#both these scenarios are contentious at best so idk

[trashcanwithsprinkles]

I just realized…

if Zhongli is dead then who will rescue Xiao from the Chasm😱??!???

… and reseal Azhdaha and whatever else he does in his story quests bUT MORE IMPORTANTLY WHAT ABOUT XIAO?!?!!

good question! if i had to try and think of how the game's plot would play out if zhongli gets functionally offscreen'd at the start of the liyue arc, then i think having rex lapis actually die for real and be gone for good (like not even his spirit is left) would significantly alter the way the adepti behave

this could of course mean xiao just dies in the chasm, but we can also try to think of it as like- xiao knows that with rex lapis gone, he's truly the last one fighting the abyssal miasma. there's nobody to save his ass if anything happens, he quite literally cannot afford to take risks. i'm not saying he was banking on zhongli saving him in-game (i think we can all agree he wasn't); but i still think he like- on a subconscious level, knew that rex lapis was out there somewhere. and that with rex lapis out there somewhere, somehow, he would be fine, even if 'fine' meant passing away peacefully instead of like. idk. lingering as a resentful spirit or smth. especially since he did give zhongli a heads up that he was going to the chasm. like xiao knew zhongli knew. but if rex lapis is dead? i feel like that would change things. since we don't know how the gang would've ever actually managed to get out of the chasm if it hadn't been for xiao's (near) sacrifice, we don't know that it would've been possible otherwise. but since i do like my happy endings, we could have the traveler actually contribute in that scene and like. funnel energy into xiao. like you cannot tell me the traveler doesn't have a decent amount of energy that they could give xiao. or yanfei for that matter. or itto but like- he's out cold so idk. they were so close to getting out, too. a little extra energy kick from the traveler should've done the trick.

basically what i'm saying is that, on the xiao front at least, i could see how we could spin it so that xiao doesn't fucking die as soon as he's left without parental supervision for like five minutes.

azhdaha i'm not as sure. if the adepti's dynamics are all changed after rex lapis' death, i think we could make a possible argument for the hermits to like. notice something is up. if the traveler never meets zhongli, then maybe they wouldn't bring anyone to the expedition, or maybe they bring someone else? maybe one of the adepti? not saying a single one of the adepti should be able to reseal azhdaha, but again, since rex lapis is gone, i think they would step up and band together to deal with stuff as it comes up. i think all the adepti together + the traveler should be able to reseal azhdaha. i think. he coulnd't have regained all that much strenght if gnosis-less zhongli was able to (seemingly) easily seal him again

[katnissmellarkkk]

What would have happened if

1. Katniss didn't volunteer for Prim, so Prim and Peeta compete in 74th Games.

2. Gale and Katniss compete.

3. Katniss and Peeta's brother compete. Before, he volunteered for Peeta.

The Questions :

A.What strategy would Haymitch made for District 12?

B.What would Katniss do to them? Would she become an ally with those 2 boys?

C.Who would be the winner in the end?

Thank you so much :)

@curiousnonny

1. Cato would have won lololol unless Peeta made it his mission to save Prim for Katniss and still used his crush on Katniss to try and bring Prim home but that’s less compelling and wouldn’t have probably worked out

2. They would have probably butt heads or Gale would have refused to play the Capitol’s games and with Katniss still determined to get back home to Prim, I feel like Gale wouldn’t have been much benefit to her. Not with Cato and the other Careers. And even though Gale is canonically really hot, the Sponsors would have had Thresh and Cato who are bigger but exude the same “back off” attitude and so therefore Gale probably would have died earlier on in the games. Because he wouldn’t have joined the Careers or tried to play at some strategy. Gale was, at the point of the first book, too straightforward with how to deal with the Capitol, and would have probably gotten a target on his back with the other tributes and been the one they hunted down. So best case scenario, imo, Gale would have gotten killed early on and left Katniss alone in the arena. Or worst case, he would have gotten a target on Katniss’ back too. And this isn’t taking into account little Rue, who Gale probably would have had some conflict with allying with because he’s not a monster she’s a little kid he probably would have been angry she was even there but also wouldn’t have wanted Katniss to partner with her because it weakened their chances of survival and so therefore Gale probably would have gotten angry about Rue’s presence and done some small act of rebellion towards the Capitol and gotten himself killed by the Gamemakers if the tributes hadn’t done the job yet. And then maybe Katniss would have also been a target of the Gamemakers too? All in all, it would have been a very bad idea to have them both in the first arena.

3. I feel like there would have been so little contact with Katniss and Brother Mellark. Maybe she would have acknowledged what his little brother did for her years ago and tried to help Brother Mellark to pay Peeta back? Or maybe she would have just internalized it and felt even more guilty and then, after she won all by herself, gone to Peeta and apologized to him for not helping his big brother more and maybe thanked him for throwing her that bread years ago? And maybe that would have been their “this would have happened anyway” story? Well anyways I digress.

A. Haymitch’s strategy with Peeta and Prim probably would have been just straight up strength for Peeta and for little Prim… maybe sympathy? Idk, Suzanne said Haymitch waited for a tribute like Katniss all those years he was a mentor so maybe he would have sighed and said he’d try next year with different tributes and drank away his guilt and self-hate. His strategy with Katniss and Gale would have been to have them use their hunting, probably try to get them to fake a romance but with Gale not willing to play the Capitol’s games and also not wanting to perform for the Capitol’s audience, then I doubt it would have worked out well for them. So in the end Haymitch would have probably hated Gale more than he disliked Katniss at first and Gale and him would have had a contentious relationship which would have deflected also onto Katniss and Haymitch’s relationship too. Disaster on all sides. And then idk I feel like Haymitch might have used Peeta’s brother’s wrestling and strength the same way he used Peeta’s but somehow it probably wouldn’t have worked out the same way. Katniss wouldn’t have had the same connection with Peeta’s big brother or his brother wouldn’t have liked Katniss because she was too standoffish or from the Seam. And therefore it would have made it impossible for Haymitch to make them into a team. And then Haymitch probably would have just chosen Katniss alone and left Brother Mellark to do his own thing/just use his strength alone with no ploy to play up the sponsors.

B. She definitely would have allied with Gale obviously but as I said above, I’m doubtful it would have ended as well as it did with Peeta. And I doubt she would have allied with Brother Mellark unless it was out of convenience like Maysilee and Haymitch.

C. Either Katniss would have won alone or Cato would have. I can’t see Gale and her partnership starting a revolution or bringing them both home. And I definitely cannot even see Brother Mellark and Katniss making their alliance last to the end of the games lololol.

[parachutingkitten]

Just out of curiosity, if you were given the opportunity to write a Pixal season; what would you do?

Thing is... there's so many options (which is part of what makes the tommy tweet so stupid to me)

Not to mention deciding where it falls in the timeline. But, I'll give you a couple pitches.

A Pixal season might be an opportunity to essentially make a season of nindroid-go. As I've mentioned in the past, pixal has 15 predecessors who were all malfunctional and abandoned. They could make for great villains. Alternatively, a villain idea I was gonna use for my next gen story, zombie robots. The nindroid army was never really properly collected and disposed of, and something reactivates what's left of them. Anyway, use this as an excuse to bring in a redeemable Cryptor, find echo on the island, spend more time with Borg, throw Mr. E in there for kicks. Idk. And everyone has to pool their resources to defeat whatever army we're dealing with. We get another classic borg tower finale. It'd be fun. Anyway, character development wise, Pixal would be dealing with self image, and identity issues- what even is she? Her samurai X identity is stolen from nya, she lived inside of Zane for years, in fact his heart may be the only reason she has free will- plus if the villain looks like her, that's a major mind freak. Anyway, the big message of the season would center on her getting back to her roots and connecting with her original family, namely Borg, and Cryptor, and learning to be herself!

This second pitch was my wish fulfillment seabound follow up, although you could take the themes from this one and place them in a different plot. This would focus much more on Pixal's relationship to the team and kind of confront the weird side character limbo she's been in head on. Some time after Nya's sacrifice, The water element finds a new master in Pixal. Pixal feels weird about this, again because this is the second time she's taken on a piece of Nya's legacy. The team understandably feels weird about this, but it's not really her fault. She doesn't want the element, but she feels a responsibility to use it- just like she did with samurai x. I imagine there's a lot of tension between her and Kai. There's a whole scene where the team is discussing if Pixal should join the team, and pix walks in and has to be like "I'm sorry, was I not on the team before? Because last time I checked this team would not be functioning without me." She starts to question whether the team is even worth it anymore, maybe she just storms off at one point. Anyway, lots of team building through tension, everyone grows closer, kai and pix especially. Nya is the main obstacle of the season. The whole climax comes down to Pixal somehow turning her human again with the new power. It's a moment where everyone's ready to abort and then Pixal gets an idea and she's like "I can get nya back, just trust me" and Kai looks her in the eye and is like... "Yeah, I trust you." - cuz you know character development. And so we get Nya back, the water element reverts back to its proper owner, and Pixal goes back to being samurai x. (btw this one would solve Tommy's requirement of the focus character being a ninja, cuz pixal would be the temporary water ninja, wear a gi, all that) This one also doesn't even have to be a wholly pixal focus season. It can be a season 5 scenario in which Pixal's water ninja thing is just a sizable side plot accompanied by the climax.

Lastly, you could have the pixal season be a girl power season- this could potentially follow up crystalized from what we know now. It would primarily focus on Nya and Pixal's relationship, which would grow from being mildly contentious, to really contentious, to insanely in sync best friends. Obviously, the point of contention is samurai x. They both feel entitled to it, and kind of resent the other taking ownership over it. But they get forced to work together over the course of the season. They get to know all the pain the other has been through in their journey to be included on the team. You can get a bunch of fun cameos and side roles from other female characters. Basically, all the themes of my samurai swap au I have yet to update. This could also just be a heavy side plot if you wanted.

Anyway, those are a few ideas.

[sou-ver-2-0]

Hello 💜 I might have been spamming you a bit with the likes but I really do enjoy your meta💜 I also wanted to mention that I really do like the way Reko says she wants to reach out to Shin if you go Reko/Sou route? Gin and Reko being worried about him (w/ Gin likely feeling guilt for having voted for Kanna) was pretty sweet, especially with him treating Gin nicely in general and Reko having tried to get him open up early into 2-2 Main Game too? I don't think that route will end well but (p1)

(p2) I would honestly dig Reko and Shin being on friendly terms if the cast made out, especially with how Alice/Kanna route has Alice ending up being a big bro protector figure to Kanna, while Reko the only adult Shin has yet to be betrayed by that's alive and had the sense to vote for him than Kanna is the younger sister who plays big sis to a good deal of the cast. It's just an interesting thing actually, that how dysfunctional Reko/Sou route vs Alice/Kanna is?

(p3) With former, there is still some awkwardness compared to Reko/Kanna with Reko having already taken a big sisterly role with her, but Alice is more than willing to look out for this child, while with Reko/Sou you can see that Reko genuinely feels bad for him and wants to amend things, yet Kanna's death really was the last straw for Shin that at best she is going to get Shin not looking out for chances to actively harm her (or Gin) while they might be collateral damage anyway.

Part idk bc I forgot to mention: I like how his "I-I wouldn't leave you behind..." to Gin right after they visit Gashu's secret room sounds like he is hurt that he would think he would leave a primary schooler back if he found an escape path too, especially with him in ch 1 saying Gin should rest with him and Kanna and likely having planned to look out for him too, if Gin wouldn't have said he gives him weird vibes and stuck to Sara. And offers him snacks to leave him work in Nao's room gfkfg

Okay I swear last part but I forgot to mention that I also like that Gin says he hates loner but doesn't want him to die/says he feels sorry for him for smelling gloomy and he is actually one of the members who while saying he hates him in 2-2 Main Game, he also does get worried for the "outsider" types, saying he is worried they might not get enough clear chips? That said wow bullied by a primary schooler rip Shin

Hello there! I really enjoy your meta too! 💜

I absolutely love this ask. You wrote so much, so I wish I could think of interesting things to say, but all I want to say is “I love Shin’s relationships with Gin and Reko too!! I love them so much!!”

I suppose, in a way, Gin and Reko act as a barometer for how a “normal, decent person” would react to Shin. They are suspicious of him and sympathetic towards him at all the right moments in the narrative. They are neither as cynical as Keiji nor as optimistic as Kanna. But they are hilarious and I love that for them!

Like, you just mentioned all these genuinely sweet moments for them. But if I can pull up some contentious memories:

REKO: I'm gonna take that bastard out, I swear...!!

GIN: I bet he's just hiding under the bed in his room or something, woof!!

REKO: Perfect spot for a treacherous ass like him! Let's check it out!

This comes from the beginning of Chapter 2 when the whole team is on a witch hunt for Shin, and I just! I love how eager and aggressive they are in their pursuit of justice, oh my god haha. I love how well they both team up against him. It’s such fantastic dark humor.

Then I love how you can tell from Nankidai’s writing that Reko aggressively shakes Shin when they finally find him!

KANNA: What in the world happened?

SOU: Eh...? / T... That's what I wanna know... / Where is this place... When did I get here...?

REKO: Cram it, you bastard...! Like hell anybody's gonna worry about you now! / What're you plotting?! Tell me!

SOU: W... Waugh?! Hold on...!

KEIJI: Now, now. Violence isn't the answer, Reko.

REKO: Tch...!!

SOU: W... What is it...? You're so mean suddenly...

Featuring a bonus obnoxious “Now now” from Keiji, LMAO get a load of this filthy hypocrite.

I just love to imagine Reko grabbing Shin by the scarf and shaking him! Nankidai blesses us with the wackiest scenarios.

Also remember when Gin wanted to scribble on Shin’s doll??

GIN: Let’s scribble on the loner’s doll, meow!

SARA: Gin…

CHOICE: Don’t get us caught

SARA: Safalin will find out. Don’t touch them.

GIN: Meow! You’ll live to see another day, loner!

And they always call him “Beanie Man” and “Loner” instead of his name… They crack me up so much!! I could go on and on about them!

Anyway, the only reason I bring up these contentious moments is to highlight how sweet it is that they don’t actually hate Shin at all. As you pointed out, they end up sympathizing a lot with him! If Shin was just being his regular vulnerable self, they would probably be protective of him. (And just a little bit teasing!) I think that speaks very well for both Reko and Gin. It shows what genuine good souls they are.

I also love that you pointed to examples of Shin being protective of Gin! It’s lovely to imagine that if Shin hadn’t taken on the Sou persona, we could have seen more “big brother Shin” moments like that! Personally, I’m very fond of imagining Shin as a good big brother figure towards all three children in the Simulations. I want to think, in his true heart, Shin is someone who couldn’t stand to see the children die before him.

That makes it all the more tragic if they end up becoming collateral damage for Shin’s revenge. :(

I also love to imagine that they could become friends if Shin lived, and if things worked out just a little bit better. I don’t believe Shin actively hates them. Reko voted for him, and he would just hate Sara more for “tricking” Gin into helping to murder Kanna. I don’t know if Shin…wants to live anymore…in the route where Kanna dies… But if they managed to escape, I think Reko and Gin would both worry a lot about him! And they would want to help him. I’m certain!

Thanks for sharing your thoughts with me. I’m a huge, huge fan of the loner’s relationships with the rock star and the furry kid. Seeing fan art or fanfiction of them being actual friends gets straight to my heart.

[survivor-kuwait]

Episode 10 - “I wanna merge” - Thomas

alright just a recap of the round since i was at work all day! i was suuuuper excited that despite being in the warzone i was there with owen and matt my main boiz. also now people don't need to go bitching that i haven't been there yet anymore xoxo bite me cullan u bitch. apparently right when we got to the warzone tommy threw out adrian's name to trace bc he's still pressed about him calling him inactive during the round that nehe left which i mean eyeroll but ok. so as soon as i heard this i told matt, which probably was a mistake on my part but oh well. at that point i still was wanting to go through with what matt had wanted which was an alliance with us, adrian, and maynor. matt tells me last night though that adrian apparently initially brought up wanting to vote myself or owen due to challenge prowess, and i'm assuming the fact that we're winners as well. again, eyeroll. i brush it off and am like well let's sleep on it and see where we're at in the morning. so i tell owen all of this as well and make him promise me not to leak bc this could've potentially been a big round for us depending on what we wanted to do. he agreed with me that adrian even suggesting our names in passing wasn't a cute look and i didn't really wanna stand for that. we talked about it in pms and then again in the paradise hotel chat and it was odd bc then traces' information and actions were always seemingly right behind us. i'm fairly certain matt was leaking all of it to him but ok. i mean i hope he wasn't, but we'll see. trace and adrian got close real fast if they weren't already so that was kind of another point that i was trying to drive home with matt. good ol' matt kept mentioning yk that me and owen are his main people and that he doesn't care if adrian goes and at that point it just felt like ok well put your money where your mouth is. so we push for that and come to the conclusion that we really just need us, tommy and chloe obvs bc she's not gonna vote herself. the group decides to leave trace out of it after i bring up how trace apparently has all of the tea so maybe it wasn't getting leaked to him afterall??? idk shrug. i did let stephen know what was going on a little before tribal, i probably should've confirmed with him earlier but i wasn't sure how much he was willing to trust me with kind of right away like that. everything goes right as planned and adrian leaves 6-2??? happy to be back and out of the warzone, but i miss matt and owen already, but corey is back with me now!!! oh that reminds me apparently matt is wary of both ian and corey so i gotta keep an eye on that moving forwards and plan accordingly. ummmm also trace messaged me and was like hey so what happened?? i decided to tell him that i legit must've misunderstood messages from someone and that he was back to voting adrian. idk i just played dumb so i hope he bought it. he was like yeah as long as it was miscommunication and not me getting fucked over it's cool sdjgksdlg like what am i supposed to say to that.... yes i was trying to fuck u over u right.... got me!! 

Genuinely surprised Chloe survived after being a target for so long, makes me suspicious there might be another alliance out there, because most people told me Adrian, they might not trust me yet, hopefully voting with them helped me there.

If I’m being truly honest. This challenge is so weird that i dont think imma be able to like do iy. Might be a warzone trip for me this round and it sucks because I dont want to go. Like Adrian was someone i could have worked with but he left 6-2 and I hope it wasnt Matt who voted Cloe.

---

I got the first one in 6 clicks. I hope im able to get the rest pretty quickly but i dont know if i move from kuwait or i start from survivor again.

Part 1. I have emotional motion sickness. Somebody pls roll the windows down. I'm scared to lose Matt or Owen at this tribal. I don't see it happening but it still worries me. Ideally, Thomas leaves. Kait or Stephen leaving aren't the worst case scenarios either. Realistically, I predict Trace or Stephen. Trace.... pls survive. I'll send this confessional in two parts. Will be writing the second part later tonight. Part 2. Well. Adrian left. this is bad for my game. Is it worst case scenario? no. But Trace didn't vote him out; Matt did. Matt betrayed Adrian and Kait basically told me so. I cannot trust Matt as much as I thought I could; but maybe his allegiance is to Owen primarily as Matt sold Adrian out bc Adrian wanted to target Kait/Owen. It's hectic but Adrian was a number for my game, personally. I'll do my espionnage and try to keep tabs on what everyone is thinking. Oh, and attempt to win immunity again!

Well, last night's war zone did NOT go as I expected. I really thought that everyone was on board to vote Chloe, but I was clearly mistaken. The tribal left me a little confused, and genuinely nervous about what my fate would be if I were to return to the war zone in the near future. There are a few things that I did learn from this war zone, however. I really think that matt is kind of calling the shots over there. He seemed to be the sneakiest one, and was the one lie that kind of hurt the most. Kait claims that she thought I knew the vote was Adrian, and that is was a mistake on her part. I don't fucking buy it. Kait is clearly close with Thomas (she literally calls him Tommy), but decided that they couldn't trust me enough to tell me in the end the vote wasn't chloe. I did not appreciate that. I hate being in war zones where people who are inactive get to stay because somehow, someone figured out how to goat them to the end. I am going to do my best to stay out of the war zone this round, but this challenge is confusing so I have no idea if I even have a chance.

Im really nervous for this immunity. I hope i had a quick clicks. If not I hope im with people i can work with and not be voted out. Im anticipating a merge soon but how it works idk.

http://prntscr.com/nu7q5f what kind of false scorpio antics.......... 

Me? Safe again? Hskshdjd who woulda THOUGHT!!! I’m glad madison is finally safe I feel like the more she goes the more time she has to make connections lmao. I know she rlly wanted to be safe this time for some reason but part of me thought she had been throwing tbh so she could actually play the game which isn’t a bad strategy. I feel really bad for matt going again :( but I think he will be okay. Here’s hoping they send Stephen out please and ty!!!! In other news I still think I’ve never talked to Ian or corey which is funny af because corey could be my number one in this game. I feel like he will be loyal to me once we make it together.... I rlly just hope him and Kait don’t clash, but I’m scared af because Matt was sus about corey getting renee out and I haven’t gotten to tell corey that yet. Hopefully when the time comes I can get corey and Kait to work together and the three of us can go to the end somehow. I’m not gonna turn on Kait. I can’t turn on corey. It’s gonna be messed up if they ever start to target each other bc Kait doesn’t know I’m close with him but he knows I’m close with her nnnn

Kait thinks I'm targeting pairs, huh? Well, yes but actually no. I'm targeting pairs in the since that members of those pairs are people I don't think would work with me, I'm not targeting them for being pairs. I've got a pair in Leo I want to work with, also MY SIGN PARTNER IS STILL IN THE GAME, albeit barely. It has become abuntly clear to me that Matt does not have over lapping interests with me in this game. The man is out there spreading propaganda against me to Kait and Owen, who has never met me might I add so he sees me exactly as I see him. A threat. Kait, I thought you were warming up to me, but please keep thinking Corey is who you should confide in, he's totally not closer to me or anything.

This Warzone is really stressing me out. I don’t think I have the same allies I’m usually confident with. There’s Devon and Trace and Maynor and Chloe but I only can trust them so much because none of them are working together. I’m hoping to get out timmy or Stephen who I don’t know and don’t trust but I also know that my name certainly could be coming up soon enough because with each tribal I survive I become a bigger and bigger threat. I’m ready for some idol shenanigans if need be but I’d love to save that shit for down the road.

The names being thrown out right now are Cloe, Timmy, and Stephen. I much rather have Timmy stay because we are actually working together in this game rather than against. Stephen even tho we dont talk much there is still that connection through his game he hosted and one we played together. Getting majority on Cloe will be great because she wont get dragged to the f3 and take a spot that could be mine.

This warzone feels different. It’s an odd group and a lot of people who haven’t been together. So it’s somewhat quiet but also contentious since anything could happen at this point. Not sure how tonight will play our, should be fun....

So the vote seems to be Chloe, yet she always gets votes and it’s never her so naturally I’m weary. I think this will be the time though, especially with who is at this tribal. Trace was saying Devon had said Stephen, which I don’t want him going because he would be a good number for me. Trace also said that Matt said my name but I think he’s now on the Chloe train...I’m hoping. Either way I doubt he would have majority. I’m hoping I stay because it’s about to be merge and I think I’ve been doing well so far. I’m proud of how social I have been with people, it’s not the best, but it’s a lot better than I usually am.

It looks like the vote is locked on Cloe but still very awkwardly quiet. I hope nothing crazy goes down. *knocks on wood*

Don’t mind me just dying and having no idea what’s going on at all hahaha probs gonna be voted out next xoxox 

This better be the last Warzone, I wanna merge.

So, with little debate, I think we settled on voting Chloe. Originally, Devon and Matt wanted to vote Stephen, but I had to convince them onto Chloe because I want to make sure we have more people on our tribe than theirs so that I have a chance of winning immunity. Matt told me he heard Timmy's name which is weird. I think he was just trying to scare me. I told Timmy about it, and Timmy was upset, but I really don't think it went anywhere. Chloe came to me and told me that she would vote anyone as long as it wasn't her. I really don't trust Matt even though he keeps telling me that I can trust him, so idk. Maybe I'll flip the script at the last minute and try to get everyone Matt at the last minute, but we shall have to see if that's smart for me... idk