#Sometimes i think about that

[royboyfanpage]

Ollie with Roy 🤝 Roy with Grant

"You're my son but the word "son" has Meanings so I'm gonna just call you my buddy so we don't have to address that."

[gayofthefae]

Bear with me, my brain is reuploading all of Buddie's buildup in preparation

When Eddie was shot, the first thing he said was "[Buck], are you hurt?"

[sundayswiththeilluminati]

So this week’s story has raised a big question for me; just WHAT tools does Rasputin have at his disposal? Because even if we limit ourselves to the idea Rasputin ONLY has options that would technically tithe to Xivu, there’s a whole ladder of escalation beyond what we’re currently doing and below playing into Xivu’s hand. I feel like we’ve only ever seen the top (Warsats go BRRRRRR) and bottom (Give Guardians guns) of that ladder.

Short answer: Destiny's writers deliberately keep the extent of Rasputin's arsenal ambiguous, but I think he scrapped everything midrange a long time ago and was hoping to just nuke the Wrathborn from orbit.

Long answer: I said in an earlier post that Rasputin's four roles in the Destiny narrative are mystery, tragedy, power, and humanity. You're getting at the angle of both power and mystery. What arrows are in Rasputin's megaton quiver? We don't know. He has the warsats, of course, we know about those; we've also heard about fun toys like caedometric cannons and antimatter warheads under his control during the Golden Age. But then we also get hints at hidden and hibernating assets or secret projects - enough to bolster Rasputin's air of power and mystery and make it plausible when the narrative requires he pull something extra-spicy out of the closet.

Red probably did have more assets between "hand cannon" and "planetary defense cannon," but he lost an enormous chunk of matériel fighting the Pyramid Fleet the first go-round. Everything midrange would have either gotten scrapped for resources or bodged together into something bigger, and post-Collapse he had no incentive to rebuild those assets. He's been piecing together some defensive stuff that will hopefully mean less babysitting his facilities - his frames carry weapons and those perimeter defense towers pack a punch - but it hasn't been a priority.

But remember one of Rasputin's strengths is his adaptability, and not just his decentralized processing network. He's very good at taking what's on hand and turning it into what he needs. He fabricated the supercharged Valkyrie to use against Xol more or less on the fly, and scrambled long-disused assets into a brand-new artillery battery to take down the Almighty in a matter of weeks. The IKELOS weapons have that rapid-prototype look for a reason. Sleeper's hacked together from old Golden-Age weapon designs*. Red had serious manufacturing complexes in Hellas Basin at his disposal and, while we still don't know what Seraph energy is, it seems like he can fold it into matter on demand. So asking "what tools does Rasputin have" is a little like asking a chef with a pantry full of ingredients "what's for dinner."

*I like to think it's a miniaturized warsat cannon, but a friend of mine has a great theory that Sleeper's a vehicle-mounted weapon Rasputin made Guardian-portable by stripping off all that pesky radiation shielding.

In the specific case of the Wrathborn, though, I think Rasputin was hoping to get it all over with at once. He doesn't have the resources for a long campaign, and he risks contamination by Xivu Arath. Rasputin would rather go for major overkill than deploy too little up front and have to sustain and escalate. He's kind of a glass cannon right now, while the Hive can hold their own against Cabal attrition campaigns, and there's no attrition like Cabal attrition. And there's the additional threat of Hive corruption, which, we've never gotten an answer on whether Omnigul could have poisoned him, but neither he nor the Vanguard wanted to find out. We've already seen Wrathborn contamination subvert mechanical systems. And I've talked before about how he doesn't actually like combat that much; he has no concept of "fair play" or a proportional response. No, Red wanted to deliver one quick hammer-blow so massive he didn't have to deliver another, and it looks like he's not going to get that.

[blessphemy]

me when real human beings read something i wrote: woah. neat.

[akumanoken]

when you've literally haven't had any action since your pirate boy went back to the sea and you're still not as uptight or frustrated as our holy knight.

[inkskinned]

please i love you i'm begging you bring back suspension of disbelief bring back trusting the audience like. i cannot handle any more dialogue that sounds like a legal document. "hello, i am here to talk to you about the incident from a few minutes ago, because i feel you might be unwell, and i am invested in your personal wellbeing." "thank you, i am unwell because the incident was hurtful to me due to my childhood, which was bad." I CANT!!!!

do you know how many people are mad that authors use "growled" as a word for "said"? it's just poetics! they do not literally mean "growled," it's just a common replacement for "said with force but in a low tone." it's normal! do you hear me!! help me i love you please let me out of here!!!

[evidently-endless]

i think we should remind musicians they can absolutely make up little stories for their songs btw. it doesn’t have to be about them at all. you can invent a guy and put him in situations to music. time honoured tradition in fact.

[kensatou]

i'll let phie-san say it:

[liquidstar]

If my mom sees a significant amount of blood she gets lightheaded, and has fainted on some occasions. Once it happened when we were kids, I wasn't there to witness it but I heard the story from my dad. Basically my brothers, around 7 or 8 at the time, were playing outside while my mom was making their lunch, and she accidentally cut her finger. It wasn't anything serious, but it drew a fair bit of blood and she passed out. My dad saw this and rushed over, but he didn't really know what to do so he just sort of started slapping her to wake her up (not recommended, but he had no idea and panicked)

At that exact moment my brothers both came in from playing, and all they saw was our mom unconscious on the floor and our dad slapping her. So, like, without even saying a word to each other they both just INSTANTLY start whaling on him, like, full blown attack mode to defend our mom. Which obviously didn't help the situation, but she did wake up and everything was fine.

Now our dad says that he's actually really glad they attacked him over what they thought was going on, because it means he raised good boys. And I still think that's true, they're very good boys.

[eunnieboo]

lovey-dovey feelings

[adriles]

they are Cancelling me for dealing with my grief as best i can . also for the vicious war Crimes

[adjit]

I think we need to get more comfortable with the idea that sometimes shitty, racist, homophobic, bigoted people are still incredibly talented.

I feel like every time I see a post addressing someone’s shitty behavior the post also takes the time to mention that they’re not even good at [x] anyway. And that’s just not always true? Equating being good at a skill as being morally good is just not necessary. Someone can be a fantastic writer, can have a beautiful singing voice, can create breathtaking artwork, and still be a horrible person.

I know part of this is probably just the instinct to dislike everything about a person when you dislike them, but I also think this mindset leads to people defending creatives way past where they should, because if bad people create bad art, then if this person creates art that I like and resonates with me, then they can’t be a bad person!

And you know. That’s just not true. Those two things are simply completely unconnected and I think it’d be healthier if we all started disconnecting them in our heads.

[chloesimaginationthings]

Michael doesn’t like Halloween anymore in FNAF..

[foundfamilywhump]

the question, you see, is not ‘is it too ooc for this character to cry’ but rather ‘what circumstances would push this character to cry’

this is the whump wisdom, go forth and make that character cry

[sashayed]

If you are in your 20s and depressed I want you to know this: As you age, I promise, you will acquire tools and perspective that will open your world in ways you cannot imagine right now. You will find levels of contentment and joy you never thought possible. You will access a deep understanding and forgiveness of yourself that comes just from hanging out long enough in the same body, and that forgiveness will change everything. Also you may have a regressive depression so intense and long-lasting that it feels like a traumatic brain injury. don't freak out it's normal

[secondbeatsongs]

for anyone too young to know this: watching The Truman Show is a vastly different experience now, compared to how it was before youtube and social media influencers became normal

before it was like, "what a horrifying thing to do to a human being! to take away their autonomy and privacy, all for the sake of profits! to create fake scenarios for them to react to, just to retain viewership! to ruin their happiness just so some corporate entity could harvest money from their very humanity! how could anyone do something so evil?"

and now it's like, "ah, yeah. this is still deeply fucked up, but it's pretty much what every influencer has been doing to their kids for a decade now. probably bad that we've normalized this experience"