#and also feferi. there was so much going on

[charliesinfern0]

absolutely love taking characters that have so much potential to be dynamic characters and… give them character

[relaxxattack]

hello! i am here because im very much a quadranT enThusiasT. im curious: have you heard of alTerous aTTracTion? To me iT seems preTTy pale and id like To hear whaT you Think :]

i have heard of that! to me alterous attraction is very similar to queerplatonic attraction in that it's an intentionally queer nebulous thing that hang out outside of actual defined boundaries.

i don't think that moirallegiance is actually queer or outside of any social boundaries for trolls... it's just a regular old, government mandated or biologically mandated, normative relationship.

moirallegiance is something normal for trolls that they feel a romantic impulse for. it's a separate branch off from their romance, the same way blackrom is-- but i never see people jumping to describe kismeses as qpps. simply because humans are better at understanding something is "real" romance when they explicitly have sex lol -_-

moirallegiance is still a strong romantic feeling for a troll even though they don't have sex, basically.

however.... i can run myself into the ground talking about this over and over, and it won't change the fact that for (most) humans, moirallegiance is something alterous or platonic! and in the end that's okay. relationships, sexuality and romance can't easily be defined or have boundaries put on it no matter how much explaining someone does.

yeah, maybe for humans having a moirail WOULD feel like a strange alterous middleground between platonic and romantic, because a moirallegiance has elements from human platonic friendship and romantic partnership. maybe for some people it would be exactly like a qpp even! the thing is relationships are dependent on the people in them, and different for every single person.

so really there's no use for me trying to explain why moirails are different than qpps or anything, because for most humans, they're probably not. and maybe at the end of the day that's fine and i shouldn't be wasting that much energy anyway lol ^^;

although, no matter how much i try i can't not be annoyed when people equate moirallegiance to platonic best friendship. it's dumb and nerdy of me but like come on, multiple trolls in the comic have said otherwise... T^T

[sayakxmi]

[taxi-boi]

i was initially just going to put this in the tags but since i dont want to just be talking out of my ass:

this is the authors note on page 87 in the 6th homestuck book. which discusses the content of page 3252 of the webcomic (the jade jadesprite karkat convo)

he calls karkats past current future selves thing a practice of "faux splintering"

and explicitly compares it to dissociative identity disorder. and continues with the following

"He's broken himself up into various 'identities,' compartmentalizing them by where they are in time rather than who they are, in the same way one might in response to trauma, grief, shame, or anything else that might trigger that kind of psychological fragmentation"

like the only difference between karkat and every other plural ass character is that most of karkats bullshit is confined to the (relatively) simple mechanics of time dilation rather than physical alternate selves in (sort of) physical alternate bodies (excluding the standard cases of alternate selves in dream bubbles, ofcourse).

which inadvertently implies that karkat is more truly plural, and it is not just simply the consequence of weird sburb classpect kernelsprite timetravel magic system bullshit. it all takes place in his own (singular) head. (which isnt my genuine stance but an interpretation that could be made)

one could potentially read it as simply the changing opinions that come with time (over the span of only 8 hours) rapidly bolstered by his self hatred and implied inability to truly take responsibility for his prior faults (or perceived faults). which is even stated in the above section,

however, in the ccg and fcg conversation starting on page 4685 (the one where karkat types with red text) we watch ccg converse with a version of himself mere minutes ahead of him, reach the point where hes in fcg's shoes, before responding to the same minutes prior pcg with (naturally) the same level of aggravated vitriol.

near the end the conversation, after the roles have entirely reversed, fcg has this to say

fcg is so 'dissociated' from the state of mind that he was in 10 minutes ago as (p/c)cg, and even after that point, to where he doesnt even believe the feelings occured, or atleast cant determine where they came from.

above are two excerpts from the pluralpedia page on emotional amnesia...

i think you'd be right that he'd resent the insinuation that it wasn't "just all him."

but he'd also be wrong about that fact, like most things karkat thinks he knows.

your guys' trans headcanons suck ass. start making plural headcanons

[thewertsearch]

Resolution to the summoner's mutiny is foggy, as I only understand what has 8een rel8ed to me through the 8rief answers I thought to solicit. Ultim8ely, the ire of the Condesce would 8e such that in the settling dust of the conflict, she would 8anish all from the homeworld, except the young. […] I cannot imagine how she would come to enforce such an upheaval in our civiliz8tion. Though I suppose she will have on her side the advantage of an unparalleled lifespan, and the leverage extended 8y the hideous psychic prongs of her deep undul8ing monstrosity.

Attention is drawn to the prodigiously long lifespan of the Condesce - the empress of Mindfang's time, and Feferi's probable ancestor. I used to think that the modern Empress was a different troll, but now that we're aware of fuchsiablood longevity, I'm pretty sure the two are one and the same.

Based on a line from Feferi's introduction, I was assuming that she was the only fuchsiablood in the universe - but let's take another look at the way that line's phrased.

You are 'the only of your kind' known to possess this blood.

That doesn't necessarily mean she's the only fuchsia troll, does it? For example, it might just mean she's the only Alternian with fuchsia blood, because the Empress doesn't actually live on the planet.

I really want this to be Mama Peixes, because the existence of a living Ancestor has so much story potential. Just how much does she know, and what's her agenda?

Nevertheless, I take the prediction as truth, and find it amusing that a homeworld domin8ed 8y children will 8e the gr8 summoner's legacy. One of them, at least.

Anyway, the Summoner - the boy who could fly - is the reason Alternia is a planetary Neverland, making it clear that he was the original inspiration for Pupa Pan.

It's also notable that we've only just started delving into Alternian history, and we've already learned about two massive rebellions against the social order. Contrary to what Alternians have been led to believe, this oppressive culture clearly isn't natural to them, and they've been fighting it every step of the way.

They don't want to be a murderous empire - they're forced to be, again and again and again.

More importantly, and less amusingly, his legacy will 8e my demise. You see, I first learned his name when I asked who would 8e the one to kill me.

And here's yet another layer to the Quest Cocoon Incident. Vriska wasn't content with living like Mindfang - she wanted to die like her, too.

Given that Vriska knew about the Summoner, one can only imagine how weird she must have been around Tavros. Not only was she constantly berating him, she was also putting him on this bizarre pedestal, comparing him to someone I'm damn sure he never knew existed.

And she'd never tell Tavros about the Summoner, either, because that would allow him to derive confidence from something other than her tutelage. No - she just silently compared him to a legendary hero, and he constantly failed a test he didn't know he was taking.

Seems like something's going very wrong in the Veil.

This seems like a sign that the session is on its last legs, and we're running out of time before it completely turns to static. We're entering the endgame.

The oracle I will resolve to part with. I will conceal it in a crypt 8earing the sign of the expatr8, with a map to its loc8tion hidden in this journal.

The cueball was sequestered in an Expatriate chest, which makes me speculate about whether Equius ever got his hands on it.

He can't see inside it himself - but like Mindfang said, it shouldn't be too hard to find a technological workaround, and Equius is a roboticist. I wonder if either Zahhak ever used it for themselves?

To whomever finds it, 8e wary, for the truth it tells may leave its new keeper 8lind as I was. Though no more.

She warned you, Vriska.

She told you it would leave you as blind as she was.

And it did.

[meraki-sunset]

i have a question about hiveswap as im just getting into it, considering that the events of hiveswap and hauntswitch both take place in the late 1900s, whats the point exactly?

we already know whats going to happen and that all of the characters are doomed fail on their goals and then die no matter the outcome. the caste system is never abolished, HIC stays in power, both earth and Alterna get destroyed, and doc scratch continues his plan without a hitch

none of it seems to really matter or serve any purpose other than worldbuilding for 2 already doomed worlds (3 if you count the cherub portal implying a lost society of cherubs)

Well, it is. It is worldbuilding, that’s what precuels are. They add extra context to events you already know will happen, they add to how they happened, how we got there. That doesn’t make them pointless.

It may seem irrelevant at first glance, but Hiveswap actually has a very important role.

It sets the stage for the arrival of the players on both Alternia and Earth-A

The events of Hiveswap are happening with an equivalent distance in years between both Alternia and earth

Which means the Beta children are about to arrive in their meteors (1995 - 1996) a little after the time when Joey and Jude are having this adventure (1994), which means the Alpha trolls will get to Alternia soon too.

Both timelines are mirrored in time, they both have the same exact amount of time before the end.

We know the Beta kids hadn’t arrived yet to earth during Hiveswap because it’s 1994, and that the Alpha trolls hadn’t arrived either because Trizza is the heiress, and there can only be one at a time, so Feferi isn't there yet.

This series of events are necessary for Doc scratch’s plan, otherwise he wouldn’t have intervened, giving Xefros a surveillance free communication channel, so Joey and him aren’t detected by the authorities.

He needs them under the radar so they can (while trying to send Joey back home) connect people with each other, cause necessary problems, kick start important events.

All which will set the stage for the 12 troll player’s arrival.

What do I think it’s the most important event Doc Scratch needs Joey and Xefros to make happen?

Trizza has to die. There can only be one heiress at a time, and if Feferi is about to arrive, then Trizza has to go.

The events of Hiveswap/HauntSwitch will cause the death of the heiress, either fighting against the Condesce, at the hands of the revolted trolls Joey and Xefros will influence, crushed to death by Feferi’s own meteor, who knows. But if this is the "equivalent to 1994 on Alternia" and all that is happening it’s really happening as a mirrored version of Earth’s timeline, then the 12 trolls should be to arriving at different dates during the following year. Which means she doesn’t have much time left, as we know Feferi was the only heiress on Alternia during Homestuck. And we’re 13 years away from the end of the world. It needs to happen now.

It's the same tactic Doc used with Rose, Vriska and Terezi

The only reason he ever “helps” anybody it's because he needs them to make things happen.

He needs Joey and Xefros alive, he needs the rebellion to go through (even if it fails, it'll fail in a way that it's usefull for him), he needs Trizza gone so Feferi can come to Alternia and so the final stage of this plan of millions of years connecting dots and manipulating people to create a hostile planet for the new players to grow stronger that their predecessors, can begin. The rise of the new players.

I personaly think Tyzias might be the one to intercept Karkat or at least be involved in it.

It could be her, Joey or maybe someone else, but whoever intercepts him will have to know about the signless and according to Tyzias’s password (69) she already knows about him and she knows his symbol, and seems to be a follower in the down low. Tyzias also must knows how the singless promised that there would be another troll like him, and according to Doc scratch's explanation:

The followers of the summoner decreased enormously, but the Doc said himself that there were still some of them hidden and I think he was talking about Tyzias and her alies.

Sometimes we forget that there was intervention from the suferer's followers to ensure Karkat's survival

That’s why he has the sufferer’s symbol, someone who knew it gave it to him. And we know Tyzias knows.

The ectobiologist and team leader also seems to always be the last one to turn 13, (as well as the last to wake up as their dream self) so Karkat should be the last one to arrive, ending that chain of events.

Of course this all means that, by the time the end of the world happens, and asuming they’re all still alive, all Hiveswap trolls would be adults carrying duties off planet and would die the day of the apocalypse during the Vast Glub along with all troll Civilization.

The same would happen to Joey and Jude, assuming Joey is successful and returns to Earth. They would die on the 13th of April 2009 with the rest of humanity, not knowing they had a part in it or that their lost brother was the detonator of the end of the world.

It’s tragic in the end, but it’s necessary. Someone has to play that role.

They are the stagehands who prepared the stage for the first act of the play they were never meant to see.

And who knows, it may not be the end of them, maybe we’re too quick to assume they didn’t get saved somehow. By some random paradoxical event or deus ex machine that teleported them away from danger. We’ll have to wait and see how it plays out.

It's been a while since i wrote an analysis, i really missed that ^u^

[propheticclown]

Just a little ramble post but people grossly oversimplify Eridan's character so much to the point where it's not even Eridan.

FIrstly, Eridan's "I'm a violetblood and we need to cull lowbloods glub glub glub" stuff isn't actually how he feels, and that should be clear considering his best friend is a mutantblood and the only lowblood he actually hates is Sollux, which is lowkey understandable because Sollux is just as cocky and arrogant as Eridan, if not more.

Secondly, he's not misogynistic. Don't get me wrong, he's absolutely a weirdo, but not in a Cronus way. He's legitimately just socially awkward. He doesn't know how to properly express his emotions because of his emotionally neglectful lusus and it screws him over in the long run.

Thirdly, He's not actually prideful. If anything, he's envious. He envies Sollux, he envies Kanaya, he envies Karkat, heck he even envies Rose. All of this envy manifests in self-hatred. He utterly despises himself. He doesn't think he's deserving of love at all, he asks almost everyone besides Feferi for some kind of Black Quadrant romance. Which also transitions nicely into my next point.

Fourthly, ERIDAN WANTS TO BE HATED!!! Eridan does NOT care for himself at ALL! He WANTS to be miserable because he thinks that's all he deserves! That's why he supports all these horrible ideologies, that's why he doesn't indulge himself in anything he personally likes (Ex. Wizards and Magic), that's why he constantly asks to have kismestitudes, because he hates himself and is self-destructive! Eridan TRULY believes that the ONLY thing he has going for him is his blood color, which is why he emphasizes it so much! He's a massive emotional wreck who gets completely disregarded by his friends. Is he an asshole? YES! ABSOLUTELY! But it's because he WANTS TO BE ONE SO NO ONE LIKES HIM! But due to this, he feels more emotionally volatile because he has no one to comfort him. He doesn't want to be loved but he DESPERATELY NEEDS IT! His character is contradictory in nature, which it's supposed to be, because he's a 13 year-old boy who's destined to be completely devoid of any and all hope!

Also before someone accuses me of being weird or something for "defending" Eridan's character, I utterly hate Eridan. Eridan is my least favorite Homestuck character. But the DISGUSTLY gross oversimplification of his character drives me completely and utterly coo-coo crazy banana pants! Get it glubbin together!

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

How murderous is Karkat and Eridan?

Eridan: "killin is all i evver done practically the ocean wwas my killing cauldron"

Karkat: loves his friends so much that it hurts

They're both really blasé about killing things like imps or game enemies, and neither of them WANT to hurt their friends. Eridan's just more used to it because it was his whole job, and he's a lot better at fighting than Karkat is.

Vriska at one point says to John that her bodycount is probably "many thousands," so we can probably use that as a reference and assume Eridan's in that same bracket, because he and Vriska have a lot of parallels. In fact, I'd go so far as to call Vriska and Eridan a literary device called "parallel characters" - by listening to Vriska tell John about her feelings about her bodycount and of her place in society, we get to learn about how Eridan's feeling, too.

If we set the bar at 3000 (the low end of "many thousands") and Vriska and Eridan are both the equivalent of 13 years old, or a little less than 700 weeks, that meant he and Vriska were averaging out to multiple kills a week (and given they probably didn't start when they were newhatches and 3000 is a low estimate, like... it was probably an insane number like 5-7 kills/week). But never anyone they "cared about," in Vriska's words, until the Team Charge debacle, or Eridan went berserk on Feferi and Sollux (we should also keep in mind that Eridan outright says to Kanaya that he doesn't want to kill people he considers his friends).

But Eridan is significantly less emotionally intelligent than Vriska (a fucking feat), has less of a support system, and has a lot of Duty and Responsibility and Fate of the Species on his shoulders, so he copes a lot worse (again, a fucking feat). For Eridan, it's less about "being murderous," and more about "society demands that I be murderous" + "if I am not murderous, everybody dies" + "when I grow up, murder is my only viable career path".

He's ANXIOUS AS FUCK at his core. Via their parallel character status, we know from Vriska that they're both actually really nervous about growing up and taking their place in a society that demands bloodshed from them. When Eridan obsesses over genocide, it's a byproduct of Literally Being The Guy That Is Preventing Genocide (to the point of not really having other hobbies). We also know that he feels guilt towards his victims (or at least more than Feferi), which we know from Vriska is societally unacceptible. And if it's unacceptible for her to feel bad, then imagine how much less okay it is for the sea dweller.

So I wouldn't necessarily call Eridan murderous - like with most things regarding Eridan, it's more complicated than that - but I would call him "on a hair trigger", "conditioned to reach towards murder as an early solution," and "obsessively/anxiously trying to live up to how murderous society demands he be," all while not at all wanting to kill people he cares about. I think it's really important to note that, even though the higher the blood the more volatile the troll, and despite being unauspiced and unmoirailled, and without relying on sopor, Eridan did not start shooting to kill until Sollux and Feferi escalated the situation.

And before anyone mentions that Feferi's in the same boat, she spends practically the whole time with Sollux, who is foreshadowed to be her moirail.

Like, the tragedy of Eridan's character is that he's lonely and terrified, but does such a good job at putting up an obnoxious front that even a lot of the audience became convinced that he basically sucked and his problems didn't matter. His dumbass plan to go to Jack was a genuine attempt to save Feferi, the person he cared most about.

If you go back and look at that conversation, Eridan's casual casteist threats aren't genuine (see my pinned Eridan essay for details) - and SOLLUX is the one who says "I should have killed you when I had the chance". And Eridan DOESN'T KILL SOLLUX, because this whole time, Eridan has not wanted to kill his friends. It's not until Feferi - the person he cares most about, the one whom he concocted that suicidal mission in order to save - turns on him in agreement that Sollux should've killed him - that makes Eridan finally lose it.

Meanwhile, Karkat just loves his friends. He loves them so fucking much. I think this is pretty well-documented about him? He's got no qualms about murdering game constructs like imps and the black king, but he feels deeply fucking hurt and betrayed by Bec Noir since he bonded with Jack/Spades Slick. I don't think Karkat ever makes a genuine death threat against anybody but past!Eridan, but he and Eridan are heavily foreshadowed to be moirails, and that conversation has a hilarious bit in the middle where Karkat seemingly forgets that he's mad at the guy and just starts telling him he's a dumbass. Later on, he expresses missing his dead friends, including/especially the assholes, in the same segment as the meteor runs into dead Feferi and Eridan, so I think that that was more an angry outburst than a genuine desire to see Eridan dead.

In fact, even though he's basically shown nothing but scorn for Gamzee and Gamzee's religious beliefs and clown-ness, and even after Gamzee murders two people and seems to be trying to murder them all, Karkat can't bring himself to kill or even fight the guy, just shooshpap him down, later ranting that Gamzee was a lovable bullshit clown that he liked a lot, and (one of) his best friend(s).

So they're both in this boat of not wanting to kill their friends, but feeling societally pressured into grandstanding that they're TOTALLY murderous assholes just trust me - but Eridan was in a position where he was forced to do it at the detriment of any other hobbies, or else everybody died, and is also one of the best fighters on the team, if not THE best. Thus, the fact that it's a viable option is not only near the forefront of his mind at all times, but he has the skills to resort to it. I guess technically, that does make him more murderous, but it's also, like... any normal person in his situation would wind up the same way, honestly.

[zan0tix]

Pleaseeee tell me more about that homescryption au

A little something between you and me and everyone else who happens to look at this post. Im working on a lineup for the four scrybes :D

Roxys design is subject to change and you guys have already seen D1rk. Jane and Jake are in progress!!! (Also D1rk and Harley are the names for dirk and jake but weve been struggling to come up with appropriately fantasical/magical names for Jane and Roxy that align with magnificus and grimora😞 Harley feels old-manish enough that it fits in well… im sure well get there but if anybody has ideas feel free to comment ✌️)

But yes i can tell you more!!! ILL PUT IT ALL UNDER THE CUT THIS POST IS GOING TO BE LONG o7

Working with cyrus repliiku to flesh it out x3 he was the one who got me into the game and im CRAZY NOW!!!!

The four alpha scrybes methods of inscribing cards are that Harley uses his magic blunderbuss and the things he shoots become cards, Roxys cards are the fantasical characters she creates in her stories, Jane will be a detective of death, uncovering how cards die and writing up a casefile in her detective agency about them (might give her a magic magnifying glass. Well see), and D1rk were trying to figure out something with Sburbs captcha card + ghost captcha system like how Po3’s cards are printed from real robots

The students/the scrybes underlings are going to be other homestuck characters or splinters!

D1rks will be the robots (aradiabot, arquius (wanted him to me more unique than just brobot + hal so he gets to be a robot) and jadebot.

Harleys will be jake-ish splinters rather than new characters. Thered be the Adventurer (prospector), the Hunter (trapper/trader), the Sailor (angler), the Ectobiologist (mycologists), and the Actor (woodcarver) and his campaigns would be more Action packed like jakes action movies type stuff hehe

Janes will be the dead trolls, nepeta, equius and feferi. Not much to say besides them being dead lol 😭

And roxys were still figuring out but nerm. Viceroy/Casey, Rose (maybe goobert but they are actually nice and kind to her) and Eridan….(lonely wizard he was banished to the shadow realm for being annoying 😁👍)

Luke Carter is going to be Calliope and Satan in the greater scheme of the daniel mullins-verse will be Caliborn/Lord English because i think itd be very funny for him to just. Be making video games and thats his evil plot. LOL and Sado would be Gamzee. (Will not expand to pony island or the hex this is just clearing up the ending of inscryption)

Kaycee would probably be Aranea but like just some normal girl. Not all that sure abt the OLD_DATA tho ??? Maybe just all the wrong doings Lord English has committed and influenced culminated into the files or the code that brought him into the universe I DUNNO.

Retconning the drawing i did when i first scribbled this AU, i believe when harley turns the other scrybes into preexisting cards d1rk would become a seagull (kingfisher replacement) roxy would become a jaguar (wolf replacement) and jane would become a jackalope (pronghorn replacement) 😁

And the way harley would be defeated would be using his blunderbuss on him with a special bullet instead of film. Po3’s decapitation fulfilled the Dirk prophecy too LOL

I think that of the gameplay/card gimmicks themselves would work basically the same but i might try and come up with more creative homestucky twists on them

Im planning on finishing the designs and making sprites and more mockup screenshots :3

I might write up or draw a comprehensive ref sheet for this au someday but for now heres what weve jotted down 👍

[meowcatmutie]

hello. here's a post about homestuck characters' typing styles, but mostly focusing on punctuation because that's something i see a lot of people get wrong when they write homestuck characters

read this post if you care about writing them perfectly! if you don't give a shit about this feel free to scroll past. I'm very autistic about all of the little things in homestuck like this so maybe i'm the only one who always notices these things. idk! i want to talk about this anyway

john/june types in all lowercase and generally uses all proper punctuation.

dave almost never uses punctuation or capitalization! this is very important! he does not use apostrophes or periods practically ever unless it's in an ellipsis (instead of separating his sentences with a period, he just writes each sentence in a new message), commas very rarely, and he only uses question marks when they improve the clarity of a sentence (i.e. if it wouldn't have been easily understood as a question otherwise). he may use exclamation points or all caps if he is shouting, but he doesn't shout often. he also very occasionally writes a word in all caps for EMPHASIS.

jade almost never uses apostrophes or periods (unless in an ellipsis), and types in all lowercase unless she is shouting. she DOES use question marks and commas, and she uses exclamation points liberally.

rose, dirk, and jane all use perfect grammar. this is pretty obvious.

jake capitalizes the first letter of each sentence and puts a period (or whatever else) at the end, but in between those there is Nothing. no commas or apostrophes, and he doesn't capitalize proper nouns.

roxy types in all lowercase, doesn't use apostrophes or periods (unless in an ellipsis), only sometimes uses question marks, and uses exclamation points frequently. her typing style is the least consistent otherwise.

aradia's typing style is very similar to dave's, but with slightly more exclamation points.

mostly everything about tavros's typing style is pretty obvious and also not all that consistent so i don't have much to say about this, except that the word "i" is always lowercase, and he uses apostrophes in their normal places.

sollux uses periods at the ends of his sentences, but he uses apostrophes inconsistently.

karkat uses all proper punctuation, but on rare occasions might omit the period at the end of a sentence.

nepeta doesn't use apostrophes or periods (except in an ellipsis), DOES use commas, and uses exclamation points VERY frequently. also, she uses cat puns, but she doesn't shoehorn a cat pun in every 3 words, and she doesn't tend to replace very common words with cat words. (yes, this is about people having her replace "you" with "mew". it bothers me)

kanaya is pretty obvious, but i'm going to iterate anyway that she almost never uses any punctuation at all.

terezi DOESN'T use periods (except in an ellipsis), and frequently omits apostrophes, but not always. also, most people know this already, but sometimes i see people get it wrong, so i will note that she only replaces the letters A, I, and E with 413.

vriska uses perfect grammar and uses exclamation points liberally. her usage of 8s to replace letters is typically confined to only B and eight/ait/ate sounds, she ONLY replaces other vowels with 8s when she is very agitated/angry/upset. often, when an "eight" sound is in the middle of a word, the T will be retained, e.g. "explan8tion", "rel8tionship", "n8ture".

equius uses almost perfect grammar, except that he ALWAYS omits punctuation at the ends of his sentences.

gamzee uses all proper punctuation.

eridan NEVER uses any punctuation.

feferi mostly uses perfect grammar. obviously she uses a lot of exclamation points too, because she is -EXCIT-ED.

thx for reading. if you ask me to beta your fic i will do it btw

[relaxxattack]

okay so i don't want to particularly call out these kinds of headcanons as bad. but they highlight a specific fandom trend ive seen for ages so here goes:

the extended zodiac is not alternian canon, nor zodiac.

i know that's brash for a lighthearted official personality quiz. but i've seen this zodiac presented frequently as the End All of trollsigns -- even claims that all trolls MUST derive from these 288. this is a complete misrepresentation of original canon.

first, obviously, the notion that your personality is determined by your caste is literally just what troll racism is, so the canocity of this test claims racism as truth. second of all, the traits are not even accurate to the trolls we DO see in canon- they're pulled from western zodiac.

the zodiac's also determined by lunar sway; nonsense because alternian trolls don't have lunar sway. it's a "moon a sburb player dreams on", and none of these trolls are sburb players. (i also feel like this should go for aspects, though that is a more controversial opinion)

so yeah, the extended zodiac is inaccurate and purely just fandom sburb personality-type nonsense. but does that really make it noncanon? plenty of stuff on alternia is nonsense.

except... homestuck trolls don't believe that signs are a zodiac that determine their personality.

not only is the idea of signs being related to some sort of personality zodiac never once mentioned by a troll, but the signs are frequently tied to other things that have nothing to do with personality. kanaya equivalents trollsigns to signatures, and later vriska explains the concept to john as being similar to a family crest, bemoaning that trolls have to do much more searching for clues or their ancestry than humans do. cronus also refers to his sign as his signature.

virska does use the phrasing that trolls who have the same sign "have a lot in common", but she also does this explicitly in the context of explaining to john how troll ancestry works, as hussie further notes in the commentary of that page that signs are included in physical/genetic characteristics trolls look to for ancestry clues. even hiveswap, which wants you to believe in the zodiac, concludes that signs are specific to troll surnames and that there are signs outside of it. multiple trolls in homestuck have signs that do not appear in the extended zodiac.

the extended zodiac quiz ≠ the alternian sign alphabet.

alternians wouldn't know what aspects or lunar sways are, nor have personalities equivilant to their signs (feferi and meenah are right there). deciding that trollsigns = personality test is a purely human concept that comes from our western zodiac.

but you know what alternians DO have?

THEY HAD THEIR OWN FUCKING CONSTELLATIONS AND ZODIAC. FROM THEIR OWN CREATORS. THIS WHOLE TIME.

where are the headcanons about troll's placements on THAT zodiac?

[cure-typhoon]

please please please talk more about the beta troll’s friendship 🙏

You have summoned me in my favorite subject: 🎉🎉🎉🎉 FRIENDSHIP!!! 🎉🎉🎉🎉 Take a sit because this is going to be long, so long i may end up dividing into different posts!

Okey so sadly we don't have a lot of info of the full group dynamic besides some clues and what we know is them literally at their worst thinking they we're going to die in a meteor,after a full one month campaign in the game they had won yet was taken from them being chased by an undefeatable enemy that destroyed their planets and probably their lusus too. And at the end three of them going on a rampage and killing the rest of the team

So not the most reliable info of how their normal dynamic as a friendgroup would be, but tbh it could never be "healthy friendgroup" in a human sense because, well, they live in Alternia.

But even in hell, the flower of friendship can blossom, so lets talk about the fucked up friendship between these kids:

We know little about how their friendship started, contrary with the Beta Kids that we know because of June's birthday presente for Jade arriving in the past to young Jade with her pesterchum and her probably looking at the clouds in Prospit and seeing there the pesterchum of Rose and Dave following suit

Because the Beta Trolls are a much bigger group and we dont really know if they actually celebrate their wriggling days, as none of the trolls mentioned it but it could also be in part because of Karkat's disdain for the celebration or them maybe not knowing because he is a very private kid after all

Maybe Kanaya was the first troll that befriended all of them, like Jade was and both of them being the assigned Space player of their group and the first ones to wake in Prospit, but i also doubt that considered she didnt went through the birthday gift shenanigan that young Jade went through

So what most likely happened: The trolls who we're closest to eachother (Equius and Vriska, Eridan and Feferi, Aradia and Tavros, Terezi and Vriska* (not totally sure about that one) and maybe Sollux and Aradia/Feferi) befriended eachother first and meet the rest (Karkat, Nepeta, Gamzee, Kanaya) online and just shared their info between eachother.

I honestly wonder who thought of the idea of all sharing their Trollian between eachother, maybe Feferi? maybe it just happened overtime? but what matters right now is the

F R I E N D S H I P

So today we will talk about the underrated friendships between the group

Starting with Aradia and Tavros! Both members of Team Charge, i see very few people talk about them as friends even though they were obviously very close considering they we're part of a Flarp campaign together.

Both seem to match pretty well personality wise, both adventurous and wanting to have fun in the game, Aradia knows that Tavros picked a hard class for himself yet she still encourages him and tries to cheer him on and advice him in the case of Vriska trying to get under his skin.

When Vriska starts to surrond him, she tries to communicate with her first, but sadly she and terezi where distracted by Doc Scratch, so he gets paralized

Side note: After Aradia and Terezi, his third option for asking for help is Karkat, which is...interesting, they dont talk a lot but when they do its Tavros trying to get advice/help from him (2 out of 3 convos), so either Karkat and Tavros have more convos besides the ones showed (very likely) or Karkat just having a reputation of helping with issues that he is the first one who comes to Tavros's mind

also Karkat calling him bro is so fucking funny cdbhd, idk if its sarcasm or if its genuine like with Eridan but he seems worried for a little before going on a rant about how stupid this is, only to come back trying to advice him to do this in private (also he winks at him as GTavrossprite but thats smt for the Tavkat shippers)

Anyway, back to Aradia, after her death we dont know about their relationship that much, we know that the whole reason that this whole revenge cycle was because Aradia wanted to avenge Tavros

But after her death, we don't know if they talk or if Tavros even knows she is dead, as it was mostly secret that only Sollux, Vriska, Terezi and Equius seem to know,

What we know is that Aradia keeps Tavros close to her heart, as the only reason she didnt straight up kill Vriska is

Because he was there to see it

And thats all the info we have of their relationship while Aradia was a robot, is more than likely Tavros confronted Vriska (besides creating Bec Noir) because Aradiabot had just exploded and he was blaming her for that too (especulation)

Their post-death/revival shows them having the same relationship pre-aradia's death, after they find eachother in the afterlife

Theyre big pals :)

Staying with Tavros, another friendship people dont seem to talk a lot about is Kanaya and Tavros, which tbh, we dont have a conversation on screen between them, but we know they talk and Kanaya tries to mediate to help him when Vriska is bullying him

And also, even after she cut Vriska out because of the whole ''Having a crush on her but finding out she has a crush on Tavros'' (probably because she was sulking) she seems to have a fine relationship with Tavros, as she made a Tinkerbull plushie for him

To other friendships, Kanaya and Feferi! Another group of trolls with very few coversations, but we can easily tell in those that they cared for eachother

They have a lot in common, being of the few trolls who woked up in their moons before the game, having a huge responsability as their lusus can either kill or revive their entire civilization, being in a unhappy moiralliagance (with their cases kinda mirroring eachother, with Feferi not wanting to be in any quadrants while Eridan wants to change them, while Kanaya wants to change quadrants while Vriska seems to be fine with where they are) and knowing their lusus were going to die when they were 13

Feferi and Kanaya seem to have very a similar relationship as Karkat and Eridan, where they advise eachother about their moirals + possible romantic relationships. And their very contrasting personalities helps them balance eachother out

Feferi is even comfortable enough to invite Kanaya to the horn pile and knowing Kanaya's expressions enough to guess that she is nervous about coming off as meddling with them

After Feferi gets killed off, Kanaya is already ready to attack, only waiting to see what Eridan is planning to do, attack her first or trying to escape

If it weren't for Kanaya distracting herself with the matriorb, and Eridan inmediately picking on this opportunity

To piss her off enough to set her off and attack him first

So she is an easier target that he can kill her off without a fight

Speaking about this two, next time we will to talk about the complicated (annoying) friendship between these two, why next time? because this post is already getting to fucking long!

Come here for Part 2 -> Here! (when its done this will get updated with a link lol)

[cringefail-clown]

been thinking about alpha feferi and her ruling over beforus, especially in contrast to how condesce ruled alternia. like, beta meenah kept her iron grip over her citizens largely because of the existance of gl'bgolyb. cant do much against her if she can wipe the entirety of troll society with one command given to her lusus. however, gl'bgolyb was a "gift" given to her by doc scratch in the post-scratch timeline, so alpha feferi didnt have that ace in her sleeve avaliable.

wondering how this all turned out. she probably didnt have as much to say in how beforus was actually ran. beta meenah couldnt give less of a shit, tossing the responsibility of governing to the largely male upper castes and going to wreck havoc in space away from all that boring political mess, but i imagine beta feferi wouldve wanted to be much more proactive in managing her citizens. maybe she started bright-eyed and ready to flip how things were ran on beforus, but her ideas were quickly twisted and mangled into something much more nefarious that would benefit only the highbloods? sure, she had her longevity as a fuchsia, but how much her lone voice could actually accomplish against thousands of governing highbloods, who also lived long lives? i dunno, thinking about it makes me feel kind of sad

[completelyandtotalyuneventful]

Homestuck AU where the game never happens and the main 12 trolls all steal a spaceship and run away from alternia together simply because they all care about Karkat too much to let him be murdered because of his blood color (and also Sollux doesn’t want to be turned into a fucking battery)

Originally the idea came up as a half joke in their conversations about stealing one of the royal ships near fefs house and taking a road trip before they were all sent off alternia, but as time went on they slowly realized how fucked up their borderline dystopian society was. More importantly they realized that if they did nothing, Karkat would die.

This is a group of twelve friends. Whatever rivalry’s and spats they have don’t matter, because at the end of the day they are all FRIENDS and are never going to recover when they finally have to face the music and are forced into the rolls their caste puts them in. They are a friend group and they are held together mainly by Karkat fucking Vantas, a troll with a mutated blood color who will be culled as soon as the drones catch up to him.

So they come up with a plan to escape alternia before that can happen.

Some people are on board with the plan immediately. Kanaya, Sollux, Terezi, Gamzee, and Nepeta are pretty ride or die for the guy (and, once again, Sollux does not want to be a battery. But it’s mainly because he cares for KK). Nepeta manages to convince Equius, and Terezi convinces Vriska, as the two of them also realize that the moment they hit 8 sweeps they’ll likely be separated from all of their friends forever. Tavros decides that being with them is better than whatever he’d be forced to do as an adult. Equius builds Aradia a body and she is already getting packed for the trip, no questions asked.

Feferi is a bit more hesitant. She wants to stay and help alternia, but she knows it’s unlikely that she will be able to defeat the current Emperess. She decides to leave Alternia to escape her possible death, and to also train to become strong enough to claim the throne and change her planet. Eridan is probably the last to agree to the plan, and only because Feferi is going.

So now they’re in space. And they’re don’t really know what they’re doing or where they’re going, but they’re together and that’s all that really matters. It’s like meteorstuck except they have no end goal, no place to be. Just 12 kids who’ve fled from their dystopian home to try and learn how to heal and figure out what they want to do with the rest of their lives.

And then maybe they crash to earth and meet the kids but they could also just go on fun space adventures idk I haven’t fleshed this out that much

[thewertsearch]

I'm not surprised. After the stunt you pulled with that mind-control chip, you're lucky she didn't give you the Vriska treatment.

NEPETA: :33 < we can always curl up in the pile again to talk about f33lings :33 EQUIUS: D --> Nepeta, for goodness sa%es, a man can only di%uss feelings for so much time […] EQUIUS: D --> We e%amined my emotional state until we were both bl00 in the face […] NEPETA: :33 < b100 b100 b100 b100 b100 NEPETA: :33 < i just love how you say that word! EQUIUS: D --> I know

How, exactly, does he say 'b100'?

Karkat's quirk manifests as literal shouting, so I think Equius is literally saying 'bee one hundred'. Fantastic.

EQUIUS: D --> Nepeta, I think it would behoove us to address the e%treme danger in a serious manner NEPETA: :33 < you mean about gamz33? h33h33! NEPETA: :33 < im still not sure if i can believe it! […] EQUIUS: D --> His is the richest and most noble b100d possible among the high land dwellers EQUIUS: D --> As such, he is prone to being more violent and unpredictable than any of us

I'm not so sure about that.

Like - sure, based on the sample we have, the top half of the hemospectrum does seem to produce more aggressive trolls. Terezi, Vriska, Equius, Gamzee and Eridan are all demonstrably more violent than their lowblood compatriots. But are their attitudes really a product of nature?

Take Vriska, for example. She was forced to be a killer by the blue-blooded lusus that adopted her. Yeah, she's violent and unpredictable now, after years of abuse, but her situation would drive any troll to desperate measures.

Do we really think Aradia wouldn't become a murderer if her mom was a hungry spider? Of course she would!

Then there's Eridan, a troll whose behavior could not stem more obviously from the classism that was ingrained into him by society. His culture reinforces the idea that violence is his right, and that it's particularly justifiable when directed towards his inferiors.

Would Eridan really be like this if he was raised on Earth? Wouldn't Tavros or Karkat also become shitheads if they were handed this kind of privilege?

Let's not forget Feferi - a troll who, by Equius's logic, should be the most dangerous of the entire cast. She's not, and I think it's simply because there's no one above her on the hierarchy. Who's going to tell the princess that she's a failure of a highblood?

From where I'm sitting, it really seems like highbloods are aggressive due to cultural factors, rather than biological ones. Their blood doesn't predispose them to violence - it marks them as trolls who are expected to be violent. A case could be made that hemospectrum position is, in effect, a secondary gender for trolls - an institution that enforces entirely artificial standards for their behavior, which are then internalized as 'natural' by the populace.

So no, I don't think Gamzee was 'biologically predestined' to be like this - I think he picked it up from somewhere. Maybe he was more susceptible to Alternian propaganda than we realized, or maybe someone like Doc Scratch was manipulating him from the shadows. It wouldn't be the first time he's goaded a troll into violence.

You ever roleplay so hard that you literally gain a cat's slitted eyes when you're pissed?

EQUIUS: D --> I will now seek the highb100d, Nepeta […] EQUIUS: D --> I will e%act caution, even when safety 100% to be 100% assured EQUIUS: D --> Even so EQUIUS: D --> I would still like to take the opportunity to say […] EQUIUS: D --> Goodbye

Oh, man.

Alright, sound off. Does anyone really think Equius is going to stand up to a highb100d? No?

Ok, great. Let's stop beating around the bush, then.

Equius is basically walking to his death here, and he knows it. The comic's really laying the death flags on thick, with a very clearly telegraphed 'final goodbye' for Nepeta. It's almost too obvious, but I don't think it's going to be a fakeout this time. We can't all be Kanaya.

NEPETA: :33 < well ok, goodbye! NEPETA: :33 < but you had better believe i will s33 you again soon, equius! EQUIUS: D --> Yes, you will

Yeah you will - the next time you go to sleep.

[officialsollux]

What do you think of erifef :-)

ahhh erifef..... it's about the misunderstanding. it's about being the opposite of who you seem to be when you're looking at one another. it's about the being kids too young dealing with stakes too high and using violence and using each other until finally that violence goes ON one another.

Feferi is VERY misunderstood in canon in part because she sounds very sure of herself and the things people around her are doing when in fact that narrative is NOT the true reality of the situation. she is. so so so. and i truly do mean so. witch of life core. she needs Eridan and she is in some ways using him and then switching her desire to be rid of him when she doesn't need him. she views the things he does always as sincere or manipulative in the opposite direction Eridan is acting, which is ironic since they've known each other for so long, but also, half the time Eridan gets absorbed. Feferi finds Eridan too much! he is too much for her! and she is someone who like. has to put herself first or she will twist the situation to suit those needs. but for Eridan she resents him in part because she did try to fit herself into a position with him for a long time because of this relationship with orphaning he had with her that she felt free of in the game. Feferi is in no place when she is a preteen/young teenager to be around very hyper-sensitive and traumatised individuals who she feels any responsibility towards. Eridan is like all of this plus she feels trapped. Which just sort of captures them in this cycles of him feelings overbearing so forth.

Eridan on the other hand is like. Not seeing Feferi as manipulative, but rather fated -- which is part of troll romance and also part of being thirteen -- but it does give some distance between who she is and how he's romanticising her. He loses himself in her perspective. And he is also devaluing a dynamic Feferi is putting effort into maintaining even though it is taxing on her because he wants her in another quadrant. And to be honest, had Feferi returned his feelings, I DO think they'd have been much better flush rather than pale -- hence Feferi being able to like Sollux who has quite a few of the traits that make her irate with Eridan. Though to be honest, I think that relationship probably would wear on her too. Eridan also has all these opinions he's loud about that he doesn't really mean that are the opposite of what Feferi's trying to do. I cannot even truly get a grasp if she believes it because I kind of do think she should be able to see through it, but I do think Feferi is very very bad at empathy. I don't say that negatively -- how you grow with low empathy can be completely neutral. But Feferi is also this counter to Eridan's perspective and they are wrapped up in each other more than anything so if we're being real, I think their perspectives match up more than people would think -- they just cope differently with coming to grips with the position they hold and how to self identify. they miss giant chunks of themselves in opposing ways. they are each other's foils.

now if we're talking about shipping erifef. my opinion is. when they are thirteen. it is not going to work. they are toxic bad bad bad for one another. Eridan is obnoxious to some extent but a lot of this is just on how Feferi kind of is -- which is why I feel like there's not enough great Feferi meta out there. She has sooooo many great traits, and she is so young, but she also is manipulative and violent and sure of how things should be even when she could be wrong. How she treats Eridan is not great on many occasions, not that she doesn't have every right to get space from him, and not that Eridan's isn't someone who shoots himself in the foot constantly trying to interact or portray himself ever.

I used to be really intense about them for a while and then I went the opposite way and I just like this week started thinking of them romantically again. But it's like very much in the context of this fic I'm writing.

I think if they both grew up enough to umask a lot (which I think for Eridan will end with a complete collapse of self and will happen fast and will end up with him falling into guilt & self hatred, still self obsessed, but with a loss of his armour and ideology) (likewise, for Feferi, I think it'd need to be drawn to her attention, repeatedly, shoved in her face what she is and what's she's like, and I think the way she'd come to grips is in fear of the weight on her shoulders and what if she, after time passes by and by and by, could become like her ancestor?) they could potentially be a romantic match.

The thing is. Eridan does genuinely love Feferi a LOT. And I do think Feferi loves Eridan too, she just isn't equipped to meet his needs. Feferi wants to help people so badly. She wants the world to be better. She has a world in her head that's counter to the violence pushed upon them, but it's still wrapped up in the huge privilege they both share. She can't really handle not wanting to fulfill a position, especially one someone else could. Like, the situation with Eridan does need to Be Flipped on Eridan, whether or not that's an accurate representation of the situation or not. Because the way Feferi needs to meet her needs also needs to met by her sense of security in perception. She resents Eridan mostly because of what she doesn't want to be for him.

now. if we are talking pale -- I don't think there's ever a time when it would be necessarily smart for the two of them to be moirails. that's like, the worst matched quadrant for them by FAR. flushed i'm like, well Feferi doesn't like Eridan and that's her right, so it's one of those things where, I wouldn't want her to change her mind to suit him unless they'd both moved on from his childhood crush you know. I CAN see her liking him as they mature. If they unmask. I think she might kind of start to like the balance Eridan has and the sweetness he holds for her. She also has feelings for Sollux who has more in common with Eridan than either of them would like to admit. I can see it being very sweet, especially if Eridan has a good moirail too. But I still think it could go VERY badly. their personalities are kind of bad for one another in many ways. So it depends on how they grow up and how stable they are.

they should not be kismeses. it would uh. destroy Eridan. even if they weren't childhood friends and he liked her red. like i cannot tell you enough how bad that would be. still perhaps not as poorly matched as moirails for both of them, but for Eridan. yeah not good.

so yeah flushed erifef could go hard in very specific circumstances, childhood friends make me SOFT. it's about the love it's about the history it's about the growing up together. i think erifef is compelling and toxic. they are foils. but in more complicated ways than people always think.