#BUT the lore of the url change was basically .. yes!

[jrueships]

This is lowkey a stupid ass question but is your username jrue ships like different ships involving jrue or is it jrue’s hips 😭😭😭

yes !

[flame-of-tar-valon]

musings on ffxiv politics in my very not-canon fanfic world:

so. firstly. I'm not precisely making any of these changes in the pursuit of 'realism'. I don't care how fantastical they are, really. any added complexity I introduce is purely in the interest of making them more interesting to write, for me.

now, a bit of context: I am a fan of Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time. in this series there is a focus on (fantasy) political maneuvering known as Daes Dae'mar, or the Game of Houses. this is essentially the process by which members of an aristocratic monarchy compete against one another for social position and political power, up to and including claims for thrones. Daes Dae'mar was very influential on my developing adolescent brain, to the point that two of my earliest tumblr urls were direct references to it.

so, naturally, I am motivated to flesh out the systems of governance for all of the relevant city-states. a lot of these are fleshed out in lore books or supplemental materials, but I am not referencing them while writing this post. I will reference them when writing my fic, though, so please bear with me if anything seems off. now, onto the meat of this post.

Part 1: Ul'dah

Ul'dah is the easiest, because it is the city-state with the most political intrigue of all of them. conflicts between the Sultana and the Syndicate erupt constantly, most notably in the 2.x MSQ. what I dislike about this is the way the game bends over backwards to keep the status quo. nanamo is a naive, powerless figurehead who wants to abdicate, but is poisoned before she can by a challenger. but yet ANOTHER opponent of hers swapped out the poison for a nonlethal one and orchestrated the former's execution at the hands of the sultana's fiercest defender! adeledji is an antagonist who wants to disrupt the status quo and has to be stopped; lolorito, on the other hand, profits from stability, so he saves the sultana's life, orchestrates adeleji's downfall, and covers up the entire thing to keep the peace — with strings attached.

how am I planning to change Ul'dah politics? first, by expanding the arena of potential future Syndicate members. the Syndicate is comprised of the six individuals who have provided the most wealth to the city, allegedly. how, then, is this wealth determined? is this a table where anyone rich enough can outbid someone for a seat? in my opinion, there needs to be competition for stations, influence, and financial power. maybe some of the seats are permanent: even just the head of the nation's military and church, respectively, leaving the other four seats up for grabs. THEN actually show the group of people vying for those last seats, show what happens when power changes hands — in canon, I'm not sure if the seats vacated by adeledji and raubahn were ever filled (unless pipin inherited his father's seat).

speaking of showing change: I don't want Nanamo to stay on the throne. she should dissolve the monarchy the way she originally planned to. yes it was naive, but the message of "oops ok I'll stay on the throne but learn to be more like lolorito but it's a good thing because I still have my pure heart <3" isn't something I'm interested in writing. have her abdicate. let it be messy. let her live a new life at the Silver Bazaar under a fake name.

Part 2: Limsa Lominsa

so Limsa Lominsa is in a really weird place as the most politically compelling to me and also the most disappointing execution to me. you have a bunch of major pirate* powers — in order to be a contender, all you need is a ship and a crew — and every seven years they have a contest and whoever wins is the dictator for the next seven years. that person's crew becomes the national military, but every other pirate crew is still out there, so the dictator needs to keep all her opposition happy. the dictator controls basically everything that is national — military, trade, land, treaties, law, whatnot.

to boil that down to "yeah the current ruler paused elections under martial law, outlawed piracy, and all three major opposition crews are fine with all that" is a bit of a letdown. sicard's duel was so cool! and hyllfyr's intervention was also badass! but I want things to be more complicated.

merlwyb's martial law has to end at some point. when it does, who will win rulership next, and what will her successor do with her ban on piracy and all her peace treaties? other crews won't always be content with not getting a seat at the planning table. but aside from the dictatorial crisis, consider: how is it decided which crews are politically significant enough to be worth mentioning? aside from merlwyb's League of Lost Bastards, there's rhoswen and carvallain who... have their thing going on, and hyllfyr who seems to just endorse merlwyb.

I want to explore how ambitious pirates with no fondness for taking orders scheme to rise to the top of the food chain, whether by taking the helm of the current powers or by steering their own crews into places of significance. I want to wade into the issue of how a curious libertarian autocracy accustomed to changing hands every seven years will need to change its inner workings to weather the tides of a changing political landscape as a post-piracy paradise.

also I love sicard. he will be a top player of Daes Dae'mar in my fic (and already is! if you haven't read How to Go Home Again, he's in [newly revised] chapter 2. gotta show up early to the msq these days. )

Part 3: Gridania

ok before I get started let me just say: I recently read that E-Sumi-Yan used to be the elder seedseer back at the start of 1.0. I'm bringing that back. nothing against Kan-E, it's just that for a position with 'Elder' in the title, a guy 200 years older than you probably deserves it more.

ok anyways. from what I read, Gridania is governed by a Seedseer Council who deliberate and discuss every issue of import before coming to a consensus. but on the brink of calamity, this slow deliberation was counterproductive, so they switched to just one person making decisions: Kan-E-Senna. I think they should switch back.

politics in Gridania seem to be much less linked to access to station and power, and much more linked to vested authority to carry out one's whims. those who are able and trained to interpret the elementals' will are given a lot of leeway in how they enforce their interpretation. they are not free from bias (looking at you, Hearer Marmaduke).

as it is presented ingame, there is not much room for the same internal politics in Gridania as in Ul'dah or Limsa Lominsa. I, however, think this is to Gridania's detriment, as internal political intrigue is one of the best ways to provide depth and investment into a setting.

in my fic, Gridania gets a couple shakeups, notably a mini-Greenwrath which calls the region's relationship to the Elementals into question. in the wake of this, there's groups of people who lose faith in entrusting the entire functioning of the city-state to the religious elite, and struggles for power take on a very "I know how to fix things better than they do" stance. I'm not fully sure what this will look like — Ul'dah has the Syndicate, and Limsa has the great pirate powers, but Gridania lacks a significant rulership opposition group. but I really WANT there to be one. Gridania needs it the most.

I think in order for that to happen, though, three region needs to stop being the Elementals' playpen. and I think the only way to stop painting it as such is to show how the Elementals in other parts of the world live. you cannot tell me that between Raincatcher Gully and Rootslake, only one of them has enough nature spirits to be significant to the running of that nation's government. (it probably has something to do with Amdapor, but I need to refresh my memory of the lore before I plan anything).

anyways. I'm struggling with planning the intrigue in the gridania chapters of my fic right now. that's why I decided to type this long-ass post.

[sadistpet]

MUNDAY QUESTIONS.

@mjm5655:

☀ ━ how long have you been roleplaying? how did you get into it?

oh my god okay i think since like. 2012...? i forgot the url of my first ever blog so i can't confirm, it might've been like december 2011, but definitely since 2012. so about 12 years ! i initially got into it via ask blogs which ykno. were all the rage back then. so that was my first roleplay... foray ig ?? i don't think i made a real roleplay blog until later, which was for a pokémon self insert oc of all things, but i'm prrrretty sure i deleted the blog years ago so i can't verify that, BUT i'm fairly sure because my initial ask blogs were pokémon themed.

so yeah ^-^ tldr about twelve years or so, and i got into it via pokémon ask blogs !

@viruslearnt:

♕ uwu ( which fictional characters are your favorites? )

GOD I HAVE TOO MANY. um. WAIT I FORGOT i have the perfect image for this here's my objectively correct mgs tier list that im not taking criticism on my partner said my category names were very raikovcore of me. and its true. but in WORDS raikov of course, raiden is also lovely little babie boy i love how bpd coded he is. i also love fortune and sniper wolf and eva because wamen. i love ocelot particularly in mgs3 because he's so autistic coded and silly and i love liquid snake because there's something wrong with me psychologically. otacon is so cringe nae nae baby but i adore him even though i want to scream whenever he speaks. i think those are my main ones

non-mgs wise though and more in general ? leo kasper from manhunt 2 ( who i also have a blog for because i have the impulse control of a hamster ), GLaDOS from portal, lisa garland from silent hill 1-3, mary from ib, clive dove from professor layton, and i think there's probably more but i fogor

@iobartach:

✮ ━ top three favorite muses that you’ve played

oh god. um. i genuinely think raikov is at the top of the list. writing him usually comes super easily to me, and that's not something i've experienced in a LONG time. it's genuinely such a fun experience to write him and i love the followers and friends i've gained from it. i really like the lore i've built for him and the intricacies i'm slowly weaving into his character. he's so silly and i care him very bad and i want to write him for a long time <3 um. let me look at my list

OH MY GOD YES tiff tannen from back to the future. like raikov she basically existed as a joke / throwaway line until she showed up in the comics, and i took that bitch and put everything i had into her. there's some shit i handled poorly and some stuff i'd change, but that community was so chill and she holds a special place in my heart. i might revive her blog one day. OH YEAH and if you google tiff tannen my rp blog still shows up on the first page

um. im gen not sure who else. i don't remember a lot of my time writing other muses. probably like some of my historical muses, or. yeah i cant remember. maybe my fnaf oc because that was the first time i got fanart of an oc and i felt like the gods themselves had bestowed it upon me

回 ━ what are your top four favorite shows?

chernobyl hbo is my favourite show ever of all time and it is the best show ever of all time factually contractually legally clinically and undisputably. i genuinely love every single facet of that show. it's what inspired me to get into researching nuclear radiation and that's what eventually led me to meet my partner ! i love that show so much it changed my life literally. i cried so hard. if you haven't watched it please do so on your platform of choice ( legal or no ) because it's genuinely amazing

neon genesis evangelion is probably one of my favourite shows ever of all time too, it hit so close to home and i'm obsessed with it. and even though none of the characters canonically have personality disorders, i find asuka and shinji to be super good representations of hpd and avpd respectively, which is great because you usually never see those anywhere ! it's so good. i also loved serial experiments lain but it hit too close to home in a way that i never want to watch it ever again because i think it will do irreparable damage to my psyche. but i really enjoyed it !

OTHERWISE i'm actually not much of a... show girlie. i like friday night dinner though i literally forgot it existed until my beloved mentioned it right now. um. most of the stuff i watch is like hell's kitchen, four in a bed, don't tell the bride, that type of shit because i'm apparently 47 years old. i have been watching dorohedoro, chainsaw man, and spy x family with my partner though !

[liyuesbian]

yeah I honestly liked all of the inazuma 5* quests we've done so far! I think they all added something to those respective characters, save for ayaka's (it did further her characterization but also,,, a literal date. I think it was endearing but it made her feel kinda 2d? idk) I feel like the first two were kinda filler mostly because 2.0 was sorta the calm before the storm,,, (although why were we so passive fjdsfks i feel like the traveler needs to seek out stuff by themselves more lmao) raiden is finally someone who's both girlboss and kind and not reduced to either extreme (or limited to "(hot) wife material"), which is very very good

about the archons: YEAH I love Zhongli very much but I think he owes the adepti (at least) a Full explanation... he did mention that he hinted to both the Qixing and adepti that he's not dead but ganyu's dialogue when we were getting glaze lilies for the rite of parting AAAA I was so miffed Zhongli couldn't have taken her aside to tell her right there. Xiao too, literally they would be so worried for him and they deserve to hear it from him personally dammit >:|

I think the reasoning for the "test" was like. the traveler has a voiceline that basically says: if people knew Morax walked through Liyue every day, they would just go to him for advice, hang onto his every word and try to analyze and reanalyze it all the time, like with Ningguang's paper snow. I feel like that would be the scenario if Morax stepped down peacefully, since everyone would know he still exists; he doesn't get a good retirement and Liyue still relies on gods too much. trying to drown the city was a bit overkill (childe... o-o) but I will hesitantly trust Zhongli when he says he could and would save Liyue if it truly needed him.

also true true! the people still really believe in the archons, even with barbatos who's been absent for so long (venti...), and even after their gnoses are gone and all. it's cool how they have vastly different governance styles but their whole nation More or Less respects them

baal/ei hate is so uncalled for though wtf. At least Raiden's still doing her job unlike her slacking coworkers Zhongli and Venti. and regardless of whether she's done right or wrong, people can like fictional characters who've done bad things.... why must you inject morality into your personal faves :| (genshin fandom highkey sucks oml)

yeah!! the resistance barely got a mention except for Gorou in the end scene, and it's like ??? the war is over? or? it just went by too fast and it felt like in the end the resistance were mere pawns, since the real stuff was resolved by us and Yae (paimon's line that's like "they aren't a match for the raiden shogun" at the battle cutscene is the epitome of the resistance in 2.3)

nobody has explained to me how the resistance got into Tenshukaku/Inazuma City in the first place either 😩 it is nice to see you, Kazuha and Gorou, but what are you doing here?

-welcometoteyvat (eh you can call me by mystic or my url lol, I don't really care, and I think I returned your rant with a longer rant too hsdfsa)

AJWADAH hi mystic! i love how this turned into a "thoughts about 2.1!" discussion into a whole genshin discussion #''1?2!! AND I'M ALL FOR THIS BACK AND FORTH THING

(here we go again, 2.1 spoilers below the cut)

yes!! this date thing with the female characters needs to stop... and actually, i would've loved to know more about baal's friends in the actual story quest (like with venti) instead of having to explore inazuma to find out more (but i will admit that i do lowkey like how the lore is hidden inside teyvat's nooks and crannies but in the case of la signora... not really. we should've learned more abt her first before her death instead of us having to look at an artifact set's description. i'll forgive mhy for this though - maybe we'll get to know her more when snezhnaya releases) and i share your sentiments about raiden/ei! what a girlboss!

MHM i wasn't gonna get into the whole thing with the adepti and venti's extreme laziness but hey, it's here now lmao and right?! but hinting is not good enough for me >:( AHHAHA he owes xiao and ganyu so much they're basically avid followers of his and they have history togther but he doesn't even tell them the truth?! >:(

yepp i remember that but even then, he could've just said "yo i'm stepping down. you won't know who i am bc i'll be anonymous or whatever"... and it seems like zhongli had already integrated himself well in liyue. nobody questioned his sudden appearance or mentions when he came to be wangsheng's consultant (maybe there is but i can't rmbr anything off the top of my head)

RIGHT?! goddamn raiden is trying her best out here!! i'm not excusing her actions or ei's ignorance towards the inazuman modern society pre-raiden quest but she's still trying to run her country and the corruption of a certain influential department didn't rly help either. (and yep the genshin fandom does suck D: we don't have to "moralise" every aspect of fiction!!)

exactlyyyy and again, traveller saves the day !!!! i get that they have main character armour or wtv but still, aren't they a bit too invincible? they defeated an actual ARCHON on the second try && i can't believe it only took two people to stop an entire war which had people suffering, trying to escape inazuma and the tenryou commission and some even went MAD and had personality changes when they lost their visions but now it's all fine and dandy?

OH MY GOD that's true! i didn't think about that.. how did the resistance get into tenshukaku so quickly when they were, what, two islands away?

sigh 2.1 was messy

[ambidextrousarcher]

Sarcastic StarBharat Reviews-Episode 22: In which horny deer rishis set off a chain of events.

Hello everyone! I’m back after a VERY long hiatus, had some real life issues to deal with, along with the aggravation of changing an url and some online drama too. And I’m right in time for Diwali, too, yay! Happy Diwali, people! Also Happy Children’s day!

Tagging my usual taglist: @ambitiousandcunning @medhasree @shaonharryandpannisim @hermioneaubreymiachase @hindumyththoughts @chaanv @ratnas-musings @whydoyoucareaboutmyusername @justahappyreindeer @milesbianmorales @allegoriesinmediasres @pratigyakrishnaki @iamnotthat @adishaktis @ratnas-musings. Enjoy your day, everyone!

Review is under the cut.

PS: Nila updates- The Sarcastic StarBharat review of episode 18 is missing from my blog for some reason, I’ll reupload it. Also, for anyone who’s listening to my song covers, the next items are Karam Ki Talwar from Arjun the Warrior Prince, Moh Moh Ke Dhage from Dum Laga Ke Haisha and Jo Beji Thi Dua, from Shangai.

 Okay. Rehash is in order, along with some new nicknames. Till the last episode, Madri has reached Hastinapur, the precap of the last episode makes it clear that this is the episode with horny deer rishis.

I had made a numbering mistake in counting the number of canon fails, my bad, so, as of now, we’re at canon fail #49.

Here’s the nickname rehash and additions to be made-

1. Bhishm-Mr. Paragon of Perfection

2. Dhritrashtra- Mr. Drama Queen (Honorary mention-DisasterRashtra, courtesy of @iamnotthat)

3. Pandu-Honey Boy/Lord of Cheesy Lines

4. Gandhari-Ms. Always Patnidharma

5. Shakuni-Mr. Ominous Music/Mr. Annoying Poseur

6. Karn-Mr. Glitterwash

7. Kunti-Ms. Melodrama/Lady of Cheesy Lines

8. Amba (deceased)-Psycho Princess

9. Satyavati-Psycho Mum

10. Vichitraveerya (deceased)-Drunk Kid

Here are the new additions:

11. Vidur (finally)- Picking the line where he likens himself to a thorn during Pandu’s coronation, he’s Mr. Weepy Thorn.

12. Madri-Ms. Smarmy Tears

13. Krishn-(Parody version, anyway, also, FINALLY) Mr. Excess Gyaandaan.

Now, let’s get to business.

Alright, so, last episode, Gandhari was told that Drama Queen wants her in his chambers. Being the aadarsh, Ms. Always Patnidharma that she is, she goes immediately, and that’s where today’s episode of choice begins.

She stumbles in and stutters out her usual ‘Husband?’ (International viewers, please note, Hotstar has rolled out the English subtitles for your most unfavorite show. It translates ‘Arya’ as Lord, but I’m keeping the ‘husband’ variation, because no.)

Anyway. He shushes her. ‘Don’t say anything, Gandhari, just listen. The mind is so weird, isn’t it?’ Okay…why this sudden volte face? Ah, he’s trying to apologise, I guess? He says that he was absorbed in his negative emotions of hurt, grief and jealousy, but when no news of Honey Boy came from the battlefield, he realized that he still worries and cares for his little brother, and that he was merely unfortunate, not conspired against, concluding that he was unjust to Honey Boy. O…kay? Should I count this as a canon fail? Canon Dhritrashtra can be two-faced, so eh, leave it.

Ms. Patnidharma is shaking her head next to him, because of course, she’s that much of a doormat. ‘I was unfair to you too. I had rejected you, Gandhari, but if I realise my mistake, will you accept me?’ Ah. I see what this is. Anvil-shadowing. Just before Pandu ‘loses’ his ability to ‘be a husband’ Drama Queen and Patnidharma make up with each other. Newsflash, writers: Nothing is this clean cut.

Of course, that was precisely the opening Ms. Patnidharma was waiting for, so she feels her husband up as they hug. Drama Queen’s heart, apparently, very anomalously, is overflowing with happiness, now that he has unloaded his weakness onto Patnidharma, or so he says. Don’t believe him, though, don’t be the naïve idiot Patnidharma is, because that weakness of his wreaks bloody wrecking ball havoc in the future.  

‘So what if I don’t become the King?’ Excuse me. I just choked on my water. What’s up with this volte-face? Just what? ‘I have more respect here than the King himself!’ I think I’m gonna count this as canon fail #50 because nah, he ain’t gonna say this in any adaptation that’s sane. And of course, since he’s randy too, it seems, he goes ‘When you give me a son, he’ll be the eldest son and King after Pandu. I’ll also get the pleasure of being a King. Will you give me the gift of such a talented son?’ Ah. So that’s what the volte-face is for. Canon fail #50 cancelled. Drama Queen would say anything at all to get his way, that’s right. Patnidharma, predictably, goes all gushy. ‘Yes, husband, for your sake, I’ll go to the portals of Yamlok themselves!’ Ah, sheesh, sometimes, watching this show makes me think that I should projectile-yeet myself to Yamlok.

He laughs. ‘When the time comes,’ he says, ‘we’ll go to the portals of death together, Gandhari.’ Well, that, at least, is true. He continues that they still have many happy moments to experience. She nods, melting into his embrace.

Scene changes to a green vista, the whickering of horses heard. Madri, henceforth known as Ms. Smarmy Tears, is laughing, Ms. Melodrama being stony faced and stoic. (That’s a change, though the music manages to make even THAT dramatic) The camera focuses on a deer, and Smarmy asks Honey Boy to stop, because it’s a beautiful deer. Okay…I know what’s coming up next. Anvil-shadowing, anyone? I realise it was very long ago when we were introduced to Ms. Melodrama, but I’ll give you a short rehash. She was introduced saving a deer from hunters. Anyone got the hint? It’s an obvious ‘Madri is an evil witch!’ gambit. Please do not take it. I know that in canon, Kunti and Madri probably had a fractious relationship given the whole fracas over the boon, but I refuse to believe Madri would be this transparently biatch-y.

And…bingo! Smarmy says that the deer is absolutely unique, and follows it up with a request for its skin. Melodrama, of course, is having none of it. She passionately launches into defence of the deer’s children who’d be orphaned, basically echoing her very first piece of dialogue on this show. Do you think there’s a chance that they dubbed it in? I mean…I wouldn’t be able to say that twice with a straight face. But, whatever gives, I guess. Fawn get orphaned often, goes Smarmy. It’s not like I’m asking you for the position of the Queen, can’t you do this much for me? Since StarB has a thing of making women either bitches or doormat ditches, its Honey Boy who cuts in. ‘Speak of good things alone.’ Did this guy get a theology class between the ‘war’ and this moment? ‘I’ll get the deer for you, the rest of you please stay here.’ And then the show takes yet another opportunity to set Melodrama as good and Smarmy as bad, as Melodrama tries to give Smarmy a moral lesson about abstaining from killing for no reason, and Smarmy going all casteist (not sure if that’s the right word, since afaik Kunti’s maternal family are also Kshatriyas? Yadava is not one family. It’s an entire dynasty.) And here’s canon fail #50 and #51. #50 is the fact that Pandu, in canon, hunts the deer because he wants to. Madri has nothing to do with it in the text. #51 because the jibe about Yadavs being shepherds that Madri makes smacks of a misconception about politics in the MBH. The idea of ‘Yadavas’ being shepherds is present because of the lore of Krishn and Balaram in Gokul. While I’m sure there might be some branches of the family that may dabble in those pursuits, typically, considering the social structure of that time, Kunti’s family is of quite royal pedigree.

The scene switches to Honey Boy looking for deer, listening attentively to the rustling leaves. Really, this question goes for canon too, haven’t these guys learnt a thing at all from the whole Dashrath/Sravan Kumar fracas? That it is TOTALLY not a good idea to just randomly shoot in a random forest, anyone? At least sight the prey a little, no?

Regardless, he shoots an arrow, the tell-tale thunk is heard, followed by a human scream (the typically serial-ish ‘nahi, nahi!’ aka ‘no, no!’). Alarmed, he sets off in pursuit of the sound. The camera focuses on a bloody arrow then showing us a rishi and a rishin. ‘Maharishi Kidam?’ exclaims Pandu. ‘It was you?’ ‘What have you done? You shot an arrow without recognizing me! I was dallying (read: deer hanky-panky-ing) with my wife in the form of a deer, and you shot an arrow without considering that the grace and the form of the deer could only mean it is such?’ Okay, for all that I want to call this canon fail #52, I’ll be honest…because such a scene, at least one of Pandu killing Kidama when he’s in sexual congress with his wife in the form of a deer does happen. Sometimes, *sigh* canon itself is quite strange.

But…in the whole of this thing, I have an observation to make, a few questions to ask, in the context of this serial:

1. Madri saw only one deer? What was the deer rishi doing, a deer mating ritual of some sort? Where was the wife then?

2. Does what he said mean that there might be…other rishis doing deer hanky panky?

3. Kidama was a rishi, right? He’d have figured out Pandu wants the ‘deer’ when he saw them and vanished? He could have, IDK, sprinted off real quick, or turned back into human, or just vanished once more. Why escalate it this much?

Honey Boy is very contrite and begs for forgiveness. Canon fail #53. In canon, he basically goes, well, Kings hunt deer, why cry about it? (That is, the dialogue given to Madri to establish her as ‘bad’)  The deer rishi brings up the Dashrath point I gave above and says that Honey Boy’s crime can’t be pardoned, that he shouldn’t have killed a man in congress with his wife, so he curses him that he’ll die the moment he’ll have congress with any woman. Canon fail #54. The original curse specifies ‘his loved one’ not any random woman.

Cue dramatic panoramic shot and dramatic title bgm. Honey Boy is in tears. The rishi dies.

Scene changes and we’re back in Hastina, where the court fool is entering. He says he has a lot of questions. Mr. Weepy Thorn prompts him to ask his questions. So there’s this long drawn out riddle session that’s set up to predict that Gandhari is pregnant, and Drama Queen will be experiencing the love of a son soon. There’s happiness all round, lots of hugs too. Of course, this show takes no rest from anvil shadowing either, so exactly at this moment enters Honey Boy with his wives. Honey Boy is welcomed with joy and immediately apprised of the news. In his head, the dying deer rishi’s words echo, even as his wives smile by his side. (Ah, apparently, there’s anvil juxtaposition, too! Whee!)

Anyway. Satyavati notices he ain’t looking happy and she asks him if he got what she said. He manages to sponge her off, hug his brother and congratulate him. When he does that, Annoying Poseur closes his eye.

As he ascends the throne, deer rishi’s words come back to him, asking what kind of a King he is. Honey Boy refrains from climbing the final stair, turning. He says that he has something of great importance to announce, confessing that he has killed Kidama and is no longer worthy of being a King.

His announcement is met with shock all around, as he renounces the throne of Hastina. Cue dramatic title bgm again. Camera focuses on Satyavati (who’s quite less psycho nowadays), then panning one by one to Drama Queen, Paragon of Perfection, Smarmy, Melodrama, Patnidharma, Ambika, Ambalika, a grinning Poseur (both eyes open), back to Honey boy and Mr. Paragon as he drops his angvastr limply.

Scene changes as Mr. Perfection walks inside Honey Boy’s chambers and they have an argument about his responsibilities. Honey Boy puts forward that for all that Satyavati wants a worthy King, he is no longer worthy, that even Indra renounced heaven for the killing of a sage and meditated for eons, that mere charity and abstinence as suggested by Mr. Thorn and Kripacharya won’t be enough. He continues that the duty of a King, the man who holds the royal scepter is to dispense justice to his people. He asks who would mete justice out on a King? The camera pans out to Mr. Perfection, standing mute, ending the episode.

Alright, this whole thing is canon fail #55. Pandu does not go back to Hastina, he sets out immediately to atone. Also #56, his wives know everything as he does. He doesn’t keep it hidden from them.

Precap: ‘But the crime was ours’ says Smarmy. ‘the punishment, however, has to be borne by our yet unborn children!’ ‘You can’t ever have children.’ Announces Honey Boy, going on to inform them of the curse.

[irkenheretic]

okay i promised id do it and im doing it: Explaining The Plot Of That AU I’m Vague About: The Post

(as i was preparing to write this i actually got my 250th follower, which slapped)

so i’m just gonna start with the simple version, which is this: it’s a rebel AU which primarily centers around the tallest, who are both defective. they give up on trying to make any meaningful changes as figureheads, and instead direct their attention to being involved with the “neo defect revolution,” or NDR. they do manage to make one change as tallest- there is a garbage dump planet turned into a sanctuary for defectives (who in this au are executed once discovered,) and eventually enough of the populace finds out about it that the tallest have to deal with it. they finesse their way into kicking it out of the empire, so now it’s its own planet with its own rules, governments, and most importantly, immigration policies and protections

a lot of stuff happens and it’s gonna be structured using arcs, and each arc has a separate protagonist/deuteragonist/tritagonist lineup (but that doesnt mean the same lineup won’t be used multiple times!) and yes the insane list of OCs are for this au alone: some arcs are very OC-centric, some have OCs as supporting characters, and a couple are all-OC or mostly-OC. 

its going to be very longform and it’ll span from the tallest’s elite training days to twenty years after zim arrives on earth. (the 20 year gap btwn zim arriving on earth and the story proper isnt as tightly plotted as later tho.) the point is to see how a revolution on the scale of the NDR works, who was fucked over by defact laws, who was fucked over by other laws, etc. theres a lot of lore and a lot of headcanons i made for this AU and even a conlang. i am a being of hubris. itll be a series of fics, some multichapter and some oneshots. 

the series as a whole is gonna be called Invader Zim: Annexed or just Annexed for short. its a pun on an irken word that sounds similar but means the exact opposite. i am not explaining more bc itll be explained in the fic itself. but thats why the tag for it is #anx lmao

i didnt mean for this to be as long as it got but under the cut im gonna breakdown some of the early arcs:

so it all starts with a fanfic called Love Is The H-Word (no the “h-word” isn’t “hell.) it centers around red and purple as elites-in-training, who do a little whoopsie and have an egg. purple doesnt wanna smuggle it into a smeetery, bc then he’ll never see it again, so they go to the defect sanctuary (still a part of the empire at this point.) purple knows he’s defective while red has a hard time accepting that he is as well, due to events from his past. but being around all these other defects are starting to wear down his denial, and the fic is all about that. it also sets up some plot stuff, like how defects adopted a self-identifier in the word “heretic,” hence the sanctuary being named, “heretirk.” (hey look my url!) (no, the “h-word” is not heretic, either.) 

i dont wanna say what happens in that fic bc spoilers, but stuff Happens. its also when we meet some ocs that end up being important, and the existence of others are foreshadowed. this is also where we meet the tallests’ future advisor, rarl kove, for the first time, as a local who decides to keep them company. purple bonds with kove due to their shared interest in politics, while red reluctantly bonds with titch, a young irken (a smeet in heretirken standards, an adult in imperial standards- did i mention he and red are roughly the same age? lol) who is interested in military stuff and thrill-seeking and general destruction. titch is pissed because he claims his father is stealthing on devastis as a military commander, but won’t let titch sneak in as a soldier, as titch is deaf. 

(fun facts: in the au, “titch” is regional slang for “a little bit.” ironically, titch the character is above-average in height.)

due to titch’s deafness, he developed “gesturespeak,” irken sign language, so he can communicate. this existing becomes important later

a oneshot called invade the system is right after h-word in publishing order. it details zim’s exploits in leaving foodcourtia, where he was assigned and infiltrating the invading academy he eventually graduates from (in this au, zim is too short to be an invader, which sucks because the hight minimums for the military are really short to begin with lmao)

the fic chronoligically after H-Word focuses on red and purple being back in their platoon on devastis, specifically red navigating his training and his relationships with two defective platoonmates, pon and zi (who are in h-word a little,) after the realization that he too is defective. it also focuses on how the irken military works, and how they train their soldiers. 

the first arc overall focuses on red and purple going thru training and such, and ends after they graduate and are on the field, working to get commander rank. (they planned to gain commander rank then leave and go back to heretirk to train an army there, as heretirk has.... no army.) in the middle of this, they’re pulled out and told they are to become the next tallest. they debate over staying and taking the job or just running to heretirk, and they ultimately decide to stay.

the next arc i call the “bridge,” tbh. its less tightly plotted than the other arcs; fics are spread apart from each other chronologically and all that. it spans the time after the tallest being appointed to a little after zim arrives on earth. it also has a couple of anthologies focusing on imperial defects- each chapter is a new character. these guys are all important and the easiest way for me to introduce their backstories without cluttering everything up is anthology style, lmao. other things that happen are a look into how the tallest work, eventually culminating with the resolution of the tallest having to Deal With Heretirk, tenn’s rescue from meekrob, and zim on earth obtaining a half-irken smeet named pip due to stealing an Unethical Science Experiment from dib (which is pip.) the bridge is basically just. “heres some stuff that happens between point A and point B so when we get to point B you’re not confused as all hell.” 

the next arc focuses on zim. in the first fic, pip is sick and zim is trying to get into his neighbor’s pants, to cope. this basically sets up that zim in this au has no idea how to find personal fulfillment in living- he’s only OK if he focuses on pleasing someone else, be it taking care of pip or doting on the neighbor, some rando human named piqu (pronounced, “peek.”) this is mainly a cute romance story with the underlying veneer of “a child is slowly and painfully dying” in the background. fun! 

without spoiling the circumstances, zim and pip end up on heretirk, which at this point is its own independent planet. pip is in the hospital for most of it so zim has to do his own thing. computer fans rejoice bc hes basically zims dad at this point, who tells him to go outside and get some fresh air and talk to the locals instead of schmooping or screaming in anxiety. im sneakily introducing more characters like ini, the “next-gen zim;” a short bio-engineer (she works on PAKs) who was constantly passed over by everyone because they dont trust someone that short or they dont trust someone that spazzy, even though shes actually brilliant. also her brother mo, who’s a pilot that NOBODY will teach military-class ships to (at this point, HTK has a population of ex-military that had their old ships, but still no formal army) because he doesnt talk and they think hes “slow” as a result. for the curious, he is physically able to talk most times, he just doesnt like it. zim ends up teaching him how to fly military-class which ends up being important laterrr

(haha ini and mo. wheres meenie and minie? ILL GET TO THEM)

no really, theyre quadruplets. named ini, myni, minie, and mo. these are real characters. 

minie isnt introduced till later. shes too cool to be the side character in someone elses arc. she is feel uncomfortable when we are not about her.

myni is busy palling around with pip and pip’s friend “elly” (real name elevenn, with two N’s.) elly is a half-meekrob War Crime Baby and tenn’s smeet. he has vision problems (he can “see” energy signatures of things, as opposed to conventional sight. everything is monochrome and he has to really focus to see like, words on a paper. also fuck tablets) but the trade-up is telekinetic powers (that he cant use too much or his brain will melt. fun!) this isnt relevant until the arc AFTER zim’s, where they end up poking around a historical site due to myni’s interest in that kind of thing, and they find logs of an old revolution (that was actually pretty successful in their goal, before they were caught and executed,) that lead them to a man named lefy. he helps with revolutions and helped these guys, and the trio go to seek him out; myni because he wants to impress his parents with helping them, pip because after they’ve recovered enough to walk around and do stuff, feel like they need to justify the choice to save their life and make their dad proud and all that, elly because he doesnt want pip to get hurt and die. And thats where the stuff REALLY starts happening and i cant tell u more sorry

this seemed kind of disjointed but thats bc i cant really be too detailed otherwise id like.... spoil it lmfao. but thats the summary of the first few arcs.

[corancoranthemagicalman]

‘twas tagged by the beloved mutual @kamwashere for a mutual tag game! 💕

why did you choose your url?

I was on the Voltron Amino and ended up doing an art collab. Most of the others were on Tumblr, and since I didn’t have one I just created one to be tagged in the collab. I RP’d Coran all the time and had basically been going by that name as I do now on occasion. Coran was my man. @/corancoranthegorgeousman was taken (by a rocking blogger who I don’t think is a mutual so I shan’t at) and so I think it was @robbingroses (a wonderful person and artist) who actually made the suggestion that stuck.

any side-blogs?

/sweats

...None that I use.

As mentioned before, used to be heavy into RP’ing whilst I was in the Voltron fandom, so I’ve got a bunch in relation to that. I also have two URLs that I really like saved, but I could never switch from being the magical man.

how long have you been on Tumblr?

Early 2018? Or something? That’s how long I’ve had my own account. Been stalking Tumblr since at least 2012.

do you have a queue tag?

I do despite not knowing how they work! The tag is ‘cqueue’, a play on words of my AO3 username CBlue. 

why did you start your blog in the first place?

As I’ve already lore dropped (whoops), I did it because of an art collab! Made sense to do it since I was already snooping all over the platform, and then just slowly migrated from the Amino based community to here. Now I’m stuck in Turbo Hell.

why did you choose your icon/pfp?

Currently? Because it’s a recent art and I’m trying to convince myself I’m an artist. I’m going to be changing it soon though, haha.

why did you choose your header?

Because I made a funny and found it funny. Also I listen to Radio Company too much so I have to dunk on myself.

what’s your post with the most notes?

I don’t... know? I’ve lost the site that configures that for me :(( I get like five notes on average for original posts so let’s just say I’m very popular amongst my peers ✌️

how many people do you follow?

okay to be fair most of them are dead as I literally was scrolling through them this morning. But I won’t say. 

have you ever made a shitpost?

all day e’ry day

how often do you use Tumblr?

I used to be normal. Then who the hell knows went on a hunting trip and the finale happened and now I’m here daily. I get my global news through tumblr memes, though. Like the morning paper.

did you have a fight/argument with a blog once? who won?

I mean yes and no? I’ve butted heads and narrowly avoided getting into heated back and forths, but I think I back off before it escalates into arguments or fights. I don’t get involved in that stuff anymore. Like, if people just get too negative for me or if they’re aggressive to me, I unfollow and block. I don’t have time to stress over fighting with someone in a space where I come to relax and have fun. I’ve got enough in my real world life with my real world consequences without debating on whether or not I should tag that post with John Winchester only for you to also tag it with John Winchester when you rebloggeed it from me. This is my good times space, so I don’t want to taint that with arguing and fighting.

That being said, maybe this just means I’m the loser in fights because I refuse to fight.

how do you feel about ‘you need to reblog this post’?

I think it’s terrible. I love informative posts. I love spreading information about important causes and even just different cultural things. But I cannot stand the anxiety-inducing pressure to reblog every little burning fire and asshole-CEO exposure or else I’m a terrible person. As mentioned before, I come here to relax. I know I said I get my global news through Tumblr memes, but I also try to stay strictly to the fandom side of blogging. Unless it’s a ‘cause that moves me enough to overlook the “you need to reblog this”, I hate facilitating that culture that I know causes people stress and anxiety.

do you like tag games?

Yeah! But I always feel bad because I’m terrible at tagging other people? Like what is a mutual? Is it a spiritual mutual? We follow each other but how active are we in each other’s notifs? Do they recognize my name like I recognize theirs?

So I just crumble and die.

do you like ask games?

Yeah I do! I’ve got a few asks from ask games still burning in my inbox. They’re only so late because I lost my computer for a bit like two months back when I kind of had the free time to answer them. Now the answers are slowly getting drafted so I can post them an awkward amount of time later and I hate it lol

which of your mutuals do you think is tumblr famous?

idk I think that @kamwashere blog might be pretty famous. Also again I wish I just... had an easier to view list of who my mutuals are? Not for this question but in general.

Mutuals sound off please I love you <3

do you have a crush on a mutual?

Hell yes ;)

[No I don’t lol. But I crush on mutuals in the sense of “please be my friend.” So friend-crush. I guess. But then the ones I actually actively think of as mutuals are my friends.]

Again, we’re supposed to tag mutuals. Here’s a few who I know are my mutuals, but no pressure to partake!!

@morai-the-swann-king @jitter-bugss @damejudyhench @you-cant-spell-subtext-without @blue-eyed-cutiepatootie 🌺

[peepingtoad]

THE POSITIVE & NEGATIVE; Mun & Muse - Meme.

fill out & repost ♥ This meme definitely favors canons more, but I hope OC’s still can make it somehow work with their own lore, and lil’ fandom of friends & mutuals. Multi-Muses pick the muse you are the most invested in atm.

My muse is:   canon / oc / au / canon-divergent / fandomless /

Is your character popular in the fandom?  YES / NO / 50-50 (There’s a lot of love and a lot of hate, but I think many are actually pretty neutral on him too!)

Is your character considered hot™ in the fandom?  YES / NO / 50-50 (I’d say he may be an... acquired taste? Of course a lot of people I know here find him sexie so it’s hard to say for certain, heh. We may just be the weirdos of the fandom :P )

Is your character considered strong in the fandom?  YES / NO

Are they underrated?  YES / NO (Not in terms of ability, but underrated for just how complex and multi-layered he is, I’d say)

Were they relevant for the main story?  YES / NO.

Were they relevant for the main character?  YES / NO /

Are they widely known in their world?  YES / NO.

How’s their reputation?  GOOD / BAD / NEUTRAL (I honestly think he’s a man of many reputations, both in canon and in fandom :’D)

How strictly do you follow canon?  —  I’m very much a ‘use the bones of what we got in canon and do my best to flesh them out’ kinda roleplayer. There are some things that can be taken too easily at face value that I see fit to build upon. For example, I think Jiraiya’s feelings on the prophecy and his relationship with Konoha is something that could be too easily played off as simplistic, or like they were immovable constants. But that’s unrealistic for a man of his years and many experiences, so I try to put myself in his emotional setting at various points in his life, and trace how his feelings and behaviours change, if that makes sense? 

I try to avoid saying that any of the writing was straight up wrong because it’s disrespectful to the creator. But especially for Jiraiya, who had such a significant role to play in the narrative that it sometimes took precedence over his actual character, I do find some of his actions, and the way some interactions were handled in the canon to be a little OOC... so I’ll work with it and try to spin it in a way that I feel fits how he was characterised.

Basically, I’d say that I follow canon, but I like to enrich it in areas that were lacking detail or a nuanced view that took in all the surrounding events of the time. After Jiraiya’s canon death, of course, that’s when more divergence comes in to my portrayal... otherwise I wouldn’t be able to play any post-war scenarios! But the essence of his character is the same, which I try to keep as close to canon as possible.

SELL YOUR MUSE! Aka try to list everything, which makes your muse interesting in your opinion to make them spicy for your mutuals.   —  A man of many experiences! You can bet that any topic that comes up, he’ll have some sort of amusing anecdote to share, or be able simply to talk shit about it. He's seen so much, and has a sensitive soul enough that he’ll give anyone a chance; he’s very open-minded and non-judgemental, and honestly is a humanitarian that wants to help those in need. Might leave your muse a little baffled as to how he could hold the status of ‘legend’, only to show it when they least expect it. You never quite know what you’re going to get with him: he’s generous and selfless, yet has many vices that seem selfish at times; he’s both a lover and a fearsome fighter; he’s immensely resilient at the same time as incredibly vulerable and damaged; he’s a himbo and a bit of a jock with the soul of a poet. Love him with no restraint and invite his love in return, and you’ll get not only a lover, but a devotee. Wears his heart on his sleeve... or does he? Chip away at him and find out!

Now the OPPOSITE, list everything why your muse could not be so interesting (even if you may not agree, what does the fandom perhaps think?).  —  The pervy, flirty, jokey schtick could get grating, or come across as disingenuous. In romantic situations, he’ll keep quiet about putting a label on whatever it is, and beneath his overall sweetness and devotion there may be an underlying reek of commitment issues and a fear of admitting he is afraid. He also has a habit of deflecting negativity in general, and playing things off as if they don’t matter or they’re a joke, making him actually rather a difficult person to get to know the heart of. One might feel as if they’re getting nowhere with him...

... Either that, or they get the complete opposite. Yes, as equally as he can be guarded, he can overshare like crazy, and has a tendency to become codependent with those he gets attached to, which is inconsistent with his free-spirited nature, and how adept he is at keeping others at arm’s length from his less sunny side. This inconsistency might make him seem unreliable—if the fact he’s always off who-knows-where doesn’t do the trick already.

What inspired you to rp your muse?  —  I’ve been a big fan of the Sannin ever since I first read the Deadlock, but being a very young person at the time I perhaps couldn’t relate enough to people who had experienced so much to do them justice in my teenage fic-writing endeavours, so I remained on the sidelines enjoying content by other people (there may also have been a little bit of ‘what the fuck, why do I dig the old dude so much’ denial in there haha). I’ve picked up and dropped my obsession with the series several times over the years, and my love for those three seemed to grow each time. They really are ‘the lost generation’, and as the sole survivors—alongside having a huge impact on the plot, how the shinobi world is shaped, and the three main protagonists—there’s a lot of juicy material there, a lot of emotional background, along with decades of history that basically goes untapped in the canon. 

Anyway, I digress. Coming to the Naruto RPC for the first time around this time 2 years ago at the age of 25, I made this blog and my Deidara one on a whim, but focused on the latter at first. Villains were always comfortable territory for me in my other RP experiences, and I think it made me doubt that I could possibly do someone who is frankly a lovely guy any justice, no matter how much I loved him. I even had the intention of making him fully Akatsuki/Missing-Nin AU at first. Yeah. That’s how stuck in my villain/anti-hero zone I was! But, I think in the end, the fact he actually isn’t a two-dimensional typical ‘hero’ was something I chewed over and realised would be incredibly enriching to write, worth stepping out of my comfort zone for. And being a little more mature and less angst-ridden myself by that point, I found I could resonate with his feelings and ideals in a way that I know I couldn’t have as a teen... but I was still tentative. 

Anyway, after leaving his blog empty for a bit (with its placeholder URL ‘frogdaddy’, which sadly got hoarded by someone else), I cosplayed the old bastard, along with my partner as Orochimaru. We’d been stanning that particular ship and talking about how great the Sannin are in general for quite some time by that point, but being casually in character for fun while drunk off my tits at a boat party, was a bit of an epiphanic moment. Not long after that, I threw myself right into writing this chaotic-good old bastard with gusto, and here I still am :’)

What keeps your inspiration going?  —  Taking breaks to recharge as and when I need to. Seriously. The death of all my other blogs has been pressure (mostly from myself) to be there and force myself to put out regular content, so I went into this not thinking that way and it’s really helped! 

Of course, there’s also the fact that there simply seems to be no shortage of areas I can delve into with this guy. Again, it’s his age and all the missing years in canon... but I think it’s also how much love he has and his genuine eagerness to engage with others that makes him one of the most naturally bountiful muses I’ve played. Because honestly? Most of my villain muses wanted people to just fuck off :’D this guy is open to everything.

That aside, I guess I just gel with him more than I ever expected to. I’ve changed a lot as a person and gained more confidence since various areas of my life got better, and I really just vibed with this chill, funny, romantic, pervy, big-hearted energy. I enjoy angst, but my real love is peppering the serious and heartbreaking with romance and comedy—and isn’t that just befitting of him? Writing through his eyes also helps to keep my outlook positive, so that keeps me stuck on him as much as the seemingly limitless content potential. 

And this is without even going into my cross-fandom AU ideas I have on the back-burner. Honestly, they’re there but I want to put a real effort into them while keeping his essence the same, which for some, involves brushing up on my lore!

Some more personal questions for the mun.

Give your mutuals some insight about the way you are in some matters, which could lead them to get more comfortable with you or perhaps not.

Do you think you give your character justice?  YES / NO.

Do you frequently write headcanons? YES / NO.

Do you sometimes write drabbles?  YES / NO / RARELY. (depends on whether I get a flash of inspiration—which mostly comes with random asks that happen to stir up an idea for a scene, such as this one (NSFW warning))

Do you think a lot about your Muse during the day?  YES / NO.

Are you confident in your portrayal?   YES / NO.

Are you confident in your writing?  YES / NO.

Are you a sensitive person?  YES / 50-50 /NO. (I tend not to take things personally but am also very passionate—call it my innate Leo-ness!)

Do you accept criticism well about your portrayal?  —  Hmmm. I haven’t actually had any critique on my portrayal, so I’m not sure haha! I’d say if it’s constructive, then I’ll take it into account and consider it, especially if it’s a case where it helps me realise I’ve perhaps not gotten across what I intended to very well. But I’m also quite fond of my portrayal in its essence, so I may end up just thanking the person for their opinion and carry on as usual :P

Do you like questions, which help you explore your character?  —  Absolutely! I’ve had some wonderful ones recently and it’s exactly the kick I need to get ideas out, some of which I’ve had on the back-burner but not had a framework within which to write it without it getting derailed. I definitely appreciate a question that will keep me at least a little on-topic, otherwise if I go off on my own volition I really tend to... well, go off! Even if a question is a similar topic to something I’ve already done, it’s a good exercise for me to go back to the similar headcanon and see if I can build further on it, deviate, and link it to show what past thoughts I’ve been working with. A great way of keeping some consistency in my portrayal while making improvements, I find! And then of course I’ve had some questions that are entirely new morsels for thought, and it leads me to something new and fresh, which I greatly appreciate.

Basically, any questions at all, fire away! I may take a while but I will get to them eventually!

If someone disagrees to a headcanon of yours, do you want to know why?  —  Yeah. I mean I think it’s just polite to present a reason as to why not, instead of just being like ‘this is wrong/a bad take’ or whatever. Source material is down to personal interpretation, so if I draw different ideas from it to another person after discussion, then we can simply agree to disagree on it. 

If someone disagrees with your portrayal, how would you take it?  —  They are welcome to disagree with me I guess? So long as they’re respectful and don’t then treat me as if my interpretation is ‘AU’ or talk about ‘canon Jiraiya’ as if he’s obviously a different entity to my own, then disagree away. But if prompted enough, know that I will most likely defend my portrayal with what I consider to be justification from the source material :P I did pay close attention to it, after all, and I do consider my portrayal to align well with it.

If someone really hates your character, how do you take it?  —  Depends on the nature of it and the conduct, really? Like, people are allowed to dislike characters. I myself find a couple of characters pretty annoying or don’t particularly care for them (granted, usually it’s in a love-to-hate or simply a ‘this character doesn’t interest me’ way), but that doesn’t affect how I behave towards the RPer of a character. It’s just manners, really. People tend to RP characters because they like them, so why would you take negativity right to their doorstep, in this space they’ve made as an expression of enjoyment for, and to develop said character? 

There’s been some people who admitted to me that they didn’t care much for Jiraiya, but then began to like him more with my portrayal and that’s more than fine; I take it as the highest compliment in fact. It’s also the kind of open-minded attitude I like to have with portrayals of characters I don’t necessarily like or have much interest in, because by and large, people do tend to add more depth and nuance than the busy and character-packed canon allowed.

However, if it’s the type of hate that’s got its own devoted circle of bitter bitches, who seem to use so much energy hating a character... then please, don’t engage me. Doesn’t matter who the character is, don’t expect me to follow/keep following your negative ass if it’s constant on the dash—and if the target character is any of the Sannin then frankly I’ll have probably blocked/blacklisted in a heartbeat. The ‘critical’ views of them tend to diminish them as humans, diminish the context and events that surrounded their choices, and in a way that I find is a gross double standard compared to what people will allow other (read: young, attractive, fandom faves, ‘babies’ or ‘beans’) to get away with and excuse the behaviours of. I don’t need that kinda negative energy sullying my hobby, nor do I need moral superiority that isn’t applied consistently across the board.

Are you okay with people pointing out your grammatical errors?  —  Absolutely! I meticulously fret and check, and cringe when I get a reply and happen to spot errors while rereading what I wrote before it! I edit a lot but don’t always pick up on errors, so I’m more than happy to have it pointed out. Chances are, I’ll be far more brutal to myself about it than anyone else would be!

Do you think you are easy going as a mun?   —  Overall, yeah. I’m not possessive or clingy (I don’t think) and don’t expect the world from people, nor for them to focus on or favour me or be super fast. I just expect the same respect in return. Having said that, I will express it when I don’t like something or it makes me uncomfortable, provided we’re familiar enough, because if we’re strangers I’d feel like I was coming across as entitled to your energy and emotional labour. I do my best to be diplomatic about it though, and rest assured it doesn’t mean I’m forever mad at you or turned off in any way just because I have a small grievance. I just find that being honest with each other rather than letting things pile up and fester makes a friendship more solid, and basically more genuine and long-lasting.

That’s about it, congrats for filling out!

Tagged by: @dokuhebi​ Tagging: Whoever hasn’t done this yet!

[goose-books]

Wait Max can I get a Max-assigned TMR name?? I'm asking in public because I want it to be permanent. I will be reborn as Dirt Bloodphone or something and everyone will know and I will have no ability to change it for the rest of my life just like in actual TMR (I think? I mean I guess I could re-trans.) Max please give me a name. (-yvesdot)

you know what, yves? i know you were expecting the answer to this ask to be a first name, a last name, and a cute little keysmash. but as i ruminated on your TMR name, i realized that there IS in fact a system and now i’m going to take the opportunity to climb on top of a metaphorical table and talk about THE TMR NAMES AND WHY THEY LOOK LIKE THAT.

first of all, i would like to have it on the record that you definitely can change your name! it usually happens for trans reasons, yes. probably... half? of the trans/nb characters in TMR have changed their first names, and one particular person (viridi doveswing) has changed his first and last name for partially trans reasons and partially... other reasons. so it can be done! although, of course, when i say “you,” i mean you in the hypothetical. general you. you, yves. specifically, will not be able to change your name once i assign it  (●´ω｀●)

tmr is a thing that has been growing for a long long time, very organically, and it’s gone through a multitude of changes (dark max drop the forbidden lore about how all of the characters started out as catpeople), and the worldbuilding built itself up very slowly! so first names in particular are very loose. they just need to sound like they could plausibly fit into a high fantasy setting. so we couldn’t have a lindsay, nor could we have a grusk baby name. but we can and do have everything from patch to winter to tasha! they just have to sound good and mesh decently with the other characters they’re involved with.

last names have a bit more structure to them. i deliberately gave all of the major characters last names connected to two of the major imagery motifs. we have plant names (eg dahlia, rowan hawthorne, tasha belladonna, moon marigold) and bird names (eg winter auklet, patch gosling, viridi dovewing). at least one very cool person, lily doveclaw, has a plant first name and a bird last name... which makes sense as she in particular is double important :)

lastly, of course, we must tangle with the royalty. the royal dynasties’ family names deliberately mirror each other: ravenfang and doveclaw. this is, of course, for the raven king and the dove king respectively; in general no one else has those words as part of their name, as it indicates a royal affiliation. the -fang and -claw suffixes are mostly for aesthetic. what’s that, you say? they sound like warrior cat names? well that is none of your business and i think “aurum ravenfang” sounds very pretty so there.

so! with the rules laid down. yves.

“yves” on its own actually works fine as long as we spell it “eves,” so that it refers to an evening, since that’s a natural world thing and basically the same as king dusk doveclaw’s name anyway. (singular “eve,” if it sounds better.) the “dot” is a little harder. if we wanted to go phonetically, we could look at dogwood or dahlias, on the plant side of things. or we could take “dot” literally and look at birds with spots — thrushes, wrens, types of hawk or owl (yes i googled spotted birds for this). so if you wanted to convert your name into something that would work for TMR, you might end up with something like Eve(s) Dogwood!

but of course you did not say, “max, convert my URL into a passable TMR-verse name.” you said, “max, assign me a ridiculous TMR name on par with Dirt Bloodphone.” and thus i bend the rules very slightly to designate you henceforth and always as Woodpecker Bloodbook and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.

[hopoo]

RoR2 Q&A 12/2/17

Since we got a million asks, I’ll collapse all the answers periodically into one giant QA so it doesn’t ruin your tumblr feed. I tried to answer every question - if yours isnt there, someone else might’ve asked the same question. Expand below to read!

Q: Are you thinking about putting out a beta version to test or are you just waiting for the game to be fully released A: Not sure exactly how we want to do it – we HAVE to have some way of getting the game out to testers, especially for networking/matchmaking testing. It will most likely be some form of closed/limited beta, but we really haven’t though too much about it.

Q: Any ideas on what the system requirements could be? Will they be high or playable on most machines? Also will it work with integrated graphics? A: Most likely the game will be pretty light for GPU with our graphical style, but CPU intensive. What that actually translates to won’t be until the game is closer to launch, where we start optimizing.

Q: ROR1 most loved thing me and my friends liked to do is ruining the framerate with all the items that we had. we had lots of fun crashing the game for whoever hosted the game. might this still be able to happen? I'm looking forward to the release anyway and so are my friends especialy with peer to peer now we can connect better. A: Uhh hopefuly you won’t be able to crash the game, but the game will still scale infinitely like it did previously

Q: Could you make it so that when you use Unstable Watch and timestop, all colors in the game become inverted for the duration? And if you want to go all the way with a certain reference, have only Chef's cleavers stop in midair at the edge of a radius from an enemy, and when the timestop ends the cleavers hit at the same time. A: No memes

Q: Super excites for risk of rain 2. Im real glad i found it in a steam summer sale, bought then and after that bought it for my ps4. Are we going to see any new characters? (Bandit will always be fav so as long as hes good im happy) A: Yes, definitely new characters!

Q: can you make one of the new death messages be "HOST WHEN?" A: No memes!!!!

Q: While Vita's out of the question, what about the Switch, which basically seems to have slotted itself in the 'more powerful handheld device' niche? A: We’d obviously love to be on the switch, but that ultimately depends on A. can we optimize the game to run on the Switch, and B. do we have the technical know-how to actually get it running? Porting to consoles tends to be a much more dramatic change than people expect, even if the engine natively exports to it.

Q: Hi. I’ve been a fan of risk of rain for the past few years. I just want to ask: in risk of rain, some mechanics like heaven cracker can pierce a line of enemies and the huntress’ ability to hit and run. With the change from 2D to 3D  environment, how will they work? There are many other abilities and mechanics that i also want to ask about, but these two were the first ones that i could remember immediately. A: We’re not going to bring back any mechanics that don’t fit just for the sake of continuity – however, the Heaven Cracker I can see being actually more fun in 3D since you have to actually align yourself with the enemies. Since everyone can shoot and run in the 3D version, Huntress’ niche is sorta gone, but we have some clever ideas to make that back

Q: In DevBlog #8 you explain some of the steam integration going into Risk of Rain 2 which will make a lot of people happy but will RoR2 also be available without steam for those who prefer? For example will I be able to buy it on GOG like I did RoR1, and play LAN games without steam? A: Right now we’re focusing on making it work via Steam P2P, but (I believe) that we haven’t done anything to explicity lock out connections via IP. You just won’t get the same Nat punchthrough benefits (I’ll have to ask Jeff, our network dude about it to make sure this is correct, but afaik I think that’s right)

Q: Would you guys happen to have an idea of when you think the game would be realeased? A: Nope! Hopefully not too long!

Q: Hello! I loved Risk of Rain 1 and it is great to play with friends. I have two questions (technically three, I'm cheating). 1. I am assuming you're going to release it on steam, so that said will there be steam multiplayer integration? Like... Invite via steam, games are created with the help of steam peer-to-peer. It was a pain to get 4 people playing on one server without port forwarding. 2. Will there be a better way to keep track of items? 3. Can you add a menu to see what items you have? A: Yes, steam invites and all that are the goal. I know we talked about holding TAB to expand the item menu so you could see more at once, but we haven’t actually done that yet. I know it was a bit silly for it to be uncropped and expanding off the screen.

Q: Is this still in development? A: No we’re just pretending

Q: Are you gonna have the same soundtrack from the first game? A different soundtrack? A mix of both? (Don't get rid of the Dried Lake or Sunken Tombs songs). A: That’ll ultimately be up to Chris, but I’m sure he’s in the same boat as us and doesn’t want to cover the same ground that we did previously.

Q: I was telling a friend how excited I was for this, and he expressed a concern I’d like to ask you guys about. He said that, being 3D, the game might end up either not as hectic as the first, or too hectic, what with the hoards coming from all around you. What’s your take on this? (I’m not actually too worried about it, but I still wanna hear your take on the matter.) A: Currently, we’re using SFX as a tool to present not only how close an enemy is, but what state they’re in and how many there are. Since I’ve also been playing the game for like a million hours I’ve also developed the ability to recognize which enemy by the frequency of their screenshake… but that won’t be relevant to most players. We’re really hoping to avoid radars or anything like that for awareness.

Q: Just wanted to say, RoR2 is looking to be coming along fantastically. I really love that you are constantly taking things in unexpected directions-- I never expected to see the game translated to 3D but you have done it and I can imagine many hundreds of hours spent playing. Will Chris Christodoulou be working on the music this game as well? A: Yes, he will be back!

Q: Have you considered calling the second Risk of Rain "Risk of Twain"? A: Not until now

Q: This is kind of a question and a half. How big will the RoR2 maps be and will all the RoR1 maps return in 3D with the additions of new maps or just overall new maps? A: Overall we’re not really looking at the previous maps for the inspiration for our new ones – we’re not making RoR 3D, but a sequel, so we don’t really want to recreate too much old stuff!

Q: Since RoR2 is moving to more dynamic network model, how will people with screwy NATs be affected? NAT Punchthrough is great and all, but if implemented incorrectly can lead to multiple users on the same NAT being unable to join servers outside of the NAT (See Rainbow Six Siege). Will users still be able to host dedicated servers like the old game? What does this mean for users buying the game through GOG/Humble Bundle? Really hope everything goes swimmingly because port forwarding sucks. A: This is the exact reason that we will have to have some form of limited beta, because this is something that we can’t recreate in office. I honestly don’t know enough to respond accurately on what would happen in that particular situation, but thanks for the heads up

Q: Relative to the first one, will Risk of Rain 2 be a sequel, prequel, completely unrelated, or even have story at all? A: Sequel!

Q: How were you going to implement artifacts this time around? Is it going to be based around areas that are randomly generated and you sometimes have access, or multiple spawn locations, etc. A:  Dunno, we haven’t implemented really any form of map permutations yet. The artifacts also ended up taking a much more important role in the game than we initially expected – not sure if the old way of unlocking is strange if it’s to be a core feature.

Q: (Big fan) I just had some curious questions; How many characters do you intend there to be in RoR2?, How differently do you plan on changing the previous characters?, Any hints on the final boss? pls, What is the estimated price of the game? and will their be any chance of PvP? Cannot wait, super hyped and keep up the great work :D A: We’re aiming for 10 characters on launch. No spoilers or hints! Definitely not PvP in any official capacity since the networking structure wasn’t designed for a good PvP experience.

Q: I've got three questions : 1) Will it be called RoR2 or will you find / have you found something else ? 2) Why the hell is there one more 'o' in the tumblr URL than in the actual 'Hopoo' name ? 3) What's the average of the team's favorite meals ? thx xoxo <3 A: I think it’ll just be RoR2. The hopoo tumblr was taken on creation of this tumblr, so we had to make it hopooo instead ☹

Q: Will RoR2 reveal why the Contact Light was carrying a teleporter linked to a planet crammed with hostile lifeforms? A: I’d like to explore what the heck is up with the humans in this game, but I sorta wish I had a better avenue that’s not just item logs and monster logs.

Q: I'm going to ask the real questions, is Sniper a man or woman? This is important because reasons. A:

Q: Theres something that confuses me alot about risk of rain 2. It's the lore. If the characters have left the planet, why would they come back? A: Canonically, the returning characters were never on the Contact Light to begin with (and presumably there could totally be like, a bunch of engineers and commando suits.)