#at least thats how i feel about them

[carlarte]

mikey said let's play EXTREME LEAPFROG

[screechingfromthevoid]

Orym is giving very "I have fallen in love again and that feels like a betrayal to my dead husband" energy.

He's also giving "I care so much about my friends and I have to protect them but the love I have for one is so strong that it's distracting me AND it's not fair to the others"

Like there is so much love contained in the Orym and also so much guilt.

[xxplastic-cubexx]

it doesnt need to be said but its genuinely so funny how at-the-hip charles and erik are in krakoa like they really had the green light- the OBLIGATION- to be as obnoxiously close to each other as possible and abused that right to the fullest extent

[ganondoodle]

okay i typed this in a reply but i need to say this more detailed here too, the way totk dealt with horses (and stables) is bad and worse than botw imo (yes i can rant about that too, these weird choices are in every little spot in totk, its almost impressive)

in a game that lets you build cars and stupid flying maschines, towers that shoot you into the stratosphere AND teleporting points all over the place, the chance is already low that you use a horse- though i would be one of them bc i love horses and hate building and didnt find it fun at all-

(also i almost never used any parts i had with me bc you cant put them back and your dumb vehicles despawn as soon as you dont look at them- also a negative thing about that system that reinforces the feeling of actually using it being more punishing than rewarding with the added bonus of the good ol saving your health potions forever problem)

-and something i DID like was that you can have more horses and the ... one.. new color (the lil spots but only AFTER you do that one quest in the spy post)

the stable points seemed like a neat idea, but like so many things, are utterly cheatable, imo the system should have only given you a point when you visit a new stable, so you actually have to go around and visit them all

(also .. add new stables, like mini ones or sth that dont offer beds- you dont need that anyway- so you have more places in which you can get them ... why did they remove some of them anyway, shouldn there be MORE now that the land is supposedly healing/being repaired? especially the one next to the big canyon, its so empty there it would have the perfect place for sth like a new settlement or a big boss arena but no its more empty than it was before, why?? and then putting yet another repeating annoying quest there in that weirld empty place?? i just dont get it)

letting you farm points by sleeping at a stable or bringing in a horse gives you LESS incentive to actually go around the world bc you can just farm it there

(and if that was done so youd 'discover' the malanya talks to you in your sleep 'secret' ... that is literally told to you, and if its bc you dont want to force players to go around and find every stable to get all those rewards ... why do you have 140 or whatver caves then with the majority of them being the literal same thing over and over ... to make people actually use the sleeping thing there? .. why, who uses that anyway, and farming points by sleeping there .. what the hell does that add? AND THEN the stupid sleep over tickets, probably the most nothign reward ever, dont count?? i dont think i ever used one- it just all doesnt make any sense, everything plays against each other)

the upgrading system for your horse is .. once again, a neat idea horribly executed, you have to go find malanya to upgrade them, and similarly stupidly like the fairies, they only tell you what food you need for what upgrade when you are there .. or when you are sleeping in the special tm bed at a stable, randomly, one food, bc the quantity changes too

which is just so ??????????? let me go and do a quest that rewards you with a lil booklet in which you can look up what an upgrade costs, or let the stables have that, either as a list or in the menu when selecting a horse or something?? (also why the hell is malanya in a different spot anyway, like, it feels like a modder just plopped them over there, their og spot is just empty now - except for yet again a stupid filler quest for .. another big horse and a yaaaaaaaaays crystal shrine quest- ... the spot is even still called spring of the horse god .... its so stupid, just like the fairy shuffling around, like you really couldnt think of a better way to reuse that concept other than to ... move it to a different spot in the same map and map level???? and not change anything in their og spot except idk, put a hole in the map ... for one of them like .. its like they moved them around last minute just to have the semblance of things being 'changed' with no regard what makes a change actually feel like one and what just feels like, pick up thing, click on random spot on map, drop thing- its like that for the fairies and shrines too, its so dumb and .. feels disrepectful to botw and how much thought seemed to have went into these spots that were clearly built about those things)

and like it couldnt get WORSE, they cut off the paths that horses follow automatically with one of those miasma buttholes (sorry its just a hole cut into the map, it doesnt even look like miasma burst through, it just .. cut out) a monster camp (that RESPAWNS, i thought those camps you clear with a quest would stay clear, but that would make sense, so of course it respawns and you can do the frame rate killer quest over and over yippieee) or otherwise like, with a big rock or a broken bridge-

and there is NO WAY to create a new path or fix or move anything in a game ABOUT BUILDING supposedly, like you needed more reasons to never use a horse????? i liked jsut hopping on and letting them follow a path and chill looking at the landscape, you cant do this here, and you cant even excuse it with 'its bc of the theme' as in, stuff is destroyed bc calamity 1.5 or whatever bc nothing in the game makes it feel like theres anything actually at stake, but the real crime is to make it not be fixable. WHY??? link moves entire buildings with ease but cant move one freaking rock that fell into a river?????? you swing around logs like a club but cant fix a bridge so your horse can get over it??????????????????????????????

[dykedvonte]

Do you have anything you've been thinking on but just haven't made a post about it yet? Also I'm really enjoying your fic!

I have a few things but it's likely mostly headcanons that I consider somewhat disconnected from my analysis.

Curly's parents had him old, only child, died shortly after he graduated and got the pony express position. It was the last big thing they saw him do which is a reason he stayed for so long.

Doesn't admit how much their death affected him

Jimmy has a largish family. One of the cases of too many kids to keep tract of, parent never really noticed any of them nor their behaviors

Anya lived in a lot of houses growing up, regular supportive family that just struggled to support themselves.

Became a nurse largely to avoid their financial struggles but mostly because she felt too many people weren't being cared for and advocated for in the world properly

Swansea likes high top sneakers most. Likes how snug they fit and how they shield his ankles at work

Curly has a bit of a caffeine problem since he can’t sleep. Can occasionally be found wandering the ship at “night” when he had some too late or just couldn’t sleep.

Daisuke knows a little about a lot of things. Starts conversations with “did you know” a lot but please don’t ask him deeper questions

Curly has known Jimmy longer but has worked with Anya and Swansea longer, met them during his middle years, met Jimmy shortly before college.

Swansea rents a house, Daisuke’s family lives in a big nice apartment, Curly has a condo, Anya live in a small one bedroom apartment and Jimmy has a studio.

Curly's home is very disconcerting. It's too normal to a like uncanny degree.

Anya is ambidextrous but prefers her left.

Anya and Curly are both not native English speakers so occasionally they forget words and bond over the mutual mocking they get from the rest of the crew. Daisuke knows some Japanese but is still learning, never picked it up as a kid

Only Swansea and Daisuke know how to drive, Earth in my mind is very post capitalist so only older people and like the extremely wealthy can afford cars.

It's also like walkable just due to how many businesses are in your face. Probably strict living vs shopping districts

I have more but the way that I headcanon about them is like too long.

[cerealmonster15]

shoutout to the like 2 people that ive seen post leoidikei it wormed its way into my brain and now im just SITTING HERE with it stewing in my mind forever

[lilac-set]

Reminder: even if trump wins, we’ll be ok. The presidency isnt the only political position that matters, he wont be a dictator, the president doesnt have the power to remove every other part of government that keeps the president’s power in check. Also politics isnt the only thing that matters. Even if we lose some rights (which he cant singlehandedly do) we still have community, we still have activism, we’ll always be ok. We survived one trump presidency, we can survive another. We survived before gay marriage or transitioning were legal, if we have to survive that again we will. Please, no matter what happens, promise to stay alive. Youre valuable, youre important, and youre going to be ok. Its better to be overprepared than underprepared. Im not asking you to lose hope (im doing the opposite of that), im asking you to practice coping ahead, get all your coping skills ready, determine now to stay alive, because i dont want any of you to make any rash decisions later in case we get bad news and emotions are high. Make a safety plan if you need to. Make sure you’re gonna be ok

[ssomepersonn]

many thoughts about these guys

[glouris]

“they are very annoying and irritating” are you familiar with the concept of fun and being entertained by drama

[spaciebabie]

at first getting diagnosed with cptsd was like, "yay my trauma has been validated (it always was valid)!" and i really thought that was going to be it, but then i started to do research as i do whenever i realize i have something and learned that!! the way i experience socialization is!! quite horrid actually!!

[freakinator]

thinking about kab and the thing about her i think is she knows just enough to keep herself safe Generally but not enough to really predict what would happen should something more... complicated??? unforeseen??? idk whats the right word to use but something not covered by someones reputation and/or vids happen, believe it or not this also affects her view of clownpierce (we'll get to that)

for example, mapicc has a reputation for being an violent, angry, & impulsive guy and nothing else which makes sense but is incredibly surface level and something that only really works if you dont have a lot of experience working with him

another is reddoons, his betrayal after the base incident while shocking is not unforeseen but his reputation as being a guy whos seen as being a reasonable person whos fairly loyal to his team made it seem like something he wouldnt do even tho it absolutely is

regarding how it affects her view of clown, since he isnt perfectly aligned with his reputation she instead pivots in the complete opposite direction and forgiving basically every crime he does even tho hes something much more mild and complicated than either his reputation or her view of him will ever be (think madonna-whore complex which is especially obvious when it comes to kabs vs woogies view of him)

another side effect of this Just Enough amount of knowledge aside from being blinded by her own expectations is that it frustrates ppl who think shes oversimplificating things (like me and seemingly several other tumblr users as well) especially when she claims that shes objectively correct and the smartest in the room at any given moment

how this roughness in her analysis affects her in the server still has yet to be fully seen but we do still have at least a couple months until the end but 'til then shes just gonna keep stumbling as more and more complicated situations pop up as is typical in lifesteal to happen and eventually shes gonna have to learn to adapt or else she'll be suffering the consequences one way or another

[meatgrinder-0]

ill allow myself one (maybe) hot take today. fiddleford would NOT want to help stan save ford i think. not from a resentment towards ford absolutely not i think hed feel devastated to hear he disappeared but i sincerely cannot imagine him helping open the portal when hes seen inside and knows exactly how dangerous it is. i cant even imagine him wanting to when he knows the potential consequences.

[pianostarinwonderland]

Now it's likely we will enter everyone's dream what do you think azul dream would be?

rubs hands Ohhhh anon, you're in luck because I have so many thoughts.

Since I also have ideas for the tweels, I'll take this time to write what I think all the Octavinelle dreams will be like. Most of these are my own thoughts, but some ideas are from friends. And because I love the trio so much, I'll also write my own ideas of what would possibly get them to wake up and such.

General notes before listing the individual dreams:

May be an obvious point, but I think all 3 of them will have each other in their dreams. Octa trio are very close, and I don't think they can imagine not having each other in their lives. It also matches how their initial dorm card art have each other + how all three of their stories are tied together.

I think that Jade is going to be the Octavinelle dream segment's SSR because of the twins, Kalim and co. will likely have an easier time waking Floyd up. Jade may need some prodding from someone more familiar with him.

However, I do acknowledge the argument made by my friend that it is possible for Floyd to be the SSR as he's the rightmost one in the order you find at the lessons (if you notice, the order goes Ortho > Lilia > Rook > Kalim (though Kalim is an exception) with Sebek in between Lilia and Rook, and they're the rightmost ones in their dorm order seen in lessons. Floyd is the rightmost one in the Octavinelle order). And I wouldn't be surprised if TWST decides to pull that out. But admittedly, I don't know what exactly would make Floyd's dream deep enough that he needs to be woken up by someone more familiar, so I write the dreams with the assumption that Jade will be the SSR.

Though not necessarily going to be important in the following ramble, I have a feeling that they will release Coral Sea's hometown event to be able to use certain assets (i.e. backgrounds, possible official reveal of Azul's merform) in book 7, just like Vil's hometown event was used for the Pomefiore dream segment.

As a disclaimer, I don't have full translations of the last two updates so I may not have the most accurate ideas for how the Octa dream segment can turn out because there are patterns they're following here. Many of these are still brainrot induced (even though I think I make good logic wheezes).

Ok, with all that said, here are my thoughts for the Octa trio's dreams :>>

Floyd Leech: Living underwater with Jade and Azul

It's not a secret that Floyd is at his happiest when he's in his merform. Among the trio, he's the one who transforms the most often into his merform. Some incidents include the time that he transformed during swimming class according to Ruggie (Book 3) and Vargas Camp where he transformed to get fish. Floyd is also the one who tells the most stories of his time under the sea with Jade and Azul. We know about their middle school band because of him (Robe Kalim vignette); we know about Azul's actual size in his octopus form because of him (Beans 2 main story); we know about the music contests they used to join because of him (Portfest Floyd vignette).

So it makes sense that his dream would be in the sea, where he's in his merform. It's also going to be pretty simplistic, depicting a happy life underwater.

TWST tends to be very comedic, especially with the first dream. So my friend suggested it would be fun if there were literal fish versions of the cast in his dream 😂 so we could have live2D assets of a literal goldfish Riddle, crab Ace, sea snake Jamil, etc.

Jade and Azul of course would be in merform along with him. Maybe they might be playing in their middle school band: Floyd on drums, Jade on bass, and Azul on piano (and maybe their audience is composed of the NRC cast as fish).

In this dream, maybe Floyd has no memory of ever being on land with Jade and Azul. So that may be what the others will use to wake him up.

Jamil would probably remind Floyd of basketball club days + dancing, and Ortho would probably remind him of his love for shoes. These could be pretty reasonable as the permanent card vignettes (so SR Robe/Lab, R Uni/PE, SSR Dorm) seem to be compliant with the canon of the main story. Grim would probably remind him as well of Book 3's events and how he'd do fun shit with Azul and Jade at the Mostro Lounge. They would probably remind him as well that Jade and Azul love what they do on land.

I don't know where to insert this, but it's very likely that Azul in this dream does not hate his merform. Floyd talks highly of his merform (whether it looks yummy or very strong), so it's possible that he wishes that Azul loves himself just a little bit more (I really want to say it is hinted at, but at the moment, I have no idea if that's correct, let alone say where it is hinted at, so I won't say it like it's canon). And by extension, this can be Floyd's way of sharing that maybe Azul wouldn't have OB'd if he was more accepting of himself.

Jade Leech: If Azul never overblotted

Jade's dream would take a similar path to Rook's dream, in which the premise for the latter is that Vil never overblotted because he's not in conflict with Neige. And for Rook, that's okay, he just wants Vil to be happy, even if he looks on from afar. Except that for Jade, he wants to be the reason that Azul didn't have to overblot.

See, it's very subtle, but Jade is probably upset or even traumatized from Azul's overblot. While he never shows this (this motherfucker istg) the one small bit of evidence of this is in Book 4. Jamil's hypnotizing everyone, and Kalim, Azul, and the rest are frantic as they don't know what to do. But as Jamil is about to overblot, Jade tells him to stop, or else he will overblot. And that's a very interesting thing: why is it Jade who's the one telling Jamil that he'll overblot at the rate he was going? Why not Azul, who's both fascinated with Jamil and the one who underwent overblot? Or even Grim and Yuu who have 3 experiences of overblots by that time? Of course, that's not necessarily a guaranteed indication that Jade is upset from Azul's overblot, as in general, overblot is very dangerous and could kill a life. Jade may have been saying this to prevent Jamil from entering a life-or-death situation. However, I still find it intriguing that it's Jade who's warning Jamil, especially when another instance of another character trying to stop an OB was Kalim, who followed Vil since he was reminded of Jamil's own OB (and we know Jamil and Kalim have been together since forever).

There's two ways that this can go: either (1) Jade's dream follows like Rook's, or (2) it goes the opposite of Rook's.

In (1), Jade (and consequently, Floyd) would not be friends with Azul, and Azul would continue on as he is, only a lot more independent.

(1) stems from the fact that the plan Yuu hatched to destroy Azul's contracts was hinged on separating the twins from Azul. Jade might have realized this, either in Book 3 or off screen post Book 3. And in a similar fashion to Rook, he might blame himself a little bit for Azul not being able to get the contracts off of Leona on his own due to the fact that he and Floyd are always with him. So in his mind, he thinks he might be dragging Azul's potential down, and he knows how much Azul wants to become the best version of himself. So maybe he looks on from afar as well. Maybe he's still an Octavinelle student, but not the vice leader.

(2) also stems from that same fact, but it also has an additional element: In Book 3, Jade asked Azul if they should do anything about Leona, since it was unexpected for Yuu to stay in Savanaclaw. Azul replied that he probably won't act on anything, so he says not to disturb him. What if Jade might have been hooked onto this? That maybe he should have acted more upon his suspicions? That maybe he should have been more attentive when spying on Yuu and co to find out when they hatched this plan? So maybe in dream (2), he had a countermeasure or he just knew when to nudge Floyd to go back to the dorm before Leona destroyed the contracts. Then once that was dealt with, they deal with the photo and bam, Azul wins and they get the Ramshackle branch.

Both (1) and (2) are connected by Jade's wish in the Dances and Wishes event, where he expresses that his wish is for Azul's and Floyd's wishes to come true. In a sense, (1) fits this a bit better than (2). There's also the idea that moray eels have a cowardly nature, according to Floyd. (1) could be an expression of said nature within Jade.

But if you ask me, I think (2) is a bit more in line with Jade. Firstly because I doubt he can imagine not being close to Azul, secondly because I think in his ideal world, I think he'd wish he had more control over what happened (and Jade has a thing for control).

Thirdly, it matches in terms of how his dorm card and Rook's dorm card are both same and different. The gameplay of TWST tends to be intermingled with the story and characters at times. Dorm Jade and Rook both have first spells where they boost their ATK stat for 3 turns, with fire as their duo element. The differences between them are (a) card typing (Rook Attack vs. Jade Defense) and (b) M1/M3 elements (Flora/Water Rook vs. Water/Flora for Jade). This parallel can be reflected in their dreams vs. the reality of their situations. Rook dreamt of never being involved with Vil, but in real life he was in time to intervene and save Neige. Meanwhile, Jade would dream of being on time to stop Leona, while in real life, he was too late and only in time to kick Azul's ass out of his overblot.

And fourth, this is where you may wonder: Isn't Azul's second dream going to be the Book 3 AU, based on the patterns with Idia, Vil, and Jamil? To which I answer: yes! Definitely! But here's where I'm going to point out something: Jade and Azul not only have similar ish mindsets but also have the same paintings in their initial Platinum card art, just with flipped positions. I like to think that this is reflective of their dreams, where both of them wish to change the same events of Book 3, except that they'd go about it differently.

Jade would definitely be woken up by Floyd, who would remind him that what happened has already happened. (On this note, I wonder if we'll get to see one of their vicious sibling fights so Jade can wake up, but I'm just dreaming at this point)

By virtue of him being the SSR, we gotta think of what's the scenario that would make Jade cry! Him having to fight the fake Azul and Floyd might break him. Yeah, he's fought Floyd and all, probably dueled with Azul too, but it could be different when he has to be 100% serious about it. Either that or, there might be some part of him that hates the fact that it was a dream. And Floyd would have to snap him out of it, saying that everything is okay.

Azul Ashengrotto: Ultimate business owner + Book 3 AU

The first dream we enter, in typical Azul fashion, we're likely going to see him owning a whole chain of Mostro Lounge restaurants! And maybe not only that: he's probably running a hotel or two, he's got a delivery service going, he probably has a monopoly running while we're at it. Basically, it's all the stuff that he lists down in Book 6 before he sleeps on Riddle's shoulder.

His businesses expand over both land and sea. Since Azul prefers being on land, we may see him on land first before diving to the sea to check on business there. And that's where the first confrontation happens.

I think Azul would feel practically invincible by this point! And by invincible, he not only has everything he wants, but there's not a trace of his past to be discovered, so people think he's always been this intelligent and strong. So when he's confronted by Jade and Floyd, who share memories of his past (his shared past with them, from middle school to NRC), that's the first instance of Azul slowly starting to wake up and him panicking about his perfect world being fake. And it almost works until the dream versions of Jade and Floyd come in and remind Azul of the kind of invincible person he is.

Then they descend to the second dream, which is the Book 3 AU where Azul got his contracts from Leona and probably beat his ass. Except that the difference between this and Jade's dream is that Azul does this all by himself. When dream Jade and Floyd get back to him with the photo, they're praising him, all like, "Good job Azul! You're so strong and powerful! I'm glad I get to hang out with someone as awesome as you are!"

But the real Jade and Floyd would try to stop him from destroying the photo and tell him that it's a reminder of who he was, and how much he's grown. And if Azul succeeds in destroying that photo, Jade and Floyd would pull out the photos that they carry with them (think the album from the opening). They want him to accept the person that he was, and realize the person he is now is someone who's grown stronger. He has become better.

On how his dream would collapse, this is tricky. I would want that Azul destroys his contracts (thereby breaking the deal he made with Yuu, which would entail that his happy end has been broken), but him not destroying the photo would also cause the dream to collapse since the way to his happy end involves removing all ties to his past, namely the photos. He could do both. However, the trend so far is that foreign influence affecting the happy ending is what would break the dream. If anything, if Jade and Floyd do have their own copies of Azul's past photos, that means that the presence of those indicates that Azul's ties to his past are not broken at all, and therefore they would break the dream.

Then as per pattern, the others leave while Azul sinks deeper to try and wake himself up. He meets his OB self, who's steeped in his insecurities and is very unaccepting of his past. And this is where Azul accepts those insecurities and accepts his past but will continue to move forward with his life and grow to be a person he can be proud of, and fight his OB self. Then he faces his first dream and dream Jade and Floyd, and then he wakes up eventually.

[haunted-xander]

I already know, so why won't you just say it?

[gammija]

musing about what a translation of the silt verses would sound like and immediately running headfirst into the problem of whether and how to translate 'Sister Carpenter'

[keepingmyoptionsfluid]

The idea that Tommy, a closeted gay man who was desperately trying to fit in in a hyper macho and discriminatory environment, isn't allowed to have any growth from when he was over compensating and was a dick to Chim really pisses me off. He literally had canonical growth to the point he was going for drinks with Chim and Hen in Bobby Begins Again and they got him a fancy leaving cake.

Why isn't he allowed to grow and be better? Because he's white? Because he "gets in the way of buddie"? Because no one is allowed to say and change at all over a decade?

Like this is a queer fandom and I'd bet a lot of money that a ton of people in this fandom said and did things they weren't proud of when they were younger, especially before they came out so they could try and hide it.

I know this is quite a young fandom too but like, it was literally only a decade ago when "gay" was an insult at school and doing anything that could be get you accused of being gay was fucking social suicide. You guys have no idea how lucky you are that people at least get called out for that shit now cause they didn't when I was a kid. I would have done almost anything to just be ignored, let alone accepted, rather than being openly bisexual.

So yeah, I think Tommy is allowed to fucking change as a person because Bobby, Chim and Hen came into his life and allowed him to stop repressing. Stop being such fucking assholes. You aren't any better than him, and frankly the way some of you behave makes the way Tommy acted when he was first in the show look like a fucking saint. Touch some grass.