#Still going mildly insane over these characters :D

[littleeggrock]

some songs that remind me of the qsmp, it's gonna be a long one haha

Malmo - Mook

Imagery of a train station throughout , "the kind of place you mean to pass through, before you know it it's home" - pretty obv but they cant leave the island,

"it's a Saturday night in june and im waiting by the tracks to get out of this place" - the smp started in March, but the lore really started to pick up in June, things only snowballing from there. Also the imagery of train tracks, could connect that to the outcome of the puzzles after the timer event leading up to the nether

"there's something about the language, something about these people who look an awful lot like me" - there's the very obvious language barriers, and the fact that while all of the streamers on the island are very different, many of them agree on the same principles like that the eggs come before anything else, elquack bad, federation mostly bad, etc

"you laugh and I agree, that this thing has got the best of me" - many of the streamers have become so emotionally invested in their eggs that they care for them like actual children, and All of them realize this about themselves

The kids don't stand a chance - vampire weekend

do I really need to elaborate lmao.

"The pin striped men of morning, are coming forward to dance, with pure Egyptian cotton, the kids don't stand a chance" - the federation, a seemingly untouchable, perfect group, commonly depicted wearing suits, gave us the eggs, but also threw them and the characters into an incredibly difficult situation, two lives per egg, an insanely dangerous island, with the ever present threat of human error, the streamers cant keep this up forever.

"You criticize the practice, by murdering their plants, ignoring all the history, denying them romance" - the feds have little regard for what the streamers do on the island, so long as they comply with their rules and standards, but when a streamer does do something "illegal" the consequences can be extreme, pac and mike being arrested, Cellbit in general, multiple people have been shot, the list goes on. They don't care if someone or something is important to you, if it gets in the way they Will deal with it accordingly

"I didn't like the business, but that was at first glance, your pillow feels so soft now, but still you must advance" - many people have and are actively working with the feds right now, (cough jaidens gone cough cough), they may not like it now, if they ever did, but for many its too late to back out without consequences so still they press onwards

"the kids don't stand a chance" - repeated many times throughout the song, many of the eggs never stood a chance at all, trump was abandoned, tilin and flippa died to people they loved and trusted, and bobby got in over his head and the lag took him, there's almost no way for Any of the eggs to defend against the code(s) on their own, and even with streamers they were still put in almost an impossible situation, it's very difficult to log on every day and take care of an egg, poor philza lmao

Comfort eagle - cake

"we are building a religion, we are building it bigger, we are widening the corridors, we are adding more lanes" - the feds like to make structures, this reminds me specifically of the main base, where quackity walked through before he was kidnapped and where jaiden "toured" briefly before disappearing. They also are recruiting people to work with them, it's not quite a religion but they are awfully focused on making things perfect, and really like the color white which is often made out to represent holiness or godliness

"To resist it is futile, it is useless to resist it" - the feds get what they want no matter what, you may refuse them once and they leave, but they will not stop until they get what they "need". They also aren't afraid to play dirty, manipulating Cellbit and bad and leaving them absolutely miserable

"And the fluffy white lines that the airplane leaves behind, are drifting right in front of the waning of the moon" - french plane crash. Do I need to say more

"We are building a religion, we are making a brand, we're the only ones to turn to when your castles turn to sand" - the feds like to recruit people while they are desperate, (Jaiden, foolish, quackity, etc) trying to appear reliable so they can manipulate you further

"There's no need to ask directions if you ever lose your mind, we're behind you, we're behind you and let us please remind you, we can send a car to find you if you ever lose your way" - again, the feds strike when the streamers are vulnerable, physically and emotionally

There's a lot more little details I could connect to individual characters but I am very tired rn so we will stick to general stuff

This was probably mostly rambling but I needed to get these thoughts outta my head somehow before school starts again, I need space to think about an education and not just my various hyperfixtations lmao

Sorta unrelated but I have a Spotify playlist that's half stolen from other people's qsmp themed playlists and recommendations and tailored to my personal tastes, I've also added stuff I've found that i think belongs there too, feel free to check it out if you are interested

[tortoisesshells]

widowshill asked: can we see the many-times folded list fanning out indefinitely

A moderately-abbreviated list of complaints:

My subjective problem is that I simply don't care about a lot of it, and some of that's the circumstances in which I'm watching it, but part of it, I'm going to say, is the set-up. The wrap-up for 1897 was sloppy, to put it mildly, leaving a handful of characters alive, and many of those in the wind, slouching towards the present/1969. Am I going to get a clear resolution to those questions? Maybe eventually. But it's intensely frustrating that 1897 ended and left all the parts strewn out all over the place. If Quentin was successfully prevented from being walled up alive and dying in 1897, what does that mean for the present? If that means he never haunted? Do the present-day Collinses remember Quentin? What happened to Petofi, really? Are there any knock-on effects of Trask getting Amontillado'd? And what the hell was the point of Kitty getting kidnapped by Josette's ghost and then forced(? unclear to me.) to commit suicide? This doesn't have anything directly to do with the Leviathans yet, but I started the arc really peeved.

Part of Leviathans also depends on introducing a number of new characters - because they've done away with most of the original cast of Collinsportians. The Todds, for example, both facilitate the plot and will inevitably be wrecked by it - and while I can't say ultimately how effective they'll be as plot devices, right now I don't think the narrative's done enough to make me care about them being ground to dust by Collinsport horseshit. Joe Haskell being driven insane and forcibly committed to Windcliff? Tragic, because he's inherently decent and we had a lot of time to care about him. New characters who get thrown in the meat grinder of being sock-puppeted by snake cultists in two episodes or less? Well. I'm trying to care, but I don't know who the Todds are. And they're not even well-connected to the other characters - it's not as though anyone is being set up to mourn them when the worst inevitably happens? I'm not sure I care about them, and no one I care about on the show particularly does. So there's that.

(Sidebar: I know I complained about this to you, but. The Todd's antiques shop is a delightful set but it's so badly integrated into the world of Collinsport. We've established that no one comes to Collinsport, except the summer people - and at large Collinsport isn't exactly an economic powerhouse. The Todd's just opened this place in the fall? To what trade? How are they making enough money to hire Carolyn on part time? It used to be that the economic situation in town was a major issue; more recently, Collinsport as a place mired in the past was still a significant point of commentary. If Leviathans had been made 400 episodes ago there'd be some dialogue about what used to be in that storefront, or the difficulty of making enough money to live on if you're not fishing. I miss that show. I know we've got immortal werewolves now but I demand that Collinsport's economic situation makes sense.)

Part of it, and I'm sorry to be unkind because there's no way the working conditions for those child actors was ethical in the slightest, is that the various kids they've had playing the Leviathan Child are just. Not up to DS standard. If they want to sell me on a child gleefully contemplating murder again, they've got to find someone in the same league as Henesy. I had no trouble believing that kid had drowned kittens and attempted to murder at least two major characters and frame a third for one of those attempts. To be flip: git gud, little Antichrist.

Part of it, much more seriously, is that I can already see how the narrative is divorcing itself from consequences for the characters. I'm thrilled that Dennis Patrick is back and getting paid, and thusfar he's been one of the most consistently affecting performances but. I hate Paul. I hate the retcon eliminating him willingly deceiving Liz about his death and allowing Jason to eventually blackmail her; I don't want the narrative to tell me to feel sorry for a man who made his wife miserable before attempting to rob her and abandon both her and their daughter. Liz, on the flip side, has been brainwashed by the cultists and is currently tormenting Paul, but because she's brainwashed and not responsible for her actions, they've lost any emotional heft they might have had. There's no possible emotional catharsis for her - either in choosing to let it go, or choosing the twist the knife. Liz's internality has been sacrificed, again.

Lastly, Dark Shadows earliest and most effective monsters were those whose monstrosity was both literal and metaphorically appropriate - Laura, an undead fire witch apparently produced by a dangerously unhappy marriage to Roger, came back to burn their son alive; Barnabas, the privileged son and vampire - who'd been immured by a father who could neither stomach Barn's murder of innocents nor convince himself to destroy his son and heir, coming back to drain the lifeblood out of Collinsport in a way merely more literal than the way his descendants have. What are the Leviathans saying about anything? They're not even dealing in real cult tactics - the brainwash is completely magical. They're not charismatic. They're not selling anything to those who are strong-armed in. This is the late fall of 1969, we're knee-deep in the Mansion Family murders, and DS has nothing topical to say about cults? They're not even trying to say anything about H. P. Lovecraft!

In sum: I'm not scared of the Leviathans because they're so obviously unreal, they're tenuously connected to either the established world in Collinsport or the lived experience of the viewers in late 1969, they're relying on retconning established canon, and as soon as they're inevitably destroyed, no one is going to face any consequences because everything was the Leviathans' fault. I would say bite me, but I'm not even sure Barn is a vampire at this point.

oh. and they sheared down Quentin's sideburns.

the problem with Leviathans is. well. there's a lot of problems with the Leviathans arc.

[apompkwrites]

HI! Ive been binge reading your stories now. I wonder what will happen if character! reader got transported in the streamer character's world.

reader impact || you're isekai'd!

series masterlist characters: albedo, childe, kaeya, xiao genre: fluff summary: it's your turn to be isekai'd! how will our plays react when they find you in their very own home? notes: i really like this idea! i hope you like the characters i chose :D

albedo -

albedo is... tired.

what's new?

he's spent almost the whole day making prints off stream to sell and honestly just needs to rest.

although, he has noted that klee is... abnormally quiet.

his art session wasn't interrupted by her running through his room, drawing with him, telling stories of what happened during the day. absolutely nothing.

and, being the good big brother he is, he worries about her.

so before he heads up to rest, he goes out into the living room to make sure she's okay.

however, what he doesn't expect is seeing a familiar character playing with klee by the couch.

you're... here?

you're here?!?!

WHY ARE YOU HERE?!?!?!?!

you, the very character he basically idolizes, are sitting on his couch, in his home, with his sister?

is... is he going insane?

"albedo! look! look who it is!"

klee's yell confirms to him that, no, he is not going insane.

you turn around to look at him once klee starts waving him over.

"ah, so you're albedo."

you...

you said his name.

you. just. said. his. name.

"i... am assuming you wouldn't mind helping me understand where i am?"

"...n-no, not at all."

he doesn't show you his notes on alchemy to see if he understands it, i don't know what you're talking about--

childe -

childe's day is going relatively normal.

waking up to help take care of his siblings and then straight to streaming (to probably yell at his teammates/opponents).

and that's exactly how it goes.

his stream goes well, his viewers are having funs, he's having fun, it's all good.

"BROTHER!!!"

ah, yes.

of course, this is a daily occurrence in their household.

his siblings (more specifically teucer) like to barge into his room and watch him play or talk to him.

he doesn't mind it, of course.

they're his darling brothers and sister.

"hey, teucer!"

luckily, he's not in a round right now so he can give his brother his full attention.

teucer says hi to the chat, as always, before hurriedly tugging on childe's arm.

"you gotta see who's outside!"

"alright, alright! i'll be right back, chat."

after making sure his chat can be left alone, he lets teucer drag him out of his room.

he expects it to be one of his friends or someone his family knows.

he didn't think that you would be in his living room talking with tonia and anthon.

"(name)! (name)! this is who we were talking about!"

"so this is your older brother?"

childe's caught off guard but he's quick to keep his composure.

"yeah, that's me!"

"well, it's nice to meet you."

you two quickly bond over stories of your siblings while teucer goes to make sure childe's chat is accounted for :)

kaeya -

oh god.

so it's supposed to be a normal day for kaeya.

you know, waking up, drinking, streaming, flirting with you, the usual.

but he goes out to the living room before streaming and...

there you are?

just... drinking his wine?

he's mildly confused.

but he'll get over it quickly, don't worry.

"well well, what do we have here?"

you turn around as soon as he talks, ready to draw your weapon.

you scan him up and down before letting out a soft hum, letting your hand fall back to your side.

"i must say, you have good taste in wine."

"i pride myself in that."

the issue is... he was planning on using that wine for his stream...

"...you know what? why don't i join you?"

his favorite character from genshin is here in his house and his first thought is to... bring them onscreen to drink.

his viewers aren't complaining soo,,,

they all just think one of his friends cosplays.

(and they're really good at it)

looks like they have more content for their flirting compilations :D

xiao -

another day, another... sleepless night.

it's times like this where xiao misses his old roommates.

they all bonded over their sleep schedules or lack thereof.

but now that they've all moved out... it's just him.

him all alone with just the lingering aftereffects of his nightmares.

or so he thought.

he passes through the quiet home, nodding to the merch of you in his living room.

"morning, (name)..."

"it's not often i hear a mortal say my name."

...hold on.

it'll take xiao a bit to understand what's happening.

this man thinks he's hallucinating.

i mean, he's been having bad nightmares recently so why wouldn't his mind try to cope by imagining you, his literal comfort character, in his own home.

"tell me."

your calm voice cuts through the air.

"why is it you're up this early?"

he doesn't tell you upright.

even if you're fake, he doesn't want to say it out loud.

but, you're smart.

you'll understand.

"... i see."

you don't say another word. just sit there in his living room, watching as he mutters words of encouragement to himself.

and you're still there when he passes out a few hours later.

little does he know, that you'll be sitting right by his bed to "keep him safe" when he wakes up.

[eldritchamy]

You can’t just say that and then not tell us what happened in the game on Sunday!

My campaign is so insane and homebrewed that it's hard to even explain what's going on without a HUGE amount of context, and the thing that happened on Sunday was very specific to both the setting and an original character from my PC's backstory which is ALSO subject to a lot of secrecy because of a future plot twist I have with her.

That said, I'll do my best to give some accessible context.

EDIT: this attempt failed horribly good luck with the ENORMOUS wall of text below the cut, much of which covers some Magic The Gathering lore specific to the Ravnica campaign setting.

Essentially our game takes place in Ravnica, the MTG setting that was adapted for D&D 5e. There are two big asterisks to that, because it's not simply canon Ravnica.

The first asterisk is that my DM actually adapted the setting on her own before there was an official 5e sourcebook for Ravnica, and much of it is customized with that in mind. The Guilds in particular are a lot less fucked up and evil.

For anyone not familiar with Ravnica, it's a plane of endless city, and the MAIN city was called Ravnica, but it's so expansive that it's essentially become synonymous with the entire plane. Think an infinite Coruscant from Star Wars, but with better worldbuilding. The CITY of Ravnica was founded over 10,000 years ago when a powerful Sphynx and "Planeswalker" (a MTG concept that basically amounts to powerful spellcasters with the ability to teleport to other planes) united the ten warring factions in a magically binding agreement called the Guildpact, which forces cooperation between the factions and prevents then from destroying each other. Now the ten factions are "Guilds," each serving a necessary function in the city. The Azorius Senate is where the legislation comes from, the Orzhov Syndicate is the banking system (also one of Ravnica's two primary religions and the mafia), the Golgari Swarm is a massive collective of undercity recyclers (which includes recycling living matter) and are responsible for most of Ravnica's food and agriculture production, the Izzet League handles infrastructure and technological advancement, the Simic Combine is the biological sciences including medicine and bioengineering, the Cult of Rakdos is the entertainment industry (very much including adult entertainment), etc. etc. etc.

There was a point in Ravnica's history where the then-leader of House Dimir (the guild responsible for a lot of shipping and messengers, but also secretly a sort of black hat spy network) committed a crime for which he had to be punished, but it was impossible to punish him without exposing the existence of House Dimir to the public (a condition for the original signing of the Guildpact) which created a loophole that BROKE the Guildpact, and there was a period of chaos and war until some long winded magic stuff happened with an artifact known as the "Implicit Maze" which promised power and prosperity but could not be solved without cooperation by all of the guilds. The Implicit maze was solved through the actions of a powerful Planeswalker and mind mage named Jace Beleren, who as a result became the "Living Guildpact," which granted him all of the magical power of the Guildpact and made it so that any law he verbally spoke became magically binding on the plane of Ravnica. This was, to put it mildly, a big fucking deal.

In the official D&D Sourcebook for the Ravnica setting, Jace is still the active Guildpact.

OUR version takes place further in the timeline, about 5 years after one of the most major events in all of MTG lore from what I understand, called the War of the Spark. WOTS was a HUGE deal and is hard to explain briefly, but what basically happened is a 25,000 year old Elder Dragon named Nicol Bolas, who was ALSO probably the single most powerful Planeswalker ever, spent a long time trying to steal Planeswalker Sparks (sort of a rare magic birthmark on your soul that gives you the POTENTIAL to "ignite" and become a Planeswalker if the right conditions are met) from other Planeswalkers in order to not only recover the power that he had lost when another big event in the lore changed (nerfed) how Planeswalkers work, but ultimately to transcend the limits of Planeswalkers altogether and become a god.

He got very, very close to succeeding.

The War of the Spark refers to the specific event when Nichol Bolas used an Interplanar Beacon to lure Planeswalkers to Ravnica, where they would be unable to escape because of an artifact his agents had activated there, called the Immortal Sun, which basically blocked all planar travel out of the plane except through a specific device on Ravnica called the Planar Bridge, which an agent of his, an extremely cunning and malevolent Planeswalker named Tezzeret, managed to destroy and incorporate into his own mechanically enhanced body. The long and short of it is that Bolas lured and then trapped Planeswalkers on Ravnica, bringing through a massive army of undead (the Dread Horde) including undead gods (the Eternals from a plane called Amonket, which are basically the Egyptian gods), with the intent to use something called the Elder Spell to steal a huge number of Sparks in his final ascension to godhood.

Ravnica got its ass kicked but fought back HARD with a lot of help from all of the very powerful people who now found themselves united against Bolas. Tezzeret used the Planar Bridge to destroy the Guildpact Chamber, stripping the Guildpact's powers from Jace and removing the single best defense Ravnica had. The Izzet Guild leader, a 12,000 year old hyper intelligent dragon and wizard named Niv Mizzet, fought Bolas personally as part of a risky plan to resurrect him as a new Guildpact. Bolas killed him and a planeswalker named Nissa spearheaded a ritual with Ravnica's ley lines to reignite the Guildpact and channel its magic into a resurrected Niv Mizzet, who was then powerful enough to REALLY fight Bolas. Ultimately Bolas was defeated and through a coordinated effort between Jace Beleren and Nichol Bolas' twin brother, Ugin. They created a massive illusion of Bolas being killed and disintegrated, while what actually happened was his memories were erased, his sparks taken from him, and his names stripped from him. Ugin locked himself and his brother in the Meditation Plane until the end of their natural lives, which would be a few thousand years in the future. This was done to prevent Nichol Bolas from bringing himself back from the dead, which he had managed to do after a previous confrontation with Ugin.

ANYWAY. Our campaign is about 5 years after the War of the Spark. Niv Mizzet is the new Living Guildpact, and Jace Beleren is still one of the most powerful planeswalkers known, and the leader of a group of Planeswalkers called the Gatewatch who work together to stop threats to the multiverse that any one of them couldn't do on their own. A handful of other very famous MTG characters are part of this group, including Chandra, Karn, Vraska, Saheeli, etc.

Jace Beleren is also, famously, kind of an asshole and not many people like him on a personal level.

SO ANYWAY.

The darker aspects of canon Ravnica are still there in our version but are largely muted or underground. Rakdos especially. Surface level Rakdos in our version is a lot bigger on consent and safe practices in its kink scene, and the Simic Combine is MOSTLY a legitimate bio sciences and medical services guild with only a LITTLE bit of horribly unethical and non-consensual bioengineering experimentation. And we aren't located in the 10th District as depicted in the official sourcebook, so the locations in it aren't really relevant to us.

THE OTHER asterisk to understanding our campaign is that we have a very open minded approach to how the Multiverse WORKS, and therefore a lot of crossovers with other stuff are possible in our world.

As an example, in our first session we all arrived at the site of our collective employer, a transguild organization called the Emerald Magistrates. We have plane-wide authority and jurisdiction to investigate all kinds of things, and we handle a lot of diplomatic stuff with other planes. Our first mission was to go meet with some of the first visitors from a "Myconid Kingdom," who consisted of something like a dragon turtle dragonborn and a princess. They came to Ravnica to get away from an ex-partner of theirs who was not really grasping the concept of a breakup very well.

Which basically means, our job was to help Bowser and Peach break up with Mario, and to convince him to leave them alone.

Since then an Embassy for the Mushroom Kingdom has sprung up near an Izzet waterworks, and there is a permanent planar portal (in the form of a warp pipe) that leads to the plane of Miyamoto (basically Smashverse). The next day we visited the Mushroom Kingdom and foiled a raid by Shiekah bandits. One of them (who turned out to be Daisy) was carrying a strange motherboard-like device that was meant to be attached to the cell towers Izzet was helping build in the Kingdom to get them a basic cell network. We brought the device back to Ravnica and learned it was the work of a Planeswalker, most likely Tezzeret, in conjunction with another faction from Miyamoto (the Space Pirates).

There was also an outbreak of a "Helix Plague" memetic cognitohazard, which was basically a contagious insanity where people would mindlessly rattle off button inputs and memes from Twitch Plays Pokemon. We had to bring in a Jenny brigade from Johto to help us contain it, but that came with the problem of Pokemon Trainers being turned loose on Ravnica, and it turned out their Pokeball technology worked on the creatures (and people) of our world.

So we investigated THAT, and found a second portal that took us to the basement of a Team Rocket building. We took an elevator up to the top floor and confronted Giovanni, who revealed that he was fully aware the Pokeballs worked on sophants (our catch-all term for sentient life forms, whether humanoid or not).

It turned out that Giovanni had met a man with a metal arm who taught him a lot of things about the Multiverse, and showed him how to enhance his Pokeball technology to capture a much wider range of creatures, some extraordinarily powerful (we walked passed a Pokemon battle where a trainer was using a Beholder the night before). The man also helped him design a planar portal device, powered by a captured Mewtwo, which could take him to other worlds. The man's only request to him was that he have fun.

Giovanni showed us one of the creatures he had captured on another plane. It was a planeswalker named Tamiyo.

We managed to overpower him with a very well coordinated Charm effect, taking his Pokeballs from him, and our artificer disabled the device that was imprisoning Mewtwo. We convinced them (Mewtwo uses they/them) NOT to kill Giovanni because we needed the information he had to help us stop the man he was working with, whom by this point we had 100% confirmed was Tezzeret.

This is an issue because the current Izzet Guild leader, Ral Zarek, was SUPPOSED to have hunted down and killed Tezzeret after the war, as he was now one of the most dangerous people in the multiverse and Bolas was really one of the only people who could get in his way. So Tezzeret even being alive was a problem. Actively working to create chaos across other planes, and being able to capture other Planeswalkers, was a HUGE interplanar emergency nightmare scenario.

Mewtwo was able to identify the creatures in the Pokeballs for us without opening them. TWO Planeswalkers (Tamiyo and Garruk), Darkwing Duck, Pyramid Head, and a Peridot. Mewtwo released the Planeswalkers and Darkwing, but told us the gem-creature should only be released in space for its own comfort, and that the Master ball contained a horrifying creature that it might NEVER be safe to release. Giovanni, now under the effects of a Charm Person spell, confirmed that he is considered a master trainer by the rules of this world, and even he was unable to control this one.

Mewtwo was also able to show us Giovanni's memory of meeting the "man with the metal arm" and we all saw a vision of him meeting with Tezzeret and a floating suit of black metal armor, which he was siphoning some kind of energy from. (We know out of character that this is Dark Samus).

SO ANYWAY our campaign is fucking crazy. That's the CONTEXT part of this answer.

For the character part, some basics.

I am playing a very homebrewed character. I'm using a Tiefling subrace that I homebrewed myself (Bloodline of Erinyes, my character is the daughter of a Deva who became an Erinyes after an encounter with a Succubus, so she's basically half angel half fiend and that averaged out to Tiefling), and an entire 5e class that I homebrewed myself (Witch, specifically a shadow magic subclass I called Nightshade, which plays kind of like a stealthy caster, largely using Warlock-style mechanics but with very different flavor).

My character's backstory is basically that her mother Lailah, a Deva (warrior angel), spared the life of a Succubus who was a refugee of a war between Elysium and the Nine Hells, and ended up sleeping with her. Shortly thereafter she began to wonder if the Gods' ideas about morality were wrong, and she was cast out and became an Erinyes, and fell through the planes to Malbolge (Sixth layer of the Nine Hells). There, she met another Erinyes who used to be a different kind of Deva on Arborea. She was an oracle and a planar guardian, and she abandoned her post after a vision that she would be needed here to help Lailah. She took her to a cave she had set up as a living space, hidden in the mountains of broken adamantine, and they lived together for about 3 years, and raised a little tiefling together until it was safe enough to leave the hells. She was able to send Lailah and her daughter (Ash, my character) to the Prime Material plane, and she came out on the other side in an overgrown, wild forest on the fringes of Ravnica. Lailah raised her daughter there alone, but Ash would sneak out to play with another little tiefling girl from a nearby druid village, named Aria. Long story short one day Lailah disappears, Ash and Aria go to the city to find out what happened to her, they end up staying and making a living there, and eventually get super duper double deluxe gay married. Aria is a retired adventurer who was active up until the end of the War of the Spark, and now works as a foster mom for the animals that Ravnica doesn't know how to care for. She basically runs an animal rehab out of their home in the Selesnya Conclave (a guild whose guiding philosophy is harmony between the city and nature). Ash is a reputable leather worker who sells her goods to merchants around the city.

Ash never gave up looking for her mom and uses the markets to learn about the adventures of other people, especially planar travelers, and about 5 years ago (around the time of the war's end) she met a woman who appreciated her sense of subtlety and diplomacy, and took her on as an information broker for House Dimir, promising her a favorable exchange of information. The woman introduced herself as Ally. She became a trusted friend and mentor.

Fast forward to campaign times, she was the one who convinced Ash to take the job with the Emerald Magistrates, because it would open a LOT more doors in terms of the information she could uncover and the people she would meet.

So.

Ally is a character that I created as part of Ash's backstory, and I am EXTREMELY proud of her as a character. This is my first ever D&D campaign, and I think I did a REALLY good job creating a backstory with a lot of well defined themes and plot hooks for my DM to play with. I absolutely love my PC and I am literally obsessed with her, her story, and the campaign in general. I think about it almost non stop every day. And as much as I love Ash, Ally is probably the character I'm proudest of, because of HOW MUCH opportunity there is for my DM to play with the open spaces I left. She's a perfect character for story threads and plot hooks, and she's GREAT at coming into the story at interesting times to offer some new juicy paths to explore.

Ash met with her when we were first learning about the weird motherboard thing (which turned out to emit a signal that creates mindless rage, overriding a sophant's conscious mind and suppressing memories while activating some kind of blind adrenaline fury), and again when we learned that the prime suspect was Tezzeret. She told Ash about some of the things that happened in the war, including how her boss at the Magistrates was a powerhouse during that time and was personally responsible for saving thousands of lives, and there are rumors that she sparked herself during that time, which Ash didn't know about. Ally also gave her the names of a handful of Planeswalkers who she had direct or indirect knowledge of, and gave Ash a piece of paper that basically set up a meeting with a contact of hers, an archivist for Jace Beleren. Ash took it back to her team and her boss, and they ended up meeting with Jace a few hours later, just like that.

This is all to say that, in addition to having created the character, I had some inkling of how connected she was and how much she knew, and how powerful she herself was.

So last session, we were dealing with the aftermath of Nora (the boss) basically exploding in a psychic scream due to overwhelming stress from something she had done the previous day (she was confirmed at this point to be a Planeswalker, her thing is speed and self-duplication and there's a running bit about her astonishingly lethal consumption of caffeine and energy drinks - she consumes the equivalent of 5 5-hour energy drinks *per hour* in addition to highly corrosive caffeine abominations just to keep up with her body's insane metabolism). She was hurt pretty badly but she's alive.

But the psychic shockwave collapsed part of the building and knocked Ash and Giovanni unconscious instantly (I rolled a 4 on my CON save) and drove almost everyone else in the building to their knees. The other people in the room were 3 members of my party, Mewtwo, Chandra Nalaar, Jace Beleren, Rosalina (who is a Planeswalker in our game), and Karn. Hold that thought.

The moment Ash fell unconscious, her breathing and heartbeat became very erratic. Which has a serious consequence that is very specific to Ash.

She and Aria have a pair of special rings (the same ones they proposed to each other with) that are enchanted to pulse in tune with the other's heartbeat. As long as they are on the same plane of existence, they can always feel each other's heart beating through the rings.

Remember when I said Aria is a retired adventurer who was active until the end of the war? Her party's end-of-campaign arc would have included the final conflict, in which they managed to take down a large portion of the Dread Horde, including at least one of the God Eternals.

Aria, along with her party, has killed a god.

She does not fuck around when her wife is in danger.

So when the artificer picked up Ash's phone, she got enough out of her to figure out where Ash was, then Shapechanged into a dragon and flew there, breaking down the front doors when she got there. So she got to Ash's side, sent a text confirming her location to a contact listed as "For Emergencies," and got to work making sure Ash was okay.

WHICH BRINGS US, FINALLY, TO THE SUBJECT OF THIS ASK.

A winged figure dropped in from the hole in the ceiling and loudly (and angrily) asked what the hell was going on.

The bard immediately got heart eyes, because Ally is a tall, intimidating goth woman, and all of the players are gay as fuck.

Then things got really interesting. Because Jace RECOGNIZED her, and asked her (under a name no one in the party knew about yet, apart from myself out of character) what she was doing there.

Ally jumped clean over his head and ignored him, running to the now barely-conscious Ash's side and checking, alongside Aria, that she was okay. Jace continued to try to talk to her, mentioning a card game she beat him in, when she stood up, turned around, and made the other players fall in love with her instantly.

Standing in a room with SIX of his allies, none of whom recognized her (not counting the still-unconscious Nora), she shouted Jace down and backed him into a corner, fully intimidating him into complete silence, called him a fuckboy, blamed him for not taking good enough care of the people around him, and yelled at him to sit the fuck down.

She did this to the former Guildpact. Unambiguously one of the most powerful people on Ravnica, and one of the most powerful Planeswalkers currently known.

In a room with SIX other incredibly powerful people who are friends or allies of his.

And all of the players including myself lost their shit.

I knew there was a possibility of her entering the scene. I suspected what would happen if she did was she would be overwhelmed by all the power players in the room who demanded to know what reason she had for showing up in the middle of what should be one of the most secret meetings on the plane, and she would be deeply uncomfortable in a room with TWO extremely powerful psychics when she's a person with a lot of very important secrets that she has very good reasons to keep for now.

What I never considered was the possibility of her coming into that room and not only being absolutely FEARLESS, but so overwhelmingly confident that she shouted Jace into silence right in front of the most likely (and powerful) people to back him up if a fight broke out.

After shutting him up, she returned to Aria's side and checked Ash for signs of a concussion, which she confirmed, and then told Aria that she needs to go to a hospital. Between the two of them they decide Aria will be the one to take her, Ally was going to leave either way but she had other things that urgently needed her attention.

Ally stood up again, gave an unexpectedly affectionate hair ruffle to the unconscious Nora while saying she needed better caretakers, and then teleported away.

That's about as well as I can explain it without just posting the session notes for the entire campaign so far. Which would be A LOT, because we've had 16 sessions and I take notes like Marisha Ray. My notes are so detailed that I keep better track of the timeline and where we are relative to previous events than the DM.

So my favorite NPC and the character I'm possibly proudest of had the most badass moment of the entire campaign so far (we're about a year in) and I have been foaming at the mouth ever since.

I can't WAIT to find out what happens next.

[1-of-those-things]

Fanfic Master List (All Doctor Who)

OneOfThoseThings on AO3 

(Updated 8/19/21)

Doctor/Donna Standalone Fics

The Best of Times (Amnesiac Remix)

A mind-wiped Donna runs into Martha and gets some good old fashioned human help realizing her potential all over again. Word has gotten out through the twenty-seven planets she saved though, so there are a few more aliens following her around… including one very specific alien who really shouldn’t be there.

Ship: Tenth Doctor x Donna Noble

Also Featuring: Martha and Jack

The Noble Neverwere

A timey-wimey fantasy fic in which the TARDIS finds a way to keep Donna Noble, but has a little trouble with the details like anchoring her in time and space.

Canon-compliant in the sense that it's never been explicitly stated that there isn't a time-fluid echo of a certain ginger companion haunting the TARDIS.

Ship: Tenth Doctor x Donna Noble

Also Featuring: Missy and Twelve, with cameos by Ryan, Mickey, and Rory

Standalone Fics with Other Pairings 

The Volatile Nature of Binary Stars

A dark(er) AU in which the Master happens upon a mind-wiped Donna and gives her a little boost the rest of the way to full Time Lord status. Then they both return to the TARDIS and an unsuspecting Doctor.

Spoiler: Unlike most fix-its, in this one Donna is Not pleased that she was abandoned and does Not magically just get over that.

Ships: Doctor x Master (Simms) AND Doctor x Donna

The Beat Between Measures

A missing scene from Revolution of the Daleks, in which the Doctor and Jack get a proper reunion

Ship: Thirteenth Doctor x Jack

Universal Lost and Found

A fix-it in which Martha runs across a mind-wiped Donna and helps her (re)claim what the Universe owes her.

Ship: Donna x Martha 

Note: Doctor x Donna and Doctor x Martha are implied, but this one is a Donna x Martha fic

Polymorphism

The companion polycule fic you’ve all been waiting for. The TARDIS pulls her Bad Wolf through to a parallel world where she’s still travelling with the Doctor. And Martha. And Donna. And things are a bit friendlier this time around. 

Ship: Rose x Martha x Donna x Tenth Doctor 

Note: This is really Rose x Martha x Donna with the (arguably canonically Ace) Doctor not left out in the cold. It’s not even a little bit a harem fic.

Series 

Nice Things; Good Things 

A blatant canon divergence from Journey’s End where Donna just lets the metacrisis Doctor and Rose right back onto the TARDIS and then they all just go back to traveling together. Pretty soon after that, Jack gets added in and then it’s just the whole team enjoying themselves for once instead of having just endless tragedy for the sake of character building.

As the series goes on, it gets more and more polyamorous, but it’s set up so that each fic can be an acceptable stopping point so that anyone who isn’t on board can just hop off whenever they like and not have to deal with a bunch of unresolved cliffhangers.

Individual fics are carefully tagged (which makes for a hilariously long list of tags for the series, in case anyone is wondering.)

It Has Been 0 Days Since the Last Incident

The most standalone of all the fics in this series.

Ships: Eventual Doctor x Donna and Tentoo x Rose (in the background)

A New Path (Optional backstory for Jack getting added)

Doctor x Donna

Tentoo x Rose (in the background, leading to Tentoo x Rose x Jack)

A Series of Perfectly Reasonable Misunderstandings

Doctor x Donna

Tentoo x Rose x Jack

(Starting down the poly path)

Indisputably Well-Laid Plans

Doctor x Donna x Jack

Background Tentoo x Rose x Jack

A little light Tencest (as a treat)

Hints at pretty much every combination of these 5

Note: this fic also marks the shift into explicit ratings territory

Proper Communication

Donna x Rose

All Together Now

Ten x Tentoo x Donna x Rose x Jack

Too many subsets of that to bother writing out— just call it shamelessly poly

Modern Arts (and Crafts)

Ten x Tentoo x Donna x Rose x Jack

Just a full stop poly PWP

Standard Courtship Rituals

All 10 pairing subsets of Ten x Tentoo x Donna x Rose x Jack

10 ficlet-style dates

Interspecies Compatibility 

A series of semi-standalone, loosely-strung-together stories about the Doctor and Donna working through some of the many differences between humans and Time Lords.

This series tries not to actively contradict major canonical events. But a lot of liberties are taken around that.

Some of the stories are more or less crucial to the ‘plot,’ so the optional ones are handily marked ‘(Optional)’.

Ship: Doctor x Donna

Biological Specificity

A detailed lesson in Time Lord biology

Can be read as platonic, but only if one doesn’t keep reading this series

Acclimatization

Hard to call this one entirely platonic, but could be if one ignored alien cultural implications

Ecological Fitting

Probably not platonic unless you’re using an interesting definition of platonic

Symbiosis

Pretty solidly outside the boundaries of platonic here

Contact High (Optional)

A fun day out

Spandrel (Optional)

A casual day in

Synesthesia

This is where this goofy series starts to take a real turn toward shippy

Atavism

This is where the ratings should probably tick up

Exaptation (Optional)

An optional morning after

Coevolution

The obligatory Midnight fic

Survival Without Recovery

The fix and official end

Not particularly shippy

Lazarus Taxon (Optional)

An optional epilogue with a slightly less happy-go-lucky tone

Also Featuring: Cameos by Eleven, Twelve and finally Thirteen

Open to Interpretation

Less of a “series,” more of a “collection” of fics that are open to interpretation by the reader.

Platonic, shippy, ace-- you decide. 

Just Act Natural 

Donna gets the Doctor to Martha’s wedding. Shenanigans ensue.

There’s an optional sequel, “Compatible Lunacy” that is just straight up shippy. 

Interspecies Communication

The Doctor fails to read the room and Donna has to deal with it.

Originally written as part of Interspecies Compatibility, but it actually makes more sense as a cracky standalone.

Bathtime in B Sharp

Donna and the Doctor have to take a medicinal bath. Pointless fluff.

Cuddles in C Minor

A shag-or-die setup in which the aliens severely overestimate the Doctor’s mating drive and an indignant Donna gets a thorough cuddle.

Absolute Shameless Fluff

Compatible Lunacy

Optional sequel to “Just Act Natural.” 

Split into two parts because “Just Act Natural” could be read as platonic but “Compatible Lunacy” makes the whole thing more shippy

Ship: Platonic or Doctor x Donna (If you read “Compatible Lunacy”)

Tension in D Minor

Donna tries to get some alone time with someone with matching human urges. The Doctor takes it a bit personally.

Ship: Tenth Doctor x Donna Noble

Morning Cuddles 

Originally part of “Nice Things; Good Things” but it probably makes more sense as a little standalone cuddle ficlet.

Ship: Established Tenth Doctor x Donna Noble

Arguments That Did Not Go As Planned

Donna tries to train the Doctor, one argument at a time. 

Ship: Sort of Accidental Tenth Doctor x Donna Noble

(Moody) Gen

(It Breaks You Down) A Little Bit More Each Time

Five times Donna Noble died, in escalating degrees of severity. (Not actual death, but y’know.)

Collaborations

Aurous and Auriferous

Aurous is a Journey’s End fix-it in which the metacrisis Doctor has to save the Time Lord from himself (Written for the DW HopeZine prompt “Plastered in Gold”)

Auriferous is an optional (significantly less “Gen”) sequel for people who think Gen Fixits are all well and good, but want a little Tencest to round it out.

A collaboration with the insanely talented @denzikken and @fritzmetzger

Ship: Ten x Tentoo (mildly implied in Aurous, actively happening in Auriferous) Also some light background Donna x Rose (for flavor)

Special thanks to anyone who’s read, given kudos, and/or commented on anything I’ve put together! Lots of love to the whole fandom!

[spngeorg]

I've been (slowly) going through the podcast, and i just gotta say...

How dare you kick me in the feels in ep 11?!? Like, ouch. Literally teared up a little bit there.

And yes, so much agree on the finale parallels. It made me kinda annoyed at sam, so sad for Dean, and really mad at the finale (again).

Seeing the earlier episodes through the lens of having seen the whole series just hits different. And kinda makes one wonder about which parallels/foreshadowing were accidental, pre-planned, or a thread that wasn't intentional, but picked up later in the show on purpose. Regardless, it adds so much to the experience of the rewatch.

Ok, going to go sit in a corner and go mildly insane over all the heart stuff on ep 12 now!

AAAH hello friendo, and I'm sorry for all the feels. I'm using this podcast to basically dump my feels into. There will be more :'D

As for what was planned, I don't know that they had even the remotest clue how the early seasons would be expanded on the way they were in later seasons. They just laid down characters that were easy to love and a dynamic universe they could endlessly toy with and delve back into in new ways. The writers were (mostly) very good at knowing the bounty of past canon and (mostly) building on it year after year.

(don't worry, there will be points where most of my yelling is devoted to lamenting where they fell down on that job, but still the vast majority of my personal wailing will be all about the characters :'D)

Thanks for listening!

[hypermania]

What are your overall thoughts on the episode? I kinda enjoyed it I think

there were obviously a few parts that didn’t work for me but overall i really enjoyed it! it had a really fun energy and i liked a lot of things:

the montage of beth and the fbi agent getting ready was Top Notch

i like this fbi agent in general. i like that she’s not sinister. she’s just doing her job and she’s good at it. 

(not too big a fan of her partner if i’m being honest. i’m not on board with the sort of stereotyping that seems to be happening (between him and dean’s coworker) and i find it so odd that they nailed ben’s trans storyline and then just... so consistently drop the ball on tertiary gay characters. i do find the contrast between him as a gay fbi agent and turner as a gay fbi agent mildly interesting though)

loved the girls calling rio beth’s “boy” and then their judgy little knowing faces when she denied it so hard 

beth wearing the sunglasses in the diner had me hollering!

followed by annie saying something like “did you tell him to look for a blind person or a d-bag?” (cant remember the exact phrasing but it was hilarious)

max’s cousin pronouncing it mrs boh-lahnd 

tbh the whole thing with the cousin was over the top but in a good way i think

the thumbs ups

dean’s fascination with beth’s “the one you wore for him” polkadot dress that frankly looks like something my grandmother would’ve worn

ruby’s “i’ll do it... you touched it” LIKE?? 

also just ruby on that motorized scooter in general; still just as funny

everything with ruby and sara i honestly dont even know where to start with it. it was #heartbreaking and i was watching the whole thing with my hand over my eyes, peering through my fingers, because it was so hard to see. part of me was like oh my god please dont tell her that this is all because of her kidney please dont put that on a kid please dont make her bear this weight but also knowing that it probably needed to happen given the circumstances. and just the small detail about sara not even having her period yet... like? she’s SO young and she already knows too much about the world. it isn’t fair

the gregg and annie scene made me cry? zach and mae’s chemistry is insane and every single scene they’ve had together from the pilot episode up until now has underscored how much these two people care about each other and their child despite any differences theyre having and just how much history they have! i am in my feelings about it tbh 

“i dont have any furniture, man” 

“i don’t get a lot of repeat customers”

“...by a man with no arms”

and obviously everything with rio from the way he can’t eat sushi to the way he says incentivize to the way he called beth champ like it was all A+ give manny an emmy so we can all go home

there were some things i didn’t much care for and i’m sure they’re the same as everyone else (dean and gayle, beth telling dean to stay, annie and dr. cohen) but overall it was a solid episode. i’m excited to rewatch it in a way i haven’t really been with most of the episodes this season (and how dark they’ve been).

[rel-ish]

writing prompt~ two characters talkin about destiny? how much they hate it or like it or wish it stopped annoying them? (sorry im mildly obsessed with the idea of ~destiny~ dsjfgs)

Curled beneath the heavy blanket and surrounded by the sounds of the midnight forest, muffled by the thin fabric of the shabby tent, it should have been easy for Charlie to drift off to sleep. She buried her head in the pillow and let her mind wander to somewhere safe. Back home. Memories of her own bed, listening to the steady rain, knowing times were certain and tomorrow would be the same as tonight. The repetition had been boring at the time, but she would give anything to be sure of her future now. Still, the memory was enough to comfort her.

The only thing that pulled her mind back to the real world was Rowan's constant shifting beside her. Rolling over, turning his pillow, pulling and kicking his thinner blanket, rolling over again. The movement canvas of the tent was amplified in the near silence, and Charlie felt the discomfort radiating off of him.

"Can't sleep?" she mumbled with her eyes still closed.

The movement stopped, and for a precious half minute they were both silent. The chirping of crickets seemed louder, but it was welcome. A cloud drifted away to let the moon shine down brighter upon their small clearing.

Rowan sighed. "Of course not. You can?"

"Not anymore." Her voice was honest and blunt, but understanding. She paused. "Tell me what's on your mind. Maybe you'll be able to rest then."

The longest pause yet. Charlie entertained the idea that he had finally fallen asleep, and then--

"What are we doing here? We've decided we're so special that we're meant to be doing this, we left everything and everyone behind, and now what? We're taking a break from hiking through the woods alone towards god knows what to sleep in a tent on the forest ground? This is insane, Charlie, there's no way this is right--"

"Slow down," she said calmly, and he did. She waited for his breathing to even out before speaking again, slowly and softly. "First of all, we set out because no one else was going to, remember? We may not be the best candidates, but at least we're doing something about it. We're stepping up. Second, we're taking a break because we need to, okay? And we've been doing fine here so far, think of this as a normal camping trip if that helps."

His last point was more complicated, and she mulled over it for a moment, during which Rowan filled the silence again, though less frantic than before.

"I don't think this is right. I don't think we're supposed to be doing this, Charlie. I think we should be back home." He took a breath, and his voice shook a little. "I want to be back home."

"I know. So do I," she admitted softly, a little ashamed. "But there's no way the 'right' thing to do was to sit back and watch them ruin everything important. Watch them draw closer. Like it or not, this is where we're meant to be. You can't change destiny. I'm sorry." The genuine empathy was clear in her voice.

"...Are you sure?" He half-laughed as he spoke, but it was a sad, nervous laugh with no real warmth.

"I'm sure," Charlie said.

Rowan sat up and pressed his head into his hands, then looked up and spoke. "What if we turned around and went home? What if we--"

"You wouldn't. And we won't."

He was silent again. She was right. As much as he wanted to return to safety, he would know it was temporary, and he would know he was sitting back while everything fell apart. It was selfish, and he knew that.

"I just-- it feels like everything we have to do is set in stone now. And we have no say in our lives anymore."

"We have a say. There's just a right and a wrong option. You can still choose the wrong one if you like." Her voice was growing more distant, and Rowan yawned.

Charlie offered one last idea of peace for him to consider. "This isn't the end, okay? We'll be back home soon. And safe. And everything will be how it was a month ago. That's destiny, too."

And she was right, Rowan thought as he finally drifted off, lost in his mind. Maybe he was destined for a life of safety and peace after this. Maybe.

-

ty for the prompt!! :D sorry im shit at dialogue and never have any real context for scenes gjskfjdh 

[jq37]

thoughts on this week's ep?

**spoilers for broadway brawl**

***Before we start, I remembered as I was typing this one of the important notes I lost from last week’s recap: Interesting that Christmas seemingly went off without a hitch. I expected Santa to come back into play somehow (like, someone would check on him to make sure Christmas was still on or he’d call them in to help or something) but he hasn’t, at least not yet.***

My guys, my guys, my guys. Was that something or was that something?

I think I am on record as saying that combat is my least favorite part of ttrpgs generally speaking because I’m here for the RP but when a combat episode shines it really freaking shines (see eg: that first combat ep of Bloodkeep where everyone went full Galaxy Brain except for Matt who couldn’t hit a single thing) and this is such a good example. This is easily a top five ep of the season for me, maybe top three so let’s get into it and break down why it was so awesome.

We start right where we left off with Titania and members of her court having come into the theater to beat the tar out of Misty mid-show.

Quick note: At the end of last ep, it was set up so that Misty was thrust on stage right after hearing the mirror was on stage which would place this fight right at the top of Act 2 but at the start of this ep, Brennan seems to indicate that it’s taking place during what would be the closing number. Which would make more sense but imagine you go see a play, the first act is super dope, and then the second act is an insane, minute long fight that’s pretty unconnected to the plot and then a buff, naked, beautiful man tells you the show is over and you should leave. Wild. Anyway.

Pixies with tommy guns in inherently funny.

So one of the things that makes this fight really great is the way it directly ties into the story in a way besides “These bad guys are in our way.” Misty is using this show as a part of her reincarnation spell so if the show is messed up, it fails and she’s on her last life. Brennan has a cool mechanic of making her roll death saves every round at a difficulty lower than her modifier (which is s/t crazy like 11) but that gets harder with damage done to her and performance checks failed by other players who decide to jump on stage. It’s a great way to make the battle feel like it has more personal stakes and it’s my fave original Brennan mechanic since the Family in Flames Sophie’s Choice situation.

(I love that the death save counter is changed for theater comedy/tragedy masks for this. Nice touch.)

Em, Esther, and Wally are also at the fight which is clutch.

Also, Sondheim is specifically here which is an insane detail to add just because.

WILD that no one knows what’s going on with the ritual initially because, as Lou almost does, getting all the civilians out is the smart move and it would COMPLETELY ruin Misty’s plans instantly.

Lou having Kingston take the stairs bc’s he’s 50+ years old and has no time for that nonsense has equal but opposite energy to him doing extra rolls for Fabian to do unnecessary parkour before a simple attack because Fabian’s Like That.

Murph fireblasts the hell out of Titania’s foot soldiers right off the bat from outside of counterspell range which is very cool.

“Give me a performance check for the cockroach.”

“You’re upstaging me bitch?”

Another great thing about this fight is that because of it’s theatrical nature, everyone’s RPing it more than a usual battle ep (or more intensely maybe is what I mean).

Titania hypnotizes Don Confetti and his goons into fighting for her.

“She doesn’t know she’s in a play but she does sing most of her dialogue which is helpful for you.” Titania is just Like That.

Pete drops an erupting earth and drops a sick 37 damage on those same minions Kug got.

I didn’t notice before but yeah, Ally does roll die like a f-ing beyblade champion.

Emily hearing Murph’s low key, offhand comments and cracking up is great.

“Get Sondheim!” (Emily and then Ally: WHAT?!)

Actual living dude Stephen Sondheim being involved in this fight is just so ridiculous and fun and crazy.

We go around to Misty’s turn and she has to beat a 28 (upped from 10) and she fails which feels worse than a normal failed death save somehow.

Lou, in a very good RP move, tells Pete to tell Misty to end the show so she can tell them not to so the group has a valid reason to not evacuate which is a thing they (or at least him and Ricky) would obviously want to do.

Sophie, the madwoman, jumps out of the balcony, grabs a costume, then runs on stage. Emily’s glee at being told that her grabbing the costume will give her advantage is great. She’s always trying to figure out how to make the most of her moves. She is the living embodiment of the concept of method to madness (which is from Hamlet since we’re talking Shakespeare today). 

Ox is constantly dying (Brennan!) but also it’s like, why was he even there before the fight started? I’ve never seen a non-service dog in a theater.

Ricky: Is this part of it?

Oh, forgot to mention that everything that happens on stage is kinda shielded by the Umbral Arcana so everyone watching thinks it’s part of the show, which is a cool plot detail.

Ricky gets fULLY NAKED (Emily, with perfect comic timing: Now do I roll with disadvantage?) and leaps into the fray. He casts Protection from Evil and Good on her which (1) He does by Magic Mike body-rolling on her while he’s naked and considering how much shorter she is that her raises some interesting questions about positioning and (2) is the most clutch use of this spell I’ve seen in a while. It’s a spell I always wanna take as a Paladin because it makes sense character-wise, but I’ve never been able to actually use it because we’re never fighting fiends, fae, or celestial.

Brennan’s dime change change reversal of the critic’s comments on Ricky’s body rolls when Zac re-rolls his 11 makes me glad I never had to face him in a debate team setting.

Ally: What’s Esther’s deal ;)/Brennan: *Esther’s Weapon Stats*

“Your only secret you’ve ever had in your life is that you have a crush on her.”

Wally has a beautiful singing voice and a working knowledge of Midsummer's which is wild.

Lou’s periodic, “My man”’s when Ally/Pete does something cool. He’s very dialed into being Kingston.

Ricky’s aura keeps everyone near him from being charmed and Misty saves everyone else w/ a nat 20 counterspell. Few things in D&D are more satisfying than a well executed counterspell.

Titania trying to get Pete to be her consort or something when he just over the super posh Priya is very funny.

“I mean between me and Sondheim, get Sondheim!”

“DO WE HAVE HOMEWORK TONIGHT?” (“We did have homework.”)

Anyway, Misty has one success now!

Misty tries to use puppet to get Titania to drop her crown and it doesn’t work. Brennan says the crown is Crown of Stars which I looked up and it’s actually a spell, not a physical crown, but I’m assuming he used the mechanical effects of the spell on a physical item.

Brennan doing all these musical/singing bits when he absolutely doesn’t have to. I love it.

I love Ricky and Sophie being the two martial fighting heavy hitters of the group. Like, the two fighters, having the spellcasters’ backs.

I hope the one kung fu fan in the back of the theater never sees another Broadway show again because he’s gonna be so disappointed. 

“I’m just so inspired by that beautiful penis.”

Murph, out of character, verbally acknowledging how insane what they’re doing is. I love when someone pauses in a game of D&D to just recite what’s currently happening out of context so everyone can appreciate how crazy it is. D&D. Gotta love it..

Emily and Siobhan have a quick conversation in the background about whether Sondheim did Les Mis or not (not, that’s Claude-Michel Schönberg) while Brennan and Murph are Ring nonsense.

I also was mildly suspicious of Alyssa so I’m glad Kingston checked her out.

The entire roast of Brennan when he’s selecting D6s is an instantly iconic D20 moment. I can’t do it justice. You kinda just have to see it.

“Someone call Wizards of the Coast!”

Em, Wally, and Alyssa go out when Titania puts out a huge spell that blinds Kug.

“Yummy, yummy, tastes like ass.”

On Misty’s next turn, she rolls a fail which makes it 2 failures to 1 success. Brennan mentions that a nat 1 counts as 2 failures and a nat 20 counts as 2 successes. I’m sure that won’t be relevant later because you can’t foreshadow things when dice rolls are completely random.

Misty fails on puppet again again and Titania goes full Wicked Witch of the West on her and starts Jonesing for those shoessss.

Emily’s Emily(tm) move of the session is doing a flying leap at Titania, hitting her with a stunning strike and having Brennan retract the Box off Doom he was pulling out because she can’t save when she’s stunned. She just plummets out of the sky.

Don Confetti respecting the sacrament of marriage as he goes full Opera ghost and tries to garrote Sophie.

Ricky (still naked) grabs the crown from Titania, tosses it to Misty, and, with some improv and a good charisma roll, makes the show suddenly make sense to the very confused but entertained audience.

I’m so glad that Murph decided to turn into a bear and that they made the Winter’s tale ref. I should have had faith in Brennan and Siobhan, the theater nerds. Exit pursued by a bear y’all.

Lou and Emily bonding over being proud of their die for rolling well when they lend it out for a big roll.

Really wish Pete had wild magic surged in this fight. Just to add that extra bit of chaos. 

With a very good turn (no damage taken, no performances failed) Misty only has to avoid snake eyes to get through this turn. She leapfrogs over that low bar and rolls a nat 20, instantly fulfilling her win condition. At this point, the play is superfluous and Titania is still down.

“Brennan lost and now he knows reddit is gonna eat his ass.”

OK, remember how I said earlier that Misty seems like the kind of character you nudge a little temptation at just to spice things up? Yeah, her killing Titania and getting the crown of the Seelie Fae makes me a liiiitle apprehensive, but we’ll see how that turns out.

“I killed my queen! This is America we don’t have royalty here.”

“Bear, I don’t know who you are, but take me on your back, let me ride on stage.” —creator of West Side Story, Stephen Sondheim

Misty charms the critic at the show to make sure they get a good review which is such a fae thing to do.

Kingston’s clearly not loving attacking Don and Co. post “real fight” what with his whole Do No Harm thing (well, that’s Dr’s but same principle applies I assume) is a good character detail. For that matter, so is Ricky just taking Titania’s crown and not beheading her which he super could have done while she was down but it would have been very incongruous with everything else about him.

Brian “This isn’t Loony Tunes” Murphy throws Sondheim as a projectile weapon at a pixie who snaps the pixie’s neck and then does a monologue at the audience.

I love it when someone rolls low on an insight check and Brennan gives them useless info and then they repeat it in their character’s voice.

4 mins from the end of the ep, Siobhan realizes there are two Perrys in this story for the first time and has a bigger reaction to that than almost everything else in this ep except her nat 20.

Ricky looks for costume faun legs to cover his fully out dick instead of costume pants or even his own pants.

Misty starts glowing with reincarnation energy and she runs into her dressing room for privacy. Also, she still super hasn’t told anyone what’s going on. (ALSO, assuming she’s gonna make the world think she died, it’s gonna be wild for the company of the show to have their leading lady put on the performance of her life and then die on opening night).

“Who am I to refuse a crown when it’s placed so deftly upon my head?”

You know that behind the scenes thing where Brennan is like, “Yeah, I knew Siobhan was gonna steal that book,”? I got some of those vibes during the crown scene.

The implications of what Misty did are gonna be left until next ep but Brennan says something about her creating her own court and it looks like she’s recruiting followers in the promo. IDK how I feel about that (these stories tend to have great power--especially tied to powerful magical items--as a corrupting force) but I am very excited to see how it goes down! See you then!

[tigerkirby215]

5e Yuumi the Magical Cat build (and a test of Tumblr formatting)

So I have no idea how this website works but I mostly made this account to post DnD 5e character builds based on characters I like. Ever since the latest UA came out I’ve been ecstatic over the fact that we finally got another Support-based Warlock that isn’t Celestial. The fact that it’s a genie Warlock is awesome and there’s tons of roleplay that can be done with a pocket wish-granting elemental walking around with you... good thing we’re ignoring all that for the sake of B O O K!

Yuumi! To be honest I haven’t played League of Legends in ages but Yuumi was a character who drew my attention immediately because she’s an UwU Kitty-Cat... who had like a 36% win rate on release. She’s better now though! ...Probably. Regardless Yuumi was my immediate thought when I saw the tether mechanic from the latest Warlock UA. Constructing a build for The Magical 7th Item Slot Cat was something on my mind for the longest time, probably because the only other character I could replicate is... what? Io from DOTA?

I got the OK from Tulok the Barbrarian-senpai to make some DnD builds which is why I’m using his format. All these builds will keep away from Homebrew and can all be made on D&D Beyond... as long as your DM allows Unearthed Arcana which this build heavily relies on.

GOALS

Shield, heal, cuddle! - Yuumi is a support, through-and-through. Probably one of the most support-focused supports in the game. While this build will still have good damage output the main focus is on keeping your teammates alive and well.

Book, do something! - Yuumi is a dynamic duo between the cat and the book. Hopefully your DM is okay with you not really having a “patron” and instead having a sentient book fly around instead. I mean, it’s basically just a Hexblade right?

Lost Chapter - Yuumi honestly has a pretty basic kit. Replicating 4 spells is easy as cake in 5e so a lot of this build will be focused on replicating Yuumi’s typical item build as well.

RACE

Well as you can tell Yuumi is clearly a Bugbe-Ah who am I kidding she’s a Tabaxi. You’re welcome to pick whatever race you want but Tabaxi is honestly a good pick for this build. You get an increase to both DEX and CHA, some useful skills (be sure to ward bush!), and probably the most important skill: Feline Agility. Much like Yuumi you don’t want to be caught off-guard so a quick self-use of Zoomies can help you get away from the enemy and back to your team. For your language of choice... is Yordle an option? Halfling is probably the closest you’ll get to Yordles in 5e so just opt for that instead.

ABILITY SCORES

Much like Tulok I’ll be using Standard Array for ease-of-use. Roll for stats if you want but this is a general guideline for where to put your highs and lows.

15; CHARISMA - You’re cute, cuddly, and oh-so snuggly. Yuumi in-lore is an innate spellcaster and that translates into Charisma; helps that this also impacts Persuasion for head scritches.

14; DEXTERITY - Yuumi isn’t the fastest champion in-game (it’s on Book to do the “walking”) but she’s still a cat, and cats are fast. Dexterity affects AC as well as several other useful things.

13; INTELLIGENCE - Your best friend is literally a floating book it’s bound to know something.

12; WISDOM - You’re a smart kitty and you know a thing or two about Yordles... doesn’t stop you from dissing everyone else though.

10; CONSTITUTION - It’s technically in-character to dump Constitution but I don’t recommend it. Intelligence and Wisdom are higher on this list but you don’t really need them - feel free to get some Ruby Crystals.

8; STRENGTH - Here’s something that’s in-character to dump and I do recommend dumping. Strength is almost completely redundant in this build so don’t be afraid to ditch it.

This would be the point array I’d use if I was RPing Yuumi but if I wanted a more functional character I’d go CHA / DEX / CON / (INT / WIS) / STR for my stat spread. But much like in League you’re more than welcome to buy some health boosting items (notably an Amulet of Health) to compensate for bad stats.

BACKGROUND

Yuumi spent most of her time in Nora her master’s hut which would technically make her a Cloistered Scholar? But Sage works better if you’re teaming up with Book. You gain Arcana and History proficiencies which are honestly the two I’d pick for a magic cat that has a sentient Book as a best friend. You also get the Researcher feature which lets you know where to find any information: Book knows everything and can bring you anywhere - ask them to tell you where to go! You also get two languages and... uhhh who synergizes well with Yuumi? ...Yasuo? Is there a monkey language in 5e? Jokes aside just pick whatever language you think will be useful.

(Art by EmeraldParrot on DeviantArt)

THE BUILD

This may come as a surprise but despite the fact that this build was made almost entirely for the sake of using the new UA Warlock patron we’re actually not starting with Warlock! While half of Yuumi’s power comes from Book (who I’d consider the “patron” in this relationship) the other half of her power is innate. Now I could make her a Sorcerer to reflect the magic within her or I could perhaps make her a Wizard to get more value out of Book but I had to ask myself a question: which class in D&D would be the best for a character who regularly insults and sasses other characters and thinks too highly of themselves?

LEVEL 1 - BARD 1

Yes this build is a Bardlock build, and the only reason we’re going Bard first is for the extra music instruments as well as the choice of any skill we want.

Your choice of instrument doesn’t matter much (it’s mildly important for Instruments of the Bard or if you have an Artificer, but other than that don’t worry) but I’m contractually obligated to take a Lyre every time I make a Bard. Other than that you synergize with Yasuo so steal his Flute, and I’ve always been a fan of Pentakill so I’ll take the closest to a guitar. (Lute)

For skills take Acrobatics, Persuasion, and Survival. You’re a cat which means you need to be quick on your feet and are adorable as hecc, and you need some survival instinct when you’re constantly hopping between dimensions. (Truthfully though as a Bard you should be picking skills that your party lacks, though I’d argue that Acrobatics and Persuasion should always be taken to remain “in character.”)

For cantrips take Message to coordinate with your party in team chat and Vicious Mockery; Yuumi is a cat of sass so feel free to diss your local god by calling him a dog. Or alternatively this could be you flaming the enemy team in /all - I won’t judge.

Cure Wounds and Healing Word are absolute musts for any support - in particular Cure Wounds is good for you since you can cast it from wherever your You and Me (tether) target is located. This means that whoever you’re tethered to can get the full value of Cure Wounds instead of you being forced to pop Healing Word instead. Other than that Longstrider lets you replicate Zoomies’ movement speed boost, and you can never go wrong with Featherfall. (The only spells that are really “mandatory” here is Cure Wounds. Maybe Longstrider too. Healing Word is always useful but both it and Featherfall are just suggestions.)

LEVEL 2 - WARLOCK 1

And from Bard we immediately jump to the meat of this build: The Noble Genie Warlock! You get your Collector’s Vessel which hopefully your DM will let be a book with cat-sized portals inside of it?

You also get some cantrips and guess what? Eldrich Blast! Yeah it’s a Warlock build you’re going to take Eldrich Blast. Other than that take Minor Illusion to pull something scary out of Book at the right time.

For main spells Hex is great to deal extra damage and also lets you debuff some of the target’s ability checks. Sleep is more of a Zoe thing but it’s still an insane pact-specific spell so there’s no reason not to take it.

LEVEL 3 - WARLOCK 2

We’re going to keep going in Warlock firstly for Eldrich Invocations. The main one you want here is Lance of Lethargy so you can replicate Prowling Projectile’s movement speed slow and help set up some kills for your team. The other invocation slot will be left open for now as we wait for level 4, as will our spell choice.

LEVEL 4 - WARLOCK 3

Hello Book! Of course we’re taking Pact of the Tome for the Book of Thresholds Shadows, or just Book for short. Again be sure to ask your DM if the book can be sentient for RP purposes. Or alternatively have it not act be sentient and make your party think your crazy when you talk to it! As for cantrips take Guidance to buff your ADC with some Adaptive Force (note: Guidance will not increase damage), Mending to fix any tears Book may receive (don’t want any more lost chapters!), and even though you’re not really a melee fighter being able to magically scratch nearby champions enemies with Shocking Grasp will give you a fighting chance if you get stuck in the middle of combat.

Note: While it would be more in flavor to use Primal Savagery the reason I opted for Shocking Grasp is because you can cast it through your ally to cause an enemy to be unable to take Reactions. It’s more in flavor to scratch at your enemies but Shocking Grasp is far more useful for this build. Truthfully you can take any cantrip you want though these are just recommendations; I know having 3 damaging cantrips is a little excessive but I like having an attack roll cantrip, saving throw cantrip, and backup melee cantrip.

Now for the Invocation we skipped. I think most 5e veterans have identified what we’re looking for: Book of Ancient Secrets. Book is a resourceful... book and the value of Ritual spells can’t go unmentioned. Take Comprehend Languages and Identify: flip through Book’s pages until you can find the info that you want! And don’t be afraid about picking bad rituals because you can just inscribe more rituals later on!

Now for Spells! Once we get to 2nd level spells we get a lot more stuff to choose from but let’s just choose the main spells we need:

Misty Step - You’re a noob if you’re not packing Flash. Also since this is a multiclass build the problem of Misty Step taking Pact Magic slots can be negated, as you can use your Bard slots to cast Misty Step.

Hold Person - Hit a snare with Final Chapter so your friends can clean up!

Truthfully though all your 2nd level spells open up a huge array of possibilities and I’d recommend picking up any one of them. The Noble Genie gets Enlarge / Reduce which is one of my favorite spells thematically: feel free to pop an Elixir of Iron on your tank!

LEVEL 5 - BARD 2

Feel free to take Warlock 4 for the ASI but I’d like to get the Bard features up-and-running. At level 2 you get Jack of All Trades which means that Book can always help you out of a jam. You also get Song of Rest which further solidifies your role as a support.

For your spell of choice Charm Person lets you use that cute kitty face of yours to get a bunch of fan art on DeviantArt.

LEVEL 6 - BARD 3

Let’s start by picking out our Expertise because that’s the easy bit: Arcana and History - straight from your background. You’re a magic cat with a sentient book you should know these skills well.

Now for your Bard College. There are several good choices: Lore gives you more Magical Secrets to let you “itemize” better, College of Valor lets you buff your allies’ attacks with some Adaptive Force, but at the end of the day the question is this: what subclass lets you shield while also increasing your allies’ movement?

College of Glamour yes really! The main reason for this is Mantle of Inspiration which was the most Yuumi-esque ability of the bunch. You can expect a Bardic Inspiration die to give all your allies temporary HP as well as allow them to move as a reaction without provoking opportunity attacks. You also get Enthralling Performance which is certainly a nice bonus: distract a crowd with your feline charm while the rest of your team does their work.

You also get another spell and... I’ll be honest throwing all the spells on this guide is making this post far longer than it needs to be. I can give some general advice but I’m only here for the class features - not the spells. Pick spells that will help your team, the same way you’d itemize to help your team in League.

LEVEL 7 - BARD 4

Mostly taking Level 4 Bard now for the ASI. Bump Charisma for better spellcasting.

You also get another cantrip: get Dancing Lights to summon some moon moths to chase!

Note: One more level in Bard will get you Font of Inspiration, which allows your Bardic Inspiration to come back on a Short rest. It will also buff Mantle of Inspiration. If you think you’ll need to use Mantle of Inspiration more feel free to take another level in Bard earlier than suggested in this build.

LEVEL 8 - WARLOCK 4

And another ASI! Bump Charisma again for a maxed out spellcasting modifier!

LEVEL 9 - WARLOCK 5

At this level you get another Invocation as well as 3rd level spells. There are quite a few good invocations to pick from but as a squishy support you’re going to want Zhonya's - or in this case Tomb of Levistus. While not quite Zhonya's this invocation will give you a phat health buff in exchange for making you completely stationary until the end of your next turn. Pop it if the enemy Assassin ults you and pray that your team saves you.

Now that you got 3rd level spells there are some obvious choices. Counterspell? Fly? Maybe Dispell Magic or Gaseous Form? Honestly if your DM is allowing UA spells Psionic Blast from the psychic UA works great with the Genie patron. Those are my picks for some good level 3 spells - unfortunately the spells from the Genie Patron aren’t that good besides maybe Create Food and Water, which is only really useful for specific adventures.

Oh and you get another cantrip! I’d recommend Prestidigitation to pull more things out of Book.

LEVEL 10 - WARLOCK 6

This is the point that this build really starts to shine through. Is it bad that this build needs to get to level 10 before it really starts working? ...Eh...?

Anyways you get Elemental Resistance at this level which lets you give your You and Me (tether) target resistance to one of four elements. You can only choose one resistance per long rest so try to pick the damage type you think you’ll run into a lot. Pro tip: Fire damage is really common. Ignite is a powerful Summoner Spell.

LEVEL 11 - WARLOCK 7

At this level you get access to Level 7 invocations which are all... ehhhh? There are some cool ones here but none of them are really great for Yuumi so instead we’re going to go back a bit and pick up Exhaustion. ...The Summoner Spell, not the D&D debuff. Mire the Mind lets you cast Slow once per long rest: slow is a really powerful spell that you can pop on the ADC so your team can wail on them. Just make sure you don’t lose concentration.

You also get access to 4th level spells and while this is technically a spell Lulu has: Polymorph! Turn your allies into T-Rexes, turn your enemies into Fish (don’t try to eat the fish or they’ll turn back), and most importantly you can now become an actual cat! Truthfully though there are several great 4th level spells too and I recommend you look at all of them.

LEVEL 12 - WARLOCK 8

Ability Score Improvement but you should have max spellcasting by now which is the only thing that matters so... how about some Feats? I’m not going to choose any one particular Feat and instead focus on some of the better ones for you to take.

Alert - Along with Jack of All Trades this will almost always guarantee that you’re the first to go in initiative, meaning that you can tether to someone and start applying buffs.

Inspiring Leader - Lets you use Bop and Block early and give all your allies a nice health buffer to start the day.

Observant - With your Charisma and your proficiency buffing your Perception score this should guarantee that you don’t miss anything with those feline eyes of yours. Be sure to ping incoming ganks!

Resilient (CON) - You don’t really need the other effects of War Caster in this build and Resilient is just more useful overall.

Spell Sniper - Read this spell over and ask “does this sound useful?” If yes then take it, because you’re in a game with a DM who actually likes using cover mechanics.

Tough - Yuumi isn’t tough; that doesn’t mean you can’t be.

Lucky - When in doubt break out the OP bullshit perk.

You also get another spell: Dimension Door lets you recall back to base or somewhere similar.

LEVEL 13 - WARLOCK 9

At Warlock 9 you get access to another invocation, including your 9th level invocations and... oh oh there it is boys! Ascendant Step! Now you can be a proper hovering kitty cat! (Note if you took Fly at earlier levels it might be a good idea to drop it. Or not: you can still buff your allies!)

You also gain access to 5th level spells and here’s where it gets fun: Bigby’s Hand! Honestly this is just a fun spell but you can also justify most of the effects as being part of Yuumi (and Book)’s magic.

Clenched Fist - A full damage Prowling Projectile against a target.

Forceful Hand - More of a Janna thing but still very useful.

Grasping Hand - Hit your snare with Final Chapter. "I am TOTALLY doing this!"

Interposing Hand - Again more of a Taliyah thing (or perhaps Jarvan) but still very useful!

This would be my immediate pick but other than that for 5th level?

Creation is your other patron-specific spell and it is awesome. A little situational maybe but that’s the nature of Book! Pull out something useful: unfortunately it can’t be fish but still!

Hold Monster is like Hold Person but better. It’s a big spell slot though so be wary.

Synaptic Static is like a combination of Leona and Alistar, which is to say it’s a big nuke from the sky that makes all your enemies do less damage.

Contact Other Plane is not my first pick for a number of reasons but if you don’t know what to pick being able to ask Book for directions can be helpful. And it comes back on a short rest too! :) Just make sure Book doesn’t break your mind. (Maybe invest in the Resilient feat for Intelligence if you plan to use this spell.)

(Artwork by sakkiye on DeviantArt)

LEVEL 14 - WARLOCK 10

And now we’ve reached the capstone of our Warlock levels and we get two very powerful abilities. Firstly there’s Protective Wish which lets you use your reaction to swap places between you and your tethered target if either of you get hit. Tank hits for your allies... or alternatively don’t do that and have them shield you from baddies trying to spray you! Just make sure that you aren’t teleporting into a more dangerous location and as a word of advice: don’t throw your allies into danger without their consent.

The other ability you get is Genie’s Entertainment which is far more useful. As an action you can make Book pull a target within 90 feet to a harmless dimension where they’ll be stuck for up to a minute. They can make a Charisma saving throw every turn until they either succeed or a minute passes before they’re ejected where they just were or in the closest available space. This is effectively a one-time use of the Banishment spell (which you can take as a Warlock) but it doesn’t require Concentration which means you can put your focus on other useful buffs for your team.

You also get another cantrip so invest in Mage Hand so Book can pick up things you can’t reach with those paws of yours.

LEVEL 15 - BARD 5

And now we’re bouncing back to Bard and finally getting Font of Inspiration. Honestly if you need more use out of Mantle of Inspiration then feel free to get this level earlier, but you already have plenty of short rest value with your Warlock spell slots.

And speaking of spells: 3rd level Bard spells, anyone? I’d argue that Sending would be quite in-flavor, and Hypnotic Pattern would make for a strong utility, even if you don’t have an AoE stun. Honestly I’m going to skip the spell talk and only cover the last few levels of Bard for completion’s sake.

LEVEL 16 - BARD 6

You now get Countercharm which is poo poo garbage and will make you want to die. But to be fair popping cleanse would help your ADC. (But why are you bringing Cleanse and not Exhaust?)

You also get Mantle of Majesty which will let you play the backseat gamer role you’ve always dreamed of being. As a bonus action you can start to command (the spell) anyone you please to do as you say. Approach, Drop, Flee, Halt... awn there’s not Pet command!

LEVEL 17 - BARD 7

At 7th level you get... nothing! :D Okay you get 4th level spells to be fair but I’m far too lazy to talk about spells anymore.

LEVEL 18 - BARD 8

ASI. Check my suggestions for Feats to take from Warlock 8.

LEVEL 19 - BARD 9

Your Song of Rest increases to a d8 now which honestly probably doesn’t help you much at this point. You do get 5th level spells now though, which you can cast through your Warlock slots.

LEVEL 20 - BARD 10

And for our capstone we finally get Magical Secrets! There’s one specific spell we want: Haste. It’s super zoomies! Other than that you can buy Redemption with Aura of Vitality (which kinda works more like Fiora’s ult but w/e) or maybe an Ardent Censor of sorts with Spirit Guardians? You can grab Mikael's Crucible with Warding Bond, or perhaps contract some help from Zillian and grab Death Ward! There are literally dozens of spells to choose from and I recommend searching online if you don’t know what to take.

Your Bardic Inspiration also increases which means more Mantle of Inspiration health, and you get 2 more skills to give Expertise! Honestly at level 20 it’s a little too late to really choose between Expertise but know that any skill you have Expertise in will have a +12 modifier! You’re essentially guaranteed to succeed at any check with a skill you have Expertise on at this level unless your DM is Twisted Fate and is using Loaded Dice on you.

FINAL BUILD

PROS

Cover to Cover - You’ve got a comedic amount of utility between ten cantrips and the ability to cast any ritual spell you can get your paws on. Along with Jack of All Trades and Expertise covering any skills you may need you’ll never be without a cat trick.

You and me, we got this! - Between Bardic Inspiration, Song of Rest, Elemental Resistance, Protective Wish, and a decent array of buff spells (tbh I kinda wish I took more :P) you can be an incredibly useful asset to your teammates.

You look like unscratched furniture! - One place this build particularly excels is in the crowd control department. Between Enthralling Performance, Mantle of Majesty, Genie’s Entertainment, and a huge array of debuffs you’ll never be lacking in a way to keep your allies safe and the enemies away from you.

CONS

Oh! Sunbeam ahead! - While I tried my best to avoid taking too many Concentration spells I have to admit that a lot of the nicer stuff will demand your attention: Hold Person, Haste, Polymorph, Bigby’s Hand, and Mire the Mind (Slow) all require concentration, so you can only have one up at a time. While you still have options the concentration requirement is heavy.

We’ve got 6 left... or was it 5? - If you’re roleplaying the build properly you’ll have absolutely horrendous health. No additional Constitution modifier combined with a d8 hit die means that you’ll have about a hundred health at level 20, and a Power Word Kill is all it’ll take to end you. Additionally your ability modifiers (with the exception of Charisma) are rather low which means low saving throws and a low AC with only Light armor. Know that you can sometimes sacrifice roleplay for the sake of a more viable build - having good skill checks is great and all but it doesn’t matter if you’re dead.

Full AP? - This build is pure support and I skipped on a lot of the strong damage options that you could’ve taken. In particular this is a max Charisma Eldritch Blast Warlock which doesn’t take Agonizing Blast, a concept most would consider an act of treason. A lot of the invocations I picked more for flavor than actual utility and you’re more than welcome to change Mire the Mind or Tomb of Levistus for something more useful.

But you’re not here to steal all the fame: tag along, help your team, and they’ll help you find your master! Just don’t ask the Triton what they taste like or else they’ll give you the spray bottle.

(Artwork by Chelserella on DeviantArt.)

ALTERNATE BUILD OPTIONS

More Warlock Levels?

The only thing we really get out of level 10 Bard is Magical Secrets, but if you’re not interested in getting Haste all you really need for this build is 3 levels in Bard for Mantle of Inspiration (though 5 levels is ideal for Font of Inspiration.)

You can take more levels in Warlock to get Mystic Arcanum, more Warlock slots, and more Eldritch Invocations. You also get Collector’s Call which is a very strong ability that’s sadly held back by its casting requirement. If you’re planning on going heavier on Warlock instead of splitting this build 50 / 50 than get expertise in Persuasion! You’re absolutely going to need it to cast Collector’s Call reliably.

The other important thing to note is that Warlock honestly doesn’t have that many supportive spells in its kit, especially when you’re not playing Divine Soul. Dropping Bard levels means you’ll lose spells like Mass Cure Wounds. You’ll also have far fewer spell slots to cast your lower level Warlock spells, which does mean more 5th level spells but it also means less fun with spells like Misty Step, Dimension Door, and Polymorph.

[avengerofyourheart]

Flour Girl {14} (Bucky x reader AU)

Characters: reader, Bucky.

Summary: Discovering the cute guy you just flirted with is the heir of a rival bakery, you suddenly find yourself running into him all over the city. Can your small boutique bakery compete? And how do you deal with the guy who seems determined to make your life a living hell? Luckily you’re distracted by a secret admirer…But who is he? (Inspired by “You’ve Got Mail”, Enemies to Lovers)

Warnings: none! Mild swearing?

Word Count:  3.3k

A/N: Heyooooo. Let’s go to the Farmer’s Market!!! :D Honestly, Central Park in the Autumn is something I’ve actually experienced and I loved it, so even just writing about it and imagining a Farmer’s Market there.... *swoon* :) Add in Bucky, and I would probably die. ha! I hope you’re ready for this! I’m excited to hear your thoughts, any feedback is appreciated! <3

<<Part 13    Part 14     Part 15>>  

Flour Girl Series Masterlist

Full Masterlist

____________________________________________________

Sunday morning broke with clear skies and unusually high temperatures predicted; the makings of a gorgeous day. Since Thursday when Bucky proposed joining you at the Farmer’s Market, you’d continued to find each encounter you had with him more pleasant than the last. After the grocery store, you, of course, saw him at the Nest each morning, but he also happened to be at the bookstore where you went to browse and unwind Friday evening.

It turned out that you shared similar tastes in books and even had a lively discussion about who your favorite authors were. You each challenged the other to read something they normally wouldn’t and then planned to report back with thoughts on the books. That night as you tucked into bed with the book, you found yourself excited about the prospect of more time spent together. It all seemed to come out of nowhere, but you couldn’t deny the light flutterings of butterflies in your stomach at the thought of Bucky.

During those few days, you continued to hear from B, you both still maintaining that air of mystery. He was still as sweet as ever, confusing your heart and head along with the added newness of whatever was happening with Bucky. Both were mostly pushed out of your head on Saturday, since it was your busiest day of the week. You spent the early hours baking double what you did during the week so you could spend more time helping Wanda with customers.

That night after work, you were exhausted, so catching up on some TV followed by some reading before bed was all that was in the plans.

Sunday, you woke up surprisingly early, for a day that you actually had the option to sleep in. You made some breakfast and drank your coffee, then changing your outfit three times before you were satisfied. There really wasn’t any need for you to dress up, since Bucky had already seen you in your worst, sickest state, but part of you just wanted to gussy up a little, even more for yourself than for him.

Just before 9am, you decided to head out early and enjoy a leisurely walk to the park to spend time there until Bucky arrived. The weather was perfect as predicted, sun shining with a light breeze, and your sweater was just perfect for warmth. Settling on a bench, you pulled out your phone and replied to a ‘Good morning’ text you had received from B earlier.

FG: Good morning, Bernard! Happy Sunday. Plans for today? I’m enjoying a leisurely morning out in the sunshine.

B: I’m happy you’re taking the morning off! You work too hard. I’m enjoying  quiet Sunday morning as well.

He followed that message shortly with a picture of a Belgian waffle with strawberries and whipped cream, probably purchased from a food truck that traveled around to different locations in the city. “Mmmm waffles” was his caption and you replied in turn with heart eyes and drooling emojis. Minutes later, he sent a link to a youtube video with the caption “Made me think of you.:)”, which caused your heart to skip a beat.

Plugging in your headphones, you slipped a bud in one ear and pressed play. The video was a clip of a stand-up comedian you had heard about, John Mulaney. He opened his monologue with a mention of how he ‘zones out’ often, which you had to admit was relatable, but he then shared an anecdote about the Beatles, how none of them had mustaches and then suddenly they all had mustaches. At that point, you were laughing near the point of hysterics. For the sake of strangers nearby, you tried your best to laugh quietly with a hand over your mouth.

Eventually, you began to calm down and the video ended, so you returned to the message and typed out a reply.

FG: Oh my god, I should not have watched that in public. I think I hurt myself from holding in the laughter.

You hit send with a crying/laughing emoji. Those three dots popped up and you waited for a reply, but when you saw it arrive, your breath caught in your throat.

B: I’d give anything to hear you laugh.

Frozen in shock, you blinked, noticing the three bouncing dots as he continued to type. What the hell did that mean? He wanted to hear you laugh…as in…what? The anticipation was fraying your nerves so when the message popped up, you read it eagerly.

B: FG…could we meet? I know what happened last time was awful and I had no intention of hurting you, then or now. I swear to you that if you give me another chance, I will move mountains to be there. I’d like to explain everything and I would prefer to do it in person. What do you say?

Staring at the open message, you read it over and over again until the words began to blur before your vision. Was he serious? After all this time, suddenly he was making promises again? Part of you wanted to instantly say yes and take the leap, but reason and previous rejection held you back. Why now? What had changed? You had believed him last time when he said he wanted to meet, so you weren’t so quick to trust this time.

Unsure of how long you had been staring at the message, you must have been lost in your thoughts because suddenly a hand was waving in front of your face to gain your attention.

“Y/N?”

Jolting to the present, you followed the hand and looked up to see Bucky standing before you with a mildly concerned smile upon his face. He looked really good, you noticed right away. Dressed casually in well-fitting jeans and boots matched with a t-shirt and button-up plaid, then topped with a leather jacket, you gawked for a moment too long before answering.

“Hi! Sorry, I, uh…sorry,” you apologized profusely while locking your phone, shaking off the message still imprinted behind your eyes. “Just got caught up in something. How are you?”

Bucky laughed lightly as you stood up from the bench. “I’m good, how’ve you been?”

“Not bad,” you replied reflexively. “It’s a gorgeous day to be in the park. Shall we?”

“Absolutely,” he said, gesturing for you to lead the way. “This weather is insane. It almost feels like Spring in October.”

“Right?” you exclaimed, smiling brightly. “I’m not complaining.”

Small talk continued for a few minutes as you walked, then touching on work and how both bakeries were busy and doing well. Bucky then asked about how and why you decided to open City Sweets. You opened up more about baking with your mom before she passed and you feeling at home and closer to her in the kitchen. You went to college for a few semesters, but couldn’t settle on a major that interested you. Always returning to the idea of baking, you ended up taking a culinary course for some professional lessons and then worked wherever you could to gain experience.

The wish of opening your own bakery kept drifting to the forefront of your mind, so after taking a few business classes and coming up with a business plan, you made the leap using the money your mom had gifted you upon her death. It was one of the hardest, most stressful things you had ever done, but also the most rewarding. City Sweets was almost a year old. You were finally starting to make a profit and you hoped that it would continue to grow and blossom in the future.

Realizing how long you had been talking, you shifted the subject to Bucky. “What about you? What made you want to major in business?” you asked as you kept walking, the Farmer’s Market a few hundred yards ahead.

Bucky was silent a moment, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck. “Um…I don’t know, really. I mean, I grew up helping my dad at the bakery and he always wished he’d had more business experience before he started. Most of the time it was just trial and error for him. So, I kind of just fell into it. I didn’t have a strong desire to major in something, so business seemed as good as any. I think that might be why I was so jealous of you when we first met,” he admitted, catching your eye.

Reeling toward him in shock, your jaw dropped. “What? You were jealous of…me? Why?”

He smiled sheepishly. “Because…you found your passion and you went after it. I think you’re doing an amazing job, too. Even from a business perspective, I mean, you’re in a good location with foot traffic, the bakery is cozy but not too small, you’ve branched out to wholesale deliveries, and from what I can tell, your ingredients quality to food cost ratio seems ideal. All within the first year, that’s impressive,” Bucky beamed at you, his gaze then moving toward the market as you two approached.

You took in his words, nearly speechless a moment from his kindness and positive overview of the bakery. “I, um….thank you. That means a lot to me, Bucky,” you quietly replied, almost overcome with emotion.

He just nodded. “Well deserved. I’m just sorry that I made you doubt that because of my own insecurities. I can’t apologize enough, Y/N,” Bucky said sincerely, pausing just before you reached the displays of fresh vegetables.

Pausing as well, you turned toward him and held his gaze a moment longer than usual. “I forgive you, Bucky,” you told him, knowing in your heart that you meant it.

Hearing the explanation of his previous behavior and seeing how much your interactions together had changed over the past few weeks, you held no more resentment for him. It took too much energy to hold a grudge, anyway.

“Thank you, Y/N,” he replied gently, feeling a spark of something between you as you held his gaze.

The moment passed, though, as he glanced at the first produce stand, breaking eye contact. You finally took a look around as the gentle breeze rustled through the treetops. The sound mixed with music that you previously hadn’t noticed and as it registered, you thought back at the video that B had sent the other day. He hadn’t been far from where you currently stood that day. Lost in your thoughts, Bucky’s voice broke through them.

“Y/N?” he prompted, apparently not for the first time because he had an amused, patient smile on his face. “Are you okay?” Bucky asked, noticing your distracted nature.

“Yeah!” you replied, a little too loudly. “Um…yeah, I’m good. Sorry.”

Shaking your head, you walked to the table of produce and marveled at the colors and freshness.

“Oooh, beets,” you cooed, picking up a bunch of the red root vegetable with green stalks still attached. “I’ve been thinking about using more natural forms of food coloring at the bakery and I’ve heard beets are good for that. What do you think?” you asked in anticipation, glancing Bucky’s way.

He smiled at your enthusiasm. “Yeah, I’ve heard that too. I think it’s a great idea,” Bucky agreed, picking up a head of lettuce.

The morning passed, finding yourself enjoying Bucky’s company as you perused the table of each vendor selling their wares. You felt the happiest you had in a long time, finding a lightness and comfort as you talked and laughed with Bucky. Sometime later, you turned down the street toward the area where crafts were sold when you spotted a familiar food truck. Stopping mid sentence, you wandered forward and confirmed that yes, this was indeed where he had been according to the sign.

B had been here in this very spot, holding a waffle. It had been over an hour since his message, but you couldn’t stop yourself from glancing around at the people, wondering if perhaps he was still there. You had no way of knowing, but still…

“Y/N? Did you hear me?”

“Hm?” you quickly replied, blinking.

“I asked if you wanted a waffle. Where did you go just then?” he asked with more concern this time. “What’s going on with you? If you want to cut the morning short, that’s okay, but—“

“No!” you nearly shouted, then feeling terrible about your behavior. You didn’t want to say goodbye, but your attention seemed to be split despite efforts to remain in the moment. “I mean… it’s not that. It’s not you, I’m so—“

“Don’t apologize again,” Bucky kindly interrupted. “You don’t have to, it’s just…you can talk to me if you want to,” he offered sweetly.

You felt your resolve crumbling, wondering if Bucky would mind if you mentioned another guy or if he would just find it odd for you to be corresponding with a stranger. Biting your lip, you rolled it around in your head and came to the conclusion that you might as well get a second opinion on this mess. If he wasn’t as understanding as you expected, then at least you would know his character a little better. Taking a few steps, you settled in a chair at a small table outside the Belgian waffle food truck and gestured for Bucky to do the same.

Taking a deep breath, you began. “It’s kind of a long, weird story…”

_________

You sat in silence a moment, allowing Bucky to process what you had just finished sharing. It sounded crazy, even to your own ears, but Bucky had become a friend somehow over the past few weeks and it seemed like he truly wanted to know what was on your mind. Fiddling with the bag of vegetables resting on the table, you waited until he was ready to respond.

“Wow,” Bucky finally spoke, his gaze off in the distance. “That’s quite a unique way to meet someone.”

You scoffed at that with a shrug. No point in denying it.

“So…you like this guy? Even though you don’t know anything about him?” he asked gingerly, brow furrowed.

Letting out a sigh, you thought about it for the hundredth time and came up with the same answer. “Yeah. I think I do. Is that crazy?”

He shrugged this time. “I don’t know. Crazier things have happened. I can’t think of any at the moment, but…”

You chuckled at that and gave him a playful shove.

“Sorry, sorry,” he replied with a laugh. “But you’re willing to give him another chance, even after he stood you up? No wonder you blew up at me that day at the Nest, by the way. I’m sure I just made a bad situation worse.”

Feeling a warmth in your face, you spoke up. “I really shouldn’t have, I—“

“No, no,” he gently interrupted. “No need to apologize, I needed that wakeup call.”

Smiling gratefully, you thought about his previous question. “I know it might seem naive of me, but…I don’t know. I guess I just want to find out for sure if he is who I imagine him to be. If somehow I’m disappointed once again, then at least I’m not left wondering. I just don’t want to go through life with regrets, you know?”

Bucky was silent again, the corners of his mouth curving upward. “Yeah. That’s a good point. I don’t think it’s naive of you to think the best in other people. It’s a great quality, actually,” he complimented as he placed a hand on top of yours resting on the table.

You felt that electricity again, meeting his gaze for a lingering moment. Opening your mouth to speak, you were interrupted by an alert from your phone. Reluctantly, you retrieved your hand and searched through your bag for the device. A previously set alarm had gone off and suddenly you noticed the time.

“Oh, no. I have to get back to the bakery,” you told him regretfully as you stood and gathered your bags.

“Of course,” Bucky replied, getting to his feet. “I’ll walk with you.”

Grateful that your revelation hadn’t ruined your morning outing or time with Bucky, you nodded with a smile.

“Okay.”

__________________

Stepping off the subway at your intended stop, you climbed the stairs up to street level. This wasn’t a part of the city that you visited often, but it was a nice change of scenery. Nervously wiping damp hands on your jeans, you crossed the street and headed for your destination.

After your lovely and unexpected morning with Bucky in the park on Sunday, he walked you home and you unlocked the bakery after saying goodbye. Your mind was a mess of thoughts as you went about your usual tasks of setting up chairs, brewing coffee, and baking fresh pastries to sell for the day. No deliveries on Sundays, so it was less of a rush to get everything ready. By 11am, you turned over the sign to read “Open” and the work day officially began.

You didn’t mind manning the shop on your own on Sundays. The atmosphere was much more relaxed and the weekend crowd seemed to enjoy lingering with their coffees and croissants. There was a lull in business for half an hour and during that time, you nearly drove yourself crazy trying to decide how to respond to B. Your talk with Bucky had helped, but there was still a lot to consider.

Finally, you pecked out a reply and quickly hit send before you could rethink it.

FG: One more chance. I’m trusting you. Please don’t make me regret it.

He replied quickly, which you were grateful for. The wait was always the worst.

B: I won’t, I promise. I hope I can make it up to you. Tell me when. But would you mind if I chose the where?

Puzzled, you thought it over and settled on Tuesday afternoon. The bakery usually wasn’t terribly busy and it gave you some time to prepare to be gone later that day. When B told you where he wanted to meet, you were surprised, but also intrigued. As far as recognizing one another, the same rule applied, so you dug out the crumpled Beatles t-shirt you had thrown in the closet after the previous incident and put it in the wash.

Now, as you wore the shirt with jeans and a jacket, you felt the butterflies in your stomach with each step. Approaching the notable area where B had asked you to meet him, your eyes grew wide at the beautiful buildings that housed some of the greatest artists and performers in the city. The Square was enclosed on three sides by beautiful, glass-covered and columned buildings that offered an air of sophistication. Per his instructions, you headed for the center of the square where a fountain resided.

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts was the home to the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera, the New York City Ballet, and the New York City Opera. It was also adjacent to the Juilliard School where many of the greatest musicians and artists were taught. This area of the city was incredible and awe-inspiring, especially if one was lucky enough to get tickets to such an event. However, in the afternoon, it was mostly filled with tourists, which is why you were all the more curious about why B chose this spot.

People were milling about and taking pictures as you heard a string quartet playing a classical music piece. The group of young musicians were loosely surrounded by a crowd and a cello case was open with bills and coins dropped inside. Starving artists and all that. Just as you were about to sit down beside the fountain, the song changed and you froze. You knew that tune. You’d know it anywhere.

Ah, look at all the lonely people…

You heard the lyrics in your head, recognizing it as “Eleanor Rigby” by The Beatles. Stunned, you turned toward the sound and slowly began to approach the quartet. You watched them, mesmerized, until you heard your name being called. It was the last thing you expected to hear, so it took a moment for it to register. Turning around, you followed the voice and saw…him.

Confused, you took a step forward and opened your mouth to speak before you looked down and saw the t-shirt he was wearing. The Rolling Stones.

In that moment, it all came together in your head and the blood drained from your face.

“You?”

_____________________

Part 15>> 

________________________________________________________

Ahhh!!! Cliffhanger!!! I know, I know, I’m sorry. I think we all know who B is, but a little more waiting until we find out her reaction. What would you think if he brought you all the way out to Lincoln Square with a stringed quartet and everything?? Hmmm. It’s about to go down, you guys. :D Wasn’t that walk through the Farmer’s Market lovely? That conversation about “B” was kinda meta, though. heh. At least Bucky didn’t confirm or deny anything! I think he really did want to hear straight from her mouth that she was falling for him. Kinda. ;) Please let me know your thoughts!! Any and all feedback is appreciated! I adore you guys. Thank you. <3

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[cawolters]

🌸Rise of the Blood Dawn and anime inspo🌸

I’ve always read comics and graphic novels because my parents read them (mom = horror and sci-fi and dad = Donal Duck and Tintin) so when manga surfaced in Denmark in the 00’s it was never going to escape me!

At the tender age of 11 I bought my first few series (dragon ball, ranma, invu, d-n-angle, Tokyo mewmew, love hina and most impotaintly: ORORON THE DEMON) basically I bought everything in the bookstore’s tiny selection. Then I went to England and bought them out too (my suitcase had to be checked at departure and when the clerk opened it, tons of mildly graphic yaoi spilled out...).

And from there the nippophilia grew at a steady pace.

Anime came later for me, partly because it was impossible to come by (other than awesome Akira, incredible Gost in the shell and that horrible dragon ball show where they’re on namik and scream all the time) and partly because I was so deep in manga and writing Fanfics, that I had enough!

But when that dam broke, man, it was FLOOD!

And I’ve been very inspired by it all while writing my fantasy!

The Serpent Kiss has a ton of manga/anime tropes and I intended it that way because I love them!

I think they’re super fun to write!

And whenever my betas comment on how they feel a bit of anime-flair in the fight scenes, I get so happy!

Five very important animes on my inspo list are:

Naruto, but mostly just Kakashi and Saske’s stories. I like the clan fights and the bad blood, and of course, Kakashi’s anbu phase!

Darker than Black, so so so good! The first season had me rewatching over and over! His deception and his relationship with Yin is just so devestatingly ‘i love you but I don’t have emotions’-ish. I could read fics about them all day.

Avatar the Last Airbender, some argue it isn’t ‘anime’ but who cares, honestly, the characters are all so deep and the fighting animation is INSANELY detailed!! And it’s pg13!?! So inspiring so beautiful and just, so funny! The humor is priceless!

Samurai Champloo, Mugen. Need I say more? I’m in love. And also, the series is very short and free on YouTube and I cannot say how many times I’ve watched it already! SWORDS TO DIE FOR!

Full Metal Alchymist Brotherhood, yes yes yes this is perfection. From the religious aspect to the ‘third reich’ reference to the race war/hate/guilt ! Not only are Ed and Al, and their personal journey so beautiful and hard, but the world and the extermination war gives me chills! And don’t even get me started on the kickass magic!!

I tend to dive deep into shows and books that has a complex world or complex/problematic characters. And a dark element. I’m also into hardcore fluid fight scenes!

SAO has its moments but the whole thing is too sugary for me. Meh.

And what’s that anime called with the short-haired (pink) girl with glasses that can make her blood to a sword? Woah! I just remember the fight scenes being super pretty and devestating!

So yeah, in The Serpent Kiss we have the tiny girl with the big blade, the masked Kakashi tutor (through Kiel really isn’t as fun and loving as Kakashi, they definitely share a chill bro vibe). And, never forget, the INSANE boss fight where the fights layer!

Shiroin has to fight three times at the end of Book One, all right after each other, all meaning something difirent in loss/win.

It’s very classic shonen though the overall series is more Josei.

And I still watch anime after anime to get inspired!

I just finished Killer B (animation through tha roof !), a rewatch of Death Note (though I like the manga better), Devil Cry Baby, Erased (so powerful!), Castlevania (I’m a little ‘huh?’ It felt too short and strangely paced but I liked the characters and the style is so nice!)!!

Banana Fish and Gangstar (The manga is dope) are both next on my list!

If you have some other shows with this kinda vibe, I’ll be happy to watch!!

I would love some horror recommendation!

.

.

.

-ciao-

[jailynn24]

My thoughts on season 8 Episode 5

So I have spent the last day since that horrific episode reading reactions and listening to reviews and I’m coming to my own conclusions:

Rant and Spoilers ahead: It’s long y’all- not that I think anyone will read this but I need to get it out of my system

There is no excuse for the crap that was put on display Sunday. Yes you can say it was cinematic beautiful but visuals with no substance isn’t the basis of a great episode. The repetitive shots of the dragon fire, Cersei standing by the window DOING NOTHING, Jon staring at the destruction, Dany going insane, Jaime’s lack of character growth, Tyrion acting like Cersei deserved to be saved, etc. It was all crap and didn’t complete any arc that was set up.

If you want to be generous you can say Dany has been slow sliding into the madness for a while now, but since the cracks in her sanity weren’t really shown in detail, it wasn’t effective. This plot needed a season to fully form. It required tact that the writers didn’t want to invest and so we are left to just go- oh she went mad because of bells? This is complete bull shit. The dragon scenes were boring. I got sick of seeing people run for their lives. It was like the Night King battle all over again. Lack of story telling for spectacle. I would rather have an episode where plots are discussed, under handed deals are made and shady people might win if the real goal of the show was the Iron Throne- which is what D&D were going for. Political drama is more interesting than constant fire. Honestly they could have still had the fire and blood aspect with the political, but of course that would require dialogue and story. 

Cersei- fuck I hate that character- BUT I hated her death more. She was supposed to be the wicked queen to Daenerys’ mad queen. That was the set up. That’s what the writers have been playing with the entire series- not just the last couple of seasons. She is one of the most stagnant characters ever. Her arc has been flat. “Grieving mother” (I put that in quotes because I have never felt her grief except with Joffery and I didn’t care if that little bastard died so I felt nothing then) to a queen drunk and drunk on power. This has literally the most basic villain storyline ever. Her story is only mildly saved by Lena, who tried to act her way out of the paper bag that was D&D’s scripts. My own opinion aside, this end for her was lame. The symbolism of her dynasty crumbling all around her... NO! You can’t spin that to make it okay. She spent the last two seasons killing innocents and not giving a fuck. She actually said she choose death over bowing to anyone. Give her the death you gave her little bastard or Ramsey. Being weak and whining to Jaime- gag- made me want to vomit. And don’t get me started on that phantom baby. Even if you are to throw logic out the window (which you would HAVE to), it has been over six months at minimum (more like 8 months really) since she last saw Jaime. SHE WOULD BE SHOWING FUCKERS! So her “I want my baby to live” shit again doesn’t fly. Human babies are only in the womb for 9 months- you do the damn math.

Jaime- Oh Lord- what have they done to you? The saddest part is that he could have been the best written character in the history of GOT- could have. Instead he was used as a plot tool. The dying in the arms of the woman he loves is ridiculous. Cersei and he were never in love. Please let’s stop that toxic narrative right now. They were narcissistic at best. Their entire “love” was based on being mirror images of each other, which changed when Jaime lost his hand. Again if you want to be generous you could say that Jaime came back because in his heart he will always care for her as the mother of his children- that Jaime is so stupid he would throw away his life for the life of his “unborn” child. BUT again that would be crap. Jaime has had a journey of self reflection. While Cersei has stayed stagnant, he didn’t. He questioned her and saw who she was. He knew she had sent one of his friends to KILL HIM! By the way, that little nugget wasn’t told to him episodes ago- it was said last episode. The same episode he slept with Brienne, was happy with Brienne, decided to stay with Brienne- then 12 minutes later decided that because Cersei was winning the battle he needed to go back to save her? At this point she was winning. Her armies had taken down a dragon, had a hostage and hadn’t lost anything yet. So his need to save her- once again doesn’t work. Beyond all that was the line about the innocents of King’s Landing- like what the actual fuck? This is character assassination so the writers could set up his wet noodle death in the arms of Cersei. I’m disgusted. This might have worked if the build up was there. It wasn’t. In fact the build up to his story was actually heading in the opposite direction.

Tyrion- not much to say. The writers have given him next to nothing. He has swung from 8*2- go to King’s Landing to kill Cersei as a wight. 8*3- wants to fight but knows he can’t. 8*4- being happy for his brother because he knows Jaime is in a good place anyway from Cersei and also was almost killed by the same man that was sent to kill his brother- which also happened to be his friend. 8*5- Telling Jaime to save Cersei because... hell I don’t even know. Another wonderful character assassinated. Honestly he has felt like a false Tyrion for the last couple of seasons. The writers can’t seem to find his voice without GRRM. It’s sad. He was one of the best on the show.

Jon- he... wow. He has done even less than Tyrion. His decline is another waste. I’m okay with him not being the focus, but he should have done SOMETHING of note. Now it just seems too little, too late.

I think I’m going to stop there. All this is doing is making me more sad for the potential that was thrown out the window...

[oreramar]

Crafting Magic Items in D&D 5e

Okay there’s really not much point to this ramble/rant, but I need to lay all of this out, because I’m mildly annoyed - not enough to be actually frustrated, but enough I need to air my grievances with the rulebook even to an uncaring void.

I was looking through the Dungeon Master’s Guide for D&D 5e and saw some of the potential downtime activities for party members - things to do if you give your party a few days, a week, a month off of campaign matters and battles to do their own things. One activity was Crafting Magic Items, and so of course I thought that looked nifty and took a closer look.

At the base, it’s pretty reasonable. Each rarity tier has a minimum level requirement plus a cost in gold, and the cost jumps exponentially as it goes up the tiers. Makes some sense, you can’t expect a very rare item to be as easy to make as one that’s merely uncommon, even if the cost gets kind of ridiculous by the end (500,000 gold cost to make a legendary item - granted, by the time you’re level 17-20, you’ve probably raided more than one dragon’s hoard, but that’s still a lot).

But then there are rules for how long it takes to craft as well.

See, you can only work on the item in 25 gold increments, one increment per 8 hour workday. So to make a Common level item, you need to be of third level or higher and to set aside four workdays - just a little less than a full 40 hour workweek - and 100 gold. Uncommon items require 500 gold and about 20 workdays, also for a third level character - so if your character takes weekends off to rest and recharge, that’s about a month of downtime.

Not bad, right? You could absolutely have your player character pick up magic item crafting as their downtime hobby!

Only if you plan to stop there, really.

The next tier is Rare: 5k gold, 6th level requirement, and 200 workdays. That’s seven thirty-day months practically without any breaks. Weekends off? I don’t have an exact calculation but my gut says that might push it closer to eight months, maybe nine if the character occasionally takes a little more than just two days a week to recharge a bit. It’s doable if your campaign does a one-year timeskip sometime after you hit level 6, but you still have to have the gold for it and you’re dedicating most of that character’s time to doing this.

Then there’s Very Rare and Legendary, and at that point...well, frankly, why even bother with the pretense that a character could conceivably do this as “downtime?” Once you get to those levels you’ve got a full-time, long-term job, because Very rare costs 50k gold, requires level 11 or higher, and takes 2k workdays, or 5.5 years practically without any breaks - probably something like seven years if the character takes weekends off and nothing else. As for Legendary...500k gold, level 17 or higher, 20k workdays - 55 years without breaks, more like 70 or more with weekends. 

That’s...that’s not downtime. That’s not campaign activities. That’s when the final evil has been defeated and sealed away, everybody’s already level 20, each character has insanely vast riches, and in post-campaign wrap-up you say that, yeah, your mage is going to settle down and devote bloody decades and most of their wealth to making the most powerful such-and-such in the entire world, so that maybe if your group returns to this world for a campaign two set a century later they might run across it someday. Hell, if you’ve got a human character (or another race of similar aging), a legendary magic item is their entire life, assuming they were in their twenties when the campaign ended.

Seriously, why did the creators of the game not just stop their chart at Rare and put a note in saying that Very Rare and Legendary items can only be made by powerful master craftsmen over long periods of time and are not downtime activities? Sure, lay out the numbers, but don’t give the base impression that a player could *totally* make their own version of the Holy Avenger to bring to the final battle against the Undead Lich Emperor of Darkness. It’s not happening, and they’re better off either hoping one is dropped in the loot or changing their dream entirely.

Just.

It’s disappointing, is what it is, to see something that looks like a cool mechanic for between adventures (and for personalizing the hell out of a party’s gear) only to discover that, in the most practical terms, that mechanic has a hard cut-off before it gets halfway through.

Maybe the intent is for players to band together for the difficult stuff, but even then it’s unfeasible, because every person working on the item has to have the level required, and must participate every day. So if you use the simplified math of dividing time by party (even if it’s technically incorrect for real-world physics, let’s go with it), a party of, say, four would still take 1-2 years for Very Rare. 10-20 for Legendary.

Still not downtime.

I understand that those last two tiers of items aren’t supposed to be easy to run across, so it does make sense to limit their production in some way or other. The thing is, you’ve already got some pretty hard limits in the level requirement and in the sheer gold cost, neither of which would be easily achieved for most NPCs in most worlds.

And, again, I might not have minded this so much if it weren’t for the fact that it was laid out in the book, in a chart, as if it was possible for in-game purposes when it so clearly is not, and is not meant to be.

Edit

AND ANOTHER THING (I just found out)

The downtime activity section tells you that an adventurer who crafts their own magic item(s) can sell them at regular buy price (usually adventurers find, on average, buyers for half the price for things they find or loot, probably because it’s pre-owned). Anyhow, the implication here is that you can make cool stuff for yourself, or you can make cool stuff and make a profit for yourself.

Sounds good, right?

Wrong.

Standard/suggested purchase price ranges for magic items by tier (found in a different section of the rulebook): 

Common: 50-100 gold. Uncommon: 101-500. Rare: 501-5k. Very Rare: 5k-50k. Legendary: 50k and up.

The top - top, not base - suggested price in each category is exactly what it costs an adventurer to make the damn thing. So, if the DM adheres to all the rules and charts as written, if you’re lucky in finding a buyer, you might recoup the gold you spent in making the item, but you won’t get anything more for the time you spent doing so.

How does this economy even work? Is the assumption that adventurers are hobbyists and inefficient with the gold in materials and time spent compared to whoever made the already extant magic items in this world? Does the value of a magic item depreciate that much even during the process of making it? Did someone just throw numbers around without actually thinking them through since it’s not really a necessary game mechanic? Maybe, I suspect.

Yeah, I’d just ignore the crafting rules in the book, or else make my own. By all means, make things difficult to create as they scale in power, but there’s bound to be better ways to do so than just making huge numbers as thresholds. (What’s that? To make a Holy Avenger-esque weapon you need the cooperation of a very powerful celestial being, like a Solar or an out and out God - one which might set you a quest or a test of some sort for instance - but once you have that it doesn’t take years and years and hundreds of thousands of gold to craft? Sounds like an adventure!)

[ajw720]

If anybody is still doubting what that team's priorities are or if they're trying to sabotage, seriously consider wtf is happening: Emmy voting started YESTERDAY. D is a frontrunner for LEAD, for a very serious, acclaimed show. And they have him interviewing about Boob Soup. And a bar where he is "just the piano man." Even the shittiest reps in the industry would know how totally insane this is. It's like BLATANTLY fucking him over

Anon, I really, really, really try to remove my personality from the way I view the bar. And there are some aspects that simply aren’t my taste. I think the signs are tacky and immature. Same with the name, especially when we know it is a “tribute to her grandmother.”  But I understand in this world we do not all agree, what is funny to you may not be funny to me.  I think it is in extremely poor taste and I hate that D is associated with it, but perhaps I am old and boring like they all accuse me of being.

But the drink list is an entirely different situation, many of those names of actually offensive and insulting and reducing women to their bodies. 

D actually picked one of the drinks that is mildly less offensive (emphasizing MILDLY), and it is called BOOBS SOUP. I think this fact speaks for itself.  And as I have said multiple times names like Slut and Nice Rack are extraordinary problematic  The drink menu is the opposite of feminism and empowerment and not the words that would ever be used to describe a strong, independent women. 

Having him promoting that bar at all is a major issue, it a strike at his character, and is seriously putting his reputation in question. because being associated with the bar makes D look like a guy that is perfectly fine with naming drinks after woman’s body parts in an offensive manner or calling a person a slut if he thinks she is promiscuous, which last I checked is MY CHOICE as long as it is with a consenting adult.  

And to do this WHEN IS IS SERIOUSLY IN CONTENTION FOR AN EMMY AND VOTING IS ONGOING IS IRRESPONSIBLE. It is proving once again that all Team Shit cares about is the bar and the b&c. And it proves to me that they would prefer D did not win.

What part of Me Too are they not comprehending?  What part of everyone dressed in black at the GG standing in unity do they not understand? 

I often wonder if they truly think this is funny and will sell OR if they are actually just trying to damage D in every manner possible while they still can. Fear is real, we see it with the stans. Well Team Inept must be petrified because they KNOW they come out of this looking like major abusers who actively repressed someone against his will. And perhaps their goal is destruction.

Having D go on NATIONAL TV and utter the words boobs soup is once again surpassing yet a new low. I give him kudos for doing it while wearing a pink jacket, but it doesn’t take away the sting of his words.

THIS NEEDS TO END.  You and I just have to hope that the incredible work he did on that screen is sufficient for the Emmy as well as the massive amount of good will he has in the Hollywood community because of his networking and charming personality. 

I think it will be, but that doesn’t change the facts. 

Team Inhumane in my opinion is actively trying to harm their client. Please may they all never work a day in their lives again when this ends. And please let everyone of them, especially her, be exposed for the vile human beings that they are.

[kinkyacademia]

Either Kai's or Kurono's (you choose, I love my babies equally) s/o first christmas with the yakuza and they find out that those guys don't really celabrate it and now the s/o tries to change that (too specific?)

Let Father Pasta tell you all something; Even if I don’t celebrate most Christian holidays, I do love decorating for Christmas. Muahhahaha, LIGHTS!! So, you get a lot because i n d u l g a n c e.I feel like I need to explain this; Kai’s S/O is always very high in the “Yakuza hierarchy” so almost all members of the Yakuza speak to them only when the S/O speaks first. I didn’t know if you Meatballs knew this :> 

-Mod Pasta🍜🍝 2

Chisaki Kai:

Kai happened to start dating you, a lovely barista at a coffee shop that he fancied, a few months before Christmas. He never, ever told you about the Yakuza until a few weeks before Christmas. He wanted you to move in with him, and it seemed like a big obligation until he pulled out the dominance guns. No, he didn’t bring a real gun, but he did push you into a wall and take your virginity enough to convince you to move in with him. Getting used to his “coworkers” was a hoot, but you soon fit in. They’ll always be a bit rowdy and dark, but you managed just fine.

Since he still liked seeing you every day at the shop, he let you keep your job. Since you were the baker for the pastries, you started making more and more peppermint and Christmas themed goodies. Kai never really celebrated Christmas, and you soon found out why when you baked some peppermint chocolate cookies for him and his “coworkers” one morning. You left the house about an hour before Kai woke up each day (obviously you were escorted to your bakery by a guard without your knowledge), so he would come get a coffee every morning from your coffee shop. Your friends thought his mask was a bit creepy, but overall they were just happy that you had someone you loved.

“(F/N), ah,” The clockwork ring sounded, and your boyfriend entered the shop. You were already briskly bringing the baggie of cookies to the front with a breathless smile across your face - the sweet bread for the morning shift was almost done. You could tell that he was smiling under his mask as he nodded to the cashier. You handed him the caramel mocha and cookies, and he lazily raised his eyebrows and almost opened the baggie.

“Wait, no, I made them special!” You exclaimed, causing a few people to turn your way. You shyly smiled around, then quickly leaned over the counter to place your floury baker hands on top of his strangely smooth own. He seemed mildly surprised, but your grin kept him waiting.

“I understand. I’m coming to pick you up after your shift, (F/N),” He nodded, and you nodded back before briskly taking a few steps back towards the baking room.

“Alright! Looking forward to it!” You happily waved to him, giddy for him to get the pre-Christmas surprise. Your coworkers and friends teased you about it all day, but you just knew that he must have loved them.

When he picked you up, you didn’t seem to sense anything special about him. Your ever-present and energetic smile were quite bright today, and he questioned it. You tried to lie and prod about how his morning went, but his response threw you off.

“I usually don’t eat sweets for breakfast, but your cookies are an obvious exception. Peppermint compliments chocolate quite well,” He then slid his arm casually over your shoulder, resting his hand over your chest and leaving you without your outlet for energy.

“You’re missing the point - they were Christmas themed! I even put candy cane striped frosting on them,” You whined, and he sighed.

“Ah, so that’s why you’re so hyper. (F/N), I don’t cel-the Yaku-we’ve never celebrated Christmas,” He seemed to stutter in his words, something you have never heard him do. You gaped, then grinned wickedly. His arm stiffened slightly - he had grown to be cautious of that face.

“Well, it looks like I have some work to do!”

-

“You are insanely lucky that I love you, (F/N),” Kai muttered as he slipped past you. You yelped, then sighed as you went to go join in the general happiness of the Yakuza household. It was usually so dreary in here, but the overnight lights and Christmas theme really seemed to bring out the best in everyone. Kendou had taken his helmet off, and everyone else was chatting in a much more lively manner.

Kai had gone off to talk to Kurono about some sort of business, and you spoke with Joi for a bit before Kai returned. You felt a bit uneasy at his general silence, and Kurono seemed out of character as he removed his mask and striked a conversation with Shin. You turned to Kai, your hair flipping slightly, but you couldn’t spot him.

“Quite crazy, don’t you think?” Joi tried loosely to continue with the conversation you had started, and you quickly turned back around before forcing your sunny attitude to kick into high gear. Sure, his coworkers would never be quite “delightful,” but this general chatter was a huge step up from complete, uneasing silence.

When you felt an arm wrap around your waist, you yelped. Joi quickly waved you off, his eyes spelling the words out instantly; Kai’s coworkers have always been afraid of him in some sort of way. You leaned back into your boyfriend as he dragged you off, mumbling a few things like, “You’re being so vulgar,” and, “Kai! You’re being so forceful!”

“(F/N),” One simple word brought your impatient silence, and he finally pushed you into the wall outside of his bedroom. He let go, and you felt slightly awkward standing in front of him like some sort of war criminal. You glanced at the floor, then into his absolutely emotionless eyes. You forced yourself to assume something good was coming out of this.

“Do you like the lights? Some are from my old apartment, but I got some more after my shift,” He was silent, and your smile became painfully large. You wondered why his eyes were slowly narrowing as his hand suddenly shot out and grabbed your jaw, fear shooting through you as he angled your face upwards to directly face him as he became insanely close.

“Do you know what you did?” His voice edged on annoyed, but it was overall angry. You grumbled, lightly pawing at his hand and complaining about how tight it was. You didn’t know how normal inflicting pain upon others was to him - no, only in the bedroom for you.

“N-No?” You mumbled, and your lips started to pucker up with how much he was pushing you. You whined loudly, and he leaned his mask past your ear to where his lips were close enough to hear his breath.

“You avoided your escort. Have you not realized that, when I don’t come get you, I have a guard follow you back here?” Your eyes widened. You didn’t realize that Kai loved you so much… You were just too oblivious to the obsessive side of this, and you felt yourself relax into his grip.

“I’m sorry, Kai, I didn’t know you do that,” You whispered, and he pulled back and let his hand fall from your face. You hadn��t realized that you went on your toes, and you fell back onto your flat feet. His arms wrapped around your waist, his hands sliding into your back pockets and forcing you to stay close to him. You didn’t mind, and wrapped your arms under his jacket and around his back. The silence was comfortable until he spoke again.

“Thank you for livening the place up, the others needed it,” He sighed, sounding more defeated than thankful, and rested his chin on your head. You closed your eyes, simply enjoying each other’s embrace. This was a common sort of “cuddling” position for you two, since Kai could easily slip away if he was needed instead of having to untangle his arms and other appendages.

A few minutes later, Kai pulled back. You leaned forward, but he shook his head and patted yours, “I need to do some paperwork, let’s go,” He then grabbed his door handle.

Chisaki Kai is the master of reading body language, but for some reason, he couldn’t sense your sudden giddiness as he pushed the door open. He did sense the mass of Christmas decor decorating his room, though, and he quickly whipped around to shoot a glare at you.

“Merry Christmas hunny!” You exclaimed with a squeal, scampering down the hallway and past mistletoe branches and random little snowmen charms on the windowsills. You heard ghostly footsteps follow you like a hunting dog, and it didn’t take him long to catch you. Your gleeful laughter even elicited a chuckle from him as he carried you back to the room and half-assedly scolded you for decorating your and his’ room without asking him.