#Dimension20 is SO REAL

[verosvault]

I need Dimension20 Fan Friends 😭✋

I really need Dimension20 Fan Friends to talk to. 😭😭

I want someone to talk with about my dying love for Sklonda Gukgak and Cathilda

I want someone to talk with about how I Love The Unsleeping City so bad and how it's currently my favorite D20 season even though I haven't watched all of them yet. 💀

I want someone to talk with about how BAD I LOVE Aelwyn and Adaine's sister relationship! 😭✋

I want someone to talk with about how HOT Garthy O'Brien is! 😭✋

Also like...Sandra Lynn??!! She's AMAZING!!

I want to have long talks with someone about Riz Gukgak and Baron and Kalina and how Murph always manages to make characters that punch me in the gut of my emotions (looking at Riz Gukgak, Kugrash, and Gerard)

I want to talk with someone about my love for Sokhbarr! And Je'er'em'ih! And John Feathers! And how DOPE it was when Sokhbarr summoned a lava mog!

I'm- This show has me in shambles just- CONSTANTLY! It's on my mind 24/7 and I can never get rid of it. Brennan Lee Mulligan and the Intrepid Heroes. 7 people that really know how to ruin my life in the BEST way POSSIBLE. 🥲🥲

I've been watching Dimension20 in Chronological order as well as trying to keep up with the new stuff when it comes out. So yeah- I'm on Mice&Murder rn and it's already gonna be one of my top favorite seasons. I can already just tell. 🥲🥲 it's- Yeah....I have no one to talk about it with though and I'm going onto episode 7 hopefully soon. 🥲🥲

I need more D20 friends. 😭✋

I haven't watched all the seasons so I don't wanna get spoiled from future seasons but I need people to talk with. It hurts to keep all my fangirl thoughts about this show inside. 😭 That's why I started up this blog in the first place tbh. 😭✋

I'm desperate. Help. 💀

I also have Instagram and Discord. 🥴👌

[sunflowerdragonsunny]

Welcome to Dimension 20 in this episode our intrepid heros are taking a real fucking standardized test. Flip over your scantrons.

[feelingtheaster99]

Oh, don’t mind me, i’m just BOWING down to the acting prowess of one Emily Axford in Neverafter Episode 4

[figscigfigs]

as someone who played little red in into the woods and has a reoccurring nightmare as little red riding hood trying to save the pigs, ylfa is my only option

[verosvault]

Literally I agree with EVERYTHING @rat-king-kugrash SAID!!!

I haven't finished all of the Dimension20 seasons but "The Unsleeping City" is still my #1 favorite season!!! It's SO STRONG and SO EMOTIONAL!!! The storytelling is SO AMAZING!!!

I also feel like I have some kind of appreciation for stories with strong themes considering that The Unsleeping City and Mentopolis are definitely among my top favorite seasons! 💀💀❤️❤️ OH! I LOVE IT SO BAD!!

All of the character arcs in TUC! I- I can't even say in words how GOOD they all are! I'm-

It feels SO REAL!

Kugrash's character development is by far my FAVORITE IN TUC! IT'S SO- IT'S- It's not that it's relatable but it makes SO MUCH SENSE???? Like...It feels like such a TRUE, REAL LIFE SITUATION?! I'M- AND KUGRASH IS LITERALLY A RAT MAN?! UGH! I'M EMOTIONAL!! 😭😭✋✋

no villain speech has ever stuck with me like robert moses’ short manifesto from his conversation with kingston. people think they make choices. they think they’re gonna steer left, or steer right. but they didn’t build the roads. the big choices already got made for them, a long time ago.

because he’s RIGHT. not about his takeaway, obviously, which is just “and that’s how it should be.” but the statement itself is true. they DIDN’T build the roads. people are told over and over that because they “make choices” the outcomes of those choices are their responsibility, and that it’s freedom, even. they think they’re gonna choose to steer left, and then they crash. they choose which auto insurance they have. they choose what new car to buy. and that’s freedom. but they didn’t choose to be required to drive a dangerous vehicle an hour away to work their life away at a job they don’t care about just to keep themselves alive. they can only live their lives in a narrow framework, a structure sustained by a threat of imprisonment and violence. they didn’t build the system. they didn’t build the country, or even the concept of a country. they didn’t build the laws, they didn’t build the city, and they sure as hell didn’t build the roads.

[isit-allover]

she’s so real for this

(ID: a screenshot from siobhan thompson’s instagram story, a repost from @/dimension20.memes of the simpsons ‘do it for her’ meme edited to have pictures of emily axford)

[easays]

To Ragh; or, On Fatness

Hi! Below is an actual play mini-essay. These are written as part of a personal writing practice of thinking critically about actual play. I hope you find this reading engaging and know that all I write reflects my own interpretations rather than as an official representation/canonization of these shows. Keep reading for my interpretation of Ragh Barkrock's fatness as part of queer representation in Dimension20.

Ragh Barkrock may be one of the most beloved NPCs in Dimension20. It would be easy for Ragh, a bloodrush player good enough to potentially play professionally, to be presented as hypermasculine. In fact, the freshmen year art for Ragh, when he was antagonist rather than beloved ally, showed him in a muscular, inverted Dorito shaped body typical of a jock.

He's, obviously, built, and his cut jaw and cheekbones only bolster that image. As Ragh comes to terms with being gay at the end of Fantasy High, his countenance changes. When we see him again, the new art reflects a chubbier, happier Ragh.

The show aligning weight gain with acceptance and happiness already works against prevailing stereotypes that use weight loss as a quick metaphor for improving yourself and being the "real you." Moreover, connecting Ragh's acceptance of his sexuality with what seems like a larger comfort in his own body is a strong indictment of hypermasculine gay culture. As Gabriel Arana writes, gay men "must reconcile their sense of masculinity with their failure to conform to its heterosexuality." Not doing so has negative mental health outcomes, as Arana points out, and contributes to a culture that devalues fat queer people (see the popular "no fats, no femmes, no Asians" that often is touted in masculine gay subculture).

All of this, I think, is why Ragh's art for Junior Year was particularly impactful for me as a fat queer person. If being a gay man (or half-Orc, in Ragh's case) means having to situate your life in relationship to failing compulsory masculinity, then it seems there is an inherent queer aspect to embracing, celebrating, and showcasing a beloved NPC in an explicitly fat and happy body.

FHJY Ragh art by @caitmayart

Ragh is still strong and he is still fat. His body radiates a commitment to the power of fat bodies to exist in spaces they are often violently unwelcome in, such as gyms. Existing in gyms and sports spaces as fat people means dealing the "impossible standard that rejects nearly all of us" and upholds a diet culture rooted in impossible, Eurocentric and colonial body standards. In TTRPGS or actual plays, there is a unique opportunity to think about how bodies might exist in worlds different from ours, to imagine bodyminds as otherwise. However, as queer critics like Paul Preciado have noted, sci-fi and fantasy representations of cyborgs and other transformative bodies often lean into "fixing" disabled people or moving gender nonconforming bodies more easily towards technologies upholding a normative standard rather than questioning the standard all together.

Spyre is a world that deals with similar issues to ours, even without direct one-to-one correlations, so it, too, is a place where the narrative and artistic choices should be examined in how it helps us interpolate the world the audience resides in. From the Applebees cultish adherence to a deity-based nationalism to the various representations of parental neglect and abuse and every side story in-between, Dimension20's flagship show does not shy away from difficult realities even when recasting them through fantasy. Ragh, as a half-orc gay son of a disabled single mother, then, I see the arc his fat body goes through as meaningful and intertwined with his self-acceptance and queerness. He moves away from the toxic masculinity engineered into his blood rush team to instead pursue coalition comraderie with his friends to the point that he and his mother end up joining a communal living situation with those friends and their parents. Ragh's body expands as his family does, as his ties to community do, and to me, the gift of his fatness is the invitation to expansion that it holds out to us as viewers.

[yourheartinyourmouth]

whoever does the captioning for Dimension20 is doing a real bang up job. the captions are so descriptive, especially when people are doing silly voices or miming things with a vocal component. it’s the first time i’ve seen captions that actually captioned what’s happening, and that include the people relying on captions into the jokes and fun. it’s fantastic and i love the crew for this show so much, they’re all doing excellent work.

[figuerockfaeth]

the full dndads crew on dimension20 agenda is so real

they keep appearing on dropout i promise you it is coming

[theobscurepotato]

Dear Yuletide Writer 2024

Dear Yuletide Writer:

First off, thank you! I hope you are as excited about your assignment as I am to receive it. Hopefully the lateness of my Yuletide letter didn’t panic you too much! I enjoy a wide variety of fic, and these are truly some of my favorite canons, so really you can’t go wrong...but if you are looking for a spark of inspiration, I hope this letter provides it.  

General Likes/Dislikes: 

Things I love in a Yuletide fic: M/M, UST, hurt/comfort, banter, happy endings. When I look at the canons I chose, one consistent theme is that they all end on a note of hope, yet the characters I chose within these canons don't always get to experience that. I think, more than anything, what I would love to see is a chance for these characters to catch a glimmer of it for themselves (or for each other, in the canons where I've selected a pairing). 

Things I generally don’t like in a Yuletide fic: AU’s set outside of the canon setting (coffee shop, etc), MPREG, graphic gore, body horror, unhappy endings. That being said, if you have a wild idea that goes against these, these are definitely more loose guidelines than DNW’s. 

___

Coldfire Trilogy

Damien Vryce/Gerald Tarrant Not sure if there will ever be a Yuletide where I don't request CFT fic. I do write frequently for this fandom, but just because I write in a certain style, please don’t restrict yourself to my “usual” topics. For this canon especially, I’m excited to read what you want to write.  I’m starting my millionth re-read of the trilogy, so I am excited to read anything set either during canon, or a post-canon fix-it. Give me all the banter. Give me all the UST. Give me Gerald Tarrant doing something kind (while doing mental gymnastics to justify it to himself as FOR SELFISH REASONS ONLY). Give me Damien forgetting to agonize over what GT is and just enjoying a moment with him (bonus points for him Prophet!fanboying). Give me physical contact of some sort between them, give me the soul bond! I ship these two hard, but I am happy to read pre-slash/gen.

Dimension20: Escape from the Bloodkeep

Leiland (Kraz-Thun) I watched Escape from the Bloodkeep 2 months ago(?) and once I was done, I immediately restarted it and watched the series again. Bloodkeep has some of my favorite Dropout cast characters, but of course it was Matt Mercer’s Leiland who stole the show for me. Someone on Reddit summed up Leiland as “All that dark power and regal lineage turned into a benny hill skit” and in response I can only say, that’s exactly why I’m here. I am happy with both pre and post-canon fic, gen or shippy (and not picky on ship). I’d really love to see Leiland navigate how to be Leiland, and not Kraz-Thun, and getting more comfortable in the “evil” found family he has created. Galfast Hamhead, while not requested, is of course 1000% welcome in any story.  Yoroiden Samurai Troopers (Ronin Warriors)

Shuten/Rajura

This was my first real fandom, well over two decades ago now, and Shuten/Rajura was my first ship. I definitely carried a binder plastered outside with the Masho chibi from Amanda Swiftgold’s page and stuffed to the brim with too much printed fic from Mink’s Yaoi Cake archive. This was a rare ship even then, and I am absolutely fine with gen, and fics that include all the Masho. I would of course love a fix-it fic, but I am open to exploring missing canon scenes also. I would enjoy a fic either from Rajura or Shuten’s perspective that grapples with their encounter out on the tracks, and that sprinkles in some of their shared complex history. Feel free to bend canon details in terms of what the armor enables. 

Uprooted

Solya/Marek These two have taken up residence in my brain and will not leave me alone. They truly enable each other in a way that is absolutely toxic, but I would love a fic that lets them attempt to do better by each other. I would prefer that Marek lives in your fic, whether that means exploring pre-canon events, or a missing scene during their story, and I would definitely enjoy a fix-it (just think of the hurt/comfort possibilities!) where they get to figure out their version of a happy ending. How do they navigate a world where they both wield less power? Would they be able to make their peace enough with that to carve out something new? Or would they chafe against that lack of power, and it would be that struggle that entwines them further?

[verosvault]

🚨SPOILERS FOR FANTASY HIGH JUNIOR YEAR EPISODE 6🚨

Dimension20 "Fantasy High Junior Year"

Episode 6 "Party Politics"

Timestamp: 1:46:15

Video Length: 45sec.

Jawbone is an angel! 😭✋

Jawbone has a giant cup of tea. He's in his cardigan with some workout shorts and fuzzy bunny slippers! 😭✋

Adaine: "Thank you. Thank you." *Takes his tea*

Jawbone: "Oh, Uh-oh! Uh-oh, what do we got going on here?"

Adaine: "There's so much sugar."

Jawbone: "Late night study party, huh?"

Kristen: "A real dark night of the soul."

Jawbone: "Hey now."

Kristen touches Jawbone's neck so hard! 😭✋

Adaine: "Kristen got re-dumped." 😭✋

Jawbone: "My niece can be a piece of work. Come here, kiddo."

Kristen: "She was actually kinda nice about it. I love her."

The awesome caption team: (Brennan cringing) 😭✋

Jawbone: "Maybe when the sun's not out, we go on a nice little ride, maybe get a little picnic, PB&J's out on the grass, sunset."

Kristen: "Who's this man? Who's this angel?" 😭✋

[dumpster-fire-sapphic-failgirl]

Okay, so, due to the nature of Dimension20 and Fantasy High specifically, most of the NPCs live in a space between trope and caricature

Brennan being Brennan (and the Intrepid Heroes being the Intrepid Heroes) those tropes are often turned on their head and the caricature belies something deeper, but as a starting point, they are all larger than life, none more so than Arthur Aguefort himself

Which brings me to Worlds Beyond Number, and the Wizard Sly

Aguefort is a cartoon character. He wouldn’t feel out of place in a sitcom (with or without laugh track)

Sly, in the 30 minutes or so of screen time we’ve got so far, feels like a fully fleshed out, real person. Eccentric but not played for laughs.

and i’ve been thinking that, for the last day or so, there’s this thread between them (something more than “magical old black man”) and i think i landed on it

Time

What is chronomancy but divination turned up to 11?

These two men seek to make the world a better place through their knowledge of time. They can be gruff, but give good advice. They mentor multiple generations of young heroes. They both have red birds that seem near and dear to them.

The more i think about it, it’s not a thread that binds them. They, thus far, seem like two sides of the same coin. The Wizard Sly seems very much to be Arthur Aguefort freed from the hijinks of Solace and burdened with a more grounded world

… you know, with his capacity for shenanigans, i wouldn’t put it past Arthur to have dimension hopped and found himself having to run a long con

it’s like, super unlikely

but…

[howlbear]

I'm going to be so real rn if Ayda doesn't win I may just burn everything down please don't ruin this for me

[Image ID: a promo for Dimension20's "The Pinners circle" pin of the month voting bracket]

[unsleepingtales]

I am home for passover so I might not get to watch the whole thing in one go but regardless it’s time for episode sixteen!!

I’m so excited to finally get some backstories!!

They all look Great today.

Oh! Fun!

Thank god they’re looking at her file

Kipperlilly loved her friends :(

SHE CAME UP WITH THE NAME 😭

Oisin and Ivy pitched the ratgrinders :(

Did jace fucking kill these children

Something happened in those mountains

When you start saying a thing.

You really do gotta honor the cock.

BEARDSLEYYYYY

A grim whisper of banana pancakes

OH MY GOD THEY WERE RIGHT I SAW SOMEONE POST ABOUT THIS THEORIZING THAT BOBBY WAS ONE OF SANDRA LYNN’S OLD PARTY MEMBERS FUCK

Sklonda x Sandra Lynn you will always be special to me <3<3

Return of the van!

Beardsleyyyy

That’s so cool. That tree thing is so goddamn cool.

If they’re fucking with Gorgug’s house I’m gonna be so pissed off

Gileariel baby real <3

Brennan thank you for reminding Ally to talk to Bucky

Did Aelwyn get another five cats. Didn’t she have ten.

Yayyyy Aelwyn’s back <3

Fucking brutal

(vaguely British accent) I’m Kristen

I love how IMMEDIATELY Ally went in on the simulacrum

Hey I cast legend lord on you and nothing came up. Yeah.

AnUs mention!

I love that we all know these details about how wikipedia sorts things

Brutal! Honestly! The Abernant sisters don’t pull punches!

This is a joint ☺️

One of my favorite things about watching the intrepid heroes is the physical comedy. It has definitely informed my physicality when rping and playing d&d

Bitchhhhhhh

Mastermind Rogue!

Hard cream soda oh god

Rizwalda 😭

Fascinated by the teacher evaluations. What mechanic purpose does this serve. Or is it just to immerse the players further in the school thing.

Second Kristen is straight because real Kristen thinks British people are straight

You need to respect my life!

Official date!!

What are you DOING

White knuckling control of the date setting

Yessss I love the pun

Ally’s thousand yard stare at the mention of the buzz saw

RIZ IS PAID FACULTY FABIAN REMEMBER THIS PLEASE

I love the chill music that plays when we see Mazey

Gertieeeee

He’s such a good friend

Brennan’s so good at the seething face

My bank tells me 😡

Corsicaaaaaa

They’re so married

Adaine’s little ice cream party what if I cried

Sandra Lynnnnn

I’m not very good at being a kid. Oh god. FUCK.

‼️BIDEN MENTION‼️

I can be competent because you guys are there when I need you 😭

Oh my god. Mothers and daughters and mothers and daughters and mothers and daughters.

It’s alliterative!!

Poly Zara! <3

I do actually love the reading of the comments

Liar. Frumpy. Wrong.

Damn alright I guess that’s all for this episode of dimension20

Looking forward to next week! I will have just gotten home from a concert that I will be going to after a transatlantic flight that morning and also I’ll be done with essays one way or another so I’ll be all kinds of loopy!

[virusvisal]

I’m really enjoying Dimension20′s Neverafter, I’m a real sucker for fairy tales, so I also wanted to draw Ylfa ‘cause I love her, she is such a nice polite girl in a very monstrous situation haha. Instead of drawing her in a normal or wolf version I thought it would be more fun go for a mid-transformation version, when she is starting to go berserk.

[greenerteacups]

Fic Masterpost

Oh, boy. Okay. Here we go.

I have written literally hundreds of thousands of words of fic, and this is where you can find it! Consider this a kind of annotated bibliography.

Harry Potter

Lionheart

Harry Potter, Draco Malfoy/Hermione Granger | 300,000 words and counting

How Draco Malfoy met a girl on a train, ruined his life, started a war, and ended one.

Notes: Oh, honey. This is my baby. The longest fic I've ever written, the currently running one, and the one I'm most fond of. A Gryffindor!Draco AU that retraces all 7 books. Slowburn Dramione (SLOW, slow burn, a simmer, currently more like a suntanning) with Golden Quartet vibes. I pre-write all the books and then release them in weekly updates, kinda like a serial publication, so you always know when your next hit is coming!

Volume I, "Green and Golden," composed of Years 1-3, finished early in 2023. It's currently releasing Volume II, "Son and Heir," which just finished the first act of Year 4.

/

The Climb

Harry Potter, Severus Snape & Harry Potter | 22,000 words

"...in the event that I, Lily Evans Potter, and my husband, James Potter, become deceased," read Albus, "I do hereby name Severus Snape as sole legal custodian of my son, Harry James Potter, until such a time as he comes of age." He folded his glasses on the table. "Fuck," said Severus, with feeling.

Notes: An unexpected brainworm that I had while compiling a Severus playlist for Lionheart, which rapidly spiraled out of control. It's a "Severus raises Harry" fic, which I never had a taste for until I started writing this — I realized there was so much more juice in the narrative idea than I'd realized. I like how I use voice and style here; I think I made a real leap in technique between SWHTWW and this one.

//

Other

the scenes which hold the waking world

Six of Crows, Kaz Brekker/Inej Ghafa, Matthias Helvar/Nina Zenik, Jesper Fahey/Wylan van Eck | 70,000 words

Thirty million dollars for a secret. That's the payout for Kaz Brekker, the most dangerous, ruthless, and talented extractor in the dream industry — if he can manage it. But to have a chance, he needs the best. That means finding a team willing to attempt the impossible: a knife-wielding cat burglar, a college dropout with perfect aim, a sullen ex-Navy SEAL, a drop-dead gorgeous former Soviet spy, and the estranged son of their rich employer. If they can avoid killing each other, they'll go down in history. If they can't, none of them may wake up again.

Notes: This was my first novel-length fic, and I'll always have a soft spot for it. It's an Inception AU with the vibes of Leverage meets Ocean's 11, with a side of psychological trouble and codependency. Read if you like spy movies, heist stories, or dangerous criminals whose Achilles heel is being unable to stop talking shit to each other.

/

someday we'll linger in the sun

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Namor of Talokan/Shuri | 40,000 words

As the legends have it, after she earned the blessings of Bast, the Princess Shuri took a god for a lover. The legends say less about what happened in between.

Notes: Another drabble that spiraled wildly out of control. (You may notice a theme.) I watched Black Panther over Christmas break and thought, "Wow, that's an incredible storyline that didn't actually happen, wish someone would write it." Technically unfinished, but I think the existing chapters serve as a complete story. Unfortunately, no plans to come back to this one; I might mark it as finished at some point, because it feels settled to me.

/

it's a western, henry

Dimension20: Fantasy High, Riz Gukgak/Fabian Aramais Seacaster | 10,000 words

Nobody fantasizes about kissing goblins in the moonlight, or taking them out on ice cream dates after class. Especially not beautiful half-elves on the bloodrush team, who could have anybody they wanted (and probably do). It's the beginning of a bad joke. A goblin and a half-elf walk into a tower... And the goblin ends up slain on the floor while the half-elf walks out with the princess.

Notes: My first fic, which started as a writing exercise. A character study in fantasy race relations and a love story between a nerd and a jock in which the jock is the anxious one. Working title for a while was "it's not easy being green," before I found the fancy Siken line. I still think there's some good humor in here, and I like rereading it from time to time.