#also its a bad system to want to see the story of the spirits and u got other players just fucking gunning it

[sympaii]

never thought playing sky would make me so angry and upset but here i go

[gancegancerevo]

Rides to Lake Silberneherze Thoughts

It was great. The second major visit to Kjerag sees us return three years after the previous event to see how the nation has built itself up after the Saintess reforms the political system of Kjerag and accepts the Silverash clan’s plans to open the country to outsiders.

Degenbrecher is the main selling point of the event in my opinion and damn did they work hard to make her appealing. She’s not only very strong, very skilled, very pretty, and a lot less long-winded than the other politicians, she’s also got her own story. It’s quite beautiful to see someone immigrate to a new country and have it just be a story of finding a home you can settle with. She’s the kind of character who’s physically strong enough to survive hardship. And in a sense, she is emotionally strong as she does not hold any grudges against her old nations. Probably in part because she’s beaten up the ones she needs to and let go of what she doesn’t need. She’s very much her own person and she herself has decided she wants to stay in Kjerag as one of its people. Makes you think about all the immigrants who makes their homes in new countries and how that experience is unique to them.

Leto was adorable in this event. The way she takes everybody she passes by and makes them her friends is hilarious and wonderful. It’s also great that they made her a competent field operator. She was able to sense and threaten a Trillby Asher all by herself even if that went awry. She also knew when to call up her superiors when she needed help.

One of the best parts about her arc here is how they turn the classic father-daughter reunion on its head. Because for one, Tatyova, her mother, is alive and well. And seems to be perfectly capable of continuing to care for Leto. Leto ultimately doesn’t care about her father, as she should. Arctosz’s decision to make his family leave for political safety makes it obvious that he knows nothing about the wider world. His privileged upbringing means he has no idea about how others would treat a single mother and what it means for a child to grow up without a father. The thing that really brings it into perspective for me is the attack on Chernobog. If you don’t know how bad it was, read the Ursus Student Group side stories. It makes every excuse Arctosz make seem extra moronic. This story takes the “looking for a long lost father” trope and makes it an ode to all the mothers who had to deal with single-parenthood themselves.

Harold is quite interesting. He’s your classic bumbling high-spirited old man except he’s also a Victorian military officer. Like Degenbrecher, he’s someone who also adjusts well to Kjerag life finding work as a veterinarian and doing old man things. In spite of this, he remains loyal to Victoria and when told that he would need to attack the people he’s lived with for months, he ultimately sides with his country. This is an interesting contrast to bring in this story. About how some people would throw away their old countries while others would remain loyal. Though overall, he was just fun to watch. Especially when paired with Leto or others who humor him.

By far my favorite part of visiting Kjerag is seeing the Saintess and Enya and Kjarr do not disappoint.

Before I gush about yuri though, I should say I love how Enya, and especially her relationship with  Enciodes has evolved. She’s much more active in the goings-on of the nation and is willing to use the Saintess as a state official rather than just a ceremonial position. She and Enciodes managed to separate their personal lives from their work in nation-building and it’s so interesting to see it play out. Enya inserting herself when Enciodes tries to avoid more direct interactions. The whole banquet scene with Harold. It was great especially when they both admit that the Head of the Silverash clan and the Saintess have a similar vision and plan for Kjerag’s development and both go silent when others ask about the relationship between Enya and Enciodes Silverash as siblings.

Enya and Kjarr have to be the most wife and wife coded characters I’ve seen in Arknights so far. Like a pair well into their golden years, they have a mutual respect and trust of one another while still disagreeing on some issues. There’s also that sense of both of them playing an active role in the relationship rather than the usual one stays at home and one works sort of dynamic. I especially like when Kjarr is like “babe, are you sure I shouldn’t use my god powers?” and Enya keeps insisting that they can’t rely on god to fix things for them. And of course the eternal pestering of Kjarr for a statue adjustment. If she can’t ask Enya for it, she’ll let Degenbrecher and the Trillby Asher do it. I always love Enya and Kjarr and this has cemented my favorite Kjerag dynamic even more.

Lastly, I really appreciate the way they included the Doctor this time. It’s not the take control of a situation you’ve only been aware of for a few hours. Instead, they made reasonable assumptions about what others are plotting and taking a few small steps to push pieces into the best place possible. Kinda like how they can’t rely on Kjeragandr, they also can’t rely on the Doctor of Rhodes but that doesn’t mean either of them can’t do one small move themselves.

P.S. What do you mean Kjerag has a battleship under Lake Silberneherze. Though it might be more shocking that Enciodes expressed approval of Sciurus before Ratatos did AND that Ratatos liked Sciurus naming the battleship Walnut to mess with her kids.

[sprintingowl]

TTRPGs As Terrariums For Blorbos

One thing that I think isn't covered enough in TTRPG recommendations is styles of play.

There's a lot of "this game has this tone," or "this game is this amount of crunchy," but less "what are you playing towards?"

In games like Microscope and I'm Sorry Did You Say Street Magic? and The Quiet Year, you're playing to see what happens to the setting.

In games like Mork Borg and Into The Odd and Mothership, you're playing to see how far your character can get.

And in a lot of games, you're playing to create a blorbo, an OC, just a little guy, and the soul of the gameplay is the story of who your guy is and who your guy becomes.

This is blorbo style play.

And the thing about styles of play is that you can apply them to any game, even games that aren't really built to enable them. So I wanted to take a moment to shine a spotlight onto some games that do specifically enable you to fully blorb out. (I'll try to cover a mix of genres and tones, but the rpg scene is vast so if you have a favorite that I missed please feel free to shout it out in the replies.)

-Golden Sky Stories. This is the English translation of the Japanese TTRPG Yuuyake Koyake. You play as shapeshifter kids and spirits in a small town and, instead of tracking EXP, the thing that you carry from session to session is your relationships with other characters. The tone of the game is heartwarming, and if combat happens, both sides lose. There can be emotional turmoil, but this isn't a game where you have to worry about bad things happening to your blorbo.

-New World Of Darkness. On the other hand, let's say you *want* bad things to happen to your blorbo. You want to play a guy that's really going through it. If you also like modern supernatural stories, New World Of Darkness was built for you. Characters in NWoD can be entirely non-combat, or a literal werewolf, or a noncombat werewolf. The game places a lot of emphasis on navigating through the setting socially, as its supernatural creatures tend to run in factions and starting a fight usually means making a bunch of enemies.

-Pasion De Las Pasiones. Of course, not everyone wants a fantastical setting. Sometimes good old melodrama is hearty and comforting. Pasion De Las Pasiones is a playable telenovela, and it encourages you to play your characters bold and recklessly. Every class even has a built-in Meltdown, where if you're pushed to the edge they become extra reckless, ensuring a broad fallout of messy drama when they do manage to calm down.

-Cortex System / Unisystem. Perhaps you want to drop your blorbo into an existing fictional universe? But you also want stats and meaty character creation instead of just freeform roleplay? There are easily a dozen games on the Cortex engine, including Supernatural, Firefly, Smallville, Battlestar Galactica, Marvel, and Leverage. And on Unisystem, there's Buffy, Army Of Darkness, as well as a somewhat rare I Can't Believe It's Not Planet Of The Apes.

-Lancer / Gubat Banwa. If you like blorb-y play but still want a heavy side of combat, both of these games have you covered. Lancer has a sprawling scifi universe focused on mech pilots, and Gubat Banwa has a violent and lavish mythological Philippines setting. Both of these games also have stunningly beautiful artwork, so if you like seeing a setting visually come to life, these are for you.

-Fabula Ultima. My final recommendation is also an extremely gorgeous looking game. Fabula Ultima is built on the bones of Ryuutama (itself an excellent travel-fantasy game) to enable meaty, blorby Final Fantasy style campaign play. Combat is a rich and deep option in Fabula Ultima, but so is everything from spellcasting to crafting, and players have built-in resources they can spend to affect the story. If a scene isn't quite going the way you want it to, you can spend a point to nudge it in the right direction. Fabula Ultima also feels extremely complete without being too complicated.

So there you go. Eight options, and that's barely scratching the surface of the sea of blorb-y games (Seventh Sea, Exalted, Blue Rose, Legend Of The Five Rings, Coyote And Crow, Timewatch, Nahual, and more!)

It's also not wrong to play non-blorb-y games in a blorb-y way. Do whatever you're comfortable with! But you might enjoy dipping into these titles.

Finally, if you've read this far and you're somehow still looking for MORE recommendations, I wrote this game about runaway changelings trying to find their place in the world, and it's probably the blorbiest in my catalog.

[phoenixcatch7]

Every so often I drift back to the overlord anime but I can never stay for long because it's a good 70% smut with the succubus and 20% side character drama that never goes anywhere. It's a similar premise to svsss, in that a modern guy accidentally gets sucked into a fictional fantasy world he was obsessed with as the villain with a group of people and a place he rules over and wants to protect, and his paranoia/procrastination combo strategises his way to victory.

So of course I thought, 'let's get our dear old scum villain (affectionate) in here'.

Cuz i'mma be real sy would make an infinitely more interesting panicking lich king. Take off that emotion nullification, for starters.

A) pidw was a vr mmorpg with a vast, overarching storyline of the rising emperor lbh, whom players could battle or wed for rewards. A respawning final boss of such strength it took a world wide unified invasion of top players to fell. When sy gets pulled into pidw and all the npcs come to life, so too does lbh, who is very confused as to what happened but remembers sy as one of the players who fronted the invasion (having dug up every nugget of lore on lbh and using that vast knowledge in strategy) and carries an immense grudge that eventually turns into love as he gets to know sy. Sqh is there too, of course, the uncredited game dev who made lbh and his right hand man mbj, who's own base in the north got retaken when mbj also resurrected and is having his own worrisome love story.

B) sy and sqh are in the same guild, named cq, and the demons are sqhs overly detailed npc. Lbh works as the guardian overseer, aka the head npc, and as they wait for the game to shut down sy sneakily makes a joke in lbhs character sheet about him loving sy. They get sucked in, the characters come to life, and sy spends the time he isn't using panicking about the situation, five dimensional politicking, or protecting the base being in denial about the whole lbh thing (and his no homo) and feeling DEEPLY guilty (and hiding it from sqh). Lbh, of course, now having free will, thinks about it a bit and decides to fall madly in love with his kind, gentle, soft hearted lich king boss in spite of his loyalty to his creator. Sqh goes 'dude, wtf' and so goes a very long back and forth as sy tries and fails to come up with the right code of ethics to deal with this insane situation he inadvertently created, meanwhile lbh is strategising how one could feasibly get railed by a skeleton and being the Best Housewife Right Hand Man Ever. And get headpats in the process.

C) sy was part of the xianxia themed cq guild, and everyone (the peak lords) got sucked into either ygddrassil (overlord world) or pidw (svsss). Basically, all the peak lords are millennials old friends running around trying to deal with the consequences of their role play and finally getting to try out the fancy food and drink. I love this one because everyone would be really comfortable with each other, lots of slang and in jokes, a well oiled team stuck in a crazy situation together with ridiculously powerful characters each and every one, and you could have sj as a member! Sy could be the beast tamer peak lord. It'd be so interesting to see what they'd class and subclass as. Sy might still be a lich, but Yqy would be a really interesting choice! Him and sj would definitely still have history though... Hulijing, wood elf, bamboo spirit, human, who knows!

D) sy spent a few years as the lich king guild leader in ygddrassil (I'm definitely not spelling it right), bored by the lack of anything interesting, before the system intervened (maybe as a remnant of the original game interface?) and whisked him off to svsss. Post canon he gets either revealed as an imposter or there's some past life wife plot (some animal that was a boobacious beauty in its past life getting cursed to switch between them?) that turns sy into his old big bad lich overlord form, which is hilariously incongruent with his personality but utterly terrifying and anathema to the jianghu, but lbh is now having to crane his neck back and desperately trying to figure out how to get dommed. Everyone is fully convinced this is sy's og body, and not some modern human one they don't even get to see.

E) sy gets yoinked by system and when lbh (and maybe some others?) catch up a few years later he's in the skeleton body in ygddrassil dabbling in world domination and very eager to see them. The npcs get introduced and draw many incorrect conclusions.

[whispering-radiance]

[Rc9gn OC] Goddess of Amber, creator of the Eye of Eternity |

Ladies, gentlemen and nonbinary folks, I’ve finally finished this introduction card for this gorgeous lady — Some of you might’ve already seen her on some of my drawings, but she didn’t have a proper introduction. As usual, you can read more in the section below : D

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Actually, the idea for this character popped to my head when I was rewatching some episodes, and I focused all my attention on the Eye of eternities. Like—woah! That’s a cool and important item, but … where did it come from? Like— it’s always “and the ninja had this magical stone and used it to do this and this” so he just had a powerful artifact in his back pocket? I didn’t question it 10 years ago, but now I have a power of imagination and ability to draw — So I played around with this concept

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As it’s written on the card, she’s the goddess of amber. Even though she’s one of the divine, she’s not really considered to be very powerful— and so she doesn’t really have lost of recognition anywhere.

As for her character— She has her own system and ways of doing things, she’s harsh and rarely accepts change. Things rarely catch her attention, only when something extraordinary happens, she will get interested.— And I get her, she’s old, very old— at some point you simply loose interest in the mundane, especially if you have seen it happen for thousands of years. Amber spends her days in solitude, away from noisy people and other gods — she prefers to focus all her energy on her craft rather than social interactions.

What she crafts? Well, mainly enchanted amber. With it she’s able to capture almost everything— but I’m not talking only about organic things— many essences can be kept in such form— Feeling, music, memories, spirit— It helps her relive the moments even from hundreds of years ago.

She’s also found of making jewelry— In the picture she’s holding a string of amber that will eventually become a necklace like this:

(My grandma has this bad boy— I have many found memories of playing with it)

————————————————————————

Amber met First Ninja on accident— After he was defeated by Tengu, he was badly injured and casted down from its mountain — Luckily his agonizing tumble ended in Amber’s garden— At first she was annoyed with the intruder, but seeing how he somehow survived all the suffering, sparked some attention towards him.

She patched him up and listened to his stories — Probably the tails of the sorcerer and the threat he posed, stirred something inside her— If chaos destroyed the land, she would lose her peaceful life.

So she helped him recover, and even taught him a few new moves. After defeating the Tengu she decided that she wants to preserve peace across whole land — finally she has found a new calling in her life.

—————————-

- I’ve tried looking into it, but I didn’t really find anything about the symbolism of the carp in the series— Seeing how it’s always connected with the Eye of Eternities— I might as well make a silly connection, that Carp is her symbol — Also, let me add this stupid fun fact — The sea in my country (Poland 🗣️‼️‼️)is known for its amber — So fish equals sea and that reminds me of amber.

- She probably looked less elegant while traveling and fighting with the Ninja, but I haven’t designed that yet

- When I’m referring to “Gods” or “Heavenly” I don’t have any of my characters in mind — I usually think about Japanese pantheon

—————————-

There are three words that might need some clarification, so here it goes:

- 古樹の女神 (Koju no Megami) - It roughly translates to “Goddess of Ancient trees” Amber starts as a sap from a tree, and takes some sweet time to form into its solid gem form. So this title is quite fitting

- 樹液 (Jueki) - It literally means sap — It’s kind of a pet name for her? Or a name you’d call your sweetheart— To be honest it’s only used by some of her closest friends— Others call her Amber or just refer to her as Lady.

- Naginata - is a polearm and one of several varieties of traditionally made Japanese blades (Wikipedia)

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“You’re putting a lot of work into characters for a teen show from 10 years ago”

Yeah— but it’s nothing compared to what I did for Generator Rex — Making characters and stories helps me enjoy the show 3x more!!

[nocturnesmoon]

Your Mooneyes

Word count: 4.2k Tags: 2nd person POV, gender neutral reader, Smoking, hints at addictions and substance abuse, indirect talk of death, hints at self-isolation and other destructive behaviour, hurt/comfort, bittersweet A/N: This is very self-indulgent. Also, if anyone notices the small cyperpunk2077 reference I put in there, Hi, I love you, let's be friends. - You thought you could finally have some peace up here on the rooftop, a place where it was just you, the smoke, and the moon. Then he came along, and for some reason you don't mind it -

Smoke filled you from a heavy breath, it entered your lungs and swirled the nicotine into your system. Only when you felt that familiar buzzing, your shoulders relaxing just a little, did you let go of the smoke and air. It mixed with the winter air around you, tainting its sweetness and churning with the bitterness of the frost.

The taste in your mouth turned sour, putting a dirty gland over already yellowed teeth. You didn't usually smoke, truthfully you didn't. Though it had still become a ritual for you, the only reason you bought the stupidly expensive brand that wasn't even good. It wasn't the worst of your vices, there were way more effective ways of destroying oneself. It was however one you would never part with even if your life depended on it.

You didn't particularly like the taste or the sensation it gave you, it was bitter and made you cough, it did much more bad than good. Yet you still found yourself lighting a cigarette, every year on this very night, as well as the nights leading up to it. When the snow would be covering the grounds of the forest outside the base, and when everyone had either gone home or were celebrating inside with their fellow brothers in arms.

Up here on the rooftop where nobody went on nights like this was your moment of peace. You found comfort in the moon and its light of solitude. Its cold gaze was like an old friend greeting you once again, your only true guidance in the creeping darkness of not only your mind. It was your solace in the bitterness of the merry Christmas spirit.

You didn't fault the people around you for taking part of the festivities, you didn't pay them much mind. Usually you kept to yourself, even more so during this season. Despite Soap's adamant attitude at including, you everywhere, along with Gaz's attempts at pulling you along after your small protests. You adored them and their efforts, yet they simply didn't understand how you could possibly be so gloomy this time of year. It was a time for friends and family, for baked goods and cheery spirits.

Perhaps that's why you disliked the season so much. It was a mix of many things, but Christmas reminded you of darker pasts. Not to mention it was a stressful time to be in, the frost outside was cold and harsh, and if you hear one more repetitive Christmas song, you might actually pull your gun on someone.

You didn't want to hate it if you were being honest with yourself. You wanted that connection the people beneath your feet had. You wanted that sense of family, that sense of comfort and safety. To be protected within a tightknit network of people who know each other inside and out. You didn't have that anymore, and you no longer sought it out. It was presented to you on different occasions, but the innate fear that it would all be for nothing, again, was too much.

The soft click of the rooftop door opening pulled you out of your own head, your head turning instinctively to check out the new threat that had moved into the vicinity of your solitude. You find yourself surprised to see the soldier with the skull mask, the rough and harsh Lieutenant that the recruits made up ghost stories about, your Lieutenant, your LT Ghost.

He seemed just as surprised to see you out here, his body tensing up as your eyes locked. Your pupils darted over him, scanning his body language and the twitch of his hand on the door handle. He was looking ready to just about bail as soon as he saw you, perhaps he had hoped for the emptiness of the rooftop that had called to you in the first place.

And just as quick as you saw the tense hesitance, it disappeared into the thin night air. Instead, something in him shifted and with heavy steps he made his way towards you. The determination in his form almost took the breath from your lungs, having you force back a cough from the resisting smoke.

In the time you've known him you've done your best to get a mental profile on his psyche. You had been able to prod and dig into Soap and Gaz easily enough, their openness making them easy reads. Your captain was a bit more difficult, be it his years of experience and stoicism, or the fact you didn't see him as much as the rest you didn't know just yet. Though at the end of the day you still knew where you stood, you knew what kind of people they were, you knew their tells and how they would respond to situations. It was your job to know in a sense.

Now your Lieutenant was a completely different story to the rest of your squad. You prided yourself in your ability to read others, it was a useful skill in interrogation and other means. A skill that unwillingly carried over into your every aspect of your life, finding yourself analyzing and dissecting every person you met just for fun if anything else. However, Ghost had been your greatest challenge yet.

Maybe it was wrong to think of it like that. He wasn't a challenge for you to complete, you wouldn't get a reward for your work on him, nobody would even know if you did it right. But he was so enticing in a way you couldn't comprehend. His mask was one thing, it hid most of his facial features, and his dark style of clothing made him blend into the even darker surroundings.

If Soap was an open book to you, then Ghost was locked up with a steel lock and the key was thrown into the sea.

It was only when he reached your space on the rooftop, that you looked away from him again. The cigarette hanging loosely between your pointer and middle finger. You brought it to your lips, watching him from your peripheral. Despite having deliberately decided to come over, he still put distance between the two of you. Out of respect or out of his adverse nature to touch was unclear.

There wasn't much acknowledgement between the two of you, but you allowed him to stay, for now. There had always been a silent understanding between you both, you may not have him figured out but there was mutual respect. A sign of trust between you from the countless times he had saved your ass for a bad decision, and the few times where you had saved his.

Ghost had been in the taskforce a lot longer than you had, and his reluctance at your entrance had been tough. It took you a long time before you could safely say you had earned his trust. He had respected you as one respected another professional, but his dramatic indifference at your presence had been discouraging compared to that of his other coworkers. Yet over time you had been able to remedy that.

"Since when do you smoke?" His gravelly voice disrupted the comforting silence, and you fought the urge to roll your eyes. He didn't know about your habits, at least not the ones that only presented themselves at certain times of the year. It was the most surprised at the fact he was still here on base, and not off somewhere celebrating Christmas with anyone.

You expelled the smoke you were holding in your lungs, scooting it downwards as you leaned more forward against the railing. "They taste like shit and make my head spin," you said with your gaze returning briefly to the moon above, "But once I start something I don't quit."

His response was more of a quiet rumble from his chest, a noise followed by the slight nodding of his head. "From one addict to another, I sympathize" He responded and held out a hand towards you, "Bum a smoke?" You looked down at his hand, once of the rare times he didn't wear his gloves and allowed the world to see a little of his skin.

Your metal cigarette case was softly cradled in one hand, the custom-made piece that held the few cigarettes you smoked every year. Your thumb ran over the small crystals that were probably fake, they covered over the entire thing, and reflected light on its surroundings when it was just right. Wordlessly you clicked it open, sliding one of them out and placing it neatly in his hand, making sure to not accidentally touch him in the process.

You weren't totally sure why you avoided touch so much when it came to him, he never recoiled from it when someone did come in contact. Though he very rarely initiated it himself, and normally he always positioned himself so it would be the least likely thing to happen in most scenarios.

"Thought you went home," Your voice was quiet in the night, glancing up at him and looking into those brown eyes. You found yourself allured by them; they were the eyes of a person who had seen so much. "Most of the others did," you add quickly, flicking the ash off the cigarette and bringing it to your lips for another drag.

Ghost shifted the weight on his legs, his hand coming up to tug up his balaclava, so it rested just above his nose. You took in the sight, the scar over his lip, the slight stubble on his jaw, the way his lips moved when he was about to speak. You stopped yourself from analyzing further, it took a direction you didn't know whether you were mentally prepared to address.

"Just finished my last report for the night," he brought the cigarette to his lips, and your body sprung into motion. You fished out your lighter from your pocket, turning your body to the side so you were facing him more directly. He leaned, accommodating so you could light it up for him. His eyes caught yours, and you held the eye contact, trying to ignore the way your cheeks warmed.

It reminded you of occasional lingering moments the two of you shared. The times when you would do paperwork together in silence, how he would sometimes rise to hover over you and help you where it was needed. You were perfectly capable of doing it yourself, but you let him, for the mere reason that you liked the attention he gave you. You felt safe with him, in a different way than you did with the others.

His gaze held yours until his cigarette was lit, he breathed in heavily closing his eyes as he relished in the calming feeling. He leaned his back against the railing, letting the smoke out into a small cloud above. "You smoke a strange brand," he said and cringed from the flavor that touched his tastebuds. He pulled back and looked down at the cigarette as if it had insulted him personally.

A smile tugged your lips, you could feel the start of a laugh bubble in your throat, but you decided to repress it. "They're not really mine" you admitted, dropping the hand that was holding your own cigarette, to your side. They belonged to you now, the cigarettes, the case, the habit, but it was never really yours.

Your eyes snapped to the slight movement in his mask, above his eye, indicating a raised brow. Either contemplating his own confusion or curiosity. You figured he probably found you weird, though he had never said it aloud. "Who's it then" he didn't sound too interested, not that you could blame him for it. The man had a lot of mysteries to deal with in his job alone, he didn't need the extra vagueness.

"Was my Ma's" you answer him, turning back to the railing so you could lean your arms on it. You had started this little ritual years ago, it helped take the focus off of the painful memories that surrounded you and clouded you during the season. Intent on not bringing focus towards it again, you change the subject, "You're not gonna head home and celebrate?"

There's another moment of silence between you both, and for a second you wonder if he's even going to grace you with an answer. "No," his answer was short and curt, "I don't typically celebrate." It made sense to you, not everyone celebrated or made a big out of Christmas, but you thought he would still have someone waiting at home. A family, some friends, maybe a partner.

"Don't got anyone waiting at home?" You settle for asking him directly, unable to hold your curiosity at bay. You felt unbelievably intrusive even asking, you knew how private he was, even though he answered a lot of Soap's questions he avoided the ones that dug too deep.

He lets out a small cloud of smoke through an audible sigh, his head turning towards you to look at you. For the first time you felt slightly self-conscious beneath his piercing gaze, the analyzing nature you used yourself was now turned on you. "Do you?" he asked, avoiding the question like he always did, in his very own way of turning it against you.

You blew out the air through your nose in low amusement. You weren't sure if he had always done this, but he had definitely toned it up when it came to you. Taking from your own example, you were starting to think he was being insufferable on purpose just to make you laugh. "I'm still here," you say and take a long drag from your cigarette, "What do you think."

You heard the rumbling sound of his hum in answer, it came right from his chest, and it made you wonder what it would be like hearing it when you were pressed close. "Johnny practically invited everyone over for the holidays, you could've said yes," his body turned around, mimicking the way you were leaning forwardly against the railing. His gaze looked up towards the moon as well.

It was oddly comfortable out here with him, you had expected to be tense, annoyed that he disrupted your quiet alone time. Though you found yourself now enjoying the time, hoping he would stay for a while longer.

You thought back to a few days ago when Soap had left the base to travel back home to Scotland. He was celebrating with his family as per usual, every few holidays he would invite the team over, insisting that you were all family at this point anyway. Aswell with the fact that his own family absolutely wouldn't mind more people either.

Sometimes Gaz or the captain said yes, insisting themselves that his family was delightful company and very welcoming. You didn't doubt them, but you had yet to say yes to the offer yourself. Most holidays you made your own plans, and Christmas was different, not one you usually allowed yourself to spend with others. This time around both Gaz and Price had refused as well, having their own people at home that they were celebrating with. Ghost hadn't ever agreed either, despite Soap's pestering he hadn't budged yet.

"Why didn't you?" you countered him, using his own insufferable way of avoiding questions with questions. You had always expected that Ghost would go with Soap unless he had his own plans at home. But he had never even met Soap's family, a fact that had surprised you when you first learned. They always had such chemistry together, the banter they shot back and forth in the field as well as the off time they occasionally spent together in whatever way that made sense. They seemed like good friends to you.

The sigh he let out indicated he didn't exactly appreciate the countered question, though the little crinkle at the corner of his eyes did make it seem like he was smiling at least a little under the mask. It made your own smile show itself and tug at your lips. "I don't think I'm ready to meet 15 different versions of MacTavish," he admitted.

This time around you snorted audibly, it made his eyes snap to you, the crinkle in his eyes getting bigger as he looked at you like you were the most adorable thing in the world. "Does he really have that many family members?" You asked highly amused and just a little bit horrified at the possibility.

The chuckle you heard from him was different, one you didn't get to hear like this all that often. Normally his laugh would consist of quiet breathy chuckling, not the audible one he let you hear right now. It almost managed to make you forget why you were out here alone in the first place. It was a nice feeling, making you feel just a little less alone.

"No idea" he shook his head through his chuckle, "But I'm not risking it just yet." You couldn't fault him for that, the possibility of meeting a lot of new people all with the same energy as Soap might be overwhelming at first. Normally it wouldn't strike you as the type of crowd Ghost would surround himself with, not that you think he'd surround himself in any type of crowd willingly.

You felt his shoulder bump against yours, intentionally, and it made you freeze up out of shock. You look him in the eye with confusion but instantly start mentally berating yourself for your reaction of surprise when you see his own uncertain look. As if he was already regretting making the contact, he cleared his throat, "So, why are you really out here?"

You didn't answer, you didn't know if you wanted to. Were you and Ghost even that close? Would he be weirded out by all this? You knew a lot of things about him, but then again did you even really know him. "My Ma used to say that people reside in the stars" you speak quietly, gazing up at the twinkling stars in the midnight sky.

"That when we pass over to the next plane of existence, we leave remnants of our souls in the stars we cross, that way you leave something behind to guide the next generation," it was something she had told you about over and over again. How so many of your family members were looking down at you, that the shooting stars, and the twinkling lights where their way of communicating. You don't know if you believe it but.... "I feel closer to her out here."

You couldn't see his expressions, or what his reaction was to your words, too focused on watching the stars like they were the most interesting thing in the world. In truth you were scared, maybe he would laugh, or tell you off, scoff and mock you. He didn't.

"Do you think she was right?" You were surprised when you heard Ghost's voice inquiring interest. Was he just being nice for the courtesy? No that wasn't Ghost, he didn't dance around subjects he always said he didn't have time for that. He was asking genuinely.

"Maybe," you say a little taken aback, you had spent months mulling over the question yourself. Did you believe the same or were you just clinging onto the remnants of her in you. "I want her to be," you admit to him in a whisper. You could remember all the times you had looked up at the stars and looked for a sign, a twinkle or movement, anything from her.

A silence fell over you both as you looked up towards the stars, getting absorbed in their beauty and their places next to the illuminating moon. You wondered if he had lost people too, that it could be why he was so closed off, why he refused to let you in too deep no matter how much you prodded at his walls of steel defense.

He made a noise you couldn't discern, something between a hum and a sigh. "I hope so," he sounded hopeful, and disheartened all at once. It was confusing to witness without the needed context behind his emotions. His eyes were focused on a specific clutch of stars, allowing you to look up at him unnoticed. "I think it'd be nice," he whispered quietly, matching your own tone of voice.

Maybe he hoped that whoever he had lost was up there too, maybe he was looking for a sign as well. Maybe he was just like you were, or maybe you were completely delusional. For a moment you allowed yourself to fall for the fantasy, the thought that maybe the two of you weren't all that different. Broken souls and scarred hearts, just waiting for someone to see them for what they are.

When he moved his head to look at you in turn, meeting your eyes with a feeling you didn't know what was. You fought the flinching urge to look away from his gaze, feeling like you were intruding on feelings you weren't allowed to see. Your long-forgotten cigarette almost falling out of your hand when he spoke, "She'd be proud of you, if she could see you now." Your eyes widening just a fraction and your mouth slightly agape in your own confusion.

His gaze was dissecting, almost uncomfortable as he pierced through your own defenses like they were pudding. How he did it you had no idea, techniques running through your head, but you dismissed them, there was nothing malicious about this, just pure emotion. "I hope so," you cringed at the choked-up note in your voice.

Ghost let out a huff, something akin to a silent laugh with the nod of his head. His eyes softened and it almost tore your bleeding heart right out of your chest. You had never known yourself to be this easily picked apart at the seams. A skill you didn't know he possessed, as if he had been observing you for a long time and just now revealed just how easy you could be. Your brain was quick to make it out to something negative, but deep down in your heart you knew Ghost wasn't like that.

"I'm proud of you."

The words froze you over, your cigarette falling from your rigid hand as your own emotions pooled in your eyes. You didn't know whether you wanted to be angry with him or thankful for this newfound ability of his. Maybe you weren't as well walled up as you thought, and apart of you didn't mind it. His eyes kept you in a trance, "Ghost..." your vocals were barely there.

"Call me Simon," He turned to you fully, his presence had never been so inviting, "For tonight at least." The amusement in his voice was clear to you, his grin barely concealed behind that skull mask of his. It only made your confusion greater, your brain processing too many things at once as you comprehended what had just changed in the relationship with him.

"What?" you blinked dumbfounded; you had heard him clearly enough, but the spiking overload was rendering you momentarily confused. A thing he seemed to pick up on, quicker than you had expected him to.

"C'mon, it's getting cold out here," his threw his cigarette to the ground, stomping it out with his foot and double checked yours too. Then his hand grazed yours with caution, this time you didn't recoil or flinch away. You let him slide his hand over yours, holding and gently tugging you along to the stairs that led down from the roof. Out of the safe place you had created and into a new one in his presence.

You stumbled after him, your brain catching up to the fact that you were now leaving. You weren't used to being overloaded so quickly; he did things to you that you had no explanation for. "Wait- Where are we going?" you didn't know what he had intended, but this wasn't the way back into base, the door on the roof would've been the easier choice if that was the case.

He chuckled; the sound muffled behind his mask as well as the fact you were still walking a step behind him. "I'm not leaving you out here alone," he glanced at you from the corner of his eye, the feeling making your cheeks heat up again, "I know a pub, they're alright at holidays, you'll love it." He reassured you as if he knew it for a fact, that he was so certain you wouldn't dislike it. You wanted to argue, protest that you weren't in the mood. But the way he looked at you rendered you quiet, the urge to trust him being great, the urge to be fine with the fact that maybe he did know you.

He saw you the way you saw others, he read you as easily as you would read anyone else. In all your years spent analyzing people and their behavior so you could accommodate them, you had forgotten how much you needed someone to do that for you. You needed someone to see you.

And he saw you.

All of you.

[kipperlillyforpresident]

Okay so number one. Super cool that you wrote your paper on the American dream. Single-handedly it is my favorite antag from any season.

And two. Well it is true the back to back filming probably definitely made them have less nuance for this. I absolutely agree with your statement. If your players can't engage in a story something is probably wrong. Honestly I've just come to the conclusion that the reason that episode 19 felt so weird. Is because it felt more like it was the intrepid heroes killing the rat grinders. Instead of the bad kids killing the rat grinders. Like I don't know if I'm just going crazy here?? I know it happens where your characters blend together so much in your mind That it's hard to differentiate the character from the player. But things felt so mean spirited in like a unique way. Like a unique way that you can only get from hating a villain as the viewer. Instead of like the character. Because besides Kristen trying to see if Buddy was still in there. It felt as if, the bad kids. Who have notoriously all been put into difficult situations at different times because of various adults. Saw what is basically just them without the support system. And hit it with a nuke. It's not like a Johnny spells type thing where You can be like "this guy sucks. kill his ass." Cause besides Kipper Lily. We don't actually know any of the rat grinders motivations. Like people can say that the rat grinders were just power hungry All they want. But the more likely answer is probably, Porter saw a group of vulnerable children who were actively unsatisfied with the situation they had been put in. And prayed on that!

It's frustrating definitely. But there is always fix it fics. And these final episodes aren't going to stop me from loving the rat grinders. I do not care what anyone in the fandom says. Because half of the time they're just spitting the same misogynistic bullshit we got with saccharina frostwhip. I'm genuinely hoping That at least the adventuring party clears up some things??. But my hopes are low unfortunately. Mary Ann forever though. She got that dog in her

a) IT WAS REALLY COOL!! i also wrote a final paper in a different class about the cubbys . Communications is kind of fake as hell as a major (if youre thinking of becoming a comm major dont </3 its great for student athletes who dont need jobs. as for me. um. well. 1 year out of college no new job), but it meant I was able to write a lot of interesting papers and my professors gave me room to run with it.

b) That's a really interesting thesis, and I haven't thought about it before, but that honestly makes a lot of sense...? Like, in that Really Uncomfortable Speech that was given before Ruben died, he was blamed for wasting a season on him. Which is an extremely meta/IH thing. It makes no sense for Fig to say that. But it does make sense for Emily to say that.

[tjerra14]

I just had a thought.. what if Ikrie had joined Aloy, Ourea and Aratak on their expedition into Thunder's Drum/Firebreak? Mostly pondering this Blue Orb because it would mean that she'd get to see the origins of at least some part of the Derangement.

Ohhhhhhh yes, that's an excellent idea, I would've LOVED that! Just imagine the potential for all that added nuance--of course, we get two Banuk perspectives for the quest(s) as it is, but Ourea is (understandably) focused entirely on CYAN (who is a friend, but also a spirit, so placed rather high within the Banuk belief system), Aratak is preoccupied with keeping his sister alive and safe (which is very interesting in itself, considering the balance the Chieftain/Shaman system evidently offers for a werak--as Burgrend suggests, the shamans focus on spiritual matters, and in doing so, protecting the scarce resources around them, while the chieftains see to the physical needs of their people, making sure that both the werak and the environment that sustains it will survive in the long term. They're both prime examples of that, with a personal spin), and Aloy is along for the ride out of curiosity, wanting to see what makes these machines different from their counterparts. Now Ikrie isn't anything like that. She's not there to save a friend, or protect a sibling, or satisfy a thirst for knowledge that respects no tradition or bounds. She might've put her spear beside Aloy's for this quest, or followed a Daemonic Scorcher that has been killing hunters on their way to Snowchants back towards the Cauldron, and ended up meeting Ourea, Aratak and Aloy in the power plant/idk what that Behemoth chamber with all the geothermal stuff and the Incident Report data point is actually called anymore this is terrible and offered her assistance. no, I haven't thought about this in a potential AU context at all And well. She might not agree with Banuk culture and beliefs on everything, but from what she says during her quest and beyond, there's nothing to suggest that she doesn't believe, in some capacity, that the machines have a place in the world, their own lives and needs that have to be respected, and quite possibly, in the Blue Light as well (in one manner or another). So I feel her seeing that those daemonic machines that have been causing so much trouble for her tribe have been deliberately twisted, crazed, altered to attack and fight no matter the consequences, would be absolutely horrifying for her to witness. CYAN's imprisonment, but on a simultaneously smaller and larger scale. The stories and songs of her tribe that she knows well enough to easily recite them to a stranger, proven to be somewhat true: there is a blue light, a harmonious spirit, but its influence is fading, and worse, there is an entity responsible for it. (So that technically makes HEPH the Big Bad of Banuk culture??)

An entity, at that, Aloy attempts to control but fails, meaning it escapes to wreak havoc somewhere else. Which would be prime motivation to chase HEPH down together with her, into the Forbidden West if need be, to slow down or even stop the Derangement that's harming machines/their spirits and her people alike. (And well. You know I'm very fond of that particular idea.)

Idk. Really love this idea, and all the potential it holds. Thank you so much for sharing!

[bestworstcase]

Ancillary to the posts about wet paper bag oz: I would love to see a RWBY prequel special or something set during the great war? I would bet REAL LIFE DOLLARS whatever he did with the sword was also when he finally had to admit that Salem was right all those years ago, and it fucked him up so bad we got the weak attempt at unification via the huntsman system and his next incarnation disassociating on the regular.

I am rattling him like a cookie jar. What horrors have you seen old man.

i think about this SO much. like

The King of Vale personally led his army into battle alongside the soldiers of Vacuo and decimated the enemy forces. Crown atop his head and armed only with a sword and his scepter, he laid waste to countless men. As the sand was soaked red with blood, the Grimm came in droves. It was the single deadliest battle of the war, and legends of the greatness and terror of the Warrior King were born that day. Historians will tell you that most of these stories are nothing but grandiose hyperbole. Unusually violent weather conditions, combined with Mantle's unfamiliarity with desert combat, are likely what led to such a high death count. But whatever the reasoning, everyone bowed to the King of Vale by the time it was over. The Great War had ended. The world was ready to live under the rule of Vale. But the King refused.

laughs weakly. this is a war that began with oz rolling out a welcome mat for mistrali colonists in his own kingdom, ignoring the protestations of his own people, so desperate was he to avoid an armed conflict. (with… the imperial power busily conquering his kingdom wshgfk OZMA. PLEASE.)

ten years later he ends it doing… that. the great war broke something in him sure as sure. i think that final battle was his:

“you said we had to bring humanity together; in order to do that, we have to spread our word, and destroy those who would deny it”

decimated the enemy forces. the sand was soaked red with blood and the grimm came in droves. the single deadliest battle in a war that lasted ten years. unusually violent weather conditions. the greatness and terror of the warrior king… who laid waste to countless men and routed every army on that battlefield. even his ally surrendered.

it’s also. well. the great war. extremely pointed thing to call your fictional global war that happened 80-90 years ago, following a century marked by increasing global tensions and smaller scale conflicts between imperial powers, and is now remembered for precipitating a devastating military arms race, the complete destruction of innumerable settlements, and ending with a treaty that "redistributed territories" ie gave independence to vacuo and menagerie as new sovereign states. oh, and an indeterminate amount of time later there was a second huge war that is now remembered for [checks notes] …the genocide.

glances at modern history. ok.

glances at

this nonsense also, courtesy of general "never fought a war but rules the country that made cosplaying the great war its whole national identity" ironwood.

it was trench warfare. that broke him. king oz sat in the trenches under never-ending artillery bombardment watching soldiers die by the thousands in a miserably futile grinding war of attrition for ten years until he shattered and personally slaughtered more people than had died in any single battle in ten years of TRENCH WARFARE with the divine relic of destruction. the war to end all wars, right?

and then—if it didn’t happen within that lifetime—he reincarnated to humankind being "quite, quite adamant about centralizing the faunus population in menagerie" (😶) and consequently another major war lasting at least three years.

what horrors has he seen, indeed.

tiny tdt draft snippet because when i say i think about this a LOT… ->

“I…” Wetting his lips, Osiander rasps, “want to put an end to war.” “You’ll need to consult my sisters,” the spirit says without inflection. “Abstractions are not in my purview.” Of course. There’s a poisoned laugh caught between his ribs, a bubble of reckless despair; he shuts his eyes, and grits his teeth, and grinds out, “This war, then.” “Narrower.” “I want,” Salem, indifferent, advising him to crush those who would not see reason. Salem asking him to try. Paradise. He chokes back a sob. “To rout every army on this battlefield,” he says. “I want a victory so absolute that it cannot be answered by anything less than unconditional surrender to myself, personally. I would end this, here and now.”

he’s fine. he’s fine

[thenessiartist]

One Piece and Religion

I just wrote an accidental essay under a Skypiea first read video on Youtube and wanted it to be on here too because its one of my favourite aspects of the series. (Since this was under a skypiea video I will only take things into accord till the end of that arc, I know it could be so much longer even with what we know now)

One Piece has a really unique connection to religion We saw it first in Little garden but the story never judges people for believing in gods and such even when other characters don't share the belief. When the giants fought without knowing why but connected their honour to their gods, Luffy found it amazing. But the moment one of them was ready to fight under unfair conditions because this was supposed to be "Gods will" Luffy went wild with rage.

Similairly Noland never ever judged the shandorians for their beliefs itself. When he found out about what the trees meant he know he did a massive error and didnt even try to explain himself. His message isnt to give up on religion out of rationality but to honour both those that live beside you and came before by doing everything you can mortally are able to do (research medicine, fight for your land etc.) I think thats extremely fascinating because most other stories I see featuring religion either go into one of two directions: 1.Its the only way to salvation and you have to trust it blindly or

Its fundamentally bad and the opposite of advancement One Piece says no to both

Ive seen a lot of people critisize the skypians for starting to pray at the end because they think the lesson was to not trust in a god to save them but thats not completely right. Yes Luffy is a mortal man who takes down a so called god but that god was a false one trying to abuse the religious system and beliefs. However the bell is also part of the belief. The belief that despite Noland and Calgara dying under such terrible circumstances and without ever seeing each other again that theres still hope. For them to hear it still and reunite centuries later. And its the one thing the shandorians still have. The belief itself is good and the bell is wort so much more than the gold its made out of. And to finish this : I also really like how the Reader/Watcher in this as well. We never see their ghosts reuniting or any indication of spirits returning to the islans. There is no scientific proof it works. Yet its cathartik to have it ring. We are left with the belief ourself that yes this definitely did work and Nolands and Calgaras story got the happy end they so very much deserved

[asgodsfall-if]

As Gods Fall - Now on Tumblr!

In a dying world of magic and steel a god has been murdered. And it’s your job to find the murderer.

You are a Peacekeeper: an officer of the law upholding order in the last city of a dying world. Along with a new partner it is your job to find the one responsible for murdering a being once considered eternal. Become part of a unique modern fantasy world shaped by over a thousand years of history and uncover parts of it never before seen by mortal eyes.

Gameplay and features:

Play as one of 5 distinct races, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. Pick between smart and resourceful humans, physically unstoppable werewolves, graceful and kind fairies, elementally potent demons or shapeshifting formis.

Customize and build your character. From their looks through their skills and attributes to their personality.

Approach problems with brute force, swift hand, sharp mind or quick tongue using an attribute based stat system.

Take advantage of a unique active ability system to overcome challenges.

Investigate crime scenes, interrogate witnesses, discover the city’s secrets and sins of its creators.

Experience a city on the brink of collapse and help control the panic, or add fuel to the fire.

Find rivalries, friendships and romance as you embark on 4 unique character journeys.

Find a way to stop the ongoing apocalypse or let the decay finish its job.

The world:

The world of Etr was always driven forth by conflict. Be it the wars of its first era, the technological race of the second, or the fight for survival in its current era. Once a land full of life and wonders, it is now plagued by an unstoppable force that is the decay as it ravages all in its path. The only place safe from it: Citadel City is a boiling pot of those that remain. Full of life and dangers as the last representatives of surviving races try to live together despite centuries of bad blood between some of them. A city where magic of old coexists alongside the cold steel and concrete of modern technology.

Companions:

Coren Ashver: Coren’s life was always an uphill battle. As a demi born of human and demon parents he was always an outcast. Wishing to follow in his dead father’s footsteps he joined the force and eventually signed up for an experimental enhancement program before becoming your new partner.

Erinwehulda Drakebraid (Eri): Erinwehulda’s the smartest forensic your precinct has. Seen as eccentric by most of your colleagues she prefers to stick to herself and her inventions. Now it’s your turn to get past the aloofness and work with her as you tackle the big case.

Mesar Nemo: Mesar’s the definition of a free spirit. A werewolf born into royalty and set to take over the clan in a few years. There’s a lot resting on his shoulders which he learned to push aside by chasing the rush of adrenaline. Now that his patron deity is gone will he step up to fill the hole?

Paoni Crowelo: To Paoni information is power and a tool used to maintain balance in a world gone mad. She sees herself as a caretaker of the city and its people and as the city’s biggest information broker there is nothing that goes by her. What secrets will her intel uncover as she aids you in your case?

You can play the publicly available demo consisting of the prologue and 3 chapters (~88.5k words) here: https://cogdemos.ink/play/cavusrex/as-gods-fall/mygame/

For a more direct line of contact you can join the official discord server where it's easier for me to organize feedback and bug reports: https://discord.gg/Dv6HtKVYSd

Also if you want to support the project and receive perks like access to patron only chats, early access to new chapters and exclusive filler stories (none available right now) you can join the Patreon, or support me through Ko-fi: https://www.patreon.com/cavusrex https://ko-fi.com/cavusrex

[musings-on-wisteria]

Exploring The Elements (Via Comparison)

This post is about how I came up with my version of the Four Elements. My variations are not exactly unique, but there are some key departures from traditional depictions that I think make my system stand out. If it’s not obvious, this is entirely my UPG.

Context: While the elements are the backbone of my witchcraft practice and are absolutely part of my spells, I view each element as more than just a tool or an energy, but as a category. For me, each element has its own lessons, its own mysteries, its own aspects and its own path for a practitioner to walk down. That being said, I think they're absolutely categories you can play with. I took the elements and made them more sacred than sorcerous; you may want to make them more secular than spiritual. That's totally your call!

For starters, I mentioned in this post that I prefer to work with the elements as they appear in my life. When I began my practice, I meditated on each element and followed the threads that it reminded me of.

To take Wind as an example, I thought of letters, weather vanes and feathers. From that I could extrapolate correspondences of communication, ideas, omens, change, exchange, favors, levity and freedom.

That's a LOT from three objects.

From there, I applied the correspondences to my life- where did I see omens, experience exchange and communication, feel free? Pretty quickly, Wind's domain became the internet, as well as academic study, games, and travel.

Once I had done this- and mind you, I didn't sit down and write out every element one by one, it was a more organic process- I wanted to find the intricacies of the system. Some of the elements seemed to overlap- Earth and Water, for instance. I wanted to know what separated them, made each its own path.

That's where comparative groupings showed up. Dividing my four elements into two sets of two as many ways as I could was a pretty useful way to figure out what they were and what they weren't. These categories are fairly arbitrary, but they help me understand the connections between the elements and solidify their meanings. You can see how this is done with the traditional four Elements, with "passive" and "active," "feminine" and "masculine," and all of that. There are three axis that I measure them through; Hearth vs. Flux, Aspirational vs. Foundational, and Energetic vs. Organic.

The Hearth elements (Fire and Earth) are physical. Their domain is the solid and mundane. They’re called “Hearth” because their properties are more familiar to us, being steady and predictable. The Flux elements, by comparison (Water and Wind) are shifting and metaphysical. They have influence over things that only exist in our minds- our thoughts, ideas, magic. They also fluctuate, hence the name. 

The Aspirational elements (Wind and Earth) have goals that are either endless- they can never be truly achieved- or which I gravitate towards in good times. When I’m doing well, I focus on these things, which encourage growth, progress and self-expression. They concern the external world, beyond an individual person. The Foundational elements (Water and Fire) meanwhile, are more about maintenance and healing. In bad times, I come to these elements for renewal and comfort. They focus on the internal, the self, the- well, foundational. These are paths that set habits and routines.

The Energetic elements (Wind and Fire) are more energy than spirit. They tend to be simpler, more linear, more man-made and more morally neutral. They’re more sorcery than spirituality, if that makes sense. Organic elements (Earth and Water), by contrast, are more spirit than energy. They’re complex. They like cycles and feelings and spiritual development. They like dealing with people rather than products. (I have a whole UPG around energy and spirit- long story short, I see spirit as condensed energy and energy as unfocused spirit- but that's another story.)

So, reading through that, you can probably already glean a lot of my elemental associations. That's how it's supposed to work- through these three comparative lenses, you can triangulate my correspondences in a really satisfying way.

For instance, you now know that Water is a Flux element- changing, metaphysical, mind-focused- a Foundational element- self-focused, healing and internal- and Organic- specializing in spirituality, cycles and feelings. The sentence writes itself- Water is about a person’s relationship to themselves and their internal feelings, the cycles of healing and development, and spiritual wisdom.

Additionally, that tells you how I might use Water in a spell! Personally, I almost never use only one element- it's much more potent to blend them. In my practice, Water will be present in both a cleansing and an emotional healing spell- but in the former, I'd combine it with Wind (the Flux Elements like movement and shifting things around), while in the latter I would add more Fire (because the Foundational Elements are eternal sources of renewal and self-love).

This has been a long post, so if you made it all the way through, thanks! I may make more posts outlining my specific, in-depth profiles for each of the elements, for my own record as much as anything else. Keep in mind these will be entirely based on my UPG and highly personal to my craft.

PLEASE, please please please add your own UPG around the elements to this post- or tag me in your own- I would really love to see what other people make of these four!

[lucas-deziderio]

Dezi reads Pact: Signature 8.7

Let me tell you something about Maggie Holt. This poor girl's backstory is that she is the survivor of a specially mean episode of The Twilight Zone. And then things got A Lot Worse. But, you know, it isn't all bad. She has some victories to her name. Two loving fathers, a handful of goblins on her back pocket, the friendship of an up-and-coming diabolist...

Now the Girl with the Checkered Scarf is a whole other story! If she were an RPG character I could easily show you her inventory and you would see that the only things she has for herself now are one (1) scarf, one (1) goblin, one (1) gender and a dream. OK, I'm exaggerating a bit, but my girl do is struggling as reality is trying to shake her off itself.

This chapter starts with a very interesting conversation with Johannes, the sorcerer famous for having a demesne big enough to fit your mom in it. Up until now he had come off as some kind of secondary or maybe even primary antagonist that Blake would have to face against at some point, but now I'm not so sure. His perspective does make sense and the fact that he's being so kind to the underdog that is our current protagonist does make him more endearing.

The first thing I want to discuss is the idea of demesnes; places a practitioner has claimed for themselves and now have full control over, being able to draw energy from it to power their practice. One of the big three milestones a person in this world must achieve to be considered a grown-up wizard.

To me, the process of claiming a demesne seems to equate the process of forming a nation or kingdom. Through the ritual, a practitioner takes over an area that was until then public and makes it their own. But to do that they need the approval of all Others, spirits and even practitioners in the surrounding region. Or, at least, to overpower them through the challenges that are part of the ritual. If successful, what was once free range becomes infused by the identity of its new ruler. We have seen before practitioners both bargaining for and coercing Others into lending them power, but this is different. This ritual is both way broader in scope and way narrower in what it rewards: a geographical, almost political, type of power.

The main rule of this magic system is so maintained: all power comes with a price. In this case, the practitioner scrapes off bits of the liberty of an entire group to make themselves the sovereign monarch of their own kingdom; a social contract born out of the rules of magic itself. As time goes on, Laird Behaim's metaphor about countries becomes poignant once again.

Still, the mystery of how Johannes was able to conquer such a large territory remains as he refuses to concede us any details. Whatever it is, I'm sure it'll become essential later. Considering Blake's streak of luck, he'll probably need to use this secret to stablish a demesne for himself.

After a very interesting game of 20 questions, our protagonist manages to get some necessary resources basically for free and steps back into reality to put her plan into action. Except that reality is kinda fed up with her. She dodges the cracks in existence, bombs a handful of goblins and starts to jury-rig a variation of the demesne ritual to claim a new name for herself.

That makes me think that, just like political power, identity itself is something that is determined by our relationship to others. Sometimes it's something we can agree upon, and sometimes it's something we must fight to stablish against discordant voices. Luckily, the girl in the checkered scarf spent this entire arc making all other powerful practitioners of Jacob's Bell pity her. She finishes the ritual, craps in a bucket and wills a new place for herself into existence. I'm proud of Mags.

A couple other questions now remain in my head. Had she fallen down into one of those cracks in reality would she end up in the same place Blake is in right now? After all, he also had his connections to reality stripped from him. And if Padraic is still occupying her previous role as the child of a family, would that make of him a changeling? Or would that be a different type of fey?

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[impossiblyatomictiger-blog]

I agree with this post on Reddit: “

For context, my immediate family has a private blog we use for fun updates on our lives. Today’s SC ruling spurred me to action and I posted this- I thought others might find it helpful when talking to religious and/or conservative family members. My family is mostly believing Mormon and Republican/reluctant Trump voters. It gets more Project 2025 specific about halfway through.

I’ve hesitated to write this for a very long time. I didn’t want to inject politics into what is supposed to be fun updates about the family. I didn’t want to offend parents or siblings whom I love and care for deeply but who disagree with my positions or opinions, as is their right.

But I can’t be quiet anymore on this. My conscience won’t let me. When all is said and done, I want to be able to, at the end of my life, say I tried everything that was within my power to prevent the destruction of my country and its people. So here goes.

Please recognize this in the spirit it was written. I’m not trying to offend, hurt, or wound. But I do need to be clear, because the stakes are monumental. If I come across as undiplomatic or histrionic, I apologize for the tone but not the underlying message.

In Germany in the early thirties we had some distant relatives who were upset with the failings of the German government. The economy sucked, inflation was rampant, and armed leftist gangs roamed the streets. They didn’t like what the mustachioed man was saying, they thought he was over the top, but they also thought that he made some sense about the importance of Germany rising again, of being respected on the world stage and stopping the subversives in their own country who were hurting and holding the people back. They and others thought that there would be responsible people like Hindenburg and Von Papen who would rein in the worst of this guy’s tendencies, and direct the energy of him and his supporters to only the good stuff. What do we call these people, reluctant supporters of Adolf Hitler?

We call them Nazis.

We do not remember or care about their reservations. We aren’t interested in their feeble protests that this isn’t what they meant to happen, that the Socialists scared them or Germany was seen as a laughingstock. We don’t care that near the end of the war, as Hitler was throwing fourteen year olds in front of Soviet tank treads, some of them protested. They were Nazis. They were complicit. They voted for a Nazi.

No one outside of Hitler’s inner circle knew what he was going to unleash, at least not fully. The people who voted for him can rightly say they had no idea where this would lead, that they thought the system would stop the excesses of the Nazi movement. They didn’t have the benefit we do of history, to see what Hitler was from the very beginning. No one in their own story thinks they are the bad guy, no one thinks they are doing something evil. But they voted him into the chancellorship and it cost them everything, and plunged Europe into destruction and horror and holocaust, and then consigned half of it to Soviet tyranny.

You know where I am going with this. You might think I am being ridiculous or hysterical. But someone in 1932 screaming that a vote for Hitler was a vote for death camps, the gestapo, mass murder, and destruction on a level never before seen in human history would have been similarly dismissed. Except he wouldn’t have been hysterical or exaggerating. He would be correct in every respect.

I was told as a child decency in public life mattered. We should only elect moral people. Bill Clinton was pilloried and denounced by my friends and family for cheating on his wife and lying about it. He was unworthy of the office of the Presidency. Those same people then excused the behavior of a thrice married adulterer who was caught on tape admitting to and joking about sexual assault. They voted for a man who oppressed the hireling in his wages, paid for abortions and mocked disabled people and women.

If I may be blunt, many people I know surrendered their religious convictions on the altar of political power. The fact he was a Republican mattered more than the fact he was the exact opposite of what their Savior and Redeemer was. Power mattered more than Christianity.

I told friends and family in 2016 that Trump would try to stay in office even if he lost, that he would commit acts of illegality and criminality without regard to ethics, morals or the law. I was told I was being hysterical, that experts around him would prevent it.

Over the next four years that wicked man enriched himself by abusing his office. That wicked man broke the law to punish the nation of Ukraine by withholding congressionally ordered aid from being delivered unless they announced on live TV they were prosecuting Hunter Biden. He even admitted he did exactly that. That wicked man banned religious minorities from entering the country – something that happened to our ancestors. That wicked man separated families at the border and placed children – CHILDREN – in cages, and did so deliberately, admitting it was happening as a way to “discourage” future immigration. Some of those families were broken permanently – the children were never reunited with their parents. That wicked man repeatedly attempted to use deadly force on peaceful protestors. He gave security clearances to his son in law who was ineligible, a son in law who received massive kickbacks from the Saudi government. That wicked man supported the Saudis in a campaign of famine in Yemen that killed millions. This wicked man sicced military police against his own citizens so he could walk across the street and wave the Bible upside down and backwards as a bloody shirt. This wicked man so catastrophically mismanaged a pandemic that over a million Americans died, we stored corpses in freezers and states were left on their own to find ventilators. “Stop the testing” he thundered, and continued to hold rallies that killed his own supporters.

Finally, and unforgivably: This evil man lost a free and fair election, and attempted to remain in office. This wasn’t just hyperbole, he wasn’t just speaking. He was meeting with lunatics and loons in the Oval Office. Orders to declare martial law were drafted.

Do you know why our democracy survived? It wasn’t because Trump didn’t try or suddenly had a change of heart. Three people refused to follow his unlawful orders to seize voting machines, deploy the military to shoot protestors, and overturn the certification in Congress. Three people. One at the Department of Justice who threatened to resign, one in the Defense Department who organized a shadow military government to prevent Trump’s orders from going through, and the Vice President of the United States.

We were three spines away from losing our constitutional system, a system friends and family claim is divinely inspired and worth fighting for.

When those three refused, Trump sicced a mob on the Capitol, where raving bands of terrorists came within feet of a Vice President and Speaker they were trying to kill. The man tried to get his own Vice President killed.

This isn’t hyperbole. We all saw it on live TV. I’m not making this up. These facts were discovered by a bipartisan congressional investigation and by a prosecutor in the DOJ after the fact.

I’m not even touching the classified documents case, the fact that 44 members of his Cabinet have stated he is unfit for future office, “very fine people” in a crowd full of Nazis, or illegal payments to a porn star here.

So what about now? What about this election? We survived one term, we can survive another, right?

In his first term there were people around him who prevented catastrophe. There were “regular” Republicans like Pence, Nikki Haley, and Generals Milley and Kelly who managed to hold off the flying monkeys. Not completely, as I pointed out, but the system held; just barely.

There are no adults in Trump’s campaign. There are no “regular” Republicans anymore, because Trump will not stomach someone telling him “no” this time. He is surrounded by sycophants and true believers, many of them convicted criminals.

Trump is going to implement something called Project 2025. It was dreamed up by think tanks and was endorsed by his campaign and Trump personally. Among other things, it will, on January 20, 2025, involve the mass firings of federal bureaucrats who have ALREADY BEEN IDENTIFIED by the campaign as people that will resist illegal orders. They have ALREADY selected replacements who will rubber stamp whatever Trump says. Independent organizations will lose their independence, including the FTC, FCC, SEC and others. Trump has stated repeatedly he will revoke the licenses for “liberal” outlets like CNN, MSNBC, and others. Under this plan he can do it and the underlings will not resist.

It also involves the FDA immediately banning all forms of birth control. Pregnancy will be carried to term even if the mother dies. It’s already happening in red states like Idaho!

Public expressions of gay or trans behavior will be reclassified as pornographic – and pornography will be outlawed. THIS IS NOT A HYPOTHETICAL DISCUSSION FOR ME. THERE IS A TARGET ON MY BACK.

Detention camps will be set up and mass roundups of anyone suspected of being illegal will occur – without due process. Forgive me, but imagine that [half hispanic relative] is picking up her kids from school and ICE does a raid. She “looks” Hispanic, as do her kids. Into the van she goes, and she is unable to prove her citizenship because THERE IS NO DUE PROCESS.

If liberal states resist, the Insurrection Act will be invoked and the National Guard will be federalized. American soldiers, reporting to Generals handpicked by Trump for loyalty to him, not to the law, will be allowed to roam free in liberal cities, opening fire on “seditious” protesters and replacing local police departments.

I am not making this up. This isn’t some wild-eyed fantasy by a liberal who watches too much CNN. They are saying they will do this out in the open. It’s on Trump’s website, he has talked about it, it’s in the social media posts of his campaign and his staffers, it’s being refined and added on by his think tanks. There are dozens of more points I haven’t even touched about Project 2025.

Who will stop him? The courts? They quite literally this morning said he couldn’t be prosecuted for official acts – one of the official acts cited by the Chief Justice was meeting with the DOJ and ordering them to carry out illegal orders. If Trump says it’s an official act, he can’t be held accountable for it.

Congress? The Senate failed to convict him two weeks after he tried to have them murdered.

The people? He lost the popular vote in 2016 and still won.

Prosecutors? They just got their cases gutted by a 6-3 Supreme Court.

Please, listen to me. I am your son, your brother. I am not a wild eyed loon shouting about fluoride in the water or contrails in the sky. I am telling you plainly (and perhaps rudely) that my existence and the existence of other people you love is at stake here. You have family members who are discussing plans with each other for self defense, for ways to protect themselves from the horror that may descend this winter. You have family members discussing the possibility of fleeing the country.

Do you want your granddaughters, your nieces, to grow up in a world where they cannot divorce abusive husbands (another part of Project 2025 is the elimination of no fault divorce), they cannot use birth control and must carry even non-viable pregnancies to term? Where their role is to serve as breeding stock for the next generation of taxpayers? Do you want a world where your son, your brother, is arrested for flying a pride flag or because he has a boyfriend? (I’m not asking you to approve of my life choices; just asking you to respect my right to make it).

If I may be even more blunt: What the hell has Biden done or Clinton would have done that compares to this? You paid a little more in gas, so the constitution must be terminated? You disagree with some of the protections given to sexual minorities, so they need to be herded into camps? What has Biden done that even compares to what the Trump campaign is promising to do? Are our lives really so bad, are we really so oppressed by Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, that we will vote for literal fascists?

You cannot count on decent people to surround this monster and prevent his excesses. They tried it in Germany, and fifty five million people died. We tried it in 2016, and over a million people died from Covid and we came within moments of losing our democracy.

Please. I’m not asking for you to register as a Democrat and support gay marriage or abortion. But do not vote for this monster. For some people in the family it is not a hypothetical exercise. It’s our lives.”

[cadybear420]

If HSS (both trilogies) were made by 2022-2024 Choices.

I've seen a couple of posts on the Reddit such as "If ILITW/TRR/ES/etc. were made today", and it got me wondering the same for HSS. So I've decided to do my own for both HSS trilogies.

Feel free to share your own speculations!

OG HSS

There would probably be only 1 or 2 LIs, both forced upon the MC, and both made race (and possibly gender) customizable. Michael would definitely be a LI, him and Caleb for duo GOC LI because I know PB would not be able to resist the "golden boy jock/bad boy rebel" LI duo. Though I can maybe see them having Michael and Maria. Emma I could see being a third (possibly race-customizable) token canon female LI. Aiden would certainly not be eligible as a LI because modern Choices (with the exception of maybe MAH) seems to hate LIs that are shy, awkward, or softies, especially if they're male or male-coded.

The book would probably still be GOC, thankfully. Then again, I wouldn't put it past modern Choices to want a genderlocked high school book where they default the MC into being a cheerleader. Speaking of which...

There's no WAY modern PB would have the activity choice system, quite simply because the multiple routes and dialogue accommodations would require putting in actual effort. Modern PB would definitely try to do a genderlocked default-cheerleader MC, but I also feel like they could default MC to being a jock since Book 1 was a bit jock centric. Or heck, they likely wouldn't even give MC an activity at all because god forbid we have proactive MCs.

Honestly, I feel like just about all of the different options and possible outcomes- the spirit stick heist, tryouts, junior captain, hoco/prom crowns- we have for the MC would be nerfed, because they would require putting in actual effort. So rather than having a MC where we can actively decide who they are and how they behave, they'd probably give the MC like one random set thing they're into and have all their dialogue choice options be lacking in variation and story impact.

Assuming Caleb is a (or the) LI, they'd make Zoe a full on straw loser villain woman who exists solely to have petty catfights with MC over Caleb and thus make MC seem like the better match for Caleb. They'd probably have her not be caught cheating until later on into Book 1, nerf her Book 3 redemption arc entirely, and instead have her be unable to move on from Caleb by then and hold resentment against MC for "ruining their relationship".

They might age everyone up to 18+ (with our MC being an incoming senior), but probably wouldn't include smut scenes considering the MTFL fiasco. I mean, ID had zero smut scenes despite its confirmed 18+ cast. If this was 2018-2020 Choices, they probably would have a couple of smut scenes, but 2022-2024 Choices would definitely not. Probably a hell of a lot more lap sitting though. But only MC sitting in LI's lap, except for Emma where it's reversed, because having a male LI sitting in female MC's lap might lose them those precious pennies from straight women.

Considering Prime getting sunset in August 2022 and PB having deleted the Twitter account for it, I'm seriously doubting how much modern PB cares about that game. This version probably would not have HSS Prime characters in it at all. Heck, they'd probably just not even make it "HSS".

HSS:CA

It would be single LI, Rory being that LI. Ajay and Skye become merely recurring side characters.

I feel like maybe PB would be more likely to genderlock this one. Or maybe not, IDK.

Danielle would be a lot more outwards and over-the-top of an antagonist. As in, we see all her behaviors up-front. She'd be a full-on straw-loser villain woman for MC to compete with over Rory.

The same thing about sex scenes for OG would apply here too. Instead of MC being freshly-graduated from middle school, they'd probably make them a incoming senior transfer student from a private school.

Assuming this continues from the Choicesified version of OG HSS and not from the one we actually have, the OG gang will have graduated by the time CA starts (given that they'd have all been made seniors in this version). In other words, we now have an actually valid reason for CA to throw out the OG gang instead of keeping them around for superficial nostalgia bait. That's one positive I guess.

[unreadpoppy]

Overall thoughts/review of Dragon Age Inquistion

So finally I finished all three main DA games and per tradition, here are my thoughts on it.

I will say, out of the three games, I think this is the weakest. Not to say that it's bad, but just that the other two captivated me more. However, I do see why many people who began playing with Inquisition love it so much.

I think the best aspect of this game is the character writing. The companions are really intriguing, their personal journeys can be very compelling and touching, and their interpersonal relationships were a huge highlight of the game for me. Their banter is really really good and some of their relationships with the inquisitor were very sweet, like Dorian and the Inquisitor being besties.

The story itself has its moments. I really liked the whole thing with Divine Justinia/the spirit during the Here Lies the Abyss, and the whole thing with the elves was really interesting to me, and In Hushed Whispers was a very fun quest. However, there are some parts that were a bit lacking to me and that's mainly to do with Corypheus not being that interesting as a villain and the inquisitor's journey.

In fact, one of the problems I had with the story was that I barely felt connected to the inquisitor. I think it has to do with two factors: Lack of a properly established backstory and that the Inquisitor. imo, is too special and powerful too quickly.

In DAO, you get to play a little prologue that very quickly establishes a few things about your character. Where you come from, your social standing, and maybe even your friends and family, but there's still a lot of stuff you can make up for your character. You can define how the character acts while still seeing what is their relationship with other characters. In DA2, Hawke has an even more established backstory, but you can still define their personality and decide how they feel about certain things. In DAI, you get a small paragraph about your overall background but everything else is left to you and that's what got to me. Like, idk, sure I'm first to the keeper but I wanted to see that keeper, and be able to establish a relationship instead of that being done in random dialogue options (because I didn't feel like I was choosing out of a roleplay perspective more of a 'i guess this one')

And while the game is visually gorgeous (besides the ABYSMAL character creator), I was very bored of doing exploration. The main quests of certain areas, like dealing with the dead in crestwood, reclaiming suledin keep, were fun to do, I got very tired of 'collect x amount of thingies.' It did not help when I had to do a thousand of these while waiting for the war table to be done with stuff. Actuall, the time thing and the power system really bothered me (and wicked heart wicked eyes what a godawful quest).

The other thing I didn't like was the combat system. Something about it felt really mindless. Fights took on forever, not because the enemy was particularly good at fighting and I had to figure out a stretegy, but because they had too much health. Like the final battle with Corypheus was very boring, where I just pressed down on the attack button until he was dead (seriously, the DA2 Legacy fight with him was more entertaining). Also, why the fuck did they get rid of spells like 'heal'. I hate barrier so much.

I will say, the final dialogue between solas and the inquisitor in Trespasser was a huge highlight for me too. See what I mean when I say the character writing in this game is the best part?

To sum it all up: the game has good characters and it's beautiful, but the gameplay system and some of the overall story arcs left something to be desired.