#anyway. these tags are a ramble and a half lmao

[marshmellowtea]

i change my mind aleheather can be yaoi too cuz if alejandro is a gay man then heather is a trans guy/transmasc in the same way that if heather is a lesbian alejandro is a trans girl/transfem. Do Not Separate Them

[wundrousarts]

Something I’ve noticed for awhile is that I often get comments from people about how they are surprised how I always come up with theories and try to guess what might happen and they “could never do that” themselves. I want to say: yes you can! There’s honestly a shortage of Nevermoor theories and ideas and speculation and etc and I want to see MORE!!!

Want to talk about how Morrigan’s mom is actually secretly alive? How the Scholar Mistresses are a Wundrous Act? Do you think the Tempus Divinity looks like an owl, or do you think Weaving and Ruination would be met together? Or have you ever thought about how this one line, from Chapter 19 of Nevermoor, about Betram Crow actually means he was a Cursed Child? Whatever it is you want to talk about: GO FOR IT!!!

I personally find it very fun to go sort of “English class mode” and look at the text in front of me and think about what different things might mean and analyze it and even overthink it to an unnecessary (but fun!) amount. But that’s just me and how I like to approach things! You don’t need to make long posts and quote specific lines if that isn’t your style. The big thing to remember is that so much can happen in the next six books, so throw any idea out there! You never know what twists and turns will be thrown at us. I think it’s fun to share these ideas and discuss with other people— sure, maybe there’s just something you missed when reading, but perhaps some new ideas spawn might from it. Some speculation could even serve as inspiration for fics!

There are some theories and thoughts that I’ve posted that have been “debunked” when I reread a book, or when someone pointed out something, or even just when something had a real-world basis that I as an American didn’t catch. But it was still fun to think about it all, and there’s some bits and pieces that I see as notable and worth considering. I think most of the Silverborn Masterpost is going to be “wrong”, but if just 1% of it is “correct”, even indirectly, I will take that as a win. I know it feels like during the hiatus everyone’s talked about everything, but I hope that the incoming communal reread (fingers crossed) and obviously Silverborn brings some speculation back to the fandom because I want to discusssssss!

[the--firevenus]

"I have always been told through legends of old"

-

my magister ref sheet <333 a bit of rambles under readmore

truth to be told there isn't much i change except simplified the clothes and add my lil hc spin design, I like to think merlin had marks all over him like an engraving magic tattoo (kinda)

i had a habit of just... fluffing the hair.... i love to think he woke up and never want to touch his hair, permanent bed hair despite hammie effort in wanting to comb it ("magister please take consider of your appearance more!")

his alias name has little to do with canonical merlin mythos and more so to just me picking it cuz i originally want to name him helios, like the god of sun but alas.... i do think its a bit poetic to it cuz he so space theme in my head

originally i want to also put more design sketches especially on his markings! but that maybe for another day, i imagine merlin had it all over his body and not many had seen it cuz guy cover up from head to toe LMAO

lastly, since the game default face to masc merlin is just... resting bitch face, i upped that a bit and make him more expressive! stranger might never notice it but his travels companion probably would, fun teasing victim tbh

[thegreatyin]

How did you manage to handle not one, but FOUR separate accounts in fl? I recently made the account for my HD little guy but having to do the tutorial again just seems miserable

there's... weirdly several answers to that question, actually??

a HUGE part of it is due to the way FL is structured. the 10-minute action timer is a core part of the game on a fundamental level, and the fact that i can very easily run out of stuff to do on one character and thus have an excuse to quickly and easily swap to another is just... convenient? satisfying? i'm not entirely sure how to explain it. the fact that i can make progress even while i am fundamentally simultaneously Not Making Progress is like pure dopamine for my freak insane awful little brain. there's just something really pleasing about spending all of my actions pursuing The Goal Of The Day™ on one account before casually swapping to another and doing the same without feeling like i'm wasting time or acting to the first account's explicit detriment. the downtime helps! the recharge time helps! the structure really really works!!

i'm technically only actively playing three, maybe two accounts minimum. the only reason the fourth (the one that'll be my future BaL playthrough) currently exists at all is so i can get his earlygame completely out of the way now and not have to waste time running through it all later, when what i actually want to do is play the ambition i've made myself wait a full year to play. and also getting free goodies as seasonal stuff happens,, something something surprise tools to help us later. the only two accounts i'd say i'm really "actively playing" at the moment are caeru and lark- and of the two, lark takes the most priority, since his ambition is the one i'm currently pursuing in earnest. for a couple months now- despite being My Main FL Character- the scoundrel has actually been pretty inactive on a gameplay front outside of the occasional progression in TLC and discordance content. purely by virtue of having Very little left to do outside of Very long-term grinds and vanities. they're in their "now what?" "now you can start playing the game" era. they've graduated to previous protagonist background cameo in a sequel anime series. they're like the yin FLPC equivalent of red at the top of mount silver. they're Literally just vibing rn. i only keep posting about them regardless because i'm insane and i will never ever ever ever ever let that bat go. but yeah, big TLDR, outside of doing the bare minimum to keep making waves/notability up every week, i'm not actually spending that much time on accounts i'm not currently actively interested in playing. and that accounts for way more gaming spoons than you might think.

i have a virtually lifelong history of playing MMOs, especially and specifically world of warcraft. i was born in the endless grind for useless video game pixel vanities and/or bragging rights. molded by it. you all have merely adapted to doing the same piece of content a pointlessly excessive amount of times for literally no reason besides whimsy and folly. me? i've done my time. i've served my sentence. i've spent weeks doing the original burning crusade netherwing dailies. i've devoted days to running praetorium over and over and over again, back-to-back, nonstop, long before square enix cut it in half and made it NOT take at minimum an hour and a half per run. i've perfected my silverwastes + auric basin goldfarming strategies. i've (almost) crafted dragonwrath tarecgosa's rest. i've killed the sha of anger so many times its dying scream of agony is embedded into the very fabric of my being. ""only"" doing making your name content four times over? that is nothing to me. it means nothing to me. it is so infinitesimal i can do the persuasive seduction quests in my sleep. it's not a matter of handling misery, or having the capacity, or even sighing as i remember the brass embassy raid segment of the watchful questline seriously i don't know why i keep forgetting that exists or what even is my problem with it i just am so consistently mildly inconvenienced by it and its highly specific resource requirements and it is the worst thing ever. maybe i'm just so used to the scoundrel's near-infinite money and troves of disposable items that i've completely forgotten what being poor is like. despite having done that step 3 fucking times now. ahem. anyway. i have transcended the feeble mortal bindings of my resistant-to-grinding flesh and ascended to a higher plane of enlightenment, they may call me insane but they will be the ones left laughing when they see what that "insanity" has wrought, i've usurped them, i've usurped them all-

hacks and coughs and awkwardly clears my throat. i mean. uh. um. Ahem.

the empress' court artistry + tales of the university nerfs helped too.

[doing-something-unholy]

Is it geologically probable for swallows rest to have basalt cliffs? Not really. Am i gonna headcanon it anyway? Of course.

Because I can picture Adrian and Victor walking along the beach, spending time waiting for lord vane to arrive. When all of a sudden Adrian comes to a dead stop in the middle of a sentence, staring at something ahead of them. Then he gasps, and gets so excited he forgets where he is, who he's with, and the collar around his neck, as he starts excitedly slapping Victor in the arm going, "Look, look, look, look--" at top speed.

Victor, who was primed for some kind of emergency since Adrian stopped talking is looking around frantically like, "What, what happened???"

Only for Adrian to point ahead and whisper-yell, "Basalt cliffs!!" And start booking it across the beach.

And yeah, maybe it painfully reminds Victor a lot of his younger self, and he's just about ready to remind Adrian of his manners as a priest, but then Adrian turns around to see if hes coming and the smile on his face is the most animated hes seen Adrian since he met him. And when he catches up he gets treated to a long winded ramble about crystal structure and volcanic activity and geologic hotspots and the Implications and how they could easily be the most ancient part of the island and erosion wear patterns and hes always wanted to see these in person cause they have them in northern ireland and and-- Its the most he's ever heard Adrian talk in one sitting.

And he supposes that having an appreciation for the wonders of the world that God made is perfectly acceptable for their profession, and lets him talk as long as likes.

[sugarsnappeases]

kara i wanna know allllll about your reg. tell me EVERYTHING <3

so obvs canonically pretty much the only thing we know about reg is his betrayal of voldemort and the cause etc etc so i like to centre that in most of my thoughts about him……

he joins the death eaters bc he’s a loser w a freakish voldemort obsession who has like three friends and bc he’s lonely and he hates sirius and he wants to spite him by joining the group to which he’s so opposed. he wants to prove sirius wrong and prove himself right and i believe wholeheartedly that, even if he was influenced somewhat by the way he was raised and by the circles he runs in, he joined the death eaters completely of his own volition!!! i’m passionate about this!!! i think it destroys the nuance of his character to say that he was forced to join or that he joined w the intention to betray them all along or whatever . to me, he was fucking gagging to be a death eater and he’s so smug when he’s allowed in. i picture him ranting to barty and evan about ‘the great honour that has been bestowed upon him’ whilst lovingly stroking his dark mark

anyway, then he gets scared. he’s just a boy!!! and he realises he’s in too deep when it’s far too late… to me he just can’t stand the violence of the death eaters. like he’s a blood purist and further than that thinks he personally is superior to pretty much everyone else, on account of his black blood, but he hates that he has to get his hands dirty in order to see his idealised vision of the world (sans mudbloods and blood-traitors) realised…. he’s soft and weak and squeamish and lonely and always so so miserable at all times as a rule. he also tries to hide how scared he is by being a massive bitch. classic.

then he realises that tom has a horcrux (and imo he would figure this out fairly easily after the kreacher thing, bc he’s smart but also bc tom read about them in a book in the HOGWARTS LIBRARY!! so it’s not much of a stretch to say that the same book and probs further, more detailed books would be in the library at grimmauld, likewise in most of the darker pureblood family libraries…. this is another thing i’m passionate about. horcruxes aren’t this big secret. nobody makes them bc nobody’s a fucking idiot like tom is. they’re also warned off properly by their rents. tom doesn’t have this…. ANYWAY) he realises tom has a horcrux and that the guy he’s idolised and basically sold his soul to is fucking bonkers (shameless self promo - i write a bit about this realisation in the regulus letter in my fic ‘where can i put it down?’…. makes me crazy) and he’s scared and alone and he wants out and he does the one brave thing of his life in dying…..

and he doesn’t think it’s a brave thing. he tells himself that sirius was a coward for running away and betraying them and specifically him. he tells himself he’s being brave, braver and better than sirius, when he’s like sticking it out, joining the death eaters, following the role prescribed to him, so when he decides he’s gonna go to the cave it’s like giving up, it’s being a coward, its admitting to himself that he’s never been better than sirius no matter how much he want or tries to be, it’s betraying the cause and everything he’s stood for but he HAS to do it. for sirius and for kreacher and for himself and for the chance that maybe he’s not past saving. he spends his whole life trying to be good but in the sense of behaving and then his death, his first (and last) real rebellion, is the only time that he actively attempts to be good in terms of a moral act even if it has nothing to do w a renouncement of blood purity. and i don’t think he fully realises that when he does it bc it’s all so tangled up in other things. and i’m not saying that he’s like morally reprehensible the rest of the time (he’s just a boyyyy) but the majority of his active choices have been kinda bad ones up to this point even if he’s been like . passively good . and also literally just a child. an angsty teen if you will

his life is marked by inaction and bad decisions and his final act is kinda the antithesis of this and it’s tragic bc he’s not ever going to survive it. and sirius is never gonna know. it makes me miserable. does any of this even make sense lmaooo basically he’s a loser and he misses his brother and he’s so lonely and he loves sirius so much even as he hates him and he’s quiet and he wants so desperately to be a good death eater bc this is everything he’s ever wanted but he just can’t in the end!!! he’s just a boy!!! a boy who would nurse birds with broken wings back to health and cry when they flew away, a boy who would hold his brother’s hand and hang on every word he says and exist almost entirely in sirius’ shadow until said shadow is suddenly gone and he’s left reeling, a boy who’s so so soft and gentle but who hides it all behind layers of barbs and cold remarks, a boy who is desperately desperately sad and scared and GOD I LOVE HIM……

[neurotonic]

Ouh. I really like how out of all the antagonists in the series, Prism's motivations (and her turning to Zoraxis) are directly influenced by Phoenix's track record. She has the most personal beef with the agent, though it's a little ironic that her TK implant helped the agent's success. If it weren't for Prism, Phoenix wouldn't be the legend that they are known for.

...Except...That's minimizing Phoenix's own ingenuity and skill with the implant, isn't it? It's a useful tool, yes! But in the end, it's just a tool. Phoenix was able to use it in unique ways, and that's not counting whatever else Phoenix has to do in the moment without TK. If it weren't for Phoenix's own efforts (and their strange ability to not Die), Prism wouldn't be forced to take revenge.

They're their own self-made people, but inevitably they left such a huge impact on each other before the third game...and if Prism wasn't the one who personally added the implant in Phoenix's head, then they haven't even interacted in person!

It could be seen as a little tragic, and it sorta is--Prism's desire for revenge is a little misplaced (and, yes, it is bolstered by Zor when she switches to their side). For all we know, Phoenix never intended to be the villain in Prism's story. But Prism's frustrated and angry and devastated about being reduced to the One Project she made. She just wanted to make something bigger than herself.

And it's really nice to see Phoenix help her once she recognizes that Zor's been using her all this time...even if it takes some time for Prism to really let them help her.

It takes the combination of their unique skills, brainpower, and their eventual trust in one another to destroy Zor's volcano kinesium base. Prism gets saved by the person she thought made her dreams impossible, and in return, Phoenix gets saved in the one IEYTD ending where they're not declared legally dead. I feel like that's something interesting? Because this is also the one finale where Phoenix has an active ally working with them close to their side (...as close as Prism and Phoenix could get, anyway).

Well. Anyway. What was I talking about? Enemies who are closely intertwined with one another's journeys end up becoming each other's most important allies? Okay, yeah. Let's go with that.

[nadjasnandor]

I've really enjoyed your quality gif-sets over the years, and felt less devastated by this season & the show ending because of your liveblogging & commentary :' ) thank you for sharing your love of this show!!

🥺 I'm so glad my blog helped a little!! Thank you for your lovely words! 💜 We'll always have these silly vampires and the joy they've brought us.

[james-spooky]

this is a test

[courtillyy]

ohno have to rework a whole ass section bc i forgot slack is a fucking bouncer. could just not have it be so. but my guy deserves this <3 secretly buff slack is real and true to the canon. it would be a disservice to not include it

[queerofthedagger]

every day the tolkien brainrot gets only worse and this is both entirely unsurprising considering who i am as a person and also leaving my face in a permanent rendition of the shocked pikachu with some disgruntlement mixed in and I just . am so so so so scared of the way this is continuing to take over my life. the last time this happened on this scale i ended up with 90 and counting fics on ao3 with no sign of stopping. i cannot have two of these kinds of brainrots and cling to whatever shreds of my sanity i have left someone please just put me down already

[volfoss]

like heres the thing- at surface level, you can really be impressed with rices inclusivity. like in a world where things were not horrible, to have a prominent black vampire in merrick, have an intersex genderfluid character in blackwood farm, billions of bisexuals etc, it all seems really nice. and then you look more into it and find that the way she writes anyone who doesnt fit a very specific mold is written horribly. merrick is treated as a sex object and a temptress as early as.. age 14 or so. she is never given the pov during the entire book that is TITLED AFTER HER because its all from a white guy who's been objectifying her forever. petronia (the character in blackwood) is misgendered often and treated as inhuman often in a very jarring way. her way of "inclusivity" with sexuality often includes very large age gaps between adults and minors treated completely normally and never really unpacking the damage that does to the victims, as well as incestuous relationships that if anything are fetishized to the point where i am positive she had a kink for it. her idea of representation is so incredibly surface level and doesn't really seem to examine many viewpoints outside of her own, nor take any care to handle any topic with any sensitivity. do i need to bring up the gay disabled vampire who is the only disabled vampire ever and is greatly treated with mass amounts of ableism from the woman who supposedly cares about him (if we are to believe rice's narrative that every slave owner just lovesss their slaves and wants the best for them and its GOOD for them to be enslaved). we are supposed to believe an author with this bad of a track record actually cares?

[snow-and-saltea]

yesterday i spent 45 minutes of my life watching a video essay criticising the use of cheap shock values and crossing of taboos for a video game and i went from "he has a point even if he's explaining it in a really inflammatory way" to "oh umm... i can see how he thinks that way even if i don't agree" to "oh this guy's just straight up using people on tumblr as material for an audience to get mad at like other outdated people on the internet. nvm he's just an asshole"

[vshushmshu]

UP AND DOWN AND UP AND DOWN AND AANYYTHING I DO IS NOOO SINNNNNNNN !!!!

[likes-words-and-shrimp]

boy howdy some of these are nasty!

10 and/or 24

LOL TRU also thank you tho

10. Worst part of fanon

- aaaaa man. This sorta goes back to the last one I answered but z-man has it rough. Sometimes it feels like he's not allowed to do anything but be sad? Or that any of his competence just gets shadowed by his sadness? I really do think he's a very compelling character but fans are only interested in one aspect of him and I don't find it very interesting myself lol

24. Topic that brings up the most rancid discourse

- I think just talking about the soulmate route?? Since it gives multiple fun possibilities and extra scenes but wow, did it create the worst shipping wars ever back in early fandom days. And the thing about it is I feel because of said ships it makes Lloyd himself as just a prop for someone's fave?? Like he's there to make them feel better and that's it. And to clarify, I'll admit I'm guilty of this too when I get into my Colette mood and want to write about her! I throw this rock into my own glass house ok. But Lloyd is his own character that deserves more than just the coveted shipping spot,,, and at least most of that discourse is not as often now except pockets here and there. This just reminds me we need more Lloyd-centric fics, I want to write them.

[nothing-lasts-forever27]

Been seeing a bunch of people posting fake paradox pokés lately, which I adore btw, but I haven’t seen anything based on a saber-tooth/smilodon yet?? So here’s a rushed attempt at a paradox luxray :v calling it Phantom Fang and giving it electric/ghost typing because why not??