#Powers and Perils

[unseenphil]

Thinking about how WOTC technically owns the rights to a bunch of older RPGs that aren't D&D thanks to buying the companies that made them, and thus those will never see the light of day again except on piracy sites.

Okay, a lot of them aren't actually -good- games, but I will always have a soft spot for SPI's Dragonquest for reasons I've gone over before, and can't even bring myself to dislike Avalon Hill's RPG output- I'm pretty sure Lords of Creation ended up being some people's first introduction to Julie D'Aubigny, for example.

[ninoxwof]

Tsunami the Seawing (Revisited)

Been over a year since I started this blog and there are some designs I want to freshen up a little bit so here's a bit of a new design for Tsunami!

[Image Description: A digital drawing depicting Tsunami from Wings of Fire. She is a blue slightly muscular seawing dragon with a light sky blue underbelly and a deep blue neck, nose bridge and forehead. She has swept back curled lighter blue webby fin that goes from her forehead to her tail, they resemble slightly like tidal waves. She has similar webby fins on her chest, a tail fin, and ears that are similar to fish fins. Her offwhite bioluminescent scales are shaped like wave markings and teardrops and they're notably on her shoulders knees tummy, tail and brow. She also has swirl bioluminescent markings on her fin like wings to signify she is of seawing royalty. On her chin, she has two long barbels similar to her father's and then two more barbels that are similar to a shark's pectoral fin. She also have shark like fins on her elbows and on the bottom part of her tail. She has a little bit of yellow on the side of her belly, on her upper eyelids and on her esca. Her horns are a deep dark blue that resemble the tip of a conch shell. Her left eyebrow has a scar that runs vertically through it and her eyes are green. She is standing giving a toothy smile. In the second image she's shown to be wearing a purple pearl necklace, and two fin rings on her tail fin. /.End ID]

[illustratus]

The Sword of Damocles by Richard Westall

[mvshortcut]

Perilous Journey AU where Curtain does end up with the duskwort and successfully puts everyone to sleep except it fails because it simply makes Number Two take a twenty-minute nap and then she's up and chasing Curtain with a baseball bat

[some-pers0n]

I don't get people who hate any member of the Jade Winglet. All they did was be traumatized teens who learned to be themselves with their friends what did they do

[verecunda]

The difference between Halbrand smiling at those cute kids in Númenor

and Annatar smirking as those elf-children in Eregion cower in terror

That whole "do good, redeem myself" thing sure was just a phase, huh? x___x

[threemoonwatchers]

Thinkin about Moonwatcher again

AU where she’s actually terrible at hiding her powers and it’s only through BBC Merlin levels of pure obliviousness that nobody finds out.

She thinks they know. They don’t.

Notable examples of Things That Have Happened Because Moon Is A Terrible Actor include:

- Kinkajou’s mind in music class: “man what’s that song that’s like ‘IF OUR LOOOVE’S INSANITY WHY ARE YOU MY CLARITY’”

Moon: (immediately starts singing Clarity by Zedd because now it’s stuck in HER head too) (realizes) (stops and shuffles awkwardly)

- Moon finally working up the courage to volunteer to read aloud to the class but she suddenly gets The Vision TM and starts reciting the Jade Mountain prophecy, glowy eyes and all, before apologizing awkwardly and continuing right back into the book. She distances herself from everyone as much as she can the rest of the day but nobody notices anything and just assumed she got lost somehow because she DID drop her book when the vision started

- Moon bringing up SPECIFICALLY the moment where Cobra threw Qibli at the wall for stealing her a coconut in conversation about childhoods “yeah my mom was terrible” “yeah didn’t you like steal a coconut for her and she threw you at the wall??? And you were like REALLY young at the time right???” “…I don’t remember telling you that but yEAH she did” (awkward look from Moon)

- Moon slipping up and saying there are “too many thoughts in here” in a crowded room and even as she’s stiffening up and has this SUPER awkward look on her face everyone just assumes she means her brain like anyone else would

-Moon saying “Mood” when the chorus to Noise by Leah Marlene plays and immediately covering her mouth and looking guilty (all jokes aside please check out this song it’s so good)

-Moon winning 20 questions MULTIPLE times in a row. She’s banned from guessing games now. She always asks one or two questions just to be a lil bit normal but it’s like. “I’m thinking of an animal” “is it furry?” “No” “corn snake?” “yEAH ACTUALLY-”

-Moon having designated a lil area that nobody really goes to where she can run off to if she feels a vision coming on and she’s able to run and Peril getting lost and walking in on her a GAZILLION times (bonus points if it’s in Stonemover’s cave purely because that’d be really funny)

And combine that with the canon muttering prophecies in her sleep and knowing immediately what’s wrong with Bandit and it’s just overall a REALLY suspicious picture

So of course she’s VERY confused after the history cave incident when it turns out NOBODY knew.

(Not even Kinkajou, who unironically used the expression “you just read my mind” SO many times around her it COULDN’T have been a coincidence, right???)

[dieinct]

absolutely hysterical that i regularly wistfully consider the merits of being able to wear dresses but some friends were going to get matching flannel shirts for a group meetup and i was like "unfortunately wearing cute flannel shirts gives me such intense dysphoria that i cannot do it at all and i am going to have to think of some other thing to do"

[wofpolls]

[resident-wof-expert]

Moments in Wings of Fire that changed my brain chemistry (potential spoilers).

Glory becoming queen and essentially giving a big fat middle finger to the concept of destiny

Viper's death being brushed over

Flame crying

The moment in The Brightest Night just as the dragonets land near Burn's Stronghold with all the dragons of all the tribes gathered around waiting for them

Clay's fakeout death

The prologue to Moon Rising

Glory's fakeout death (why are there so many fakeout deaths?)

Anemone repeatedly beating Moon with a broom and her subsequent meltdown (and my subsequent realization that she was a scary fucking character)

Darkstalker Legends from beginning to end

The epilogue to Darkness of Dragons confirming Anemone's crush on Tamarin

Sundew being confirmed as the biggest lesbian this side of the ocean

Jerboa's backstory

Snowfall's last vision in The Dangerous Gift (Pretty much all of that book honestly)

Jambu having a boyfriend, and said boyfriend being instrumental in saving the world

Finishing the Flames of Hope epilogue and realizing that all the main characters survived to the end.

[wonder-vixen]

[wraithdolll]

moonwatcher

[ninoxwof]

Qibli the Sandwing

[Image Description: A digital drawing depicting Qibli from Wings of Fire. He is small wiry with a sail that flows downward to the side like it is hair, and a zig zag scar on his nose bridge. He is a dandelion yellow, with an off-white under belly that starts at his chin. Freckles are featured all over his body on his face, legs and tail. He also has tear duct markings that are similar to a cheetah. His sail and rattle is colored brown, with his eyes and tail barb being colored an even darker brown. He has orange yellow on his paws, snout, as a dorsal stripe marking and on the arms and fingers of his wings. The webs of his wings are a duller orange color. His horns and claws are an off-white that is lighter than his underbelly. He is standing with a grin on his face, with one eye winking, and an arm lifted to show the inner side of his claw, as though he is accentuating himself. In a second image, he is wearing a cowboy hat with his horns poking out that has a piece of sky fire embedded in, a neckerchief and a golden earring with a teardrop on his left ear. /.End ID]

[katabay]

Every day. Practically every day! I think about when you said that crasso shows up with a hammer to help Pompeio in a fight.

sometimes fights can be resolved with words, other times a response calls for unmitigated violence 🥰

speaking of which, here was an early draft of the scene! back then, it was going to be Pompeyo getting jumped at a bus stop in the dead of night (currently it’s a much larger brawl and I’m debating whether or not I should upgrade the hammer to something else)

[toolazytodecide]

Someone could write a great analysis of the way the police and the justice system are portrayed in a series of unfortunate events.

We never once actually see the police (only Olaf's associates disguised as them) and yet they are mentioned in almost every book. Mr. Poe and other adults assure the children they can trust the police to fix everything, and yet they never actually do anything.

Except that is, turn against the Bauldelaires and become another danger the Baudelaires have to run from. Because the Bauldaires know, that like every other system they've faced- the police will fail them.

[utilitycaster]

I said this much right after the episode but just to sum it up outside an ask: I honestly think that taking Laudna seriously and at her word when she says that she thinks of Imogen as a sister from another mister instead of dismissing her as not knowing how she feels or being in denial bodes better for an eventual romance, not worse.

The best way I can put it is to imagine Imogen and Laudna under the current status quo as traveling parallel to each other. They will always be close to each other and relatively synchronized; but their paths will never cross. I think most people have realized this, which is why the refrain of "when will (Delilah/Deanna/Deni$e/Bor'Dor/Prism/Ashton/Orym) (ask them about their relationship/assume they're married (?????)/otherwise serve entirely as development for Imogen or Laudna)" is so prevalent.

However, this really hits on the heart of why I can't get aboard the popular fandom idea of this ship: someone else shoving them together (which has, thus far, backfired entirely; I think had Yu not been present as a distraction, the gnarlrock fight actually might have gone somewhere productive; and Bor'Dor's question led to a distinctly unromantic answer) takes everything out of Imogen and Laudna's hands. Once again, the ship takes precedence over Imogen and Laudna having any agency over their own lives. Laudna should be given choices and allowed to develop as her own person and blossom and grow...unless the choice is to view Imogen platonically.

In the end, this decision isn't going to be made because of a guest character, or another PC. It's going to have to come from Imogen and from Laudna, no one else. If this story is about them choosing themselves and each other - and I don't know if it is, but that sure has been the party line about them - then they need to make that choice on their own. One of their deaths, a sense of an impending apocalypse, and magically enforced separation haven't been sufficient shakeups to the relationship. But a mismatch in how they feel, actually voiced to each other, might be.

It feels like a strong statement to place your desire for a woman to be with the person you want her to be with over that woman's own voiced beliefs. I think a vocal disagreement that opens up room for change is going to be the most likely bet, at this point, should a relationship happen; not still more people maneuvering Imogen and Laudna into place with no thought to what they want.