#Tumblr auto wrote this

[zephyrsobsessions]

First time drawing Loki and Mobius! These are really just simple studies to help me learn their faces, not much! They turned out SO much better than I was expecting??? Usually I have a very steep learning curve until I can draw someone this accurately! That's progress (and art school) for ya I guess lol

I drew Mobius first (he's just last cause I like how he turned out the best) and that makes it my first drawing of 2025!

Reblogs greatly appreciated :) 💚

[anodymalion]

Sokka/Suki/Zuko (Avatar) Tags: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Post-Canon, Angst, Blood and Injury, Hurt/Comfort, Minor Character Death 26k words Sometimes he dreams, but it's gone as soon as he wakes, the fading fragments leaving him with only a faint impression of grief, or fear, or comfort. But the other nights - the nights when he dreams of blood, of fire, the ways the body can be rendered down by pain - those, he always remembers.

tumblr is being really functional and not letting me upload the drawing I did to go with this without shadowbanning the post. haha cool, great website!! anyway, here's a fic if you like the idea of: zukki, nightmares, suffering, and hurt/comfort with a LOT more emphasis on the hurt

[ladyswillmart]

2024 Writing In Review

I went ahead and answered some of the questions in this post! Mostly just the ones I can actually answer. Here we go:

One.) How many fics have you worked on since January?

Uhh. Two. Maybe three if ya count the massive AU timeline? I wrote a few small fictiony posts too but I wouldn't call them fics.

Two.) What’s something new that you tried in a fic this year?

I wrote a multi-chapter fic and made a website for it. I liked designing the site and adding pictures, and most of all I like having my own space to put my stuff!

Three.) What piece of media inspired you the most? (This can be the fandom you wrote the most for, the one that spawned the most ideas, the one you thought about the most, etc.)

Actually I think I wrote/thought about LotRO the most this year. Moria was such a surprise for me, I ended up really enjoying that part of the game's story. Unfortunately I haven't been playing it lately since the last major update completely borked my UI and as of today it still hasn't been fixed…

Four.) How many fandom(s) did you write for this year?

I wrote for Ultima VII Pt. 2 and a tiny bit for LotRO and I think that was it! Surprisingly no FF14 despite having a new expac. It was fine, I just don't have much to say about it, fic-wise.

Five.) What ship(s) captured your heart?

I don't really do ships, sorry. 😛

Six.) What character(s) captured your heart?

Princess Zelda from Echoes of Wisdom. She is so adorable! What a cute game! I don't know why I've never tried writing Zelda fanfic honestly.

Seven.) Did you write for any new fandoms or ships this year?

Nah.

Eight.) What fic meant the most to you to write?

Probably Ancient History because it also got me to work on a couple other non-fic things (website, timeline, etc) that I'd wanted to do for a long time.

Nine.) What fic made you feel the happiest to work on?

The ethically dubious wizard-turned-chicken POV one I just finished drafting (Ultima VII Pt. 2 again). It was the first thing I'd written in several months, plus I just like writing from weird PoVs I guess.

Ten.) What fic was the most satisfying to finish writing?

The chicken one. Felt like scratching a very annoying itch!

Fifteen.) What was the hardest fic to title?

LOL I still haven't come up with a title for the chicken story.

Nineteen.) Share your favorite piece of dialogue

"A crowd, eh? Eh, look, Morty! Looks like the gang's all here!" the thief observed, warmly. "Hooray!" "Looks like the gang would have our guts for garters, Stefano," Mortegro replied through his teeth.

Twenty.) Share your funniest line

I feel like this isn't up for me to decide. 🤔

Twenty-One.) What's something that surprised you while you were working on a fic? Did it change the story?

While writing Ancient History, I ended up feeling kinda more sorry for the story's antagonist than anything (though make no mistake, he is still a complete blister). I think maybe it did change the timbre of his parts of the story a little bit? My notes on him looked like this:

Torrissio: He has a burning ambition to learn as much as he can about the Ophidian people… Partially to recover their lost magics, many of which are very potent and dangerous (and now banned by the UCoTL, ala Elissa's Time Prism spell). But also, he really is just THAT interested in Ophidian lore. This in itself is not a bad thing, but his single-minded desire to learn as much as he can leads him to behave ruthlessly in this regard. He does not care who he hurts so long as he gets what he wants in the end. That said, although he wants to collect all these terrible, evil spells, it's not so much that he has designs on using them to Take Over The World or what have you. He does not care what others think or expect of him, and he has no other ambitions beyond the pursuit of knowledge. He is thus rather apathetic towards civic matters. The only person whom he ever really cared about is Columna, who is now dead. His actions are tinged with grief; he is drinking a lot.

So yeah, he ended up being more pathetic than anything. I might like to write him a little more some day.

Twenty-Two.) What writing programs did you use? Did you write by hand?

I use Scrivener to organize files afterwards but I actually write fics out in Notepad++, in their intended HTML files with markup. Saves a lot of time in the end.

Twenty-Four.) Did you do anything special to celebrate finishing a fic?

Finishing the story is its own reward!! LOL

Twenty-Five.) How did you recharge between fics?

After finishing Ancient History, I barely wrote anything at all for months. It kinda burned me out I guess. I don't know if this counts as recharging. Mostly I just got really antsy about it!

Twenty-Six.) Did you create fanworks other than fic?

Yes! I made a very cool timeline for my Serpent Isle AU. I also fleshed out a new backstory for Sethys, and I wrote some LotRO posts and more Hivallion stuff.

Twenty-Eight.) If this were an awards show, who would you thank

Advil and coffee… The breakfast of champions!

Twenty-Nine.) What's left on your to-do list for 2024?

Not writing but I'm trying to finish some plastic canvas bird ornaments. I'm 2/3rds of the way there! I also MIGHT try to put my newer Ultima stuff up on AO3. Maaaaaaybe…

Thirty.) What would you like to write next year?

Maybe more Ultima fics? I set up my timeline specifically to accommodate one-shots (like the Chicken story) so I'd like to do more of those, I guess. On a related note, I'd also like to try to be kinder to myself.

[leesalchemybook]

2020-2021

GTA RP characters! characters of other roleplayers that I drew for them, from a server I used to play on.

the top 4 are characters from the group my main character was part of. the bottom two are also those characters but in a cute style. the middle one is commission done as part of a fundraiser for st jude streams someone from our rp server was hosting. i donated a commission as one of the auction items :3

[quq-fan]

Thank you to everyone who got me to 250 likes!

[thatdiabolicalfeminist]

Imagine you're cozy at home, doing exactly what you're usually doing when you scroll tumblr at home. Someone knocks on your door. A couple of teenagers from your neighborhood are there, holding a 1yo baby who is fussing.

They tell you their dad is really sick, he has cancer and is having surgery on Monday. Their big brother, the baby's dad, lost his job after the auto shop where he worked was destroyed suddenly. He hasn't been able to find other work.

They don't want much, just a few dollars, they don't want to bother you, but they have to ask a lot of people because they have no other way to get money.

All the charities have said they can't help, too many people need help rn and there's not enough to go around. The baby keeps having problems with malnutrition, and they're worried about the costs of their dad's surgery.

Does your answer change if those kids aren't white? If the reason they're homeless now is because they are of an ethnicity being targeted for extermination? Does kids being far away make you feel like they're not your responsibility?

James Baldwin wrote that the children are always ours, every single one of them, all over the globe. Do you believe that? I do. Every child deserves whatever help and support they need. Every single one. As adults, we owe them protection and care.

That's why I'm asking you to think honestly about what you actually can do to help these kids.

This isn't a hypothetical family. Ahmed, the kids' dad, really is scheduled for surgery on Monday. Nader, aged 17, is real and on Tumblr begging for his life and the lives of his family and a lot of people are shutting the metaphorical door in his face. It's largely due to his hardworking determination and perseverance that his family has gotten so close to their goal.

This is their family btw. Just normal people who probably never expected to be in this situation. Look how cute baby Iman is!! Aren't those kids worthy of your help? Aren't their parents, who have been struggling to protect those children, worthy of community care?

Please help them. You can probably spare $5. Maybe you even have more. Maybe you have family members or friends who could help more if you asked and showed them who they'd be helping.

Those kids are, actually, in real life, right now, asking for your help. What will you do?

Verified here (#4)

[rcmclachlan]

2024 Tumblr Top 10

Tagged by the wonderful @liminalmemories21

How it works: Share your top 10 tumblr posts from last year! Visit this site, scroll down to "Find your Tumblr Top 10," type in your username, and select 2024. When you get the results, simply click "Share to Tumblr" and you'll get an auto-generated draft for a post with links and previews. Make any adjustments you see fit.

Surprising no one, all my top posts in 2024 were about BuckTommy. Here’s the breakdown:

1. Tommy’s just as insane as Buck (1,184 notes - Aug 15 2024)

This is probably my favorite post of the year, so I’m glad it’s sitting pretty at number one. Even after what we’ve learned about Tommy since I posted it, I still stand by it. There is no way Mr. Sure I’ll Fly Into A Hurricane On A Hunch is normal about anything.

2. Amnion (mpreg, 8x06 fix-it) (777 notes - Nov 9 2024)

This predated the mpreg tsunami that hit the fandom by about a week, but if you’ve been following me since April, you’ll know that dadvans and I had been surfing that wave all along. 

3. Season 4 alternate meeting (726 notes - Aug 10 2024)

I’ve got a list as long as my arm of ways Buck and Tommy could’ve met earlier, but the idea of “what if their paths crossed the day Buck learns about Daniel” grabbed onto my ankle like a mutant west highland white terrier and wouldn’t let go. 

It eventually became the fic Histocompatibility on AO3.

4. 8x05 spec fic ("Kiss me, Thomas!”) (704 notes - Oct 23 2024)

I wrote this after the first pictures of Buck’s face dropped a couple of days before the episode aired. At the time, we could only see one boil (I think the most popular theory was that a spider had laid eggs in his face, a la Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark), so I decided to have a little fun. 

Apologies to the people who were scarred for life after learning what a giant weta is. 

5. The 118-217 Shadow Summit headcanon (665 notes - Dec 29 2024)

A very late addition to the list! There I was with all these headcanons, still mourning the breakup and wishing the show had given us some cross-station shenanigans, when I realized I could solve all my problems with fic. Why would I try to get Buck and Tommy back together when the yahoos at the 118 and 217 could do it for me?

Then I took it a step further with this missing scene, which I had an absolute blast writing. These people are bonkers (to me).

6. “So? Tell me about the hot pilot.” (652 notes - Sep 13 2024)

I can never get enough of the Buckley siblings, and since the show finally gave us something substantial with 7x05, I decided to delve a little deeper into Buck and Maddie’s conversation about Buck’s bisexuality and the man responsible for opening his eyes to it. 

It eventually became the fic Table of Contents on AO3.

7. New Year’s Eve fix-it ficlet (651 notes - Jan 1 2025)

Okay, technically it shouldn’t be on the list because I posted it in the new year, but I wrote it a couple of hours before midnight while watching Wicked with friends, so I’m including it. It was a half-baked idea that became a half-baked fic, but it seemed like people enjoyed it, so I’m taking that energy into the new year!

8. More 8x05 spec fic (missing scene) (589 notes - Oct 24 2024)

Another fic that was born out of the episode previews, which allowed me to bring my 217 OCs out to play. All I kept thinking was, ‘What was going through these people’s heads when they heard dispatch say a body had been found at the 118? Probably something along the lines of: must be Tuesday.’ 

9. Pregnancy kink ficlet/headcanon (526 notes - Aug 29 2024)

No explanation necessary. 

10. Relative Value (499 notes - Jun 26 2024)

“Give me Uncle Tommy or give me death” has been my mantra since Tommy and Buck made out in front of God, country, and the entire First Presbyterian ER lobby. Also, it’s a headcanon of mine that all the 118 kids are obsessed with him, much to Tommy’s confusion and amusement. 

It eventually became Relative Value on AO3.

Well, this was a fun little retrospective! I can’t believe this dumb show pushed me out of writer’s block limbo as hard as it did, but I’m very grateful. 

Tagging: @dadvans, @screamlet, @epiphainie, @leashybebes, and @beanarie​​

[peasant-player]

Against Expectations

Complimenting art pieces

Ufff I'm crushed.

I didn't read the Site right from the Orctober Month and rather doing my own promt I did a drawing to a short story from someone that wrote that as a answer to a promt.

Anyway I tried to upload that pic to the website of the silmarillion writers guild.

But that is a nightmare to do from my phone. I really tried. I almost cried with the odd auto correct and the redirecting around.

Idk it might be an amazing website for writing and on a computer

Soo here is the art.

If the writer from that promt uses Tumblr and sees this: it was an amazing story !! @chrissystriped was that your story? I hope so if not sry for adding you to this post :)

Here is like always a close up..

Btw what am I going to do with the other 2 drawings that are half finished but are also from a story written for the Orctober challenge???

Fml

On another note is it just me or does the orc looks oddly handsome...

[jetra4ivor]

3-4 of my posts regarding the Minecraft Movie have gone viral. And as someone who has never had a post go viral before I gotta say…

I do not like it.

Maybe on other websites it’s not a big deal, but here on tumblr it is a nightmare.

The biggest issue is that it’s really hard to filter the reblogs and be able to respond to things. If I’m like scrolling down through the reblogs to see what people are saying or writing, the SECOND a new reblog or like comes in tumblr INSTANTLY jumps me back up to the top. Because tumblr wants me to see that someone new is reblogging my posts.

And when you’re only dealing with 1 or 2 new reblogs or likes every few minutes or hours… not a problem.

But when it’s literally multiple times a SECOND? Omg… I can’t scroll down. I can’t keep up. It’s just CONSTANTLY snapping me back up to the top and I can’t scroll through anything and see what people are saying!!!

I was hoping after a few days it would slow down… BUT IT HASN’T. The only way I’ve been able to respond to anything lately is by manually finding the individual posts or reblogs themselves and scrolling through the comments there instead.

The second issue is that tumblr keeps your post as it was reblogged. Even if you edit the post later to fix a spelling or grammar mistake, tumblr keeps the incorrect version of the post if that was reblogged before you corrected things.

And for example, in one of the viral posts my phone auto corrected “Piglins” to “pigeons.” And I didn’t notice it at first until the post was well into being viral and someone pointed it out. But even after I corrected the mistake, it had been reblogged so many times now that the incorrect version is all anyone sees. So I’m still getting people telling me I wrote it wrong LONG after I already fixed it 😭

I post primarily about gay MCSM content. Specifically involving female Jessie and Petra. I don’t generally post about other Minecraft stuff, as I try to keep my blog focused on MCSM related content. I probably wouldn’t mind too much if going viral meant more people saw some of the gay MCSM content I reblog or talk about…

But none of the viral reblogging has transferred over into any of my other posts. Which is sad because one of the viral posts is about people talking about how good MCSM is. After nearly a decade of people talking down on MCSM it’s so fantastic to see so many people stepping up and defending it and saying it was good… but none of that positivity is spreading into any of my other posts about the game!

You guys actually liked MCSM? Please… come into the MCSM fandom! Inject your love of the game into this fandom! We NEED you here! We’ve felt so isolated and small! Where have you all been? Why won’t you join us here and create new art or talk about your favorite characters or moments?

Why hasn’t any of my viral success transferred into more fans of the game joining the MCSM community? 😭 It’s so gratifying to see the love of MCSM in the comments to the Minecraft Movie trailer… why isn’t that resulting in more people coming into the fandom on tumblr?

Don’t get me wrong… it’s nice that people liked some of my posts enough for them to go viral. But the way tumblr works makes going viral really difficult to deal with and I’m not seeing the cross pollination of MCSM fans into any of the OTHER posts I’ve made about MCSM!

I just want more people talking about the lesbian block people! You came here for the Minecraft Movie Trailer dissing… please stay for the lesbian block people!

[starvingnarcissistmusic]

LISTEN TO MYTH: SIDE ONE BY THE NARCISSIST COOKBOOK PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE

ahem. okay now that i got that out of my system; i wrote a long comment that went track-by-track, but i think yt mustve auto deleted it thinking it was spam or something. i did manage to get these screenshots though, so for the sake of not letting an hour of writing go to waste i will put it here (apologies for anyone who follows my tumblr for my music and nothing else LMAO youre getting fanboy zack today)

I am just astounded at how well this concept works. I think Matt said in an interview that "once you listen, you'll get it" and you would not BELIEVE how accurate that was. MYTH is a phenomenal album already and the second part of it isnt even out yet. please god listen to it, buy it on bandcamp, buy the tape, this whole album deserves it

[letteredlettered]

Just going to address a few of the types of comments I see about AI on tumblr dot com.

I've seen people say that it's useless, because real human emotion is what the world needs now.

I've seen people dismiss it as a fad, cheering for it to crash and burn like bitcoin or NFTs.

And I've seen people passionately discuss how a) AI is using the intellectual property and creative work of human people to learn, without crediting that property, work, or the creators that enable that AI to exist, b) with that knowledge, AI can recreate or replicate the work of human artists, writers, and other content creators, thereby rendering artists/writers/creators without the means by which to earn a living. Many of these passionate (important, true) arguments end with some kind of conclusion like, "This is why AI is evil and no one should ever support it's use."

Let's just talk about the last one first. Importantly, I don't want to minimize or reduce the problems that artists, designers, writers, musicians, etc all face due to AI. It's not just artists. Anyone who creates content and puts it on the internet can have it stolen without credit by AI. AI can take an article written by a journalist, change the words slightly, and generate a fake name and fake photo so that the journalist who wrote the article makes no money while the company with the AI rakes it in. It's a huge problem that is destroying livelihoods as well as avenues of creation, expression, and information-sharing that will only get worse.

But to conclude that AI is therefore evil is kind of like saying social media creates toxic environments and therefore the entire internet is evil. Social media sucks, but I use the internet for keeping in touch with friends and banking and taxes and learning about the world and fandom and watching TV and learning about problems at work as quickly as possible and donating to charities. I mean, like, the internet does kind of suck; enshittification is real, but I think we all understand that the internet can be a useful tool.

Similarly, AI is being used to save lives. It solved the protein-folding problem, which not only saves lives but can help humanity in tons of other ways. It can identify certain signs of cancer more quickly than any human could. And before you say "well it's fine if we're only using it for science," you should know that the identifying cancer thing got discovered because some bakery wanted AI to identify pastries for pricing reasons. AI can process the billions of data that are necessary to consider to mitigate and prevent further climate change; it can help us come up with ideas for how to do so. In a bizarre example, AI can recognize which wood comes from which tree to help authorities discover illegal lumber trafficking which depletes endangered trees and protected forests. AI can help predict and prepare for the next pandemic. AI can explore space. AI can spot fake news.

Vilify certain uses of AI as is just and necessary, but vilifying all of AI just means that fewer people understand what AI can actually do, which means fewer people working to ensure this tool actually works for us rather than against us.

Second, let's just talk about AI as a fad. This idea frankly boggles me. AI is not bitcoin. AI is the internet. It's the computer. It's electricity. It's the compass. It's not just going to change the world, it already has, and it's not going anywhere.

AI is your spam filter. AI is your auto-correct. AI is why you see the ads you do. AI is why you get emails about deals for trips when you've been thinking about making a trip. AI is in your GPS, planning your route. AI is your search engine. I'm not trying to sell these things as positives right now; I'm selling them as realities. AI is not going away because it is already here, you who said you hoped it was like bitcoin are already using it, it's not going away.

AI is going to drive your cars. It's going to design ads specifically targeted to you as an individual. AI is going to be your children's friend and it's going to buy your groceries, and I'm just not sure there's much you can do about that at this point.

But last I want to talk about what the world needs now, because it does need humanity. It needs humanity to understand that the enemy is not AI; the entities that threaten our humanity are not AI entities. The entities that threaten our humanity are the corporations that are currently building AI with corporate interests in mind, with commercial interests in mind.

It might sound like I'm splitting hairs here. Maybe the folks who are so against AI on tumblr dot com are against AI because corporations are developing AI and what they mean when they say that AI is evil is that the current outlook on AI is just not that great because it is not being regulated and studied by enough governments, many of the general populace are either ignoring it or condemning it, and those who are most focused on its development have capitalist agendas that mean AI is going to be a lot worse before it gets better. But somehow, I'm getting the idea that the view on AI is not that nuanced--and it needs to be.

The humanity we need now, imo, is curiosity and ingenuity and passion, and we need that curiosity and ingenuity and passion directed at AI. If we get curious, if we inform ourselves, if we know what it is and what it can be and how to use it, then we can start to make demands of our governments for regulations. We can start to make demands of companies for how this should be used. We can start to incorporate AI into our lives in a way that gives us more time and space for art and creation and writing, not less. If we, as a species, were careful about this, we could use AI to make our world better, not just for humans but for every living thing and so many of the unliving things. We just have to pay attention.

Meanwhile, James Bridle's pointed out in Ways of Being: Animals, Plants, Machines: The Search for a Planetary Intelligence, "We tend to imagine AI as embodied in something like a robot or a computer, but it can really be instantiated as anything. Imagine a system with clearly defined goals, sensors and effectors for reading and interacting with the world, the ability to recognize pleasure and pain as attractors and things to avoid, the resources to carry out its will, and the legal and social standing to see that its needs are catered for, even respected. That's a description of an AI--it's also a description of a modern corporation. For this 'corporate AI,' pleasure is growth and profitability, and pain is lawsuits and drops in shareholder value. Corporate speech is protected, corporate personhood recognized, and corporate desires are given freedom [. . .] Crucially, [corporations] lack empathy, or loyalty, and they are hard--although not impossible--to kill."

Then he quotes Charles Stross, who wrote, "We are now living in a global state that has been structured for the benefit of non-human entities with non-human goals."

We could be treating technology itself not as something humans, in our dominance and supremacy, impose onto our world, but rather as a natural intelligence evolving alongside us. In so doing the focus would not be on creating machines that seek only profit and extraction, but rather make the world a better place. To do that we should be forming relationships with this technology and at the same time, rediscovering our relationships with the world around us. And just like anything the steps to get there are first curiosity, then education, then legislation.

[liminalmemories21]

2024 Tumblr Top 10

tagged by @guardian-angle22​.  Thank you!

How it works: Share your top 10 tumblr posts from last year! Visit this site,  scroll down to "Find your Tumblr Top 10," type in your username, and   select 2024. When you get the results, simply click "Share to Tumblr"   and you'll get an auto-generated draft for a post with links and   previews. Make any adjustments you see fit. [I’ve also swapped out the note count with the set descriptions!]

1. Apparently there's going to be a Law & Order: Toronto, and I really desperately need them to make the world's most niche joke...

This is a post the escaped containment.  People who do not know my tumblr name forwarded this to me because they thought I’d find it funny (they were ... not wrong), and I then had the debate of .... so, do I admit that this is me? 

TLDR - Due South joke.

2. I have come to the realization that what I want (need?) from S5 is lazy making out on the couch. I want them sprawled out on...

So far have not had this desire come to fruition.  Not optimistic it will.

On, the other hand, I kind of wrote it anyway in Knave 4, so I am creating my own wish fulfillment.

TK is leaving a hickey, he can feel it. Mitchell is going to tease him about it on Monday, but that's a problem for the end of the weekend. Right now it's Friday night, there's leftover takeout cooling on the kitchen counter, a movie neither of them is watching playing low on the TV, and he has TK sprawled out on top of him, sucking a slow hickey at the corner of his jaw and sneaking a hand under Carlos's shirt to palm his stomach. He stretches his neck further into TK's kiss, ignoring the faint buzzing sound of his phone until TK stops what he’s doing and lifts his head.

3. Ficlet (911 - Buck/Tommy)

Ficlet I had honestly forgot I wrote.  Buck sends thirst traps, because Lucy is right, there’s, “Nothing is hotter than a man who does housework."

4. battle of the amazing ladies

Also a post that somehow escaped containment.  Princess/General Leia won, which I can’t be mad about.  But President Roslin should have been higher up the rankings.

5. WIP Wednesday - S5 Interstitials (Lonestar)

He’s late to Elian’s birthday. He didn’t mean to be. He never means to be late these days.

6. # of Sentence Sunday - S5 Interstitials (Lonestar)

He startles a little.  TK's not a secret, he's got a picture of him on his desk, but most people don't actually acknowledge that they're married.  Campbell smiles.  "Gabriel would not shut up about his son getting married, about his future son-in-law."  Tilts his head.  "He was really excited about the wedding."

7. Whatever # of Sentences Sunday - S5 Interstitials (Lonestar)

He puts a hand over TK's mouth.  "Baby, take the yes."

8. New Fic: Every song has a you (911 - Buck/Tommy)

Buck and Tommy talk but do they listen? A fix-it fic that goes AU after 8.06.

9. Some Number of Sentence Sunday - Knave-verse (Lonestar)

He calls TK from the car. “I’m being followed.”  He peers in the rear view mirror and rolls his eyes.  “Badly.” 

TK snorts.  “Would you like a more competent criminal?” 

He turns on his blinker for the turn back to the hotel.  “Yes.  You were always competent.  It’s why Matt liked you.” 

TK makes an outraged noise. “Excuse you.  I was more than competent.  I was a fucking master of my craft.”  

10. WIP Wednesday - S5 Interstitials (Lonestar)

"I thought I'd feel complete now.  But," he falters.  "He's gone, and it's like the part of him that was still here while I was looking for his murderer is gone now too.  And-" 

TK brushes a hand against his cheek, and then folds Carlos into him.  "Sweetheart." 

"He's gone.  And I don't have anything left now."

tagging @freneticfloetry, @rmd-writes, @welcometololaland, @irispurpurea, @walkinginland, @alchemistc, @rcmclachlan, and @iphyslitterator

[beloveds-embrace]

I’m really FUCKING UPSET I WROTE THIS LONGASS ADDITION TO YOUR LAST PIECE AND IT DID NOT SEND AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Gonna go cry in a corner😭😭😭

NOOOOO REWRITE IT PLEASE i get so happy when i see additions you can do this trust 😭🙏🏼 @ tumblr u bitch when will you add auto save to your mobile app istg

[rainbowsaltblog-archive]

My Big Feedback Thread

@santae-salt

(Note: apologies if this is a bit messy or ramble-y. I wrote this in my notes app.)

Hello all. I'm not quite sure how to start this to be honest. I've been around since Alpha. I remember being very excited for all of the new features and constantly giving feedback in one way or another. I've kinda stopped for a while, but now users are scared to give feedback due to the new rules and, well, I have nothing to lose. I have had nothing to lose since August and doublely so since the last one of my referrals stopped playing due to the AI thing. I've been online and sometime communicative here and there. I've helped a couple of users and have contemplated staying here until Thirs Tee got new art (the oldbies will remember me comming Zale x Thirs Tee art and posting about it. It still is my favorite piece), but the amount of issues I've had and I have seen other players have has gotten to the point where I have to say something.

I don't know how long this'll be up, but I hope staff at least reads this. I still recall my good experiences with most of y'all. I hope y'all understand where I'm coming from. I'm not intending this to be harsh, so (naturally) apologies if it comes off as such.

The Good Things

Firstly, Santae is the first petsite that I've played on that had nonvinary characters off the bat, as well as label options for our pets! It may have been because I joined in around Pride Month and it may not have been an option before, but I love that it is an option for our pets to be nonbinary or agender and such. Silvershade and Skye (especially Skye, I vividly remember them) are so cool to me. I love nonbinary characters being canon rather than something assumed!

Secondly, the friends list and block list? Wonderful, no notes. I can now befriend people onsite. I can now block people. I wish at the very least the blocking feature came out earlier, in case users felt uncertain around certain users.

Thirdly, I love the starter pets. I love the pipsqueak dust. My pets are primarily pipsqueaks because I love their little baby wide-eyed forms. The starter pets are also really cool, especially Nochturns. Not many petsites, I feel like, have moth-y creatures, so I'm glad that Santae does. It was actually the pets that brought me back. Multiple times. Which I suppose is the point of a petsite.

Fourthly, I'm glad patch notes are their own seperate thing now. Again, wish they came earlier, but it's nice tobe able to look in one place for important patches rather than on the Discord.

There is good things, glints of gold-like sparkles in a rock. Beautiful, womderful things I love about the site and hope that this will become a good petsite, solidly in with some of the greats. But there's a lot of issues that I have that, as it stands currently, I cannot continue to play as a result.

Accessibility

I will say major strides in this topic have been taken. I appreciate some of the settings (such as reducing animations around site, color sensitive mode, auto mining, etc) that have been put in place with disabled users like myself in mind. I especially appreciate the auto mining. It makes the worry of having to click or tap multiple rocks disappear, and it helps my wrists not get strained.

But there still isn't ALT text. I recall, early on in my account, seeing a Tumblr post someone put out misusing the ALT text feature and had noted that ALT text was meant to describe the image for those who use screenreaders. I was reassured that ALT text would be used properly... and then never saw it used again. Tumblr posts from your site's blog are one thing, but the site itself also does not have ALT text currently. Those who use screenreaders won't necessarily be able to know what each image is. I know that someone else pointed out that the images of the shop links don't have it and that it's rows and rows of buttons. It's just inaccessible, especially on a website where people look over the site initially before joining. I appreciate the quests having the ability to toggle on their names and what they have requested, but I wish this was something implemented earlier and sitewide, and it's still not a replacement for alt text.

(Quick note: I have no idea if other petsites have this issue as well. This is more coming from a concerned player who tries their best to care about accessibility. I do know that it's heavily advised to have ALT text and it's not horribly hard to add in the code.)

Secondly, the colored text in news posts makes it hard and distracting to read. Plain text would be better, especially since some colors might be worse on the white backing of the news posts than regular, plain text. I'm unable to personally read through them half because of the colored text (the other half is the centering breaking the news post formatting at times). I understand wanting to make your characters' names stand out, but perhaps there is a better way of doing so? Maybe allow users to opt into the colored text highlights if they choose, so that not only are players that don't want that don't have to go out of their way to toggle it off, but also so that potential players interested in the site aren't turned off by it.

A lot of the much smaller issues that I have with the site (not very accessible on the forums, espcially not on mobile, lack of dark mode, some smaller things that I'm forgetting) makes it feel like accessibility is an afterthought. I'm not intending to be harsh here, but it just doesn't feel welcoming for many users. Mining should have come with auto mining when it came out. Images should be described when released. Dark mode should be included (and I know a lot of site have issues with that, but still). Granted, this site is still in Beta. Things still can be added. It hasn't been fully released yet. I understand, I do! It's just the way it has been brought up before, reassured that it is on the list of things to do, and then nothing happens that makes it feel this way, I guess. I get rhat images are catchy. I get that the colored text is pretty. I get that this site is in Beta. But it just feels like accessibility is an afterthought.

A little small thing that personally annoys me a tad bit but doesn't neccessarily fit here, but I'm not sure where else to put it: I wish there was more disability pride and representation onsite. Canes, crutches, and wheelchairs still aren't things onsite, much less wearable for our avatars. I recall suggesting a disability pride pin (because some people (like me) like the disability pride flag's colors) and was told that staff was afraid of having too many pride pins. The only disability presented onsite is bad eyesight (through the glasses some NPCs wear), which is a disability, but I wish there was more. I get that not every player or potential player is going to feel represented (which is why I always design "my" player character off of my beloved OC Zale). There are over a thousand players (as of writing this, over 1,200 players have been online in the last 24 hours) and potentially one to two billion people speak English. I wish, however, there was a bit more disability representation.

Transparency

When I read criticisms of this site, one of the main ones is "lack of transparency", and I can see why. When several users asked if the images onsite were AI generated or AI based, we (even staff themselves) were lied to. We were told that the characters weren't AI, only to be revealed that they were based on AI by CJ later on in an announcement. When we asked "hey, these items are exactly the same image as these other items. Were these images drawn by staff?" we were lied to. We were told that they were all drawn in-house, only to be told that they were bought assets. When people started to ask if CJ had tried to start another petsite, we were told that he had not, only for it to come out that he had (and that's a whole thing in of itself that I don't remember all of the details of, so I won't say more). When players asked if lootboxes were going to be a thing, we were told that they weren't. A week later, the pet crate lootbox began to exist. We were lied to, again. Artist and staff pays aren't super well-known and, again, feel like they have been intentionally hidden. How much are artists being paid to make onsite assets? I wish things weren't intentionally obscured like this. I was staff at one point, and things were still hidden from staff, and it's annoying and saddening. I wish CJ and anyone else that knows on-staff were more transparent rather than lie and hope no one notices. Even now, the information that the intial NPCs are traced over AI images isn't well-known and feels like it's intentionally hidden. The feedback thread has been unpinned in the past (it's pinned again now) but has been locked. The lootbox feedback was locked. After the lootbox feedback and some user confusion (it feels like), the constructive feedback rule was added, much to the confusion of many. Several feedback posts disappeared, again much to users' confusion. I wish there was some transparency to all of this. Would being upfront with "hey, we have a no AI rule now, but we have used AI in the past" turned away players, including myself? Yes. But it would have been honest. It would have been the right thing to do.

Transparency is just something that feels like it's lacking a lot of the time. We don't know why certain actions do or do not happen. While there was some transparency about the KS pets returning, and the cash shop items returning, there isn't a ton of it, especially with regards to CJ giving away premium items at random. We can't question staff actions (which is a semi-normal rule on the petsites I've been on, but the extent of which this rule is enforced is not). Actions are taken, things are removed or changed, often without the why. Someone won multiple contest catogories in rhe first contest without any second checking or reason why (or any backup in case someone did win multiple catogories for the contest). Again, forum threads disappeared without any reason why, making several users in one case think negative action was taken. There's no clarity, no transparency in staff actions and staff why's. Why does CJ mass gift with his name attached, anyways (genuine question. Y'all can send out items via the Santae Team account)? Until I joined staff, I didn't realize that Ember was the only programmer/coder for the site (and the "I'm stuck in CJ's basement jokes" aren't that great in my opinion. IDK). Assistants as a role disappeared abruptly, it seems. CJ will go on rants about the negative things in the Discord chat (which I get the frustrations, I do, but it feels like there's a time, place, and way to do that). Users are afraid to crituque this site, even before the rule was solidly out into place, because there are rumors of people being banned for bring up something as simple as "I don't like this feature very much".

I don't think we should be scared of negative actions for sometimes saying crits in a not-super-constructive manner. Is it annoying? Yes, but sometimes players don't know what annoys them about a thing but need to voice it anyways. I know I have done such on other sites, but striking down on negative opinions feels like it's cultivating an enviroment where one has to be positive or else. "It's just a beta, things will change" shouldn't be a go-to response for some things. CJ complaining that people thought the saying were cheesy made me feel a bit afraid to voice that I don't think eveey gift from CJ needs a message like that. Staff complaining about how their actions are always seen as negative make players afraid to voice their opinions. Criticizing players for bring up negative opinions will make players less likely to voice them.

There's also just the feeling of needing to please CJ. I mean no harm towards you, CJ. I know I have directly named you several times, but there are times where it feels like you're overstepping as an owner and needing to meddle with things that don't necessarily need you, personally, to deal with them. I understand not wanting to hear criticisms, but blanket banning non-constructive criticisms and making players be afraid of criticizing you without any transparency as to why maybe you banned some users that happened to criticize you is bad, bas in the way of being overly controlling. I get wanting the userbase to like you, but sometimes the best way of getting a userbase to like you is by listening and not gift bombing (especially not different gifts at different timezones. That cultivates some unhealthy behaviors). Heck, the userbase doesn't have to like you for the game to be halfway decent. Neopets' TNT is well-beloathed for making bad decisions, but players still play, Neopets is still a Thing. Neopets is still loved... in a way. Flightrising, Dragcave, I don't even know the owner, much less have an opinion on them, and I still love them (FR less so due to accessibility issues). I'm not saying "become TNT". Please don't. But not every player will love you or even like you, and that's okay.

I wish staff turnovers, when I was staff, were a little more transparent, and I wish I could've said goodbye. I wish we were told why staff was parting ways. Maybe things have changed. I hope so. I wish the NDA was more blunt on what former staff/current staff cannot say. I didn't entirely know (and still don't) what I'm allowed to say. I don't know if I would be released from the NDA if I was banned. I don't know, still, why certain things happened while I was staff. It felt like both discords were a bit of a mess when things should have been more smoothed out. It felt like the beta-general didn't have a well-known purpose. I was told it was meant to discuss news and such about the site when people have trailed off for long periods of time about non-news stuff. Heck, we made a ton of Thirs Tee family jokes back in Alpha (I vividly remember the Thirs Tee family tree). I wish that things were clearer, I guess. I wish things were more transparent.

Uh, woah, that was a ramble. Apologies. I feel like it's all important though. Again, I mean no hard feelings here.

Summary

This'll be quick because I missed an hour of an event I wanted to go to. Oops.

But:

- There should be more accessibility and transparency.

- There should be oversight and backups when something unexpected happens (like maybe scan enteries before posting to make sure they fit the theme and don't misgender characters)

- Criticism is valid. Sometimes that is voiced simply and "non-constructively". That's okay.

- CJ should take a step back. I heard some people suggest a PR person.

Anyways, I've got to go to my event. See y'all on the flipside!

*looks both ways then teleports out Old School Runescape style*

[sailingshellsgames]

Demo news ✨

I've been working a lot on chapters 1-7, and will be re-releasing them soon! (It's on ko-fi now for $1 and up, for those who want it now 😀)

Below is what you can expect in the new version. I hope you enjoy it, and that it serves as a good hold-over while I finish the game's last two chapters! The re-release will launch on 3/25 for tumblr, and on 3/28 everywhere else.

Notable Changes

Additions:

General

Introduction of auto-success more.

More weird dreams + strengthening of the subplot around what MC sees in them.

Introduction of the dream journal mechanic.

More dialogue choices throughout the entire demo.

More descriptions of environments: MC's living quarters, the Den Compound, desert terrain around Leas, and city architecture.

Rearranged the stats screen and added clarity for MC's reputation among the Fey via an opposed pair bar.

General editing (word choice, etc.)

Chapter 1

MC's favored weapon can now be a bow! 🏹

Choice added to set MC's skin color.

A few more dialogue choices around MC reacting to the vision Keo has in Chapter 1.

Clearer explanation of MC agent backgrounds. Each now comes with explicit statement of what stats will be increased upon selection.

Chapter 2

Option to specify MC's tattoos. There are 4 pre-designed options, or you can design your own! (or choose no tattoos, if that's not your cup of tea). This includes the ability to add/remove/modify tattoos via the stats screen.

Chapter 3

Define how MC and Keo became friends.

Relatedly, more content setting up the fact that MC can't remember the agent found dead in the warehouse in Chapter 2.

Virano and Adaan mini-catfight (is it me, the author? am I the drama?)

Bug fix where a character already in the room would enter that room.

Chapter 4

A new dream.

Conversation around Virano's family's role in the nobility.

A little bit of Fey-weirdness around the Ashaad.

Conversation around the campfire with the team, mentions some of why Wren came to Leas.

Chapter 5

An explanation of Chapter 4's Fey weirdness that kind of just raises more questions, but does answer at least one of them.

Chapter 6:

A new dream.

Determining which of the three paths to take in the wilds is now a skill check.

General editing.

Chapter 7:

Yet another revision of the waterfall dream/flashback scene. This one's taken so long to get right, but I'm finally happy with it. Victory screech.

Moved Wren's reason for coming to Leas into the main story, so the choice option that explored that on their date now allows MC to dig in to learn a little more.

More dialogue choices in the scene where Keo's heritage is discovered during Lasan (if it didn't happen in the wilds).

Another choice in Wren's date going into the legend behind Lasan more, and a little about Wren's family.

Removals:

Keo no longer goes into seeing the magic in a vision. Removing this was part of a consolidation effort on my part. Tldr; I had too many side plots and needed to scrap some of them. Keo still has a reason for wishing to pursue the magic, if MC tries to refuse Rin. I actually like it a lot better now, which is a happy coincidence.

In Chapter 7, going to the wilds to see Keo's mother is no longer an option. Don't worry: everything I wrote for it will be used in book 2 :) But for book 1 it created a weird imbalance where the three options were so different they didn't converge well back into the main route.

Removed the ability to give Virano a sample of the magic or not. With all the other potential endgame outcomes, this got scrapped to consolidate things. I was finding it didn't really have a meaningful impact on the larger story despite reading like a major plot point, so in the bin it goes.

[prima-after-dawn]

I fucking hate you, tumblr. I just wrote 200-300 words answering this ask and you DIDN’T SAVE IT TO DRAFTS ON AUTO LIKE YOU ALWAYS DO RRAHHHHH

I need to reset my brain bc that was 300 words of Sentinel being a total drama queen while carrying a sparkling and they’re all GONE

At least it didn’t nuke the ask from my inbox tho 🫠