ass back to Highgarden

Honestly the Umbers probably aren’t far off from wildlings themselves. Furs and leather and using every part of the animal for their clothing, but they also still have the (albeit minor) luxury of dyes and metals etc etc. They’re still physically threatening but also they’re trudging through waist high snow most of the year and have to waddle around in ten layers of extra clothes. So yea Greatjon is scary but less scary when you see him with three scarves around his face and an overcoat on big enough to cover his four layers of shirts

Extra: smallfolk from around the Umber and Bolton areas. Why is everyone in game of thrones wearing brown. Why are they only wearing two layers. That’s stupid D&D you are stupid. The smallfolk in my mind wear handmade patterns that were lovingly made by the fire. Cotton clothing dyed from berries and plants. Grey wool from the sheep and sun bleached leather that’s turned light brown. Fur hats to keep their ears warm and big pants to tuck into their boots. The smallfolk in my homeade ASOIAF universe are realistically able to survive winter

[paragonrobits]

There’s a phrase I like to use when people question why, in fantasy series, people don’t just take the most efficient and ruthless option. I say, “This isn’t Game of Thrones.” Bluntly put, apart from having a very unsatisfying ending to its character arcs due to a realistic but very abrupt swing from the character arcs it had been building up (and in one notable case, a character arc that WAS built up the whole time, but not in a way people anticipated), Game of Thrones is most notorious for a very realpolitick approach to how the characters make their decisions.

Efficiency, immediate needs and ruthlessness regardless of personal qualms comes up a lot in what people seem to have taken from that show’s success, and you see a LOT of people thinking that pragmatic ruthlessness is the most basic and standard solution to any story’s problems, regardless of whether or not its consistent with a story’s given themes and morals.

The Avatar setting is NOT one of those. In this setting, spirituality is vitally important; the reason WHY things are done, as well as HOW they done, are just as important as the actual end result, if not more.

So, one thing I see a LOT in fandom circles (usually in bad takes floating around and being mocked by the circles I am adjacent to, or ideas popular among Big Name Fans who are kind of sheltered from the actual themes of the show itself and have distanced themselves from what the show is actually like in favor of what is functionally a completely original series that appeals to their own preferences) comes down to discussions arguing that AtLA would be better if Aang just took down every one he fought and killed them all without hesitation; there is a popular implication among these ideas that Aang is considered weak to them BECAUSE he doesn't want to kill. Because killing is anathema to his people, because the deliberate taking of life is a HUGE deal to both the Air Nomads and the real life religions that they are based on.

These takes conclude that none of that matters; that his morals and compunctions should just be immediately tossed aside in order to achieve his goals. There's usually something like 'who cares about spirituality when the world is so bad' or the ends justifying the means. And the thing is that we DO see characters in AtLA saying that, quite often. Characters who don't care about the spiritual consequences of their actions, who do whatever it takes to accomplish their goals.

They're the villains.

In AtLA, ruthlessness, pragmatism and 'whatever it takes to get what I want' is SPECIFICALLY and EXCLUSIVELY associated with the antagonists. General Fong; Azula, Ozai, the entirety of the Fire Nation... one thing they all have in common, besides opposing Aang, is that they're not just willing to be ruthless, they have no interest in achieving their goals or really doing anything at all without being ruthless and amoral about it. There's a common point in the narrative here, and I think the episode the Avatar State neatly sums it up through its story, as we are presented with Fong, who is seemingly an ally, demanding that they ignore the spiritual demands in favor of just weaponizing a force of nature no one involved really understands.

His emphasis on the people dying in the meantime does make for a potent image, but he is ultimately and frequently established as a ruthless jackass who cares more about trying to weaponize the Avatar State (and mere mortals do not get to have a say in its decisions or what the World Spirit, in its fullest power, wants to do). Apart from this indicating a more or less full departure from a strict moral binary within the series, there's also an emphasis on Katara growing increasingly uncomfortable with the non-spiritual plan they're taking, to the point that she won't have anything to do with it, and she is very much the show's heart. If she disapproves of something with plot relevance, its usually a bad sign.

So this whole THING you have with people going 'everything would be better if Aang killed everyone immediately except for the secret Good Guys even though he has absolutely no way of knowing them out of context'... its genuinely really bewildering and I think its kind of proof of people not engaging with the show's themes or ethics, but assuming that ruthlessness and efficiency are the default way of handling everything. AtLA is not subtle about this and if you think that the show at any point suggests that this is a likely outcome, I don't think you're really engaging with it, or you're misunderstanding the context (such as the Ocean Spirit rampaging being framed as a last second moment of hope; I think people conflate its destruction as generally a Cool Thing, rather than the world itself protecting a dying culture from near certain destruction as the moon itself is... well, dead.)

(There's also a protagonist-centered morality in that they seem to want their characters to BE rather amoral, being all about love and acceptance and tolerance but also brutally and remorselessly kill everyone in their way without hesitation, and the people making these statements don't see any kind of logical flaw. I dunno but that's WEIRD to me.)

[disturbingstar]

The last of us trivia

TV show

• Pedro Pascal agreed to play Joel within a day of being sent the script.

• Neil Druckmann (the writer and director of the games, and the co-creator of the HBO series) watched over 100 auditions for Ellie before seeing Bella Ramsey's audition, of which he said, “It didn't feel like I was watching someone acting like Ellie. I was watching Ellie.”

• The TV adaptation offered the opportunity to expand on characters' backstories like Marlene and Ellie's relationship - as they weren't limited to a first-person POV.

• Huge apocalyptic sets had to be made for the show that were only used once - like the interior of the Capitol Building, which was built on a soundstage from scratch. Matching the lushness of the game while making it more realistic was the end goal, and art books from Naughty Dog (the company that developed the video games) were used as a jumping off point.

• Tess is portrayed by Australian actress Anna Torv. She was aware of the games but had not played them and watched the cutscenes after her casting. Torv felt her performance required consistent truthfulness due to its subtlety.

• Anna Torv and Pedro Pascal who portrays Joel decided that Tess and Joel had been lovers for some time but, like in the game, were subtle about their relationship.

• Sarah is portrayed by English actress Nico Parker. Parker watched videos of the original game years before getting the role. She wanted to stay away from the game version and provide her own interpretation of the character.

• As the clickers were a “home run” in the games, prosthetic artists from Game of Thrones were brought on to make them look as close to the source material as possible.

• There was even a movement bootcamp to train extras how to move like infected.

• The art teams were given the direction to find the beauty in the fungus. As Neil Druckmann said, “When you see the beauty in these monsters, it somehow makes them creepier.”

• It was Bella Ramsey's suggestion to have Ellie sleep with a switchblade during her first night with Tess and Joel.

• Neil Druckmann always thought of Joel and Tess's relationship as romantic, and the TV show offered the opportunity to make that explicit.

• Neil Druckmann is open to a The Last of Us Part 3 game, but it depends on whether the team can “come up with a compelling story that has this universal message and statement about love.”

• Pedro Pascal was chosen to play Joel Miller because of his ability to portray a tough, tortured, and vulnerable character who suppresses his emotions until necessary.

• Pedro Pascal based Joel's voice on his own experiences growing up in San Antonio, Texas, paring it back from the Southern accent used in the games.

• Bella Ramsey was aware of the game before their audition, but was encouraged not to play it to avoid replicating Ashley Johnson's original performance, instead watching some gameplay on YouTube to get a sense of it. As of filming the series, they still hadn't played the game.Ramsey wanted their performance to be reminiscent of the games without copying them.

• Unlike his counterpart from the video game series, Joel is more vulnerable in the television series; he is hard of hearing on one side due to a gunshot, his knees ache when he stands and he also suffers from nightmares and panic attacks. Co-creator Craig Mazin felt Joel should be less resilient than in the game to show the toll that living in the post-outbreak world has taken.

• Tommy is portrayed by American actor and producer Gabriel Luna. About a month after the casting of Pascal and Ramsey as Joel and Ellie respectively, Luna was asked to submit an audition tape. He was familiar with the work of co-creator Craig Mazin and executive producer Carolyn Strauss, and had previously worked on HBO's True Detective. About a week after submitting his tape, he was offered the role and, according to Luna, they instantly knew he was the one. He was enthusiastic for the role, having lived in Austin, Texas—Joel and Tommy's hometown—around the same time as the show's setting. He was also given a PlayStation 5 during production to play the games as research.

[thydungeongal]

In the light of recent news, I familiarized myself with Greyhawk setting, so review incoming.

It was not as bad as my first impression suggested. It uses the language of race to describe human population, but it was more of a rudiment of being 40 years old than specific ideology. And almost all nations are described as being "of mixed race".

Also, of the four races only one is explicitly white and probably white-coded, and Oeridians, who are the most important, are ambiguous but I think that they are supposed to be vaguely Mediterranean ("skin from tan to olive, most common hair colours are brown amd reddish-brown, short-tempered but very disciplined" etc.). The other two are vaguely Native American and vaguely West Asian, so the setting is also racially diverse on top of that.

It was very obviously written by someone who was a history nerd first, because it describes a lot of migrations and politics and obscure political systems, but magic is barely present. Fantasy creatures in any capacity are also barely present, playable demi-humans are very rare and orcs and others can be easily replaced by barbarians and bandits with no change. Greyhawk is extremely human-centric.

It was very intentionally written as a blueprint for your own world, like the folio is 32 pages long, and boxed set is bigger but instead of describing more detailed history it describes gods and fucking distribution of flora on the continent.

So yes, I can easily see why WotC decided to switch back to Greyhawk - it's very versatile and can be easily adjusted to anything. It probably will also make tone of official materials more low-fantasy and historical. It's great.

But also I noticed some ironic part specifically for me - it's way closer to what I like in fantasy, but in a boring way. It's a pseudo-medieval world that is explicitly a sandbox for games and therefore not detailed. As another history nerd, I can make similar thing in 20 minutes, but better because it will be specifically tailored to my interests. Setting of Jackals is also low fantasy based on real history (of Bronze Age Syria) but in a way that is very engaging and paints an interesting world. A lot of people call Forgotten Realms boring, but while it's not a masterpiece it has a vibe that I wouldn't invent on my own because I am not into high-magic works. I think that casual fantasy enjoyers will like Greyhawk for being refreshing for not having gigabytes of lore and grounded like Game of Thrones and edgy in a realistic way, but for me it's just a quick sketch inspired by real-life history with no remarkable qualities

Okay well this is another great example of an Ask that should have been a Post because there isn't even a question here. Seriously, I don't have anything against long asks but there's nothing for me to say about this one, mostly because I really don't care about Greyhawk or the direction of D&D going forward. Next time you should just make a Post.

[fantasy-anatomy-analyst]

Do you have any critique for the designs of the Mudwings or Rainwings (from the Wings of Fire novels?)

okay, you know, i think i am going to just use this as a chance to talk about the most common pitfalls for dragon wing designs.

Wings of Fire designs are fine. the style is nice, the dragon designs are each unique enough from each other to stand out in their context. i can handwave some things about their anatomy because of the more cartoonized style and i will ignore the trope of making the evil dragons look distinctly more animalistic because it's clearly a series made for a younger audience.

but it still falls into the exact same dragon wing design problems i see absolutely everywhere. I've done it, you've done it, every single person who has ever tried to design a dragon in any style has done this. my points here are all based on the most common dragon wing type, which is the bat-like wing.

lack of patagium (the membrane between the shoulder and wrist) the Wings of Fire dragons are a bit awkward because some of them do have it and some of them do not and there does not seem to be a reason for this difference. the patagium is important! you really should have it on any dragon with that bat-like wing shape.

wing fingers extending past the membrane, especially with claws included. why are they doing that. when are those claws going to get used. wing fingers are built for the specific purpose of moving the wing. the only finger that should be extending out on its own with a claw is the thumb. unless you want to do pterosaur wings, in which case there are a few forward-facing fingers and one very long finger acting as the wing frame. honestly, more dragons should have pterosaur wings, they're an actual real life flying reptile and some of them were huge. please, we need more pterosaur-winged dragons.

membrane being way too deeply scooped between the fingers even when the wing is extended. this one makes me think people just don't actually know how wing membranes work. they are not a stiff material at all, but a very flexible type of skin. it should fold up between the fingers and near the body when the wing is withdrawn, but stretch out tight when the wing is extended. i know the scooped shape Looks Cooler but it's not very functional.

wing fingers being too stiff. those things move! they bend! they're very bendy! bats fly with a lot of finger curling. here are a few videos in slow motion that show the fingers and the flexible membrane really well: video 1. video 2. video 3. a lot of dragon designs i see just use the shoulder of the wing as the main point of motion. they won't even change the elbow angle. now, the elbow will never be fully straight in flight, but it should move too! I think one of the reasons people don't do this right is that it's just easier to use fewer points of motion in animation and obviously all dragons in motion are animated ones. but when you see it even on the hyper realistic style of dragons in things like Game of Thrones, it gets pretty frustrating. make those wings flex more. (and by mentioning the GoT dragons, I know they do move more than just the shoulder, but even their wing finger motion is very stiff, like the fingers only have one joint and the membrane doesn't move as much as it should)

elbow strut. you know what i mean. that weird little bone strut on the elbow on like every dragon design ever. it gets in the way of some very important membrane motion. it does not exist in any real life membranous wing that i am aware of. the closest you can argue for is that the yi qi, a dinosaur that might have had a membranous wing and also feathers, does have an odd strut-like bone and we don't know exactly how it was positioned. but from what i've seen, there is at least a consensus that it was connected to the wing hand, not the elbow. it might have been positioned parallel to the forearm and thus would create a strut-like shape extending at the elbow, but that's not how people draw the elbow strut on dragons. it always looks like there's just a weird stick attached to their joint. it serves no purpose. the reason people do this on their dragons is because they design the membrane poorly and need to add a strut to give the wing a bigger membrane. but this can be avoided if you just attach the membrane lower on the body to give it more surface area, and also let it stretch taut instead of making it scooped like it's slack even when the wing is extended. just do more studies of bat wings in motion and you'll have a better understanding of how your bat-like dragon wings should work.

[polyphonetic]

Thinking about how much "realism" is touted in media and games. "Realism" is an aspect that justifies the inclusion of particular content, even if others find it disagreeable. But a lot of times it is truthfully unrepresentative of reality or is something that can't really be conceptualized as realistic to begin with.

The gruesome content, as well as misogyny, in Game Of Thrones is justified as being a more realistic depiction of how characters should interact and behave, even though this is a magic world with dragons. It would certainly be more realistic, for example, for a character to have a complex relationship with their identity and how it fits with their assigned role in their society, than it would be to have dragon or time powers.

In so many video games, Call Of Duty especially, torture is a tool that is used often and effectively by the good guys to get critical information out of bad guys. But in real life torture straight-up doesn't work, or is just used as an excuse to get what you want to hear. Traumatizing someone distorts their memories and does not give the tangible evidence that thorough proper investigation gives. Yes I just watched the Jacob Geller video on this...

But anyways, in many cases a "realistic" narrative is really just being conflated with a familiar one. We're familiar with stories with sexism, we're familiar with stories where things like torture are effective and helpful. We're less familiar with narratives around queer or societally divergent people, even though those are real people that exist in real life, so I'd say that I'm pretty realistic.

There was a post a few months ago floating around about how people have a better idea of how to act when a faerie shows up at their door then they would a walrus. Because we've seen stories about faeries but not about walri showing up unexpectedly, even though one is more certainly real than the other (and therefore more probable).

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

Was reading an article about how to write a realistic romance and avoid common poorly-done tropes. Seemed like a pretty decent post. Then immediately noped out and closed the tab when they listed Zuko and Katara as an example of a well-written romance 🤡

"Here's how you write a good romance" *points to a dynamic that was not romantic and didn't have much screentime or any real development until the very end of the story*

Seems like the level of quality one can expect from the typical internet think-piece - just bullshit and a pretencious way of saying "my headcanon is better."

Also, fuck being "realistic", stories have to be GOOD and ENTERTAINING. Game Of Thrones would have been a worse show if Ned Stark had been saved at the last second, but the movie Snow White would have been completely ruined if prince charming had not saved her with true love's kiss. Jack dying at the end of Titanic fits the tone of "this was a tragedy in which lots of good, innocent people were killed and those who loved them will always grieve them", but Cinderella never being freed from her abusive family would have been a fundamental betrayal to the message it's trying to send to the audience.

You should ALWAYS focus on what makes sense for the specific story you're trying to tell. Would "love at first sight" fit the magical, wholesome vibe, or would it look corny and forced compared to the more down to earth plot? If you're not gonna have the characters live happilly ever after, did you properly set up the reasons for it, or are you just doing so because "happy endings are cliche"? If the romance between the two characters is toxic, you need to be writing either cautionary tale or a story in which the protagonist being "moral" isn't that important, you can NOT be trying to use them as an exemple of what love is supposed to be.

It all depends on the context. Realism is not inherently better than wish-fulfilment.

[northern-passage]

i've shared some of Alex Freed's narrative writing advice before and i recently read another article on his website that i really liked. particularly in branching/choice-based games, a lot of people often bring up the idea of the author "punishing" the player for certain choices. i agree that this is a thing that happens, but i disagree that it's always a bad thing. i think Freed makes a good case for it here.

...acting as the player’s judge (and jury, and executioner) is in some respects the primary job of a game’s developers. Moreover, surely all art emerges from the artist’s own experiences and worldview to convey a particular set of ideas. How does all that square with avoiding being judgmental?

[...]

Let’s first dispel–briefly–the idea that any game can avoid espousing a particular worldview or moral philosophy. Say we’re developing an open world action-adventure game set in a modern-day city. The player is able to engage any non-player character in combat at any time, and now we’re forced to determine what should occur if the player kills a civilian somewhere isolated and out of sight.

Most games either:

allow this heinous act and let the player character depart without further consequence, relying on the player’s own conscience to determine the morality of the situation.

immediately send police officers after the player character, despite the lack of any in-world way for the police to be aware of the crime.

But of course neither of these results is in any way realistic. The problems in the latter example are obvious, but no less substantial than in the former case where one must wonder:

Why don’t the police investigate the murder at a later date and track down the player then?

Why doesn’t the neighborhood change, knowing there’s a vicious murderer around who’s never been caught? Why aren’t there candlelight vigils and impromptu memorials?

Why doesn’t the victim’s son grow up to become Batman?

We construct our game worlds in a way that suits the genre and moral dimensions of the story we want to tell. There’s no right answer here, but the consequences we build into a game are inherently a judgment on the player’s actions. Attempting to simulate “reality” will always fail–we must instead build a caricature of truth that suggests a broader, more realized world. Declaring “in a modern city, murderous predators can escape any and all consequences” is as bold a statement on civilization and humanity as deciding “in the long run, vengeance and justice will always be served up by the victims of crime (metaphorically by means of a bat-costumed hero).”

Knowing that, what’s the world we want to build? What are the themes and moral compass points we use to align our game?

This is a relatively easy task when working with a licensed intellectual property. In Star Trek, we know that creativity, diplomacy, and compassion are privileged above all else, and that greed and prejudice always lead to a bad end. A Star Trek story in which the protagonist freely lies, cheats, and steals without any comeuppance probably stopped being a Star Trek story somewhere along the line. Game of Thrones, on the other hand, takes a more laissez-faire approach to personal morality while emphasizing the large-scale harm done by men and women who strive for power. (No one comes away from watching Game of Thrones believing that the titular “game” is a reasonable way to run a country.)

These core ideals should affect more than your game’s storytelling–they should dovetail with your gameplay loops and systems, as well. A Star Trek farming simulator might be a fun game, but using the franchise’s key ideals to guide narrative and mechanical choices probably won’t be useful. (“Maybe we reward the player for reaching an accord with the corn?”)

Know what principles drive your game world. You’re going to need that knowledge for everything that’s coming.

[...]

Teaching the player the thematic basics of your world shouldn’t be overly difficult–low-stakes choices, examples of your world and character arcs in a microcosm, gentle words of wisdom, obviously bad advice, and so forth can all help guide the player’s expectations. You can introduce theme in a game the way you would in any medium, so we won’t dwell on that here.

You can, of course, spend a great deal of time exploring the nuances of the moral philosophy of your game world across the course of the whole game. You’ll probably want to. So why is it so important to give the player the right idea from the start?

Because you need the player to buy into the kind of story that you’re telling. To some degree, this is true even in traditional, linear narratives: if I walk into a theater expecting the romcom stylings of The Taming of the Shrew and get Romeo and Juliet instead, I’m not going to be delighted by having my expectations subverted; I’m just going to be irritated.

When you give a player a measure of control over the narrative, the player’s expectations for a certain type of story become even stronger. We’ll discuss this more in the next two points, but don’t allow your player to shoot first and ask questions later in the aforementioned Star Trek game while naively expecting the story to applaud her rogue-ish cowboy ways. Interactive narrative is a collaborative process, and the player needs to be able to make an informed decision when she chooses to drive the story in a given direction. This is the pact between player and developer: “You show me how your world works, and I’ll invest myself in it to the best of my understanding.”

[...]

In order to determine the results of any given choice, you (that is, the game you’ve designed) must judge the actor according to the dictates (intended or implicit) of the game world and story. If you’re building a game inspired by 1940s comic book Crime Does Not Pay, then in your game world, crime should probably not pay.

But if you’ve set the player’s expectations correctly and made all paths narratively satisfying, then there can be no bad choices on the part of the player–only bad choices on the part of the player character which the player has decided to explore. The player is no more complicit in the (nonexistent) crimes of the player character than an author is complicit in the crimes of her characters. Therefore, there is no reason to attempt to punish or shame the player for “bad” decisions–the player made those decisions to explore the consequences with you, the designer. (Punishing the player character is just dandy, so long as it’s an engaging experience.)

[...]

It’s okay to explore difficult themes without offering up a “correct” answer. It’s okay to let players try out deeds and consequences and decide for themselves what it all means. But don’t forget that the game is rigged. [...]

Intentionally or not, a game judges and a game teaches. It shows, through a multiplicity of possibilities, what might happen if the player does X or Y, and the player learns the unseen rules that underlie your world. Embracing the didactic elements of your work doesn’t mean slapping the player’s wrist every time she’s wrong–it means building a game where the player can play and learn and experiment within the boundaries of the lesson.

[kingdoms-and-empires]

It would seem like the Argent blessed noble blood should have proliferated more or were there a lot of only single child royal families. Like Remiel and Uriel were only children so I wonder why Uriel and Adelina had so many. Also will our siblings marry out or marry in partners?

Great questions!!

REALISTICALLY

There should be more. Siblings of the ruler shouldve married or at least had kiddos right?

Well, there are!

But those families no longer possess the ability to actually activate the blessed armor because the ability only lasts 3 generations.

Same with the whole white hair and eyes thing!

The main branch, that is the main ruling family, have to keep a constant connection to the blessed armor so they dont lose their white hair and eyes, or else itll be lost. ONLY family members with white hair or eyes can claim the Silver Throne!

But I dont talk much about this ingame because alot of it could overwhelm a reader, especially how the game is currently presented with all the walls of text it currently is. SO this will be a future wiki article and discussion that Master Feren will teach to us in the future!!!

Now for the actual answer

In terms of writing, i already have an incredibly high amount of characters. And writers usually want a clean and organized world because its easier to write about. But imagine a writer trying to work with a family tree and system like that of the Capet or Habsburg dynasty lines? Then add in all the craziness of the branch families?? ITS INSANE

Hence my lil bit of laziness in this regard lololol

Hope this answered your questions!!!

Gonna tag this ideabucket so i remember to do the article at some point lmao

[fullmetal-scar-simping]

The desert people in mangahood drive me mad because I actually like that Ishvalans have unique characteristics rarely seen in fantasy (usually white-haired people with unusual eye colours are light-skinned like in Game of Thrones) but also realistically....you would think that there would be a portion of Ishvalans with Xerxesian features because they're the closest neighbours to this lost civilisation, not Amestris, and unless all the people of Xerxes were locked in their city, they would have likely married into the local Ishvalan population as well

Like in my head Ishvalans actually live across the entire desert area (not unlike early decentralised Arab societies) with Ishvalans like Scar being sedentary inhabitants of lands closer to Amestris and those in the heart of the desert being nomads - and you would THINK that because of their closer proximity to Xerxes, there would be gold-eyed Ishvalans but NO because then the Ed wouldn't get to ev a special little descendant of a lost people

Also on a conspiratorial note, I have always wondered whether the reason Ishvalans have a negative attitude towards alchemy is because of Xerxes.

Given the lore in 03 and mangahood! Scar's brother saying that alkahestry's principles has similarities with Ishvalan religious beliefs, I think it's not too outlandish to speculate that Ishvalans practiced alchemy to some extent until they saw their prosperous and powerful neighbour (who were even more into alchemy than themselves) literally die in one night. I'd burn the records too and place a ban on the practice as a safety measure fhsnjd

Now I'm actually incredibly insane because the Ishvalan genocide absolutely did not need to be so bloody. All the other blood seals in the country get away with a riot or a battle, but Ishvalans were systematically exterminated; I saw somebody else in the tag wonder whether Father had personal issues with this desert civilisation that, despite its abandonment of alchemy, might be able to see through his schemes because their knowledge of the craft (lost though it might be) predates Amestrian knowledge - and really he was right because Scar's brother cracked the code years before anybody else!!!!

I just had to share my thoughts with you in light of your recent reblog🙏🏻 And also thank you for always answering your asks so thoughtfully!!!

[The reblog that this ask is in reference to.]

Oh shit, hey cool Miles/Scar anon! Always good to see an ask from ya again! :D

[Reply under the readmore]

Anime has no shortage of darker skinned characters with white hair, but certainly the combination of red eyes is less common. I appreciate that fma as a broad series does also have melanated characters with dark hair as well, so it manages to largely avoid the "singular ambiguous ethnic group, no other dark skin tones with realistic dark hair/eyes anywhere to be seen" trope. But you're not wrong, other types of media, particularly from the West, keeps different hair and eye colours for light skin/white fantasy 'races'.

(To digress a bit, I do prefer 03 having the Ishbalans be diverse in their hair colours, so as not to render them as a visual monolith ala mangahood. Still, white hair + red eyes + brown skin tone makes for a visually striking design choice.)

Absolutely agreed with everything regarding Ishval's connection to the surrounding geography and Xerxes. There should have been some Xerxian traits across some modern Ishvalans. Hell, why weren't there any Ishvalan traits with any of the far-too racially homogeneous (and bizarrely white and blond) Xerxians? The idea of there being agriculturally settled Ishvalans that make up the country we know of, while there are nomadic Ishvalans that call the vast "unamed" desert their home is so good! This helps recontextualize that odd no-man's-land treatment of the landmass between Xing and the eastern borders of Amestris, Drachma, and Aerugo: it's that the Amestrian regime does not recognize that land as peopled, ala a form of Terra Nullus (and thus an Amestrian-styled Manifest Destiny for the regions of the desert that would serve to cement Father's bordered geographical alchemic circle). Unsure if the large nations of Drachma and Aerugo similarly project that same racist, imperial lens on the desert as well, but famously the nation state is not a civilizational model that honours, acknowledges, or respects nomadic lifeways and peoples.

Imagine what other Ishvalan or Ishvalan-connected/derived settlements may exist closer to Xing too! And the traits that cross between travel and immigration to and from these societies. It's interesting to contemplate on!

To get back on track here:

I guess we're meant to see much of this country-less desert as the implied size of Xerxes. That this uninhabited land (because canon has no mention of nomadic peoples) is somehow void of (re-)established human life in the 400 years since its calamity. :/ Meh. I rather headcanon that Xerxes was a sizable empire, sure, but that it wasn't the total size of that massive region. If anything, Xerxes could have extended westward into what would one day be Amestrian/Aerugo/maybe even parts of Eastern Drachman territory. This would further highlight Xerxes as the analog to the ancient Persian empire that it's meant to be (which is such a 😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨 decision because goddamn, why are they all homogeneously fantasy Northern/Eastern European in appearance?!) It had to have had desert neighbours that weren't swallowed into its empire, as well as a slew of racial and ethnic groups amalgamated into its own domain as a result of its own imperialism, land capture, and slavery system.

(As an aside, imagine if instead of wholly navigating an entire desert on her own, Mei encountered and was given some aid by different Ishvalan nomads!)

From a purely world building standpoint, it would have been so cool to see the cultural drift and offshoots that develop amongst the range of Nomadic Ishvalans! Man, I would love to see the ethnic subgroups within settled Ishval too. It's fertile ground for anyone who wants to expand on these cultures, which could be awesome if handled by people who don't make garbage racist headcanons/fanworks.

Mangahood seems satisfied to leave the Ishvalan rejection of alchemy and alkehestry unexplained. This could be seen as encouraging readers to put the pieces together (that it's because of what befell Xerxes), which I appreciate in stories. For this I'll give Arakawa the benefit of the doubt for now. I don't want to jump to seeing this as intentionally racist without further evidence for this specific gap in the lore. However, it could be given a more faithless read as "They became religious fanatics Just Because [they're brown]." With the manga showing a congregation of Ishvalans blowing themselves up as an ambush against invading Amestrian pigs, from the perspective of those traumatized boots (hooray, the Dangerous Religious Orient caricature), it's hard for me not to glower at this lack of explanation.

To repeat myself, I'll interpret it the way you have: that the Ishvalans of four centuries ago saw the empty wasteland where Xerxes once ruled. No one could miss the evidence of an the alchemic reaction stitched into the fabric of the now flattened land. From there alchemy and alkehestry (or its unique Ishvalan practice along those veins) would come to be reviled. That understandable reaction eventually being codified via cultural changes and entering (perhaps even creating new) religious doctrine.

The 2003 anime making it more obvious for audiences to put together that the reason Ishbalan culture and the Ishbala religion condemn alchemy as a dangerous, heretic practice is due to the many life perverting, war-enhancing uses of this magic-science was an excellent choice. That the Grand Arcanum and human transmutation were grievous sources of tragedy and horrors, making what few people who still practice any alchemy into pariahs and exiles. We also are shown alchemy as an analog to European colonists forcibly importing their goods, economic systems, Christianity, and weapons across the world in order to shift the cultures of Indigenous peoples and gradually morph them into a more culturally and economically pliable outpost (further rooting Europe into the land and the people and one day cementing different kingdom's land claims). Alchemy was being touted as this advanced science, a sister to the early industrialism of Amestris. Modern Ishbal is not only alchemy abstaining, but it is also a non-industrial society as well (the fantasy science of alchemy sitting right next to its real world analog for the industrial-colonial system). Amestrian colonizers thought of Ishbalans as reactionary, uncivilized savages (ala the European-supremacist view of the rest of humanity), so when the Ishbalans got fed up of being harangued into displays of the "wonder of alchemy," into adopting the Amestrian way, they firmly reject their would-be colonizers. Amestris responds by armed skirmishes and occupation. All of this only further cements that alchemy is a source of misery and destruction.

Fma 03 does all of this explicit world building because the writers wanted to make it clear that everything we're made to believe about "foreign religious fanatic countries/anti-modern societies", particularly regarding the American invasions into West Asia, is racist propaganda that launders the views of imperial nations and backs their conscription for war. The team didn't want to leave this up to the default, racist assumption that viewers would carry thanks to American dominance.

Sadly, mangahood isn't interested in having this same tact. Why, when mangahood's perspective is instead that Ishval is just as guilty for Amestrian atrocities?

Anyway.

"All the other blood seals in the country get away with a riot or a battle, but Ishvalans were systematically exterminated"

Yes! This! When some people flounder about, claiming that the genocide wasn't racist (HELLO????), I have to wonder if they watched/read the same show/comic. Liorans within the rest of Amestris were not stripped from their place in Amestrian society. They weren't imprisoned and judicially murdered. They weren't thoroughly ethnically cleansed (they get to live on their own land) and genocided. Drachma is a warring imperial nation that Amestris has no hope of full scale invading and exterminating, but we see no evidence that Drachmans in Amestris are slaughtered or imprisoned (I would assume they are generally treated poorly and largely live on the lower rungs of society though). But the Ishvalans are to be fully eradicated. Whatever exceptions exist are being covertly protected by some people with power (Miles under Olivier's protection) or refugees hiding in Amestris' periphery.

It was absolutely racially motivated. It could have just been one locally-contained massacre (which of course would still be an atrocity) and that's it. But no, all of Ishval was occupied, toppled, its people ruthlessly mass slaughtered and transmuted, those within Amestris-proper were mass incarcerated and executed. It's unambiguously fascism and ethnonationalist supremacy.

Interesting theory re: Father going after the Ishvalans due to their historical knowledge of their version of alchemy/alkehestry. I can see that playing some part in his own plotting. Still, the nationalism and racism of Amestrians would not stem solely from one homunculus disseminating propaganda overnight. (Not claiming you're saying this btw!) Those soldiers, cops, members of the judicial and carceral systems, and the civilians themselves who are terrified at the sight of Ishvalans carry a bigotry that has to be rooted more deeply in this society than the last decade or so. Think of white supremacy, which had been formed over 500+ years of global European colonialism.

Father could otherwise then exploit this societal prejudice against the Ishvalans to his benefit. As it seems no other occupied people around Amestris' borders/lands have a history of, or knowledge of, alchemy that is tied to the energy running beneath the planet's mantel, it would behoove him to push Ishval to ruin and encourage further fascist constriction against the remaining Ishvalans.

(Scar Bro big brained moments. Man decodes Amestrian alchemic power and the blood seals in a matter of years of study, leading to the dismantling of the nation's centuries-long alchemic control. Fuck Amestris lol)

-

So sorry for the wait! I'm glad these responses have been enjoyable enough to read. Thanks for sharing your thoughts btw! <3 Your perspective on Ishvalan culture really enhances my appreciation of them under the mangahood continuity, which is desperately needed given canon's indifference towards them.

[the-priestess-of-dawn]

Been thinking about a postgame scenario that goes in a direction I don't think canon would ever take in a million years, but like... I think it could be really compelling...

And that's the idea of Chrom becoming Plegia's king after Grima's defeat. And specifically giving up his claim to Ylisse's throne to do it (leaving it to Lucina when she's old enough).

Because here's the thing... The game ends with Grima's defeat/Robin's return in the sacrifice ending. It doesn't address what happens to Plegia at all, and while I personally maintain that Aversa is the most qualified candidate to rule, her canon ending provides that she goes back to the village she was born in. So, fine. Let's give her that.

But SOMEONE has to do SOMETHING because realistically, Plegia is in dire straits. Validar, the king and the leader of the Grimleal, is dead. He gave, like, ALL of Plegia's resources to the Ylissean League (well, okay, we don't know how much, if any, he left in reserve, but... He really needed Walhart gone and it's not like he had any reason to think that anyone would need resources once Grima was running around, so... chances are good there's little to nothing left in the wake of the averted apocalypse). And the population has been utterly devastated, because not only did people (exactly how many is unclear, but presumably it took more than just a couple) have to sacrifice themselves to renew the fell dragon's power, but Grima was also spawning Grimleal onto their back at the final battle. Their losses are so immense...

So first of all, Chrom is definitely responsible for taking all their resources and setting half of them on fire (Now to be fair, Flavia and Basilio are also responsible, but... Idk, I kinda feel like they'd bicker with each other over who has to do the crappy parts of the job and then agree that they should just ask Chrom if he can do it. Like "Haha, if you didn't want to deal with thieves ambushing the Longfort to steal construction supplies, you shouldn't have gone and beaten me at the last tournament!" "Oh, shut up. Let's see if Chrom can send his thief friend over to talk these guys down. Or kill them, whichever." I mean, Chrom is always going to be their guy who knows a guy.) There's just no way Chrom would abandon the surviving Plegians who need help anyway, but especially not when he knows the war with Valm would've ended before it could begin without them.

Of course, there's the historical hostility between Ylisse and Plegia to consider, but... If anyone's protesting, it's probably the Ylisseans. Because the survivng Plegians, uh... probably were never Grima's most devoted followers in the first place (if you really wanted to give Grima your life, you'd rush to the front of the line at the Dragon's Table, right?) and even if they used to consider themselves true Grimleal, the religion's leadership is destroyed, and—for the purpose of this scenario, I'm considering it post-sacrifice ending—the fell dragon is gone and not coming back. These people narrowly avoided becoming Grima's breakfast or Grima's meat shields. They all almost certainly know someone who wasn't as lucky. And the one who saved them... Well, it was Chrom, wasn't it? Because he believed in humanity enough to challenge the concept of fate, a fate that the people of Plegia were surely taught was inescapable. Despite their history with Ylisse, it's hardly unreasonable for them to see Chrom as a savior to them specifically. The second coming of the Hero-King who ought for the lives of all humans, really.

And yeah, I'm going here... Chrom is Marth's descendant. Marth was Altean. Former Altea is is modern Plegia, so technically, the people can argue that he's actually theirs.

Doesn't it sort of make sense, even? Plegia is ruined, the god to whom the theocracy was devoted killed. "What we need is to restore the glory of ancient Altea!" And who better to help them than Chrom, Marth's successor in blood and in spirit?

But Chrom would frown and say no. Of course he's going to help them restore their country to prosperity—or at least to independent, peaceful functioning. But king? Sheesh, that's going too far. Come on guys, you don't really want that. Besides, he's already ruling Ylisse...

Except, he's not ruling it as Exalt. At least, not at first he's not. He forswore the title when he started his rule and in canon he is only official welcomed as Exalt after Grima's defeat. But what if he just... continued to not accept it. It's not like he ever wanted to be Exalt. He only has the right to rule because Emmeryn died—because he failed to protect her. It has nothing to do with any of his successes.

But if the Plegians made him their king, then it would be because of his own accomplishments.

And in a way I also can't help but find it heartwarming, because it was the Plegian people who got him to truly understand Emmeryn's ideals. He wanted peace, he wanted to follow her path, but it wasn't until the Plegians took her sacrifice for the peace offer it was and refused to continue fighting Ylisse that Chrom was finally able to comprehend what it meant that Emmeryn believed that all people wanted the same thing, that peace is something for everyone and not just purehearted saints like her who would never hurt a fly. So wouldn't it be sweet to expand on that existing connection? For the people who once bore a grudge against him and his nation to say, actually, our home is your home and you belong with us... For Chrom to reach back and decide that these are his people and that he will protect them...

Especially because that's what he's always done for Robin. Your father doesn't get to determine your path for you, your past doesn't dictate your future, you always have a place beside me because we are two halves of a greater whole. This AU is definitely a chrobin AU, because when Robin gets back I want them to rule at his side (after all, I do have feelings about Grima's loyalty to a people who have been praying to them to end their suffering for a thousand years).

Now, I do think that Chrom would never leave Ylisse while little Lucina was still growing up, but... Honestly it would probably take quite some time to establish a castle for Plegia's new ruler anyway (especially if they go super hard on the Altean revival theme and want it to be IN former Altean territory, which has become the "border wastes" and undoubtedly needs some help... But EVERYWHERE in Plegia needs help, so what better time to give the land some attention?) So when Lucina is an adult she can take over as Ylisse's true Exalt, and Chrom can focus his efforts on the other side of the border. I think he'd still be awkward about the whole thing, approaching it like "Well, I guess I'm here if you all still want me..." but Robin's there to give him confidence and the people there are SO excited for their hero to come and live with them and together they all usher in a new era of peace and prosperity as Ylisse and Plegia themselves become like two halves of a greater whole.

[s1urpjuic3]

Hi guys, it's me again, here to give my 2 cents on a another fandom.

Now, I felt the need to do this because as I pleasantly scroll through some Jarley content, I see 'Shipping a toxic couple is gross' 'Jarley is weird' 'Their not even together anymore' (If I could find the original post, I would so tag whoever made it because TODAY I CHOOSE VIOLENCE'

This literally might be my first ever (Omg they're so cute together as a kid. THis is my childhood right here. Jarley. Now, I respect and love her and Ivy as much as the next, but as a child, I didn't see the toxicity and the violence of Jarley, all I saw was my favorite cartoon villians, and it's just carried along to who I am now.

The main flaw about this is that THIS. IS. FICTION. Not even like, Game of Thrones or King of the Hill fiction. THIS SHIT WAS ORIGINALLY MEANT FOR FUCKING KIDS! Mf an 8 year old don't gaf abt or know about no abuse and shit. (Unless they come from that type of household, in which cases I completely respect that) Like, it's no reason that people should be this pressed over CHARACTERS that you literally can write them to act different. The writers of DC comics decided that 'Hey, this is how we want Joker, and he's never gonna change or treat Harley right' They could just as easily wrote it another way, henceforth, fanfic writers writing it a different way.

It's not about them being toxic it's about them matching each others' freaks. Everyone acts like Harley isn't fucking insane either like be so fr. She was gonna break eventually either way. The freakyness is rooted deep down inside her fr fr.

I personally/secretly wish their relationship was more like Cleo and Deuce from Monster High (Yes, I'm comparing them to someone again, I can't think of anyone else rn) Where; Yes, the Joker is mainly still and evil shitty Batman-obsessive weirdo, but he was always nice to Harley, and Harley was just like "Radical dude" (Lmaoooo) But in all seriousness, a plot where they both mutual respect each other, make realistic mistakes and hurt each other, but work it out in the end would have been great.

But I love the fact that the writers touched on the topic of abuse. I feel like not enough comics/media or anybody really talks about things women go through, or they romanticize it. I don't think anyone who ships Jarley wants to take away from what she went through. You can love them together and still not like what The Joker did to her. These feelings don't have to be mutually exclusive.

Anyways, this is too long again. Love y'all open minded Jivey fans. To the rest of y'all though? Eat dick and ☠️

(Side note: I reblogged a post on my page that talked about fans making Poison Ivy a one-dimentional character by making her entire personallity about Harley so HA SUCK ON THAT)

[amaiguri]

The WIP Questionaire

Thanks so so much from @verba-writing for the tag! I had such a fun time reading your answers too and I'm very excited for paranormal romance 😍

I feel like I wanna flag that a lot of my answers are very anime/gaming-sphere oriented and I hope I'm not totally alienating my mutuals by revealing just HOW MUCH I'm not a book person lololol But this is with what we're working:

The Questions are:

1. What was the first part of your wip that you created?

The very first thing I made was the high premise: It was synthesized from the Overly Sarcastic Productions question "What if all the Kings Under the Mountain came back...?" and then I added the context "...in a Nuclear Crisis to discuss piece?" And in my head, it was this HBO-style modern fantasy Game of Thrones meets West Wing type deal. But then... I didn't want to write the modern piece. (The modern piece should be written by people in countries from all over Europe about what it means to be a hero in various cultures.)

So I set it in 1800s fantasy world instead!

2. If your story was a TV show, what would the theme song/intro be?

The first arc would be Dance in the Game by Zaq

The second arc would be Lacrimosa by Kalafina

The Gods' Arc would be Paper Boquet by Mili

3. Who are your favourite characters you've made? Why?

Is it to cliché to be like "my current self-insert protagonist is my favorite character I've ever made"? Her and my antagonist are just THE BEST and I love them.

4. What other pieces of media do you think would share a fan base for your story?

Mmm, I think Untitled Yssaia Game's story would appeal to queer Game of Thrones fans who could FEEL the straightness in GoT, especially if they also like anime. I would hope I could get general anime fans as well as Arcane and Genshin Impact fans, but I feel like those are too mainstream and Yssaia is not. Realistically, I think I'm gonna get the Wadanohara people and the Ib people and, if I get really lucky, the To the Moon people.

5. What has been your biggest struggle with your wip?

Marketing lol -- explaining what it is to people in a way that they realize they want it.

6. Are there any animals in your story? Talk about them!

Fuafua 🥺🥺🥺

Look at her! She is a six-legged, six-eyed slug cat called a Maret. Marets fill the same role as ocelots in Yssaia, except they're more semi-aquatic like otters and their skin has a stressball-like texture.

7. How do your characters get around? (ex: trains, horses, cars, dragons, etc.)

They walk or ride Rumateurs (which are alpaca-like beings with ossicones) or take ships or airships or trains. I don't like writing about travel that much though so it is a background element.

8. What part of your wip are you working on rn?

I am pre-editing the first arc for my alpha readers and the third arc has another 50k to 100k words to draft. We're at like 250k words total right now and it is so unwieldy 😭😭😭

9. What aspects (tropes, maybe?) of your wip do you think will draw people in?

Oh, I have a convenient graphic for this. Hang on...

10. What are your hopes for your wip?

I was just diatribing about this earlier but the DREAM is to turn it into an RPGmaker adventure game and have it go viral and make a million bucks off it. I'd love to be the next Undertale but it'll never happen because I am not positioned to be the next Undertale, you know?

So yeah, that's what's what! Thanks again for the ask! This was so fun! I'm gonna pass this to @maiemorrae, @moonfeatherblue, @zebee-nyx, @winterandwords, @modernwritercraft, @words-after-midnight, @spideronthesun, @theprissythumbelina, @thepanplate, @thetruearchmagos, @maskedemerald, @moondust-bard, @pluttskutt and @emelkae 😍😍😍 I actually internalized Verba's WIP so well from this tag and I wanna make sure I'm updated on what all you cool people are working on! Open tag to any of my other moots too! 🥳

IMPORTANTTTTT⚠️

I will edit this to have a blank easily copy-and-pasteable question section when I get back to my computer. If I forget, @ me!