#but for fuck's sake they really do our dragon husband dirty

[masquerade-of-misery]

This is worse than I thought

I've just seen this post on Twitter and thought I'd share it. Here's the rest of the list:

So, as we can see, Malleus has the LEAST amount of cards out of everyone. Let that fucking sink in. When Mal stans say the game devs ignore him, they are not exaggerating. Poster boy my fucking ass!

Also, Malleus, Silver, Jade, and Epel only have one SSR. ONE.

[theharellan]

101 DRAGON AGE QUESTIONS | not accepting

for the sake of reducing the number of ooc posts i’m answering these all in one and just @ing the people who asked the questions! thank you for them all!

if you sent me one of these btw and rbed this meme yourself and i didn’t send you something, please let me know! i want to send you things back and must have missed you reblogging the meme. this includes non-mutuals.

1. How did you get into Dragon Age? | asked by @kaaras-adaar & @dreamerlavellan​

Sort of by accident, actually. It was the summer between my freshman and sophomore years in university (2011) and summertime is generally a time of inactivity and depression because I cannot tolerate the weather here. My dad happened to own Origins and I picked it up because??? Fantasy? RPG?

Starting the game I saw you could play as a dwarf, who have been my favourites in fantasy since a child as The Hobbit is among my favourite books. Then after that I fell in love with the worldbuilding for dwarves and Gorim, my first actual Dragon Age love. I was more or less hooked after that. DA was actually not my first Bioware game, I was obsessed with Jade Empire as a kid so like Origins appealed to me immediately despite being far less fun to play than literally any other Bioware game I’ve ever played. The characters and world more than made up for it.

I beat it relatively quickly and my dad bought Dragon Age II which had come out earlier that day, actually against my suggestion because I’d heard it wasn’t good. And in this instance my dad forgetting something I said turned out for the best because I ended up enjoying DAII more in some respects. While it took me a while to join the fandom as a content producer I was a consumer and certified DA trash from then on.

2. Have you finished all three games? | asked by @kaaras-adaar

Kskjdfs yes. I’ve beaten each at least 4 times, but probably more like 8. The only thing I haven’t played are some of the Origins DLC because as much as I enjoy my replays I am so ready to be out by the end of the game (and I have the worst luck with Awakening bugs) and I also don’t have Sebastians DLC b/c his never goes on sale individually and I refuse to spend more than like $4 on him.

3. How long did it take you to finish the series? | asked by @kaaras-adaar

I honestly don’t know. I think it took me like a week to beat Inquisition without 100%ing it, I’d say my first playthroughs all probably took about that long. I tend not to do everything in my first playthrough. Like shard collecting didn’t happen until round two, etc.

7. Favorite DA:O backstory? | asked by @dreamerlavellan & @fatefaulted

I’ve played through all of them and I enjoy them all except Cousland, but my favourite is Aeducan. I enjoy the politics, the culture, the aesthetic of Orzammar. I love Gorim Saelac and the surprising amount of depth to this character who is designed to be thrown away after the prologue. I love how it ties you to the Darkspawn threat in a bigger way than any of the origins accomplish. I love how it ties you to the Orzammar plot later in the game, and playing Aeducan first is probably one reason why I adore that branch of the game. It’s a good origin that establishes its world really well and has great characters to boot.

11. Share a pic of your favorite OC from any DA game. | asked by @dreamerlavellan

I just want to share pics of my girl and Solas’ future husband.

Ian Lavellan, non-Inquisitor written by @theshirallen

Thora Cadash, dwarven Inquisitor and default Inquisitor for this blog written by... me lmao.

22. Favorite DA2 party combo? | asked by @fatefaulted

My main Hawke is a mage Hawke, so this party is horrendously imbalanced, but: Varric, Merrill, Isabela. They all just like each other and I think that’s neat. Although in act one my favourite is probably Carver, Merrill, Isabela / Varric. Unfortunately the game doesn’t want me to have a warrior in my party.

24. Favorite main-story quest from DA:I? | asked by @kaaras-adaar

It’s hard to pick between In Hushed Whispers and In Your Heart Shall Burn. I love seeing the red lyrium’d companions and the dark future of Thedas, and speculating on what happened in the intervening year. I love reflecting on what it must do for the Inquisitor to see that and have it be undone. I think it sets up the rest of the game really well, and in ways Champions of the Just doesn’t do quite as well.

In Your Heart Shall burn is a simpler quest but I think the power and emotions in the quest are so raw. Playing this the first time was riveting and I was on the edge of my seat. The triumph of closing the Breach, the strangeness of your first encounter with Cole (whose appearance at the gates is another reason I prefer IHW tbh, I think it’s more tension building than Dorian’s), Corypheus, crawling through the snow. Capping it off with The Dawn Will Come and the journey to Skyhold idk, it’s just such an emotional high point in the series that every time I replay I get goosebumps.

25. Favorite DA:I place? | asked by @fatefaulted

It’s a tie between the Frostback Basin and the Emerald Graves. I love the lore in both, as elf trash I prefer the lore in the graves especially if I can include the Din’an Hanin into that category. But the Avvar lore and Ameridan is also Very Good, and while I adore the giant trees of the graves the Frostback Basin clearly was able to have more resources poured into its design, and as a result the different sections of the map have so much more character.

A close runner-up is the Hinterlands, as I think the quests there are fun and it feels like home. I enjoy returning to it. Which is good, b/c I’ve played through it... a lot... I think loving it might be a coping mechanism, but also I love the vibe of the early game that’s best captured in the Hinterlands.

32. Favorite DLC mission overall? | asked by @fatefaulted

Trespasser is up there with Shivering Isles as my favourite DLC ever produced. Its hits every emotional beat I think it needed to hit, set up the next game with greater detail and intrigue than the initial epilogue, and I’m honestly dying to get to replay it again on Thora despite what it does to my nerves. The first time I played it I could feel my heart beating faster like wtf me.

37. Blood magic: yes or no? | asked by @hopewrought​

Would I use it myself? No. Morally I think it can be reprehensible but also neutral, much like any other magic in the game. In certain characters I think even if used for good it may encourage unhealthy habits, but I think it can be learned to be engaged with in better ways.

59. Who was written really poorly? | asked by @theshirallen you can’t hide behind anon I know it was you

Oghren fucking Kondrat. When I think about the reasons Origins is my least favourite game he is among them. With Oghren there was a really good chance to portray an alcoholic abuse victim, suffering from severe mental health issues, and still mourning his wife, with the respect it deserves. Instead he just... is a gross sexist dwarf and his alcoholism is mostly played for jokes. And then he comes back in Awakening and... continues to be a gross sexist dwarf whose alcoholism is mostly played for jokes.

There could have been some really interesting stuff with Oghren, the Warrior caste of dwarves I think would suffer from issues similar to qunari warriors, where when they can no longer fill the purpose society has dictated they must serve, what then? They can’t do anything but fight. There could be comradery with Sten, or perhaps Zevran or Alistair, or any of the companions who have had the path their lives took dictated to them by societal forces they had no say in (even if they are happy with that direction). There are snippets of good stuff in here, the line “let us show them our hearts, Warden, and then show them theirs” is one of the best of the good-byes the game offers us imo. It’s a shame about what came before.

Like there are other characters, such as Sera, who I think were done dirty by their writers, but Sera at least got some growth in the DLC and there were attempts to address criticism of her character. Oghren in Awakening was just kind of a take two of an already poorly-done arc.

60. Who do you wish had been given more story? | asked by @hopewrought​

I wish Briala had more, like that she had some impact on the story in universes where Gaspard isn’t crowned with her as his puppetmaster. She and the elves reappears in that but not if you reunite her with Celene or exile her, and I think it would’ve been neat. I also wish she’d had a chance to interact with Solas in some small way given how many parallels were drawn by one of his own agents during Masked Empire.

I also wish we had more about dwarves in general in 2 and Inquisition. We get some great lore in Inquisition that was set up in 2, but with our only dwarf companion being Varric, who honestly has a relationship with his race that at times is comparable to Sera’s, it pulls a few of its punches. I really think they have dwarves set up to be important players in the next game, with their architecture featuring heavily in the dev diary, buuut no dwarves to be seen. So who knows. Just give me dwarves in the next game who aren’t Varric Bioware pls. Let me kiss one maybe.

61. Favorite NPC? | asked by @kaaras-adaar​

I’m not going to count advisors even though they kinda are NPCs and I’m going to answer one for each game so uhh...

Origins - Anora

DA2 - Feynriel

DA:I - Krem

Bonus - Lord Woolsley, the only unproblematic DA character

63. Best story moment? | asked by @ghilannainguideme

It’s a tie between the journey to Skyhold and the talk with Solas at the end of Trespasser and the resulting disbanding of the Inquisition (if you so choose). I really can’t separate them because I think the reason Trespasser works so well is how it calls back to the very beginning of Inquisition and that moment with Solas in the snow. It’s triumphant and sad, something’s ending, the fellowship is breaking, but you know all of you will continue to work towards a better world apart.

In DA:O I think it’d be saying good-bye before the final battle and in DA2 I think the moment where you can tell the Arishok he was right to take in the elves who killed that guardmen is good. Probably one of the reasons why I think Hawke-Arishok work so well as a protagonist-antagonist combination.

81. Favorite fanfic? | asked by @ghilannainguideme​

I don’t read a lot of fanfic, actually. Save what I read on here, which I do count, but idk if other people do.

My favourite writers to read are @theshirallen​, obviously. Joly wants to tweakIan’s personal quest but I think the version they have written now is still very good and you can find it here. I love reading Peace’s stuff and find their smut especially spicy in the best possible way, you can find a Merrill/f!Mahariel piece here! Gaia doesn’t write on Tumblr much these days, but she wrote a wonderful Tug/Sketch (the companions from Leliana’s Song) that you can find here.

I follow so many talented writers and I can’t list them all but here are a few I can fire off real fast: @theshirallen / @ghilannainguideme / @seahaloed / @sabraelin / @valorcorrupt / @mercysought / @hopewrought / @ofrevas / @skyheld have all moved me with their words at some point, be it in fic or rp.

82. Favorite fanart/fanartist? | asked by @ghilannainguideme

Again I just can’t choose jsdfks.

The easiest way is to just link my Solas fanart tag. Obviously this favours Solas artists, however, so also here’s a link to thedaswlw where there’s a boatload of amazing fanart all of wlw.

Of people I’m mutuals with I know @abracafockyou, @kaaras-adaar, @dalathin (currently inactive but I gotta link them), and @syntharts​ are all very talented artists.  I’m also a big fan of destinyapostacy, nipuni, elbenherzart, starscollected (on twitter), and many more.

97. What’s your favorite DA mod? | asked by @ghilannainguideme​ & @hopewrought​

I’ll chose one as many as I want to apparently from each game again, b/c why not?

DA:O - I have to admit I find this game hard to mod because nothing can really salvage the gameplay or look of the game. I need Better Dwarf Model so I don’t have to look at the odd dwarf proportions in the game (the women have arms for days). Mostly I have armour mods. I like Grey Wardens of Ferelden so I can match Alistair in the final batte and have everyone in uniforms in Awakening. I do like Kirkwall Exports because I can put Zevran in the robes of the notorious pirate tho. I haven’t used this mod yet but I also love this mod I retweeted this morning.

DA2 - Again, I don’t mod 2 very much. You could probably make some kind of chart for correlating my enjoyment of a game versus my urge to mod it, with the more I love a game means I want to mod it more. With 2 I enjoy the combat and overall design of the characters more so I mostly use a couple of tweaks, my favourite is Ishs Scarf for Merrill which just adds a cute blue scarf to Merrill and hides the fact that elves in this game have weirdly long necks. Oh and a mod to fix the weird hand dirt.

DA:I - Equal Opportunity Solas mod, I bought the game again on PC just to use it. Being able to play Solas/Ian for screencaps was everything tbh. Other mods I enjoy are More Banter, which while I have better luck with banter it is nice to be able to count on it. I installed it this latest pt and I have heard location comments that have never triggered before. Black Hair for Everyone has changed my life because finally Thora doesn’t have grey hair. No Dirt Buildup is also amazing, as the dirt can cause some really weird blotting on PCs that’s especially noticeable on dark-skinned Inquisitors.

99. Where would you live (Ferelden, Orlais, Free Marches etc?) | asked by @heysales​​

Probably Ferelden. It is fantasy England and hey if I make it past Inquisition maybe nothing will ever happen there again. Somewhere in the Free Marches might also be chill. Not Kirkwall. Maybe Starkhaven? Honestly tho I just want to live in the Frostback Basin. Have a spirit friend. Shake hands with nugs.

101. If you could meet your Warden/Hawke/Inquisitor, what would you say? | asked by @dreamerlavellan​

If I met Thora I’d tell her I’m proud of her. She’d be confused, but that’s ok.

[theyearoftheking]

Book Forty-Eight: Dreamcatcher

Here’s some random information about me. First and foremost, I hate poop. The smell of dog poop makes me start gagging. Can’t handle it. Never have, never will. My husband knows he’s on active duty (ha! pun NOT intended) if one of our dogs has an accident in the house.

So, it’s kind of ironic I work for a pharmaceutical company that promotes all kinds of GI drugs... I’ve helped sell drugs for various kinds of IBS, and now opioid induced constipation. I spend my work days talking to doctors about poop while they eat tacos. Truly... that’s how I spent my lunch hour yesterday. 

So, why am I talking about poop? Dreamcatcher, y’all. This book is literally FULL OF SHIT. We’re talking everything from the smelliest, most graphically described excrement, to high school aged kids trying to force a boy to eat dog poop... SO MUCH POOP. 

Which made me wonder... Steve wrote this book after his horrific accident, which I’m sure involved massive amounts of pain-killers. Was Steve suffering from opioid induced constipation? Was Steve dreaming about a massive shit that would ease his constipation pains? It’s really the only logical thing I can think of. 

I haven’t read this book since it was first published back in 2001, but  the first thing I always think of is how graphically Steve describes the smell of poop... “a mixture of ether and overripe bananas...” 

Gross. 

So gross. 

Dreamcatcher is an alien invasion story... aliens plan to take over a hunting town in rural, northern Maine. And they multiply by fuzzy spores, known as byrus. When someone comes into contact with the spores, it’s not long before an alien explodes out their anus... hence, the horrible smell and flatulence. 

Four friends, Beaver, Henry, Jonsey, and Pete are all up north hunting when the alien invasion goes down. Jonsey ends up with the alien leader, Mr. Gray, invading his body; Pete and Beaver end up dead, and Henry is tasked with preventing Mr. Gray from depositing a dog heavy with byrus into a major water filtration plant, which would infect a huge swath of the population. 

The boys all have a low-grade form of telepathy, which they developed the day they helped save Douglas “Duddits” Cavill from some high school kids who stripped him down, and tried to force him to eat a dog turd. Duddits has Down Syndrome, and was walking home from school when he was accosted by the high school assholes. After the rescue, Beaver, Henry, Jonsey, and Pete added Duddits to their clan, and he’d tag along with them, play cribbage, basically be one of the boys. 

Their telepathy has intensified into adulthood, and while the boys have lost touch with Duddits, they still try to go hunting every year. So, they’re out hunting when the aliens and the National Guard sweep in. The Guard tries to keep everyone quarantined and prevent the spread of the byrus. It’s okay... take a second and laugh. It’s just another example of life imitating prophetic art. There’s one particularly ucky guardsman, Kurtz, who just wants to build a name for himself by killing the entire town, and preventing the spread of the aliens. 

75% of the book is a race between Jonsey/Mr. Gray, Kurtz, and Henry/another guardsman and eventually Duddits. Henry and Duddits save the world, Duddits succumbs to the leukemia that has been killing him, and life goes on, shit and all. 

There were some fun Steve universe mentions: 

The town of Derry, Maine

Castle Rock radio station

Low men

The Losers Club 

Pennywise

The Dead Zone

Shawshank 

And then there were some lines that made me laugh. cringe, and want to cry. Shall we proceed?

The concept of “temporary quarantine”. We’re currently on day 572,000 of social distancing, quarantining, and living our best lives six feet apart. We were also told this would be temporary.

“Silence gives consent” Steve, buddy, pal... can we work on updating this line in future publications? I think we know that only consent gives consent. Silence is NOT consent. Help a girl out here. Speaking of consent, there’s a line, “...he was with Tom T. Hall: he liked beer.” I immediately thought of this asshole. 

He also thinks silence is consent, and likes beer. For fucks sake, does this man not have the most punchable face in the world? Just looking at it is raising my blood pressure. Fuckstick. 

So, then there’s the greatest debate of our time... “Underhill donned his mask and adjusted the straps without further comment...Do they work? They work on Ebola, they work on anthrax, they work on that new super-cholera. Do they work on Ripley? Probably. If not, we’re fucked, soldier. In fact, we may be fucked already.” I laughed way harder than I should have at this line. Do the world a favor, and just wear ya masks, kids. Look at this cute gaiter I got on Etsy!

Then, there was a reference to a period in time when the Patriots sucked, and no one wanted to root for them. As a die-hard Carolina Panthers fan (don’t ask, it’s a long story); I was pissed with how the Panthers did Cam Newton dirty. So, I’m hoping the Pats have a fantastic season, and make it to the Super Bowl. 

And finally, there was a speech from the fictional president about the alien infection, in which he said, “...we believe that our visitors brought this virus with them much as travelers from abroad may bring certain insects into their country of origin in their luggage or on the produce they’ve purchased. This is something customs officers look for, but of course-our recent visitors did not pass through a customs checkpoint...” 

There’s a good chance this president would have also referred to Covid as, “The China Virus”. 

The plot of this book? Meh. But the number of parallels to our current society nineteen years later? Excellent. Also, I give maddd props to Steve for writing this book out longhand, while recovering from an accident that could have taken his life (or at the very least, his leg). While Dreamcatcher is never going to be one of favorites, you have to respect the grind. 

Total Wisconsin Mentions: 30

Total Dark Tower References: 45

Book Grade: D

Rebecca’s Definitive Ranking of Stephen King Books

The Talisman: A+

Wizard and Glass: A+

Needful Things: A+

On Writing: A+

The Green Mile: A+

Hearts in Atlantis: A+

Rose Madder: A+

Misery: A+

Different Seasons: A+

It: A+

Four Past Midnight: A+

The Shining: A-

The Stand: A-

Bag of Bones: A-

The Wastelands: A-

The Drawing of the Three: A-

Dolores Claiborne: A-

Nightmares in the Sky: B+

The Dark Half: B+

Skeleton Crew: B+

The Dead Zone: B+

Nightmares & Dreamscapes: B+

‘Salem’s Lot: B+

Carrie: B+

Creepshow: B+

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon: B

Storm of the Century: B-

Cycle of the Werewolf: B-

Danse Macabre: B-

The Running Man: C+

Thinner: C+

Dark Visions: C+

The Eyes of the Dragon: C+

The Long Walk: C+

The Gunslinger: C+

Pet Sematary: C+

Firestarter: C+

Rage: C

Desperation: C-

Insomnia: C-

Cujo: C-

Nightshift: C-

Gerald’s Game: D

Roadwork: D

Christine: D

Dreamcatcher: D

The Regulators: D

The Tommyknockers: D-

Next, is Black House... which I’m rapidly devouring. The Talisman is still fresh(ish) in my mind, so that should help with making connections between the two. 

Until next time, Long Days & Pleasant Nights, Rebecca