#and i made level 30 marauder

[thistaleisabloodyone]

I tanked for the first time in 14 months and I was the only person who died!

[saintsenara]

I am literally so stressed right now since school is starting up again. I was just scrolling through your posts and I absolutely adore your opinions and thoughts. If you’re still up to the ships asks, I have a few.

For some reason, I have been thinking about age-gap relationships that wouldn’t be quite possible…and added with my love of Severus Snape… 👀👀

Abraxas Malfoy/Severus Snape - I don’t know if you’ve done Lucius/Severus but I just took it a generation back.

Romulus Augustus Lestrange/Severus Snape - I remember you mentioning in Scylla and Charybdis that the two were kindred spirits (?) since they were both killed by Voldemort.

Bellatrix Lestrange/Severus Snape - maybe a bunch of sexual tension during missions? Bellatrix’s attitude toward Severus was mainly suspicion but I feel like she meant it in a ha-ha-I’m-jealous-you’re-the-favorite way, not in a oh-wait-he-actually-is-a-traitor way.

Marlene McKinnon/Severus Snape - I love your take that she was a seasoned veteran in the First Wizarding War. It never made sense to me that everyone in the First Order were all children. Majority, maybe. But all of them being Gryffindors and out-of-school never stuck to me.

Frank Longbottom/Severus Snape - I’ve read a few works for this and I like the few takes there are.

And I already know your thoughts on Lord Voldemort/Severus Snape (it’s a favorite).

I’ve also been thinking about time-travel fix-it’s in general too. How do you think Severus would react if he found himself in Tom Riddle’s era? There’s the take on him being older and aware and absolutely done with his life, and Lord Voldemort (few years out of school or maybe in his 30s to level the age in a way) whose intrigued by the sour man (and maybe gets impressed by his knowledge of the Dark Arts?). Then there’s also student Severus meeting student Tom and getting further radicalized by this young handsome man. There’s so many to explore but at this point, if I don’t get my head out of this rabbit hole, I may never be able to pass school. 😭😭

This turned out to be longer than expected, but I love reading your posts! It’s always so entertaining, especially with your interpretation of Severus Snape. I can rarely ever talk about Severus without being attacked by Marauders fans online.

thank you very much for the ask, pal! i hope this term goes well for you - and that your extremely chic recent interest in snape-related age gap relationships endures.

let's see what we have here...

abraxas malfoy/severus snape romulus lestrange/severus snape

i'm going to take these two together - since romulus is an original character who exists nowhere other than my own head - because they occupy essentially the same role in relation to snape.

i've written before about how i really like the idea of voldemort having three distinct impacts across three separate generations - the knights of walpurgis/the original death eaters, who know the proto-voldemort of the 1940s and 1950s, with his muggle name and his retail job; these men's sons, who know the unassailably powerful voldemort of the 1970s; and these men's sons, who know the paranoid and volatile voldemort of the 1990s.

so you have abraxas - lucius - draco in each of those categories [or, romulus - rodolphus - n/a...]

snape is - of course - part of lucius and rodolphus' generation, and the voldemort he encounters when he becomes a death eater is the unstoppable political force who appears to be made of pure magic - which, naturally, makes snapemort have a very different power dynamic to something like tombraxas.

but it's also clear that snape is someone voldemort takes an interest in because he recognises so much of his former self in him - the slightly feral vibes, the poverty, the disappointing muggle father, the feeling of being an outcast surrounded by posh kids and the desire to bend those same kids to your will.

this is the reason for voldemort arranging things in scylla and charybdis so that snape can lord it over mulciber and avery, and it's also the reason why he's so insistent that abraxas and romulus [and other senior death eaters he knew at school] are nice to him - he's basically enjoying reliving his youth by, once again, making his minions obey someone who is technically their social inferior.

snape lacks the teenage tom riddle's charm [and looks], of course, which means that there's far more condescension inherent in any relationship - platonic or otherwise - that either of these two would have with him than there was in their early relationship with voldemort.

but they also have a fondness for spindly lads with an obsession with magic and regional accents, which means that i'm sure that something can come out of the fireside chats voldemort's compelling them to have with snape while they're forced to host him in their houses...

bellatrix lestrange/severus snape

i am very, very fond of this as a pairing - and, indeed, have something in the works on the topic - and bellatrix's rampant jealousy of snape is exactly why.

one of my preferred ways of exploring snape's position within the death eaters is to think of him as voldemort's exception in terms of social class - that is, that he is the only marked death eater who doesn't come from an elite, quasi-aristocratic background; and that voldemort's supporters who are from lower social classes are kept, like fenrir greyback in the rank-and-file and not permitted to take the mark.

[this is why, in my writing, i always make the carrows a similar level of posh to the malfoys and lestranges - canonically they're rather one-note working-class stereotypes, but i don't think this makes sense given what we know about voldemort's structuring of his organisation during the first war. it's also why i think that peter pettigrew doesn't receive a dark mark until he returns to voldemort post-prisoner of azkaban.]

bellatrix - on the other hand - is voldemort's exception in terms of gender [and another thing i'm wedded to thinking is that alecto carrow also doesn't receive the dark mark until the second war.]

these means, of course, that both she and snape depend on voldemort's favour - especially in the first war, when he still trusts his death eaters sufficiently highly to delegate things to them - much more than the elite male death eaters do.

i think it's reasonable to assume, for example, that rodolphus may object to his wife behaving in a way which defies the gendered conventions elite pureblood women are clearly subject to - and that it's only voldemort's authority that prevents him voicing an objection publicly. or that lucius malfoy - like sirius - conceives of snape as his "lapdog", and it's only voldemort's authority which forces him to treat him as a peer.

which means, of course, that snape and bellatrix are in competition with each other for voldemort's attention in ways which the other death eaters never have to be - which explains their vibe in canon, in which bellatrix finds snape's elevation in voldemort's good books after she falls from grace after the cock-up in the department of mysteries so infuriating.

[it also gives a really interesting dimension to her being completely fucking right about snape's loyalties, but being in the wrong position in voldemort's eyes for her opinion to be trusted by him. you just know she was pissed when she got to the afterlife.]

and - from a shipping perspective - having to be constantly jealous of and obsessed with each other is a very effective way of lighting a spark...

marlene mckinnon/severus snape

i do always like snape with an older woman, because i think it fits his whole vibe, so he goes very nicely with my preferred vision of marlene as a fifty-year-old hard-nosed ministry bitch who fucking loathes mad-eye moody.

the meet-cute? well, spies have to have handlers, don't they? dumbledore passing over his new turncoat death eater to one of his senior lieutenants - particularly given the fact that she's unlikely to be thrilled about this - is something i can get on board with.

frank longbottom/severus snape

frank and alice are other ones i don't enjoy seeing written as part of the marauders' generation - for them to be well-established aurors by the time the lestranges attack them, i think it's reasonable to assume that they're around molly and arthur's age [that is, around ten years old than snape et al.]

so i think we're repeating the same scenario as above - frank needs to debrief the order's new spy. if you know what i mean...

time-travelling snape!

i think that the teenage tom riddle would fucking hate the teenage snape, to be honest. the teen snape we meet in canon is someone who really obviously refuses to play along with the social conventions which govern an institution as elite as hogwarts - and he clearly stands out more for his grubby, feral demeanour, his uncouth manners, his way of speaking, and his refusal to be deferential to his social superiors than he does for his name and blood-status.

[indeed, he's one of the only really visibly working-class students we ever meet in canon - to the extent that i am increasingly convinced that hogwarts is a selective school...]

the young voldemort, in contrast, happily plays along with these social conventions for his own ends - simpering through slug club meetings and sending slughorn pineapple and doing all he can to be viewed as a suitable candidate for head boy, in order both to provide a cover for his wrongdoing and as a way to soothe the chip on his shoulder by beating the posh at their own game.

he's going to think snape's as common as muck, and snape's going to think he's a pretentious cunt.

a post-1981 snape going back in time and finding himself entangled with the young-adult voldemort, in contrast, i think could be rather compelling. it's very interesting that the teenage voldemort's willingness to play-act a fondness for the class system doesn't extend to being prepared to grit his teeth and suffer through a ministry internship slughorn procures for him - and his decision to go off and work in a shop has a slightly bolshy "fuck you, sir" side to it we don't otherwise really see from him.

this voldemort would, i think, be slightly more open to snape's whole vibe, and they could get cracking on all the things which make snapemort a hot ship - the shared love of magical experimentation, the dubious morality, the fact that voldemort's clearly responsible for snape's aesthetic, and so on - several decades early.

one question, though, is whether snape would know who he was.

i go back and forth on how widely voldemort's birth name is known - and whether it's ever connected to him following his return to britain in the mid-1960s.

on the one hand, i think dumbledore's secrecy surrounding it is nonsensical - a substantial proportion of the death eaters were clearly at school with voldemort, and those who weren't are still usually related to these men in some way [i always think, for example, that it's much more plausible to assume that the diary horcrux was given to abraxas malfoy, and that lucius was well aware that his father and voldemort had been at school together] - but on the other, i do wonder whether snape, who comes into voldemort's orbit as - as i've said - an exception would be made privy to the information about voldemort's background which was probably an open secret among the elite male death eaters.

[which also provides an explanation for why bellatrix is so shocked to hear harry say voldemort's a half-blood in order of the phoenix, while lucius malfoy doesn't bat an eyelid.]

which is to say, i am much more taken by the idea of snape - destroyed with grief over lily's death - rocketing backwards three decades, landing in the knockturn alley of 1951, and having no idea until he's in far too deep who the softly-spoken shop-boy who offers him a cuppa will turn out to be...

[clonehub]

I've been trying my absolute hardest to say next to nothing about tbb as a series this year for both my own peace of mind and my own (and frankly my friends) safety but what i can't be quiet on is people of all kinds but especially the usual culprits blaming Saw for Techs death when Saw was there for an actual mission for the rebellion and The Bad Batch were there because Crosshair explicitly chose not to leave with them when they gave him the chance.

Because all this blaming shifting just looks racist. Some folks are foaming at the mouth to be able to condemn a Black character for hell for an event that, frankly, had nothing to do with him in the slightest. Seeing people first blame the bad batch for "abandoning" Crosshair as if they didn't try multiple times to save his life in the finale of season 1 only for him to refuse EVERY TIME. He nearly drowned on Kamino and told omega to leave him. They were walking through the tube and he stopped. They were on the platform and he refused to go with them. Omega tried. The marauder was right there. He turned his back on them.

Crosshair made his choice but I'm firmly of the opinion that because he's being largely perceived as an edgy and hurt white man, the audience is denying his culpability and removing his agency as a character in that moment in order to extend a level of forgiveness that they absolutely will not give to any characters of color. They're shifting the blame to every nearby character because of weird racism and colorism that i don't feel like expanding upon here.

And rather than just travel the obvious line the authors have laid out, up to and including the fact that he does not have his chip because Rau and Corbett said so 7 times in one interview, rather than see that actions often have greater consequences than people expect or intend, they want to shift all of the blame to a Black man who were there for all of 30 seconds and who had his own goals he had to take care of because he had his own people to take care of. At no point was Saw obligated to stop his entire mission for the bad batch. He was trying to fight the empire. They were trying to save their brother. It sucks but Saw really didnt need to stop. Why was Saw obligated to change his plans for them? Why couldn't they change their plans for the rebellion?

This fandom is too comfortable with racism and colorism but specifically Anti-Blackness. I was going to try and let this go because often times when I mention Crosshair especially in the past i get levied with false accusations and bad faith reads of what I'm saying but this is anti Blackness. There are people making jokes about hunting down, beating, and shooting a Black male character for something that was a whitewashed man's fault.

And shit like this is why this show either needs to change or go. I and others predicted this kind of thing like two years ago and we've only been proven right time and again. From me being racially harassed to people complaining of Blackwashing because they hate Black people so much that they think a person of color not passing for white makes them Black and therefore bad, to what I'm seeing now: largely white people daydreaming about being violent against a Black man. Because they refuse to see that the character they perceive as white is responsible for his own actions the way every other character in the series is responsible for theirs. It's just racism and anti Blackness all around.

[ungarmax]

i made a new ffxiv account so i could play without having to pay, and i started a character named barry bluejeans and i've leveled him so far to 30+ in arcanist (summoner/scholar), marauder (warrior), and rogue (ninja). i think thematically thaumaturge (black mage) should be next. i think rogue was my favorite play style but i don't really care much for ninja for some reason. scholar is my favorite in dungeons because i really like to heal. my main on my account i paid for once upon a time was a white mage.

if you want to join me i'm on dynamis/maduin. DON'T make a lup though because i'm going to make @ficklepenguin be my lup and we're going to get married. also i plan to make taako on my other account because at some point i'm probably going to want to pay for it again.

[spindrifters]

sirius 2, 12, 14, 16,18 remus: 3, 1, 19, 25, 30

Sirius

2. When I think I truly started to like them (or dislike them, if you’ve sent me a character I don’t like)

I've loved Sirius since PoA came out, but writing his perspective in marginalia is what made me fall in love with him on a much deeper level.

12. Sexuality hc!

That is a homosexual.

14. Best storyline they had

Becoming the first person in history to escape max security wizard prison because he saw a rat in a newspaper. Iconic behavior tbh.

16. A childhood headcanon

I don't think Sirius realized that mudblood was a slur until he got to Hogwarts. In context of his upbringing, he just thought it was the word you used for wix with muggle parents. James punched him for using it at the beginning of first year, they both got detention, and in the way of eleven year old boys everywhere, they emerged from the event as lifelong best friends.

18. How do you think they were as a kid? (Like, were they shy, noisy, wild, etc)

An ADHD menace of a monkey child. He really did try to modify his behavior to live up to his parents' expectations. It just didn't work.

Remus

1. My first impression of them

I was like six when PoA came out but I feel like it was something like soft and unknowable gay kinship.

3. A song that reminds me of them

Bones and Skin - Mirah

19. The most random ship you’ve seen people have with them

Strong tie between Remus/Gilderoy Lockhart and Remus/Dumbledore/Elphias Doge. The fics both exist and they are written well, I have eye witnesses to back me up.

25. When do you think they acted the most ooc

That time he married a lesbian and had a kid with her.

30. The funniest scene they had?

That time he fucking gaslit Snape about the Marauder's Map while his and his friends' dumb high school nicknames were written right there for everyone to see.

character ask game

[grailfinders]

Fate & Phantasms #57F: Eric Bloodaxe

well now you've done it. look what happened, y'all've made fun of Eric Bloodaxe (the bloodaxe king) so much he up and left Fate entirely! he's set out to Eorzea to check out that free demo of hit MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn he's heard so much about. but he still wants to wear something slightly resembling his usual outfit, so he asked us to help out. that's right, we're making your favorite fate characters as glamour sets now! why not?

so to start with, if we want to look the part we need to start at character creation, and thankfully we won't even need to worry about getting horns from somewhere else, since the Au Ra race is kind enough to provide them for free!

admittedly he does still look a lot skinnier than I'd like, but that's just how mmo's tend to work, y'know? damn you, anime prettyboys! that being said, at least you'll always be able to swing a giant axe around if you play a Marauder. they definitely feel beserker-y too! run into literally every enemy and don't stop swinging until they're all dead, real easy gameplay.

we'll put all the real nitty-gritty stuff at the end, but for now our model's here so we'll talk about the fit. in order to put on any glamor (which allows you to make your armor look like whatever so you're not constantly mix-matching to get the best bonuses) you need to be level 30. I am not leveling a whole-ass character just for an April Fools bit, so our model this evening shall be Miss Akeminemi Homumomu. say hi Akeminemi.

we're going to make as much of our outfit as possible so you can wear this as early as possible, and with as little grinding as we can manage. to start off, let's talk weaponry. most of the crafted axes you can get are a little too clean to work as a proper bloodaxe, but you can at least match Eric's double-bladed style with a labrys, specifically a Spike Bronze Labrys as that is the lowest-level one we can make.

UPDATE: we found a weapon that matches Eric's blood axe much better! the end of the Extreme primal questline, "To Tussle with Gods", gives you tokens you can exchange for the Dual Haken.

your headgear is dead simple, as thanks to the average MMO player's obsession with their own face you can just toggle off the visual part of your helmet anyway, no crafting needed. score one for vanity!

your body is less so. while you can just not wear anything if you like living dangerously, most party members will appreciate you actually wearing armor as the party tank. in that case, you'll want to wear the Emperor's New Robe as a glamour, turning whatever armor you wear invisible! once you can glamor you can buy one from a nearby merchant for less than 100 gil, it's a steal. that being said, Akeminemi looks like a small child, so she'll be wearing a shirt for modesty's sake.

for your gloves, pick up some Goatskin Armguards and dye them a skintone, I think Pumpkin Orange works well enough for our purposes. boom. arms, guarded.

your Pants were the biggest sticking point here- there aren't many skirtlike options you can make that still have metal on them, especially in early game. if you've got the time or you're already high level, the Light Steel Subligar is the only one I could find that's craftable. that being said I've beaten the basegame and I still can't make the damn thing, so we're using the Brand-new Trousers as a substitute. you get them as part of the main story quests, so it's still easy enough to get.

finally, for Eric's big stompy boots grab some Bronze Sabatons and darken them with some Kobold Brown Dye. so, let's see how it looks all together, shall we?

absolutely terrifying. happy April Fools Day, y'all!

(oh right, the specifics, almost forgot)

for character creation:

pick Au Ra, the Xaela variant set height to max tail style 3, reduce size to min face 1 skin color: row 16, column 4 hair style: row 6, column 1 hair color: row 8, column 7 jaw 4 eye style 2, with large irises eye color: row 12 column 4 no limbal rings (he's not a cat now, c'mon) eyebrow style 6 nose 5 mouth 3 default lip color only use the eyebrow addons under the "other" options no facepaint and voice #12

and again, his outfit is Spiked Bronze Labrys Emperor's New Robe Goatskin Armguards (dyed Pumpkin Orange) Brand-New Trousers (or Light Steel Subligar) Bronze Sabatons (Dyed Kobold Brown)

[endversewinchester]

We’re going to ignore the xenophobia and biases (Fleur is part Veela, remember) in favor of the marauders era content this time around.

Is Tonks upset over Sirius? Possible. Andromeda (her mother) was Sirius’ favorite cousin and Sirius and Tonks are remarkably alike, which is hilarious in itself because Remus has a type but whatever. I do believe they got along quite well in the few months they got to know each other. It would make sense for her to be upset over that.

Remus comforting her is a bit weird. It should be the other way around, whether it you think of wolfstar as a romantic or platonic thing. It makes me think Hermione doesn’t really know the topic of their conversation, which tracks because I think Tonks is more upset at Remus not wanting to romance with her, with how the earlier convo between her and Mrs. Weasley went.

I think Ron’s instincts are spot on, which they usually are. The depression part from being refused by a man is very… old fashioned. But it is an older book saga, and I do think Sirius dying from Bellatrix plays a part into it, so I won’t question it much. Once again, nothing weird re remadora so far.

And now we get Remus for the first time, and Remus is looking worse than Harry has ever seen him look. Sirius died 2-3 weeks ago, so it checks out with that, but also with the war. Clearly he’s been told to keep track of death eater activity, as he is bringing news to the table.

I love that he made time to come to Harry’s party though. He only has you now, moons. Take care of him.

Important info on Regulus. We never really get to learn how Sirius found out that his brother had defected from the death eaters and passed away in what Remus and Sirius both assumed was murder, but it couldn’t have been from the newspaper. That “he only lasted a few days” is also fairly specific. Makes me think he was around when Sirius found out, but it might just be that Sirius told him how it went down afterwards.

Just want to talk a bit about werewolf politics. We are seeing the girls all be prejudiced towards Fleur (though we can’t say for sure it’s over her being part Veela), and now here we have werewolves be placed on the same level as dementors and inferi. Sure, the amulets don’t work but you are comparing werewolves with two of the foulest creatures we have in canon. It seems overtly excessive, and it goes to show how the British wizarding community views those who are different from them.

Here I just want to touch on Narcissa. Fandom likes to romanticize her because she saves Harry at the end of the saga, but nope. She was just like the rest of her family. A little less so than Bellatrix, who was completely insane, but still. Same thoughts, same beliefs. Sirius was her cousin, yet she feels no compassion towards him.

Let us also remember that Narcissa only saved Harry in exchange for Draco being alive, which is why she goes through the effort with Snape here as well. She is willing to bend the rules, but only for her own son.

Perhaps the most relevant bit of info we have in this chapter. Greyback has connections to the Malfoys and by extension to the Blacks (which is how it’s used in fanfiction more often than not). I wonder how far back those connections go, being Greyback bit Remus 30+ years ago at this point. And the hypocrisy of them being anti Remus being a teacher but keeping a werewolf of their own as an attack dog.

[rainofaugustsith]

50 FFXIV!

I finally made it to level 50 on all the jobs I'd previously ignored (except for blue mage which isn't needed for the amaro achievement) in FFXIV. Whew. At this point, I'm slowing down on leveling. Right now I'm focused on getting the two remaining aiming classes - bard and machinist - to level 70. I'm giving the level 50-60 tribal quests to one of the level 50ish jobs I have every day and just leveling them slowly. After the aiming jobs, I'll probably try to switch to the remaining tanks and focus on leveling those. I have not started gunbreaker yet since that gets picked up at level 60. I'm waiting until the other two tank jobs I'm leveling hit 60 too, so they can all share gear.

It's interesting. Some of the jobs were ones I put off on exploring because I didn't think I'd like them, and in some cases I was right. Some of them have turned out to be a joy. Spoilers for monk story below.

I love the job and the story!

Bard - I hated the archer missions because of the absolute asshole NPC you have to work with, but I'm adoring bard and all the NPCs there. The class itself has been really simple for me to understand and a lot of fun. Rain of Death is one of the best skills ever, I think.

I love bard enough that I think it may take over from dancer as my go-to class when I need ranged DPS. I'm kicking myself for not enjoying this job sooner.

Ninja - Fun! One of the things I've enjoyed about this class is that the story missions have often tried to teach you to use specific skills and remember the one combination set you need. You get to jump around a lot. I've also enjoyed the NPCs Rigel has worked with. I'm hoping to see familiar faces as this story mission goes on, and I think the Stormblood level quests might get very interesting.

Rogue - Separating this from ninja because the story and NPCs were so different. I really liked the way the rogue story chain set up the guild as the arbiters of underworld justice, keeping the peace and helping where they could in Limsa. I adored Jacke and the rest of the guild members, too. And the way the rogues' guild is concealed in Limsa is hilarious.

I dislike the job, but love the story

Machinist - I really, really dislike playing jobs with guns. I grew up in huge cities. Guns were never good things there at all. So a job that has Rigel waving around a gun and shooting things doesn't thrill me. This isn't a class I would voluntarily play outside of leveling it up for the achievement.

Having said that, I love the story. It really supports the MSQ and the Firmament story chains, and delves more into the way the class structures in Ishgard change. You get to work with House Haillenharte and eventually Hilda, and that's so much fun. I look forward to each installment of the story as I level.

Marauder - I really liked the Marauders' story chain and the theme of protecting Limsa Lominsa. The job itself, not so much.

Pugilist - The characters introduced in the Pugilists' Guild were really interesting, and the level 1-30 story foreshadowed a pivotal moment in the MSQ. I really liked these stories, even thought the job itself doesn't really do much for me. I mean, cool, Rigel is punching people like Popeye, I guess?

Club Ambivalence

Paladin - this job is White Mage's cousin to me: bland, non-offensive, sort of like watching paint dry in a video game. Other than the fact that one of the NPCs appears to be a reflection of one of the Warriors of Darkness, not much is piquing my interest here either job or story wise. However like white mage it isn't arduous. It's a perfectly serviceable job, and as a perk I carry that special shield We All Get in Heavensward as a glamour.

I like nothing here. I'm just in it for the Amaro.

Monk - Oh. My. God. This is a quest from a dudebro game that somehow made it into FFXIV. I hate it here to the point that going forward I've decided I'm not even going to do the story beats unless I absolutely have to for the achievement. The monk quest giver is a professor who insults the Warrior of Light's intelligence every other sentence - literally calling her stupid or making other insults about her intellect over and over again in every single quest. It got old really, really fast, especially since the game never once gave Rigel a chance to tell him off. The other NPC in the quest, an Ala Mhigo monk, started out as intriguing but he also got old really fast when he betrayed the WoL. Worse, those two quest givers never go away - the Warrior of Light is forced to continue working with someone who verbally abuses her at every turn and a guy who literally tried to murder her to steal her aether/power.

I'm leveling this, but the minute it gets to 80 it's getting dropped cold, I think. I'm not doing the story beats, I'm just leveling it.

Warrior - I felt like the level 30-50 story chain was a weaker version of what we see in some other stories, like Dragoon and Black Mage - people wrestling with power beyond their ken, and the possibility of becoming a monster from it. I didn't enjoy it. I still can't get into the warrior job either. Rigel's just hacking at things with an axe.

[miloscat]

[Review] Jaws Unleashed (PS2)

What if Ecco the Dolphin but with more dismemberment?

I’ve always been curious about this licenced game. Not because I’m a fan of the shark thriller movies that it’s based on, but because it’s the game that Appaloosa (formerly Novotrade) made after their final instalment in my beloved Ecco the Dolphin series: the 3D Defender of the Future. They started work on a sequel, Sentinels of the Universe, but it was cancelled. Instead they got some more out of the engine with this, the first official Jaws tie-in where you play as the shark. Sadly this was their last game before folding… Godspeed, you Hungarian heroes.

Unleashed is like a bizarro mirror of Ecco; Jaws’ underwater handling is similar albeit with turbo speed, the UI is familiar, the environments feel like they could belong in Ecco’s world much of the time (and they most likely reused some animal models, especially for the bottlenose dolphins you encounter). But of course you’re ripping and tearing through wildlife, devouring humans amid clouds of unconvincing blood, and generally being a force of devastation. Or are you? What surprised me here is the discovery that Jaws is in fact a kind of eco-terrorist, biting back at the humans whose industry is poisoning the ecosystem.

The setting is Amity Island, as seen in Jaws: The Ride in Universal Studios. Oh, and the movies as well. Much of the game’s trappings evoke the original film only: loading screen tooltips provide IMDB trivia facts about it, and there’s a handful of unlockable clips directly from it, but it’s set in “modern day” 2006, 30 years after the events of the film. The same mayor(!) is up to his tricks again, denying the existence of sharks for the sake of tourist bucks, while Brody’s son as seen in the sequel movies (from what I gather) acts as the voice of reason. Honestly, I had trouble following the plot but it’s really just an excuse for a series of setpieces of Jaws making trouble for the meddling humans. Oh, they call the shark Jaws explicitly in the game’s text and manual by the way.

Anyway, there’s some nice variety in the levels. The first proper stage has you breaking out of an aquarium in spectacular fashion in what’s probably an homage to the third movie Jaws 3D. Some have you blowing up boats and devouring beachgoers (playing into the MA15+ rated “power fantasy” promised on the back cover). On the other hand, others have you destroying factories and oil rigs, or disrupting huge aquatic mining operations that seem straight out of DotF’s Man’s Nightmare. These spoke to me more, giving the shark a purpose as a kind of destructive avatar of vengeance on behalf of nature (when he’s not fighting other animals like in the orca and giant squid boss fights).

Jaws isn’t just a marauding masticating machine: he has an overly complex control scheme that is supposed to let you dodge, lock on, go into sense outline mode, stealthily drag people down, and pull off advanced combo moves with the charge, tail whip, and biting. But you can get by pretty well just with the swim and chomp buttons for a good chunk of the game. Then as you go on they lean more and more into the mechanic of picking up an explosive barrel and spitting it out at targets, culminating in a slow-paced nautical mine maze that has you carefully clearing a path to some injured divers (to eat them, of course).

In between levels is an impressively large open world. You can zoom around the shallow waters of Amity Island, teeming with fish and sea life for you to chow down on and boats to sink. These sections look really nice and colourful, although they’re bland and repetitive from a wide view, and like most of the levels much flatter than Ecco’s 3D spaces. The seas do contain bite-sized sidequests for some quick action in between the story, with ramping difficulty in exchange for points to upgrade Jaws’s parameters: worth doing to prepare for the later levels.

Jaws Unleashed has highs and lows. I enjoyed the sequences with more involved objectives, unless they included navigating dark, samey corridors (the mine). Battling boats and beasts was kind of cool, but for their beefy health bars. Scouring levels for collectibles to swallow is a nice addition, until instant death traps reset your progress. Most of all I just got a kick out of a game that has an injection of Ecco DNA, even if it represents a necessary pivot in various ways. Also, if you stop swimming for too long Jaws will die, just like a real shark! Nice touch.

[ohmygodshesinsane]

I posted 2,528 times in 2022

547 posts created (22%)

1,981 posts reblogged (78%)

I tagged 2,526 of my posts in 2022

#taylor swift - 485 posts

#tv - 320 posts

#me - 299 posts

#hp - 279 posts

#fanfic - 257 posts

#fanart - 154 posts

#midnights - 153 posts

#lily evans - 147 posts

#stranger things - 144 posts

#writing - 143 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#like yeah ok dont count the 2k oneshot i read but all the young dudes is a different level?? and i want credit for sitting through a 500k fi

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

sweet nothing

Lily Evans has lived with James Potter for two months, and this sun-drenched, fancy-free summer feels like a dream.

Or maybe, the calm before the storm.

For @jilytoberfest ‘s Bittersweet Challenge, with the prompt: “It never works for us, and it never will.” Angst-to-Fluff. 

I’ve had so much fun writing this and I hope you guys enjoy it too!

Read it on Ao3!

57 notes - Posted October 30, 2022

#4

just watched secrets of dumbledore i do not remember theseus being so hot what

64 notes - Posted April 13, 2022

#3

watching human resources and the shame wizard like. remus lupin is saying those things ?

94 notes - Posted March 19, 2022

#2

i just want to support him ok

130 notes - Posted July 2, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

‘When they get near me -’ Harry stared at Lupin’s desk, his throat tight, ‘I can hear Voldemort murdering my mum.’

Lupin made a sudden motion with his arms as though he had made to grip Harry’s shoulder, but thought better of it.”

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Chapter Ten, ‘The Marauder’s Map’

aka a line that destroys me every time because. lily and remus’ friendship. just. pain

163 notes - Posted April 8, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[generalperfectionbread]

And there we go. Fun times. The Toxic God story itself was fun, so I'm looking forward to the new storypack in 3.7. In terms of shenanigans, my northern neighbors were a shattered ring Xenophobes, so I could only make them a tributary, and one of my other near-neighbors diplomatically vassalized the other nearby one, so no super early vassals. Did form a mutual defense pact, so when the fanatical purifier crisis aspirants attacked (Croll Skull Lords), had some fun times there (won, got some territory for my first sector-turned-vassal). Ketling Star Pack was nearby, and was my first real vassal, and Scholarium. When the Croll came again, and hit level 5, had more fun, got more territory, and was largely ready for it. They had eaten my former northern neighbors, so I re-took that for another vassal. Not long after that and I had snowballed things so that in a short while I had diplomatically vassalized just about half the galaxy. That in turn made taking custodian and passing a few of the politics tradition laws something to pass the time until the final Toxic God events had happened. Fight wasn't too bad, but longer than average leviathan fights. Waited a bit more, insulted everyone, got that achievement, left.

No L-Gate in my territory, so didn't get that opened, no Great Khan even tho someone else defeated one of the marauders and attacked the other. First League precusor and the relic world was in my core sector, as was a size 30 Barren world I terraformed and was setting up to pass the time. Oh and I got Zarqlan, but well past when the fleets would have been anything other than trophy/troop escorts. Didn't even end up completing my first megastructure, which ended up being a Science Nexus since Mega Shipyard took a while to roll.

It's....

Almost Stellaris time. Next two achievements I'm going for are the Knights of the Toxic God quest chain, and Toxic Workplace. I feel like with these ethics I should be able to keep factions happy, get better bonuses than I had been before I think since they'll be the official ones, and still be in a good spot, I hope, for initial war and vassalization, which I'll turn to a Scholarium hopefully soon enough for it to matter. World started, initial moves put in place, but that's it.

[forcemelt]

PTS 7.1 annihilation / watchman

gonna go over some things I have personally noticed on the PTS for 7.1 for the annihilation marauder and watchman sentinel disciplines as there are some things that made me go 👀

I will try to make this coherent so that even people who don’t play anni get this as long as you sorta know how marauders tend to work like though I'll try to explain some stuff for context. i say this but it'll still make no sense lol

wrote this before the new iteration of the pts came out today, no idea if anything changed bc i don’t have the time to check.

anyway, posting it under the cut, it’s honestly way too long

hemorrhage / plasma blades tooltip

so shortly after 7.0 launched there’s already been some early datamined stuff for 7.1 - in particular i saw a spreadsheet that included some changes to certain abilities/utilities’ tooltips and from what I heard some of it actually went live since then even? not too sure now.

either way, to explain what the hemorrhage passive does, here’s its current tooltip description:

the important part to focus on is the last sentence; that’s some self healing! anyway;

this ^ is the tooltip for hemorrhage now on the pts (and this was also in the very early 7.1 datamined stuff I mentioned). what could this mean? are they removing anni heals?

after a quick test (really didn’t require any deep look on that one lol) I’m still most definitely doing basically the same amount of healing as on live.

need to point out that plasma blades, the watchman mirror for the passive still has the text about healing included on the pts. of course discrepancies between the supposedly mirror disciplines are not a new thing at all, anni and watchman literally have that on live right now with blood fury / burning zen for example.

either way i’m gonna lean towards the new hemorrhage tooltip being some kinda mistake or a leftover of the devs considering removing anni heals but dedicing to just get rid of aoe dr instead. or at least that’s my working theory but honestly who fucking knows lol, but like they would definitely include this in a dev post if they were to remove something like that anyway heh.. maybe in 7.2 🤯

blood fury / burning zen

ok, so this the one main thing I wanted to talk about, but i wanna explain some stuff first.

blood fury is one of the three utility choices you can make once you’re level 43. besides that, there’s also furious power (a rotational ability back in 6.X, now rendered useless as we don’t have the descent of the fearless set bonus) and then theres a choice called bleeding center, the latter of the two actually being the usually recommended choice for that level - what it does is that when one of your dots critically hit you build 2 fury, even during berserk - this is very very handy as annihilation currently wants to have berserk (an ability that becomes available once you get 30 stacks of fury which you build by using rage spending abilities) up for use before force rend (one of anni’s dots) come off cooldown, since now it will do 4x more damage on the initial hit if berserk is also active (it’s like a 40-50k hit - thats a lot of damage at once for a dot spec)

so if burning center tends to often be the recommended choice, why am I talking about blood fury?

simple as - it’s a dps increase. the reason people don’t always recommend it is because it makes the rotation harder to manage and its not viable on fights with a lot of target swapping for example, as you won’t be be able to build your fury stacks as fast and you might end up having force rend off cooldown before berserk becomes available, meaning you have to either delay it or use it without the buff, which is something you should avoid. but as an anni main that loves high parsing numbers this won’t stop me from taking it to a lot of fights (same for a whole lot of other anni maras out there ofc). plus i actually quite like the additional difficulty it introduces to anni, since with the dispatcher’s challenge legendary implant it no longer really has rage issues as much, so blood fury is like a bit of additional fun.

ok, so anyway, there are some interesting things to note about blood fury:

1) first off, “effect cannot occur more than once per second” my ass. happens on each hit with your weapons. you know how the ravage ability is like several hits on the target with both of your lightsabers in just one gcd? yeahh, you get a whole bunch of blood fury hits from it

of course, when people noticed this discrepancy, the question was; so what is the intended effect here? the way it works on anni or watchman? lot of people assumed that the way it is on watchman is the intended effect but it’s not like we couldn’t be sure...

2) and now the funny part - on live there’s currently a discrepancy between how blood fury works on annihilation marauder vs how it works on watchman sentinel (called burning zen there). so what exactly happens is; blood fury only occurs during berserk - when you use berserk, you get 6 charges of it - over the course of a few seconds those charges are consumed by your dots (aka “bleeds” on anni) that are on the target and berserk makes it so they are a crit hit. however - on annihilation, blood fury hits don’t consume berserk charges, but hits of burning zen DO eat berserks (called “zen” on watchman), which... isn’t really something you want. god forbid you pop zen one gcd early and place blade barrage in there, which is all nice and well on annihilation, but on watchman say bye bye to your buffed force melt because your zen charges will be eaten by barrage lmao.

anyway, great news! there’s a new addition to the blood fury / burning zen tooltip on the pts server:

turns out it is not supposed stacks of berserk! and after testing, it does work properly on both disciplines too this time.

but to my surprise, this wasn’t all! I decided to try some parsing on the pts despite my ping being less than ideal. and suddenly my crit is way higher? WELL - as it turns out, blood fury is now an autocrit too! and this actually makes sense - since it’s labeled as bleed damage it means it should technically also be a crit like the other dots are in the berserk window, and it actually does that right now on watchman on live too  - I just never noticed since the fact that the charges get consumed so quickly renders it useless and mostly a dps loss despite the crit.

so yeah, it might do even more damage. I’ve only done a few parses on the pts, but I was able to get even 1k dps increase out of blood fury alone so far and was able to hit 31k dps on the dummy without too much trouble (still one of my luckier parses though, its not like every parse on live i do is 30k). i’m tempted to play around with it more but my ping on the pts really isnt the greatest. on parsely.io there’s someone who was able to do 31.8k even - unsure whether they weren’t able to farm some of the new gear tiers already though.

but either way - top parse on live right now is 31.1k, blood fury making up ~1k of that damage there. doesn’t seem unlikely that you could then parse 32k with annihilation if blood fury will amount for double the dps it does now, so I wonder what kinda implications could this have. would be hilarious if all the former anni players who switched to fury at the start of 7.0 would now switch back bc it can suddenly parse really high (though it depends on just how big the upcoming fury nerf affects its overall dps - and again, not every anni plays with blood fury)

anyway i talked too much so huge props who actually read this tehee

[mischief-marauders]

Modern Marauders: Remus’ Birthday

December 23rd, 8:24 pm

Sirius took a small sip of his tea and forced himself not to make a face. Hope liked her tea the same way her son did, more sugar than tea. He took one more sip to be polite and then set it down in front of him. James chugged his down and set it down as well.

“Great” Sirius thought to himself. It was an amazing idea to give a teenager with ADHD a shit ton of sugar.

Hope sat down across from them and gave them a grin.

“I thought you boys were spending Christmas at Hogwarts with Remus since he can’t come home”

“We are” James interjected politely, his hands slightly shaking. Sirius mentally groaned at the sight of it.

“We told Remus we had to go pick something up from my house but in all honesty, we wanted to see you and talk to you about something”

Hope (she refused to let anyone call her Mrs. Lupin) raised an eyebrow in curiosity.

“And what is that?”

“Remus’ birthday. It’s coming up in two months, we have no idea what to do for his birthday this year, and we refuse to let it pass without something special. I’m sure you’ve heard of the past celebrations”

Hope coughed on her tea and laughed.

“If you’re referring to Remus writing to me about you boys setting off fireworks in the great hall during breakfast last year, then yes, I am aware”

Sirius gave her a sheepish grin.

“He made us promise not to do anything too big this year but we aren’t sure we can do that. We promised no fireworks, explosions, or school property damage. We actually wanted to hold a surprise party for him. But we need something to give it that extra oomph, ya know?”

Hope looked thoughtful and then carefully said “Why don't you have a theme for the party?”

James sat up in excitement. “Yes! A themed party. We can plan the party around that!”. Then his face scrunched up in confusion. “The only problem with that is that Remus doesn’t really like anything enough to hold a party around”

Hope sat back and looked deep in thought. “Give me two weeks and I’ll send something via owl that can help���

January 14th, 2:30 pm

Lily looked startled at the pile of books that fell on the table in front of her and then up at the boys that dropped it.

She scowled at a smirking James Potter and a smiling Sirius Black.

“Can I help you?”

Sirius’ grin grew at her offering help, unaware that it was complete sarcasm.

“Yes! As I’m sure you know, Remus’ birthday is coming up in a few weeks. He made us promise nothing big. No fireworks, no explosions, no coordinated dance numbers. But he didn’t say we couldn’t throw a party. We just didn’t know what theme to have a party so we visited his mother and today, she sent these back. We’re not exactly sure what they are, only that they’re muggle and neither of us knows what the hell it is. She said he absolutely loves them, the blue one is his favorite and that he would kill her if he knew that she sent them to us”

Lily peered at the books and a grin replaced her scowl. "Comics? I love the Avengers! I didn’t know Remus liked reading comics!”

James nodded. His mother mentioned that he always loved them but when he was a kid, the neighborhood kids gave him shit for liking comics. They bullied him because of it, so he doesn't want anyone else knowing. So you know what these are?

Lily laughed and arched an eyebrow. ‘Know it? Please, I love the Avengers!”

She flipped through a couple of pages and looked deep in thought.

“How much are you willing to do to make Remus happy?”

James and Sirius looked at each other and responded in unison. “Anything. We’ll do anything for Remus”.

Lily laughed and grabbed a blank piece of paper and a pencil from her bag and started sketching. “Okay, since Remus doesn’t want a lot of people knowing, it’ll be just us. I’ve been working on my charms and transfiguration so I know I can make these. I’ll go as my favorite Avenger and then you two can go as the other two. You guys handle the decorations, cake, and getting Remus there” She paused thoughtfully.

“We need one more person to join us. No group of heros is complete without a villain. And from the number of times he pops up in these comics, he is Remus’ favorite for sure”.

Sirius slapped the table. “I know someone who owes me a favor and loves cake. I’ll get him to come"

Lily grinned. “Great!”

March 10th, 5:55 pm

Remus looked suspiciously at the note in his hand. Sirius slipped it to him during lunch and then disappeared all day. James also disappeared and he couldn’t find Lily during lunch. The note said to come up to the dorm room at 6 pm on the dot. Remus sighed and prepared himself. His friends took everything to the next level. He couldn't predict whether there would be fireworks, a hippogriff, or the whomping willow in his room.

Remus paused outside of the door carefully, preparing himself before he twisted the door open and stepped into the dark.

“Hello?” he murmured cautiously before someone flipped the switch and a group of people screamed “Happy Birthday!”

Remus looked around in shock at the dorm room. The beds and dressers were gone, replaced with tables laden with his favorite foods and a huge multi-colored cake. He blinked as he tried to process what his friends were wearing. No. It couldn’t be. James whooped in a very realistic Iron Man costume. Lily smirked at him in her Scarlet Witch costume. A tight-lipped Regulus glared at him from the corner, dressed as Loki. Finally, Sirius ran up and pulled him in a hug while wearing a Thor costume.

‘Happy birthday Re!”

Remus was speechless. His friends dressed up as the Avengers. For his birthday.

“H-How did you know I liked the avengers?”

James gave him a conspiratorial wink. “A little birdy told us”

Remus looked around in confusion.

“Where did you get these costumes?”

Lily laughed and pulled her wand out. “C’mon, we have magic. Just a bit of charms and transfiguration, and voila!”

Sirius grinned at him. ‘Do you like it Re?”

Remus opened and closed his mouth a few times while tears pooled in his eyes as he looked around at each of them again.

Sirius' felt himself grow nervous and anxious. Maybe they had gone too far. Hope did say he was bullied for liking comics. Maybe they shouldn’t have done this-

Remus’ face broke open into a grin and he laughed as he wiped away his tears.

“Like it? I love this! What the hell, this is amazing. I can’t believe you went through all this trouble for me. And you?” Remus beckoned to a bored looking Regulus.

Regulus shrugged at him. “I owed Sirius a favor and he promised me I could have cake.” Then his blank face was overtaken by a small grin. “And happy birthday Remus.”

Remus laughed as he pulled his friends into a group hug. Even Regulus let himself get pulled in.

Lily broke away and pointed to the bathroom. “I think there’s one more costume in the bathroom for the birthday boy. I heard it’s your favorite”

Remus ducked into the bathroom to get changed. As Sirius laughed and pointed his hammer at the ceiling, a large roar of thunder shook the room and lightning hit the quidditch field. Sirius looked in shock at his hammer.

Lily cringed as she took it from him. “Maybe I shouldn’t have given a charmed hammer that creates lightning to the person with the least amount of impulse control.”

March 11th, 2:00 am

Hope sat up quickly in fear. There was a scratching at the window and a beat of wings.

“Lyall”, she whispered as she shook her husband awake, "there’s something at the window"

Lyall grabbed his wand from the nightstand and stood up quickly. He inched quietly to the window and opened it.

A large, white owl flew into the room and dropped a letter on a terrified Hope Lupin before flying out. Hope cautiously opened the letter and grinned as a photograph fell out. It was a picture of Remus grinning wildly in a Captain America costume next to Lily, Sirius, James, and a boy that looked like Sirius. On the back, written in her son's messy handwriting, were the words "Thank you -R.J.L.”

[recreancyrpg]

Welcome to Recreancy, Ashley!

You have been accepted for the role of PETER PETTIGREW!

He walked taller, held his head up a little higher, and felt like, for once, the sorting hat had known what it was talking about when it put him into Gryffindor. With James back, Peter suddenly finds himself worrying if he's going to go back to floundering in the water, like he's on the edge about to be pushed back in.

Please take a look at the new member checklist and send in your account within 24 hours!

OUT OF CHARACTER:

NAME & PRONOUNS: Ashley (She/They) AGE: 30+

TIMEZONE: EST

ACTIVITY LEVEL: I work part time and run my own rp, but I'll probably be a 7/10 because I'm online almost every night and I am in desperate need to write lately, lol

ANYTHING ELSE: N/A

CHARACTER DETAILS:

NAME: Peter Pettigrew

AGE: 24

GENDER, PRONOUNS, and SEXUALITY: Cis Male, He/Him, Peter isn't truly sure what label he'd use for his sexuality. He wants to be loved, he knows that, but the thought of actually doing something more than cuddling or holding hands or soft kisses is something that really makes him feel grossed out, but he'd never admit that to anyone. He's spent so long assuming that no one could love him in that way anyway that he doesn't think it matters what he feels or doesn't feel. However, in today's terms, Peter would be Panromantic/Asexual.

BLOOD STATUS: Half-Blood

HOUSE ALUMNI: Gryffindor

ANY CHANGES: N/A!

CHARACTER BACKGROUND:

PERSONALITY:

Enough. It was something that Peter Pettigrew had never felt like he was. He wasn't enough to his mother when he was born; his father having left weeks before, and never came back, never met his child, never knew his name. He wasn't enough when his mother was left single, forced to work hard and provide for them, when she wanted to be a socialite again. He wasn't enough when his mother began to focus more on her career than her baggage of a child, and he had to learn to fend for himself. He wasn't enough when the other kids at the muggle school made fun of his looks, his clothes, his leftover lunch from a dinner two nights before. He'd thought he'd be enough when he got his letter to Hogwarts, but even that wasn't enough, simply a 'At least you're not a Squib then' from his mother. It hadn't given him much confidence for going to school, and the overwhelming feeling that had come from his first visit to Diagon Alley for school supplies hadn't helped either.

Being a hat stall hadn't felt surprising at all to him. Peter had been terrified of Slytherin; his mother had talked it up over her years, and Peter had wanted nothing to do with it. Was it something that could have fit? Of course. He'd learned to be cunning in order to keep himself safe, but self-preservation was not the same as ambition; although Peter wanted to be enough, he did not want to be a leader or to be something out of the ordinary. There was courage in that, bravery, and although perhaps Peter didn't understand it, didn't see it, the hat realized something he hadn't, and Peter had to let out a breath at being able to sit at a table with his new friends.

At Hogwarts, most of it still felt like he wasn't enough. He was Quick-Witted and had decent grades, but it wasn't enough to be anywhere near the top of the class, or close to his friends. He was scared of being on a broom and Quidditch was out of the picture. He was decent at potions, but not enough to make a difference. He was quite skilled at Wizard's Chess, but would rather let the others win. He was part of the Marauders, and yet, he wasn't seen as Enough of a Marauder to anyone but their group, it seemed. Despite all the times James told people to piss off, it ate away at Peter like an acid and eroded any confidence he might have; like he could never truly be seen as one of them, and the people around them would always laugh at this poor, pathetic tag along who wanted to play as if he belonged.

The Marauders were different though, because with them, he finally felt for once in his life like he was Enough. He was included, and loved, and he loved them more than anything. If it was studying together, or playing pranks, or just hanging around in the common room, Peter didn't have to be anything other than Peter, and they loved him for it all the same. Peter never had to think twice when it came to James, or Sirius, or Remus, being there for him, or him being there for them. The Marauders were a unit, a family, and Peter was devoted more than anything to them.

Lying came almost as naturally as him feeling as if he wasn't enough. Not to his friends, of course, The Marauders were the only people that Peter would never lie to, and it was never as if he were out to be malicious about his lies. But he'd learned from a young age that little white lies were easier to tell, to keep him safe; safe from his mother, safe from the other children, and safe from anyone who seemed a little too interested in how his mother earned her money. The familiarity and ease with which he managed it came in handy at Hogwarts; quick with something always on his tongue, ready to get them out of trouble whenever they were caught, Peter found improv quite easy. A joke, that perhaps one day he'd grow up to be an actor; despite the fact that the limelight terrified him.

More importantly than that, he was Useful. Useful in how he could quickly come up with something that could get them out of detention. Perhaps to others there would have been dismay at the fact that when he turned into an Animagi, his form was that of a Rat. But Peter didn't see the negative connotations with such an animal, in truth, he rather admired the little creatures that he'd seen sometimes in the castle. More than that, however, with James being a large stag and Sirius being a large dog, Peter's small form as a rat was Useful in being able to get into small spaces, in being able to slip into areas that the others couldn't get, and at racing to the Whomping Willow to hit the button so the others wouldn't get hit by the tree.

He realized it was also useful when it came to making the Marauders Map. Peter could run around as a rat a little easier, making the work quicker when they split up. Peter may not have had a photographic memory, but he was good at mapping things out and helping to show where things went, and how far. To Peter, this was his way to be Enough; if he was useful, it was good. If he was useful, they'd keep him around. If he was useful, he'd never have to worry about being left behind, or shoved out of the group. If he was useful, he wouldn't be just loved, he would be Needed.

As graduation drew near, however, Peter floundered. He hadn't truly thought of what he would do outside of Hogwarts, because thinking about graduation meant thinking about The Marauders no longer living together, meant thinking about them being separated, meant thinking about the After that he didn't want to even consider. Not to mention that James wanted to join The Order after school, and Peter had absolutely no desire to do so. The Order meant facing the war. The Order meant fighting. Peter had so far flown under the radar as a half-blood, who's mother had been a pureblood. He didn't know his father had been a Muggle, and so he didn't think he truly had any skin in this fight. However, he had friends that did, and more importantly James wanted to join, and so Peter Loyally followed after him.

Peter was Dependable for those in The Order. Perhaps he wasn't the best at dueling, and sometimes his Self-Doubt would take over and make him a less than desirable person to boost morale, but he was always there, just the same. Perhaps not the first to volunteer for a mission, and perhaps a little reluctant to go out into the field, but Peter had other talents. His years spent fending for himself, his love of chess, his quick-wit, it all helped and made him Useful to the Order. Strategy felt natural to him, assessing the risk and seeing what moves could happen, what moves made sense; his Anxiety helped him to look at every outcome and situation, and the mapping skills didn't hurt either. And he was more than happy to let James take control as Leader, while he advised from beside him. It felt natural and easy.

However, Self-Preservation was something he focused on a lot more, and that he worried James didn't understand. Peter was Quiet, shoulder hunched, hands shoved into pockets, making himself small and doing his best to blend in with the crowd, to never be noticed. Maybe it even seemed Cowardly, but Peter would rather be safe than sorry, and he told himself often that he couldn't be a coward if he'd joined The Order, could he? He was inconspicuous though, flying under the radar of the Ministry and of the Death Eaters, because who could truly care about some quiet, anxiety ridden boy who couldn't look you in the eye when talking to you? Even being called Pathetic didn't seem like an insult to Peter, not when it kept him safe. When James went missing, things spiraled and Peter felt as if the world had gone out from under him. James had been the rock, he'd always believed, and suddenly Peter found himself standing between Sirius and Remus, and wondering how they were going to survive this.

What Would James Do?

It had always helped him before when he was feeling anxious or scared; whether that had been right before getting caught at school, or if it had been facing his mother once he returned home, or when he'd been off on a mission that hadn't involved James. Even a few times when someone kind had spoken to him and Peter hadn't known how to react; his thoughts went to how the older boy would respond, and it became clear. And now, with James not there anymore, he clung tighter to that thought than ever. Sirius and Remus needed James, or needed someone to be like James, just as the Order did. And so Peter gathered up all the Courage he could, and thought 'What Would James Do?', before stepping up to try and do just that.

It wasn't about Leadership. Peter never wanted to take over, or take James' place. It had never been about Power either. Peter didn't want all eyes on him, if he were honest; what he wanted, more than anything, was to be Useful, and without James, that position was needed, was it not? They needed someone to step up, to speak up, to do what James would have done and to lead them. Somehow it worked, and Peter found himself even more surprised by that fact, and surprised that people would follow him, would believe in him. Suddenly, Peter felt like he was Enough to more people than just The Marauders. He was more than just useful to The Order. There was suddenly Confidence in him, albeit at first it was acting more than real confidence. As things continued, however, the confidence grew more. Peter stopped hunching his shoulders as much, stood up a bit straighter than before, amazing people that he wasn't truly as short as he seemed, though he was still the shortest Marauder. He walked taller, held his head up a little higher, and felt like, for once, the sorting hat had known what it was talking about when it put him into Gryffindor.

With James back, Peter suddenly finds himself worrying if he's going to go back to floundering in the water, like he's on the edge about to be pushed back in. Truly, he never wanted to be a leader when it came to anything, certainly not to be in a leadership position within an organization fighting a war. But he couldn't ignore just how much confidence this role had given him, how much he felt like he was finally Enough. He's beyond happy that James is back, and wants to never lose him again. But the feeling that maybe things could turn again, that he'd no longer be as Useful as James, that they would start looking only to James again, and that Peter once again wouldn't be Enough, is a scary feeling. Maybe he's even being a little Touchy about it, a little more Inconsiderate sometimes. But Peter doesn't want power. Peter just wants to be Enough.

BRIEF OVERVIEW OF FAMILY:

Thistley Pettigrew was a young witch who grew up in her family home in Scotland. She was the apple of her parents eyes, pampered and treated as if she'd never have to have a care in the world. She went to Hogwarts and was a proud Slytherin, much to the surprise of her Gryffindor parents. Still, they loved their daughter more than anything, and the three were very close. That was why, when they passed only a few months after she graduated from Hogwarts, it was so completely devastating to Thistley. She spent weeks mourning in the family home, before feeling as if she needed to get out; and so she began to travel and drink, partying as if she were trying to drown out the memories and forget the pain completely.

That was where she met Dalziel. She never learned his last name, never thought it was really important at first. He was a drinking buddy and a friend, an older man by seven years, who let her crash with him and who got her back safe when she'd gotten completely wasted. It went from drinking buddy, to friend, to friends with benefits, and Thistley was sure that she was starting to fall in love with the man. he was just what the pureblood needed, despite him being a muggle. She wanted him to stay with her, needed him to stay with her; he took care of her and made her feel as if her parents were right, that she wouldn't have to have a care, because she would be taken care of. Who needed work when you had a man ready to provide for you?

It was when she became pregnant that things took a turn. Thistley had never wanted children, but Dalziel's attention had started to wander towards other girls, girls younger than her age of twenty. She had to get the attention back on her, she had to keep him from leaving her; and so, she'd made sure that they weren't as careful as they'd always been, and gotten herself pregnant. She was ecstatic, already thinking of them moving back to her family home and raising their child together, feeling as if she'd just won the lottery. But Dalziel... he hadn't wanted children either, and when she announced she was pregnant, he'd begun to look for a way out.

It was towards the end of her being seven months along that Dalziel left one night to get them food and didn't return. Thistley had fallen asleep, exhausted from the pregnancy, and awoken to find that he still hadn't come back. She felt like she couldn't be too concerned; he was having a child with her, he had to come back, didn't he? But days went by and she didn't hear from him, couldn't find him. She didn't leave the apartment though, desperately hoping that he would come back, and when she went into labor, she was sure that he would be at the hospital with her.

He wasn't. He didn't show up at the hospital, and Thistley was devastated. When she was finally ready to go home, she couldn't go back to the apartment if he wasn't there, and so she left a note for him, hoping he'd see it if he returned and that he would join her at her family home. She went there with her little boy, her little Peter. She'd named him, and then realized she didn't know his father's last name. Instead, she gave him her own last name, vowing that once his father returned, she'd change it for him. He was her darling little boy, her ticket to getting her love back, and Dalziel would return, he had to.

A year went by and Dalziel never returned. Thistley was never able to find him, and it wore on her. Here she was now, a single mother of a small baby, living in a large building that felt less like a home anymore and more like a prison. It was in need of repair, and she was in need of money. She found a girl who was willing to babysit for her and watch Peter while she worked, and she was more than glad to hand off the small child to someone else. She'd started to resent her child, and she didn't have time to take care of him or focus on him, not when she had to begin working and getting things back together for her life. She was tired, angry at the world, and upset at the fact that people looked at her as if she were garbage.

The babysitter seemed to care about as much as his mother did. She took care of the boy, of course, making sure he was bathed and fed and was learning to talk and walk as he grew... but it was a job and not her own child. It was at that point, as he began to get old enough to learn and do things on his own, that Peter had to really learn to become self-reliant. His mother was always busy and rarely had time to even speak to her child, and the babysitter was more interested in running off with her boyfriend than actually watching over the child she was supposed to be taking care of.

Peter learned quickly to take care of himself. It weighed heavily on him, and he vowed that once he was older... once he was older, he would be enough, and he would have help. He wouldn't have to be so self-sufficient. He wouldn't have to worry about being safe, or fearing for his life because he had to go into town on his own; he'd have people that would protect him and help him, unlike his mother. Survival was the main focus, and he was developing a quick-wit, thinking two or three steps ahead and always trying to figure out the next outcome.

When it was his turn to go to Hogwarts, his mother was actually very surprised that he'd even gotten his letter, saying that at least it was proof that he wasn't a Squib then. She hadn't thought he'd have any magical talent, though that was probably because she didn't pay any attention to him. Hogwarts was also an easy way to get rid of the babysitter for good, and to send Peter off and leave him there during holidays as well. Upon graduation, his mother finally just put her foot down and kicked him out, without even seeing if he had anywhere to go. In the years that have followed, Peter has not spoken to his mother even once; he did see her in Diagon Alley once, where she was chatting with some other Purebloods and she seemed to be trying to get back into that society, but Peter never spoke with her.

OCCUPATION:

Peter works at Mr. Mulpepper's Apothecary in Diagon Alley; he's always been pretty decent when it comes to potions and ingredients, and there's something rather relaxing about measuring out the ingredients and knowing what to do.

LIVING SITUATION:

Peter currently resides in a very small flat in London, located in a rather dingy back alley, with a rickety staircase leading up to the door. He'd luckily saved up enough money from odd jobs the summers between Hogwarts to pay for the first month of the very cramped flat, and got a job quick enough to stay. It's not much, and he gets very lonely on his own, but he didn't want to end up relying on anyone else, and now he likes the place too much to go anywhere else.

ORDER OF THE PHOENIX:

Before the purebloods were taken, Peter didn't really have a role or a place in The Order, other than following after James, and trying to advise situations the best he could. As with at Hogwarts, Peter was a follower, and doing whatever he could to be helpful and useful to those who lead the charge. However, after the disappearances, Peter began to step up, and now he's become more of a leader, taken on more responsibility, and has people looking to him, something that still shocks him despite it being months past now. As for his thoughts on the Order, Peter wasn't really convinced to join at first, only after James wanted to, did he want to. At this point? Had he not gotten people to look to him, and had he not started to get the confidence, he would have grown tired of the Order and how long things have gone on, worried that they'd never win; however, with a new found confidence and leading successful missions, Peter has something that he didn't really have much of before either - Hope. Peter thinks that they can win this war, if they keep trying. He can help, and now that the others are back, so can they. He believes they can do this.

RELATIONSHIPS:

- James Potter - Peter adores James, and some might even go as far to call that an obsession if they knew about the 'What Would James Do?' motto that Peter's adopted. Peter has always looked up to James, seeing in him that confidence and assurance that Peter always wanted to have. Peter always found it easy to follow after James' footsteps, following his lead into whatever James wanted to do. Pranks? Of course. The Order? I guess. Leadership? If he had to. James had all the qualities that Peter wanted to have; Confidence, Hope, Optimism. He's Peter's role model, and of course Peter's grateful to have him back. He just doesn't want to lose those qualities he's gathered for himself, because if James is back, then people don't need him pretending to have those qualities too, when he borrowed them as he played like James, right?

- Sirius Black - Peter has always adored Sirius as well, though on a lesser scale than his adoration for James. He understood Sirius somewhat with their parents, and always wished he could pull off the confidence that Sirius has. That adoration hasn't gone any less, and he still is friends with Sirius, but he can't help but feel a little hurt and worried over it now. He knows that he could never truly measure up to James, and he doesn't want Sirius to think he was trying to steal his place, because he wasn't. But they all needed a rock, and Peter had stepped up to help, because it was needed, right? He's worried Sirius sees through him far easier than the rest, and how can he be sure Sirius won't use those cracks to his advantage? Not to mention, he's unsure what Sirius has been getting himself into.

- Remus Lupin - As long as it's been James and Sirius, it's been Remus and Peter. Remus was the first one who truly felt like he would listen, and knowing that Remus is the first to support him now is something Peter is thankful for. Peter worries for him, especially with the news out that he's a werewolf. Peter never understood why Sirius would assume that Remus is the spy, because Peter knows Remus far too well for that to have any truth to it. Peter has never really understood why people are so against werewolves, why there's so much prejudice, but perhaps that's because the only time he ever really learned of them was after he'd met Remus. To him, Remus is far too kind for anyone to be rude towards him, and Remus is one person he'll defend until the end of time.

- Lily Evans - Peter hadn't truly liked her as much from the start; but perhaps that had been because James was always going out of his way to get her attention. Not that he was jealous, of course, but it interfered with pranking time! That, and maybe a bit of how his mother would talk about muggles and muggleborns, considering she'd never told her son that his father was a muggle. But through Hogwarts he'd come to finally adore Lily as well, and he was one who rooted and cheered so hard for Lily and James when they got together. Lily fit in with them as easily as a puzzle piece sliding into place, he thought. Still, as the war went on, Peter couldn't help but worry about how they would be safe. He can't truly say he blames Lily for breaking up with James upon his return. Sure, he doesn't like that it hurt James, but her words have some truth to them; it is dangerous, especially being open like that.

- Gideon Prewett - Peter had known the twins from being in The Order of course, and had always admired the older men. He saw how badly Gideon's disappearance hurt Fabian, just James' disappearance had hurt them. Peter has watched them all trying to fit back in, and he isn't sure what they're even attempting at this point. They were captured and tortured, for Merlin's sake, it's not like it's going to be that easy to just go back to how it was before. Peter knows this, and he knows that Gideon is struggling. After spending so many years struggling himself, so many years of playing pretend, and now especially the months of 'What Would James Do?' acting, he knows that Gideon is playing a part too. There's a lot of faking going on, and Peter worries for him, because he's been there, and it's not easy.

- Caradoc Dearborn - After joining The Order and being in it for awhile, Caradoc is another who Peter has truly began to admire and look up to. Perhaps if he had not had James as a role model, Caradoc may have been the next on the list. Peter thinks him wise and responsible, and seeing the way he run the bar and how he manages it and The Order's safehouse, their haven, all at the same time? Peter can't help but want to have that sort of confidence too. Caradoc was someone who Peter worried at first wouldn't be behind him; but it seems like Caradoc approves and Peter is overjoyed at the way the older man has been receptive towards his new found confidence. Peter wants to make sure that he lives up to any expectations Caradoc might have, and he's desperate to keep his approval.

- Severus Snape - Peter has never liked Snape, and unless James or Sirius went after him, he would have done his best to just stay far from the other man forever. But being a Marauder, and adoring James and Sirius, Peter found it far too easy to follow after them into their pranks and taunts against him, though never led any of his own. Did he think Snape was deserving of it? Absolutely. Was he going to be the one to do it on his own? Absolutely not. With James gone, perhaps Peter had started to feel rather bad about what they'd done at Hogwarts to Snape. Perhaps he could have seen himself actually befriending Snape at one point. But suddenly he seems disgusted with him, and Peter can't help but feel stung and upset. He's not truly James, no matter how much he's playing it up! Surely Snape can see that, can't he? It's infuriating that he seems to not understand.

- Frank Longbottom - If there were any of the older members that always made him feel as if he were just a child that was playacting, Frank was it. Peter knows that the Marauders have always been rather immature, and it's something he's always loved to be with his friends. But war has a way of changing everyone, and growing up is hard to do, especially when people around you don't' think you can handle any real responsibility. Frank was always someone that Peter tried his best to avoid as much as possible, not wanting to hear any lectures or words of thinking they were too reckless and immature. Now though, Frank seems to be maybe a little kinder towards him, a little more like he believes in Peter, and Peter doesn't want to have any cause to make that go away.

- Amelia Bones and Edgar Bones - Peter doesn't understand what Amelia's problem is, truly. She doesn't seem to like The Marauders at all, and Peter can't help but bristle at it, and feel upset. As with Frank, Peter feels as if Amelia believes them to be just children and not worth following at all. He also doesn't understand why Edgar seems to want to follow after them so much, though Peter wonders if it's just to make his sister upset about it. Either way, Peter isn't used to having someone want someone to be like him, especially when he's not really being himself.

OOC EXPLORATION:

SHIPS/ANTI-SHIPS: 

Peter/Chemistry is what I ship, and Peter/Forced is my anti-ship. Personally, I don't feel like Peter is going to be up for any romantic relationships; he too focused on everything else, but I'm also not going to say it won't happen, because muses and what they do, you know?

INTERPERSONAL STRUGGLES:

I feel like Peter's really going to have to figure out who he is beyond 'What Would James Do?' and start thinking 'What Would I Do?' I think he's focused so much on getting everyone to look up to him and love him by being as much like James as possible, that he hasn't really focused on having them like him as his own person, aside from being a Marauder. I'd love to see him kind of be able to come into his own and figure out who he is as his own person, and get the others to look at him and like him for who he is there, instead of just being as much like James as possible. He wants to be enough for people, but he has to do that as his own person, if that makes sense?

WHAT ARE YOU MOST LOOKING FORWARD TO?

I missed writing with you guys! You both are so wonderful and I enjoyed writing with you so much in HR, that I knew I had to jump when you opened this rp! Not to mention that the fact that Peter is not a spy, and that he actually has gained some confidence here??? 100% caught my attention and I had to start writing the bio for him right away. I am so excited to see how this all goes!

PLOT DROP IDEAS (OPTIONAL): N/A at the moment.

ANYTHING ELSE? <3

[iapetusneume]

I just got Monk to 50. It’s my last Disciple of War class to get to 50. (After this, all I have to do is get Astrologin to 50 and everything is at least that far.)

With Melee DPS being my favorite role, it’s always been surprising to my friends in the game when they heard I hadn’t touched Pugilist/Monk for the longest time. But, there’s a reason for that. (And it’s not the game or job/class’ fault. I really want to stress this for anyone considering playing the game.) I honestly thought for a time that it might be the one job I leave at level 1.

TW: Mention of abuse  (though this does have a happy ending)

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I really struggled with FFXIV for a long time because two of my abusers used to play it all the time. They were obsessed with it. At one point they tried to get me to start playing. At the time, you had to get a Disciple of War class to 30 before you could unlock Rogue (which is what I wanted to play).

At the time, I didn’t have a system to play FFXIV on, so I had to play on Navona’s computer when she wasn’t using it. And she was really happy to show me around the game, but this also meant that we couldn’t play together. Sometimes she would play on Armony’s computer, but more often than not Armony was also home too, and she wasn’t playing FFXIV at the time. So I was doing a lot of things alone.

I got Pugilist to level 30, and just managed to unlock Rogue when my abuse got a lot worse. I had been enjoying the class quest, but there’s a lot of references to Jojo’s Bizarre Adventures, which was also a favorite anime of my abusers. (I also really struggled for a long time with that show for the same reason.)

My abusers no longer wanted me to play the game, and wanted Navona to play instead. So I didn’t play. (Tbh, there was a time that I couldn’t stand hearing the word “roulette” because of their abuse and my bad association.)

I somehow lost my logon info for that account. When I made a new account years later, I couldn’t bring myself to try Pugilist. By then, they had changed the rules so that I only needed to get a Disciple of War to level 10 to unlock Rogue. So, I picked Marauder, and went from there.

When I did a name change and fantasia to make Vivian my main, it felt extremely odd that I wouldn’t level Monk. It was her canon class in the tabletop game she’s from. Her love of hand-to-hand combat is a big part of who she is. It was easy to get by for awhile with Rogue/Ninja, but it started to feel strange when I got Ninja to 80 (this was back before Endwalker) and I had to move onto something else. I was doing it mostly because I wanted the chance to play dress-up with an OC, so I tended to find amusement when she did Jobs she would never actually do. And I enjoyed the story for so many of those Jobs, and was also able to look at it a bit more abstractly in terms of allowing myself to have fun. This is a game, remember? Games should be fun. So I let myself have fun.

And one day I decided to try Pugilist/Monk again. And now it’s at 50. And I’m sure I’m shit at playing it, but you know what? It’s super satisfying. It’s even moreso seeing Vivian actually be able to do hand-to-hand combat. There were several times I felt very emotional about it. It’s a combination of seeing Vivian really shine in her OG fighting style, but also knowing that I’m taking something back.

I’m taking back some things that my abusers took from me.

[thebadgerclan]

SFW Alphabet: Remus Lupin

Requested by Anonymous

A = Affection (How affectionate are they? How do they show affection?) Remus is very affectionate, part of it’s just his cuddly personality, part of it’s because Moony loves to show his mate that he loves her.  He shows his affection mostly through physical touch: holding your hand, having an arm around you, holding you in his lap on the couch, kissing your forehead, brushing his hand against yours in public.  He doesn’t shy away from PDA either, if he wants to kiss you, he’s gonna kiss you, not giving a shit who’s around.

B = Best friend (What would they be like as a best friend? How would the friendship start?) Remus would be a very supportive friend, always there when you need to talk, a shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen, he’s there.  The friendship started after Lily introduced you to the Marauders, and while Remus was a little reluctant to let someone new into his life, when he sees that you don’t care or judge him for his lycanthropy, he latches onto you.

C = Cuddles (Do they like to cuddle? How would they cuddle?) Remus loves to cuddle, after a long, stressful day, the only thing he wants to do is hold you or be held by you.  He’s the big spoon I’d say 95% of the time, it’s just more comfortable (David Thewlis is 6’3), he prefers holding you, and Moony likes to feel like he’s protecting his mate.  When he’s the big spoon, Remus either lays on his back with you tucked into his side, arm tight around you, hand carding through your hair, the other hand stroking your side or is on his side with you pressed against him, either facing him or with your back to his chest..  The other 5% of the time, when Remus is the little spoon, he likes to be on his side, face buried in your chest, arms folded against him and sort of sandwiched between the two of you.  He likes this because it makes him feel safa and makes Moony feel that his mate is near and will protect him

D = Domestic (Do they want to settle down? How are they at cooking and cleaning?) Oh yeah, Remus wants to settle down with you.  With you, he has a partner that he can rely on, that he loves more than anything in the entire world.  Remys has lived alone for most of his life, so he knows how to keep a house clean and cook for himself.  When the two of you get a house or apartment together, you split the household chores evenly, but Remus does prefer to cook, it’s something he enjoys and he likes providing for you

E = Ending (If they had to break up with their partner, how would they do it?) It would be because of his lycanthropy, he’d break up with you to keep you safe.  Remus would try and let you down gently, but of course, it shatters your heart when he breaks things off, but part of you understands why he wants to, even if you don’t agree with it.

F = Fiance(e) (How do they feel about commitment? How quick would they want to get married?) He’s a little skittish about commitment, thinking you’ll leave him, be disgusted by his condition, but once he realizes that you’re not going to leave him, that you don’t care about his lycanthropy, Remus is so committed to you (he always has been, but he’s even more committed now).  He wants to get married to you as soon as he knows you’re truly committed, he goes out and gets a ring for you and proposes as soon as he knows you’re ready

G = Gentle (How gentle are they, both physically and emotionally?) Remus is very gentle, both emotionally and physically.  Emotionally, he’s such a softie, he never hides what he’s feeling from you, if he’s sad, you know it, if he’s angry, you know it.  It takes him a while to be that open with you, but when he gets there, there are no secrets between the two of you.  Physically, Remus treats you like a piece of glass (and I mean that in a good way), he holds you so tenderly, like you’re something precious, to be treated with reverence and tenderness, which to Remus, you are. I think it goes without saying, but Remus will NEVER hurt you, never raise a hand to you, you’re his everything, he would never do that.

H = Hugs (Do they like hugs? How often do they do it? What are their hugs like?) Remus loves hugs, he’s a very huggy person, not just with his S/O.  He hugs you very frequently, at least 5-6 times a day.  His hugs are warm and soft, wrapping you in his arms feels like safety, and you can feel the love pouring off him when he hugs you.  They last for up to 30 seconds at a time, and he kisses your forehead when he pulls away.

  I = I love you (How fast do they say the L-word?) I’d say Remus tells you he loves you after a month or so.  He’s known that he’s in love with you after a week, but he wants to be sure that you’re serious about the relationship.  And when he does tell you he loves you, you know he means it, you know he’s serious, and you know that he’s in love

J = Jealousy (How jealous do they get? What do they do when they’re jealous?) Moony drives his jealousness, he doesn’t like anyone getting too close to his mate, doesn’t like it when you’re too far from him, things like that.  Remus is level headed, he’s logical, so he knows that you’re not going to leave him, and he can control Moony to a certain extent, but he comes out sometimes.  When he does, Remus will snarl at whoever’s near you, snaking his arm around your waist and pulling you close.  He’ll kiss you: either on the lips, hard and passionate, or on your temple, and whisper “Mine.”

K = Kisses (What are their kisses like? Where do they like to kiss you? Where do they like to be kissed?) Remus likes to kiss your forehead or the crown of your head, your cheeks, nose, hands, wrist, arms, legs, everywhere.  And of course, your lips.  Remus likes to be kissed on the lips, on his cheeks, and his scars.  He might cry when you kiss his scars, just wipe his tears away.  His kisses are tender and sweet, love pouring off him in waves.

L = Little ones (How are they around children?) Remus is really good with kids, he loves them, and he does want to be a father, but he’s hesitant because of his lycanthropy.  When he’s around babies, he melts, cooing at them and cradling them close to his chest

M = Morning (How are mornings spent with them?) Remus gets up around 9 o’clock, and if you’re still home/asleep when he gets up, he’ll make you a cup of coffee/tea/whatever you like, and he’ll sit with you, usually with an arm around you, on the couch.  He loves the mornings; the quiet time before you’re dressed and still a little sleepy where he can just be with you.

N = Night (How are nights spent with them?) Remus likes to hold you in the evenings: having you on his lap, arms around you, he just wants to be close to you.  Nights and evenings are usually spent talking about your day, reading, or just being with each other.  (And of course, there’s a fair amount of sex too ;D)

O = Open (When would they start revealing things about themselves? Do they say everything all at once or wait a while to reveal things slowly?) I wanna say that after a few weeks, Remus will slowly start opening up to you.  He doesn’t want to overwhelm you, and there are things he’s a little hesitant to tell you.  But he gets there, feeling secure enough to tell you everything.

P = Patience (How easily angered are they?) He has a bit of a temper, but it takes a lot to really piss him off.  With you, he’s endlessly patient, very few things that you do make him mad.  With others, he’s still very patient, but he does snap sometimes, especially close to the full

Q = Quizzes (How much would they remember about you? Do they remember every little detail you mention in passing, or do they kind of forget everything?) Remus remembers a lot, but he tends to forget some littler things.  But the bigger things, he remembers: like your favorite meals, favorite books, etc.  There are some little things that he’ll randomly remember, like the earrings you wore on a date

R = Remember (What is their favorite moment in your relationship?) After a particularly bad full, Remus had staggered into the house, and you were nowhere to be found.  He was sad, but he cleaned himself up as best he could.  A few minutes later, you returned, a bag on your arm.  “We were out of chocolate,” you explained, sitting on the floor where Remus was sitting and pulling a bar of chocolate from the bag.  “I convinced them to let me in, they weren’t happy, being woken up at 2 AM, but I got it.”  The fact that you went to Hogsmeade to get him chocolate overwhelmed him with love for you, and it made you love him even more

. S = Security (How protective are they? How would they protect you? How would they like to be protected?) Moony takes Remus’ existing protectiveness and increases it 10 fold.  Moony wants to protect you, his mate, more than anything in the world.  If anything could potentially hurt you, Remus is tense, watching everything around you to make sure you’re safe.  He’ll keep you close, an arm around you, your hand in his.  Above all, he needs to know you’re safe.

T = Try (How much effort would they put into dates, anniversaries, gifts, everyday tasks?) Remus can’t really afford to take you out as much as he wants to, but when he can, he goes all out.  It’s not a 5 star restaurant, but Remus makes you feel like royalty.  When he can’t afford to take you out, he’ll cook you a romantic dinner and serve it to you.  The same applies to gifts and anniversaries: he doesn’t have much money, but what he can afford, it’s the sentiment behind it that counts

U = Ugly (What would be some bad habits of theirs?) His self consciousness concerning his lycanthropy.  He thinks he’s dangerous, a monster, someone undeserving of love.  It takes you a while for you to break him of this habit, and he still slips and tells you you should leave him, but you’re (obviously) not having it

V = Vanity (How concerned are they with their looks?) Not really.  Like Sev, he keeps himself clean and tidy, but you love him for him, and in his mind, his scarred face is enough for you, so it’s enough for him W = Whole (Would they feel incomplete without you?) Yes, absolutely,  once Remus felt how loved you made him feel, the thought of not having you in his life is unimaginable.  It causes him physical pain, and he can’t think about it for more than a minute at a time.  Luckily, you have no plans of leaving him (please don’t leave him)

X = Xtra (A random headcanon for them.) With the Wolfsbane potion, Remus can just curl up and sleep during the full, so one time, he was on top of you in bed, curled up in a ball, fast asleep.  Moony whined when you tried to get up, not getting off of you

Y = Yuck (What are some things they wouldn’t like, either in general or in a partner?) Remus can’t be with someone who won’t validate his feelings.  He knows he can be irrational sometimes, but if a partner just brushes his feelings off, he just feels worse.  He needs someone who can talk out his feelings and help him through the rough patches

  Z = Zzz (What is a sleep habits of theirs?) Remus will not be able to sleep if he doesn’t fluff his pillow.  It sounds funny, but if he doesn’t do it, he won’t be comfortable.  It’s mostly psychological, but he has to do it.