#but I actually might die because of what he implements

[reesiereads]

Anyone who voted for him, I hope one day you break out of your brainwashing enough to understand just how much you’ve failed all of us and I hope the weight of that fucking breaks you.

[literalgrill]

Do NOT Support Hard Drive On Patreon

You might see friends today suggesting you support Hard Drive on Patreon today. You know, the funny video games version of The Onion? As a journalist, I will firmly tell you DO NOT GIVE THEM A DIME.

The CEO has pushed out all former staff that have built the site up to its current greatness and has been pushing the use of AI. The staff begged to have a Patreon before basically all being pushed out, but the idea was refused until now, when it will only line the pockets of a single person instead of hard working writers.

I know they might have provided laughs before, but Hard Drive is a shell of what it was once. Let it die and support the people who actually made those moments of joy possible. Don't believe me? Check out what former employees are saying below:

Kevin Podas: Okay you know what, I would feel bad saying nothing about this, so here goes:🚨SAVE YOUR MONEY🚨

We passionately advocated for a Patreon at Hard Drive & were aggressively shot down. The talent & people who built the site were pushed out. To see this now is beyond upsetting. For the past few years or so I put a lot of myself into this website. I pitched a ton of jokes, got over 120 articles published, & met a lot of great people. I'm sure if you've been following me for some time you could easily see this.

However, there is a lot of misinformation. I was eventually promoted to Managing Editor of the site & was ecstatic. Grateful for the opportunity. Felt like all of my hard work in the comedy mines was finally paying off. But things took a turn for the worst, & each day there were new surprises that affected our livelihoods. These were all very avoidable surprises, mind you.

A patreon was going to be our hail mary, but alas, for some reason, the power that be did not want it. Causing us to leave a dream job behind. "At least we did all we could," we consoled ourselves afterwards. I put a lot of myself into this project. I pitched all sorts of ideas that could have helped-- we all did. Merch collaborations, Patreon-integrated YouTube content, so much more. And most of them were shot down out of sheer stubbornness and nothing more. To see lie after lie spread, and multiple big publications and YouTubers that I am a fan of promote this Patreon under these pretenses is incredibly upsetting. There are so many receipts.

Please share this and consider pulling out if you've already put money into this. On Hard Drive using AI, also from Kevin Podas: I can't personally confirm that part aside from some of the recent header images for articles on both Hard Drive and Hard Times are being made with AI. As far as writing, it's been mentioned in the past, but I personally do not know. Maybe others do, maybe not. MORE From Kevin Podas suggesting the owner denying a Patreon being set up earlier cost an artist a job that was replaced by AI: We had a social media person who was awesome! He made the images until this AI implementation. He had to leave because ad revenue was low and a Patreon was aggressively refused.

Luca Fisher: at the risk of burning some bridges, i have to back up kevin here. i've only been part-time, in-and-out of hard drive since i got in last year, but i can corroborate that management doubled and tripled down about not hosting a patreon/crowdfunding and that many other suggestions and ideas, including mine (and ones much smarter than mine!), were shot down in really long, apocalyptic threads of everyone left on deck desperately trying to come up with ways to keep the lights on. managerially it has been messy and sad

i've written for multiple publications that have long since died, ones that were in the process of dying, and ones that, in this case, are soon to be put in the ground. it is sad and sucks every time. i don't know what could have been done differently, but i do know that a lot of great writers and content creators were left shorthanded and unhappy by the way things have gone. and it is sort of puzzling to see the sudden championing of patreon after we were all told plenty of times that it couldn't work and we should move on also, just to add my own personal two cents here, i was really disappointed by the shuttering of many different article sections on the site over the past 6-8 months. i understand cutting corners in a deficit, and i know it had to be done. that said…

all in all, i'm really sad to see this all happen. i don't fault anyone, if only because i don't really know enough about how this all can happen to make sense of it. games journalism is in a sad, sorry state, and will likely no longer be a thing in the next decade

VideoSealMan: I'm gonna say this because I think I deserve to. For months, MONTHS on end I was bugging Hard Drive management about a Patreon. Often I got ignored for a week+, but when I actually got a response I was encouraged to - of all things, write up a Google Doc pitching the concept I did it regardless. I wasn't the only one trying to sway management on a Patreon, but so fiercely was I fighting for it that last night, I was accused of making this comment directly by the CEO! With no evidence whatsoever! After I'd been gone for over a month.

I vouched so hard for Patreon because I wanted all the writers and creatives working with Hard Drive including myself to get paid better. When I actually got a response, the idea was often shut down. Eventually due to the state of my company, my pay was cut for a second time I confronted management alongside a couple other important figureheads at the org and told them that if we couldn't do a Patreon - I could no longer financially justify staying there. The answer was still no, so I left. Baffled at the decision, but whatever.

It is unendingly frustrating to know that myself and many other people who put their soul into Hard Drive LEFT because of management's absolute refusal to compromise on a Patreon, to then see them launch one anyway a month later and get over 1000 people pledging money. I'm seeing a lot of things float around about greed and people being fired. No one was fired. Everyone who left, left because they were sick of management's decision-making. And honestly, management is a lot of things but I would not call them greedy. (From my experience.) They did genuinely make an effort to pay people as much as possible. I found the pay very fair for a while. I am not disputing that I was paid what I was owed - yet management frequently feels the need to remind critics of that. Lmao, yes. I was paid what I was owed. No one is disputing payment. You did the bare minimum a business owner should do and paid everyone their due, very well done. I make no allegations of greed, cheating or foul play. I make allegations of poor management and incompetence that has fucked over other people.

Basically the only people left at Hard Drive have been there for about 2 months. They will reap the rewards of this successful Patreon I and so many others passionately fought for for so long. We will not see a dime.

I do not know the new people at Hard Drive, But I feel bad for them. They were haphazardly thrust into Hard Drive's workplace with little to no explanation on how anything works, or given any context on the state of the place. Even now managements feeds them half-truths and misinformation about other people's grievances. I am broke and have been for a while. I had to move out of my flat in Reading and back with my family because of how little money I was making. This has basically doomed my flatmate to moving back in with abusive parents, which is something I feel guilty about every day. If we had gone with the Patreon I worked myself hoarse over back then, this could have been avoided. Some of my other good pals could also not have been fucked over.

It was a bad judgment call, but it's not a crime. It's just management getting it wrong.

So should you give to the Hard Drive Patreon? I don't know! I don't think any of the new people working there to patch up the holes left by the recent mass exodus have any bad intentions. Maybe they deserve it! But it is not the same site you knew a year ago, or even a month ago. Myself and many people who were there far longer than me and did far more for it than I did are all gone now because we could not deal with management's terrible decision-making and dogass communication any longer. That's what you should know, imo

I had an agreement in place with management that I would receive the next 8 months of revenue from the Hard Drive YT channel from my leaving in November. This was a deal I appreciated, and thought was very fair on management's behalf. So far, the deal has been honoured for 2 months. However as of last night I was removed from the Hard Drive Slack without warning, and as an editor for the YouTube channel. This means I no longer have any way of verifying how much I am owed, I just have to take their word for it. I'm sure management will make their own statements full of half-truths and weird language on the many cases being brought against them - I'd take everything they say with a pinch of salt if some of the screenshots I've seen of them talking about me are any indication lol

To management; I do not want to talk to you. I want you to DM me a screenshot of how much I'm owed every month and then send me the money per our agreement until June, then we can go our separate ways. Do that and admit to your mistakes, and maybe you can recover your reputation! That's it from me, lol. If they pull out of the deal and fuck me over I'll have more to say, but most of what I know is other people's stories of incompetence and poor decision-making, lol. I genuinely get no pleasure out of doing this; I do not think management is evil - I just think they're really bad at what they do and it's cost other, more talented people, lol. You should believe the writers imo

One last thing I wanna say btw, management did often stress that no one should try to make Hard Drive a full time thing. They were transparent about that, and that is fair. I was working on it because at a few points, I was lead to believe we actually were doing a Patreon. Many other ppl have similar stories of being strung along by management changing their minds and stop-starting shit every 2 weeks. We all made the fatal mistake of overestimating our manager - who would tell you one thing one day and something totally opposite the next week lol

Hunter R. Thompson:

I'm not your dad, but speaking as a Hard Drive writer, I don't know that funding Hard Drive on Patreon is worth it

The driving talent on the back end—behind the kickass site I joined in 2019—have peaced out over the years as the site's been (in our view) increasingly mismanaged. Mismanagement like, not setting up crowdfunding before the ship sank and all its best crew failed; or publishing a screenshot of Andy Ngo pedojacketing a trans writer, complete with her deadname; or a disgruntled ex-writer getting falsely accused of shit-talk, by actual staff. I'm grateful for the writing I've gotten to produce for HD (and will forever be kicking myself for not writing even more, in the four years I've had to do it!! i'm a dumbass!!!) but it is very much no longer the site I signed up for.

I don't want to resign as a contributor altogether, because I'm open to the idea of the site recovering and bad practices being retired as finances level out-- it would just be dishonest for potential backers to not be Aware Of The Circumstances, I think.

Jeremy Kaplowitz: i truly don't want to start shit, but feel compelled to say: i want to see Hard Drive succeed w/o resorting to throwing former writers & editors, myself included, under the bus. surely there's a way to save the site without building it over the corpses of those who left. my $0.02 i don't blame anyone who wants to sign up for the HD patreon and i support the website, but that includes those who worked on it for years, have complaints, and don't deserve to be treated like bitter assholes like this kind of stuff is just objectively true, meanwhile there's these new writers who joined the site after i left (meaning, in the last ~3 months) claiming people are liars. decide for yourself if you care, but this is what happened! [Quotes this Tweet]

Seth Finkelstein: Writing for Hard Drive has been a privilege the past few years, and it makes me so angry to see people I looked up to get jerked around behind the scenes. The amount of grenades the editors jumped on our behalf is immense, and I don't think the way they're being treated is right.

Other Bits On AI: We do know for sure however that AI art has been used by the site. Its fucking owner confirms it here:https://twitter.com/MattSaincome/status/1743040541603123622. Seems the owner pushed AI written articles as well! TayFabe: My vaguetweet is making the rounds & these made me apoplectic. - owner regularly lobbied using ai. Once he tested it & said ai was writing better satire than 25% of the HT/HD writers. - ai images were used on the site & socials w/o consulting the team or disclosing it publicly I found the ai bit relevant to include bc 1) it illuminates a stark change in HD's current direction & leadership, 2) ai images have previously been used on the site and (since deleted) ig posts, 3) ai content fucking sucks, and repeatedly pushing to use it is a telling quality The "handful of writers who chose to leave" includes 2 editors-in-chief (both cofounders who wrote a combined total of >1,000 articles & defined the voice of HD), & at least 3 other editors. These guys put in WORK since 2017, so cool to be corrected by ppl who joined in Nov 2023 [Link to mentioned vague tweet from post.] More from TayFabe: owner continuously lobbied for using ai in every possible way. No one else wanted to do it, but he kept on, saying ai was writing better satire than 25% of the HT/HD writers. Also, ai images were used on the site & socials without public disclosure or consulting the team.

The owner has responded now multiple times in a private discord... Thank you for people sharing screenshots! First Screenshot:

Kevin's Response: He banned me from the server for speaking out, so no, I didn't see it. And he gave no indication of a timeline, it was just "we'll do one when *I* say so" and gave every inclination he was totally against it. It bred an environment that pushed our hands to have to leave. Screenshot Round Two:

Kevin's Response: "Starting one in 3 months" is an absolute lie. He denied it, I have screenshots and others who can confirm. No timeline was given. Just "this is what it is now" and like, I couldn't live off of that. I wanted to do more but he was allergic to good ideas from others around him.

Matt, owner of Hard Drive, responds publicly on Twitter.

Matt: Kevin, the patreon launch was delayed because I didn't think it would work. Everyone is happy that it did work. Everyone who left the site because we didn't have money to pay for creative content which didn't revenue is welcome to return home. But unclear why the hostility.

Hard Drive paid out literally every dollar it had, then a bunch more, to creative people who worked on the site. When we ran out of money, we couldn't pay anymore. We did our best.

Kevin: Right, and my point of this thread was that it was completely and totally avoidable. This is reasonable to be upset about. How could I have been any more clear?

Matt: If we knew with 100% certainly that the community would have supported us via patreon, we would have done that. We didn't know. We had tried 4 years ago and got no support. We were wrong this time. We did our best to figure it out. We paid all the money we could.

Kevin: So you knew with 100% certainty this time? Or you took a leap of faith?

Matt: It was a last gasp panic effort after ad rates got cut in half on january 1st due to seasonal spending changes. We didn't know it would work. We were embarrassed to ask for support. We wanted to figure it out.

Kevin: Every site has a Patreon. Every YouTuber, comedy group, etc. But you insisted that nobody cared about Hard Drive. Which is wildly untrue. I know you see that now, but again, I think you can see why I and many others are pretty upset. A last ditch panic effort was long overdue. A couple more things from Matt:

It was about the size of the hole we needed plugged budget wise, the time I had left of personal resources, and the past data I had about us trying a patreon (which turned out to be a bad indicator). I didn't think the Patreon would help us fast enough. I made a bad estimation

aka "if we make $1000 more dollars a month via patreon, which would be 10x what we got last time, we will not solve any of our problems. If instead we try to plow down path B, we might make it out in time." That was the thinking. I chose the wrong path, but didn't mean to Kevin also retweeted this comment from the user Matt was responding to: So you're saying that you're bad at running the business, didn't listen to any of your employees until after they were forced to leave their jobs, and now you're going to get more of the money from the Patreon that was their idea in the first place? Matt's Response: Respectfully, I made a mistake delaying the patreon decision. But keeping a comedy site alive for 9 years is not easy, there are lots of potential ideas, and think overall we've done a good and honorable job. Will leave this thread in peace now to allow people their space.

Sorry for linking to Elon's hellsite (derogatory), but sources need links so...

[undiscovered-horizon]

Hello! Just finished Die Happy, and oh my gosh what a wholesome and sad time!! I love the way you portray Sanji and his inner monologue with himself.

Would it be possible to get a continuation where reader ends up making it a habit of sleeping with Sanji now that’s she’s had a taste. They kind of make a nightly routine and no one really questions it because they just like seeing everyone happy. How would Sanji feel realizing that it’s been weeks since you first started sleeping with him? What if reader is trying to tell Sanji they actually really like him but he just thinks reader is to perfect for him so he’s kind of blind to her advances.

Thank you so much and I hope you have fun writing!!!

All ye who yearned (@federalclassroom @sparkyrosewood14 @zzbloody-animezz @clonaa @number-0-iz) come get y'all juice:

Maelstrom - Sanji x Reader

Part 2 to "Die Happy"

Enjoying my work? You can leave me a tip on Ko-Fi

WORDCOUNT: ~ 1.2k

One night turned into two, two turned into a week and a week turned into... well, however long you and Sanji have been sleeping in one bed. He's not keen on keeping track but taking in the moment instead. He doesn't ask why you continue to crawl right back into his bedroom every night. In fact, he doesn't dare make any comment about your new habit out of fear that you might think he's grown tired of it.

Every night he thinks it might be the last, so he forces himself to stay up as long as he can. Although having you sleep soundly against his chest makes his heart rejoice, the new and asinine sleeping schedule he has implemented puts his body into a poor state. Sanji expected someone to say something but he hasn't considered the whole picture and how it looks to the other Straw Hats - he sleeps in one bed with you every night and looks exhausted during the day. It gives... quite a boost to one's imagination. This is why no one so far has made any inquiry about the new sleeping arrangement.

Even if only opportunity made him the person you like to waste your spare time with, Sanji feels as though the universe itself has smiled at him. Some god above him saw his suffering and decided to ease his burden a little. In his mind, this is the most logical explanation.

But that's about to change.

He feels you stir against him. Unknowingly, Sanji freezes, afraid that it's his feathery touches that wake you up from slumber. He holds his fingertips right above your skin, uncertainty hanging in the air.

"You're not sleeping?" you murmur against his chest.

Gently, he sets his hand back on your arm. Your skin is burning his fingers but he welcomes the scorch like frosty cheeks welcome the scarce sunlight in winter months.

"Just thinking about something," he answers with faux disinterest, hoping that you won't inquire further.

To Sanji's horror, you lean away from him and prop your chin up on your head, staring at his face from above. A bright, curious glint shines in your eyes.

"Come on, shoot. What keeps you awake at night?"

Like a deer caught in headlights, he's silently panicking for a moment.

You. All of you. From the way you say "good morning" in a raspy voice to the "goodnight" you separate with a yawn. How I can tell exactly what's on your mind by the expression on your face. The little dances you do when you're having a good day. How adorable your scowl is. The way my chest hurts when I see you frowning.

Sanji gives you a reassuring smile and shakes his head slightly. "Nothing you should worry about, love," he dismissed you. A beautiful liar he is - nothing in his voice indicates the dread that resides inside him.

His heartbeat quickens suddenly when you give him a flash of a smile. In the twilight of a dark night, you look like a faerie, luring a poor, lovesick man to bestow his deepest, darkest secrets upon you.

And Sanji just might.

"Maybe I want to." You shrug your shoulders. With your other hand, you poke his chest playfully. "I'm fine with worrying if it's about you."

Sanji swallows thickly. You're in his bed, snuggled against him and openly admitting you care about him. If he doesn't change the course of the conversation soon, he might act upon his desire, confess feelings he's been unwilling to admit even to himself.

"As much as I appreciate that," he begins nervously, "there's enough in that pretty little head of yours. You just lean on me and I'll do the rest." Sanji forces himself to smile softly at you as he makes a point of leaning through putting his hand on his chest.

You chuckle and bite your lower lip. Sanji's mind tries to slip into his well-known fantasies of kissing you but he manages to keep his thoughts at the present moment.

"Spoken like a true gentleman." Hinging on your forearm, you lean closer to his face. "Maybe it's you I should marry."

He clenches his hand covered by the duvet. Having you so close to him was a daydream until you made it turn into somewhat of a nightmare. Sanji keeps telling himself that whatever happens, he can't let you in on his feelings, fearing that if you learn of his hopeless affliction, you will abandon his intimacy once and for all. And that Sanji doesn't even want to consider as a possibility.

"I thought you wanted to marry a prince," he says in an attempt to divert the conversation.

A scoff leaves your lips and you shake your head in disapproval.

"Fuck princes," you drone out. "I'm not a participation award you can put in your trophy case and show off. I'm more like wild, untamed waters. Like a maelstrom." Your voice hangs for a moment and Sanji holds on to it with more hope than he thought he's capable of. Maybe the universe really did take pity on him. Then, you lean even closer to him, leaving a rather obscene lack of space between your faces. "And you, my lovely Sanji, are a skilled sailor."

His heart stops for a moment.

"Don't do this," he whispers in a weak voice. "Don't give me hope for something I can never have. It's cruel."

"'Can never have?'" you repeat in confusion. "It's your bed I keep crawling back into despite telling myself to stop doing that. You already have me. All of me. I don't care how desperate that makes me look. I want you to have me."

Sanji tries to control his ragged breathing. His iron will is crumbling as he allows himself to look at your lips. Is he dreaming?

"You shouldn't say things you don't mean," he warns you in a distant voice. His mind is too occupied, too busy going haywire, to be rooted in reality. Will you taste as sweet as he imagined? Will you linger on his lips like the reviving kiss of a goddess given to a dying man?

"You shouldn't assume I'm someone who just runs their mouth," you answer.

His lips barely touch yours. There's too much fear in him - fear, that this isn't actually happening. That you're just a dream within a dream, that he imagined this moment to curb his desperation. But then he feels you kissing him back, your lips engulfing his as though you're silently begging him not to go anywhere and stay with you. Sanji can't help himself putting his hand on the nape of your neck and fixing the angle off the kiss to deepen it; to kiss you like princesses deserve to be kissed.

Maybe you are a maelstrom - raging waters twisting into deadly whirlpools. But he's definitely not a sailor. A shipmate would navigate dangerous tides, while Sanji seems to be drowning. The waters of you are filling his lungs and yet he feels like he's breathing for the very first time. He's slowly falling farther away from the light of reason. Soon, darkness engulfs him. But it's not cold. It's not lonely. It's the darkness of a warm, summer night.

And in this darkness, drowned in the untamed waters of a maelstrom, he hears a siren singing in your voice:

The madness of returned devotion.

[highfantasy-soul]

I've seen some interpretations of Qimir/The Stranger's comment "When you lose everything, that's when you're finally free" that I don't really agree with.

A popular interpretation is that he's saying you have to cut off all your connections to people and love nothing, that's the only way to be free, but I think that's completely incorrect.

My interpretation is that he's saying when you lose the structures that have told you what to do your entire life, the people who had such strict expectations for you that you tried to mold yourself to, when you let go of all that, then you're free to really take a look at who YOU are.

Who we are a lot of the time is molded and shaped by the expectations of others: I can't get that tattoo because my grandmother wouldn't approve, I can't move to a different city because it would make my family sad, I can't post about political issues I'm passionate about because my job will fire me for it, I can't say what I really think because my friend group will treat me differently.

When you lose all that, you're no longer bound by their expectations and you can do what feels right for YOU. This doesn't have to be that they die! "Losing" them can just mean (in terms of Osha and the Jedi Order), you're no longer a part of that organization. Osha's not beholden to it's rules in a physical sense, but she was keeping herself mentally constrained by their rules all the same. Once she 'loses' that, she has the freedom to take a step back and assess her life and who she is and gets to decide who SHE wants to be - without being afraid that she's letting anyone down or not adhering to the rules of the organization.

There will be no social or structural consequences if she decides that she DOES want attachments now - because the Jedi can't punish her for it since she's "lost" her standing with the Jedi. She's free.

That's why it's so important to look at both the philosophy offered (when you lose everything, you're finally free) and also the interpretations of different people and how they're implementing that.

I do think Qimir/The Stranger was trying to color his killing of Yord and Jecki as something positive for Osha, but I don't think that's the 'end point' of his sentiment. I think that he's genuine in his belief that they were enemies who would kill him/stop him from existing as he wants to and so it wasn't 'evil' to kill them to stop them from doing that - I don't think he's lying to Osha about that to manipulate her - I think he's just trying to share how he views the situation.

After all, if an abused character killed their abuser, they might also indicate that they now 'felt free' because they "lost" that thing that was controlling them. That doesn't make them evil, it doesn't mean they're trying to lie and manipulate their way out of responsibility for the death, it's just indicating what their mindset is now that the threat to their safety is gone.

That acknowledgement isn't me saying Qimir's justification is 'right', only pointing out his own thought process behind the actions and how I don't think he's telling Osha that she needs to lose everything and KEEP it lost. I think the idea here is that once all your previous 'baggage' is stripped away, you're free to create the life/attachments you actually want.

[grahminradarin]

SPOP And Queer Joy Tw for transphobia, the Daily Wire, and getting kicked in the nuts

I was watching the most recent video from Some More News about a deeply stupid and bad and transphobic film from the daily wire called Ladyballers, and there was a scene they talked about where one of the main characters who was a guy that has been disguised as a woman for a couple weeks in order to win a woman's basketball tournament realizes he might actually be trans, and confesses this to the basketball coach who is his old friend and came up with the idea. The basketball coach then tells the trans character that she doesn't understand her own feelings and that the coach will help her figure it out. When she continues to insist that she's a trans woman, the coach kicks her in the nuts. And this made me realize the whole conservative mindset is based on an authority figure convincing people under them that they don't understand their own feelings and they don't know who they are, but the authority figure does. And the point of it all is to make someone never trust themselves or their own feelings ever.

And then I thought of the ending of She-Ra.

And I finally get why it felt so right and so triumphant and so different. Catra and Adora have been living with Shadow Weaver their whole lives, and Shadow Weaver has constantly been telling them who they're supposed to be, and it hurts both of them so much over the course of the series because Adora keeps trying to fit herself into that mold better (is helped in this endeavor by light hope) while catra is trying to break out of her mold to put herself in Adora's as the golden child

And then hoard Prime shows up as the ultimate example of an authority figure insisting that you don't understand yourself with the chips, which are literally a direct physical implementation of that idea!

And in what both of them think are their final moments alive, they kill the shadow Weaver in their heads, trust themselves to know who they are, and do what they've wanted to do the whole time. Catra stops trying to prove herself and admits that she cares and wants to just be enough without having to try. She stops caring about whether she's weak and says she loves someone. Adora stops trying to be the self-sacrificing hero and acknowledges that she can care about other people differently than just having to save them and she finally takes something she wants without worrying about the consequences.

They both say "screw authority, I know who I am and I'm going to let that out" because they both think they're about to die. And that one tiny moment of rebellion and understanding saves the entire goddamn universe. It terrifies Prime to the point that he can't even comprehend what's happened, and then it obliterates him and frees everyone he's ever hurt. It fixes everything

That one moment of queer Joy, even at the very end of the world, is all that it took.

[alpaca-clouds]

Fixing Karlach's Companion Quest

Let me ramble a little bit, after this post venting about the 3rd Act and especially how underused Karlach is was shared quite a lot. Because believe me people, I have thoughts in regards to how one could do her companion quest.

As I said: Out of the origin companions Karlach by far has the most lackluster companion quest. In fact her companion quest has less content than the quests for Halsin and Jaheira. Because basically Karlach's companion quest has only those steps:

Find the "Paladins of Tyr" and defeat them

Go find Infernal Iron for Dammon in the grove.

Give another Infernal Iron to Dammon at the Last Light in.

Defeat Gortash (which you have to do either way, no matter whether Karlach is on your team).

Which is not a whole lot.

The only decision Karlach will have in her entire questline is always "Does she want to die or rather go back to Avernus with Wyll?" And both are most certainly bad endings for her. And while Baldur's Gate (the city) is filled with those Steel Watch soldiers, that have a working infernal engine, the player does not get a chance to somehow try and follow up on it.

So... Let me talk on how I would write her quest.

Act 1

For the most part I do think Act 1 for her is alright as it is. I would maybe bring in some more tension into the story of some folks from Avernus coming for her. That does not need to happen in Act 1, but it should be hinted at. Because when we meet her, we learn that she had been haunted for days by folks from Avernus, but then... we never see anything of that outside of the paladins and the stuff with Mizora and Wyll. And that is kinda a let down.

Just hint at some infernal creatures being seen or something. Make her a bit more anxious about it. Something like that.

Act 2

The big issue is that Karlach has basically no content at all in Act 2 right now. Like, at all. You meet Dammon early on, bring him an infernal iron that you probably already have on hand. If you romance her you can get the first sex scene with her afterwards. And yes, if you actually go around talking to all the NPCs you will find one, who has a message from Flo, a demon who was a kind of "friend" to Karlach in the hells. Which is where we get introduced to the thing that feels like it should go somewhere - but never goes: The soul coins. While we can already collect those in Act 1, this is where Karlach actually explains what the Soul Coins are. And it is pretty clear that this at some point was the set up for a corruption arc... Only that this arc never happens.

Something I would do to play from this is, that sometime during Act 2 you will encounter some devil (maybe they'll actually come to camp) that will actually challenge you on Karlach. And during the fight she would through some way or another actually use a coin (just make somehow sure she has one) and there are gonna be consequences from that.

You can talk to her about it, she probably would just act as if it was nothing. Something like that. Just build that one up.

Act 3

See, I kinda think I know why the soul coin thing goes nowhere. Because for the Soul Coins to be used you need to have Karlach on your team - and generally speaking the game does not force you to have certain characters on your team. Sure, for some events on the companion quests you get highly encouraged to take the companion in question along, but... You are not forced to do so. And for Karlach to get corrupted she would kinda need to use the Soul Coins - and implementing that would have been a bit harder? However, here is what I would do:

Once you get into the city, you will sooner or later find Dammon. Karlach will ask about him, you take her to meet him. He will tell you, that he has no idea how to fix the engine. But the player will get the ability to note that ineed the Steel Watch are running on Infernal Engines, and hence understanding them might help. Hence, this will actually also give you another reason to go to the Forge, which can then double as Karlach's "Dungeon". You will try to find some stuff here - and from there you could go different parts.

Either you really frame the entire Karlach conflict around the soul coins, or you frame it around her want for revenge. I think storywise the soul coins would work a lot better - however they would also need a lot more change in the game.

Because a Soul Coin plot would probably build around her using the Soul Coins again and again and through it losing control. Basically a addiction metaphor. And for that you would either need to talk her out of it or the engine could actually fail earlier than the finale. If you really want to be a bit evil... let her die earlier on. I mean, the game lets characters leave/die earlier, so it is fine to let that happen, right?

The revenge plot is easier to do. You go to the Forge, deal with the Gondians one way or another, you bring those plans to Dammon and he realizes he needs something (a MacGuffin, a specific bit of information, whatever) to actually fix the engine. And this is something that Gortash has.

I wrote about this before: I generally think that even in another origin playthrough or a Tav playthrough the game would be better if you could actually get Gortash to give up rather than fighting him. For one, the fight against Gortash is boring, but also it would improve the story a lot more to get to see both him and Orin with a bit more nuance.

In this case the story would go like that: You go to Gortash. Given this is past the Forge storyline there is a good chance you destroyed his Steel Watch. He is pissed. Well, works good, because so is Karlach. Of course he does not want to help you - and Karlach wants to kill him. Still, you need his help to save Karlach. So you need to convince the two of them in one way or another.

I think this is especially poiniant because one of Karlach's biggest wants is actually a regretful Gortash. And sure, she will not realistically get that anytime soon. But give it a chance?

Well, either would work: A story about the Soul Coins - or one about the entire revenge plot. In my fics I went with the second one, because only a few plot points needed to happen differently for that. But if you were to remake parts of the game, I think both would be nice solution. (For my alternate Gortash confrontation: Hurt Begets Hurt.)

[etaleah]

On the one hand, yes I want Sonic to catch Shadow in the third movie or in a remastered SA2 because I like Sonadow; HOWEVER, I also want it because it would be the ending that makes the most narrative sense.

For one thing, it’s a simple, believable explanation for how Shadow could survive that doesn’t involve having to come up with convoluted justifications for Shadow somehow being unharmed after falling to Earth and burning up in the atmosphere or why/how Eggman would save him and how Shadow mysteriously got his inhibitor ring back. Saving Shadow, especially at that point in the story, is something everybody could believe Sonic would do, no clarification needed. That’s just who Sonic is.

For another, it saves the creators from having to go through the amnesia song and dance again (which I personally think was a mistake and only implemented to give him something to do in Heroes) or taking the risk of killing off a fan favorite that’s extremely marketable. Shadow just never gets amnesia because he never falls. Simple as that. He never dies because Sonic saves him.

And while it might be easy to think that Shadow not dying or being thought to have died at the end would weaken the sacrifice, I actually don’t think that’s true. Just having Shadow remove the inhibitor ring and starting to fall afterwards shows that he was willing to make the sacrifice, and that matters much more than whether he actually ends up having to make it. Frodo and Sam don’t die on their journey to Mount Doom, but that doesn’t make them not heroes. They were willing to die for the cause, and that’s what counts. The same is true for Shadow.

Having Sonic catch him also helps cement that they’re allies/friends now, and that Sonic has forgiven him. Now that Shadow has redeemed himself, he gets to reap the rewards of his redemption. It’s a nice little symbolic gesture that, while it may not be necessary, is still nice to see.

Anyway let Sonic catch Shadow pretty please with a cherry on top covered in a banana sundae.

[rmwb-fanfics]

How to remake Harry Potter:

(A step by step guide)

We’ve already had one god-awful adaptation that way too many people think is good. This is our one chance to have the book characters represented correctly, along with the plot they support.

I’ve put YEARS of thought into this. I’ve written scripts for episodes of a hypothetical tv show. I’ve drawn concept art. I’ve done shit. So I figured I’d share my thoughts.

1. Stick to the books*.

Stick to the books has a massive asterisk next to it because I mean the plot and characters. Some stuff (as you’ll see later) should be changed.

Nothing in this show should feel out of character. Harry should be closer with Ron than he is to Hermione. Snape should be a real d*ckhead. Hermione should be judgmental of those who don’t think like her, etc etc. The way these characters navigate their relationships is why the fandom is still relevant. It’s why canon-compliant fic is popular in the first place. We like their dynamics. SHOW THEM APPROPRIATELY.

Plot is a sticky thing because I’d say there’s wiggle room, but not too much. Certain characters have to die. Certain events must happen. You cant change that stuff.

2. Use the Medium.

You’re using film as a format to tell your story. Ideally you’d us animation, but I know Warner Bros has less creativity than Disney’s remake department, so I won’t even try and pitch that.

Use colour and saturation. It can help contextualize emotion. It can make us subconsciously recognize things. For instance, the scene growing more saturated when Ron walks into the room when Hermione is wearing the horcrux, or any multitude of other uses this could bring.

Bring in costume design that (actually fits the world) but also helps show how that character is feeling. What they’re thinking, their personality, their future, etc.

Make magic fun™️. The books sort of sidelined magic in 5-7. Don’t do that. Divert from the books. Magic should feel alive. Colour-code them so we as an audience can recognize spells and what they might do before we see it. Implement sound design to make each spell unique and vibrant. Make this world subtly bursting with magic like it was in the first few books. Have it weave around characters, wrap them up. Be creative with action scenes. Force transfiguration into battle scenes. Choreograph your duels. Show don’t tell us that a wizard/witch is powerful. Turn people into portraits. Lock them up as mice. USE MAGIC.

Your set design should reflect this. Everything should be bursting with personality. Don’t just use the shitty movie sets. Inject some colour, have the surroundings aid you in telling the story. Get weird with the camera. Use these tools to their fullest potential.

Actually fucking try.

3. Utilize Music.

Music is just… such a massive part of film. It’s frustrating how often even the best filmmakers overlook its use. Characters should have themes that mature and develop as the series goes on. Have action arrangements of the themes to play with heroic moments. As the series progresses, we grow attached to these themes. When they appear, the audience FEELS something. Don’t reuse great pieces to force emotion. (Dumbledore’s Farewell in The Prince’s Tale. Are you fucking kidding me?)

For example: Have a theme for Neville that starts out timid and uses very shy instrumentals, but we first hear a change when he stands up to the trio at the end of PS. Then it gains more instruments until OotP, when it grows again. Once we get to DH, it can be used in this heroic swell as he chops the head off the snake in front of Voldemort and everyone watching. The audience, consciously or not, will feel that moment even more.

Have a theme for Ron and Hermione that might not even be romantic until HBP when it gains that element. PLAY WITH MUSIC.

Themes for mystery, adventure, loss, love, friendship, LOCATION. Let them come back throughout the series to highlight various moments. See Lord of the Rings and The Hunger Games, as well as (surprisingly) the Fantastic Beasts films.

Let music affect the visuals. Magic can bend and swivel with the music. Use it to tell the story. Use it to show emotion. Use it to progress a character’s arc. USE CONSISTENT MUSIC.

4 . Be Bold.

This is the big one and it may seem like I’m contradicting myself but I’m not. Rowling’s work hasn’t aged crazily well to modern fiction standards. This is your chance to rectify that. Fill plot holes, actually think through the politics. Introduce world-building elements that enhance the story/characters. (The house system, and how Slytherin fits in. The logic behind avada kedavra???) Get creative with solutions. Contradict the original work when it comes to description of location. If it doesn’t work for the film format, don’t force it to work here.

Spend more time with characters we know are relevant, but maybe not to the plot. These are your Ginny Weasleys, your Seamus and Deans, Nevilles, etc. Really fill them in. Give them more scenes. Ginny has two phenomenal arcs that play completely off-screen, explore them. Show us her friendship with Hermione. Show us her insecurities and her faults. Give us more of her and Harry’s friendship. We know they get married, so maybe fix the whole “Rowling wrote the epilogue first, but didn’t realize she was waiting too long to introduce these characters until HBP”.

Add scenes. Add jokes. Add smiles and covert looks. You have more time, which means you have a chance to focus on friendships, and romance, and world building.

Tell multiple storylines. Give Remus and Tonks a cool spy/thriller subplot interjected with the main story in OotP. Show us more of Fleur staying in England. Give us more of Harry and Sirius bonding. All of this stuff can fit loosely into canon, and be welcome creative additions.

BE BOLD.

And finally,

5. This is your chance to not only retell the story, but to do it better.

RECOGNIZE THIS. Take advantage of this opportunity and enhance canon, don’t fight it.

Don’t add Hermione and Harry dancing because *YOU* don’t like where the romantic pairings went. Don’t add Draco sympathy because you want him to have a redemption arc. Don’t dumb Ron down because you don’t like the fact that he’s just like the teenage boys you dated in High School, and he was a bit immature.

Make changes, be bold, use music, stick to the books*, use the medium, but take this as the opportunity that it is to enhance what came before.

Thank you.

[kaffykathy]

Sometimes I look at Lancer's core book and just think about how lacking it is in significant details for all the factions, like who is the current leaders of Union, to founders and owners of the many corporate entities.

I know that doesn't sound like exciting lore to anyone, but for Union, there's no one like the Camerons from Battletech or the Karl Franz from Warhammer Fantasy. And I can see that it was probably purposely implemented like this for the reason that these entities are bigger than the identities that lead them, and that's why when a name like Johnathan Harrison pops up along sith a small blurb of who he is, we start to realize his significance and why Harrison Armory is the way it is. He was basically a fascistic General from Seccomm that fled and made his own Union how he saw fit, and his clones still live up to his legacy to the current setting of Lancer.

At the same time, Union doesn't have any of that. There's no lore about some, or any politician of government in the Core Book at least other than the seats and chairs that they fill. The reason for this is to give the players the ability to make their own interpretations with the world, but it's really saying something when your big government super power claiming to be in a utopian golden age doesn't have a face to its actual organization.

(Side note: if anyone ever tells you that their realm is a Utopia, you should be taking that the same way that someone says that a ship is 'Unsinkable'. Sorry to burst your bubble Pilot NET, but some of you really need to read between the lines about this. Especially with how much of a bureaucratic nightmare DoJ HR is.)

I know that it's very much the case that Massif press could have done this intentionally to show in the Lancer setting that the sum is bigger and more significant than all the parts added together. The world of the setting is too big to care too much about one individual or planet without weeding in a reason why in most cases because unless you're playing a mission book like Solstice Rain, you probably wouldn't be visiting any of the planets or people brought up in the first place. But the thing is, to me, is that this really makes Lancer less lively than I think it should. When I read about the Albatross, I wanna know about their heroes and significant feats and journeys. I could just play and Albatross, but having record of the daily life at the perspective of a nomadic Lancer would have been told so much more than I think the actual descriptions give.

It's why I love the blurb of text on the Sisyphus NHP. It builds a character, tells a narrative, and humanizes this being most probably would only be used to get a better roll. It also implies how cycling actually works for an NHP and the significance to it. And from all this, we can see that Sisyphus knows that his fate is to be cycled and die over and over again. Something barely given full page and it's just text on equipment.

And yet we don't have anything like that for the bigger picture. We don't know that the leaders of Union generally feel or think about the world surrounding us. We don't have a set uniform for Union or any other of the major players. And as a person who was fascinated with historical things like what soldiers wore during the battle of waterloo, or what camo patterns did a certain tank use, I feel like it's a significant diservice to not give us official uniforms and outfits for Union.

Imagine what cultural reflections that could have impacted the clothing an officer would wear.

I don't know, Lancer really likes to skim on the actually interesting descriptions, but I still love it. It's just that it really doesn't give me enough reason to care about things like Cradle or the Solar System in its current timeline. There is a lot of telling, and not showing in the lore for me, but they don't even tell things that historical nuts like me might be interested in.

[ignitesthestxrs]

i'm nearly done with veilguard and like. there have been some stand out narrative moments! it is, in general, a much better game and story than i feared it was going to be able to be post-anthem, and shaped much more like the game i wanted it to be once we got the news that it was going to be single-player only.

but. ultimately. it's sooooooo Player Choice Focused and so so so scared of making any big narrative calls one way or another that it has resulted in this game where the mechanics themselves take agency away from each of your companions and hand it over to your protagonist.

sobbing deeply like it should not be Up To Me to decide for a character What Their Culture Should Be, and honestly it's deeply fucked up that the game is making you make this choice regardless. as an example.

like the game offers you a plethora of choices, but there aren't actually consequences for any of them in a way that impacts you, the player, emotively or narratively. the big choice that might harden one or the other of your companions is like, a coin flip that the game is very careful to stress doesn't reflect on the...morality or world beliefs of your character?

what i mean by this is that in da2, if you make pro-mage choices in front of fenris, he'll be annoyed with you. if you talk shit about blood magic in front of merrill, she'll get mad. the choices you make are reflected in how your companions respond to you over time, however clumsily implemented mechanically they are able to be in a game made in 2011.

meanwhile this game made in 2024 has chosen to go the route of Everything Rook Says, Goes. this is articulated most clearly in the conclusion to davrin's quest, where he literally says 'i can't make this choice, but i trust rook to'. whatever rook says goes.

so while the choices you are presented with over and over again seem on the surface significantly weighted because it changes what events occur, they ultimately leave me feeling cold, because there's no emotional fallout in the wake of making them (maybe with the exception of treviso vs minrathous, but even then the issue is like, well i had to pick one and you lost the coin toss).

even if i do have opinions about the outcomes of one choice or another, the game assures me that those opinions don't have to come into the decision. because whatever you choose, in the wake of that choice, the specific companion will assure you that you made the right choice. even if they're mad about it, they understand that you had to do x thing. there's nothing you can do, or say, or believe, that fundamentally clashes with a character's world view. only bad luck that forces you into an untenable position, or the ability to convince any companion, eventually, that you were right.

idk i just think that narrative choices are only meaningful if you have to defend why you made them in some way - not because of their outcome, but because of what that choice says about the character your playing. if i decide to leave a shitty mayor to die and he comes back later as a monster to kill a bunch of allies, that's just a quest i'm ticking off when i kill him.

but if i then get confronted by a companion with opinions on restorative justice in the wake of that choice, now i have to actually contend with the impact of that decision i made in early game. now someone is mad at me, or disappointed. having to kill one more dude in a killing dudes game is not a consequence. the whole point of having companions in a narrative choice game like dragon age should not be to have 6 besties who agree with you and each other all the time, but instead a way to help figure out how you want to navigate the game world, story, and the choices you're going to make about it.

ultimately it feels like this game is terrified of interpersonal conflict in a way that sucks a lot of the joy out of playing this kind of rpg, and i'm sad about that. veilguard wants so badly to assure me that i'm doing amazing sweetie that it's ended up creating a world where i can only do amazing.

that, or i'm just so great at video games that i have won every interpersonal conflict in the [mumbled] hours that i've been playing veilguard. that seems likely.

[packet-of-staples]

Have you always wondered that you really wish that undertale would also gets it’s own adaptation since cuphead and fnaf gets it’s own

(it’s much better if undertale was like a animated series)

(And I really do wish it got it’s own adaptation cause I love the games😔)

I actually hope undertale never gets an adaptation outside of the video game format! The game is so intrinsically tied to the fact that it is a video game I dont know how you would adapt it.

Games like Cuphead, Fnaf and Mario's plots arent as tied to their video game mechanics like Undertale's plot is.

Entire plot points and characters just would not work (Like Flowey's entire character, resetting, choosing to spare or kill etc.). The whole story hinges on what you the player chose to do and that gets thrown out the window when you are watching something.

The active role the player has in shaping the story by sparing or killing cannot be replicated by a passive watching audience. Not in a way I think has the same impact anyway. Your choices are what make Undertale what it is.

Sure the story its self is very good! Outside of the mechanics. But a lot of the emotional battles like Asriel, Omega Flowey, Sans or Asgore are so inextricably tied to flipping the mechanics you have learnt on its head to illicit a reaction (see, Asgore breaking the Mercy button in a pacifist run through. You cannot spare him despite having done so for every other character. This is shocking to the player and I dont think it could work the same in a different format).

Or okay let's take the entire Omega flowey fight. What save points is he drawing back on to move you or kill you over and over when it is in film format? Who's save file does he discard when you cant make a save file when watching a movie? How about when he crashes the game after you die? How would you implement that into a film? You really cant.

How would you explain the ethics around resetting if you are unable to actively reset? You would not be able to relate to Flowey, get that gut punch in genocide when you realise you have become just like him after resetting and slaughtering all of your friends. When watching a tv show or movie YOU are not doing anything, the character on the screen is, you are just an onlooker with no ability to alter the story.

Toby wants it to feel like you're playing with these characters like toys you can discard, love or damage whenever you want and makes you think about the ethics around that. Characters in a video game feel a lot more like playing with toys than watching a film does, because in a video game you are able to make an impact on what they say or do. While in a film characters have a set script, you have no impact, there are no choices you have to make aside from keep watching.

Undertale's Metanarrative is woven into it's very being. By separating it from the video game format I feel like you are just gutting it of what made it special in the first place. You would have to rework it so much, I feel like you'd might as well just write a whole new story.

Does this make sense? Its 1 am while I'm writing this so I hope I'm not talking in circles.

[spirk-trek]

I would love to hear your thoughts on kirk's backstory and what happened on tarsus iv, I feel like I've read so many conflicting takes on here and none of them actually match up with the episode (conscience of the king)

Hi anon! The way you worded this makes me think you were just looking for information and not a fic request. Forgive me if I was wrong!! 😅

I think the reason there are so many conflicting ideas is because of how vague it is in canon itself (which is cool, leaves a lot of room for interpretation). Because of this, when I recently wrote a thing about Tarsus IV I also struggled with "research" for it. Here's what I came up with:

!!! Disclaimer! I am not declaring any of this the One True Canon™! This is just my interpretation/speculation based on existing lore !!!

To me, it makes most sense for Jim to be sent to Tarsus IV with his mother, and for her to be a civilian scientist/researcher of some kind. I find it very hard to believe the massacre could have taken place if Starfleet were present, which would include George Kirk, Jim's father. George is said to have been absent often due to his work (SNW), so it wouldn’t be strange for him to be separated from his family (this is also just normal in Star Trek in general, i.e. Sulu [AOS] and like… everyone with children in TNG).

A more recent Trek book called Drastic Measures seems to back this exact idea up (depends who you ask which novels are canon, and this book was written for Discovery so take it with a grain of salt).

Sam would, in the TOS timeline, be 10 years older than Jim (~23). That would make it unlikely he'd be tailing after his mother to remote colonies. It's much more likely he was concerned with his own career/family/life.

So, in summary of those points, I think it was just Jim and Winona. Jim is between 12 and 14 years old, and his mother was a civilian researcher (the novel I mentioned earlier made her a xenobiologist, probably for plot reasons).

Something I do see exaggerated sometimes is the method of killing in the massacre. An antimatter chamber appears to be what was used, similar to A Taste of Armageddon, so it would not have been mass carnage or a big dramatic fight in the end. Just... zap. 

SPOCK: "He was certainly among the most ruthless, to decide arbitrarily who would survive and who would not [...] and then to implement his decision without mercy. Children watching their parents die. Whole families, destroyed. Over four thousand people. They died quickly, without pain, but they died.”

However, these are also quotes from the episode, so I can see why people might think the massacre itself was more violent: 

- JIM: “Four thousand people were needlessly butchered.” - LEIGHTON: “I remember him. That voice. The bloody thing he did.”  - JIM: “Are you sure you didn't act this role out in front of a captive audience whom you blasted out of existence without mercy?” - KARIDIAN/KODOS: “Murder, flight, suicide, madness. I never wanted the blood on my hands ever to stain you.” 

There was a revolution of some kind, probably brought about by people easily radicalized out of hunger and desperation.

- KARIDIAN/KODOS: [reading] "The revolution is successful…” - SPOCK: “There were over eight thousand colonists and virtually no food. And that was when Governor Kodos seized full power and declared emergency martial law.”

If Kodos already had his ideas about eugenics, which it sounds like he did, he would have seized this as an opportunity. This would make him an even more solid comparison to Hitler, which they were definitely going for to at least some extent (this was written two decades after WWII which many involved in the making of star trek were deeply affected by if not veterans themselves).

Because of the above quotes, I also think there’s merit to the idea of there being multiple formal executions where Kodos gave his infamous “speech” each time rather than just once (this would be another reason Jim would remember it enough to write it down), rather than one massive execution of 4,000 people. However, this quote could be interpreted to mean the opposite:

SPOCK: “Kodos began to separate the colonists. Some would live, be rationed whatever food was left; The remainder would be immediately put to death.”

Arguably, the even more traumatic suffering would be the period of starvation and upheaval leading up to the massacre. To me, a 3-6 month period of slowly worsening starvation as the food supply shrank and shrank to nothing would make the most sense.

One aspect I don't quite get is that Kodos's body was supposed to have been "burned beyond recognition.” Since we know from Conscience of the King his death was staged, then this fake death can’t have been pulled off in the midst of Starfleet intervention upon arrival (they would have taken him into custody to stand trial rather than kill him on sight anyway). Burning yourself to death is a highly unusual form of suicide, so I’m not sure if that’s supposed to allude to him being fake killed in the carnage following the execution when the people didn't react the way he wanted or expected? My only theory is that there was unrest and rioting for the period of time between the massacre and Starfleet arriving with relief, and he used that to fake his death once he knew he would be put on trial.

Anyway, this is super long so I'll cut myself off there. Hope that answered your question, sorry for being crazy! If anyone has anything to add, please do!

[uboat53]

In light of the election, a word to those who voted for Trump.

I'll admit, I've run out of sympathy. It's been eight years of him being overwhelmingly in the public limelight and he was president for four of those. You all know who he is now and you still voted for him.

And I get it, you'll claim that you voted for him for "the economy" and that you don't support all of the ways in which he's a terrible human being, but I have a hard time believing that considering that the average Trump voter doesn't actually even know what Trump's economic policy will be. Look, America had a decent economy under Trump the first time, not because of anything he did, but because he inherited a decent economy from Obama and spent all his time doing petty things like the Muslim ban rather than screwing up the economy. Don't believe me? Find any graph you like of the US economy and show me where his policies changed anything dramatically from the pre-Trump trend (at least, before he completely screwed up the pandemic).

And, look, if he'd just been promising vague, back to normal-type things, I might believe you that it was the economy, but he hasn't. Since the start of his campaign he's been promising to implement massive tariffs on all imports; something he can do, by the way, without Congressional approval. Tariff, by the way, is another word for tax; he's going to add a 10% (and more!) tax to every single thing that the US imports, and we import a lot. Inflation, by the way, has been back down to reasonable levels for months, this is the type of thing that would cause it to spike back up again.

So, yeah, I don't believe you that you voted for him because you were very concerned about the economy; if you were very concerned about the economy you would know all of that already. No, you didn't vote for him "in spite of" the racism and the lawbreaking and the bigotry, you voted for him because of it. The economy was just a fig leaf.

And if that strikes you the wrong way, if you think I'm wrong about that, if you think I'm judging you in bad faith, sit for a minute with that feeling. Ask yourself, why did you vote for a racist? Why did you vote for a criminal? Because you did. Whatever reason you tell yourself you did it for, you still did it. And millions of people around the country and around the world are going to suffer for it.

And, if the economy, as just about every economist predicts, crashes under the weight of Trump's tariffs and other terrible economic polices, I'll admit that my reaction to your shock will probably not be what you'd like either. As I said, I'm out of sympathy after eight years. You voted for a criminal and a bigot in exchange for a "good economy" and the most likely result is that you will still not get it.

I hope that all of the women who will die because they're unable to access abortion care find peace and that their families will too. I hope that all of the immigrants who are deported and the communities they're ripped from are able to heal. I hope that all the gay and trans people who will be attacked and denied support by their own government find what help they need. I hope that all of the Jews and ethnic minorities who are murdered all over the country by white supremacists emboldened by Trump are able to find peace as well. I hope that all of these people are able to survive the economic shockwaves that are coming.

As for you, I'll admit, as unsympathetic as I am generally, I still have my humanity and that leaves me with at least a small bit of hope for you. I hope that you one day discover the humanity to, even if your assumptions about the economy were somehow correct, risk a little bit of what you have to prevent the suffering of others. I hope that you aren't one of the many people devastated by the economic policies you've voted for. I hope that you eventually realize what you've done. I hope that you'll take responsibility for what you've unleashed and work to combat the bigotry and crime that is coming. Ultimately, though, I hope, when you do realize everything that's happened and everything is said and done, that you can forgive yourself.

[7thcirclebaker]

Alright, so since we don't know who's the lead for season 4, and we mostly think Eloise needs someone who will actually call her out on stuff, and clearly the canon relationships at this point are up for grabs, I propose a Theloise potential storyline.

In this season there was the focus on heirs and family inheritance and how surprise titles just are like a thing. From Season 2, we know the Sheffields don't have a male heir, or at least we can assume so, as we never see or hear of one. As Edwina has made a good match on the continent, likely her first born son would inherit whatever title is there, assuming there's only one. And she doesn't seem to have gotten pregnant yet either. This means the Sheffields would need to hold out another couple of years to have an heir, even from the daughter they basically disinherited. But clearly, it's also possible for families to go searching for the nearest male next of kin who would inherit which we saw in the Mondrich plotline this season.

Enter Theo, a like 4th cousin of the Sheffields. They find him, and quite forcefully don't let him out if it, because well he can actually read and is young, fit, and healthy. But he's really not a fan of this, doesn't want it really, is always talking about workers rights etc. in an attempt to tire him out, and for him to be more palatable to the Ton, they buy him a commission, because there's very much a war on. It's a cushy one that's unlikely to see too much battle so he's not at major risk but it should alter his life priorities or something.

Danbury hears that the Sheffields are sending this poor lad of to war, doesn't connect Theo Heir to be Sheffields, to Eloise's printer apprentice Theo and tells Kate about him. They decide to invite him to the next ball as he's kind of her cousin and she wants to do some fence mending. Eloise bumps into him there and they're both just an absolute mess, but like defensively angry at the other. Still people don't connect them to the scandal from season 2, and the only one Eloise would tell is Pen, who won't be writing about this.

They cool off after a little bit and send an apology letter, I wanna say Eloise apologizes first because Pen calls her out faster, and also Theo might die like, is that what you really want the last things you've said to him to be. Thus we get the letters over several months.

Boom! Combat! Things actually go pretty okay, and Theo gets a commendation and a shiny medal. He's horribly wounded though, like weren't sure he'd survive wounded. He does, and gets sent to the country for air from the military hospital only no one told Eloise. So she's thinking he's ignoring her or dead, he thinks she's ignoring him because he's now somewhat fucked up (I wanna say in a way that means being a professional printer is no longer viable because of the work, so he has to accept that he's the Heir now). Someone tells Eloise that he's not dead and is in fact at the Sheffields. She storms herself up there all abluster and yells at him for letting her think he was dead and after that last letter was somewhat touching and like maybe he proposed in it. They argue, they make up, they make out.

Eloise was of course unchaperoned, as we'll say the Sheffields died or were in the city lauding how great their heir was in battle. We get three angry Bridgerton Brothers battle ready for their baby sister. They agree to get married and the family slowly come around once they see how in love they actually are. Also because he's like actually maybe willing to ask for help about how to do the estate management and also how he can implement some reforms and it makes his brother's in law think about the estates they manage and do some reform as well. Everyone wins.

[highladyluck]

AU thought: Nynaeve is born in Seanchan and raised from childhood as a damane

Immediate first thought (besides ‘why did you choose violence’) is that she’d probably be the best, still. She’s making it onto Tuon’s entourage. I am in pain thinking about it.

This is my AU, so I’m going to solve a personal mystery and say that her dad is Ajimbura & she’s from the Kaensada Hills. Let’s say her mom still died early from illness & dad still taught her how to hunt & track before she was tested. In fact, Ajimbura treated Nyneave as his son because he had seen her channeling at an unusually early age & was hoping declaring her his son could protect her from being made damane.

The Kaensada Hills are rural and unassimilated enough that this was not quite as useless an idea as it might seem, and let’s say they also had very functional ideas of gender roles- if someone does Man Things, they are A Man for all intents and purposes, or vice versa.

Spoiler: It doesn’t work, the sul’dam do eventually get around to testing even there and if there’s a saidar channeler, they’re gonna grab her. Nyneave becomes damane around 13. She still has that Talent for Healing, but because most Seanchan don’t want a damane working on them in that way, she’s only allowed to practice on other damane. It’s a Talent and not something that can be taught very well, which also dampens people’s enthusiasm about it since it’s not super replicable.

She’s still ridiculously powerful even with this somewhat problematic skill, though, and so she sees a lot of use in combat situations. Nyneave comes to Tuon’s attention when Nyneave’s sul’dam makes a judgement call & lets her bring one of Tuon’s favorite damane back from the brink of death after a combat injury. Tuon’s like ‘mine now’ and Nyneave joins the favorites squad.

Nyneave’s been with Tuon for ~6 years by the WH timeline. Once Ajimbura finds out where she is (since she’s higher-profile now that she’s with Tuon), he’s like ‘I must kill the Daughter of the Nine Moons’s father to avenge the loss of my son’ but her father is dead already (of ‘a bad wager’ in this timeline too) so he decides that as male captain of her bodyguard, Furyk Karede stands in loco parentis to Tuon, and therefore he must be killed.

After 3 failed revenge murder attempts, by the custom of his people, the debt rebounds upon Ajimbura and now he must become like Furyk Karede’s son and follow his trade.

This is the mechanism that Ajimbura’s people, distant descendants of the AoL Aiel, devised to stop blood feuds. If you try to revenge murder the same person three times & you can’t hack it, you have to join your enemy’s family instead and act in their interests. Most people don’t want to take that risk, or pick easier-to-kill enemies, so there’s a lot of trophy-hunting instead, kind of like how the Aiel have implemented complex prisoner of war rules so less people die.

So that’s why Ajimbura is Karede’s unhinged manservant in THIS universe. Still wish I knew why he’s there in canon!

Because I do not want Nyneave to suffer unduly, let’s say she comes with Tuon instead of Mylen (whose battlefield-medicine-descended-Healing is less impressive when compared to Nyneave’s Talent). Nyneave also represents Seanchan supremacy in a homegrown ‘we’re better than you’ way rather than a ‘we’ll brainwash you all’ way. Slightly different message, similar outcome.

She gets captured by our heroes at some point & basically has some of Alivia’s arc after that, but because she worked with Tuon and has insider info on her, she’s got more to do in Rand’s inner circle than just make people uncomfortable & lay out his outfit for the rest of his life. Actually, you know what, let’s full-circle this, the former Wisdom of Emond’s Field is Alivia Al’Meara & she’s the one who makes the call to uncollar Nyneave when she asks for it.

Also, Nyneave becomes friends with Aviendha because Avi meets her once and is like ‘forgive me but you’re the spitting image of my second-sister’s first-daughter’ (or whatever) and then they figure out that the Kaensada Hills tribes are also descended from AoL Aiel, and this connection becomes very important later on when the Kaensada Hills tribes strike out for independence in the aftermath of the entire Imperial family being murdered & the civil wars in mainland Seanchan.

[irontragedyreview]

I wasn't going to write about this chapter but I think there is something very interesting in the way Sir Nighteye's prediction is brought back and how it has been a sword hanging at All Might's throat ever since we as readers discovered it. How Nighteye's quirk works leaves a lot to the interpretation, considering that Izuku was able to escape his fate, we could think that Nighteye's quirk works subjectively, this means that people can affect and modify the probabilities of his visions, but on the other hand we can't detract from the fact that Sir had been with his quirk for decades and that throughout this his visions seem to be set in stone.

The prophecies and visions of the future aren't something new, over time this topic has been touched by books, movies, etc, also its implementation has give different paths, sometimes these visions are written in stone and by more behaviors carried out by people the result is the same, in other cases it's precisely the behaviors of people tending to avoid that future what ends up cementing it, other cases these visions are actually infinite realities that can happen in a multiuniverse, in positive cases the characters with this type of visions manage to change that future. This leaves an open question about how we can interpret Nighteye's vision and if they can twist them. Our first approach to his quirk is All Might, he says that if Toshinori continues on this path his death will be at the hands of a villain, this happens after his confrontation with AFO, where Toshinori is hospitalized and marked with a decrease how he could use his quirk. At this point we can all say that All Might's path isn't the same where the manga began, All Might who fought and beat AFO was determined to continue until his death, he's the man who got up covered in bandages and would seek to continue fulfilling his work as a symbol of peace, at that moment that talk of the possibility of a successor begins, but this happens many years before All Might actually actively accepts passing the OFA.

Toshinori pre Midoriya had no more incentive to live and avoid his destiny than to fulfill his duty as a symbol of peace, although this incentive kept him going, the truth is that having it as his only reason to continue, he was also accepting that his death would be in a fight and he didn't care. It isn't until Kamino during his new confrontation with AFO where he decides for the first time to live beyond that fight. Kamino is the first time that All Might decides not to die because he wants to continue as a teacher and above all to be able to improve as a mentor for Midoriya, he wants to live to scold him. Then we have his conversation with Inko where he promises his life for Midoriya to be surprised when Inko tells him not to give his life but to live for Izuku, in Chisaki arc he tells Izuku that he decided to live for him. Later Toshinori talking to Aizawa tells him that he wants to live, here is an important step because it doesn't include Izuku but his desire comes from himself which is positive, of course Midoriya is an important factor but here Toshinori agrees to live for himself, not for other but because he wants to live.

With that saying, it remains to wonder if the conditions of Nighteye's vision have been altered or if the path that leads to this vision is the one that is being developed at the moment. The questions raised by Nighteye's quirk are: did his quirk already foresee Midoriya's introduction to All Might's life? Was the future that Sir saw in that hospital shaped by the lonely destiny that Toshinori seemed to have decided where he would work until his own death? I think we can all confirm that the All Might after the first victory against AFO isn't the same one who is now peeling off his Hercules armor, this Toshinori seems willing to accept the probability of death but this doesn't mean that he is actively looking for it or is it something that he simply accepts as an immovable fact.

Therefore, this fight is a true unknown, we know that Nighteye's future is possible of change Midoriya is the proof of it, the energy that surrounded Midoriya that day is what twisted the future, so the probability is open to that Toshinori himself, Horikoshi has not given us a specific description of this quirk, the path is open to interpretation and with it Toshinori's life or death, what we know is that Toshi has traveled a long way from the disenchanted hero who saw in another quirkless boy a hope and an opportunity and that at this moment is also answering the question from a long time ago