#and I can't overstate how much i love the books

[esotericdescent]

I HAVE FINISHED S2 and y'all .... I have so many feelings without any idea of what to do with them all right this moment ( bonus points for having a headache rn from crying lmAO ), but I can give some thoughts for now. I absolutely fucking LOVED season 2. It was very different in a lot of places, but the thing I loved about it was that it lead with something in Leigh's writing that, imo, she is known and loved for ( or at least she is by me ); her twists and turns, the way she keeps you constantly guessing until the very last moment. I feel like if they hadn't changed things, they wouldn't have been able to pull off that specific feeling for those of us who read the books. I had no idea what was going to happen for most of the time, save for the direct references and foreshadowing I caught, and it was a wild ride and SO much fun. I loved it. I cannot overstate how much I loved it tbh. The soft moments and those heart-wrenching, complicated moments, the equal attention in the various types of relationships was also spot on imo and it's something I love about her writing as well. There were so many different kinds of hugs and shows of affection between those various relationships and I'm absolutely weak for it. The show is 100% like a fanfic, an AU, and I personally didn't feel like they did a disservice to the source material or the characters. Things made sense in the context of the AU. I feel very passionately about all of this, but I respect those who feel differently. I just wanted to get some of my feelings out. This does mean that it'll be a lot harder to mix both book and show canon, so I may keep things more separate—but that just means that I'll lean into either show canon or book canon, depending on who I'm writing with and what their preferences are. I love both the show and the books as their own separate canon so I am more than happy to lean into one or the other.

[scarlet--wiccan]

Fantastic Four (2022) #23

[thegreenthepeacetheorange]

Everlark (Catching Fire, Ch. 11)

probably one of my fave everlark-heavy chapters and one i believe is so important and so huge for their relationship development. it's long but please bear with me because it's such a great chapter and there's so much to say and it'll be worth it!!! this is my best one

i love how haymitch and peeta have just become a part of katniss's family. like they don't seem out of place just sitting playing chess in her house.

peeta instantly picking up on her being hurt when she makes that noise and holding her steadily once he does

peeta carrying katniss up the stairs and tucking her into bed

katniss catching and holding his hand to keep him there and trying to fight off her lowered inhibitions due to the sleep syrup. that whole 'drunk words are sober thoughts' thing. she's fighting hard to 'control her tongue' but man, i wish she would've let go. there she goes keeping secrets from us again as the unreliable narrator

her holding his hand against her face, him warming her hand in his own. ugh. HANDS.

"stay with me" - the fact that she doesn't tell us what peeta says here but we know from mockingjay that he says 'always.' more evidence that peeta was endgame, carefully constructed by suzanne collins herself, from chapter one of book one

peeta being a husband and making sure katniss gets her daily cheese buns. for so much of the trilogy so far, we have seen gale be synonymous with providing for katniss and her family through hunting but peeta was that figure when he gave her the burnt bread and he's also that figure now, constantly providing her family with bread, keeping them fed and warm.

it is so IMPORTANT that katniss includes peeta in her family plant book project. it is her family book, passed on through generations. her mother and father worked on it together. it is so deeply hers and she lets him in. she lets him become a part of her family book by asking him to draw the pictures and including him in the process. i actually can't overstate the importance of this. this is something they do together that also later, after the war, becomes a crucial part of their healing process (and haymitch also ends up contributing - family!). at this point in the trilogy, he is her family.

i'm just going to include most of this passage and do a full on analysis of it because it is IMPORTANT:

I like to watch his hands as he works, making a blank page bloom with strokes of ink, adding touches of colour to our previously black and yellowish book. His face takes on a special look when he concentrates. His usual easy expression is replaced by something more intense and removed that suggests an entire world locked away inside him. I've seen flashes of this before: in the arena, or when he speaks to a crowd, or that time he shoved the Peacekeepers' guns away from me in District 11. I don't know quite what to make of it. I also become a little fixated on his eyelashes, which ordinarily you don't notice much because they're so blond. But up close, in the sunlight slanting in from the window, they're a light golden colour and so long I don't see how they keep from getting all tangled up when he blinks. One afternoon, Peeta stops shading a blossom and looks up so suddenly that I start, as though I were caught spying on him, which in a strange way maybe I was. But he only says, "You know, I think this is the first time we've ever done anything normal together." "Yeah," I agree. Our whole relationship has been tainted by the Games. Normal was never a part of it. "Nice for a change."

her fully checking him out as he works, his hands, his eyelashes. katniss describes him so poetically, like the sunshine slanting in from the window. what a romantic setting. she is constantly talking about him in sunlight (this is just one example) and it's like, in her eyes, there's always this glow around him, this light radiating from him. and then she gets caught checking him out.

peeta can make a blank page bloom with colour. and there we go with the language of growth again. this boy who radiates hope, possibility for katniss. this boy that she associates with life and with the growth of dandelions. he breathes life into things - in this case, her family book.

katniss is so intrigued by and deeply, carnally into his intensity. like she is down bad for him here. all her examples are examples of him protecting her: in the arena, in interviews, from the peacekeepers. she is so into this charming, dominant, protective, passionate side of him that i don't know how people can say she isn't romantically/sexually into him. like the proof is there. she doesn't know what to make of it because this side of him scratches an itch that she hasn't allowed herself to confront until now (and not even now, because she's unsure here but it's there. and we know she'll confront it after the war when she mentally can)

so far, katniss has been thinking that her relationship with peeta is the capitol's design. it is overwhelmed the the games, by the capitol, by snow, by the cameras, the flashing lights, the crowds, the having to 'act up' element of it, that katniss is constantly trying to tell herself that her connection to peeta is inauthentic in so many ways. but here, we see them in a 'normal' moment. a quiet intimate moment. a moment just for them. and it seems like bliss. removed from all the other capitol-forced elements, they choose to sit together and work on her family book and it is such a truly lovely moment for them. and it's not singular. while katniss is injured, they do it for a lengthy time. and i think that this particular chapter, this particular era of their relationship, post-victory tour and pre-quarter quell announcement, is when their relationship really develops to the point of katniss fully being in love with him. i think she was falling for him long before, and the victory tour also solidified them more but here, removed from the games and the capitol, given a sense of normalcy, i think katniss really got a taste of what life with peeta would be like, in all his shades. his kindness, his goodness, his intensity. she was thinking about all of it. him carrying her up and down stairs, bringing her bread, showing his passion/artistic talents, him just being there for her and her family, him looking after and protecting her despite her 'choosing' gale, how he looks, how he works, how he smiles and laughs, how he touches her. because of these days, she gets to the point where she's willing to die and leave prim and her mother behind to ensure peeta lives.

[jkrockin]

Wait what guy who hadn't read Atlas Shrugged?

I was pretty sure I'd told this story here, but a cursory search suggests that I have not. Okay let's gooooo

Many moons ago, I worked in an emergency services call centre. I worked nights- I could get regular shifts, it paid well, and I am a huge freak, just like everyone else who works nights in a call centre. It is a lifestyle that attracts freaks. Some of my coworkers weren't full-time creatures of the night, but students or whoever who picked up occasional nights for the extra money, and one of them was Libertarian Shithead, who we'll call LS for short.

LS was a twentysomething white dude who wore a lot of name brand surfwear and designer sunglasses. I assume his parents were rich. LS loved nothing better than recreational arguing. Unfortunately, he wasn't very good at it; he had some of the most dogshit opinions I've ever encountered in the wild, and was terrible at defending them. He'd say some crap about how Gattaca-type eugenics is Fine, Actually, because if you let people make designer babies, the ~*Free Market will decide what traits are desirable! Racism and colourism and ableism and sexism and intersexism won't affect those choices at all! And I'd get mad, because I have principles to speak of, and we'd get into it, and WITHOUT FAIL, we'd get maybe halfway into an actual discussion about whatever horseshit garbage he was on tonight, and the second he thought he was losing, he'd say "oh, well. I'm an ~*Objectivist, so you can't really understand my perspective unless you've read Ayn Rand." Then he'd sigh, and change the subject.

At the time I had not read any Ayn Rand. Being fundamentally powered by spite, I withstood maybe three weeks of this shit before I pirated an epub of Atlas Shrugged, put it on my e-reader, and proceeded to slam through it at supersonic speed so I could finally get to finish an argument with this terrible boy.

Anon, I fucking hated Atlas Shrugged. The book is bad. It's way too long, every single character is an unbelievable douche, the prose sucks. Ayn Rand wants to fuck a train so so so badly, but the prose is so turgid I couldn't even get invested in how much she wants to fuck a train. And the core of the matter, the politics I was there to understand, are, y'know. Objectivist. Eye-bleedingly selfish and capitalistic, expressed in amazingly childish and blinkered terms. Even the bits where it seems like the shithead capitalist dudes want to fuck each other are too mired in the scunge of Rand's terrible views to be enjoyable.

But I read the fucking thing! I powered through it with only quite minimal complaining! I finished the book on the train to work, and when I saw that LS was on that night, I plonked myself in a seat by him, and metaphorically cracked my knuckles, ready to fuckin' party. In a perfect world, I would have been cool enough to have waited for the perfect mid-argument moment to drop, but I didn't. I think I lasted exactly until we were both off a call at the same time, and then leaned in as close as the desk dividers would let me, and said "So I finished Atlas Shrugged. I have some thoughts."

I cannot overstate how quickly it became obvious that LS had not read the book. For a hot second I thought maybe it had just been a while and the fine details had escaped him, but no; he didn't know who half the characters were, or key points of the plot, or even know any of the stuff in the John Galt speech, i.e. the big juggernaut of Here's How Objectivism Works near the end of the book about Objectivism that this fucking guy hypothetically based his Objectivist views on. It took me maybe five minutes, in between calls, to realise this, and another five for him to admit he hadn't actually read any Ayn Rand. He'd read her Wikipedia page.

ANYWAY I didn't speak to him for like a month after that, and I don't think either of us lost out there!

[piratecaptainscaptainpirates]

A Guide for Writing Ed's Top Surgery!

I'm getting my top surgery on July 3 (whoo!!!) and I'm using this as an opportunity to gather info for fic purposes. I love writing Ed as a trans man, and I love everyone else who writes and draws him as trans, so I wanted to share the notes I'm taking to help others who want to draw or write Ed's top surgery experiences! I'll update this as we go in sections (pre-op, the surgery itself, and initial recovery).

This is all just my experience with getting a double-incision with free nipple grafts surgery, and it's from a US perspective. Your mileage may vary and this definitely isn't meant as a medical guide. If you're having your own top surgery listen to your surgeon, not me.

Pre-op guide below the cut!

In the months before his surgery:

Getting insurance approval for top surgery in the US, depending on where you live, can be incredibly frustrating, dehumanizing, and painful. Ed will need at least one letter from a therapist or other mental health provider, and he'll probably feel very frustrated about being treated like a child who is unable to make his own medical decisions. I had several insurance denials, needed to switch insurance companies (currently having to settle for one that's more expensive in every other way but will at least approve this surgery), and needed three (fucking 3!!) letters from mental health professionals to get my approval. Hard to overstate how much it sucked and how much it makes you feel like the people writing state and insurance laws see you as a stupid child. Ed will very likely have Lingering Issues about this experience.

Ed will need an initial consultation to confirm he's a good candidate for surgery. Mine was quick and easy!

Once he gets his approval, or once he decides to pay out-of-pocket, he'll get his surgery date! Depending on his clinic, this could be years away or it could be as soon as a couple months out, so anything is realistic for your story. You could lean into the joy of a date that's sooner than he'd expected or he could be frustrated by the whole process grinding to a halt.

His pre-op appointment:

The pre-op appointment is when Ed will meet his surgeon and get the details for his surgery date. Mine was almost two weeks before my surgery. He'll also receive packets of information and his post-op check-up dates. If he smokes, he should be tobacco-free by this date.

This is when Ed and Stede will be able to ask any last-minute questions. Ed can ask here if the surgeon will be willing to give him heart-shaped nipples, but they'll probably say no

This appointment is also when Ed will be struck by the reality of having post-operative drains and not being able to shower for a week. This will be deeply upsetting for him

Ed will probably be very nervous for this appointment (what if something goes wrong and he can't get his surgery?) but he'll be relieved and comforted by the whole experience. The mood in the whole plastic surgery center, for me, was downright fucking jubilant, all the nurses who saw my name on the chart were congratulating me and telling me how happy they were for me! This WILL make Ed cry

The week before his surgery:

It begins to sink in that Ed is about to have major surgery. He's excited, of course, but he'll be a little nervous too! Stede will need to give him lots of cuddles and promise to take good care of him

They'll need to make lots of Ed's favorite comfort foods to freeze so he has something to eat when he can't raise his arms well enough to cook

Ed should practice doing things without lifting his arms above his shoulders. He'll have a great time stomping around and pretending to be a dinosaur

He'll want to prepare a selection of comfy clothes he can wear without raising his arms. Stede's robes will be perfect

The biggest struggle for Ed during his recovery will be the boredom. Stede should help him build up a stock of video games, books, Lego sets, sketchbooks, and model building kits to keep his hands and brain busy!

They should prepare Ed's sickbed. He might be more comfortable sleeping upright on the couch or in an armchair propped up by pillows. He'll have to see how he feels after surgery and what positions are most comfortable, so getting both the couch and their bed ready is a good idea!

At some hospitals, including mine, you won't know what time to arrive at the hospital for your surgery until the day before, when they'll call you to let you know (they do this based on surgery room flow to ensure you arrive at the right time). Ed will find this stressful; Stede will HATE it.

Ed may need to shower with a special antiseptic skin wash the night before and the morning of his surgery. He will not enjoy having to get up at the asscrack of dawn to shower

The night before Ed's surgery, he and Stede should pack bags, just in case. Top surgery is an outpatient procedure, but just in case anything goes wrong and Ed has to stay overnight, it's good to be prepared. A change of comfy clothes, a book, and Ed's Nintendo Switch are good things to pack. Ed will also love taking a stuffed animal to keep him company after Stede can't go any further with him (and he can use the plushie to cushion the seatbelt on the car ride home).

Ed's super excited and everything's set for him! Good luck, Ed! 🥳

[christiansorrell]

TTRPG Read-Through: Traveller - Book 1

Here is a read-through I did about a year and a half ago (originally posted on Twitter) of one of the all time classics: Traveller by Game Designers' Workshop! This read-through just covers Book 1 - Characters and Combat from the original Traveller box set trio of books. - Christian

This is the 1981 Second Edition printing of the classic Traveller three zine box set! Been wanting to read this for ages now. It's discussed A LOT in Mothership circles.

Really interesting to see GM-less and solo play options here. Didn't realize that was being done explicitly at this time. Also, nice to see "he or she" language here rather than the just "he" you see a lot in older games.

The UPP is clearly the creation of an utterly deranged mind. This seems like a huge overcomplication of just listing stats (unless all your players are proficient in hexadecimal).

[Hi, it's me from the future here (aka now - 2024): I've learned to embrace and love the UPP (or more specifically the planet stat version from one of the other books). It's complicated at first but really quick and cool once you know how to read it.]

I really like Social Standing as a stat replacement for charisma or charm or other social skills you tend to see. Feels like it would have more impact on the story and less of a "Roll to see if you convince him, I guess" sort of anticlimax social skills have most of the time.

I'm now into the "you can die during char creation in Traveller" bits. Really cool in some ways. Really comical in others. It recommends you enlist your bad stat characters into the Scout service because of it's high mortality rate (so you can roll a diff char before play), lol.

Essentially, you roll stats and that's your entire character but to give them some experience they can enlist in a Service. You have to roll to get in and may get rejected. If so, you submit to the draft (get into one at random). You can die. You can gain skills and promotions.

Honestly, the char creation feels like a solo game unto itself. Risk v reward of how far to push your enlistments to boost your skills and standing and benefits. You could have a whole story in your head by the end of it. Great Session 0 material.

As a 34 yr old, this hurts. Apparently, I have -1 Strength, Dexterity and Endurance now...

I admire commitment but asking GMs to use this full char creator for all NPCs (which means generating chars until you get one capable of filling the role you need) is truly too wild. Best part: at the end, it just says you can also pick whatever you want for stats and skills.

The weapons and intro text have much more of a space as a new age of sail vibe to them than I was anticipating. It's cool. Far more Dune than Alien (so far).

Interestingly (unless I missed something), skills are detached from your stats. Your base stats make getting into a Service easier and help you with Saving Throws and such, but skills have their own modifiers based on the situation and your expertise. It's cool (if a bit dense)!

In case you were wondering, there is absolutely no art in this entire book. I'm hoping we'll get some in one of the other two books with vehicles and ships and such but won't be holding my breath. Gives the whole thing a very Serious vibe.

Always interesting to see how older games chose to handle this (or not).

Here's the UPP in action along with quick listing of other character info. Interesting even if it is just too overcomplicated for my tastes.

Can't overstate how much char creation feels like a whole solo game of its own. You can roll a character at age 18 and have them go through seven 4-yr terms in a Service before retiring and having substantial cash, specific possessions, memberships and social standings. Wild.

The character sheet mentions PSIONICS which is exciting (but I'll have to wait till Book 3 for more on that apparently).

Combat is straightforward but has some unique bits: a focus on stealth as an option and movement/attacks occur by all parties simultaneously which means everyone (enemies too) gets to move and then everyone chooses who to attack and you roll them all. Sounds really fun.

Stats have cool effects in battle. Your Endurance stat is the number of attacks you can make before needing to rest (can you imagine if DnD just didn't let you do a base attack at a point?). Strength and Dex can boost or lower certain weapon rolls like you'd expect.

If trained in a weapon, you can give your expertise as a negative mod to your enemy's rolls to attack you to reflect parrying and blocking which is cool. The skills also add to your attack rolls. Skills just seem really useful overall here.

I just love that we get stats for broadswords, revolvers, and laser carbines. Plus, there are even special tables for archaic weapons for when encountering lower-tech civilizations. It feels like a really wide open interpretation of what space could look like. Feels exciting.

A few more equipment tables and a final quick reference page at the back and that's all for Book 1. I'll be back with Book 2 and 3 in the coming days!

Main thoughts: Character creation is very involved but really cool - its own game practically. Skills are very deep in a way that feels refreshing when compared to more stat-focused games. Combat has some fun, chaotic twists. Feels like a wide universe of possibility here so far.

I'll add Books 2 and 3 to this thread when I give them their own read-throughs. In the meantime, here's my newsletter (last two months have Mothership freebies): https://meatcastle.substack.com

And here's my website (with links to my games and modules and all that good stuff): https://shop.meatcastlegameware.com/

Thanks for reading!

[nhescio]

Do you think he was ever in love with Bedelia like he was in love with Will? I ask this because Bedelia says they were both the "brides of Hannibal". But Hannibal never courted her like he did with Will, Bedelia came into Hannibal's life much before Will but he never pursued her like he did with Will. Mads said he wanted a future with Will unlike with other people he hooked up with Alana, Bedelia or Anthony. He took her to Italy as a consolation prize when Will betrayed him. Even in Italy H was pining about Will all the time and telling Bedelia how much he loves Will. I know he slept with Bedelia but he probably slept with Anthony too and he slept with Alana, Hannibal is a hedonistic guy who sleeps around. For him sleeping with someone doesn't mean he is in love with them. But when Will confronts Bedelia, she pretends as if Hannibal held them in the same regard which is obviously not true. Hannibal would choose Will over her in a heart beat and even she knows it but yet she acts as if Hannibal sees them both equally. I don't understand why? 😭 Why do you think?why make herself seem like a competition when she is not?

Wow. Okay. First of all, thanks for your ask! I'm surprised you chose to send it to me, but I'm glad that you did :D

For your question, if I could only choose "yes" or "no", I lean a towards a "no", but of course, how I feel is a lot more nuanced than that. So, fair warning, this answer might be a bit long.

Personally, I read NBC's Hannibal as a completely different person than book Hannibal. (Not really that hot a take.) So since we're talking about the show, I just want to clarify that I don't see Hannibal as a psychopath/sociopath (aka still a person, but a person that happens to mentally compute the world differently). The writers and actors have mentioned again and again that their Hannibal was meant to be larger than life. He isn't someone that has the same morals as an average human because he isn't really human at all. His mindset is so divorced from that of society's that it is completely impossible for us to understand how he thinks and acts.

Because of this, I think technically, yes, Hannibal did love Bedelia. Was he "in love" with Bedelia though? No. And especially not "in love" like he was in love with Will.

I think Bedelia may have believed Hannibal letting her "see behind the veil" mind meant that she was an important person to Hannibal. Isn't that obvious to her? He even took her on his escape to Europe in place of Will! I think Hannibal really did care about Bedelia, but nowhere near the level he cared about Will.

We have to realize that everything we see on screen has to be taken with a grain of salt. There are often things hidden in the subtext- especially in a show like this. Unfortunately, that means we can never be sure of the motives of our favorite characters, but I don't see that as a negative. (This is what lets the community have their widely different "favorite headcanons" and write our delicious metas.)

I'm not going to say that this is exactly what happened or these are Bedelia's exact feelings, but I think ultimately, she overstated her relationship with Hannibal because she was looking to provoke Will. I can't be sure that Bedelia believed Hannibal loved her more than he really did (not that she fully reciprocated that love), but she definitely saw her status as something elevated. When she told Will that they were both Hannibal's brides, she was right in the fact that they both allowed to know the truth of Hannibal's motives. But, while she was given a peak in his doors (most likely because she was his pet therapist), Will was welcomed with open arms. Both she and Hannibal knew that Bedelia was in no way equal to Will, even if she pretends to be later on in her sessions with Will.

I don't completely understand why Bedelia chose this route, but maybe there were hours of Hannibal whining about Will that she had to endure that we don't know about. Bedelia is likely just using her experience with Hannibal to gloat, since she was smart enough to distance herself to not get hurt. She would be elevating herself into a position of mental superiority to Will since he came out completely changed and scarred. She was just interesting enough that Hannibal wouldn't kill her and smart enough that he wouldn't physically hurt her since she isn't completely under his thumb. (Also, by that point, Will was probably the only person she could discuss these things openly with since Hannibal was incarcerated, but I digress.) What she didn't realize though, is that Will was just as dangerous to her safety, if not more, than Hannibal. I've seen an amazing analysis on here comparing Bedelia to Gideon since both had taken roles that they didn't have the right to- Bedelia as Will and Gideon as the Ripper. This is why their "punishments" parallel each other, with both being forced to consciously consume what they know is their own human flesh.

TLDR: No, Hannibal was not in love with Bedelia like he was in love with Will. Yes, Hannibal did hold some level of love for Bedelia, just like he did for Alana (and to a lesser extent, Jack). Bedelia, probably too used to being able to squirm out of tight situations, chose to provoke Will by gloating about her clean escape instead of prioritizing her own safety. What she didn't realize was that any affection Hannibal holds towards her is nothing in comparison to his willingness to fulfil Will's whims. (Which is why they chopped off her leg to eat.) Basically, all the stars aligned (negatively in this case) and Bedelia made every wrong choice at the finish line which led to her fate at the end of the series.

Did this response completely derail from your question? Maybe, so I'm sorry about that. Anyway, if you made it this far, thanks for reading!

[utilitycaster]

If you've read that recent article on polygon about Candela Obscura - "Critical Role’s Candela Obscura fails to differentiate itself enough from its inspiration" (6 November 2023) - I don't know much about the other systems and have trouble being objective about things I love, I was wondering what your opinion is

Hi anon!

I have! I will also admit I don't know Blades in the Dark terribly well, or rather, I have roughly the same BitD knowledge as I have Candela knowledge: I've watched (or in this case, listened) to a actual play show run in it (TAZ Steeplechase) and I've looked at the SRD. The Candela full rulebook doesn't come out for a week, so I really can't judge it for myself. So this isn't going to be objective either, but hopefully it will point out what I think the flaws in this article are regardless of the merits or failures of Candela Obscura as a game.

I think my overall issue is what I said about Polygon on the whole earlier this week: it really feels like their metric is first, is this innovative; and second, "does this reinforce my pre-existing political values in a way that allows me to feel warm and fuzzy and virtuous because I played a fun game/watched a fun show and lets me continue to ignore that I haven't actually engaged in any of that tiresome and inconvenient meaningful anticapitalist action."

I also, for what it's worth, think that this mentality very explicitly conflicts with what Critical Role is doing. I think a lot of people interpret the whole "a group of friends playing games" image as encouraging parasocial behavior (which, frankly, is weird in that while the CR fandom has had a parasociality problem, it's no different than any large fandom - Laurisha shippers or the Twinnies & Husbands crowd are literally just the Actual Play Fandom equivalent of Gaylors and Larries; also like, the pitch for WBN earlier this year was basically "hey, we're four friends playing games" and no one has blinked at that, nor should they have) when I think it's intended to mean "we are friends having fun making and playing the games we want to play; it's great if you'll join us but we're doing what we want." Given that Polygon has shown something of a bias towards those shows that give them early access, I do think it might be that they're just cranky they're not being given any special treatment or catering by an actual play show they've been shitting on for years, and this is simply a vicious cycle.

All that aside, more importantly in this case, I think the article shows a notable lack of Ebert's law: "A movie is not about what it is about. It is about how it is about it." Samantha Nelson, the author of this article, appears to be both incapable of evaluating Candela Obscura outside the context of Blades in the Dark - which is frankly, in my again admittedly limited opinion, vastly overstated as an influence (the Forged in the Dark engine is certainly a strong influence, but that's purely mechanical and also it's still only an influence - more on this later) - and also seems to want Candela Obscura's rulebook to flesh out Newfaire and Oldfaire in the same way that Blades in the Dark fleshes out Duskvol.

The thing is, those wide-open spaces and the vagueness of OldFaire? That's deliberate. The Looper interview with Spenser Starke and Rowan Hall as well as the Tabletop News interview both make this clear. The aim of Candela Obscura is to be very easy to pick up, to not have a bunch of intimidating lore that players and GMs need to know before they jump in (and I say this as someone who, when invited to her first D&D game, was the person who read the PHB and sent the other new players a brief summary of each race and class; I love intimidating lore), and to accommodate a wide range of styles. They considered making Oldfaire much more detailed in the book and then decided not to so that GMs felt more free with the world. Again, my knowledge of Blades in the Dark is heavily skewed by an actual play of it that's explicitly not in Duskvol (which I think is a very interesting commentary, namely, maybe Nelson just really fucking loves Duskvol but no one else gives a shit). I genuinely think they are, as more and more Polygon TTRPG/Actual Play coverage seems to be, barely paying attention to what's in front of them and just deciding based on who put it out.

As I said in my earlier posts I do think Candela distinguishes itself from BitD in a number of ways mechanically. The gilded dice mechanic is obviously one of the biggest ones. The lack of flashbacks - a pretty core element of Blades in the Dark - is another. The fact that scars change your stats rather than dealing a permanent penalty (as Trauma does in BitD) is seen as a flaw, as is the lack of lair-building, but I think these things work in tandem. Blades in the Dark is very much about growing territory and becoming a more and more powerful crime syndicate; while four traumas will take you out of the game the same way scars will, there's a lot more opportunities to heal and I believe you have much more room to take stress. Candela Obscura, as another interview I read states (ScreenRant), is a gothic/eldritch horror game about normal people in unfathomable circumstances. You don't really get much better! You adapt, but progress against these monsters is always a long shot. Candela as an organization has been operating for millennia, and the war seems to be one of attrition, and the mechanics, from what I know from the show, reflect that.

The bit about the criminal crew and the lair is honestly kind of funny to me, because in the TAZ Steeplechase wrap-up I listened to last week the McElroys noted that the lair element of BitD was actually really hard to incorporate and they largely ignored it. Obviously that's not true for everyone, but famously D&D in the earlier editions guided high level play towards running one's own dungeon, and there is a reason that hasn't survived to the newer editions, namely, that shift from being a crew out there doing wild and exciting heists and adventures to painting the walls of your clubhouse and hiring guards is not actually fun for a lot of people.

So in summary: I really don't think the author of this article paid a single scrap of attention to the motivations behind design choices, is mad the horror game doesn't give them a kiss on the cheek and tell them they're So Good at Leftism (the comment about not understanding that the restrictions on scarlet aren't tied to anti-immigrant sentiment is particularly egregious), and generally is like "why is this game that shares some similarities but ultimately rather different goals than Blades in the Dark not literally Blades in the Dark but with slightly more aggressive ghosts."

[buzzkillchainsaw]

HI HELLO OH MY GOODNESS HOW DO I PUT THIS

I literally just randomly stumbled across your comic with pearl and tetra and decided to give it a quick read, but then it really hooked me in, like REALLY hooked me in! It was the first one of your works I've seen so I didn't have any prior context, but the story it had even standing alone was just.. AGHHH I have no words it genuinely just struck my heart and soul! And then I decided to check out your blog and saw that you had more writings for WoF and that's when i saw the whole arc you wrote I decided to give it a quick read as well! i personally find it difficult to get into original wof stories cause I tend to gravitate towards one's involving canon characters (genuinely, nothing against OC stories! i find them so cool and want to read more of them, they're just a bit harder for me to get into), but remember when I said I'd give the arc a quick read? that quick read turned into reading the entire thing in one entire sitting because I actually get so attached to the characters and story and setting and EVERYTHING??? it all felt so genuine! like I was being taken on an entire journey with them!!! like, i actually cannot overstate just how amazing it has been to read it all!!! idk how to describe it but whenever I come across a story that I'm able to feel so connected and invested to, my heart starts to smile and my heart is smiling so much rn!!! Like, all of that and it was a DRAFT??? Ice, datura, pearl, tetra, no-one, and sidewinder's stories just felt so genuine I actually can't say it enough and I don't use the word genuinely lightly

it's really late where I am so I'll stop here before I probably write 50 more paragraphs, so I'll just say once more that I'm glad I stumbled upon your blog, and really, thank you! The genuine love you have for what you do is seen in the art you make, and I hope that, whatever you choose to do in the future (art or not!), it's something that brings you genuine love and fulfillment! AGHHH FR READING THROUGH THE ENTIRE ARC AND COMIC WAS AN EXPERIENCE YOU ARE AN AMAZING ARTIST THANK U AGAIN AND GOODNIGHT

I've been opening and closing this ask all day bc I don't think I can formulate a response fit for your genuinely kind words :')

I'm so happy you enjoyed my stuff & hopefully it continues to bring you joy for a long time! I also never expected so much positive feedback on my little "book arc" from so many different people, so I just wanna say thank you and everyone else who read through the entire thing, it really means a lot! I wish you the best life :)

[exilethegame]

Update!

Hello everyone!

This past month I haven't written anything due to my hand pain. I've gone to the doctor but they haven't actually figured out what it is that's causing the pain. Long story short-- I can write, albeit in moderation, with a few modifications, and significantly slower than before. The doctor’s hope is that so long as I’m careful the issue might resolve itself— so I guess we’ll see how that goes in the long run.

I'm going to try writing a bit to see how much I can type with all these new changes and will then resume working on Chapter 5 pt. 2 once again. Depending on how that goes I'll try and get my Patreon up and running again and hopefully business will go back to normal!

I also want to say thank you to everyone who has sent me a kind word while I've been gone. I've read them all and hearing everyone's support has been so incredibly helpful as I've been stuck sitting on the sidelines for a lack of better words. Seeing everyone's discussions of the game, art, and general support 100% kept me from going stir crazy, so thank you all! I can't overstate how thankful I am.

Hopefully, soon enough I’ll be able to get back to creating the book that we all love! Finishing the demo is such an incredibly exciting milestone to reach and will be the beginning of a new era for The Exile for a lack of better words, so I’ll do everything I can to reach that goal (safely, may I add)!

That’s all! Thanks for reading. :)

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

reading update: January 2024

as long as I'm talking about The Gargoyle's Captive, let's discuss what else I've been reading this month.

Maeve Fly (CJ Leede, 2023) - I really liked this slender debut novel, which follows the titular Maeve Fly as she prowls LA like a homicidal alien, playing an unnamed ice princess in a certain theme park by day and indulging her murderous tendencies by night. Maeve is in a downward spiral; she's 27 years old and is preparing to lose her grandmother to illness and her only friend to a blossoming acting career. she sees no future for herself beyond losing the only two people she cares about and has no further goals, contenting herself with alcohol and porn while she rereads the same books, rewatches the same videos, and listens over and over to her playlist of Halloween music. Maeve is, it must be said, an abysmal loser, and I like her terrible melodrama a lot. I do think some of the hype is perhaps overstating the feminist credentials of this book; it sort of reminds me of when a college friend told me their favorite feminist movie was Suicide Squad (2016) because Harley Quinn was in it. Maeve talks a lot of big game about how women are always expected to have some tragedy to be deranged serial killers, while men are allowed to just do it, but it hit me as a little tryhard. there are a lot of books trying to be "the female American Psycho" right now - Eliza Clark's 2020 novel Boy Parts is frequently described as such - but it feels a bit too on the nose when Maeve's ultimate climactic rampage is directly inspired by a glimpse of the American Psycho novel. it's not that deep, but it is a gross, captivating read told from a fascinatingly cracked POV. check out Maeve Fly.

Laziness Does Not Exist (Devon Price, 2021) - yeah Devon Price is still following me (though my days are numbered, I'm sure) so it's a massive relief to say that I did like this book. Price has sort of become my self-help ride or die, mainly because a.) he's so much more self-aware than the average self-help writer that it feels kind of insulting to call him one and b.) he's actually dealing with topics that are relevant or interesting and providing actionable advice. while LDNE didn't engross me quite as hard as Unmasking Autism (while I am, famously, not autistic, I do believe in their beliefs, by which I mean I'm the token allistic among my close friends and I vastly prefer autistic company) it hit me hard in several unexpected pressure points. I'll happily admit that I can't relate to Price's interviewees who willingly work 50+ hours a week for jobs that hate them and are destroying their minds and bodies, but I still struggle to escape the perpetual sensation that a moment at rest is a moment wasted. It probably didn't help that I was reading this book while on vacation at my mother's, where I visited the beach almost daily and was so work-averse that we didn't even bother going grocery shopping because I didn't want to cook. and yet, despite getting dummy chill in some aspects of my life, I am still constantly possessed by a malevolent ghost insisting that I'm wasting my time and have never actually done Enough. maybe Price's next book, Unlearning Shame, will finally fix me; it's out in four days and god knows I'll be getting my hands on it as soon as humanly possible.

Patternmaster (Octavia E. Butler, 1976) - y'all know I love a messy political fantasy, and this is just... god, the absolute messiest. I thought Mind of My Mind was bad, but it turns out Mary's descendants are going to full-on reinvent feudalism with psychic powers, treating non-psychics as chattel and causing technological advancement to regress since they refuse to handle their problems with anything but psychic powers. and it's even got two brothers duking it out for the throne that will give them power over every bitchy psychic on earth! you love to see it. if I can be 100% honest I do think it's straight up bananagrams that this was the first book released in the series even though it's chronologically last; I genuinely cannot imagine caring enough to figure out what the fuck these people were talking about if I didn't have the previous four books for context. and even "context" may be generous; Octavia still has absolutely 0 interest in explaining what's up with the fucking outer space werewolves who are the psychics' #1 enemy. if I could have brunch with any person living or dead I would summon Butler up in a heartbeat to explain what the fuck her thought process was in plotting out this series over some mimosas, and I would take extensive notes on every word she said. an absolute genius and the uncontested queen of freak shit forever.

Thirsty Mermaids (Kat Leyh, 2021) - I purchased this graphic novel in November 2023 at a conference where I bumped into Queer Comics Peddler, my very favorite queer midwestern pop-up. running into them is always a delight, and this time I came with a question: could they give me a recommendation? the very nice people working offered up Thirsty Mermaids, which was the PERFECT companion for a long airplane ride. it's cute without being overly sappy, and avoids the trap of sacrificing a plot for the sake of checking off as many representation boxes as possible. the story is simple: three mermaids use a spell to turn into humans and go ashore in search of booze, only to realize in the morning that they don't know how to turn back. taken in by a generous bartender, they're faced with the reality of having to make money for the first time in their lives. hijinks ensue, but also a very sweet and warmhearted story about the friends looking out for one another as they try to figure out exactly where they belong and what home even means. also the artwork is GORGEOUS, with the mermaids' extremely memorable character designs being a real standout. if you're a graphic novel enthusiast, definitely check this out 🧜‍♀️

Sugar, Baby (Celine Saintclare, 2023) - Sugar, Baby came to me in a very similar way as Thirsty Mermaids: while visiting a witchy little bookstore that I was immediately charmed by, I asked the cashier what they would recommend. they offered up Maeve Fly (fab) and this novel, a stack of which was on the counter advertising an upcoming event with the author. neither have disappointed, so shout out to that one employee with the great taste! Sugar, Baby sees a young cleaner named Agnes, one of the only biracial women in her unnamed English town, befriending the daughter of a wealthy client and getting whisked away to her new friend's London lifestyle: crashing in an apartment with fellow models, staying out all night to party, and making money by going on dates with extravagantly wealthy older men. Agnes starts out having a swell time, but the cracks pretty swiftly start to form as she realizes how much more dependent she is on these men than her wealthy new friends and she begins to wonder exactly how much she's willing to diminish herself to get the bag. it's not a perfect first novel but it is a compelling one, a perfect airplane page-turner that crashes from glitzy to ghoulish and back with breakneck speed.

The Gargoyle's Captive (Katee Robert, 2023) - my full review is over on patreon for my darling supporters who want me dead (and picked this book in the first place, damn them to hell), but suffice to say this is a fun book to read if you like the sensation of your brain melting out of your nose, if you're really turned on by baby's first bdsm, you are not particularly concerned with trifling matters like "plot coherence" or "character motivation" or "writing that is complex and artful," and/or you've ever wanted to have sex with a dude whose penis is so big that you feel genuinely fear. also, hey, I forgot to include this in my patreon write-up so fuck it: Robert REFUSES to tell us what kind of food the protagonists are eating, ever. whenever they have a meal it's just "the food was placed on the table" "I took a bite" etc. drop me a HINT, man, come on! is it a protein? grain? starches? the only thing I know for sure that they're consuming is wine and a single marshmallow, and god does it show. it's just a very weird and distracting omission and it's absolutely not the worst thing about this book but it is a hill I'm willing to die complaining on.

[kittymaine]

So! Finally, the Dawn of DC series' have wrapped up and the Alan Scott: The Green Lantern series was far and away my favorite one (written by Tim Sheridan, art by Cian Tormey). So, I wanted to write up a little blurb about it and what I liked about it so much.

For those not in the know, the past six months DC has run a bunch of limited series about very early DC superheroes who have had a bit of a comeback in recent years, after the events of the Lazarus Planet stuff. Alan Scott: The Green Lantern follows the titled character and tells his origin story, altering it to fit into current DC continuity.

It starts with Alan and his struggle with his government minders, who are attempting to manipulate him by blackmailing him. They have obtained his journal from when he was a young man first looking for the legendary power, The Crimson Flame, that resulted in the accident that gave him his lantern powers. The journal details his love affair with one of his officers, Johnny Ladd, in addition to the events of the ill-fated expedition.

To make matters worse, someone is murdering people that Alan used to know and trying to make it look like Alan did it. He follows the clues, which lead him back to Arkham Asylum, a place he knows too well. He had checked himself into Arkham Asylum briefly after leaving the military. While investigating, he recalls the people he met there and his realization that none of them deserved the treatment they received in the name of "helping" them.

Throughout the story, the JSA (the Justice Society of America, kind of the progenitor of the Justice League) is also investigating the case and trying to pull Alan into the fold. But he's understandably reticent, considering that's just what his government minders want him to do.

When Alan finally catches up with the person who has been framing him, he's faced with his worst nightmare and most cherished dream. John in fact didn't die in the ocean the day they found the crimson flame. Instead, he survived and became a Red Lantern!

And okay, at this point, I would be spoiling the last two issues of the run and I don't want to do that. But, it definitely keeps getting more intense and dramatic!

This is exactly the kind of story that I love and want to read in a comic book. Like, sure it's dramatic and over the top, but if I can't let a comic book do that, then what can I? Even though it is incredibly dramatic, almost melodramatic, I still liked all the characters, I understood where they were coming from and why they were doing what they were doing, and I was absolutely glued to every issue that came out!

They're going to release all the issues in a trade paper back soon, and I encourage anyone who likes comic books and superhero stories and especially queer superheroes to give it some consideration! I really can't overstate how much I liked this series.

[wildmelon]

i played through @lacunafiction's the fernweh saga book 1 last night and was totally blown away. as someone who's usually very romance-focused the plot was so gripping and i was dying to solve the mystery. i always say i don't like horror, but i like being creeped out, and this delivered so brilliantly on well-written creep factor and a sense of growing unease. the author describes it as slow-burn horror, and i enjoyed it so much because of how genuinely spooky and smart all the symbolism was.

even if you don't play if i would 100% recommend this if you like the sound of a supernatural small-town psychological horror murder mystery. i can't overstate how compelling i found the creepy elements. also i'm in love with both j and r.

[esther-dot]

In last season brothers choose their sisters over Dany. Theon rescued Yara from their uncle without caring about Dany order. He later sided with his pseudo family starklings. Jaime goes back to Cersei and even Tyrion tried to save her at last. So how come people think that Jon would choose his aunty over his siblings?

I thought how they wrote the Cersei and Tyrion relationship was a total mess in the end, but you're right that at every turn D&D were communicating to the audience this idea of family, no matter how fucked up the relationships were, would trump everything else. The fact that it was loyalty to a sister specifically for Theon, Jaime, and Jon is very interesting, now that you point it out!

I can't find it right now, but after s8 I wrote that Jon could have gone South, not been reunited with Sansa or won back Winterfell or become king, and instead fallen in with Dany and been madly in love and fought for her, but if he heard her threaten to go to Winterfell after burning KL, he still would have killed her to protect the Starks.

There was simply no way to build enough emotional weight on the Dany side to make us even question what Jon would do if forced to choose between her and the Starks. He already "betrayed" a lover to protect the North/his family in the books, in the show they focus more on his oath/the Watch if I'm remembering correctly, but in neither canon is it reasonable to think that Jon would side against the Starks. There's just nothing to suggest it.

Each time I have seen that idea, it has nothing to do with Jon, and everything to do with Sansa hate. If it was Arya who had reunited with Jon and reclaimed Winterfell and fought for Northern Independence, I think the conversation around s7-8 Jon and Dany, their choices and goals, would have been wildly different. Unfortunately, Sansa has never been a fan favorite, fans didn't like how she disagreed with Jon, and they decided her distrust of Dany was petty, because they didn't like her.

You really can't overstate how much resentment people had towards Sansa because of how they believe she mistreated Arya, Tyrion, Jon, and that’s including some people who knew about Dark Dany. I even saw Arya fans saying that they hate show Sansa so much, they would have been willing for Arya to die if it meant getting to watch Jon kill Sansa. So, I think that kind of expectation wasn't about what the show was doing or reasonable spec for the characters, it was mainly about hating Sansa. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[irisbleufic]

I really cannot overstate how groundbreaking/memorable your Good Omens fic is! I remember reading it in ye olde LiveJournal days and....God, it must be almost a decade later, when I got onto Tumblr I remembered not only the fics but your username and you can't imagine how chuffed I was to see that you 1) are still writing and 2) wrote Great Gatsy speculative fiction!!! Writing can be a hard, solitary endeavor, but please know that your stories resonated and continue to stay with me, and I reread them to this day. Thank you for sharing them with us!

LJ fandom was so much fun! I feel like I was writing and posting there on the borderline between LJ’s decline and AO3’s inception, and because I didn’t start transferring my fic from LJ to AO3 (and just posting to AO3, for that matter), I did myself and my readers a disservice. Still, Good Omens fandom was born on LJ in the early 2000s; I feel proud to have been there and writing at its inception, through to the present day.

I know there are folks who wish I loved the show the way I love the novel, but living with the book for 19 years and my longest, most involved work of fiction ever (CoT) for nearly as long has made it extremely difficult for me to see the novel’s setting of 1990 transposed to now (there’s also the issue that despite the fact that I love what I’ve seen of Tennant as a human being, I’ve never enjoyed any of his roles except for his Shakespearean ones; the casting of Crowley in particular was always going to be impossible in my eyes). It is what it is; we all have those stories that we’ll never see any other way.

Thank you for continuing to read and love my stories in a world where the novel is in some sense being phased out, I guess is what I’m trying to say 💙 I’m astonished I’m alive to be saying this; I didn’t expect to survive the cancer ordeal of 2019-2020. I thought that finishing CoT would be the last meaningful writing I’d ever do. It’s weird to be a survivor of so many health issues barely halfway through my life. I hope my next 40-50 years in fandom will be just as filled with amazing friends and fiction.

[bunny584]

I started writing this long reflection about media analysis, JJK and the impact of it and this entire fandom and your story but it'll work better once H&H is complete and I can make it less ramble-y and coherent. (oh look I'm rambling again just like the now-saved draft)

Instead, let's just dip into the moments that left the biggest impact because I barely held it together.

The P word and I gasped. Thankfully no one was standing near me on the train platform.

 “You’re always to my left, Suguru.” 

Now I want to go back and see if that's always the case?

But Satoru has revoked Suguru’s access to his voice and mind space. He’s retreated to the steel entrapment in his head. Leaving Suguru to fend for himself. 

The mystique over his "really good eyesight" and their silent communication is so delectable. And then this happened, I can feel it. 

Suguru can read any page in any person’s book, no matter the language. But he can’t seem to decipher her expression.  

I loved the moments of accuracy during the active trauma. But this felt the most writing from what you know and your training as a physician. (and the chuckle from the doctor over the phone later, poor boy was too stormy to catch that but a doctor would NEVER do that if it was bad news!) 

The joy of Fatherhood, given and taken from him in a night.  

I have not experienced this type of loss, but I know people who have. And that type of grief is so intense. You didn't overstate or linger on it too long to undercut the feelings and space.

Will they survive this?

I know they will because you've said as much. But that didn't make this any less impactful. The journey and all....

He fantasizes about your precious love child.

Of all this chapter held, this moment was the proverbial straw. Especially with the dream of a girl. And the precious love of dads and their daughters. And now I am going to lose it again, just thinking of my husband and how he would've felt. (he also would've chosen me over the fetus like The Boys).

Satoru fails to swallow a gasp, and the cords tethering Suguru’s brain to rational logic snap in half.

A deft touch here, appropriately use of the intense emptions of sex and touch. I hope it is not their last (not that we need visceral descriptions of it, you've had great pacing without needing to keep reminding us of time passage)

His addiction to being needed is one he’ll never recover from.

Oh Sugu, your doting and motherhen-ing is adorable and I can't get enough of it.

I just want to like, ramble on and on and on. Wine, snacks, and a big comfy couch.

Jen my little angel 🤍🩷. I love when you do this to me with your juicy analysis and questions that make me think.

Long Author POV below:

1. The P-word. This was left field but of course she’d be. The boys have been filling her reckless. And part of me feels like their bodies knew. The way they doted on her in the fluff flash back, both kneeling to put her shoes on. They’re like dogs who sense their human is pregnant. Now though, with the loss. They’re going to be INTENTIONALLY trying to make another one. Even more desperate when reader pushes them away for a bit.

2. A reader actually made a comment on AO3 that they can’t wait to see the boys communicate more. Because it’s true, I’ve written them so in sync I leave a lot of their dialogue to the reader’s imagination. It was fun to force them to try and figure out how to verbalize things when they’re off step with each other.

3. Suguru being unable to read the doctor’s expression. *sigh* gonna get emotional here. They try to teach us divine neutrality in med school and residency. Delivering bad news while being empathetic but distant. You should be able to call time of death one minute, then walk into the next room and give another patient your 150%. I struggle with this. Elia struggled with this. I hope I did it justice with how it’s written

4. Girl Dad Suguru 🥹 I struggled writing his and Satoru’s reactions. I just wanted to explore the complexities of yes they love reader, yes they want more of her, but ultimately reader, NOT baby, is their priority. Full stop.

5. Satosugu soft sex. I hope this didn’t feel TOO out of place. Mostly because grief is MESSY. It does things to short circuit brains. And sometimes it makes you want to make love with someone to feel in control and warm and intimate. They both were crying and confused through it. And Suguru was so desperate to feel close to Satoru again. Satoru didn’t verbalize it but his “I’m so lonely” and “no, stay” was my way of hinting at that.