#and then i extrapolated it to their normal versions as well

[areallyyellowmango]

I know most TNMN ships make no sense, but counterpoint: Stevenois cute

[wilcze-kudly]

One thing I'm realising about a good chunk of the avatar fandom is that they need to be hand held through every development in the entire franchise. Like I've had my suspicions for a while but the reactions to the new Mai comic really cement it for me.

There's this odd aversion to understanding that characters will grow and change. And even if the building blocks for a character's growth are set up earlier, so many people seme unable to extrapolate that potential + time = change.

I think part of the reason to this is that the most prominent character growth arc in the franchise is Zuko's. And it's a very well crafted storyline, but it is also very much spoonfed to us. Not just by us getting to go into Zuko's pov but even having Iroh helpfully narrate and explain what the fuck is going on in Zuko's world at the moment.

And I think this is why a lot of the fandom expects changes to the characters to be these explicitly shown, overtly prominent, dramatic affairs, perferably narrated by a conveniently placed old man. But Zuko's arc was quintessential to a deeper plot, and it had the drama and structure one would expect of a solid storyline. But this won't ring true for all characaters.

Taking Mai's character growth from the apathetic teenage girl who is resentful to the more established young woman who possesses more agency and seemingly has developed more radical views for example.

I've made a long ass post on this, so I won't bore you with the details, but the crux of Mai's character is that she was restricted and handled for most if not all of her life for multiple different reasons.

But at the end of the show, most of those reasons are removed. And this would, as you can imagine, trigger a change in the charcter.

But Mai's change wouldn't be like Zuko's, wouldn't involve wandering a foreign land, running a teashop and having allergic reactions to good decisions. Mai's arc would be her going about a normal life in that flowershop, learning to see the world from a different perspective and looking back at events and systems from her childhood and going "huh. That was fucked up."

And with the comic book format being much more streamlined, this just wouldn't cut it as a compelling plot, because it would basically be a less dramatic version of Zuko's deprogramming. But it doesn't have to. Because we have all the puzzle pieces. Hell, even the comic preview spells it out for us with this obvious metaphor.

I'm just surprised how many people seem to have such an averison to not having every plot point spelled out witg big bold letters. How many people won't go through the simple process of engaging with a piece of media rather than just consuming it.

And I don't mean to grandstand or act like I'm better than the fandom for doing something as simple as not reacting negatively to a slight shift in the fictional status quo.

[deepsuns]

rambling headcanons (part 1?)

feyd-rautha centric / house harkonnen

literally just my personal thoughts while writing out my feyd-rautha fanfic. feel free to use my ideas with credit if you like ❤️ enjoy my ridiculously large extrapolation of Dune material that sounds like insanity

• the marks painted on feyd-rautha's skin are rectangles, or purposefully/artfully changed rectangles. rectangles are relative to the number four, which in some cultures references "death". i would equate it, in relation to the harkonnens, as being from Slavic mythology - the god Svetovid has four heads and is a god of abundance/war (in which the harkonnens are engaged in kanly with house atreides, making it a good metaphor for fanfics). additionally, the rectangle is the metaphor used upon anything meant for use in life: here, in the arena, feyd-rautha is being prepared for "use" by the Baron to display himself during his birthday and appease the masses. with the rectangles painted upon his chest signifying the number four, feyd-rautha is being prepared to bring death in abundance for house harkonnen. with svetovid having four heads, i would also suspect these heads are the following: the Baron, feyd-rautha, lady jessica, and paul, each to represent an aspect of house harkonnen unconsciously.

• touch is a sacred thing. intimacy (true intimacy, that is, such as vulnerability/affection/tenderness) is a sacred thing. the harkonnens do not indulge in casual touch, but the Baron blasphemes this aspect of his house practice by doing so casually towards feyd-rautha (and so have those before him). the servants do not touch feyd-rautha at all during the preparation hall scene, and are wearing gloves to apply the ink/paste. in addition, feyd-rautha is careful not to truly touch anyone outside of canon typical violence. also, there is a heavy chance of poison being present on skin as well.

• house harkonnen is a house that admires power and strength. by that thought, we can assume that margot fenring's remark in the books ("here is one that will not let himself go to fat") internally as she regards feyd-rautha, insinuates that the baron has willingly let himself go to fat after his illness but is still respected due to his wealth and power. by comparison, feyd-rautha is the perfect visual of an heir and everything that the baron is not and he does his best to mold him into a different shape.

• feyd-rautha engages in mithridatism, or the self administration of lethal poisons in non-lethal amounts. it would not be out of the realm of possibility that assassination attempts happen often in regards to house harkonnen, and poison is the most subtle way to do so, whether it is by skin on skin contact, proximity, through food or drink, or simply touching an object.

• in house harkonnen, masochism/sadomasochism would be a heavy coping method, alongside extreme versions of hypersexuality. such a violent and dangerous house is doomed to have those who cannot stomach it or are majorly human, and manipulates their tastes in childhood to that of the extremes rather than normality.

[pabit]

Checked my emails this morning: found this delight in my inbox. Forwarded to me from…CT? I guess? The email addresses are just gibberish…fuck. I don't like where this is all going. I don't think Habit will like this either.

j҈̕͢i̵͢͠b̶͜͝w҈͜͝e҉̛͜ư̸͢e҈͢͠b̸̕͜g̸҇͢h҈̢̛g̵̡̛h̴͜͠o̸̢͠-̶̧͠-҉̕͜-̵̨͝3̵҇͢h҈̧͝f̷̧̕a̸̕͢.̵̨̛2̸̢̛2̷̕͢9҉̢҇3̴͜͝@҉͢͡c҈̛͢o҉͜͝m̴̡͝ ➥ FORWARDED

FROM: u̴̸u҈4̶4҉4҉̴@҉g҉f҉̸h̶0҈k̸d҈l҉̶5҉̷.̷̸c̸o̸m̸҉ SUBJECT: d̷e̷l̷̸u̴̸g̸̵e̴_҉̴0҉1҉҈

Hello, C███t████, I hope this email finds you well, if it finds you at all. The following story is a retelling of events based on the personal testimony of Vinny Everyman, accrued over the course of a two hour conversation. I hope you can appreciate the art of the written word as much as I do. Worry not about my own identity — I am merely an old friend, asking that if you are still alive out there…please, heed this tale wisely. [docs version RECOMMENDED]

| THE FOUR DIVIDED

On the eve of the Habit’s arrival to the house displaced in time, we find more darkening matters brewing amongst the sweeping fields and never ending daylight of a different, yet similarly displaced plane — the Eden.

“Hey guys, what’s up?”

Vinny waves a hand in greeting. Here he approaches through one of the many thick fields of tall grass, meeting up alongside his cohorts Jeffrey and Evan, who stands to Jeff’s side.  He smiles, even though neither of his friends smile back.

Evan had made it sound like he and Jeff were just thrilled to be able to sit around and shoot the shit together again, Vinny recalls.  It seemed that everything was fine and I wanted to believe it, but…I knew better than to deny what I had heard earlier in the day. After noticing the audible thud of some odd piece of furniture being tossed about inside from where I sat on the deck of the cabin, I sprung up instantly — and pressed my face to the front door.

Unfortunately, I only managed to catch onto the tail-end of the apparent argument between my two friends taking place within..but I heard enough. From the sound of Jeff’s uncharacteristically loud shouting and Evan’s halfhearted attempts to rebuke him, to the way the uncomfortable tension in the silence that followed that became this unshakable chill down my spine, down to simple fact that I was not meant to be privy to this conversation in the first place…well, I knew it had to be about me.

When the unpleasant silence stretched on for longer than I could trust to be safe, I pulled my nosy ear away from the door and quickly made my leave so as to not be caught listening in. And, not long after I found myself at a picnic table to pretend that I’ve been sitting there all this time, Evan bounded out of the cabin with a similar briskness to his step – making his way over to me to deliver this…illusion of having a normal, friendly reunion to look forwards to.

What a cruel way to ensure I’d actually show up...

As Vinny internally extrapolates upon the building sense of dread leading up to where he stands now in this field… 

…facing two people who apparently would have me get my hopes up before pulling the rug from under me with treachery instead…

…on the outside, he maintains an innocuous naivety in his demeanor.

Of course they aren’t happy to see me, says his darkening ruminations. Vinny smiles anyways. 

“So uh…what’s going on?”

Jeff regards him with an aloof stare, his lips pulled into a line – an unreadable expression that betrays the blistering rage that quickens his pulse as he stands there. It is only after the all too innocent question is asked that Jeff’s fury begins to make itself known on his face.

“You already know the answer to that, don’t you?”

Vin stays quiet in spite of the menacing way Jeff starts walking towards him, knowing anything he says will only incriminate himself. He glances at Evan, noticing his own unusual silence. He has only half a second to recognize the alarm in Evan’s eyes as Jeff takes advantage of his distracted focus in the next moment. Jeff swings his arm, successfully driving a fist into Vinny’s face; his punch thrown with enough force to split the man’s cheek under his bony knuckles. Vin stumbles backwards with a loud yelp, somehow lucky enough to avoid falling to the ground despite his dazed state. When he is able to force his eyes open through the throbbing pain in his skull, he realizes that Jeff is still in hot pursuit.

 Vinny prepares to defend himself this time. 

“You’ll pay for what you did to me,” proclaims his new opponent.

Jeff reels back and swings again. Vin pulls his arms up to cover his face and weaves his body away – just barely making it out of the other’s range. He continues to step back as Jeff presses forwards, like an enraged bull seeing nothing but red. Vinny is thoroughly bewildered.

“What are you talking about, dude?! I thought we were done with this shit!” Vinny says, steadying his footing. He will fight if he really has to, no matter how much he will hate himself to win in the end. Jeff is not much of a fighter, Vin figures, regardless of how much his face hurts at the moment.

“You thought wrong,”  Jeff replies, lowering his voice sinisterly, “like always.”

Vinny risks another look towards Evan, desperately seeking for him to respond in some fashion, useful to him or otherwise. Evan says nothing and only shrinks further away instead, refusing to meet his eyes. It hurts, but there is no time to address it. Sensing his imminent approach, Vinny frantically returns his attention back to Jeff.

“Look, man– I said I’m sorry–!” Vin cries out, the taller man lunging at him once more. Jeff grabs him firmly by the front of his shirt and shoves hard – Vinny digs his heel into the dirt and pushes back. It is then glaringly obvious to him that Jeff is at a disadvantage. As Jeff struggles to maintain his position, his strength easily outmatched, Vinny swiftly knees him in the stomach before he has the chance to realize this fact for himself. Jeff keels over with a strangled sound, falling to his knees in agony.

Vinny shortly appears overhead, his figure looming ominously in the harsh shadow being cast by the sunlight shining from above.

“I don’t want to hurt you. Please, Jeff…just stop this.”

Jeff feverishly retreats away from the other, crawling on all fours, gasping for the air that has just been knocked out of him. 

“All…you have ever done…is hurt me,” he croaks, forcing himself to his feet despite the fiery pain licking at his lower ribs. The adrenaline makes Jeff numb to the flame, “I don’t see why that should suddenly stop now…it’s the only thing you’re any good at.”

Vinny stills himself, processing this absurdly offensive remark for a moment. A million and one ways to react generate in his mind, though he ends up shrugging as if his response requires no thought at all.

 “At least I am good for something though – what about you, Jeff? What are you good at, besides being a pathetic weakling?”

“Oh— there’s the Vincent I know,” says Jeff with an insidious laugh, a hand clutching at his injured stomach, “go on then, get it all off your chest!”

“You are trying to provoke me,” Vinny growls; he hates hearing his full name being said with such condescension. Every muscle in his body tightens like a coil, threatening to burst forth at any moment, “is this really what you fucking want? Just another pointless fight to the death?”

“The point,” Jeff wastes no time to redirect, nudging an elbow into Evan’s side to call him to attention, “is that we are going to throw you out of here. You don’t belong in our Eden – you’re just another monster like the rest.”

Vinny snaps.

“So that’s how it’s gonna be, is it!?” 

He starts rolling up the cuffs of his flannel, preparing himself to sincerely beat the ever-loving shit out of the next thing that breathes in his direction. Vinny trudges forward.

Suddenly, Evan leaps into action as he hastily places himself in between his two friends.

Vinny finds his violent will instantly diminished. He can’t hurt Evan.

“That’s enough, god dammit! Both of you knuckleheads cut it out already! Fuck!” Evan yells with blatant frustration, unwilling to hold his tongue any longer as he addresses Jeff directly, “What the fuck are you doing, jackass?! I never agreed to kicking out our fucking friend!”

Jeff dismisses the disapproving ruckus with an indignant scoff, choosing to ignore the stream of Evan’s colorful curses as he speaks over the man’s head all the same. 

“You haven’t changed at all, Vinny. That’s why I can’t let you stay.”

“Come on dude, you can't be serious right now…” Vin refutes with vigor, “you know you can't win a fight against me on your own, and I believe Evan just fucking said he isn’t gonna help your sorry ass– you can’t do jack shit about me being here! What’s your big plan now, huh?! You’ve got fuckin’ nothing!!”

“I’ve got time,” Jeff asserts with uncanny confidence, hobbling around to face the large hill behind him. The cabin resides just on the other side. 

“I’ll find a way to get rid of you eventually. Let this be your only warning.”

Vinny is too stunned at this chilling rejection to say anything in response, giving Jeff the opportunity to walk off without another word. He stares with wide eyes as Jeff makes his way up the hill within the next few minutes, a knife twisting deeper into his heart once the man completely disappears beyond the horizon.

This isn't how it's supposed to end.

Vin’s lip quivers as he then turns to the only other person left still beside him.

“Well, um…that was– unpleasant…and also very confusing,” Vinny starts to say, his voice trembling. He brings an equally shaky hand up to inspect the cut on his face, hissing through his teeth as he carelessly reignites the wound’s sharp sting. Vinny observes the blood left behind on his fingertips.

Evan appears to be at a loss for words in his own right, his face red and sweaty as he tries to catch his breath. He knows he should respond – though it is hard to want to say anything at all after such an exhausting exchange – resulting in a thoughtless reassurance, empty of any substance.

“Yeah, uh…but it’s gonna be alright, Vin.”

“Don’t give me that bullshit,” Vinny bitterly objects, remembering what had been the first ugly revelation to cut him deeply today.  “You told me he was excited to see me, that we’d come here to hang out just like old times…you wanted me to think everything was perfectly alright earlier,” he explains, anger rising again in his voice, “but you were just fucking setting me up! How dare you tell me it’s alright?”

“For fuck’s sake, I didn’t know he would go this far!” Evan deflects. He lets out an irritated huff of air, refusing the worst of his impulses from taking over, “I just wanted him to talk to you, not wage a fucking war. Not to mention tryin’ to drag my ass into it— shit.”

The words bounce around in Vinny’s skull, eerily familiar to his ears on the way in.

Habit told me to prepare for a war. I guess that wasn’t a lie after all.

Vinny whips his head to the side as his eyes involuntarily well up, wishing to obscure Evan’s view as he wills the tears back into his head. He won’t allow himself to cry, especially not in front of Evan, and especially not because of an intrusive thought about his former captor. Evan can tell that something is wrong as he looks the other over, intently observing the shudder in Vin’s shoulders. He is only a bit too careless with his approach.

“I’m sorry Vinny…I didn’t want this to happen.”

Evan reaches out to Vinny with every intention of comfort, only for him to flinch hard at the sight of the arm coming into view. The brief terror behind tearful eyes as Vinny pulls himself away is unimaginably crushing for Evan to witness. He damns himself internally for committing another inconsiderate blunder.

 Realizing what just happened, Vinny clamors to apologize, “I— I’m sorry— I didn’t mean—“ 

“Don’t be, that was on me,” Evan cuts him off, trying to be casual even though his heart is breaking into tiny little pieces. 

He quickly changes the subject to avoid the awkwardness of the moment, “anyways, uh…it's gonna be alright and I mean that, okay? Jeff can’t make you leave, and well…I’m not gonna let you walk out on us either,” he says, craning his head back to peer hard at the other man, “so don’t even think about it.”

The thought had indeed already occurred to Vinny, and he would have verbalized it too if it weren’t for being so easily caught. He wonders what exactly had given it away, as Evan’s word choice unfortunately reminds him of Habit once more. He attempts to push this uncomfortable intrusion aside but to little success, his discomfort only growing more cumbersome by the second. As his thoughts race along to every dark corner of his imagination, he manages to find the light at the end with a remarkable realization:

Only Habit has come the closest to knowing the real Vincent; at least in my opinion. I had never felt more naked than when he had to live with that parasite after all. If Evan remembers what it was like to have watched those days go by, as the creature puppeteering his body thoroughly stripped me down to my immutable core…then Evan, too, would have the truth for himself all the same.

Evan knows me better than Jeff ever will, Vin decidedly concludes, taking his glasses off to rub the moisture from his eyelashes with the back of his hand. Though he is unsure if he should really feel comforted by this thought, he finds that his body relaxes regardless. With his eyes now dry, he places his spectacles back on his face and offers a small nod.

“I won’t be going anywhere, I promise,” Vin dully reassures; tired though not insincere. He directs his gaze out to the hill ahead, “so um…what are we supposed to do now?”

Evan moves to the other man’s side, studying the rolling horizon with his hands on his hips.

“Ah, well…obviously you should stay away from Jeff, I think he’s made himself pretty clear on that,” he deliberately begins with his answer, “but besides having to avoid him, I think you’re pretty much fine, right? I mean– I doubt he will be able to convince Steph and the doc to take his side, so–”

“So Jeff is just gonna try pushing all of my buttons until either I give up,” Vinny interrupts, dejected at his own insight, “or I kill him.”

“Huh?” Evan is perplexed, “c’mon man, maybe he just needs some time by himself to get his shit together. I’m sure he’ll come around.”

Vinny sighs, “you know that’s not going to happen, Ev. He’s just as stubborn as the rest of us.”

Evan can't argue against such an obvious fact, “Okay, well…I can help you deal with this.”

“I can’t let you do that,” Vinny counters adamantly, refusing to even consider the idea. He squeezes his eyes shut and drops his head between his shoulders, “I won’t let you get hurt because of me again. I fucking can’t let that happen. God dammit—” Vinny wraps his arms around himself and hugs tight, overcome by the heavy reality of the current situation.

“I don’t need your fucking help, okay? Go back to Jeff. Maybe you can teach him how to fight properly; he’ll need all the help he can get.”

 “Screw him!” Striking a bit of a nerve in Evan, he grabs Vinny by the elbow, gripping him firmly but not hard enough to hurt, “I’m on your side!”

Vinny’s eyes fly open at the unexpected touch, though he makes no attempt to escape the other’s grasp, frozen in place. Staring into gray-blue pupils, he discovers that he no longer sees the nightmarish counterpart piloting a stolen skinsuit. He only recognizes Evan, his friend, staring back. 

There are no sides winning this.

Vin yanks his arm out of Evan’s grasp with a long frown, and wordlessly, he stomps away. Evan does not follow after him.

---

[ask] >>

[zmediaoutlet]

trying to articulate something here --

I dig the experience of reading meta that is coming from a well-reasoned place but I nevertheless fundamentally disagree with, and I think that comes down to a willingness to sift down and down and down until you come to an essential Thing about the text-genre-intent-characterization-whathaveyou. Like -- I can see how you got there, but wait, you didn't consider [xyz].

Top of mind example: Dean's masculine because he's trying to act like John. On the surface -- absolutely! He's trying very hard to mimic Dad because his universe centers around god Dad. He's also often operating in a world of trying to do what Dad would want, and making assumptions of his own about what those wants would be, which is a slightly different operating structure.

...But. What's actually driving that? Is it dad qua dad? Or is it -- Dean is essentially loyal-obedient-conformist? Is it that, in the cultural context of growing up in the '80s-'90s with a father who grew up in the '60s-'70s, this is what being a certain kind of man meant and so it is essential to lock into those tropes and characteristics?

We look to how Dean acted like a certain kind of boy when he was an 18 year old and then a 26 year old; we look to how that is updated by the time he's 40, and operating under what is the correct kind of man to be in 2020 vs 2005 (use of language, acceptable levels of nerdiness, fashion sense, etc). From there we can look to how he's not being John, he's being... a normie, more or less. And bless his heart for it. He just wants to Fit. If he were sticking with Acting Like Dad, he wouldn't cheerfully cosplay through a Panthro case, you know? So what's actually driving the behavior, when you look to the heart of it?

So then, if Dean were Deanna--

You can extrapolate. And this stuff is outside the text -- you have to decide What Dad Would Want from a girl-child (given cultural context and norms, given how the young version of John was characterized, given how John and Mary might have operated when they were 'safe' for those first 5 years, given how John might have then shifted his expectations and needs for his kids upon entering the hunting life), and then whether What Dad Would Want fits against a fairly normal conformist presentation (in the way that Dean is intensely normal, if a little wrong-side-of-the-tracks), or if John flips the script and for some reason decides that his kid should not fit in and have what's actually a much harder time, for a traditional gender presentation in the culture they live in, etc.

All of this boiling down to: what matters most in the meta consideration? What's key for characterization and universe structure? Does it actually matter? --no, not at all. But it's very fun to tease apart.

[namdubsar]

Drawing Cuneiform, Part 3/3

(Previous)

So, how can we draw these signs in a way that's clear and legible, without getting too overcrowded and busy?

We have to make it clear where strokes start and end, because these three are all different signs (the sounds qa, me, and bar). This means we can't only mark the heads.

And we have to be able to mark multiple heads on a single stroke, because these two are different signs (the number 2, and the sound a). This means we can't only mark the tails.

So how can we achieve both of those goals, without ending up with a mess of heads and tails everywhere?

Well, it turns out some ancient scribes tried to solve the same problem!

Ashurbanipal, the last of the "great" kings of the Assyrian Empire, was known for being a horrifically cruel and bloodthirsty ruler (which is part of why he was the last of them). But he was also a great scholar, and he devoted a lot of his time and effort to building the Royal Library, which was meant to include all the knowledge of the world. It's thanks to this Royal Library that we have as much ancient Mesopotamian literature as we do today!

Like any good librarian, he made sure that every tablet filed in the Royal Library was properly labelled, and like any good emperor, he made sure they all had his own name on them, just in case. Usually this was stamped into the clay the normal way. But sometimes the tablets brought back from sacking a city had already been fired. What then?

Well, in exactly three specific cases, we've found this library information (the "colophon") written on in ink.

Here are zoomed-in images of the two I was able to find in the British Museum's collection. The third should be somewhere in there as well, but I haven't been able to locate it.

The text is pretty badly faded, but we know what it says based on other tablets from the Library: "Palace of Ashurbanipal, King of the World, King of Assyria".

Now this looks promising! This isn't just the improvised work of a scribe whose tablet dried too fast—according to Irving Finkel, the British Museum's cuneiform expert, the neatness and elegance of the writing suggests that there was a long tradition of this. Ink is just less durable than fired ceramic, and less likely to survive for the thousands of years it took us to rediscover these artifacts.

It's hard to extrapolate much from just these two inscriptions, but we can say a few things:

The heads are drawn with curved lines, and the tails with straight lines

Multiple tails can share one head, and multiple heads can share one tail

So let's see if we can render some text in this style! Here's what the full colophon should look like, if the rest of the text had survived:

I had to make a few guesses to make this work. We don't have any "Winkelhaken" strokes in the surviving text—the ones that look like big hooks, without a head or tail—so I just guessed at how they would be drawn.

But still, I think we've found our winner. This is the most readable style I've seen yet for writing cuneiform in two dimensions. You can see clearly where all the heads and tails are, you can tell the heads apart from the tails, and each wedge takes a maximum of two pen strokes to draw, a big improvement over our earlier versions!

So to finish off, here's how our Gilgamesh excerpt would look in this style:

Very readable, I think!

Next up: how exactly does this style work?

[amratsu]

oh yeah. this came up somewhere else so I might as well share some POWER LEVEL DISCUSSION. explanations under read more. Not sorted within the tiers.

Singularity Tier: doesn't need explaining, especially with recent MSQ where grandjeet can basically D4C their way into being the literal perfect version of themselves across all multiverses

Juiced Up Tier: Astral + some extra juice. Needs multiples of the tier below to take them on. Avatar Belial is however notably unstable and can be stalled out. Bubz is a hilarious jobber but is supposed to be strong. People here could feasibly delete an island as a general feat of power. Lucilius, Cosmos, six dragons, and so on would go here too

Inner Teachings/Eternal Tier: Prime fuckos of the sky. Top class mortal + top tier extra juice (primal or eternal weapon). Luminary Knights are about here as well. Could render an island uninhabitable. Cag belongs here but probably couldn't straight up fight anyone else in the tier; on the flip side she's capable of more raw destruction given time, and is the win con vs higher tiers in group scrambles. Boundary accessed eternals would go to Juiced Up. Narmaya is the other anomaly here but she's considered about equal to Octo and Funf.

Combat Focused Primal or Primal Hunter Tier: Self-explanatory. Could demolish a landscape. Society members don't need much explanation, they're powerful + their weapons are extremely strong, but not Revenant tier (if they got access to the automagod forms more easily, this would likely bump them up). Siegfried punches above the rest of the dragon knights by virtue of dragon blood. Belial I've never considered to have too much raw power, he's just smart. Anila's here by virtue of extrapolation; spars between Zodiacs have been shown to fuck up the area around them without much effort on their part (and that's between Kumby and Vikky, who consider themselves pretty weak). Grimnir is called a War God but I don't think he has many explicit displays of power so far. Charlotta eats her vegetables. Yuel and Socie canonically can make skyscraper high pillars of flame with their dances as a normal thing, and their story villain is pretty high up there.

Paragon Mortal Tier: Could destroy a town/make it evacuate. tbh Metera could cheese out people higher tier than her since she can fly. Otherwise, she's never really shown any explicit feat of power. I've never considered the Dragon Knights SUPER powerful as far as the whole cast goes, and they generally don't solo any of their threats, but they're the best within their groups.

Strong Combatant: Could destroy a building. Ladiva and Soriz don't have anything going for them besides martial arts. Ferry's not really ever indicated to be a strong combatant besides being a ghost and having a bunch of support summons.

Civvie: dude that's our fucking mess hall cook.

[judgeanon]

Issue one of Absolute Batman indirectly confirms that Ras Al Gul and the League of Assassin's exists in the Absolute Universe, what do you think and Absolute Lady Shiva would be like or how would you go about it

Well, I wouldn't involve the LoA at all, that's for sure.

But the thing about Absolute is that, so far, there doesn't seem to be any set rules for what an "Absolute" character means other than a retelling. Does it mean more grounded version? More altered versions? More gritty versions? There's nothing set in stone as far as I can tell, so it's hard to extrapolate what an Absolute Shiva would look like.

However, if you told me to come up with one, here's what I'd do:

Sandra Woo is the greatest professional fighter in the world. She's an unbeaten MMA champion who holds more belts than she knows what to do with, a worldwide superstar with a legion of fans and an inspirational figure to thousands.

She's also incredibly bored of it.

Having reached the peak and found it a lonely place, Sandra is pretty much just sitting there, waiting for someone strong enough to make life interesting again. But despite famously never saying no to a fight, all she gets are blowhards who go down in one round, or decent fighters who would've been a good challenge three years ago. And her attempts at pushing the boundaries of who she's allowed to fight feel increasingly like banging on the bars of a prison cell.

Things change, however, when after a title match in a foreign country, she finds her hotel door broken, the place a mess and a note on the floor: someone has kidnapped her manager, her closest friend, her sister. Carolyn.

Arrangements are made to pay Carolyn's ransom, but unbeknownst to her team, something has snapped inside Sandra. All alone, driven by cold rage, she sneaks into the meeting place and beats the absolute shit out of the gang that kidnapped her sister, going so far as to kill a few of them in a fight more furious and exhilarating than any she's ever had.

Sandra rescues Carolyn, who is grateful at first but later tremendously disturbed that her sister would do something like that. She's not some movie star or some superhero, she's just a normal woman. Normal women don't do stuff like that. And the thing is, Sandra agrees. But she also has started to realize she is not normal. That the limits of what people consider possible are so much weaker than she thought. That maybe out there, beyond the borders of the "normal" world, there are new peaks to climb.

Over the next few days, Sandra destroys her life. She retires undefeated and disappears from the public eye. Everyone assumes she's just shaken by the whole kidnapping ordeal, and maybe she is, but not in the way they all believe. Abandoning Carolyn, Sandra goes on a journey into the shadier corners of the world, constantly pushing against the limits of what's normal, of what's realistic, of what's possible. And gradually, she comes into contact with a whole twilight world of almost otherworldly people that offers seemingly endless new challenges and opportunities.

The more she walks her new path, the more she sheds the last few remnants of her previous life, until finally she loses even her own name. And on the blood-splattered rock floor of a ruined temple turned fighting colisseum, she gains a new one.

You know what it is.

One of the things that I think is key to Shiva's appeal is how she's a very fantastic character in otherwise "realistic", grounded settings. I'm not even talking about Gotham, I'm talking places like Hub City, where the more grounded things are, the more Shiva shines as a strange, out of place presence.

So what I'd do for an Absolute Shiva is to take that idea and apply it to Shiva herself. Have her start as an extremely powerful character who's "trapped" in a very realistic world. Then have a moment where she breaks the rules of that realism and steps into the wider, wilder world of martial arts/comic book fantasy. Meanwhile, keep Carolyn alive and use her as a point of comparison, as the sister who stays in the realistic world, and show just how much different Shiva is becoming.

The main driving questions of the story and of Shiva's development would be "What can you become if you refuse to believe in limits?" and then the slightly darker "How far can you go if you let go of everything?" And eventually she'd reach a point where she abandons all realism and becomes the impossible, inhuman, borderline magical kung fu warrior we all know and love, but hopefully with a much stronger foundation this time.

[itsclydebitches]

Has it ever been mentioned if Tai and Summer we actually romantically involved? Maybe it's just me but the scene where they talk didnt feel like a married couples and more like really good friends. It would be interesting if Tai isnt actually ruby's father and him and summer decided to just co-parent ruby and yang to give them a normal family life. I just feel icky that tai ran to summer as soon as raven left.

Obviously it's entirely personal what does or does not feel "icky" to you, though it if helps, I frequently remind myself that RWBY has nonexistent timelines. Like, by the writers own admission none of this has been thought out. So if you get into the nitty-gritty and start asking questions like, "How long was Raven gone before Tai became romantically involved with Summer?" yeah, you might run into some timing snags that impact our overall view of the relationships. However, that's not because the writers wanted to engage with that kind of complicated dynamic, but simply because they throw out plot-points and ages without ever thinking through with how those two things intersect. I feel similarly regarding the "Yang raised Ruby" fanon (which is fanon and I find it frustrating that much of Volume 9's sisterly interactions, like Yang standing in front of Blake, have been squeezed through this largely unsupported lens of, "Well, Yang is basically Ruby's second mom so that's why this moment is wholesome and not a super weird animation choice) which doesn't hold up upon scrutiny, at least not without a lot of assumptions. If you start thinking about when Raven left, when Summer left, Ruby and Yang's ages, when they were both born, the adventure into the woods, them starting their training young enough to get into Signal, who was supposedly around when, what's a literal fact and what's just someone's emotional interpretation of events... any simple timeline falls apart. There are simply too many contradictions and vague claims to map out a coherent, canonical timeline. We can assume and headcanon many options, but they remain just that: assumptions and headcanons.

BUT that means there's plenty of space for your interpretation, anon. For me personally, I don't think RWBY is ever going to reveal that Tai isn't Ruby's dad and I read the not-very-romantic-y interaction between him and Summer as simply indicative of RWBY's overall approach to romance. After all, Blake and Yang have been in love for several Volumes now, but up until the big kiss all they did was hold hands. However, what RWBY puts on screen is what they've put on screen, which means it's perfectly valid to watch something that looks fairly platonic and extrapolate from there. One of the things the RWBY fandom needs to get better about is allowing the prevalence of fanon to produce outright anger over other ideas. Fans harass others for arguing that it's unlikely Yang actually raised Ruby, or theorizing that Qrow might be Ruby's dad, or writing fics where Blake and Yang are in different relationships. There's such a focus on maintaining the One True Fanon that it obliterates the very purpose of fanworks. We're meant to be transforming the canon in ways that please us and, if we're up to sharing it, pleasing an audience of like-minded folks too. Why would you want to adhere to just one standard telling? That's boring. That's just canon 2.0. You might as well watch RWBY, watch one other version of it (like Ice Queendom) and call it a day if you're not willing to allow a wide variety of creative content to exist. You don't have to engage with it, no one says it has to be your personal cup of tea, but leave fans who want to play with the fictional dolls their way alone. The internet is a big place and the block button doesn't have a limit.

[carecrowgames]

Yazeba Read Through #4

We are on Page 18 now, and I am extremely excited, as it seems we have actually entered the rules this time folks! And I thought that might make me go less granular .. BUT as I said I have been wondering how the book would begin to explain to its reader what it actually is, so I just have to immediately hone in on the second sentence of the page.

It's a bed & breakfast of course but it's also this book right here.

There is something about stating these two as a dual existence that just works so well with the magical realism of the bed and breakfast itself. I guess I also just love when a fictional world gets legitimacy as existing similar to how the book (or in this case pdf) does

The playful voice from the welcome section continues here, but as it invites you to explore the bed and breakfast it also gains a gentle tone. The specific metaphor used, the sprawling bed and breakfast standing in for the complexity of a rulebook, both promising to become easily navigateble after some guidance, somehow manages to make both of them a more imaginable space. My mind begins to draw in what's missing within my image of one one with what I know of the other and conjures my own experiences of sprawling social spaces to lend familiarity and extrapolate development over time. I find myself remembering how I got used to life in the computer science faculty until it’s sprawling series of laboratories and hallways were simply another home.

I get away being able to imagine both Gertrudes life in the b&b after months and years pass and my own potential relationship to the version of it that could manifest in my games in it.

This is where the melancholic Amelie OST (the fact that this movie has the same name as one of the residents will break me oh my god. I am only noticing now) reminds me that at some point in this book there are late chapters, the last of which is Goodbye Yazeba and I have to wonder how much this is going to be a story that will have to end. What I can also imagine is the late chapters giving a number of open ending points, that would still allow you to replay some chapters, but this also feels like the kind of story that at some point just. Ends. I think I would find myself feel very content and sad in the healthy measures about that.

As a note, I am delighted to see the playlist I'm making for this already influencing how I interact with the book. The fact that the moon princes melancholic longing was able to carry forward to make me think about how this story might end is just really cool. Can recommend the method!

And now we get the confirmation that there are parts of the book that are off limits to start with - a super cool decision for a ttrpg book honestly. Explaining the choice by likening it to the way some parts of a bed and breakfast might be off limits to a new visitor is so clever too. It continues to build the book-building double reality, and in that playful way puts rules for reading the book down without having to spend much time explaining them immediately. It just makes sense this way!

This is also why this reading experience is extremely different for me than the usual ttrpg book I read. Normally I would have jumped immediately to the playbooks, read up on central mechanics and started browsing different parts of the book as I put some first session prep together. And I know that's not how other ttrpg books are intended to be read either, but the way Yazeba specifically presents itself as overlayered fiction book / bed & breakfast / ttrpg makes me want to engage with it as an authored experience more then I tend to with a ttrpg book, that invites me more to approach it as a box of toys.

 If i were to read it like I usually do though, this is where I would actually feel invited to start jumping, as the page continues to lay out how exactly Yazebas Bed and Breakfast is played it gives us all the needed key elements to get started, and importantly all of their page numbers.

I find this whole buildup so far works really well for me. We've been invited layer for layer to the fantasy and fiction of Yazeba, got first impressions of its central cast, narrative hooks to go along with then and some character voices to lead us along when trying to play them.

Now the book is pointing all the unruly readers with no attention span, who might have been hooked by the fiction, but won’t stay long for rules explanations (that’s normally me!) to exactly where the toys are - with just enough context to use them well. The rest, I would feel if I took on that mindset, can be figured out in play.

I really appreciate when a game recognizes, that not all its players are going to approach it the same way. Laying out different courses through it, that reward different interests and needs is a great way to do so.

The entire part laying out the rhythm of play is wonderfully efficient btw. Every section is at most 3 sentences long, contains bold keywords to keep attention going and manages to leave me with a good grasp of what's going on. For how gigantic this book is, making such short work of the overview feels very restraint, I'm super impressed.

I also love how encouraging the language is. You WILL be able to confidently guide your friends. Remember to take breaks, the bed and breakfast will wait. Rules often are hard for me to keep focus on mentally, and I know for many they can be overwhelming. The use of a strong, friendly and guiding voice here I think really helps keep the mind motivated.

In honor of that, the new song added to the playlist is Ben E. Kings “Stand by me” which, is a song that has symbolized a vibe of positivity and support for me since years now.

Speaking of language, the Nouns for the mechanics integrate so very well into the fantasy. Concierge for the facilitator for example is very flavorful. I feel like this book makes a consistent effort to make the feeling of playing the game make you feel like you’re a part of the b&b and that rules. In addition, Whoopsies and Bingos as names for what I’m pretty sure are going to be weak and strong moves feels like they very much help reinforcing the genre space, making the characters feel less mechanic and more like people with fuckups and cool moments to come, you know?

But now I’m really getting ahead of myself. Afterall the section is about the flow of play and I have not talked at all about it yet!

Let's get this out first: chapters are so cool! They are so cool it makes me want to work out my thoughts on them so bad, that I forget we don't even know much about them yet as far as the book goes. I already know a bit on how they look like from the ashcan (which released along the indiegogo campaign), but that only leaves me burning to revisit them as part of this more!

In addition, i think this is where we actually see how powerful the fiction book/ttrpg double-life the book is living is in communicating information. It is obvious from the text that chapters are at the core of playing out life at the bed and breakfast, being the thing characters are used to play, and putting out what is needed to unlock more chapters and characters (more on that in a sec). They are how you interface with life in the bed and breakfast, but that alone would not give much of an impression of what they are. But the name *chapters* and the consistent fiction book/ttrpg duality that has been build up, immediately conjures the kind of stories they will tell in your mind. We already know what it is like to read a chapter in a story, now our mind is left to ponder what it will be like to play them.

Excitingly, we have learned how unlocking works now!! As I said I already knew how to play a chapter from the Ashcan, but with added context much more about it is coming together. The way the loop works feels super elegant to me. You get familiar with characters and their connected narrative threads, you look at what chapters you are able to play and which might allow you to explore what you are interested in, you slot in your preferred characters and play to find out what happens, you go and check what characters and chapters you’ve unlocked and that gives you new chapters to pull on more threads, and new characters to explore and play with. The entire thing feels a lot like a narrative exploration loop I would design for a video game, which is actually the second time in today’s session that I was reminded of video game design specifically (the first being the way the page numbers create a dynamic playspace that can be explored based on player preference). I am fascinated to see these strategies implemented with how you interact with the BOOK instead of in play loops only.

Talking about game mechanics, the whole Shelf, Journey and Track system reminds me a bit of achievement systems. Which in turn makes me wonder if the game will invite us to look at the potential unlocks and what we’ll need to do for it beforehand. If it did it would give extra incentives to explore the chapters as well as extra prompts of what to do with them. If it doesn’t it makes for nice surprises. I am super curious about this!

As a last note on the page for now, Mementos you can put on your Shelf is another one of these amazing images, that already makes me nostalgic for experiences I didn’t even have yet. It actually reminds me of my favorite game Signs of the Sojourner ~ maybe I’ll add an ost from that game to the playlist at some point.

Aand I think that’s about it for the day. I might actually have even more notes on this tomorrow, but I need to sleep at some point don’t I.

See you tomorrow as we enter Page 19: Characters.

---------------

you can find my other Yazeba readthrough posts under #zeebthrough!

Preorder the game on https://possumcreekgames.com/pages/yazebas-bed-breakfast

[am-i-the-asshole-rotomblr]

AITA for following a faller on here?

okay so this is going to be a bit awkward and weird and I'm really sorry about that. I (19F) am a really big fan of a particular video game. I've played it a bunch, it's a bit dark so I tend not to talk about how much I like it in public because people get a bit weird about someone who is normally fairly optimistic and positive liking what I guess is technically a horror game.

anyway, a few months back, I made a friend on here (16M) who. well. I'm gonna call him G. we bonded a bit about liking the same TV show even if we're not in the same universe probably. (it's a GOOD SHOW, which isn't at all relevant to what I'm asking here but it IS.)

fast forward a bit. had a really rough night one time, my sister (29F) ended up chatting with G a bit to reassure him that I was doing better and mentioned the game that I was playing.

it was then that he informed both of us. that sometimes. fallers from fictional things happen. or things that seem fictional in one world might not be in another? idk, multiverse is weird.

but, uh. apparently my favorite character has in fact been a faller (?F) in some other version of my friend's region for??? months???

and like. it's cool to click over to her blog every few weeks or so and see what new shit she's up to, because she seems to be doing way better in the pokemon world than she did in the world that my favorite game is set in? but also it's deeply weird seeing this character who has kicked my ass on so, so many occasions as also just. a regular person, too.

obviously she's not the same person as the character in the game. we've never actually spoken but she seems nice and I would actually just straight up follow her, except that I'm borrowing my sister's account and when I brought this up to her she thought it might be an asshole move.

and. idk. on the one hand 90% of what I know about her IS stuff from the game or stuff extrapolated from it, but most of it seems to have been fairly accurate, and I'd like to know other stuff! she seems like a really cool person!

on the other hand, it feels. kinda creepy, for lack of a better word? to follow someone who I first knew from a video game?

(it's a really good video game. I'm not mentioning which video game here because that would probably draw unwanted attention to her blog and. I'm not sure if she knows she's a video game character in some worlds and I soooo do not want to be responsible for that existential crisis if she is.)

so. uh. there you have it.

AITA for following a faller on here, literally or just by clicking over to her blog every few weeks or so when I remember, when I first knew about her from a video game?

[branmuffins22]

Moots said they wanna hear about WIPs and I feel like I gotta get this brainrot out anyways so HERE I GO

I've only got three projects I'm actively working on right now, all of which are Owl House fanfics, although I've got ideas here and there for other things (video games I might've made if I weren't so burnt out, ttrpg characters that might need their own goddamn settings and stories to themselves, a Code Lyoko fanfic, music (mostly loads of disconnected song lyrics), 3D avatars, etc).

The Owl House fanfics in question are three(-ish?) fold:

Theseus Who?, a mostly-canon-compliant 5+1 post-titanification headcanon compilation that DOESN'T just let Luz keep her titan form (mostly it's just a bunch of changes along the lines of when Hunter's eyes changed color after Flapjack saved him). - It's actually sort of a tie-in to another, bigger fic I'm writing that's gonna be point 2, so you can assume anything mentioned in this one will happen throughout the timeline of the next one as well. - I've currently already got the 5 written, so now I just need to buckle down and finish the +1, unless I decide to do another sweep of edits (I think the excessive parentheticals might be too excessive). - - I only started it like a week ago, and I've been waiting for motivation to strike again to let me finish it for like half that time.

Masha and the Very Normal Nocedas, a mostly-canon-compliant sorta-multimedia veesha longfic based on the dramatic irony of Masha slowly driving themself nuts trying to piece together what the Deal is with Luz, Vee, and the rest of the Nocedas. - by "sorta-multimedia" i mean its got plaintext segments describing the story, journal segments of Masha recounting events as they remember them and trying to organize their thoughts, chat segments when the characters interact over text, and possibly more if I feel the Need. - I've only outlined the three prologue chapters and the following intermission, only have snippets and vague ideas for scenes for the main bulk of the fic itself, and have only actually written two of the prologue chapters and the intermission. - - won't start posting it until I at least get the third prologue chapter done, so I've got a usable buffer. Hopefully that'll be sooner rather than later.

The Overthinker AU (or "The Artificer AU"? name is also very much a work in progress), a canon rewrite that I think I'll actually split into a bunch of shorter "episodes", so I can appropriately tag each one, rather than tagging one monolithic fic with Everything Under The Sun. The basic premise is "what if The Owl House, but there's more time", both in the meta sense of "not bound by the 20-minute TV episode format" and the diegetic sense of "the broad-strokes plot of the show will happen over a longer in-universe period of time" (though I'm a bit stuck on just how much more time I want to give em). - for the most part, I wanted to put more emphasis on Luz's magical development, and extrapolate a somewhat wider magic system out of what we see in the show, but I also want to go into more detail on how her actions affect those around her, even outside of all the friends she makes (stuff along the lines of the little things the crowd mentioned while protesting Eda's petrification at the end of season 1). - I'm almost (reluctantly) thinking of pulling a Grapes of Wrath with it, structure-wise, by having main plot/character development chapters alternate with shorter intermissions focused on magical exploration, worldbuilding, and so on. - this project is currently just the scribblings of a madwoman in my private discord server and three wildly unfinished fics in my google docs folder - - one of these fics is Something Like a Bible, which is essentially a condensed version of the entire broader project, boiled down to bare plot and occasional commentary. Like a series outline and a plot synopsis rolled into one, though perhaps not quite the series bible it claims to be. - - - honestly I REALLY aughtta work on this one some more, just so I can get most of the Big Ideas out of my head and share them with people. - - the other two fics are currently untitled snippets of scenes from the project, one a sentimental/instructional note from Eda to Luz, and the other sort of a ragefic twist on the ending of Thanks to Them. - this project is gonna include tons of ideas from and allusions to other fics which inspired it/me, such as The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled by IdeaHunter, All that's at Stake by The_Lampman, and Decorative by TheTokenAro, to name a few. - I could make a whole post about this project on its own (and in fact, I have before), talking about all the little changes I'd make, the developments I'd include, the more sweeping changes, the additional themes I'd toss in, and so on, but there are some I REALLY don't think fit well into the "rambling tumblr post" format (and/or just don't want to spoil yet), so I shall Abstain (for now :P).

[feysandfeels]

Hey! I'm so glad to see you posting again. I wanted to ask are you still part of the sim fandom, you barely seem active anymore? I don't want to be mean or anything, just a question out of an observation

Hello my boo!

I am. I most definitely am. Life just got really busy. I had a blast reading HOSAB and going through part of ACOTAR las year before life became chaotic lol. I'm still a Rhys girlie. I still love Manon Blackbeak and I am still waiting for her book. I am thankful I got Miss Lidia being badass. Queen.

But to tell you the truth, the theories got a bit much. Like the whole fandom shifted to really long and dull analysis of why Elain will end up with x or y, and when you've read Sarah's books for as long as I have you just know how this story will turn out. It's going to be Elucien. I'm sorry to the rest of you but if Elain and Az do hook up it will be that... a hook up they both kinda regret eventually and rather pretend never happened, Cassian brings it up on solstice dinner and everyone laughs and cringes.

The other theories were like the really really really really long explanations about how this word that appears on this one chapter is echoed in this other book in the other series meaning that the cat is actually Dorian's father, who somehow is now connected to Nyx because Nyx has a cat plushie in his crib. Respect to those who enjoyed it, but it's not for me.

And if it wasn't that then it was how much everyone hated the crossover and how it ruined ACOTAR or CC or whatever for them and I just *tired sigh*. While everyone is entitled to their own opinions and can post about them online, it did become like the trend to hate or not trust or dislike her decision. So I took a step back of my online fandom experience, because it gets tiring to see everyone and their mothers criticize Sarah.. when I adore her so much and I do think her work is good. Sometimes I do wonder if for all the people who dislike her world building, her writing style, her character dynamics, her narrative choices... like is it worth it to keep reading it just because you like 3 characters and then hating what she did with said characters?

Anywho, most of my irl friends who also read sjm are on board with the crossover -like why not it will be an experience™️ - and excited to read the 5 to 10 chapters she will most likely spend in Prythian and then send Bryce on her way -with like cocktails, a espresso martini like the pretentious bitches we are-. So that's where I went. To the "well rather wait until it drops before I start saying it's a mess" camp. It drains me a bit to see how other people are already like "i hate it"... so when we see how it actually develops oh I just know it's going to be worse. Because like yes she clearly retconned some aspects of her plot.. but I think, more often than not that is part of the creative process in most artistic endeavours. You cannot plan a big ass series that will take a big chunk of your life to write and not have those initial plans change. It's like the architecture vs the garden writing thing.

So yeah I curated my online experience so much I got an irl experience instead. But you know you can always hit me up to talk about her books, mostly in a positive-critical way. Because yes... her world building is not as straight forward or like squared (I don't have a better word but like... the rules are clear and logical and A-> B -> C) as some people normally prefer; but I think there's something engaging in how she approaches it when you tie it to her characters and then extrapolate that to fantasy trends in the past few decades. Like give her some credit is all I'm saying.... which people really don't... even when they like her characters...but then again they like them for their version of the characters and not for how Sarah wrote them.. you know Sarah... the one who created them.

This got way longer than I expected... no I'm off to learning my lines again.

Besoooooos and long live Feyre Archeron High Lady of the Night Court and Her Royal Highness Fire Breathing Bitch Queen of Terrasen Aelin Ashryver Galathanius

[softness-and-shattering]

Also - Im guessing and extrapolating here - doing shit like smoking in the woods and buying plan B and whatever your particular versions of this sneaky shit is, it puts you in uncomfortable situations that you just have to cope with. It makes you learn that its ok to be unsure and uncomfortable. Its how you learn to trust yourself.

Instead we have kids and teens insisting everything is catered to them. Nothing is allowed to be sexual or dangerous or adult in their presence even if they put themself into a situation where there is adult material. Probably because theyve never found themselves at a party where theyre the only one who hasnt smoked and now they gotta be normal about it and decide if they want to try it, or politely decline, and not freak out at a room full of people doing the Forbidden Activity who wont take it well. Because you can always just close the computer. So they dont learn hey these are still normal people I can have a conversation with and actually I will be ok after this and I can make my own decisions. Because you can yell at people on the internet in ways you just cannot talk to people IRL. So youre not forced to realise that people with very different thoughts and practices to you are still people you must treat with respect. And that they will respect you in kind!

How can you step out of your own comfort zone if you cant even step out of your *parents* comfort zone. Sure your parents guide you safely as you learn to walk but then they leave you to walk on your own. Sounds like parents arent letting their kids walk on their own and theres too much surveillance for the kids to walk off anyway. And its an extremely important part of growing into an independent adult to learn how to walk (or wheel, or move in a way I can't think of rn) away from your parents, out of their sight and be ok alone and find your own support systems. And its a scary process and its exhausting but without it you cant properly be your own person.

here's my hot take about my generation and people younger than me (I'm 22 years old)

The reason current teenagers and people in their really early 20s are conservative on accident and have such shitty takes on the internet is because our generation was much more sheltered than previous generations and because we were raised to be ok with orwellian servailence and that is 100% the fault of our parents, Reagan Era kidnapping panics, and the rise of technology all coming together to prevent us from doing the sketchy shit that sends parents into panic mode but which is also completely fundemental to childhood development. If your parents had even a crumb of money to their name and even a shred of free time they started tracking your phone as soon as it was possible to. I did not experience this because my parents are actively trying to live like it's the 1990s and still have not gotten cell phones of their own, and did not let me have one until I was 18 years old and it was no longer their choice, but literally over half of my friends in middle and high school had their phones tracked by their parents at some point or other, and we would occasionally find this out, not because their parents told them, but when we were trying to do the aforementioned sketchy shit and their parent's car would pull up. And I would, like a reasonable person after finding this out, encourage my friends to just leave their phones at home, and their response would be "What if I get kidnapped" or "My parents are just trying to keep me safe"

This in my estimation has lead to a combination of kids being terminally online because they do have internet access and are better at deleting search history than their parents think they are, but don't have the freedom to go out and do shit without their parents' knowledge or consent, so they have the most privacy from the people who control their lives while they're on the internet, and kids not having the real world experiences they should have, not knowing how to connect with other people irl, not feeling comfortable leaving the house because of the horror story lies their parents told them to make them ok with the surveillance they were inflicting on their kids. Kids these days are growing up in the fucking panopticon when they should be out in the woods playing with knives or stealing cigarettes from their older sibling and going out to an empty parking lot to smoke them or whatever and that shit is sticking with them into adulthood. Things that were "tee hee we could get in trouble isn't this so fun and daring" in the 1990s and 2000s have become in the 2010s and 2020s things that are "If I do that without texting my parents some sort of lie to excuse where my location is my parent's car will pull up and I will get grounded for the next two weeks."

Like even when I was 19 I had a 16 year old friend who would volunteer their time at a food shelf and that's how we knew each other. We would talk about dungeons and dragons together, and the game store was 4 blocks from the food shelf. One day we left the food shelf earlier than they had told their parents they would and they got punished for that. We were literally just going to look at dungeons and dragons miniatures and dice, which was self evident if you could see where we started and how far we walked and where too. I have to assume that this isn't uncommon. It's wrong, but it's not uncommon.

[cptn-m]

One Piece chapter 1107 review

The Egghead climax is definitely in full swing now, but it's still hard to tell how much of a full length, stand-your-ground fight to expect from this arc. Battles lately have left more like skirmishes. They're not about beating down your opponent until they physically can't move anymore, it's enough to make them dazed and in need of a moment to catch their breath so you get the chance to go on to your own objectives or keep them away from theirs. Plenty of other arcs have featured these kinds of 'smack the other guy away and get back to the more important stuff' kinds of confrontations (which people online love to extrapolate into being decisive wins or losses despite the result's lack of staying power) but never as a substitute for the traditional final battle. And I think this feeling that the final 1v1 could still come is the last thing that makes it hard to predict the remaining length of the arc.

Getting started, it's awesome seeing the Giant Pirates in action. With the scale normal humans can reach in One Piece, it's easy to forget how freaking big real giants actually are. They tower over the Marine warships enough to cleave them with single swings. And while there are humans who can also cut a battleship in two with their blades, those are individuals, and generally ones near the top of the food chain. When Mihawk cuts through a ship in an instant, it's a moment of awe. And giants are a whole race of people who can do that just virtue of their sheer size.

Usopp's joy at seeing the great warriors again is a wonderful moment. I get the need for a recap for casual readers, but I'd rather have seen some kind of explanation on the giants' timeline - when and how Dorry and Brogy gave up their duel and reunited with the others.

I feel like I'm starting to see part of the escape taking shape in the sequence with the ship sliding. The talk of Brook 'passing through in a moment' and not being able to stop seems to be setting up the crew on top leaping onboard as the Sunny slips past. There's probably going to be a little bit of tension and last minute saves with Jinbe and Zoro rushing to make the rendezvous and a Vegapunk having to rush inside to turn off the barrier (almost forgot about that) and then have to make it back in time, or just sacrifice themselves so the others can get away. With the giants right underneath, there's people there who could catch the Sunny and break its fall, or it could just do a coup de burst to ramp off the edge and into the hole in the Marine fleet made by the giants' arrival. That's my theory for how things play out from here.

Even though I floated the idea of Bonney being upset with her 'god' for not showing up sooner, I'm not at all surprised that she commits to him as a hero instead. While very dramatic, the other thing wouldn't quite have been Oda's style. I appreciate Luffy's casual dismissal of the Nika idea. He's still himself. But I do wish his reaction to seeing Vegapunk's injuries was a little more personal and had a bit more staying power before he shifted back into fun mode. Gear Five coming with a strong sense of euphoria isn't something I mind, but I want to see the difference split a little more evenly. Or at least give Luffy a chance to see a thing like this before transforming. I was close to writing off the lead-up to the attack on Saturn as well. The back and forth with Bonney almost makes it feel like the move is going to be more about showing her up than avenging Vegapunk, and that, to my mind, made it too much of a game. But after taking the stare attack from Saturn, the old Luffy shows his face. Nika will play with Bonney, letting it be her plan and a souped up version of her punch, but Luffy has a score to settle about his friend. The expression in that panel is good. He's still smiling, but it's a determined, focussed smile, with a furrowed brow that brings a wilder intensity to the wide Gear Five eyes. This is the version of Gear Five I want to see more of.

Vegapunk not being able to move without dying is an interesting complication to add. On the topic of having to stand and fight, it gives Luffy and Sanji a reason to defend this space to the end instead of stunning or knocking back Borsalino and Saturn before fleeing, but what happens after? Can we get Chopper down here to save the scientist? And if Vegapunk has enough medical knowledge to be sure of that, wouldn't Atlas, who shares his brain, have the same medical knowhow to do a patch job? Surely Franky has the strength to carry Kuma in her place.

Then there's the Sanji moment. He doesn't know. We'd thought that maybe because he'd acted less pervy around Bonney in some recent chapters that he had a sixth sense for it, but now we just have to say he doesn't know. This does mildly sour the coolness of the laser kick (as does the fact that he did it already two chapters ago without the big reaction). "Physics as we know it is dead" is a great line though.

I'm very interested to see how the choreography for a 2v1 for Luffy, Sanji and Borsalino will play out, even if it ends up being a short, interrupted one. In his earlier fight with Luffy, Borsalino proved an ability to zip around and attack from offshore one moment, up close the next. That speed makes him a terrible foe to have to protect a wounded ally against. In a tag team, however, one person can protect Vegapunk while the other chases Borsalino across the island. Could be fun, especially with Sanji's speed.

Now, that last scene. That's where it's all at this week. I've been asking questions about that Blackbeard ship tease for a long time, and we finally see the agenda. If that touch is what it takes for Catarina to be able to imitate Saturn (and what else could it realistically be?), shit's really about to get serious. It seems like Teach's go-to tactic is weaseling his way into the good graces of a group that has something he wants (Whitebeard's crew, the Warlords, and now seemingly the Celestial Dragons) and betray them to run off with the prize. Then there's this idea of them acquiring "the world" as an ultimate goal. Do we think it's a mirror of Luffy's own secret goal in some way, possibly relating to Gaimon's shoutout to "buy the world" back near the start of the series?

And then, in a one-two punch, we finally get Caribou's endgame. Oda's been stringing this one out for literally the whole timeskip, putting this slimey bastard in the right place at the right time to learn all kinds of valuable things about the Ancient Weapons and the Poneglyphs (as well as the Strawhats' idiosyncrasies) to make him the perfect asset to a final boss.

What a wild chapter. A finale coming together. Exciting action. Mixed feelings about the balance of goofball fun and genuine emotion in Nika. And the last two scenes feeling like they're bringing things Oda has spent most of the series coming to a head at last. The growing pains of Gear Five's implementation into moments of drama are easily forgiven in the face of these ultimate payoffs manifesting.

Oh, and Zoro's fighting Lucci I guess. There's basically nothing of note here except trash talk. The one clash we're shown isn't even particularly dramatic.

My Wordpress!

[darkysilverwing]

I've had an idea that's been bouncing around my head for awhile about simulating the entire world by only scanning a single person.

Basically you take someone's body and you break down everything, skin cells, bones, scar tissue, brain tissue, everything, as well as the memories contained inside the brain, and you use that to create the world.

So you'd start out by simulating the single person with a bunch of npc's, and you use all their memories to control what the npc's would be doing. So if someone in the memory of someone tripped on a sidewalk then you'd have the npc of them tripping on the sidewalk.

Then you'd fill in the gaps, starting by using the info given by the npc. So if they said something like "Oh yeah my dog died" then you give them a dog, and you have it die. if someone says "did you hear, josh got hit by a truck last night" the npc josh would be hit by a truck.

After this you'd start filling in more details that would make sense, like someone had to make that mug you're drinking out of in that one memory, you figure out how something like that could have been made and have an npc doing that thing, someone says they have a job walking dogs, give them a bunch of dogs to walk. Your genetics suggest that you've got a hereditary trait, make up some npcs that have that trait.

Once you have enough information down you can then start making larger leaps of logic, so long as they make sense. Like I don't speak hebrew, but I think it could be possible that some super advanced species could recreate it using what very little I know.

And once you squeeze out every last bit of info you can, you then run a simulated version of all the people you've made using what background you've given them. Continue tweaking things in the environment until everything matches how we saw them in our reference, this might mean adding new npcs that we don't know anything about and having them do things, and just continue running the simulation and tweaking things until you've got everyone we know about from our sample figured out and a lot of info we didn't know about having come from the simulation because that would be the only way for everything to happen exactly how it happened.

Sure there might be gaps in knowledge, but it's sort of like that 7 degrees of kevin bacon game where normally you can't be more than 7 people away from kevin bacon or whatever, so there shouldn't be too many gaps in the knowledge that couldn't be extrapolated via some other means.