#Like I think even if you're not a writer there is value in learning how to put into words your thoughts and feelings on things

[i-will-physically-fight-you]

The other day I was having a "struggle day" with writing. Nothing I write is coming out fluid, it is sluggish and stilted. I spent a majority of my time writing outlines, trying to tether abstract images that flicker like a distorted slideshow across my brain to a more concrete tangible form.

But if I was to tell certain people in my life this, their first suggestion would be, "If you're struggling with writing, you should use ChatGPT to help you!"

Pushing past the ethics debacle aside for a moment, I don't know how to describe how much that doesn't help with my plight. As much as I dislike creating a rough draft, it is where the idea takes birth. It's through writing the initial scene where I discover a character's motivation or a facet of the world that never crosses my mind until I begin carving away at its rough edges.

The machine doesn't understand the way I'd take a plot point and expand upon it. The machine can't capture my exact phrasing. Technology hasn't developed enough to take a vague idea sloshing inside my skull and glimmer it into existence in front of me in exactly the way I wanted it to be.

I don't always enjoy the rough draft process, but it is a crucial part of the process. I don't want a "paint by numbers" experience. I want to start with a blank canvas and finish with a nauseating, illustrative kaleidoscope of my innermost thoughts and feelings. I want my hands to be stained by the ink and sweat of my own efforts.

I don't care if I get "lost in the past" for wanting that, I'd rather let my words be unfettered and untainted by the uniformity of what a machine thinks is the most "right" way of phrasing words based on trillions of words unrightfully seized by avarice.

[mykmi]

txt as your boyfriends (sfw)

pairing: txt x gn!reader genre: fluff, headcanons warnings: none ig? tell me if there's anything btw!! a/n: i hope it was worth the waiting :(( i have writer's block constantly so i try very hard to not make y'all wait for too long, sooo enjoy!!!

| choi yeonjun |

likes to show up together at every event or party

he just likes the idea that you both belong with each other, he's so proud he has someone like you so why not show you off a little bit? and if course he likes it vice versa ;))

loves to take care of you, especially when you're tired or sick

tries cooking for you but the kitchen is a total mess... he's not necessarily neat so cleaning is mostly on you.... he's just too clumsy for it

very affectionate and communicative about his feelings

he's very emotionally available and every time there's a problem he's ready to talk it out and solve it together, so you almost never argue

probably confessed first

no but like i really do believe he's someone who would make the first move, who would take you out on fancy restaurants dates and shopping dates, who would confess his feelings first and just would do most of the work lol

needs a lot of reassurance about his work and appearance

he's sometimes insecure and too harsh on himself, as he's a very hardworking perfectionist, so he needs support and some nice words from time to time just to feel better

| choi soobin |

professional yapper

yaps to you all the fucking time. when members are tired of his yapping, they just send him off to you. “take it, it's yours” they say, pushing him into the room to you and closing the door. and what else can you do besides just listen to all of that?

dates by him are usually calm

every time he plans a date, it's usually something that wouldn't take a lot of energy, so you'd spend more time talking

very genuine with you

he just lets his guard down whenever he's around you, and it means he's relaxed the most with you. he's childish, giggly, and honest

lets you take the lead

y'all i believe he'd rarely make the first move, and it keeps on going. he can take the lead, but he'd rather not, especially in something like going out or talking to the waiters

nerdy af

spends 90% of his free time playing video games, showing off his skills to you and teaching you how to play (it's a bonus if you're a gamer like him); he likes a gf who is interested in learning ab his hobbies ^^

| choi beomgyu |

encourages you to step out of your comfort zone

he is the kind of person who will help you and try something new with you, even if it's stressful or scary for both of y'all. he will encourage the hell out of you so there's nothing left to do than to try

words are his weapon

no matter if it's about the volume of his words or the value, but both ways, they're very significant ;)

very attentive

buys you the best gifts, prepares the best dates, and remembers everything about you; he thinks it's important to show how much you matter to him

needs some private time

he's an introvert and no matter how loud he is, he's sometimes tired of being in a company. gyu needs to be alone pretty often, but he will make this up to you when he recharges

the best listener

he loves listening to you and doesn't really care what specifically you're talking ab.. sometimes he spaces out, but most of the time he listens :)))

| kang taehyun |

acts of service is his love language

he doesn't really say 'i love you', but he shows his love through small and not-so-small actions. he plans dates for anniversaries, gifts you flowers every now and then, and is a gentleman ^^

shares his knowledge with you

it's not a secret that he's very smart, and he loves sharing his knowledge with you; he only does this, when you ask ab something tho

impresses you all the time

no matter if it's his magic tricks, his physical appeareance or his knowledge and if he does this on purpose or not, but he does constantly impress you

plans his future with you

he shows how serious relationships are to him and includes you in his future, your future house, your future pet, and possible future family :)))

is never boring

he loves adventures and excitement, and he bring those into your relationship too. you'll go on spontaneous trips, some exotic places or concerts just to have fun

| huening kai |

sharing is caring

shares his things with you, whether it be hoodies, plushies, or food, he shares and sometimes doesn't even notice this

quiet and embarrassed 90% of the time

he doesn't like talking ab himself, so he listens to you. he's not so self-confident, so he gets embarrassed a lot. he'd be thankful for lots of reassurance, or else he might doubt himself :((

loves physical affection

it's easy for him to show how much he loves someone by touching them. he loves hugging, holding hands, kissing you, caressing your tummy, and anything related to physical affection

babies you a lot

loves treating you with special care and treatment, doing everything for you (including chores), and taking care of you all the time

the most supportive

is interested in everything you do, attends any events that are important to you and always praises you for your good work ^^

✉ thank you for reading ✉

[ofbreathandflame-archive]

With the rise of booktok/booktwt, there's been this weird movement against literary criticism. It's a bizarre phenomenon, but this uptick in condemnation of criticism is so stifling. I understand that with the rise of these platforms, many people are being reintroduced into the habit of reading, which is why at the base level, I understand why many 'popular' books on booktok tend to be cozier.

The argument always falls into the 'this book means too much to me' or 'let people enjoy things,' which is rhetoric I understand -- at least fundamentally. But reading and writing have always been conduits for criticism, healthy natural criticism. We grow as writers and readers because of criticism. It's just so frustrating to see arguments like "how could you not like this character they've been the x trauma," or "why read this book if you're not going to come out liking it," and it's like...why not. That has always been the point of reading. Having a character go through copious amounts of trauma does not always translate to a character that's well-crafted. Good worldbuilding doesn't always translate to having a good story, or having beautiful prose doesn't always translate into a good plot.

There is just so much that goes into writing a story other than being able to formulate tropable (is that a word lol) characters. Good ideas don't always translate into good stories. And engaging critically with the text you read is how we figure that out, how we make sure authors are giving us a good craft. Writing is a form of entertainment too, and just like we'd do a poorly crafted show, we should always be questioning the things we read, even if we enjoy those things.

It's just werd to see people argue that we shouldn't read literature unless we know for certain we are going to like it. Or seeing people not be able to stand honest criticism of the world they've fallen in love with. I love ASOIAF -- but boy oh boy are there a lot of problems in the story: racial undertones, questionable writing decisions, weird ness overall. I also think engaging critically helps us understand how an author's biases can inform what they write. Like, HP Lovecraft wrote eerie stories, he was also a raging racist. But we can argue that his fear of PoC, his antisemitism, and all of his weird fears informed a lot of what he was writing. His writing is so eerie because a lot of that fear comes from very real, nasty places. It's not to say we have to censor his works, but he influences a lot of horror today and those fears, that racial undertone, it is still very prevalent in horror movies today. That fear of the 'unknown,'

Gone with the Wind is an incredibly racist book. It's also a well-written book. I think a lot of people also like confine criticism to just a syntax/prose/technical level -- when in reality criticism should also be applied on an ideological level. Books that are well-written, well-plotted, etc., are also -- and should also -- be up for criticism. A book can be very well-written and also propagate harmful ideologies. I often read books that I know that (on an ideological level), I might not agree with. We can learn a lot from the books we read, even the ones we hate.

I just feel like we're getting to the point where people are just telling people to 'shut up and read' and making spaces for conversation a uniform experience. I don't want to be in a space where everyone agrees with the same point. Either people won't accept criticism of their favorite book, or they think criticism shouldn't be applied to books they think are well written. Reading invokes natural criticism -- so does writing. That's literally what writing is; asking questions, interrogating the world around you. It's why we have literary devices, techniques, and elements. It's never just taking the words being printed at face value.

You can identify with a character's trauma and still understand that their badly written. You can read a story, hate everything about it, and still like a character. As I stated a while back, I'm reading Fourth Wing; the book is terrible, but I like the main character. The worldbuilding is also terrible, but the author writes her PoC characters with respect. It's not hard to acknowledge one thing about the text, and still find enough to enjoy the book. And authors grow when we're honest about what worked and what didn't work. Shadow and Bone was very formulaic and derivative at points, but Six of Crows is much more inventive and inclusive. Veronica Roth's Carve the Mark had some weird racial problems, but Chosen Ones was a much better book in terms of representation. Percy Jackson is the same way. These writers grow, not just by virtue of time, but because they were critiqued and listened to that critique. C.S. Lewis and Tolkien always publically criticized each other's work. Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes had a legendary friendship and back and forth with one another's works which provides so much insight into the conversations black authors and creatives were having.

Writing has always been about asking questions; prodding here and there, critiquing. It has always been a conversation, a dialogue. I urge people to love what they read, and read what they love, but always ask questions, always understand different perspectives, and always keep your mind open. Please stop stifling and controlling the conversations about your favorite literature, and please understand that everyone will not come out with the same reading experience as you. It doesn't make their experience any less valid than yours.

[inkskinned]

something that stuck with me once, way back in middle school when i was still learning how to write - my teacher said "writing shock and tragedy is easy, it's humor that's the hardest."

i have been up and down the halls of academia. i have the fancy degree and the experience in publishing. i think i paved most of my own road with the little bricks of sorrow i had stored inside of me. i know i did it mostly with works that are blisteringly lonely. i know why we write like that. it's lifesaving.

but yeah, i mean. i also know how much people think that "sad" media is the same thing as "good" media. our human desire to connect is so hard-pressed that we immediately latch onto any broken themes. the bullied kids and the tales of inspiration. people keep saying things like "glass onion" and "everything everywhere" weren't actually good. because, you know, they're. happy. or happy-ish. happy enough. and we only value art if it's grimdark-adjacent.

do you know - people still consistently whine at me that my writing would be so good if i just capitalized things. i used to flinch. i get kind of a weird, vindictive little rush these days - i get to say thank you for the comment! i have chronic pain and this is how i conserve my hands so i can write more during the day :) grammar isn't real anyway! and now they're trapped in the room with me, you know? i get to pull out my map and show them how grammar is not the same thing as good writing.

writers have this thing. we scratch at our insides, constantly, prying our lives apart into splinters. prying the splinters apart into atoms. when we combust something into poetry, we control it. it cannot hurt us if it exists outside of us rather than burning a hole through the bottom of our lungs. it's not a wonder to me that so much of what i make comes out like a death gasp. i spent a long time at the bottom. i keep going back, too. when you're down there for so long, the only thing you can exhale is fumes.

but humor is hard. humor needs timing; which i can't promise in a paragraph. i can kind-of force it through careful spacing, but i have no idea how fast you're reading these things. humor needs a somewhat awareness of your audience, when really - anybody could be looking. humor needs us to understand what the joke is, why it's a joke, and to think - ha! that is funny. in tragedy, everyone understands the metaphor of a kicked puppy. in humor, you need to introduce them to the concept of a dog.

and forget about positivity. forget about anything not made for adults explicitly. every time i see a well-made children's media piece, i feel fucking horrible for the creators. most of the time, people see children's media as being sort of "not worth" applause, even though i'm pretty sure they have to work twice as hard. i have no idea how hard it must be to not be able to have your character just say. "well, fuck." something about a message of peace or friendship or caring - for some reason, that makes the media not for adults. like, okay. i'm pretty sure my father actually, out of all of us, could use a good book on how to control his temper and talk about his feelings.

but whatever. i write a short story about my ocd, and how it's fucking killing me. it gets an award. it gets published. i write a short story about my ocd, and how i'm overcoming it, and how my days are getting lighter and starting to flourish. i keep getting ghosted. no response. it just is lacking... something.

is this it, forever? you can be an artist, okay. but the trade off is that the things you make - if they're happy? if they're joyful? people will say it's stupid and pandering. you bite your nails off. you file your teeth. you hear something inside of you breaking.

the other day in a writing group, someone i'd thought of as a friend said: "you write so much better these days! i love what you make when you'd rather be dead."

[thesulkycroissant]

So there's this saying that the only time you see the middle of the road is when you're going from ditch to ditch, and that most of the time is how I feel about the canon v fanon debate.

Genuinely, I feel like people get so stagnanted in this idea that something isn't canon - which, what is comic canon anyway? I strain to unravel the mystery of which comics get to "count" and which do not - and focus on it so much that they miss any aspect of nuance.

Tim's parents are a great example. Tim's parents exist in the way they do for a simple out-of-universe reason: the writers wanted to avoid the mistakes they made with Jason by both differentiating him from Dick (making him not an orphan) and giving him a "buy-in" with Dick (something to connect them -> the circus). (Their logic was that Dick was the key to getting readers to like Tim, and that neglecting his buy-in was their misstep with Jason.) At the same time, Tim having parents is a problem because what parent is not going to notice their kid being gone all the time playing midnight vigilante? Solution: absentee parents. But now the shift to in-universe happens. Tim's parents are gone all the time, but it's not malicious; they're just kind of clueless. They love Tim. Tim loves them. But they are not around. And this out-of-universe choice, once you enter into the universe, logically can - maybe even should, if you're taking the characters seriously - effect how a character reads.

Tim's parents are gone all the time. There's every probability that would cause trauma. Unintentional, but fun to explore! The comics do a very little. I think fandoms can often make the mistake of believing subtle abuse (like neglect) is not sufficient, so it gets elevated to something physical. But your parents loving you and also causing you trauma is a relatable experience, I think. Even your parents doing their best and still causing you trauma is.

Jason being the angry Robin is another rough one. Because yeah, I agree, Scott Lobdell did some wacky and unkind things to Jason's backstory. But Jason, even going back to his original (not original, but his original non-just-Dick-but-blond) backstory, is a traumatized orphan willing to take the risk and steal tires from the Batmobile as a means of survival (in Gotham! In Crime Alley!). Why can't Jason be angry? In the throes of adolescence, at a time when he feels safe with Bruce, doesn't it make sense for his trauma to find its way out in anger? Can't he both believe Robin is magic and be angry? Can't he be sweet and angry both?

Dickie and anger. Yeah, anger plays a role in certain story arcs of his. In NTT, and in the first 80s Nightwing run, the stories take pains to show that the anger is triggered by something and channeled into brutal focus. And that it does not serve him. Dick's relationship with Kory in NTT nearly falls apart because of his anger. He treats her very poorly. I see a lot of people saying they want Dick to be angry, but not allowing Dick to learn how to control his anger is not giving the character his dues either.

And Damian. Shoot. Reading the One Bad Day comic for Ra's al Ghul kinda ruined me a bit because of how much Ra's obviously loves and respects animals, and how can you not see the echo of that in Damian's love of animals? Damian's League trauma is such a thing worth exploring, and I think the value of exploring it only goes up when you add in the complicated factor of the fact that Talia and Ra's do love him, and he does see them when he looks in the mirror, and every day Damian has to decide which parts of his family - his whole family - are good to keep and which are not.

Anyway. There's probably more, but this post is already pretty long lol. Nuance is cool, that's all.

[jackwhiteprophetic]

Idk if I've said this before but Buck's season 4 arc is so fucking interesting and the way they CHOSE to have it essentially "completed" in the finale by Eddie is so intentional and beautiful AAAAAAA

So basically we open with Buck in therapy, this leads to his parents coming and Buck begins and such, where Eddie is consistently there for Buck to go to, and we have the iconic "I know you did", where we as the audience see how much Eddie understands this side of Buck, and how Eddie gives Buck the space to talk and to be angry and process without pushing him to be anything else (which contrasts to Maddie this season, though I love Maddie and I don't think the effects of her childhood on her have been given enough time in the show).

And he doesn't properly finish this self sacrificing thing here, when his mum says "you're doing what you were born to do" this is exemplified, and Buck is affirmed in his purpose being the saviour.

And then we have a kind of cyclical arc with the shooting, where Buck has to confront again how he feels like he's a shitty replacement for something, and that he's reckless and he immediately reverts to his learned perspective of "I shouldn't be here and someone else should and I now I have to make sure that it's only me that gets hurt" that he picked up in his childhood, even when not knowing about Daniel. But this time Eddie stops him, and he tells him that he's not expendable, and that he has a family who need him, and that he has a permanent place in their life.

Which is literally all Buck has ever wanted.

ALSO the conversation with Bobby in 4x14 is so interesting because it feels like there's something missing, when Bobby only reprimands Buck for being reckless and is so nearly at the point, which is that Buck does not value his life and he needs fucking help, but he MISSES it, and the audience sees that, and the scene feels incomplete, and this is simply because they wanted to save that line for Eddie. ANYONE in that episode could have pointed it out, have been given that line, because it was obvious to the audience what Buck was doing. And the writers very deliberately let our frustration at the other characters for missing it build, so that the will conversation was massively highlighted and very narratively satisfying and conclusive.

It has been SO intentional and I am obsessed with it so much

[normal-internet-user]

sibling reader is so fun! youre such a good writer!! what if sibling reader tried to sneak out? what would the brothers and spilnter do?

OOOH YES!!

BAYVERSE WHEN TEEN READER SNEAKS OUT

So,

You decided to sneak out huh?

Probably to go meet some friends after curfew right?

The only issue is, you got caught,

(Like an amature)

Probably by Leo, (Or Donnie)

Now, you have to face the consiquences of your actions.

Leo will be very disspointed in you,

They don't have many rules, curfew being one of the very few important ones.

Honestly, I don't think Raph would really care about the whole, "Out past curfew" thing,

He'll just be upset you tried to lie about it,

He values honesty alot, so you lying right to their faces is kinda upsetting.

Donnie is extremely worried about you,

Where did you go?

What were you doing?

Who were you with?

Did anything happen?

He'll lecture you on the dangers of a dark New York and how you'll be able do go out late at night when you're older, and more mature.

Mikey literally does not understand the issue.

I mean, come on, they snuck out when they were your age,

So why's it such a big deal?

He kinda just think Leo's being a bit over bearing.

Leo 100% give you the "I'm not mad, just dissapointed" talk.

And you most likely earned yourself a while in the hashi.

Splinter is obviously worried and wants to know where you were,

He won't be as forceful with the interrigating as he was with the boys when they used to sneak out, (Privilages of the of the favorite child)

But he will get it out of you eventually.

Oh, and Leo will most definitly ground you for a while,

Nothing to bad,

Maybe a week or so of cleaning the dojo and other chores.

They'll definitly keep a closer eye on you for a while,

Just to make sure you learned your lesson.

(Mikey is totally going to teach you how to sneak out without getting caught, he'll even cover for you while you're gone.)

.........................................

This one is kinda bad, but I'm low on motivation, 🥲

[lavenderprose]

I have a lot of thoughts and opinions about people calling Izzy homophobic because honestly I can ALMOST see where they're coming from. Izzy Hands experiences internalized homophobia on a level that is almost sickening to comprehend and that much is obvious from the way he talks to Lucius and, to a certain extent, Stede. His 'toxic' masculinity is a symptom of that but I have my own specific headcanons about that which I'll keep to myself at this particular point; I may very well elaborate at a later time. All I'll say here is that I personally headcanon Izzy as being trans, and though I understand that that's purely a headcanon, it does add some layers to his character.

That being said, I feel like Izzy is operating from a place of "There is ONE safe way to be a man who has sex with men." It's the one he's learned and has been obeying the rules of for probably his whole life. More than likely he's seen the consequences of...not doing it that way. This is something about him that I feel people tend to overlook, especially those who already have bad faith interpretations of his character. They like to use the piracy = queerness metaphor where 'traditional' (Izzy's) piracy is compulsory heterosexuality and the Revenge's (Stede's) piracy is glorious queer freedom, but I don't really agree with that. In this show, piracy is piracy and queerness is queerness. You don't need a metaphor for something that's explicit in the narration.

Izzy (And maybe even Ed, though I hesitate more with this interpretation for him) is a gay (Possibly trans, if you wish) man who thinks he knows exactly how you're supposed to live in order to Survive Being Queer. There are many real life people like him who are good and valued members of our community, but who balk at our current openness because it seems dangerous to them. Like, actively life-threatening. And yeah he's mean about it and he doesn't necessarily need to be. But you'd probably be a little mean if everyone around you was telling you to ignore every layer of protection you've ever wrapped around yourself because you don't need that anymore! It's silly and reductive to think that way! Get with the times!

And that's not to say that either party is in the wrong. That's kind of the whole point; Izzy struggles with the Revenge crew so much because from his point of view, his reasoning and fears are very valid, while Lucius and Stede et al. feel that they are reductive and old-fashioned, and neither side of the debate is inherently wrong in feeling that way.

While I don't think that this is necessarily the intended motivation for Izzy as a character (Honestly, where the writers are concerned, I don't think any of this is That Deep) it's definitely an interpretation that I feel helps to explain his motivations and the choices he makes in the show, if you're so inclined to view him as anything other than a villain. He's a queer elder who hasn't learned yet that he can maybe just a little bit STOP white-knuckling the performative masculinity that he's been clinging to to keep himself safe.

[elbiotipo]

So when it comes to distance in a fictional setting, is metric king? I wrote some fantasy post-apoc recently where the protagonist measured it in Oranges and Aevums (the latter being their own name), but more generally speaking is it worth it to hash out bespoke measurement systems for fictional cultures, do you think?

Oranges as a measurement unit sounds so funny, and a measurement based in... yourself makes surprising sense, given all the measurements based on body parts. Why not YOURSELF?

Well, I would think in a real post-apoc world metric would be king indeed, scientific and technologic instruments are in metric even in the US and you could always get a ruler from a school or scales from a grocery store, so eventually you could get back on track to reforming the metric system. It would be interesting, though, if every society during isolation had slightly different measurements for the same units because of faulty equipment (say, ohms or amperes or even grays) and they had to make a congress to clear things up.

Returning to your main question. My perspective here is the same as conlangs. It's very, very fun to have them, but it's not fun to force your audience to read them. When I write something set in a fantasy or science fiction setting, in my head I'm assuming the characters are speaking different languages and I DO explain them and even give examples of them, but the story itself is written, for both the reader's and the writer convenience, in a language we can understand (Spanish in my case, and then it can be translated). Same with units of measurement. I seldom use direct units of measurement like writing "the ship was 110.3 meters long" (in science fiction, it's often a trap as they force you to stay true to them), when more descriptive language can be used...

In any case, you could do, for the kind of immersion I love, say something like "she was 14 oranges* tall, rather small for her age" and do an asterisk like "*A.N. : 1.39 meters tall". This is very fun when used sparingly, because it gives the worldbuilding obessed reader something to play with, you can do the conversion yourself and learn more about the world, without interrupting the story. Some understandably dislike this approach, but I think that if you know what you're doing, you can hide some pretty deep lore behind it. In one of my favorite retro games, The Ur-Quan Masters, there is an alien race called the Slylandro who live in a gas giant. When they tell you their ancient history, they use their own system of measurment based on the rotation of their planet with its own names like Dranhasa and Dranh. The game actually provides you with the rotation time on "Earth" time, so some dedicated fans did the conversion, and found out the dates fit with major events in the game's past. I thought that was an awesome bit.

But I digress again. Does this mean you should not talk about measurements in your story? No, it can do for very fun plots and digressions, as well as make things more realistic and beliveable. A fantasy world sharing all the same measurement units can be as unplausible as everybody speaking "Common". Let's remember that the current metric system is a modern invention which took a long time to be adopted (and some, well one, country, still resists it). Just take a look at the many, many historical systems of measurement:

This was especially prominent in places like the Holy Roman Empire, where every statelet, county, principality, free city, prince-bishopric, duchy, archduchy, etc. may and most often did have different measurements from each other. Just take a look at how measurements varied from each German region, it's crazy. The systems of weight where particularily important. Before the introduction of standarized coinage, coins also varied not only between kingdoms, but between regions, and even towns, and coins made at different times with different alloys had different values. Rather than money in our modern sense, you could think of them as some kind of 'asset' that could vary in value depending on the circumstances. What's more, those values had to be checked by people who knew what they were working with. Silver and gold content could be weighed, ah, but you need good scales and weights, and someone who knows how to work them! And these people could easily rip you off, or you could lose value accidentally if those scales weren't done just right or fiddled with on purpose. In fact, this is where the word 'Mark' comes from.

It wasn't as easy to take say a 100 something bill and get the change in 1 something coins. There is a very interesting subplot in the anime Spice and Wolf where Lawrence, the trader character, has been paid in gold coins, and he has to trade them into lesser denominations. However, he has to be REAL careful so that nobody scams him given all I told you above. Even getting 'gold' coins was a gamble before modern coinage and banking (another long topic). How much of that is REALLY gold and not an alloy with silver or other metal? Who can you trust to tell you how much your coins are worth? Are they compatible between borders or even time, is this version worth as much as the others? Things that characters in fantasy who have just plundered a dragon's hoard almost never think about. Except in Spice and Wolf.

(here is a gif of Holo to break the wall of text)

This all of course, as again you can see in Spice and Wolf, can make trade very tedious and even unstable. This was one of the reasons why the metric system was so quickly adopted in Europe and then elsewhere; consistent units just allow for easier trade. Lots of other things involving measurement can have a major impact on your story. For one, you NEED consistent and accurate measurement to create even the most basic industrial and scientific equipment. You can wing it for a time like alchemists (and even they knew their measurements) but eventually, you need to measure things to understand them. To have working steam engines, steel production, chemical industries and more, you need to know your temperature is. If you want to do electricity, you need measurements for current, resistance and charge. If you're doing engineering, you need to have lenght, weight and volume very, very clear, or people will die. They don't necessarily need to be universal like the metric system (though it has lots of advantages, being coherent between units and decimal so it doesn't jump between different denominations) but they need to be standarized and measurable.

Most of the above, unless you're writing some kind of encyclopedia about a fictional scientific revolution (BASED BASED BASED) will not affect your characters directly. But IT IS worth keeping in mind for what kind of world your characters are living in. The standarization of measurement units always means SOMETHING in the state of your society, the strenght of the state and centralized authority, the state of scientific understanding (one could say that trying to measure the world was perhaps THE scientific revolution, "Man as a measure of all things"), the capability for industry and the standarization of coinage and trade.

Even if you don't have your characters interact directly with those things, they will interact with them. It's also, like I've said in the examples, fun to imagine characters having to learn or deal with different units of measurement, just as it is fun to imagine them learning new languages or cultural quirks. It's something I've done in the past, in my space opera setting, the worlds descended from the United States STILL use the imperial system, much to the frustration of the rest of the metric human sphere. There is also an alien character who has a hard time to learn human measurements, and that makes her melancholic about her past, as they can't intuitively see the now-extinct measurements she does. Again, man as a measure of all things... this does include other thinking beings...

There's more I could talk about here regarding time, but I did a post about that, though I'm not satisfied with it and will probably redo it in some time at the future. In any case, there's lot to talk about why every calendar in science fiction has 365 days and 24 hours.

As always, if you found this interesting and helpful, I would be very thankful if you gave a tip to my ko-fi! And feel free to ask about anything you'd like!

[uptoolateart]

The Miraculous Child

So, in 'Representation', Felix talks refers to ‘the miraculous boy’ a couple times. He also calls Adrien’s conception ‘a miracle’, meaning Adrien too is ‘miraculous’.

The second I heard this, it hit me that the title of the show has had this extra meaning from day one. If we look right back to the start of the series, it has been a story about children and adults, especially parents, some a little overbearing (like Tom) and some neglectful or downright abusive.

The message I take away is - life, bringing a child into the world, is a miracle. Science tells us how it works, but the fact that it works is almost like magic. Yet, there are people out there who fail to see this and don't value the gift they've been granted.

There will be people reading this and thinking, ‘Yeah? So what about Chloe?’

I hear you.

Audrey is a terrible person, and Andre is no better. When he hauls her off at the end of ‘Revolution’ and says he needs to correct his mistakes, he just sends her away with her mother. He’s washing his hands of ‘a problem’, just like he’s done with everything else, e.g. when he resigned as mayor. He walked away from responsibilities, after creating a mess for the people who voted him into office. Likewise, he walked away from his responsibilities as a father.

Does that excuse Chloe's behaviour towards others, especially Marinette? No. Does it explain it? Yes.

So, let's talk about choice, which has been mentioned several times in the series. Chloe has a choice to become just like one of her parents...or to become something better.

Because, if you think about it, at some point in time, Audrey and Andre and even Gabriel were all children. And children aren't just born nasty. They learn nastiness as they grow up. To become who they are today, they had to have started out in a similar position to Chloe, for example. They represent the potential future for their children.

If we saw them as kids, we'd probably see them being mistreated by the adults in their lives and we'd all sympathise with them and hope for their redemption. But we're seeing them as adults and our instinct is to say oh well, too late, they're just awful people. In fact, they could redeem themselves at any point, as demonstrated by Nathalie's turnaround in Season 5. It's just that, the more awful things you've done, the more you have to atone for. Gabriel would have to do a lot - maybe even have a brain change - to be redeemed. But you see my point.

So, at the end of 'Revolution', we see Chloe at a crossroads. She's on that plane, annihilated by her mother, and hiding by herself in a corner. She browses her contacts and hovers over Sabrina's entry...and her face crumples like her heart is breaking with regrets. Oh, it’s sad.

But she passes over Sabrina and moves onto Marinette. She makes one last attempt to bring her down. It’s an act of desperation – redirecting her own suffering onto another, trying to keep control over things when she’s completely out of control of her own life.

Marinette finally puts her in her place, and we see Chloe fall apart in a real way - for the first time ever. I don't know about you, but I found that very uncomfortable viewing. It was a relief to see Marinette stand up for herself, and it needed to happen...but Chloe's despair was also painful. I think all of those were emotions were intended.

Let’s set Thomas aside here. I don't want to get into debates about what was said on Twitter. He’s not the only writer for the show, anyway. I am just speaking about my personal perception of that scene. Chloe gained heaps of sympathy, after she’d been appalling all season, which was pretty powerful.

The fact is…Chloe needed to be put in her place. But that doesn’t mean she deserved everything she went through. Even so...sometimes these moments are necessary and revelatory. They can be the catalyst for great change.

What I mean is – if you're in denial about your position, redirecting your pain onto others, sometimes you need that wakeup call. You need to hit rock bottom in order to start climbing back up into the light. So, when Chloe fell apart, it was painful...but I also saw it as her potential turning point. As long as she maintained her delusions to escape into at school, it was impossible for her to transform - because she refused to see that there was any change needed. But when you have nothing left…that’s when you might begin rebuilding yourself.

Every episode in Season 5 has had multiple meanings. Looking at 'Revolution', when Chloe was akumatised, she trapped her victims in a maze, going round in endless circles (revolutions). Notably a lot of them were adults.

I think if this had happened early on in Season 4, Adrien would have been trapped morosely in that loop with the others. We saw this kind of thing in 'Guiltrip'. So, it spoke volumes about his growth as a character when he was the first one to seek a way out of Chloe's maze. He immediately used his cataclysm and broke a hole, escaping and letting everyone else out. Metaphorically, what he did was break the cycle. If we think about cycles of abuse, this is what the next generation always has the chance to do - to revolt against the past.

it's interesting, then, that when we got to 'Representation', we saw Cat Noir completely lose it with his father. He needed to let it all out...but he was in danger of going too far...and deep down, he knew it. His worst nightmare was of losing all control, to the point of letting his rage destroy everything he loved. Unconsciously, he's well aware that he runs the risk of becoming like his father. However, his complete breakdown, begging his father to take his miraculous to make it all stop, tells us he won't become like his father - because his conscience is too strong. He wants to break that cycle.

Felix has also done some bad things - but he's begun the journey of redeeming himself and changing. He too is trying to break out of that cycle so he doesn't become like his father.

Kagami is embracing her passionate side, rejecting the coldness and isolation her mother has attempted to breed into her, no doubt due to her own upbringing once upon a time.

And I think there’s definite potential for Chloe to do the same. There’s no reason for anyone to remain caught in these patterns. The trick is to recognise the pattern is there in the first place - because you can’t break free of something if you don’t know you’re imprisoned. At the end of Revolution, I think Chloe finally saw her prison, saw that she was already trapped in her own maze, going round in circles. Now it’s up to her to pull an Adrien and cataclysm the bars that hold her in.

Because like Felix said, over and over – each child is miraculous simply for existing. And miracles should be cherished.

PLEASE NO POST-REPRESENTATION SPOILERS IN COMMENTS :)

[kurosagileo]

alrighty its post mortkranken thoughts time! under a cut so that spoilers are easier to avoid

(did one for obscuary here)

for a spoiler free thought first off, though, i think the time between episodes both works for and against the story. it's a good pacing so far imo, even if it's disappointing there's not much to do in the game between episode drops. there's enough time to let people analyze the most recent episode and secrets revealed, come up with guesses as to how things connect, and when that starts dying down, there's time to hypothesize about the next episode because teasers have started dropping. Game wise, there's time for people who have been playing for a while to get farther in cases so that once the episode does drop, it's easy to go through whenever you're ready. On the other hand, the time inbetween, the teasers can possibly hype a episode up a bit too much, i think that happened with obscuary and may have contributed to how the episode felt unbalanced (at least to me). High expectations mean there's a lot that could go wrong when things end up differently. I don't think they should release the episodes sooner, that would be an overload, just something i've been making note of and trying to not expect too much from a new episode so that i enjoy what comes out rather than being disappointed with what didn't

spoiler wise, i'll follow the format i had for obscuary!

jiro is winning the idgaf war and i absolutely love that for him. I think the writers did a good job of makng him the straight man to yuri's antics and thoroughly enjoyed scenes with him

yuri... is so silly i love him sm i want to kiss his cheek so that he bluescreens on the spot. i love that he seems like he's gonna be a scientist with questionable morals leaning to the evil side but then he ends up being so expressive about every little thing. he's smart but not manipulative mastermind ike if he's thinking something you Will know it

there's an interesting dynamic between the two which I'm looking forward to learning more about. Some of the few times where Jiro outwardly emotes are during interactions with Yuri. (Also with pc with the body lmao)

now for the story content, not an analysis of what things might mean but just overall storytelling

I think this did well with bringing the standard back up from the obscuary episode. for my thoughts on that, feel free to check out the other post i made. it was far more balanced with the investigation driving things, mc getting closer to the two ghouls, and the progression of mc's curse for the overarching story. the cameos from all of the other characters was exciting to see while going through, and was great for showing how different characters interact with each other. I think each of those small moments showed a lot about the characters.

for a few examples: alan's regrets for not saving naoki, highlighting how much he values being able to save people and blames himself for not doing enough even when he couldn't stop it; leo taking the documents, seeming to just do it to be antagonistic, but actually genuinely helping out both mc's investigation and alan's ass if the files went missing; ren and ritsu talking about ramen in the store, they're getting closer despite ren not liking working at his job and always complaining that ritsu is there, clearly they're starting to become friends; the three vice captains meeting and the absolute tension there

i could go on, each of those little cameos was meaningful imo, not all of them served to progress the main story, but they're important to see, to show how the ghouls are interacting with each other and how they act when mc isn't investigating their house

I think the investigation portion was a little rough near the end. The case wrapup wasn't as satisfying as I'd like, I think the best two episodes for that so far were vagastrom and sinostra, but the framing of it makes sense considering yuri's stigma. (specifically the part of the wrapup where we found the patient was behind things, the fight at the end was something i really enjoyed) It's something that lets yuri process everything instantaneously, so it makes sense that the answer is just given in a monologue, even if it ends up being somewhat unsatisfying. Yuri is a character who likes his monologue, and he's found everything out and is confident in his answer. I don't think that he would present the information in another way

The foreshadowing in this chapter was...... well it could've been more subtle. I kinda wish that while Jiro was leading mc through Mortkranken, there would be more attention drawn to multiple things, aside from exactly what would be relevant. I think that may have also led to the unsatisfying reveal

the very ending with the assembly was also well done, imo. it reiterates that the faculty want mc to gain the trust of the ghouls and is doing so. but it also calls into question where that request is coming from. right now, mc is very much being used by the faculty. she was pushed into the investigator role, pushed into being a student, pushed into earning their trust, threatened with a possible punishment for not being able to prove it. it serves her as well to grow close with the ghouls and be an investigator, and she clearly is, but I really don't think that's anywhere near the reason the chancellor put her in that position. we always keep the spy thing in the back of our minds while reading, while she's essentially also advertised as a spy to the ghouls

the phone call between hyde and sho was both surprising to see, but also not. Sho has a campus chat with hyde where he says that he's using hyde to get ahead any way he can. Learning that hyde is giving secret missions, it's unsurprising that Sho is one of the students he's using. I think this would be too obvious for the whole spy/traitor thing, however... there was one other campus chat that came into my mind, the one between subaru and leo. Subaru's waiting for MC for lunch, Leo approaches and sees he's got food from Sho's food truck, and comments on how Sho is really good at the friend act. Acting like he's a friend to customers to convince them to buy more. While the likely reading is Leo just lying to mess with Subaru (and honestly I wouldn't doubt that), I think it could also be that it's a true analysis of Sho.

He is good a the friend act. Sho has no problem lying to someone to appear nice. He did it to an old lady looking for a train station in the vagastrom episode. Leo told her he had no clue where it was, Sho gave her instructions and after she left, Leo asked how he knew and Sho told him oh I didn't. A lot of Sho's flaws are looked over because he's nice, when he is kinda an asshole a lot. I don't think that he's using a friend act on Subaru, but it's genuinely hard to tell. The scene at the beginning of the episode was cute, but depending on how you read it, it could be Sho playing it up for the bet with Leo.

I doubt the phone call from the end will actually be how we learn about the traitor, but I also think that Sho has a lot more resources than most to be a traitor

[bekolxeram]

No, OMG! I'm so sorry if my ask came off this way. I was genuinely curious if there was any way this could work, hence the question. I used to believe it was Tommy who flew the plane, but once I saw your explanation, I actually subscribed to your view. It does seem more believable. I wish it was Tommy, but I think you're right, it wouldn't make much sense. I was just curious if Tim and the writers were to confirm in the future that it was indeed Tommy who flew that plane, whether it would be at least somewhat believable. That was the purpose of my ask. I didn't mean to disregard your theories. I'm sorry. I LOVE your aviation analyses; I even sent you a coffee from the Kinley cafe 🫣 I hope you don't stop. Whenever I see you posted something, I have this huge smile on my face because I know I'm about to read a banger of a post. It's all so interesting!

Noooo, it’s not you. I actually really appreciate your asks. And thank you for the Kinley Café order, you have no idea how happy it made me.

I don’t get asks often, but since the 8x02 title reveal I’ve gotten a few, all aviation related. I’ve been… honestly, elated. I have the chance to yap about my passion and do deep dives on stuff that never crossed my mind before. Sometimes I get carried away, I’m very much incapable of being normal about planes. Ever since I saw those planes in bts photos, my brain has been bustling with ideas, and at times I click rb/reply before thinking because I get too excited. I would worry later that I might’ve forced my theories on others without being asked about them. But it’s not like they’re harmful rhetorics or antagonistic hot takes, just an info dump about a lot of planes. So people can ignore and I’ll move on.

I especially enjoyed doing research on that C-130 in 2x14, I learned a lot about aerial firefighting in the process. I didn’t pay attention back then, but I noticed the lack of airplanes when Tommy was giving Buck the tour in 7x04, so I went back and found the line from the TV reporter saying it was CAL FIRE.

I suspect that line was shoved in there last minute, because some technical consultants told them firefighting air tankers are never used in an urban environment, the weight of water/fire retardant can flatten cars, houses, it has gotten multiple people killed. I can think of more instances where the emergency seems unrealistic at first, but then there’s a passing line making it kind of possible, just exaggerated. I know we always joke about Tim writing soap opera level surreal emergencies, but I feel like all the other people involved in the making of this show don’t get enough credit, especially those designing the opening big disasters.

I’ve noticed multiple times that shortly after posting stuff about Tommy’s pilot career, a post would pop up in the tag asking people to stop obsessing over timeline. I paid them no mind before, they were probably not personal I thought, a subsection of the fandom does have the habit to use Tommy’s age to call him a predator. But this time, well, my theory was mentioned by name, so they were talking about me.

I can handle bad takes or even attacks from the toxic part of the fandom, I don’t value their opinion at all. Seeing rb after rb from people on our side of the fandom, some of whom I admire, basically telling me to stop being so obsessive over realism, being compared to fans who nitpick certain actors’ accents, tattoos, grooming choices, that one stings harder than I thought.

I know I’m being thin-skinned, I’m making everything about me, I’m fully aware that I’m a disaster. But I find myself hesitating to answer the other aviation related asks in my inbox, one of them particularly asking about the possibility of certain scenario in real life. I’m just not sure my input is welcomed here. I have this fear of unknowingly annoying people with my over-enthusiasm. I feel like that kid who keeps yapping about trains at school that everyone secretly hates again.

I just really, really love aviation. I thoroughly enjoy uniting these 2 things that I love and maybe learn new things from it. I don’t mean to impose. I was very excited this morning when I received asks in my inbox, but now it feels like being slammed back onto the ground, and it’s not a good feeling. I don’t know, maybe it’s time to uncouple these 2 things.

[voxofthevoid]

I get hate comments on my fics once in a while and I do my best to ignore them. The few fans I have are amazing, but those 1 or 2 awful comments stick like bubblegum in my brain for MONTHS. I write FF to deal with my anger issues, but sometimes I feel like it's a lost cause when I get comments like that.

How do you deal with the anger/frustration? Any tips for a newbie?

...I generally just call them a cunt. To their face and also here on Tumblr. Being the bigger asshole is my chosen method for dealing with hate comments.

I don't go around recommending this method, but if you struggle with anger issues the same way I do, it might actually be helpful.

The most common advice for handling hate comments is to delete and/or ignore—basically, to not give them the satisfaction of getting a rise out of you. Objectively, I think that's good advice, albeit reductive in how it characterizes the haters. Some of them just want attention, yeah, but some really believe what they're saying or think they're exercising their civic right to be a hater. The vast majority are anonymous cowards either way, and even the ones who slap their name on their bullshit usually can't take what they're dishing out. You can't really know what type you're getting though, so deleting/ignoring is optimal in that sense.

I've tried that. It didn't work out because, like in your case, it sticks to my brain for months and keeps pissing me off.

So I switched to just tearing them a new asshole, plus putting up a hall of shame on Tumblr. And that's worked wonders. I get it out of my system and am calm afterwards. As for the hate commenters, most of them scuttle away like garbage rats. Honestly, I've only had one person keep coming back for more, and that seems to be a case of unhinged obsession with me—always a risk for any writer (or anyone who gets public attention) but not very common behavior overall.

Ultimately, my stance narrows down to two things:

Hate comments say more about the commenter than you or your story. It's anti-social verbal diarrhea from people who never learned that the world doesn't revolve around them, and it should be afforded exactly that level of value. It's a matter of whether you silently clean off the mess or call them out for taking a shit on your carpet.

Your Ao3 comment section is not a democracy. Free speech protects one from the government, not a pissed-off author. Anyone who starts shit in the comments forfeits any right to be treated with civility.

TL;DR: Call them a cunt.

[iridescentdove]

Hey hey!! Can I request a Nikolai and fyodor (separate) x reader who’s really into photography and takes a lot of photos of them! Then gets super embarrassed if they catch them?

Nikolai & Fyodor x Photographer! Reader

The serene sound of a camera clicking as you relish in the peaceful autumn breeze. It was quiet, and calm – just as you always liked it. The scene was beautiful.

There was nothing better than you, your beloved, and your precious camera as you took photos under the warm sun.

NIKOLAI GOGOL:

For quite a while now, Nikolai has been seeing you with your precious phone or camera all the time. He hasn't seen you without it nowadays.

Well, it sparked his curiosity – but he did know you had a knack for these kind of things now.

And honestly, he really likes your shots! It's always taken beautifully and the photo is clear as day. Most of the time you don't really show him, but special occassions you do.

You took a little photo of a bird eating once!

Nikolai was ecstatic when looking through them. There's a small sparkle in his eyes no one would have ever seen.

The fluffy, rare white birdies that flock around as you fed them. He loves it. Jing Yuan??

One day, you both decided to have a picnic. Just for fun, and to value the precious time you guys had while still free. Lots of snacks and ice cream!

Of course, pictures. You took lots of them. From the birds in the sky to the food you had made yourself.

Although they were beautiful, nothing compares to Nikolai.

The soft, golden glow around his body – the sun making his features similar to that of an angels. Oh! How handsome he is. The genuine, warm smile on his face blooming in joy.

You were at a loss for words. He was just too pretty to be true. All you could do...was raise your camera.

Well, you did try to be sneaky. Try.

Seeing him staring at the vast blue of the sky was a perfect angle in all honesty. But he looked the moment you took it.

And i now present to you, a teasing Nikolai.

He is downright DISRESPECTFUL when it comes to being a teasing, pretty boy of a lad like him. He stares at you with a glint of his green eyes, and you were dead right then since.

"Oh! Does my sweet birdy find me a photograph-worthy sight? Hm~?" He inches closer, face full of mischief.

You're just...flaming red. He's not even flirting man, that's overrated. Dazai crying in the corner

Although he does pester you to show him the glorious photo, you do so either way. And both of you enjoy looking at them all, smiles on your faces.

Since irl he's inspired by a writer, i headcanon he points to each photo and creates a small little story for it <3 cute!

And for the meme worthy photos...

Let's just say both of your stomachs hurt for laughing so much at his jokes. Uses random Gen Z humor he learned

"The bird shat respectfully. The manz was too stunned to speak, poo-poo on his rizz-worthy head."

In other words, it was a successful picnic ;)

FYODOR DOSTOYEVSKY:

You'd never catch this mf off guard, EVER. It's so rare if you actually do, super incredibly rare.

Once in a blue moon.

But he appreciates it. Your love language is almost just sending him cute photos at this point, whether it be of you both or just him.

He's a hacker. I'd bet he hacks into your camera just to look at the shots himself bitch

Then again, you never fail to make his heart boom-boom. For a special occassion like his birthday or christmas, you'd prepare the gift wholeheartedly.

You'll print out the most prettiest photos of him you could find, and design it with aesthetic stickers and notes <3

It was the fanciest photo-card + letter he's ever seen.

Obviously rat, that's our gn kween (y/n)

And you may think he never appreciates it due to his calm and sadistic demeanor, but this man keeps it in his room and looks at it everyday with an actual genuine smile.

He'll never admit it, only when he probably feels romantic which is uh...let's countdown to 2738282 years /j

When you're just hanging out with him while he works, you just take photos for fun. His office may seem dark but your camera brings justice good phone? couldn't be me

But one particular time, you decided to attempt and be sneaky to take his photo.

The position he was in was perfect, so it was time.

You really thought you had it in the bag too. He just chuckles the moment you put the camera on him, and he turns around as you click.

You wanna strangle his ass <3

But oh hell, he's gonna be sly. Smirking at you all the while seeing your cute face turn completely red.

"милый, you seem to be enjoying yourself. Why not do a photo face-to-face?" He whispers, looking straight into your eyes as you nesrly die in fluster.

He's definitely having his fun teasing you, playing it out and making you look like a simp.

But the moment he stands up, fucking run

You're not making out of it alive the moment he gets his hands on that camera. He's merciless when it comes to teasing his bbg (ew /j)

Then again, at times he'll lie down with you peacefully, looking at the photos in silence.

He'll love every shot taken because it's you.

[nihilnovisubsole]

i think i followed you Back In The Day, seven years and seven blogs ago, for something related to mass effect (zaeed? maybe? who could say) and it's wild to come back to this site years later and find you thriving, surviving, growing-- playing ffxiv! love that game. curious how you'll feel about some side characters in shadowbringers, but i won't spoil which ones.

i do have real questions, though; writing tools. not pens or software, but personal structure tools and/or guidance. what does a beat sheet look like, for you? do you have a favored way of outlining or note-taking on your own thoughts when putting a story together?

and... i'm really curious how you hold a big story together in your head while you work on it in pieces, especially for something like dangerous crowns. there's this larger story i've been chasing around for a while, and I can't quite wrap my head around how to write the political/espionage plot for it without feeling like i've actually written a children's pantomime. the best i've got so far is "research real life events and use those as my outline" but after a point it becomes hard to keep track of all the variables of who knows what about whom, who is planning x when y, etc, etc. the characters don't need to know all that-- and may never know some things-- but i feel like /I/ need to understand what's happening on the macro level so i can move the world around them appropriately.

short version: how do YOU wrap your head around writing complex plots?

hey, anon! i started endwalker this week after a long... uh... glamour detour, so don't worry about spoiling things. i spoil myself for a lot of stories on purpose anyway. let's just say i've been attached to one too many characters who got killed.

anyway. writing. i've always handled plots the same way: clear documentation. if i don't note it down, i'm not going to remember it. i've used the same table outline since around 2014. it varies in detail for different projects, but the core format stays. i know it's kicking around in my blog archive somewhere, but it's worth reposting once in a while because people like to ask about it. here's what it looks like, featuring plot points cribbed from an endeavour episode:

i used this format for an outline at work a while back, and the team found it easy to follow, which was a big day for my ego. keeping track of plot structure is even more chaotic at work because we have multiple writers who all need to stay on the same page. we have very meticulous notes on what the player should know at which point, when we're introducing new information, and what we know, but shouldn't tell. we're also not above leaving notes like "this character has to convey X," "this character has to learn Y here," or "this is a clue that they're planning Z." it can be super on-the-nose. all that matters is that it makes sense to you. because you're right - if you get too lost, you can write yourself into logic holes of tremendous proportions. ask me how i know!

[as a sidenote, researching real-life events as a starting point has really grown on me in the past few years. my lead on coh3 had me do it. he said we were dealing with real people's history, so we couldn't be cheap or play fastball - we had to be accurate to pay it respect. even if you're not writing historical fiction, it just gives you insight into how people behave.]

i would argue that the plot of dangerous crowns is actually not that complicated, maybe to its detriment. there's kind of a genre struggle going on. at voltage, we were taught romance fans came for the relationship beats and valued them above all else. in fact, leadership told us players got irritated - which meant less sales - when the plot was too complex and took time away from the making out. political thriller fans, by contrast, expect relentless twists, high stakes, and harsh consequences, and sometimes see the relationships as superfluous.

but whatever. the point is, when you look at dangerous crowns' structure, it's a pearl necklace: a chain of anchoring events. the "pearl" scenes are where Big Plot happens. they're the reason you want to write the story, and probably the ones you have the most vivid daydreams about. the scenes in between are the string. not flashy, but important because they connect the pearls. they build tension and add logic, cohesion, and context. take the opera and hector's failed assassination. those are pearl scenes. that's a burst of drama i really wanted the story to build up to. i also had other flashbulb visions. livia by the fountain questioning herself, marcus' macbeth moment, the temple riot, things like that. so the question was, how could i believably travel between these pearl scenes? how could i make these big showcase moments connect smoothly?

if you're having trouble holding the story together in your head, i would ask, "what are your pearls?" what are the anchor points? outline those. it might not look like a necklace yet, but you'll sort of see it taking shape. and then, once you can see where your heart's-desire milestones are, you'll have a clearer idea of what can't fire until you set it up first. two other neat things can happen here. you could find the rhythm of your pacing, or realize you have a lot more plot meat than you thought you did. even if you don't, you have some road. and if you can't think of the string, sometimes you just have to start writing the pearls and see what comes to you.

good luck!!

[galedekarios]

that interview is driving me insane i've been thinking about it for the past hour and i still can't wrap my head around it. i think what really gets under my skin is it just... contradicts with the text of the game. the most positive possible reading of the ending where gale blows himself up is that it was an unavoidable tragedy dictated by fate but even that's a stretch. to say it's a good ending?? or a satisfying conclusion to his arc?? i call bull. it's more infuriating because there is such a clear good ending for gale's character arc and it's the professor ending! his arc was about learning to accept himself as he was, to value who he is as he is flaws and all, and he's done that in the professor ending! and the god of ambition ending is a bad end for him but still ties into his overall arc in a satisfying if sad way (imo). the ending where he dies just... doesn't. which is fine as a tragedy but to imply it isn't exactly that, a tragedy, is wild to me. and it being so blatantly contradictory to the actual events of the game makes me think that whole thing was just catering to people who hate gale which like... why? people who don't like him don't care about his story so why pander to them like this?

uhg. i am sorry for blowing up your inbox like this i just feel like i'm gonna rip my hair out and need to express that to a fellow gale appreciator. i love gale's epilogue SO MUCH it made me feel for a bit like maybe the writers had actually changed how they felt about him but. nope! silly of me to hope for that. wish i could memory wipe that whole interview from my brain dark urge style.

don't be sorry at all! 🖤 i feel the same way in a lot of ways. altho i feel the need to mention that gale's writer, jan van dosselaer, was not involved in this interview.

i started to make a meta post about this yesterday, but reading things like this from gale:

act ii [after elminster] Player: An old man with a craving for cheese. Hardly the great wizard of legend. Gale: A wizard doesn't reach Elminster's age without enjoying their home comforts. Those who seek danger over cheese don't tend to live as long. Gale: For Mystra to have sent him... The severity of her bidding could not be clearer. Or weigh more heavily on me. devnote: reflecting on mystra sending elminster, of all people - a powerful individual, becoming reflective. Gale: Time seems so infinite when you are young... a month is an age, a year is a lifetime... it is a strange feeling, to realise how little of it one might have left. Player: You're seriously considering doing what Elminster said?   Gale: Of course - he offered the clearest solution to our problem. All I have to do is find the right place and time, close my eyes, and let go... devnote: Trying to sound upbeat, not fully engaging with what he's saying (that he's going to kill himself). Gale: Then the slate will be clean, wrongs will be righted, the Absolute will be gone... devnote: Trying to sound upbeat, not fully engaging with what he's saying (that he's going to kill himself). Gale: ...and I along with it. devnote: Still trying to sound upbeat, though this time the reality that this means he will die weighs a bit heavier

and:

act ii [act ii romance scene] Gale: I am terrified - I will not claim otherwise. My face could scarcely conceal it even if my words sought to deny it. nodecontext: Hushed, vulnerable Gale: There is no point in running from the inevitable. Better to meet it, on my own terms. nodecontext: Resigned

as well as this:

act ii [act ii friendship version] Gale: Yes... but there is so much to live for, and so few moments in which to house it all. Gale: Damn you. Damn you for giving me so much to care about. Our friends, our adventures... this would have been so much easier if it was just me. But it isn't. Gale: If there is a way - any way - to save all that's grown dear to me, I want to seize it. I just cannot fathom what that might be, other than to fail Mystra and condemn the world. Gale: Stay with me, will you? I don't want to think of it any more, but I don't want to be alone either.

act iii [before the netherbrain] Player: Gale... I think we should consider using the orb as Mystra intended. To blow up the Netherbrain. Gale: I'm getting rather tired of how often those I care about seem to reach the same conclusion.

when you have this:

and i just... couldn't finish the meta.

it's absolutely beyond comprehension for me how anyone could try to frame this as an ending that is the right one in "many ways", as the "guy who starts off annoying everyone", eating your "most priced possessions", having to "give back to the world".

for the founder of the company to say he wasn't "ready" the "first time", but he's finally "ready" now.

gale's death isn't only unnecessary, an instruction given to him by his former mentor on the behalf of a goddess, who would've sacrificed not only him but thousands of others to achieve her own goals, he doesn't want to die. he's terrified. he wants to live. he is offering this because he believes that his time has run out. because he wants his death to have purpose if it must happen. because he feels he made a mistake far bigger than he can ever make up for. because he doesn't want others to waste their chance at life like he feels he has. the will he leaves behind in the epilogue if he sacrifices himself isn't finished because he thought there would be more time. i could go on and on.

and again, the question is too... for what exactly does he need to "give back to the world"?

being perceived as annoying after coming out of what is presented as isolation and depression? asking for help with a now chronic impairment that feeds on his very soul and wreaks havoc on his body? for making a mistake? by that logic every companion deserves the same fate.

which brings me to the contrast to how most of the other companions are framed in this interview: k*rlach, "the labrador of the party". l*e'zel, "she's so young". ast*rion, "much of what he does it out of fear". sh*dowheart, "the jason bourne" and "victim of religous trauma". w*ll, "the true baldur's gate hero".

the difference is staggering. there's empathy here. there's at least a surface level understanding and/or appreciation of the characters there.

...and then you have gale.

it's alienating and disappointing to see devs have so little respect and care for their own character, as well as for the parts of their fandom who have grown attached to the character exactly for the strengths and flaws he has, for the struggles he faces and for the healing journey he can have if he is helped and lives.