#but is it weird i can kind of see that this style

[contamination-zone]

warning im a yapper

hello ummm just wanted to say!!! i really like the dynamic you give fresh and nightmare/color with the whole “cat who goes to different houses to get fed twice” thing. nightmare and his weird cat that he has probably locked in a basement a few times. color and this guy he picked off the road because he looks weird and decided he can solve this mess. fresh does not have any strong personal feelings towards either of them.

i very much so like the comic thing where nightmare and ccino were talking about fresh and ccino thought he was a kitten cat,,, no he is not but he acts like one. “he keeps crawling on my lap” that is a grown man get him away!!!! he has a dog cage i think that he is put in sometimes for naughty behavior. he doesn’t really care because he’s allowed his gameboy though. do you think nightmare ever sprays him with water when he does something bad. and this is like a grown adult. what

maybe i just like the trope of dehumanization (bonus if with someone who’s weirdly chill with it like fresh) but whatever,,, your art!!!! it gives me life!!! i very much enjoy the pixely type style and how freak you draw fresh. he’s a fucking creature he is. something is wrong with that guy. and i love him soooo much. so creature. he’s the kind of guy to do that thing where you walk on all fours up the stairs.

AND the way you characterize him is!!!! so good!!!!!!!!! he is so fucked up and weird and terrible and manipulative!!!!!!! he takes advantage of others’ empathy and feelings because he has very little of it himself and whenever he does feel it he does not like it!!!!!!! he looks at a guy with a savior complex and goes yeah i can mentally fuck him up for the next seven months to get something cool i want. he’s just actually terrible and i love him for that.

i also!!! don’t know too much about CB but i feel that fresh’s dynamic with them (him?? i forgor) is very interesting from what i have seen!!!!!! and their shimeji is very cute i still need to download it but i like it a lot :3

OKAY UHHH BYE!!!!! I LIKE UR ART A LOT…… HAVE A GOOD DAY!!!!!! 10/10 fresh posting on your blog love him a lot he is my wife (he feels nothing towards me)

THANK YOU!!! I see you mass reblog things sometimes it makes me giggle :-]

I yammer back...

Glad you like the dynamics haha X] Fresh having very little personal feelings about people is fun and interesting to me. As someone who has trouble connecting and low empathy, its nice to depict someone like me. [Guy interacting with people who are a Lot more invested than he is ghghg]

Fresh would only accept being put in the cage because he can teleport out. Anything like that is only for the Aesthetic, which I think Nightmare would still be down for. Shove that thang into some awful little crate, as a treat. [Honestly I think Fresh would like to get in some nice dog crate with a blankie. Small hide / den thing to nap in :-]]

ALSOOOO dehumanization and freak who doesn't mind is my favorite dynamic <333. Fresh doesn't mind because... he isn't a monster? or a human? And he doesn't have a human/monster centric view of the world. Being seen as a human/monster isn't in anyway important to him, because he doesn't seen it as better/worse. He is the way he is, why does it matter?

Its like, I don't think a cat has very strong opinions on the fact it isn't a man. I also think Fresh is incredibly self-centered and when he's on a high point, sees himself as above humans/monsters. Of course he's not seen as human, he's Fresh! he's a sick-nasty parasite! way cooler. [annnddd way cooler that he gets to eat dog-treats. heck yeah!!]

Also I drew up a little thing with CB and Fresh. Its ahh, I like them a lot I just get nervous speaking about them because its suuuch a oc & canon are besttties that it makes me feel a bit cringe... I also get nervous because CB and Fresh have a very, toxic?? friendship.

Fresh is very possessive and strange about it, because this is his Only friend and he has very dysregulated emotions. Not being able to feel positive emotions often makes it so when he does, he gets very odd about it. So its a lot of... trying to keep CB to himself, at the detriment to CB's goals and ambitions. [CB is trying to track his family down, and Fresh uh. knows. where they are. and is not telling him :-)]

I dunno I think Fresh being genuinely friends with someone but also an awful person about it is like, sorely missing from the fandom landscape. He's a bad person but bad people can still form meaningful relationships and!!! I think that should be explored :-]

[They do eventually get somewhere more healthy. As in, Fresh's whole Thing is revealed, a lot of shinanigans happen, CB lives with his family and Fresh and CB reconnect and become friends again, just with like. Fresh trying actively to do "good person things" to make sure CB's family doesn't shoo him off [I ADOREEE good actions for morally ambiguous reasons!!!], and CB with the understanding that his best friend is Kinda a Freak.]

[honourablejester]

Ah, I think I see what you mean. That the more controlled, level-of-difficulty based structure will sort of induce dungeon makers into making a ‘one true path’ through the dungeon, in an effort to make sure that any challenge a party faces is one they can handle, even if they’re trying to have more randomness.

Yeah. That makes sense. I can kind of see his argument for the tiered dungeon, in that it does kind of signpost to the party where dangers are, that the more down they go, the more dangerous it is, so that the party can make more informed decisions about the risks they want to take. It might feel unfair to a level 3 party on like the second level of the dungeon if they run face first into an adult black dragon and get TPKd because they weren’t expecting such a high CR so high in the dungeon.

However. In that case, if you meet an unexpected dragon on level 2 when you’re way too squishy to fight it, it just means that you have to not fight it. Choose to run away and take another path, or to try and talk to it, or to try and sneak past it instead. (And have the DM understand that those are valid options and to work with them, and reward them). I do also see your argument for a significantly less controlled and stratified dungeon as well, where combat isn’t the deciding factor of where you can go. Where it very much is your tools and your skills and your willingness to negotiate and your lateral thinking that lets you navigate a unique path through this environment.

There probably is a median ground, where there still is the overall downward trend of deeper = weirder and tougher, but the dungeon designer was conscious of making everything vastly interconnected and did also liberally sprinkle even the upper levels with little surprise areas of, say, a random black dragon lair. Heh.

I just. I really want to explore. I want a huge, vast environment that I just get to explore. Potentially endlessly. I want to find the petrified forest fourteen levels down and find the tomb of the sylvan youth an ancient wizard loved so much that she made an underground glade for him, and then four areas further on meet the ancient and badly scarred medusa that the wizard tried to murder in revenge for his death, only to realise that said medusa loved him too, and the reason the forest was petrified was to preserve it around his tomb. I want to find the gnome colony on level nine that is in dire straits because the drow colony from across the chasm has shattered their artificial sun because the light was paining them, and wind up potentially having to negotiate between them. I want to stumble across the goblin alchemist on level eleven who makes fire resistance potions and remember the passage way back up on level five that we couldn’t take at the time because of the massive lava trap, and have a knock down drag out fight with another player over whether we go all that way back up for nothing but curiosity when the damned haunted lake was supposed to be somewhere close to here, and we’re going to do that first. I want to find the entrance to the vast ancient necropolis full of treasures that we’ve been hearing rumours about for five levels, and see the symbol on the door, and realise that the goddamned black dragon on level two had the damned key in his hoard, we goddamn saw the bloody thing, and now if we want in here we gotta go all the way back up and have another talk with that sneaky sonnuva.

I want my character to bring a thick blank leather-bound journal with them, and six bottles of ink, and cartographers tools, and I want them to have been Journey-to-the-Centre-of-the-Earth style keeping a journal the whole way, and making maps, and I want my DM to reward me at some point with a bottle of endless ink as loot, or to have us run into a deep gnome herbalist who teaches me how to make ink from the weird phosphorescent fungi that grow in several of the tunnels down here. I want some faction down here to try and steal my book to gain insight into other levels of the dungeon, and a whole sidequest being our party trying to get it fucking back, I worked hard on that you assholes, go scout your own conquests and make your own damned maps!

The megadungeon that just exists, that is just there to explored, is such a deeply enchanting idea to me. The vast cyclopean structure from before any known civilisation that has been piecemeal invaded and inhabited and warred over by various factions and magic users and adventuring parties ever since, such that you could stumble across literally anything down here. And you and your group gather up your best equipment and survival spells and just … head down there. To see what’s there to be seen. No more goal than that. You’re just going to see what’s down there. Because you’re a bunch of incurably curious so-and-sos who are perfectly willing to die for the thrill of seeing something new.

Megadungeons are such a cool idea, but then they turn into nothing but meatgrinders for bragging rights, and I just want a game mode where the exploration is the point.

That last part wasn’t aimed at you, by the way. That was just me rambling about my ideal megadungeon experience. I do think you were making sense, also! Heh.

I’m watching a (3hr) discussion on megadungeons as a concept for modern d20 games on a youtube channel called Knights of Last Call, and I’m enjoying it a lot, because it does explore a couple of points that I’ve been very much looking for. Namely, the idea that megadungeons should be there to enable and reward exploration. Which means, among other things, there can’t be a time-pressure meta plot (you have to get to the bottom of the dungeon to stop the lich before he destroys the world), and that the game/DM needs to explicitly reward (with xp, magic items, etc) the act of exploration, not the act of killing things while exploring.

Because the thing I always found enchanting about the idea of massive dungeons and complexes was the idea of going in to see what’s down there. Not being forced in for a plot, but just … because I’m curious, and I want to see what’s there. And he discusses how modern d20 games like Pathfinder and 5e can actually be better for that than OSR-type games because characters are more powerful and sturdy and can survive doing that. You can explore, and (most likely) have a decent shot of surviving said exploration. You can take risks because you’ll survive a broader range of risks.

The thing with a megadungeon is that it’s there to be explored, and so to encourage, enable and reward exploration for people who want to play that kind of game in the first place, you have to a) not penalise taking risks and going exploring by making it instantly lethal to try and go anywhere, and b) actively reward going exploring by making it the main way your character gets more cool things, such as magic items and/or new abilities from levelling up.

(And, he’s less explicit about this, but also making the rewards self-contained to the dungeon, things you find and gain in the dungeon, and not things you’d have to bring outside the dungeon to benefit from. So cool items you can keep and use, experience to level up, knowledge that would allow you to access new areas, etc, not things like gold where you’d have to go back outside to spend it, or quests that you have to go to external parties to be rewarded for).

The discussion goes into some detail about potential ways to do this, and potential problems with various methods, but overall I just really like the tone of the discussion. Because that very much is a thing I’ve been looking for for a long, long time. A game that rewards the simple desire to go somewhere and see what’s there. I don’t want to explore a massive underground complex because there’s a bad guy down there and I need to stop him, I want to explore it because there’s rumours that there’s a vast underground sea down there where creatures that haven’t been seen in aeons are rumoured to still live (blame reading Journey to the Centre of the Earth as a kid), or to discover why there’s a massive dungeon down there and learn who built it, or just because it’s a big strange space and I just want to see what it looks like.

He does talk about how you make dungeons interesting enough to justify that, things like thematically-distinct areas (like the underground lake, or the weird sunless forest, or the ghoul town, etc) so that it’s not one endless slog of ‘10ft wide corridors and stone rooms’, and to make it interconnected so that the players have full choice of where they go and what risks they want to take (enabling them to skip ahead difficulty levels, or retreat if need be, or escape areas that they’re not enjoying). And to possibly put in some distinct … not end goals, but capstone events, like a boss monster very deep down, that might feel like an ‘ending’ if the party wants to ‘finish’ the dungeon. Not something that will ‘burst out and destroy the world’, but something contained to the dungeon that a party could triumph over if they want a ‘final challenge’ sort of feeling. But one that’s optional, a challenge they can take up if they want to, not a prerequisite for getting out of the dungeon or completing a large goal, but just a challenge that exists if they want to take it on.

Because, and I do agree, a lot of the problem with exploring in D&D is not necessarily that there’s no mechanical support for it, in terms of things like skills, etc, but because there’s no reward for it, and in terms of structured adventures, there’s often either narrative or mechanical punishment for it (running out of time on the baddie, or running into something too lethal for your party to handle with no option to nope out). A megadungeon as a concept is a cool environment where exploration is the whole point, and the only point, and if you take care not to put an external pressure on it (‘kill the lich or else’), then then party has time to poke around and decide what they want to see and what risks they want to take (or nope out of). Especially in something so big that there’s no real chance of finishing it, so there’s no ‘100% completion’ pressure, just a big buffet of options for people to pick and choose from.  

(There are so many things in 5e that would be excellent for an exploration game, especially in terms of spells and magic items, but because combat is so much the driving force of the standard mode of play, people are reluctant to ‘waste’ spells known/prepared and/or items attuned on things like Alarm or Water Walk or Purify Food & Drink or non-combat items like Candles of the Deep or Foldable Boats or Slippers of Spider Climbing when those slots could be used for combat spells/items instead. But if exploration gets you XP, and if you can nope out of combat as required because there’s no massive stakes/story riding on it, then you’ve got more room for these things).

There’s also an in-depth discussion on ‘game balance’ and CR, and why megadungeons might not necessarily require them, for the simple fact that everything in the dungeon is optional and not required to forward the story/plot, so you can try challenges way above your level if you’re feeling frisky that day, and just nope out and go a different way if it starts really not working for you. Which I feel is a fun point.

There is a point that this is a specific mode of play and not meant to be the point of the game in general. It’s specifically for people (like me) who want exploration as its own point and reward, without needing a quest or storyline attached, and for whom combat is an element/hazard/complication but not the point. But. If you are specifically doing a MEGADUNGEON, it’s an interesting look at things to consider and what people might want out of a massive self-contained dungeon that’s going to be the whole point of the campaign in and of itself.  

Where he loses me is when the discussion moves to how to prevent the '15 Minute Adventuring Day', where people go in, do a room or two, and then go back out to rest and heal and resupply, instead of staying in the dungeon to keep exploring. And for some reason allowing healing is bad for this? If you want them to stay in the dungeon, how is it bad to let them heal in the dungeon? Set up factions to trade with and potential base camp locations in the dungeon to let them heal and resupply and set up safe areas so that they can stay in there potentially infinitely? Though it’s possible that I missed something about his point there.

But yeah. I love the idea of megadungeons, vast areas to explore just because they’re there, and I love the idea of game modes with all the cool abilities and spells and powers of D&D BUT where the thing that’s rewarded is exploration and interacting with the environment rather than combat.

(There’s also … I think this also reminds me of the story arc vs episodic discussion regarding TV, where I genuinely like episodic series equally to story-line driven ones, and I think that in games it also works, where there’s a BIG SETTING and the point is to go out and have episodic adventures in it. A loose sandbox like a megadungeon where there’s no plot, you’re just exploring and seeing what you encounter day to day (and possibly developing plots as you interact with individual areas/factions and then connect them to other ones) is also an excellent way to play a game).

Anyway. Forgive the sidebar ramble.

[homestuckreplay]

I have dishonored my ancestors beyond comprehension with this frivolous accessory.

(page 1349-1358; LOWAS walkaround)

JOHN EGBERT IS BACK. HE’S HERE!!!! Damn it is good to see him. His goofy face and glasses and his cool green slime suit appearing on my screen at the start of Act 4 was such a pleasure and a delight. To be honest I would’ve loved a day or two between the end of the Intermission and the start of Act 4. I am so excited to see John again as well as getting a bunch of new land and lore to explore that it’s super hard to concentrate on both things. The end of the intermission is pretty huge too so one thing at a time.

End Intermission

Beneath the barcode scanner door to English’s vault is a bunker of the kind WV and PM have flown to Jade’s island, complete with a command terminal and some similar establishing shots. For sure this is the bunker that Slick (then the Scurrilous Straggler) hung out in when he first arrived in this wasteland, sending commands to a Sburb player who brought about the apocalypse on this pink and green planet. Slick had a similar city building instinct to WV and succeeded in building this town – it’s uncertain whether he used the bunker’s homing function, but that may be how he met up with the rest of the Midnight Crew and Snowman. The Felt’s species and origin remain unknown. For some reason, Lord English – who still has not been seen now the intermission has ended – wanted to cut off this communication. The terminal allows for communication through time (interesting, considering Slick’s distaste for time based powers) so possibly English was researching this as a way to enhance his or his gang’s own powers?

Slick’s command terminal has twelve windows, in place of WV’s four. On page 1355, we see a Creature of some description – a sprite in the same style as the kids, with pale gray skin, yellow eyes and horns, fangs, and a black shirt with a gray symbol. Behind them floats a pincered, crablike sprite(?). They have a gray cruxite dowel and two black captchalogue cards, and there are purple clouds in the window behind them in the same twelve-square pattern as the monitor.

Barring any major twists I think this is probably carcinoGeneticist, a troll Jade talked to on page 859. They write in gray text, with text color often matching cruxite and/or shirt symbol, and the ‘carcino-’ prefix can refer to either crabs or the astrological sign Cancer, which is their shirt symbol. That’s my star sign also so I’m pretty excited about this little guy, even if he sounded like a jackass while trolling Jade and looks really angry with those fangs.

It seems like Trollslum is another intermission in the Midnight Crew MS Paint Adventure that the beta kids are reading? And therefore possibly a future intermission for actual Homestuck? I’m not sure but these pages set up a fun parallel for carcinoGeneticist and John Egbert, in addition to the ‘weird scientist’ format of both their chumhandles. This intermission did a pretty good job of introducing the Felt and giving them distinct appearances and powers despite their large numbers, so I can imagine a future intermission doing this with twelve trolls, and I’m curious what type of genre the story would slip into for them.

ACT 4

We are dropped into Act 4 with no time to prepare; I have been asking for it, but when the moment came I was not prepared. John has passed through the First Gate, which has portaled him down to the Land of Wind and Shade (!), a planet (!!) ‘where the constellations dance beneath the clouds’ (p.885) (!!!) populated by yellow salamanders (!!!!) who have an extensive mail system (!!!!!) which we the reader get to walk around in and explore (!!!!!!). This mirrors ‘YOU THERE. BOY’ (p.253) where we also get to take over as John after he enters a new area of Sburb.

As previously established John Egbert has probably spent his whole life in western Washington, primarily the suburbs. We don’t know if his family even took vacations. This could be the first other place John has ever been, and it is mystical and magical, glowing blue mushrooms and trees (which look kind of like cruxite!!) surrounding him like some sort of bioluminescent cave video game level. After the day John’s had this place is kind of peaceful when he can find a quiet spot away from the imps. What an absolute dream come true to come to a land this beautiful and get to hang out with such cool, friendly locals. I’m personally delighted by all the visuals on this page, and I’m excited for John to keep exploring LOWAS just so I can see more of it.

John in this panel acts very confused and uncertain about his situation, relying on Nanna’s guidance a lot more than he did while in his house, and nervous around the salamanders (personally, I would be thrilled to meet a secret wizard and behold his robes). That’s definitely a John trait but we don’t get to see so much of his whimsy, stubbornness, problem solving, movie recreations, etc, probably because of the format, which makes me glad this is a single panel. I loved playing through this but wouldn’t want the whole story told in this format.

I’m very grateful for the map linked below the panel, to make sure I’ve explored every corner. I did not 100% Gate 1 because combat is fairly slow and not especially engaging, but the concept is super cool and the programming is impressive. Compared to a video game it feels clunky to play (I got trapped in an endless loop of ejecting and re-captchaloguing items in my sylladex), but as part of a webcomic it’s honestly radical. I feel like I’ve read enough other webcomics at this point to understand how far this is pushing beyond what other authors are doing, and how efficiently this is giving miles of exposition where other comics might take weeks to deliver all this lore (or a handful of wall-of-text comics that readers would complain about).

This panel is PACKED with exposition, from the long distance John and Nanna conversations, and the insights from salamanders. Just like ‘[S] Enter’, this feels like a way to move the story on as quickly as possible. Some of the expository lines do feel clunky, but when it’s paired with the cool visuals and presented in such a novel way, it doesn’t bother me, and I’m sure I’ll reference this page loads just like Nannasprite’s previous exposition. Here are some of the most important things we learn, in my opinion:

John is definitely the Heir of Breath. The Heir’s arrival has long been prophesized among LOWAS’ indigenous creatures; the ‘wind’ in the land’s name presumably links to the ‘breath’ in John’s title.

‘Amphibious and reptilian life forms play a special role in your quest, John.’ ‘Underlings’ (presumably imps, ogres, etc) will deface any frog iconography they come across.

‘The Slumbering One’, who was awake and is now asleep, once cast a spell on the land’s fireflies to trap them within the clouds, much like the trapped firefly WV already rescued from a nugget of amber (p.749).

‘The Slumbering One’ also ‘commissioned’ the underlings (hired them? had them created?) and caused some sort of environmental damage using ‘sludge’, which the salamanders are not happy about.

The mail system is an extremely important part of life on LOWAS to the point of being sacred.

The Second Gate is ‘hidden somewhere in the Land’, although it also might be visible above John’s house (p.251), so there could be multiple possible routes for progression(?)

Jaspersprite’s prototyping has affected the imps on John’s land, who have tentacle, princess and cat characteristics, as well as the imps Rose will fight.

Nannasprite knows that Rose has entered the Medium (and what she looks like).

And most important of all, one salamander essentially gives John a major game quest:

‘The spell I'm sure you've heard from a reliable source cannot be broken unless The Slumbering One is first woken up, and then slain. Then the Breeze will again flow through the Pipes and the Fireflies will be released and allowed to go home. But I do not envy the adventurers who will presumably take on this responsibility!’

Clicking John gives the command ‘I am told your name is John. Is that correct?’, which is closer to the Wayward Vagabond’s ‘BOY WHO IS JOHN. DO AS I SAY’ (p.253) than to the regular player’s ‘John: Action’ command format. So this could indicate that a different future construct is talking to John – possibly the Peregrine Mendicant, because this land is very focused on the mail.

And I LOVE the mail system; it might be my favorite thing about this land. I personally looked in a whole bunch of parcel pyxis, and found several rocks, a shoe, a couple of minitablets, a chunk of amber (firefly not included), a cool frog, and best of all, a jar of bugs. I will guard this jar of bugs with my whole life. The carved minitablets moving through the pipes as a system of trade is very fun worldbuilding.

I guess my one issue with this page is the writing of some of the salamanders. Conceptually they’re great, and I love how their distinct personalities and roles within the culture come through – some are really communicative, while others are unhelpful, some have jobs in the society like mushroom farming, some are entrepreneurial (I would sell my suit to a salamander for 1 Boondollar if it was allowed) and some are outcasts (Crumplehat dishonoring their ancestors). Genuinely I think Hussie did a great job quickly showing a diverse society and hinting at its power structures and politics, but they are SO annoyingly selfconscious about making a fantasy society and it kind of makes me want to punch them? Like I’m okay with some nods to the audience and medium but ‘'GLUB' can basically mean anything I want it to mean. It's really cool having a bullshit language’ and ‘Maybe elders or something like that. Man I don't know. Also, isn't it funny how I'm sort of taking your existence here in stride? I'm treating it like it's no big deal’ do cross a line for me. Like it or not, this isn’t an ironic salamander society for a one off gag, this is a legitimate salamander society that’s going to form an important part of the story. That story isn’t going to be everyone’s thing but being all desperate pick-me about it isn’t going to make people take this story seriously who otherwise wouldn’t.

Anyway to finish on a positive note, getting to look up through the telescope and see John’s house feels very jarring, but also very cool. To see the primary location of the first three acts from a totally different vantage point feels like a point of no return for the story, and maybe John as a character. Hey if things get bad enough down here this kid’s gonna WISH he was homestuck.

[cinnamon-flame]

Starting off the new year with I think the most background heavy piece I've ever made! I think Rainwings and Nightwings would celebrate their traditional holidays together after the events of The brightest night. So this drawing is meant to show their cultures kind of blending together during a very joyful time. I remember talking about this concept with someone on tumblr a year ago but when I went back through my posts I couldn't for the life of me find it - so if your reading this, I remember you and this drawing stems from that conversation so thank you!

Close-ups:

[wisteriasymphony]

have I ever talked about the dumb ghost hunting au. given how much i love gothic themes i feel like this was inevitable

[teletraantwo]

Ok so fair warning a lot of this idea is pretty vague. It was a smaller piece of something bigger and significantly more self indulgent so I didn’t exactly worry on HOW it would happen in a way that makes logical sense. (Also this got very long whoops)

But like, I’m sure in Earthspark Mandroid was not the only one feeling some kind of way about the Transformers. So I can see a company like KSI taking root with the opposite goal of Mandroid, instead of getting rid of all transformers finding out how to make NEW ones who will obey humans. Lofty goals of “protecting the world” with these machines. And for their crowning achievement they decide a bot based on Megatron is the best way to go. After all, he’s on their side now. And he’s already shown himself to be a killer, he’d be useful against whatever KSI deems to be a threat.

There’s a couple different ways I could maybe see them getting access to Megatron, possibly offering their services because if humans can learn more about Cybertronians, then maybe Wheeljack won’t have to be the entirety of their medical team. Megs maybe being put under to get a full scan of all his systems, because one idea I had was the humans needing an authentic power source for at least their primary bot and taking a part of his spark while he’s under, enough he absolutely notices but doesn’t do too much damage. Though he’s not sure that what it is and figures hes just feeling weird about trusting humans like that. Or he’s awake the whole time and KSI manage to make a fully sapient robot with no spark at all truly Bayverse-style. And perhaps something far darker is involved, I never really got that far.

But from the first time this copy, Galvatron, comes online something is wrong. He has his own goals. His own motives. And he’s more than willing to take control of the rest of the KSI drones to accomplish those.

Anyways imagine the Autobots waking up to a disaster on the news. A large chunk of a city in ruins. And the culprit? Megatron. But not Megatron. For one, he had been there with them the whole night. Also Megatron may be a a bit smoother in some areas and his chest curves in a way fitting for his alt mode, but he’s not that sleek. He’s still boxy in the way most all cybertronians are. This warped version of him seems to have had all the edges sanded down in a way that seems Wrong, but it’s undeniable just how much it looks like him.

Megatron having to watch this manmade copy of himself and his mindless drones absolutely destroy large areas. Coming towards them, slowly but surely. There’s only room for one of them. And Galvatron is built specifically to go up against Optimus and Megatron, of not something bigger and stronger. Megatron having to wonder if this ice cold fear in his spark is how bots and humans alike saw him for so long. Finally being on the other end of that brutality and it’s an approximation of his own face looking back.

Sorry this is so long I just really enjoy a character having to face down the worst possible version of themself and get brutalized by them.

The more I think of it, the idea of Megatron dying and being reborn as a manmade Galvatron is fascinating as Hell and I wish we could explore it more

[ghostofsnails]

so did you guys know theres this character called tristan vik disventure camp and

[jovialturtleface]

Oh! Hi ^_^

[caravanlurker]

shout out to that one time I watched the PRISMCorps Magical Girl lore video and the first few episodes of TGAMM in veeery close proximity. too much time on this xP loong ramble in the tags

[spotaus]

Boys, hold me to this one, I'm gonna make a Papyrus oc.

Not exactly a new idea, but I've been sleeping on Papyri since I joined this Fandom and I refuse to keep going. We (I) need more Papyruses with the dramatic Sans backstories without directly swapping a sans, and I shall provide at least One.

[nostalgia-tblr]

u know, once someone has pointed out the orientalism in most of fandom's depictions of jotun!loki you can never unsee it.

[venterry]

constantly reminded that majority of people will look at older animation/3d models and immediately deem it ugly & unwatchable while it doesnt even register to me. i'll see old 3d animations and just straight up accept thats how they look, it can even be charming to me idk it just ends up feeling stale in a way when everyone demands hyper realistic graphics & lifelike animations for everything. wheres the fun in everything being the same

[opens-up-4-nobody]

hypothetical struggle between Christianity and paganism in bbc merlin? 👀 one that's very neurodivergent? 👀 do tell

Okay, so Athurian times take place in the early dark ages. Which was probably a weird time for religion in Britain. Because the Roman occupation had just come to an end, leaving behind the structure of catholicism at least with those in positions of power. But religious beliefs were still in the process of blending together with the local practices and other religions, leading to some odd gnostic beliefs. Obviously, bbc merlin doesn't talk about Christianity within Camelot but I think we can assume the catholic church would have a position at the round table. Presumably, Arthur would grow up instructed in catholic belief, go to mass, and have bishops or whatever advising him. He would rule by Devine right, sanctioned by the pope and magic would be characterized as demonic. And that somehow raises the stakes for me, imaging magical merlin within the walls of a very catholic Camelot.

I just have this image of merlin in the back of a cathedral as Arthur attends mass. Kneeling in this beautiful building, head bowed low as the congregation sings praise to a foreign God in a foreign tongue. A God that would apparently have merlin tied to a stake and burned alive. And merlin choking out his empty prayers, echoing in the verbal praise under the isolation of his nonbelief and magical association. Full of fear and venom.

The hypothetical struggle I imagine is one of catholic enforcement pushed by Arthur's religious advisors and Arthur's morality. Because Arthur is a good person and slaughtering a people on the basis religion is insane. So, what does it mean for Arthur if he stops listening to his advisors and starts accepting magic? He has to contend with a spiritual struggle, not just the secular issues presented in the show. And I would looooooove to watch that. The bending of Arthur's beliefs into something more flexible and less rigidly Christian according to the church of the time

[violetren]

Fantasy High Junior Year is the first installment of D20 based in the world of Spyre in which I have known with the sudden and complete knowledge of who I'd like to play as a character in some kind of unreal scenario where I got to play in that playground. Literally the only thing that hasn't come to me has been the name.

Full character concept under the cut

She's a half elf and ideally in the unreal scenario of playing her in Spyre she'd be in her sophomore year getting shunted onto some pre-established party by Aguefort after her previous party got decimated during a school adventure that should have been freshman safe but just wasn't. Most of her old party is fully dead and unable or unwilling to come back, one might be comatose, and at least one other one just dropped out and the fact that they left while she stayed is almost a bigger strain on their friendship than the death of their friends but they aren't acknowledging that because neither of them wants to feel like they are being the unsupportive friend when they are all each other has left of their party.

In her original party she was the rogue and just barely settled into the mastermind subclass, always watching other peoples moods and figuring out what words would get them to behave in certain ways. This is all very forgone conclusion based on her particular flavour of edgy rogue backstory in which she had a pretty solid start to her childhood, with hard working parents and a cute younger sibling, until one day her parents died, but instead of the classic "oh the rogue became an urchin" she and her sibling were taken in by her grandfather, a man her parents had put concentrated effort into never letting near their kids. Grandad is The Deadbeat Dad twice over, mostly just neglecting them meaning she had to step up early to keep her sibling cared for, but making them both wish he'd ONLY neglect them whenever he came back home drunk and in debt and wanting to blame someone else about it. She spent a lot of time learning how to redirect his focus before he could blow up, and how to get the focus on her instead of her sibling when she couldn't prevent it from happening.

Starting her new year with a new party who weren't missing anyone but were instead just a small enough group that adding a new member just helped round out the paperwork, she is now also an oath of ancients paladin for Cassandra, goddess of doubt and mystery.

The unreal scenario ideally takes place after FHJY so like Ankarna has finally got through to Cassandra that "no babe, the cat wasn't just grumpy with people who weren't you, she was evil to everyone including you" and Cassandra is still like "but I love a grumpy cat."

My gal ended up on Cassandra's radar either in the immediate aftermath of the battle or while lying in a hospital bed a couple of days later just in full existential tailspin of "how could we have ever thought adventuring was fun? what kind of fucked up world lets kids put themselves in that kind of danger? why do so many people i love die, or leave? why is continuing to adventure still more feasible a life path than trying to find an adult that will actually help? how could anything about my life so far be called fair?" And Cassandra is the first authority figure type being who ever looks her in the eye and goes "hey, you're right its not fair, and I don't know how to help with all your problems, but I can maybe help with some of them, and will stay by your side for the ones I can't fix."

Ankarna is kinda there watching her wife work and seeing how angry my gal is at the world and is having kind of the same reaction as a straight laced suburbanite might have when they take their kid to get a puppy at the pet store and the kid instantly becomes obsessed with the snake on display. It's a very "Sweetie are you sure you want that one, it doesn't look very cuddly, why not one of the ones over here?" while Cassandra is like "but look at that cute widdle face." (the face is a jaded thousand yard glare). (Ankarna is clinging to her new dawn philosophy by her fucking fingers and trying not to be like, this brat is giving me Kalina vibes.)

As a paladin of doubt and mystery with a background roguish masterminding, my gal's new approach to socialising and adventuring (which is her primary mode of socialisation now) is an aggressively bitchy gaslight, gate-keep, girl-boss campaign that makes people think she's constantly trying to cast vicious mockery without ever having learned the spell. It's all mean girl "Oh, you actually thought that quip sounded cool?" while dealing with anyone she doesn't immediately see a reason to play nice with. Cause like she's gotta spread some doubt, no one said what kind. For her new party she's smart enough to reign it in but that mostly just means she keeps conversations as short and on rails as possible. In a very weird way she is like a hairs breath away from becoming a cleric of Ankarna just for like the "we keep moving forward" energy she pushes out, but girl doesn't have the level of introspection (wisdom) required for cleric hood.

However as bitchy as she has forged herself into becoming she is still a big sister first and foremost, so at home she just tries to model the same acceptance and stability she remembers from her parents for her sibling. You see hints of that whenever she interacts with anyone who is already earnestly feeling doubt, because for as worrisome as her general attitude is for Ankarna, she does actually get Cassandra's "you don't have to walk in the dark alone" message. That message saved her when she was at her lowest point, so she fully confuses the shit out of her new party whenever any of them are feeling vulnerable and she's genuinely compassionate and steadfast she is with them. Also in how her whole way of holding herself changes is they have to interact with someone younger than they are.

Also she definitely has some kind of amulet or talisman of some kind that connects her with her sibling so if her grandad comes home while she's off adventuring and presents a threat she can teleport immediately to her sibling and rock that old mans shit. Fuck him, she has smites now. Technically its for any situation in which her sibling feels unsafe but it was brought with grandad in mind and he's the only reason either sibling has ever thought it would be needed. She would absolutely leave the party hanging mid combat no hesitation and barely any warning if signalled whether they had gotten close enough for her to explain what the signal meant or not.

She doesn't really talk with Kristen that much (Kristen's first impression is also probably "oh no, are you the new cat") but she does sometimes text with Craig about all this new church stuff.

[maliro-t]

some game design thinky thoughts.

[relevant-url-incoming]

I think the funniest thing I ever did to Nalyan was put him in this outfit like.

Oh you don't like being around Jedi? and your excuse is that you don't care about or trust the Force and you think Jedi are so stupid and you dislike their aesthetics and insert another petty grumpy argument here? what the fuck are you wearing buddy because that looks suspiciously like half the clothes that got dropped on my consular. you've got a dopey little ponytail that's totally not a little piece of eight-year-old you still desperately hoping to become someone's padawan and your formal outfit is just bootleg jedi clothes. it's funny because if i don't laugh at it i feel really really sad for him. my guy. you need so much therapy for all the shit i put you through.

anyway he will wear this and tell people with a straight face that he's never spoken to a single jedi in his life. these people include risha and corso, who were in fact there the last time he talked to a jedi, and guss, who takes this as an insult and not nalyan being a fucking weirdo (because if anyone other than guss asks nalyan is the first to say he should totally count as a jedi. only if guss isn't there though). this man has Problems.