#Ended up being in the game and also how much I ended up actually caring about it once it came to actually playing the game

[fishyfishyfishtimes]

The polls are soon ending! I think this is a good time to talk about my personal favourite location, Ember Twin :)

Honest to cod I didn’t expect to care too much about the Hourglass Twins when I started the game! My followers already know that I’m an aquatic environments fan through and through, I tend to like them the most in any given piece of media and find them the most interesting. While exploring I did my research one planet at a time, starting from Timber Hearth, to Giant’s Deep, to Brittle Hollow, to the Ember Twin. I was pleasantly surprised…

I don’t know when it started, likely in the midst of doing several repeated visits to the Ember Twin since going to places and exploring them has a time limit (moreso than the game usually has), but I started to really like the atmosphere of Ember Twin. Firstly, the concept is cool as hell: two planets that orbit around one another exchanging sand between them. What!!! That’s awesome!!!! Like twin stars but you can actually get in there! And then there’s the environment itself. The red-orange stone of the surface and cave walls, the sun that’s nearly always in the sky, the massive canyons and crevices and tunnels, it’s beautiful. Ember Twin and Ash Twin do not settle for just being “generic desert” and go hard into one extreme which makes them lots more unique, either being super rocky with canyons or basically just all sand. I know that some people find the caverns of Ember Twin claustrophobic — and the squashed-to-death animation and sound is pretty morbid — but in a way they’re also comforting? Despite being in this dark maze of tunnels you know exactly where to go, no one can get you, you can do your own little adventures. You sort of feel like a kid adventuring around their home town, which is funny, because that’s just the position that many Nomai children were in, literally exploring the caverns and stepping stones and tunnels of their home!

Speaking of, the locations of Ember Twin are so cool! I can’t get enough of the Sunless City, it’s confined underground but still feels really big. I really like the High Energy Lab and Quantum Moon Locator, Nomai design is really fun to see and, well, I just find myself really liking the various locators and machines lol. Feels really major. The lakebed cave, it took me a while to figure it out, but it was always sort of comical to fly my ship directly into the canyon and then drop down when it would inevitably get stuck in the walls. I think the equatorial canyon is really cool (and scary! But cool) and the paths on the sides offer the same comfort as the caves themselves. And! Chert! Chert is there! Chert is my favourite Hearthian!!! Science rules!!!! :DD I also really like flying from place to place! A lot of Outer Wilds locations have a gravity similar to Timber Hearth (or um. I guess just three? Timber Hearth itself, Brittle Hollow, Giant’s Deep — which actually has more gravity. Though recall those are the places I went to first!) which means that you basically use your boosting power only for big jumps. But Ember Twin? Why, you can circle that whole planet with ease! It’s just so fun to start from say, Chert’s camp, jetpack your way into the sky, and then go around the planet to another location super fast. You’re free! :D

Even though the sand tends to halt your exploration at some point or another, the feeling of getting to one certain place in time or getting a crucial piece of information just in time feels really good also. At some point I was trying to figure out how to get to a room as the sand was rising up dangerously close — I realised how to do it and got in just in the nick of time! I felt really accomplished about discovering everything in the Sunless City hehe

So yeah! Cool atmosphere, cool locations, cool Hearthian, hot and dry environment!

[otome-dissection]

Finished yakuza 7

Holy shit

Ryo Aoki

[yourgamemasterthewhiterabbit]

Of my 2% capacity to be attracted to anyone, my type is like 90% women, 5% pretty men and 5% men you would swear are super fucking manly, and never questioned being straight and cis, but are now suddenly *stressed* that they can't figure out why their attraction to me [fully socially interpreted as a woman and labelled that way up until relatively recently] feels incredibly fucking gay

[gay-artificer]

I've seen people be like downpour ruined how people see five pebbles and im gonna be honest if you were here for any number of years pre-downpour the fandom was always god-awful with the nuance in his character. thats not a downpour thing thats a fandom thing

[mabaris]

alright so now that we’ve gotten some actual crumbs, it feels like it’s a good time to lay out my prediction for what da4 is going to look like. writing this in a letter and mailing it to myself

we are part of an underground organization formed from the ruins of the inquisition to stop solas from ending the world

meanwhile the wardens have been researching the blight/the location of the archdemons and discover some secret about the location of the black city/what is actually contained in it

we’re supposed to be shocked at the reveal that the evanuris are trapped in the black city and the maker doesn’t exist

the ancient elves were in control of some crazy mutating technology (like in hormak) and that was the original source of the darkspawn. the whole thing about them being from the deep roads and a dwarf concern was actually just a red herring, they’re just underground because they’re powered by lyrium and this has ALSO been an elf thing the whole time :)

anyway, now we need to Double Make Sure the veil stays up because the evanuris have something even worse cooking up in the black city and we need to prevent them from unleashing a super blight and destroying all life, and our job is to convince solas to give up, not because we disagree with his plan but because his actions will have unintended consequences. even if he doesn’t care about everyone else and wants to rebuild the world, he won’t even be able to do THAT because the super blight will kill elves too. so although we WERE enemies we will have to band together to defeat the greater threat etc. it will be optional to recruit him as an ally/advisor, or you can just fight him directly and take control of his forces

we will have to cross into the fade AGAIN and storm the black city directly to put a stop to whatever’s going on in there

[chronurgy]

Okay since it looks like we're really actually genuinely going to (probably) get a new dragon age game soon, here's some (specifically story) stuff I'm hoping to see:

Kal Sharok - either a companion from there or a chance to go there, please please please I HAVE to learn what their deal is

Anderfels companion, especially a warden one - I'd love to get into messy warden politics in the country they rule but don't technically rule

Minrathous - I've needed this city injected into my veins ever since I saw that neon lit, floating building concept art and learned they host laser light shows there it looks sick as hell and I can't wait to see them contrast the barbaric south with the enlightened north and the horrible bloodshed that sustains it 🖤

Par vollen or any sort of permanent qunari settlement - more information about everyday life under the qun please! It's obviously hard to do that when the qunari don't make alliances as a rule and also they're actively at war with the imperium and the rest of thedas, but still

A religious schism within the qun - the qun is all about things following their proper nature, but who decides what the proper nature of things is? People, of course! And people will always disagree. It'd be interesting to meet an offshoot who claim that they're the ones following the "true" qun and it's actually the rest of qunari society that has failed to follow the correct path (I know this will never happen, no one else in the world would actually want to play religious schism simulator 4)

A foreign born mage who came to tevinter to avoid or escape the circle could be fascinating - I think there's a lot of conflict embedded in that character that could be used to great effect. What's their social class in tevinter? How do they justify the things they see? Do they even try?

Sick fucked up red lyrium magic - lyrium potions restore mana, what do red lyrium potions do? Hopefully let you do horrible and fucked up magic. Red lyrium was so cool in da2 and I'd be ecstatic if they'd return to those roots for it

Antiva - a plutocracy with a haunted marsh? Sign me the fuck up

The half destroyed ruins of a city decimated during a past blight - make the blight scary! Remind us of all that has been lost, and let us see some of that history firsthand

Just ANY followup on the lore from the descent dlc - can we get more about the titans please???

A diversity of opinions on Solas and his plan among the dalish - please let them be people with conflicting beliefs and desires and not just one monolithic group I'm begging

Related to the point above - a dalish companion would be excellent, especially if they could help bring that insight to the party

I wanted to get this out before we see the trailer and gameplay so I'm definitely forgetting some stuff. This is also just my personal list of things I'd like to see. I'll probably do another one focusing on more gameplay and mechanical things.

[torgawl]

what is an "i love you" compared to when dainsleif said "defeat me, command me to step aside, show me that you are worthier than i to rescue her" and "my memory has all but faded completely... but i will always remember how much she too, loved these flowers"?

[seraph-chim]

gueeeeehhhhhhhhggghhhhhhhhhhh i wanna write a sonadow sickfic but like. The Logistics.

[darkaac]

ac valhalla was not unlike eating dirt

[jinghengs]

i wholeheartedly, genuinely, cannot believe my quality of life has been increasing bc of a fucking gacha game

[ruvviks]

made the realization my vampire story would work best as a video game and now i can't stop thinking about it

[waywardsalt]

now bc of that one post abt zelda getting fridged whenever that one guy directs a zelda game im thinking abt tetra just getting turned to stone in ph and like. what would it have been like if she were an actual character in ph. what would she have done how would this have changed the story

[greyedian]

ok ok fuck it I'm gonna try to be brave and actually work on Sterling and Gale's whole uhhhh situation bc I started a new bg3 run with my friend so now they're back occupying my brain. Again. Sooo... *carefully opens document*

[followerofmercy]

Networking/Knowing A Guy: A Guide

This is the autism website. Now, as an extension of the power of love and friendship, there are few things more useful than Knowing A Guy. Knowing A Guy means you have a support network. Knowing a plumber, or a tax accountant, or just that one dude that's really fucking good at finding the information you need when you're really overwhelmed, can be the difference between being able to pay rent and having a fun party with friends to fix your shit.

How does one end up Knowing A Guy? It's a skill you can develop called Networking and it is one of the foundations of society. Unfortunately making those connections with people is fucking hard and nobody makes a tutorial for it. So, here you go:

The golden rule is you scratch my back and I scratch yours

It is necessary for survival to seek out useful people

Great news! Everyone is useful in some form or fashion - including you! When given the opportunity to learn about someone, do it! Extroversion does not come naturally to some people and that's okay. Just take whatever falls in your lap.

Types of usefulness: trade skills, connections of their own, personality you jive with, pleasant to talk to, niche interest in shared hobby, security - the list is pretty much endless. I know a guy that lives in the metro area - no job, no major hobbies, inoffensively annoying to me personally, kinda ignorant, not attractive to me, but you know what? He knows how the fuck to get around the city by foot. My rural-raised ass APPRECIATES the guide.

Remember important information: general personality, background, skillset, likes and dislikes. You can find this information by making smalltalk about their life. There is no such thing as pointless conversation. (Yes, even the annoying smalltalk)

The more people you know, the higher the likelihood that one of them will be useful in a given situation - or will know someone who is.

It is overwhelming. In a given clique/community/workspace/whatever, there is A Guy Who Knows The Other Guys. This Guy is a shortcut. Find them. They're often elderly, extroverted, a little bit annoying, a secretary or in some otherwise forward-facing position. Look for people that are gossipy/talk about other people a lot but not in negative ways. If they constantly talk shit, they'll talk shit about you too. They're still useful but be careful with the information you share

You do not have to like someone for them to be useful.

You do not have to like someone for them to be useful.*

If you have low self esteem, you're going to feel like you're using people. You're not. That's the devil talking. People like feeling valued and the connections you are making are the threads holding community together. Recognize people for their talents. It's only a problem when you're taking advantage of people

So: don't feel scummy about it. You're an animal. You have to claw out your right to survive and people will respect you more for it.

Luckily mutualism is the name of the game in the animal kingdom. Offer something back. The foundation of a Know A Guy relationship is Mutual Benefit

Sometimes that Mutual Benefit is just spreading news of the The Guy far and wide. My plumber friend is my actual friend and I love her to death, but I'm maintaining our backscratch relationship by pimping out her plumbing business to anyone that'll listen

Food is a good Mutual Benefit. People across cultures for all of human history have bonded over food. I have good success asking people for a favor and then offering to buy them lunch in return **

General compensation is also good. Offer a service in return and always do your best to offer financial compensation as appropriate. Having your plumber friend take a look at your drain: doable with a case of beer. Having your plumber friend redo the pipes in your entire house? You need to pay for that.

Being transactional is not necessarily a bad thing. I would advise against keeping an itemized list of things owed, but fish don't seek out cleaner shrimp just because they enjoy their company. Everyone gets something

Unfortunately being extroverted and generally personable is a huge benefit here, but that's the value of the Guy That Knows A Guy. There's someone out there that has consolidated All The Guys so you don't have to be the local expert. Always remember nobody can do everything and you don't need to master every skill

* This is the foundation of a functioning community. I have many acquaintances that I find incredibly annoying. They include doctors, welders, artists, social workers, lawyers, construction crew and random fuckers at the grocery store. I do not hang out with them. I do not have to in order to maintain a civil Know A Guy relationship. I can drop them useful tidbits and fuck right off so I don't have to spend any more time than necessary with them

** People may assume romantic intent. Be prepared for that. I generally denote that it's a friendly/work lunch by calling them bro at some point if they're my age. Otherwise my general demeanor is sufficient to show that I do this with everyone

Source: personal experience, mother's teachings of crime, booth vending and poverty

[the-cooler-king]

Oh yeah..... midnight gospel be hitting.... sitting in my bed fuckin. Crying. Get a grip girl

[mayspicer]

Ok, the boss is no more! There were some super stressful moments but surprisingly we all survived o:

My animal companion got hit with disintegrate, but we had hero points to make him avoid it. I would cry actually, because disintegrate means no resurrection x_x

The war is prevented! At least this one, because Cayden's party is right at the center of a much bigger one just starting. Today we saved the country. Cayden is trying to not even save the whole world, just maybe slow the whole thing down and save as much people as possible...