#also see previous reblog

[miz-chase]

i am SAD about IRL SHIT

so I am TELLING you all:

that seeley booth was raised in a barber shop, canonically. whatever his feelings about his father, he cares a lot about a good hair. We get to see that play out on screen a bit (see: S7E9 The Don't in the Do) but consider this in combination with bathboybooth. Brennan gets the best head massages and hair washes in the tub from him. It's soothing for both of them after a long day. Freezing in the cold and rain after Doctor in the Photo? He comforts her, blowdries her hair to help get her warm, soothing and sweet. He's the one who puts her hair up at night in french braids and does the same for Christine. Pre-relationship casual hair-touching, "yaknow Bones, this would lay better if you only just-" (only fair turnabout because she kept poking at his sore tooth).

it's especially funny because it means Booth very intentionally keeps that perfect 5 o'clock shadow because he is a lifelong expert in a perfect shave. He knows exactly and intentionally what he's doing, vain boy.

[entamewitchlulu]

hey anyone know why the fuck tumblr has decided to be Y2K-themed on the most random day in June

[alongtidesoflight]

so here's my honest thoughts on dragon age: the veilguard, after ~40 hours of playing. i finished the main quest after having finished all companion quests and major faction quests. just to clear up what content i saw, i played as an elven transmasc rook who is a member of the lords of fortune. he romanced lucanis (although after finishing the game i'm now leaning towards taash). i don't know what's happening in playthroughs that have a different race, gender identity, romance or faction going on.

full spoilers ahead, i mean it. don't read further if you want to avoid them. i don't want complaining about it in my asks.

oh and also, if you're worried because of a few negative reviews online i can comfort you by saying don't give a fuck about a certain big name youtuber who is very much tied to bethesda franchises giving this a negative review. i'll explain why.

i'm starting off with the things i liked

the game looks really pretty. i was worried it wouldn't feel like thedas anymore (with them trying to "focus on northern thedas only" i thought they'd make a clear cut in environmental design. they do and they don't. it's complicated. i'll elaborate on it when talking about the negative stuff). anyway it does. minrathous feels like kirkwall. treviso enchanted me like the winter palace did. the hossberg wetlands reminded me of the hinterlands and a couple other inquisition maps. arlathan looked like... arlathan. the crossroads were different, but familiar. overall i like the way it looks and feels. it's thedas, with a twist. it's a good one, and gives everything a solid but unique feel.

combat is top tier. if you're a hardcore dragon age player you WILL miss the tactical aspect of it for a bit, but i promise you, once you're used to the way the combat works, you will be lapping that shit up. and once you get to ability combos you'll mourn the control you used to have over your companions in battle a bit less

the MAIN quest and its story. i expected worse, way worse. and for a while the game even had me tricked (harr harr you'll get it in a second) it is Really That Much Worse. but holy shit was it good. i walked away satisfied ngl.

your choices have SOLID weight. there's consequences, good AND bad. i got minrathous blighted, ruled over by venatori, and the leader of the shadow dragons ultimately died because of my decisions. i made those at the beginning and throughout the game. he died at the end. DAVRIN died because i didn't expect what i was saying to have that much weight. i thought i was in the clear. he had hero status. well turns out, your choices can still get your companions killed even if you do everything right. i fucking love him. he shouldn't have made that sacrifice just because i told him to do everything it takes once.

the inquisitor, morrigan and dorian being there, surprisingly. there's also negatives to this though, see below.

speaking of companions dying and the inquisitor playing a bigger role: the final quest feels like me2's suicide mission. i was blown away by it and the fact that i got to see the results of all my efforts playing out in front of me.

bioware are NOT trying to redeem solas. they love him as a character yes, but i wasn't forced to see any good in him. he betrays you. he fucked my rook over twice. he fucked him over right back, for good this time (the veil wasn't torn down, i anchored it by binding him to it, he's doomed to uphold it). but solas really lives up to his name as the trickster elven god. rip to all the people who grew really attached to him over the years.

varric died. if you like him that's probably as hard reading it as it was watching it. varric died and the game lies about it until the very end. when the realisation hits, it hurts. but in the very best way.

the amount of care they put into gender expression and trans identities this time around. (i'll add onto this with negative points as well too).

rook feels very much ingrained in the world of thedas. he doesn't ask questions that expose the player to lore through dialogue as if he's stepped foot into thedas for the first time. those conversations feel very solid and good. i hope other faction players got as much joy out of this as i did.

and the things i didn't like and boy there's a lot unfortunately

the music. let's just get that out of the way holy shit. it doesn't feel like it belongs in this universe. it gets so incredibly sci-fi-y at times you'd think it's taken straight from mass effect andromeda. there's not a single song unique to veilguard that i really enjoyed. it broke my immersion, real bad. hearing a busker play the tavern songs from inquisition on a lute right after i killed some venatori with wobbly bass songs playing in the background is just odd. weird tonal shift. don't like it. it's made for people who like flashy light-weight cinema.

tevinter nights is required reading. the podcasts are required listening exercises. the game is so fast paced, especially at the start, that there's no time to introduce you to characters and how much weight their names carry in-game. i would not have known who half these people are if i hadn't skimmed over tevinter nights. i'd care even less about them than i already did. there is no time to get properly attached to them. people will act as if you're talking to a legend personified and you'll be thinking man goddamn which chapter of tevinter night were they in again and what did they do???

there's a weird mismatch with the animations. you'll have beautifully fluid ones, like emmrich casting spells. and then you'll have rook's face animating in the most unnatural manner that's sorta reminiscent of mass effect andromeda's "my face is tired" addison, when their emotions SHOULD be landing with the player rn instead.

i'm not vibing with the art style. sometimes it works. most of the time it doesn't. at points i felt like i was watching tangled.

that also brings me to some of the dialogue. same issue. i am watching frozen. i am watching tangled. someone on the writer's team really likes the adorkable trope. bellara is its victim.

for all the talk about identity, bioware sure doesn't like theirs. the grey warden armor got a redesign again and it just makes them look like a generic army. i hate it lol

in general, i don't like the armor design. the wardrobe/appearances system is fine, but it's just not helping if all the armors are just... kinda bland or downight bad looking? and don't get me started on the lords of fortune armor. that is orientalism personified.

the world states should have been carried over, full stop. i know they said they didn't because they want to separate what happens in the north from what happens in the south, which... i could have lived with that. but the inquisitor sends you letters that keep you up to date on... the south of thedas. you learn that there's a blight again, that people are standing strong but it's difficult, denerim's fallen, the rulers are taking care of it, orlais is fighting and they're successful for a while, etc etc. what's good bioware. i thought we don't care about the south this time around. why are you feeding me so much boring generic information. if you're not gonna show any of it and just write letters, then carrying the world state over should not have been an issue. i have a game dev background. those few lines of code would not have broken your budget or pushed your engine's limits. fuck right off.

this gripe of mine carries over to all the cameos. as a lord of fortune you have to deal with isabela a lot. it's fun. i missed her. you get to go drinking with her and taash and bellara! also my hawke romanced her. she's not mentioned once. they had the opportunity to put a sentence or two about her in there with not a lot of effort, trust me.

when varric dies, all she has is a single line about it. for gold, for fortune, for varric. she only says it if you interact with her on your way to the final push. that's not mandatory.

morrigan is there. kieran isn't. the old god soul that mythal and then solas absorbed? who cares at this point, the gods are dead now and solas is locked away for eternity. i suppose? why is morrigan there. she feels unneeded. i wish they'd just left her down south, at least that way i wouldn't have had to witness her god awful redesign.

dorian at least feels as if he belongs in this story. the shadow dragons are a crucial part to protecting minrathous. he's also weirdly underutilised. isabela and morrigan had more lines than him in my playthrough.

on the topic of romance: bro that was underwhelming. no, genuinely. you know when romance picked up a bit? after the point of no return. i heard maybe two lines of companion banter about it before that. maybe i missed something which i honestly doubt, but romance did not play much of a role in lucanis's storyline. i saved his grandmother as he wished me to (and if you read tevinter nights you know she was rather abusive and their relationship not the healthiest) and told him to focus on his family. a reunified family my rook wasn't even introduced to as a partner at the end of all that.

really, do not buy this game if you're only in it for the romances. others might be better, lucanis's basically gave me nothing. except for an outing (the second coffee date i had with him, it was getting repetitive) all of it played out once i committed to the final quest. the sex scene was a fade to black. annoyingly right after davrin died. if you're looking for well paced and good spice, pick up something else. the sweet talk and the final goodbye were nice though.

for all the good the ever-presence of gender identity does, it is brought up in such a disruptive manner too. it doesn't even play out naturally if you CHOOSE the lines that are meant to be said. hearing the words trans and non-binary in this setting doesn't feel right, and i'm saying this as a trans guy. i think it could have been handled more gracefully. the amount of times my rook went "i'm a MAN" as if he's about to start drumming on his chest and roaring any second now got super nerve-grating. "i'm so glad you're into me... the me who is trans. remember?" just. tell me one trans person who'd talk like that to a person they've grown close with and are trying to romance. this game doesn't handle sexuality well, so all this hey my body might not look like the way you're expecting it to look talk amounts to nothing anyway. i feel about this the way i feel about krem: this is partial exposition to trans experiences... packaged up for cis consumption. the ONLY exception to that is interacting with taash. holy shit was all of that heartwarming and bro did it feel good and natural to talk to them about theirs and rook's gender.

rivain and nevarra are new locations added by veilguard. they're also incredibly underwhelming, small and constricted maps. rivain is a coastline with a few ruins. the hall of valor is a partial ruin nestled into a cave on a beach, with a fighting pit. isabela is there in her skimpy outfit commentating your pit fights. that's it. i'm sorry if you were looking for a bustling pirate cove or whatever. you're not gonna get it. the nevarran crypts btw are a long ass dungeon crawl. that's it.

speaking of maps. i thought people were being dramatic when they said you're gonna be fighting the same enemies on them again and again. i thought they were figure of speeching it. they're not. you WILL fight the same amount of enemies. in the same spot. every time you reload the map. best to stay on a map and clear out the enemies and do as much questing on that map as you can before leaving, because you WILL have to do it all over again once you return.

the three choices i made for my inquisitor didn't matter lol she didn't have to face solas and therefore couldn't stop him at any cost as she had sworn (maybe because my rook tricked solas into binding himself to the veil, there was also an option to fight him. would she have stepped in? who knows). blackwall wasn't mentioned. and either her using a small amount of her forces in the final fight was the reason the civilians of minrathous fared so well..... or it just didn't matter. ultimately i think she had very little impact on anything

[ffc1cb]

i’ve always found it peculiar how during meeting the chargers cutscene the game just assumes your character automatically understands what krem is talking about when he mentions binding (though, granted, it’s all very unsubtle). like, this is a roleplaying game. what if i want to play a character who just doesn’t get it

[samissimo]

We didn't do cookies last year. Here's some Tatsugiri I made with some of the dough scraps this year!

[nostalgia-tblr]

"i miss the days when all TV shows had the perfect number of episodes for their story (AT LEAST 20) and since nothing got cancelled before it's time there's 7+ years of those shows for me to watch on DVD these days, and even the filler episodes are good! They may be a bit forumulaic at times but it's a great formula and that's why I shun modern TV in favour of weird old shows like [names 2-3 of the most popular and successful TV shows of the 1990s]!"

[plushri-moved]

250,000 people turned up in London for Palestine yesterday! Make the next demonstration on Saturday 9th March even bigger, please show up if you can.

If you're in the UK, email your MPs and urge them to support the potential motion for ceasefire in Gaza tabled for 21st February.

All you have to do is enter your postcode at the site will generate an email to your MP for you! Then autofill your information and it will send the email. It takes a few seconds. No ceasefire, no vote!

From the river to the sea 🇵🇸❤️

[orange-artblog]

dark cream week: day 6 - thunder

shattered by galacii-gallery

cross by jakei95

dark cream week by @zu-is-here

the full image ->

and a close up of Shattered as I think it‘s quite pretty

[b0amagination]

Tastes of Whumptober: Day 30

Let's see what Payge and Nicolai have been up to! We met them on Day 12, which this post references and continues from! They also showed their faces on Day 16 and Day 26, should you want to see more of them <3

Content warnings for: the slightest moment of nail whump, creepy whumper, and painful wound cleaning.

Recovery

Payge had been confined to the basement bedroom for… two days now. This was the third. He awoke the same way each morning so far. The same padded cuffs kept him in bed on the mattress by his hands and feet, only mercifully allowing him to change positions.

The first day, Nicolai had sat down and trimmed his nails.

“Of course I have to, dove. I know you’ll come up with a thousand keen solutions, and it’s my job to think of each one before you do.” They gestured for his hand then, and he handed it over reluctantly. 

“I wasn’t thinking of that…” They trimmed his thumb down, leaving the thinnest sliver of white at the edge.

“Of course not. But you would have.” The pointer nail was cut even closer, if there was such a possibility. 

“For Christ’s sake, leave a bit of nail! They aren’t used to being so short.”

“Don’t ask my permission for your delinquency, Payge. I wouldn’t have to take such precautions if you would accept my care.”

“I am, aren’t I?” He protested, false hope in his voice.

“You should have seen yourself on the table.”

A full-body shudder shook his hand and caused them to clip too far. 

“Come on!” He pulled his hand away and observed the nick as it slowly wept a single drop of blood. Nicolai snatched it back and continued their work.

“You’ve had worse. On the table, for example.” They had the foresight to grip his wrist hard before he flinched again. 

“Forgive me for never wanting to remember that.”

“Well, I don’t plan on letting you forget.”

He did remember. Every night. Payge was a side sleeper now. 

The second day, Nicolai changed his bandages.

“Sure you don’t want to look? You could have supervised access to a mirror.”

“I’m sure.” 

“Well, then.” 

They turned on the tap, slowly adjusting the temperature before filling a bowl. A rag was dipped in, wrung out, and pressed over the bandages to moisten them before unwrapping.

“Aren’t you grateful I’m not ripping this off with the scabs, dove?”

“...I am. Thank you,” Payge whispered.

The dressings only tugged mildly at a few stubborn parts. Probably where they cut deeper, he thought, and just as quickly shoved the idea away. A separate rag pressed against his bare skin, starting at the edge of the wound. 

He caught a glimpse of it at some point: stained various shades of brown, red, and something on the yellow spectrum.

“It’s not infected, is it?” An infected wound of that size… it spelled a death sentence without medical intervention.

“No, no. Just severe.” 

Each fiber of the cloth was tangible as it pressed him into the back of the chair, scratching whenever Nicolai adjusted it.

“It’s looking lovely so far. Red suits you.”

“My mom always said it clashed.” She had, really. Always said he looked better in neutrals. Burgundy or merlot, orange blossom or cream. Not red.

“Nonsense. Nothing could clash with you, dove.” 

“Sweet-talking me gets you nowhere.”

“I quite enjoy it, actually. Sweet-talking you is a favorite pastime of mine.” The rag drifted over his collarbones, tracing them absentmindedly, before it returned to the bowl to soak. After they were done, Nicolai would disappear upstairs and bleach them, rinse, and fold them up like new for next time. They’d made him help before.

A brown bottle emerged from the cabinet and tipped onto a third cloth.

“Oy, you told me peroxide only makes scars worse.” Payge held up a hand and pointed at the offender, as if it could be anything else.

“Yes. Put that hand down.”

“Did you forget? You try to minimize a lot of those.” A glare told him he was pushing his luck.

“You’d be a fool to think I worked so long and hard on nothing. I wouldn’t do that to you without reason.” 

He held his tongue on the truths that itched to spew forth, too aware of his current position. 

He’d felt the burn of that the rest of the day, especially when Nicolai refused to rinse it with water. Even the unharmed skin around seemed inflamed.

And this morning Payge was still wearing the shirt they’d dressed him in. Breathable, flexible fabric that zipped up to his neck in the back, still tight enough to compress his torso. He could reach it if he tried, but it would be a chore. The point of the barrier, of course.

He was stuck in bed until they came down and unlocked the cuffs. But it wasn’t all bad.

The windowless room could only be lit by the switch next to the door. At all other times, a projection shone on the popcorn ceiling. A window into a fishtank, towers of kelp swaying as different species swam by. A simple night light in the nearest outlet created the illusion, shooting light out when it didn’t detect another source.

It was strangely comforting. 

So long as he glanced up at it from his side.

[shikai-the-storyteller]

Hmm

[autobot-ratchet]

honestly as much as I harp on Getaway because I am Team Rodimus Ride or Die, I do think a lot about how cool he seemed before he did all that shit to Tailgate and the mutiny and whatnot

especially in relation to Skids, like Skids is a Good Fuckin Dude, he's got a solid moral compass and tries his best to be his best so for him to be close to Getaway, he must have seen good in him, genuine good, Skids is no fool

Getaway may have been able to bounce back from the Tailgate thing and even the mutiny itself if said mutiny had just been Megatron being taken away by the Galactic Council like he originally planned, he had enough crew members on his side even after the Tailgate thing. He would've just been a huge jerk instead of a monster, but alas, things slipped out of Getaway's control almost immediately in a way that was irreversible from the get-go

it also fucks me up how Skids was the only Lost Lighter to die in that altercation, his plan to get rid of Megatron got fucked up in a way that did the most personal damage to Getaway, killing his closest friend, damaging his standing with his fellow mutineers, and locking him in to his downward spiral

he had multiple chances to quit while he was ahead or at least slow down with the atrocities but he was just too bitter and angry and spiteful and desperate to be something greater than he is and honestly that's some good fuckin tragedy right there lmAO like I know I've hit him with the worlds smallest violin.mp3 over his motivations but much like Pharma he really is a deeply tragic character and as much as I appreciate the villain route he went down in mtmte, I wouldn't mind seeing him get a happier ending in another continuity

[kedreeva]

WIP Wednesday Game

It’s WIP Wednesday, time for a little accountability, sharing your work, and getting a kick in the pants.

Here’s how it works:

In a reblog (or new post w/ rules attached), post up to five (5) filenames of your WIPs; not titles, file names.

Post a snippet from one of them. Snippet must be words you wrote in the last 7 days. We’re posting progress here. If you haven’t made any, go make some and come back to post!

After you’ve posted, people can send you an ask with one of your file names. You must then write 3 sentences in that file. If the filename is one you can't share from (for example, an event fic), write 3 sentences on it anyway, and then 3 more on another to share.

That’s it! You can invite others to join in, or just post. If you tag me in your post, I will send you an ask request!

If you’re reading this, you’re invited!

If you see someone posting a WIP Wednesday Game snippet, send them an ask! Make them write.

Requested/Friend event mentions under the cut! If you'd like to be pinged next week, let me know!

friends @fiore-della-valle @redbirdblogs @greenbergsays @idkfandomwhatever @luckyspike @obaewankenope @mad-madam-m @sleepymccoy @eriquin @sosobriquet @qprstobin @spacebarrette @andavs @zainclaw @anonymousdandelion @flameraven @fractalgeometry / Requests @aparticularbandit @madnessfromthemountains @makeroftherunes @not-orpheus @1attheedge @preetsramblings

[screambirdscreaming]

At the bus stop one time there was a gaggle of preschoolers waiting to catch the bus for a field trip day, and someone walked past with a couple of friendly little dogs, to great general delight.

But after a little bit, the dogs were getting overwhelmed, and the preschoolers were gently coaxed to back off so the person with the dogs could continue on. Specifically, one of the preschool teachers said, "Sometimes, when you're small, being surrounded by big people can be a bit scary and overwhelming. Even if they are friendly."

This was recieved as great wisdom: after all, the preschoolers were also small, and understood how scary and overwhelming big people could be! And the dogs were indeed even smaller than the preschoolers, so it made sense.

What was funny and charming was that, upon absorbing and reflecting on this wisdom, they all felt the need to tell it to one another. In tones of great insight, they turned to one another and said, "Did you know? Sometimes when you are small, being surrounded by big people can be scary and overwhelming! Even if they are friendly!" Back and forth, without any particular concern that they were all saying the same thing. Have reached comprehension of an insight, it must be shared!

I must say that this behavior is less charming in tumblr users than in preschoolers. Not least because tumblr users, having gained a little analytical skill to misuse, insist on Summarizing and Generalizing and Unifying the insights they repeat, quickly turning any interesting new information into formulaic dogmatic mush.

[cel-aerion]

First Nights at Freddy's - Movie Soundtrack/Score in Order

Because I am a nerd and wanted to figure out for myself which songs appeared where, I have gone through and made a playlist of First Nights at Freddy's that combines the score and the soundtrack, and puts them in the order they appear. The playlist length seems excessive because some songs have only a portion played (e.g. "Hey-O!" is over a minute, but is only seen in the film for seven seconds; the track "Hiccups" includes the intro it had when it was in the individual "Web of Lies" video during the "Previously on..." bit, but that's absent here, etc), but as near as I can tell from listening while going through things, this is what I've come up with.

This does not include songs released on the soundtrack that do not seem to actually be in the movie, just because that's not what this playlist is for. (And I'm hoping I didn't just totally miss all of them being in here somehow??? I would feel very silly if I spent so long on this and then was just oblivious to a whole seven songs.)

Under the cut is the listing for where the songs appear in the movie.

1 - How It All Began - 0:04-0:38 2 - It's Him - 0:42-2:48 3 - Welcome to Fredbear's - 2:49-4:31 4 - Quirkiness Runs in the Family - 4:36-5:10 5 - Hey-O! - 5:12-5:19 6 - A Poor Investment - 5:20-6:25 7 - Ground Zero - 6:45-9:51/10:13-11:03/11:12-11:32 8 - So It Begins… - 11:37-12:29 9 - Calling for an Update - 12:32-13:30 10 - Between Jobs - 13:30-14:40 11 - Down the Rabbit Hole - 14:41-16:20 12 - Hiccups - 16:23-18:45 13 - Web of Lies - 18:46-22:38 14 - It's Been Seven Years - 23:00-23:34 15 - The New Server Manager - 23:34-25:21 16 - Sickly Sweet and Terrified - 25:23-26:43 17 - Open Bracket - 26:44-27:25 18 - Be Careful What You Wish For - 27:25-28:20 19 - You're the Boss - 28:21-29:31 *20 - ?? - 29:34-29:41 21 - Boxbound - 29:44-30:16 22 - Sketchy Business - 30:19-31:34 23 - Baby's Story - 31:38-32:51 24 - Dark Remains - 32:56-36:59 25 - Think Inside the Box - 37:03-37:34 26 - Spring Locks Tend to Fail - 37:34-39:19 27 - A Giant Freaking Rabbit - 39:20-41:41 28 - Superheroes - 41:43-42:25 29 - I Was Born Freddy - 42:30-43:56 30 - Robotic Fox - 43:56-44:56 31 - Act Natural - 44:57-46:06 32 - Pizza to Go - 46:07-46:30

33 - Setting Us Up the Bomb - 46:33-46:56 34 - Boneless Pizza - 46:57-47:37 35 - Off With His Hands - 47:39-48:20 36 - The Great Pizzescape - 48:21-49:23 37 - Two Miserable Monsters - 49:25-51:55 38 - Pan Stambush - 51:56-54:01 39 - Baby I Love Youk - 54:04-54:15 40 - Taxi Driver for a Bunch of Puppets - 54:16-55:56 41 - A Rabbit Out of Your Hat - 55:59-58:16 42 - Fear Is Like a Hammer - 58:17-1:00:30 43 - Shadows of Agony - 1:00:30-1:03:00 44 - Olly Olly Oxen-Free - 1:03:00-1:04:36 45 - Currently Running - 1:04:35-1:05:02 46 - You've Helped Enough - 1:05:03-1:06:06 47 - Returned to Sender - 1:06:08-1:07:09 48 - Freddy Fazburglar - 1:07:09-1:08:09 49 - Taking Back Fazbear's - 1:08:10-1:10:19 50 - Reunited - 1:10:22-1:10:52 51 - This Is My Restaurant - 1:10:54-1:12:19 52 - Saving Springtrap - 1:12:20-1:14:35 53 - Another Three Points - 1:14:37-1:15:08 54 - Who Here Wants a Harecut - 1:15:09-1:18:06 55 - Virus - 1:18:07-1:20:35 56 - The Battle for Fazbear's - 1:20:47-1:24:55 57 - We Thrive on Violence - 1:25:03-1:27:08 58 - Don't Wake the Baby - 1:27:12-1:29:28 59 - Ready to Retire - 1:29:33-1:31:29 60 - Extra Raisins - 1:31:43-1:33:06 61 - Afraid of the Dark - 1:33:07-1:34:18 62 - Baby I Loved You - 1:34:17-1:37:06 63 - Secret Scene - 1:37:06-1:37-44

*There is one sound cue, in the list as Track 20, that I cannot for the life of me figure where it's from. If anyone else knows, please let me know so I can keep from going insane trying to work it out.

[mpsideadump]

Excited to see the result?

Second chapter of Detroit: Lie or Die is ready to be read!

Connor meets P!

Disclaimer: Results of Poll had no effect on the outcome of the encounter. I had already planned how this would go beforehand.