#a dumpster fire of feelings

[egophiliac]

You can’t pick Lilia for this. But who is your other favorite short character in Twst?

I like the angry little king boy 🌹

[jtownraindancer]

In light of the recent Watcher debacle, a collection of some of my favourite YouTube comments, in no particular order:

And the one that made my entire day:

[lizzybeeee]

THE ENTIRE DRAGON AGE AMA IS A DUMPSTER FIRE

They avoided all the high-rated questions with genuine criticism (not blind hate!) and went for questions that were safer and allowed them more leeway. After that awful IGN article and that treatment of Davrin...God, just put it down. I have no faith that BioWare will be able to continue Dragon Age or Mass Effect with the respect it deserves.

Edit - They had an opportunity for genuine discussion with fans who were concerned/unhappy with the way Veilguard was -> people unhappy with the story, the marketing, the lack of 'RP' options in an RPG, etc... Instead they just doubled-down even more, avoiding those critical questions, with no real acknowledgement that fans have very reasonable problems with this game.

Some Highlights & My Initial Ramblings Below:

The Executors

"They attempt to manipulate events in the most subtle way they can manage."

So, very clear that they're not simply observers of what is happening in Thedas: they're manipulators...

"Magical Illuminati Confirmed! Lizard People Did 9:30 Dragon!!!!"

All that complexity of character -> his hatred of Orlais, his experience as a general, his relationship with Cailain, and the influence of Howe...all diminished. Any influence from a shadow cabal is too much influence - all the humanity of Loghain's choices/consequences...God, what a waste.

Not to mention what this does to other events/characters in the series -> they imply they've been intervening as far back as the magisters breaking into the golden city. I do not find this compelling! At all!

2. Solas and the Executors

Oh my god, he sounds like such a fucking Mary-Sue I'm so sick of Solas at this point -> "Actually, I know more about the Executors than anyone alive - not even the rest of the Gods know as much as me."

("I'm also, like, an Ancient Elven God, I'm responsible for the Blight and the Veil, and I kind of locked the Gods away cause they were evil - but, like, I'm really sad about it. Also the Herald of Andraste thinks I'm cute <3")

<- Previous comments: massive oversimplification, obviously

But I miss the days when not everything was about Solas. It removes so much interest and wonder in this world when the fucking egg is behind it all. I loved him as a character in DAI and now I just feel this bone deep tiredness when I see his stupid face.

Don't you dare threaten to bring Gareth David-Lloyd back -> keep him away from this mess!

3. The Fate of the Rest of the Evanuris

Yay. I'm so looking forwards to "The Return of the Elves: Electric Boogaloo 2" - it was done so well the first time!

"It was the elves all along!"

The only character with any potential to be interesting is Andruil*, but how they handled all this lore was done so shallowly and so poorly that I find it hard to give a damn anymore. Not to mention that the game literally mentions Ghilan'nain mourning Andruil - so is this a retcon/redirection/or have you confirmed that one of the most interesting members of the Evanuris' is dead?

*interesting in that she's established in lore to potentially have a tonne of really cool things attached to her (the void armour, the great weapon she has etc...). The rest of the evanuris are nowhere near as well established as she is.

4. Southern Thedas, Sociopolitical Issues, and Future Games

NOW YOU WANT TO INCORPORATE GEO-POLITCAL EXPLORATION?? You avoided any meaningful discussion like the plague in DATV but now you're acknowledging it?? OkaY. okAy.

They couldn't even give us the long-term ramifications of the mage/templar war how the hell am I supposed to believe that they will be able to pull off 'elven gods are real' etc...? For a game series that totes : your choices matter -> they have not proven that they have been able to show that in a meaningful way. They literally cleaned the slate with this game to avoid doing that.

So, what, does that mean that the Veil is never going to come down now? Or are you going to have the entirety of Thedas build themselves up again just to have the Veil fall and send things into chaos once more?

What a fatalistic, miserable outcome for Thedas -> why the fuck would anyone bother to live in Thedas if you're going to keep throwing meteorites at them? By all means, change/conflict has to happen for the series to move forwards...but this is just so miserable at this point.

(The Elder Scrolls, at least, gives people room to breathe between crisis' or sets them up in different areas of the world! Bethesda treats past installments/your decisions with greater respect than DATV does.)

Even, then, if the Veil remains up, that means that the spirits are just trapped in the Fade being miserable for the rest of existence. The entire series has been humanizing spirits, from Justice to Cole, and now they're just throwing in the towel? I guess they can stay in the fade now! Problem solved!

What do you mean the Evanuris are not a threat anymore? IN A PREVIOUS QUESTION YOU LITERALLY SAID SOME ARE STILL POTENTIALLY KICKING AROUND THE BLACK CITY?

Weakened, sure, but Solas was 'weak' in DAI. You're giving yourself an out if you decide to go back to the elves again. Please do, I'd love more content on how the elves alone fuck everything up!

5. More Southern Thedas, the Chantry, and Tevinter

Thanks for the confirmation that things in the South are so fucked up that they have to work alongside the 'Slave Capital' of the known world to rebuild!

Slavery was one of the biggest things that caused a rift between the north/south chantry system -> one of the reasons why there were exalted marches -> a uniting belief in the south is that slavery is fucked. They didn't address slavery in DATV - what hopes are there that they will do so effectively in a future game?

Don't tell me that Dorian fixes everything off screen either -> either he solves slavery off-screen or the south is being forced to work the slaver-capitol because their land is nuked and they have no ground to stand on.

I'm so thrilled.

6. Solas and the Idol / The Blight

I will never get over Solas fucking curing the Blight off-screen and no one asking questions/giving a shit. Hello?? The Hero of Ferelden would like a word with you???

So the Blight is calcified in Minrathous, at least, but everywhere further away is still fucked! Once more, the South is doomed to suffer from the long-term effects that regular blights have -> not to mention the red lyrium (which still exists according to the AMA) across the south.

I don't care; it's lame. It's a lame way to conclude the blight and I hate it. This game did not earn 'cure the blight from thedas' at all. You could have had us learn how to soothe a titan and see how that can diminish the blight but you did it this way.

Another 'magical ritual' because Solas has such a good track record with them lmao.

7. The Agents of Fen'Harel / The War with the Qun / The Crows

Turned him against the idea of being a leader???!!

Fen'harel's Call to the Elven People After the events at the Winter Palace, elves left the Inquisition under mysterious circumstances, as did elven servants across Thedas. None could say where they went, but those who believed the Inquisitor's story about Fen'Harel wondered just how large the Dread Wolf's forces were... and what the ancient elven rebel had planned. This is from the Trespasser Epilogue, Epler!

Your concept art for Joplin literally had him as a leader of a faction of elves. Just be honest that it's a retcon and you changed course - don't try to save face with this reasoning.

About the Antaam: "We needed some big mindless bad guys to fight and so we did this because we didn't want to address the Qunari War/Invasion we set up in Trespasser".

You had to canonize Sten as being alive and Arishok in order for this reasoning to work -> you didn't even come up with an alternative Arishok to take Sten's place.

Yeah, the exchange that set up the Crows we see in the game as "idealists" did not make the game. I can confirm that!

I'm sorry, "Caterina kept Illario in check?" as in, 'kept him an idealist and not the usual Crow'? The woman that beat him with a cane and starved him and his cousin to train them as Crows. Fuck off.

lmao -> tell me you're coming up with this on the spot without telling me that you're coming up with this on the spot.

8. World State Discrepancies - Isabela

Outright ignores the very real criticism about the marketing from this game and World States.

"there are absolutely places where we unintentionally suggested there was a hard canon (...that Isabela is always assumed to have joined Hawke's party.)"

Unintentional?

Excuse me, you have her talk about Merrill and the Kirkwall Crew as family - that was not unintentional in the slightest. Not to mention Sten, Blackwall, Sera, and Cole are canonized as being part of your world state no matter what.

You had a story you wanted to tell - one that only fit a few world states - and you went ahead with it and disregarded those choices. Don't try and lie about this all being a big misunderstanding.

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Edit - They could have taken the opportunity to address the very reasonable criticisms that people had with this game but they cherry-picked questions and avoided/minimized anything remotely critical.

They could have provided us some insight into the game development time but each time they approached the topic they settled for "we're happy with what we delivered and it was well optimized."

They had an opportunity to acknowledge that people were bothered by the handling of the lore/stories (to potentially mention they could course-correct/ rethink their plans) but instead they doubled down on everything that they did and even 'justified' some decisions. They doubled down on the Executors, Solas's changing motivations, the destruction of Southern Thedas, and the elves/Solas being at the heart of everything etc...

This AMA basically confirmed that the only reason they did what they did to the south was for a reset -> It's not a compelling or fulfilling narrative to have everything we've done reset back to ground zero off-screen. BioWare games differentiate themselves from other RPG's by their import system from previous games - it was compelling and exciting! With DATV they set the expectation that BioWare can outright throw out entire games worth of choices/build up, not solely retcon them.

Justifying your choice to water down the lore/world of your story by saying you'll address it in the 'next game' does not instill me with confidence, BioWare! It doesn't explain that lack of it in this game either!

They avoided every question that, rightfully so, pointed out the misleading comments made by devs in the pre-order period of the game:

the fact that there were only 3 imported choices from previous games was leaked by a reviewer -> BioWare was vague from the start about choices

that this game was the most 'romantic' in the series

that world states/ headcanons wouldn't be disrespected

that there are 'lore' reasons for bad darkspawn design

that there are lasting, impactful choices/consequences to be made in this game

that the lore/world was not watered or toned down

that companions are deep and you can disagree with them etc...

BioWare's behavior towards their customers in the lead up period to this games release was downright scummy. I absolutely felt misled after playing the game for myself and recalling what I read in interviews put out. While EA is undoubtedly poison, you can't hold them solely accountable for this.

I feel for the individual developers who worked on this in what was undoubtedly a toxic environment from EA - but I feel that it's pretty clear that BioWare itself has a lot of problems within and in their leadership/executives. Working for EA does not give them an excuse to mislead their customers.

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I already had a very grim outlook on the franchise from the end of DATV but this literally look my interest out the back and sent it to God. What a disaster.

[theoneofshame]

Harry grabs for the firewhiskey.

“Do you only ever go for the hardstuff?”

“It gets you there faster,” Harry exclaims, rummaging through the cabinets for glasses. Why in the bloody hell they were in the topmost shelf is beyond Harry. Probably Kreacher in a petty spell.

Voldemort, the giant git that he is, makes no move to help.

"Do you mind?"

"Yes, yes I do."

Prat.

“Besides, what’s the point of drinking if not to get pissed?” Harry huffs out, stretching for all his 5'4 stature allowed him. His middle and index fingers graze the edge-most cup, accidentally pushing it further in.

“To enjoy it perhaps,” Voldemort snarks. He watches Harry throw away his last shred of dignity and climb the counter to reach, like it's something fascinating to behold.

“I’ll be enjoying myself plenty, thanks,” Harry says, victorious in his plundering with a cup in hand.

"Why not just summon it?"

Harry rolls his eyes. "Kreacher has objects not react to my magic when he's cross with me." Which is always. Harry stopped keeping track of the reasons.

Voldemort wandlessly summons the second cup to him. Harry flips him off.

For all Voldemort's belly-aching he still shares a glass with Harry. Then four more. They've moved to the study and drank through most of the bottle when Harry makes the comment, “never would’ve taken you for a lighter spirits fellow.”

“I prefer sweet things,” Voldemort says, slowly raking his eyes up Harry's form before locking on to Harry’s own. The way he said it had Harry’s cheeks flushing. Probably just the alcohol catching up to him. Still, his belly is warm and he's feeling good.

[livelaughliushen]

I hate when people write svsss off as “the funny one” when it has some of the best satirical commentary’s I’ve ever seen in a novel. There’s so many layers to scum villain and so many ways to interpret it, it’s everything from a lighthearted romantic comedy to a cosmic horror story and everything in between. There’s so much nuance and depth but people so easily write it off as either “problematic” or “not that serious” and it makes me so angry. Idk justice for scum villain

[my-coven-is-claudia]

pondering how katelyn essentially replaces garroth in the gar/laur/aph dynamic during s2. like garroth, katelyn builds a rapport with laurance and becomes his comrade in arms. she plays the grounded, well-mannered, strategist to laurance’s impulsive, confrontational, casanova self. she also develops an close relationship with aph and acts as her personal guard, becoming extremely protective of her. honestly, katelyn slots in perfectly into this trio, adapting almost seamlessly and it allows her to grow and change as a person. and then garroth comes back. someone needs to be displaced. laurance leaves. you cannot have both.

[wearesociety]

one of klaus’ redeeming quality was how much he hated damon. he was always on that man’s neck. he treated him like the dirt on his shoes and i had to stan just because of that!!!!! like the amount of times damon would offer himself in place of stefan to be his ripper buddy and klaus would be so disgusted. it reminds me of how bonnie hated him in the earlier season. no one has ever hated damon like klaus and bonnie have. we had to stan the smartest tvd characters.

[headspacedad]

y'all NEED to see the ornament my sister just got me for Christmas

apparently it's a Hallmark/Walmart ornament and that somehow makes it even more surreal.

[prettyboymeat]

grusha scribbles

[chuluoyi]

they’re saying XAVIER is a RED flag! baby xavi :((((((((

HAHAHA the way i know exactly which twitter thread this is 🥹🥹 but seriously they’re so right if you think xavier is a red flag then you haven’t been through disastrous 2010-2019 otome game era 🙂‍↕️ during my time as an otome mc, i went through being caged inside a literal animal cage, sold into an auction and bought by the highest bidder (at least twice or thrice??), and married a lord who puts it blatantly that he only marries the mc for power and will gladly have her die after giving birth to his child 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️

whereas xavier is just this pouty baby:

[eatyourmaker]

Someone draw Ignacio dying of heatstroke STAT

[evansbuck-ley]

yk what i have been thinking about? the bucktommy beginning was sm about tommy teaching and showing buck new things. and it felt so romantic and hot. but now 8x06 has recontexualized everything in a bad way. 😩

it seems like they never had any casual talks about buck's newly discovered queerness. just, yk, hey, how are you feeling two months into this relationship? do you still have moments where you worry what others might think? buck put a rainbow emoji in his public instagram account during pride, has queer friends, and... he apparently did nothing with his personal queer revelations?

they apparently also never talked about exes and what they did in their lives before meeting and how they want their lives to look like in their future and their personal boundaries and and and... like, you ask those big questions (family plans, financial situation, hobbies, job situation, etc.) in the dating phase, which is before you actually commit to a person in an exclusive monogamous way! why invest in a relationship when you don't even ask if the other is looking for something long-term lol?

the fact that 8x06 also confirmed that they spend a lot of time together just makes things worse because 1.) what the fuck have you been doing all this time then, both individually and together, and 2.) then it makes even less sense for buck to ask tommy to move in or for tommy to break up immediately or for both wanting to reach out because how did they even reach the 6 month mark without talking? without learning anything of importance about each other and themselves?

it makes canon bucktommy look like every other shallow short-term fling that buck had so far. could have simply been fuck buddies and they would have had the same level of knowledge about each other after 6 months. just hate how this one episode retrospectively fucked over canon bucktommy in so many different ways ☹️

8x06 is straight up trash. fact.

if they had always planned for them to break up they could have done it SO much better and not leave a bad taste in everyone’s mouth. And you are right, contextually it makes the whole six months they were together seem so…meh.

and as much as people joke about buck speed running his bisexual awakening, since the first initial story line, has anyone really acknowledged it? are you telling me that hen has not even spoken to buck about what this all means to him? wdym known research freak evan buckley didn’t spent all night after tommy kissed him deep diving into this whole new side to him. they simply said “look he is bi and now has a boyfriend” and moved on. they don’t even SAY the word bisexual in the show. which is just fucking insane to me. they just skate around it in such a horrendous way.

and don’t even get me started on the Abby side of things because I absolutely DESPISE it. it’s such lazy writing.

but on the flip side, contextually 8x06 gave us so much good. buck was ready for something more with tommy, he was ready to live together and grow old together. he was ready for tommy to be just last. same for tommy, he wanted all that with buck. buck was also tommy’s last and they had so much opportunity to really dig into his character, to explore why he was scared to go there with buck. but again, they just wrote it off.

we also have previous episodes that actively show that this isn’t just a fling, especially for tommy. he showed up to the cafe simply because buck asked. he came to the hospital after fighting a fire because he made a promise and buck got a lil pouty about it. he showed up for buck again and again in 8x05 because he clearly cared.

for me personally, 8x06 doesn’t make their whole relationship seem like a fling. for me, it shows that these two characters care about each other so much, but clearly lack some communication of how they feel and where they both are, in the context of their relationship and in the context of their own personal journey’s.

[imactuallysoup]

Do you think he would go to a casino? I think he would-

I've never drawn him and its so late, and this was just supposed to be a sketch but then started adding color then got lazy. I've been seeing so much gravity falls lately so I thought why not

[soulofamy]

they released high res images of what kung jin was supposed to look like

[eureka-its-zico]

Okay so….

I might be finished with chapter 9 of Chaos in Their Bones by tonight. Which gives me time to edit it (hopefully) to post it tomorrow. That being said,

Is there anyone who would like to be added to the tag list that hasn’t been added or would like to be added?

Much love 🖤 Jenn

[softsimulation]

cycl0n3 sw0rd & svynx

after a messy breakup with his first girlfriend, blair, cycl0n3 made the decision to get out of his comfort zone and leave sunset valley behind for a fresh start. initially he headed for san myshuno but being the socially anxious loner that he is, he couldn't handle the bustling crowds of people and constant noise. instead he found a small town just outside of san-my, got himself an "it'll do" apartment and used his computer smarts to get a job with a startup tech company where he has very little in person communication.

he did however get over his socially anxious tendencies just enough to go and adopt svynx from the local shelter.

(when i was a kid and only had base game, i thought cycl0n3 was a really evil sim because of his name so i wouldn’t let my sims interact with him EVER and the one time my sim did talk to him i deleted the save file 😭)

credit to @pugownedplaysthesims-blog on the gallery for creating svynx!