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frenchphobic · 4 years

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long fucking post on why a c!dream is a shitty person and probably should not have a redemption because it is unpog

honestly i just want to refute dream apologists thats why im making this post. i think that dream as a villain is interesting but i think that trying to make him out to be secretly a good guy is just bad ngl. also /roleplay and all

tw for abuse and mentions of suicide

dream as a villain

dream is a villain. he is chaotic evil according to wilbur, deliberately does not stream to appear less sympathetic (and yet), and is set up as an antagonist to tommy who bears the title ‘hero’. dream is not a good person, no matter how you look at it or try to justify his actions.

‘but he wants to unite everyone to be a big family :((’ the ends dont justify the means believe it or not. having a vaguely positive goal does not excuse the actions you’ve done. it also goes hand and hand with saying dream is correct for punishing tommy the way he did because he acted up. if i socked you across the face and then suddenly said ‘sorry there was a roach on ur face’ does that make it okay? probably not i still punched you, enacting an unnecessary amount of violence. thats a very simple analogy i will admit and there are more complex comparisons. another example off the top of my head is say a child just scribbled all over you walls with crayons. would hitting them be a justified answer? if u said hes thats really fucked of u go seek help u loon. violence as a punishment is very toxic, just because it gets the job done does not mean it is okay. at the end of the day, you still committed this act and the harm you caused is real, having a good motive doesnt suddenly make it okay.

‘but tommy causes all of the conflict’ the disk war wasnt even caused by tommy, it was sapnap and then tommy got involved. and the reason why tommy even caused conflict was because of the discs, because he wanted them back. and most of the time there was a level of antagonism from another party, such as schlatt exiling him, dream taking the disks in the first place, dream threatening l’manberg. and if dream wanted to end the conflict so badly, why didnt he just give tommy back his disks? tommy upfront said everything started with the disks, so he wants them back so he could end the conflict. notice how after tommy got his disks back he has been staying out of conflict, apologizing to everyone, and the only bad thing hes done is try to scam people but everyone does that. this would have been the most peaceful option, yet dream chose the path that would further antagonize tommy which then draws everyone else into conflict. why did dream need to have leverage over tommy so badly? why did he want to hold power over tommy so badly? its because of control, and that’s ultimately dreams end goal. sure he wants a big server family, but would said family have a free will?

‘but dream is sad’ the thing is dream is completely at fault for everything that happened to him. he pushed away sapnap (and george ig). he tried to take control over the server and their possessions. literally everything that happened to tommy. literally everything involving ranboo. villains can be sympathetic, i am not arguing against that. but it does not mean that they should be left off the hook. that doesnt mean u should ignore the shit theyve done because ‘oh no theyre sad’ because it doesnt make anything better. dream had this shit coming for him.

now people also skirt around calling dream an abuser. which is fair ig, its a very loaded word. its much easier to say manipulated. that being said, dream can classify as abusive. and no, tommy is not abusive. abuse is about control and a power imbalance. dream has power over tommy, but tommy does not have power over dream, at least not in the way dream does. he’s taking back power to stand up for himself, dream uses power to control.

the reasons i listed for why dream is from the Domestic Abuse Intervention Project so if u want a source on that, there you go.

using coercion or threats: dream often threatened tommy, such as the pit thing and often employed violence on him. while normally this could be attributed to Normal Minecraft Player Go Smack. minecraft mechanics cannot always translate to real world since violence is pretty normal in minecraft however we also need to consider the context of the scene. dream gave an order, tommy refused, dream applies violence, tommy submitted. thats why its a threat, it has tangible effects that can correlate to real life.

using intimidation: dream blew up logsteadshire as a punishment. dream also destroyed tommys items anytime he visited. dream also hit tommy with his axe i believe. he killed mushroom henry, one of tommys pets.

Using Emotional Abuse: dream guiltripped the shit out of tommy for just hiding things and pinning the blame on tommy for just wanting his own private items. he definitely played mind games on tommy, pretending to be his friend. honestly i probably dont even need to go as in depth because it was so obvious.

Using Isolation: putting him in exile in the first place. destroying the bether portal so no one could visit tommy anymore. i really dont think i need to expand upon that.

Minimizing, Denying, and Blaming: dream in tommys stream when he got trapped said that exile wasnt that bad. he does shift the blame onto tommy for logsteadshire being blown up, even though dreams reaction was entirely unjustified for not listening and hiding.

Using Economic Abuse: see this is where i attempt to parallel minecraft mechanics to real life. obviously, there is no monetary system in place, so when i mean economic, i will use valuables such as armor, food, etc in place of currency. the idea behind economic abuse is to limit the victim’s resources so that they are dependent on the abuser and cannot escape. dream only really allowed tommy to have the armor he gave him while not giving access to armor so he does not regain a sense of power, and in the prison stream, dream holds all the potatoes which puts him in a position of power over tommy. this argument is more ambiguous i feel cause the whole minecraft mechanics thing is kinda weird so u don’t necessarily have to take this part in.

i feel like i need to emphasize this very strongly because dream is not a good person. abuse cannot and should not be a response to someone. its an awful mentality to have. i just want to prove the point that dream is not a good person, his reasons absolutely do not justify his actions.

what makes a good redemption

redemption arcs are tricky. when done right they are great. when done poorly, its a slap in the face. rn im going to establish a formula to what makes a good redemption with an example.

the most well known example of a good redemption is zuko from atla. first, its the magnitude of what theyve done and why. zuko did commit some shitty actions, since he was in a position of power in the fire nation but its because he is a child being abused and wanted to regain honor. zukos real awful acts was season 1 and the whole betrayal thing. thats not to say that zukos actions suddenly are okay, he did shitty things. but its something that can be traced to a higher entity or seem less malicious then the other villains. the thing also about the magnitude of actions is that there is a certain point of atrocities that there is no redemption. some people simply cannot be redeemed because the actions they commit are so ingrained in their character or the action itself has serious moral issues that it would just be wrong.

the next is acknowleding what they did was wrong. a genuine reflection on the self and analyzing what they did and why it was not okay. zuko realized what he did to uncle iroh was bad for example. he turned his back on his father, realizing he didnt and shouldnt seek acknowledgment from someone as heinous as him. its pointing out your actions and going ‘hey, this wasnt right i should not have done this’ and not even excusing ur actions. its also going straight for the root of the problem and figuring out to stamp it from the source. just because a character is sad does not mean they are reflecting, sometimes they are attempting to garner pity. it has to be direct and clear acknowledgement of the injustice.

and finally, an important part about redemption arcs is the actual redemption part. its when you make amends. zuko made amends with katara by trying to help her get revenge, he fought against the fire nation and tried to make things more peaceful in his rule. he apologized to iroh. an important part of the amends section is that it does have to be a genuine desire to change and become a better person, not to change a person’s perception of you. the thing is u cant expect a person youve hurt to forgive you. you cant expect people to be sympathetic towards you nor should u attempt to make urself sympathetic. u shouldnt be expecting a pat on the back or an award. redemption is about internal and character change.

why dream should not be redeemed

ive already established the key points to a good redemption (imo) but heres where dream falls short. his actions are extremely heavy so redemption may not even really be possible. abuse is not something you can wave off so it does cross to the point of fucked up. acknowledgement of what he did was wrong? all he said was that he changed, yet never explained why he changed or was too vague. he needed to label specifically what he did and bring it up. attempting to make amends? he’s been doing the exact opposite in fact he continues to manipulate tommy and ranboo. its not a genuine change. he is still repeating the cycle and has given no indication of ceasing. at the moment he does not have any signs of redemption.

and the thing is most of the attention around a dream redemption comes from either justifying his motives (which i do want to emphasize does not make anything suddenly okay) and because he is sad in prison sad face. these are not good reasons. its gonna pain me severely to bring this up but snape from harry potter does have some form of sad character ig yet he very much abused his authority to bully children as old as 11 just because he said ‘aight gonna die’ doesnt suddenly make his general bigotry and abuse suddenly okay there is a threshold. again im so sorry for using harry potter as an example none were coming to mind and i needed a popular one i do not like harry potter please dont say i do i would pass away.

and the last thing to consider is the audience. keep in mind that the audience is composed of minors and while yes there are adults, minors are the main component of the fandom. keep in mind that there are quite a few people who can relate to tommys character because they might be in the same position or have gone through his experiences. tell me what kind of message does it send to that audience that abusers can be redeemed. this is not a narrative u should push to this audience in these situations and the writers are seemingly aware of it. remember how in exile tommy spiraled into a suicidal mentality? consider how fucked of a message it would be if he just committed suicide instead of escaping abuse and attempting to recover from his experiences. tommy did an excellent job in not going that route and having a message of ‘it will not get better’. its the same thing here. victims are not obligated to care for or forgive their abuser, and portraying an abuser as sympathetic might fuck with the message a lot, even change their perception in that ‘oh, maybe my abuser was right, maybe they had a reason for treating me the way they did’. this is not to say that every victim watching this will internalize this message, but people also look up to these characters. there can be a degree of influence from the story onto oneself and thats the dangerous part.

conclusion

all in all dream is a shitbag asshole and probably shouldnt get a redemption because it would not be pog thanks for coming to my ted talk.

#dream smp #dsmp #tommyinnit #dreamwastaken

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nemirutami · 6 years

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Detective au??? Dude ur after my heart I wanna know

I WILL INDULGE YOU.... A LOT! Because who else will ask for this? No one, I say.

It’s a pegokita AU, and no one is shocked.

There’s also a Minake detective au but it’s very different and I could talk abt that in a whole dif post.

Alright, so the basic premise is that Minato and Akira work together to solve mysteries (one big one in particular). Pretty simple, but I have additional lil details/notes I know I’ve worked out for it, so I’ll share those!

Akira is a good cop that catches bad guys, but he does it... unconventionally. He breaks laws sometimes just to catch them, which... pisses off his supervisors a lot, especially if he does property damage and costs them money. So, one day, they all collectively decide that they want to get rid of him, and decide to put him on duty with this very obscure detective agency in town. Akira isn’t happy at all, he’s such a ween about it because “I’m your best unit and you’re sending me off to God only knows where? Wtf will I do over there? What?” but he’s in enough trouble as it is so they hope that the detective that’s going to act as his mentor in that agency will be able to straighten him out and keep him in line.

Enter Minato, the mentor they mentioned above. Minato owes Akira’s supervisor big time so he can’t possibly deny this request. However, all Minato is told is that “someone from the station will be working under you for a couple of months, consider him your new assistant” but even Minato knows that this is just code for “take this guy off our hands, we want to breathe” LMFAO, so Minato is expecting a troublemaker but God he has NO IDEA just how much trouble Akira will be.

Minato is a pretty well-known detective due to his track record. However, the hype about him died down ever since his partner was killed in a major tragedy (Sorry Aegis, in this au, I needed you to be a meat shield) and since then, Minato’s done everything to stay under the radar. For what reason? Who knows? He’s never told anyone his motive, and he pretends not to know or care when others ask him about it. Like he’s blacked out the events of years ago? He gave up on his own agency and left to work for the Kirijos, a much smaller and less known agency in an obscure part of the city. He signs all his official documents with an alias “Sakuya Shiome” so that no one can trace orders/cases back to him. For all the public knows, Minato Arisato no longer exists, and Sakuya Shiome is a separate entity entirely that has no ties to him what so ever. You hear the name “Sakuya” and all you think is “some random guy working an office job... or something”.

That doesn’t mean people don’t know he’s alive though. People who Minato trusts know his identity. No one in the Kirijo Agency calls him “Sakuya”, and no one in public would ever assume his name was “Sakuya” since he was involved in a major tragedy that aired nationally. Mitsuru assumes Minato is trying to catch the people responsible (and she keeps asking him about it specifically to keep him from doing so...) but really... he’s just trying to live a normal life after Aegis took a hit for him. He figures, if he goes after the people responsible, all Aegis’s work will come undone, because the people they were dealing with WILL kill them on the spot if they find them. Then what? Aegis would have died for nothing so he could get away.

So, Minato’s living peacefully in secrecy not to poke a sleeping bear (bc who knows, the people he tried to expose years ago in that tragedy might still be after him). Now, enter Akira.

Akira’s police station works closely with detectives and scientists when it comes to examining evidence and gathering intel, so he knows at first glance who Minato is.

I have to mention that Akira was so not ok with this job lmfao he was a pouty grumpy bitch because “I’m better than this I DESERVE BETTER THAN THIS I DID NOTHING WRONG...” but then Minato enters like “So, you’re the new assistant... eh, you’ll do.” and Akira is wide eyed bc this guy is??? His senpai? He gets doki over him... but it all fades pretty quickly when the “legendary detective” only wants him to do paperwork.

It’s been like... Two whole weeks and Akira hasn’t stepped foot outside Minato’s office space? Whenever he asks Minato about going out and investigating, Minato turns him down and says he was ordered to help, not to whine. Minato was talked about as someone who wasn’t afraid to take risks, but most times when Akira arrives to work in the morning, he finds Minato passed out on his workdesk, probably hasn’t even left the office to go home? Stayed in there all this time? Akira’s admiration fades rather quickly, thinking, “This isn’t the person I came to admire, right?” and he calls Minato out.

Akira’s already upset he isn’t allowed to go out and do things, and asks Minato if he isn’t ashamed to have sunk so low? To have become... lazy? A shut in? He doesn’t get a response from Minato. All Minato does is check the drawers very carefully for a case file that he hands it over to Akira. He tells him to go out and investigate on his own. Akira isn’t disappointed because this means “SUNLIGHT!!! I GET TO GO OUTSIDE!!!” but it’s so clearly a tactic Minato’s used to get Akira out of his face, so Akira calls him out on that too, and Minato doesn’t deny it at all. “Good, now leave. You have work to do.” but when Akira tries to press him to follow along, and Minato draws back with “Just get out of my face...” and that’s enough for Akira to back off... for now.

The selling point for this is that Akira’s gonna make a WHOLE LOT OF NOISE and put the agency on the map unintentionally and that’s going to result in the wrong people finding out Minato’s still alive. However, Akira being there is going to help Minato regain courage to actually go out and investigate on his own again, which he hasn’t done since the tragedy. He’ll learn to use Akira as his messenger and as his source, sending him out on missions and making Akira travel to areas he can’t reach on his own.

This is a detail they only find out later, but during the tragedy where Aegis dies, Minato ends up breaking his leg. Since the team that killed Aegis are still onto him, he has to check out of the hospital almost immediately after surgery and turn down therapy for the sake of survival. So, the group that actually helps him recover some mobility is the Kirijo group (perhaps the only people Minato would trust with his life when it came to that sort of thing). So, Minato can move, he can walk, but he can’t run for long periods of time.

He never really bothered to recover more than necessary, because he was sure he wouldn’t be able to ever step outside again, so he only regained enough mobility to walk back and forth between his apartment and his office space (which are all pretty close, and even then, he sleeps in his office when he doesn’t have the energy to walk back home).

There are a few more notes I think, but this will suffice for now. Detective AUS... I love detective AUS...

#tnt answers asks #detective au #wolfir-shard

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diamond-song42 · 5 years

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Card Shark 85: Creepy Crawlies

Welcome back to Card Shark, my friends! I’ve been feeling burnt out and needed to relax a bit now that university finals are over, but I intend to bring you a bunch of new Sharks before Christmas (including a special holiday Shark!). Now for today’s Shark, I’m looking at what might be the scariest card in Leaders and Legends… at least visually. Let’s take a look at “Creepy Crawlies!”

Thanks to the set designers for haunting my dreams. This is a nice even Event with its 3 AT cost, 3 Yellow req, and 3 power. During your Main Phase, you can play it to dismiss a Friend or Resource, any Friend or Resource! Depending on the AT cost of the dismissed Friend or Resource, the controller of the dismissed Friend or Resource may put a number of Critter Tokens into play matching that cost. (So, for example, if Crawlies dismissed an opposing Staff of Sacanas, that’s 2 Critter Tokens the opponent can put into play.) This card can get rather unpredictable that way. And it’s important to note you can do it to yourself! You could dismiss one of your own Friends or Resources and get some Critter Tokens in exchange. Of course, you may be asking yourself, “What good does a tradeoff like this do?”. And to that I say it primarily depends on what you get rid of. There are plenty of ways to make the best out of Critter Tokens, some of which I’ll go into detail on later. But you have to make sure the tradeoff will be more beneficial than the card you dismiss. Not factoring in Critter boosters, what would be considered an uneven trade, then? Well, let’s say you get rid of something cheap, like one of the Rainbow Powered Mane 6 Friends from High Magic. The Friends only cost 1 AT, but they have 2 power, and Crawlies draws from AT cost, not printed power. But chances are you’d plan around potential discrepancies like this, and that only makes this card more shocking.

Let’s put aside the disturbing graphics for a minute and see where this card goes wrong technically. It is a good source of Resource removal if you’re in a pinch and can’t reach something like Bewitched Beavers or Friends Are Always There. But if you do that to your opponent, they have the option to put extra power in play. And Critter Token decks are not an uncommon thing, my friends. They could reap from seemingly small units of power greatly. So while you could get rid of an opposing Friend or Resource, your opponent may only bounce back from that loss stronger than before. It’s also worth noting that Crawlies’ payoff for you may take a while to set up. You must have a Friend or Resource in play of your own to play it, and you’ll always end up paying a minimum 4 AT to play everything. Even those cards that decrease the cost of the cards you pay still need to be played with AT, so you’ll probably never end up paying just 3 AT. It’s a bit of an expensive procedure. That’s the world of MLP:CCG for you. Even so, this can still be a hard hitter when played at the right time. I wouldn’t build an entire deck around it, but I highly recommend its use.

Here’s a few more cards to help you gather all the animals like Starlight Glimmer asked:

*Rarity, Booming Business. This may seem like a surprising suggestion as it is not a Yellow Mane. But this Mane may be one of the best to benefit from Token Friends of any kind, and is also my favorite new Mane from Leaders and Legends. As long as your opponent controls a non-Token Friend (yours or theirs), they can’t retire Token Friends for being in excess of their home limit. Creepy Crawlies certainly is a good incentive for your opponent to make up the power of a lost Friend or Resource. Your opponent gets free power off of you! But then they have to choose whether controlling Token Friends (in this case, Critter Tokens) is a risk they’re willing to take. While there is a chance they won’t choose to put Critter Tokens into play, depending on what you dismiss, that’s still power your opponent has to make up. And it’s an effect that’s super hard to shut off if you make it work, as it’s a Mane Character effect! Business is booming, alright... at least for your side.

*Queen Novo, Benevolent Ruler. If you’re running Crawlies to use on your own cards, this is a good UR to have on hand. Faceoffs involving Benevolent Ruler decide the winner based on the player with the lowest total power, not the highest. With Crawlies, if you’re prepping for a big Faceoff, you can reduce the power on your side and kick Novo into high gear. Ideally, you’d Crawlie a Friend or Resource with lower cost than power, a fairly easy task to accomplish. It’s a delicate balance, but a beneficial balance nonetheless.

*Rarity, Radiance. Here’s one to use if you’re focusing on dismissing your own Resources, specifically Accessories (but you must have some cards in your hand you’re willing to banish/part with for the rest of the game). First, you play Crawlies and get rid of an Accessory, played by you on one of your Friends or one of your opponent’s Friends. After you put your Critter Token(s) into play, you banish a non-Resource card from your hand and activate Radiance. You can not only search your deck for an Accessory to put into your hand, but your discard pile as well! That way, you can get back any Accessories you may dismiss with Crawlies and use them again. You just have to make sure your Accessories don’t get dismissed by your opponent before you can make the most of them - while you could still retrieve them from your discard pile, it doesn’t do much good to dismiss an already dismissed card, does it?

*Fast Food. This is not a Resource you’d dismiss with Creepy Crawlies, but would use to benefit those Critter Tokens you put into play. Fast Food boosts your Critters’ power by 1, effectively increasing any Critter Tokens’ power to 2. A system like this could guarantee your Critter Tokens overpower any Friend of yours you dismiss, even if the AT-to-base power ratio is a bit uneven. Again, however, beware that your opponent may try to get rid of your Fast Food before you can use it - effective Resource removal tactics aren’t limited to Yellow!

Thanks for reading this installment of Card Shark! In the next Shark, I’m going back to covering Friends and looking at a dual-color Friend that makes so many players happy I can’t even. Start making your guesses as to what that Friend is! Diamond out!

#my little pony #mlp:fim #my little pony friendship is magic #mlp #ccg #mlpccg #mlp:ccg #leaders and legends #set 11 #event #creepy crawlies #every little thing she does #card shark #bugs

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ask-shakespearehigh · 6 years

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Q&A post with the Mods!!!!

This is going to be a long one oh boy

How strict is the delineation of creative control vis-a-vis characters/plays between the mods? (@pedanticlecturer)

We generally have the plays split up along lines of “what we know”— we have a list at the very beginning of the blog. Sometimes we’ll draw the others’ characters (mostly me drawing some of Star’s…) but even then the final say on characterization is up to the “main” mod for that play — mod aster

what aster said -- mod star

What is your favorite play? What is your favorite character in terms of how they were written in the source material? (@pedanticlecturer)

I think my favorite play overall is Macbeth, just because I like the vibes (and the fact that I too could kill Macbeth), the fact that you don’t say it’s name in theatres, and the fact that it’s a play I did a full read through and analysis of in class. Favorite character? Puck from Midsummer. — mod aster

uhhhh,, hmm. ive always had a soft spot for midsummer since i saw it with aster esp bc of how fun the costumes were. of the comedies it has the largest potential to be the most visually pleasing bc of the concept of fairies,,,and im gay and dramatic so i love that. id die if i got to costume design for midsummer,,,or be in it,,,yeah. fav character. hmm. probably mercutio?? i recently saw a version of romeo and juliet where mercutio was played by a woman and oh my god it was amazing!!! not to mention mercutio’s portrayal in baz luhrmann's INCREDIBLE version of r n j!!! (I based my mercutio design on him) he just spends the entire time making dick jokes. love that. -- mod star

How do you answer asks so fast? I mean it's great but I'm impressed 😂 (Anon)

Personally, it’s a mix of: notifications on, quick drawing speed, and using the blog to avoid my class work — mod aster

aster is fast and (as you can see from all of my answers) im lazey -- mod star

Are there any elements/characters of the plays you're covering that you would have liked to work into this blog's plot, but couldn't due to the constraints of the setting or the synthetic nature of the blog? (@pedanticlecturer)

I wanted to make everyone gay but unfortunately due to plot constraints we have to have some hets but that wont stop me from making it lgbt as possible. -- mod star

I did want to make The Tempest more of a central play, but it just didn’t translate well. Similarly, other supernatural elements like the witches in Macbeth. This isn’t so much a constraint mentioned, but my own time/energy means that I want to show the Macbeth backstory, in a specific format, but I can’t right now— mod aster

Is there a hierarchy of import when it comes to each play's individualized impact on shakespeare high's general arc? If so, what plays are crucial to the foundation of the story? Which ones did you do mostly for shits and giggles? (@pedanticlecturer)

This is phrased like an ACT question and i might not answer it right so sorry in advance but: mod aster and i only selected a few plays for each of us to do given we dont know all of shakespeare’s works, but we tend to put more emphasis on the the more well known. But it also comes down to 1. How much we have plotted out for each play and 2. What the followers ask about most. Our two most popular are hamlet and macbeth bc people are familiar w those but around march caesar always becomes relevant again. I didnt even have designs for some of the characters until someone asked about them. -- mod star

I would say the same as star— it generally comes down to what people ask about. I will say that the overall plot is sort of separated into “has happened” and “is happening”. Like, the human potion of Midsummer, Julius Caesar, and Macbeth are all in the “aftermath” portion, while Twelfth Night, Hamlet, and Romeo and Juliet, among others, are happening. We’re trying to incorporate as much as we can, and I don’t think any of them were really put in without some thought.— mod aster

What personal significance does shakespeare hold in ur guys' lives? (@pedanticlecturer)

I go to a theater school rn and so ive dealt w shakespeare (although not all of them) it also helps that i was in loves labours lost last year as moth and that i read hamlet and r n j. Theres also a theater in my state that always does One Big Shakespeare per season and they always do them super well!!! My love for shakespeare probably started w seeing midsummer at that theater w mod aster!!! So. Theater kid rights!! -- mod star

To be honest, I got back into Shakespeare Because of the blog. I’ve been friends with some people that got really Pretentious about Shakespeare, and it kinda put me off of it. I did have a book of abridged plays (the plays’ plots written out in prose, basically) that I read as a kid, which is what got me into not only the plots of a lot of the plays, but also the idea of having them illustrated. And, same as star, the theater in state does the One Big Shakespeare— and they tend to do some really cool things with the costumes, setting them in diff time periods. I haven’t been able to see any lately since I’ve moved, but they still slap. — mod aster

🥰😘💙🥰🥰💜💟🥰I 😍💗💚😍😍LOVE🖤🖤 YALL ♥️♥️🧡💛💚💝❣️💕💘💖💗💓💞💝❤️💛💜 okay now i have a question i swear— how long have the two of you been doing art??? and what were your first shakespeare plays??? (@hellaghosts)

Uhh i started drawing when i was like idk 12 and i have the giant boxes of sketchbooks to prove it!!! I moved to digital art at abt 14-15 but mostly stayed traditional until this yr when i got a Neat New Tablet so some of my sketchbooks are sitting abandoned rip. My first shakespeare was either romeo and juliet or midsummer nights dream and i love both of them v much!!! I have a very old piece of art that i did for r n j for my freshman class assignment on it and it hasnt aged well alsdjfjafd circa 2016 i think??? -- mod star

Oh man. I started drawing when I was about 10, but it was Bad. I don’t think I got much into drawing again until I was about 14? Sometime around the end of middle school/beginning of high school. I would say I started getting into drawing as more than doodling/coloring edits sometime around 2015-16? I would draw on my iPad with my finger, then I got a tablet for my computer, and now I pretty much stick to my iPad with an Apple Pencil. My first Shakespeare play was….. uh…… probably Midsummer???? I have No idea. We would go to plays when I was little, so I honestly don’t remember if I saw others before. It may have been Romeo and Juliet— I had that book where it was the original and the “modernized” with the little dog that explained things— which, if you know it makes sense, but if you don’t is probably a bonkers answer. — mod aster

Do you think this blog has like? An overarching thesis (be it b/c intentionally or simply b/c ur own take on the world has bled thru to the point where u believe it’s central to the piece at this point)? (@pedanticlecturer)

Not gonna lie, I had to read that like three times AND dm you to figure out what you were asking from us and all I have is “be gay, respect women, write your own happy endings”. — mod aster

This blog started with an ides of march shitpost and you think we have enough brain energy to write a whole thesis? I projected feelings of found family onto my half of the blog but idk if that counts. Be gay do crime 420 69 -- mod star

What’s the nature/rough dynamic of ur relationship? How do y’all know each other? (@pedanticlecturer)

Met mod aster when i was like 4 and even tho we didnt live close we became like, best friends although the Best part didnt start until we were like 13-ish and eventually we talked like non stop (about anime and homestuck. Yknow. 13 year old kid things) and we didnt see each other a lot bc of Distance and now its even worse bc aster is in colleg.,e but we consider each other siblings regardless of family bc we’re adopted into our own respective families so that bled over into our friendship and it would feel weird calling him anything other than my brother now. We’ve seen each other at our best and worst and if you really want a good insight on what we’re like as siblings watch griffin and justin mcelroy’s overview video of catlateral damage wherein i am griffin and he is the long suffering justin. -- mod star

Star is basically my long distance sibling and functionally the only cousin I recognize bc like their parents are basically an aunt and uncle and like our dads look enough alike that we’ve both accidentally gotten the wrong dad for a hug or similar so like. Anyways yeah Star is the Griffin to my Justin, complete with our absent middle brother who we love dearly— mod aster

Dubiously relevant q but what kind of music do y’all listen to when u do art (if that is indeed a habit either of u partake in) (@pedanticlecturer)

It can depend on the piece? I was working on some (unrelated) oc prints that were song-focused, and for those I just listened to said song on loop. Sometimes I have playlists. Sometimes I’ll just be in a Mood and throw a song on loop. But a lot of time for the blog, I’ll listen to The Adventure Zone for the billionth time, because I have Too Much Attention. I’ve also, on request from Star, linked the most recent “loop song”.— mod aster

I tend to obsess over the same like 3 songs every few weeks so those get listened to on repeat but it also depends on the tone of what im drawing or who im drawing i might genre switch bc of that. If im drawing ophelia i stick to lana del rey and if im drawing hamlet its the neighborhood, horatio is sufjan stevens etc. i have categorized,. Most of the characters i draw into different songs/genres/energies of music but not like i ever follow that. Sometimes i just pull up a really long nonsense video and forget to draw. Essentially: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ -- mod star

How’d y’all come up with ur pseudonyms? (@pedanticlecturer)

I love space so much and my main blog is starryeydsailor space gay rights!! Im also tiny and full of energy and bright so basically i;m star -- mod star

Uhhhh i was like “hey i want to do uhhhhhh flower?” And then I google searched flower names until I found one I liked —- mod aster

How did you end up deciding the rough timeline of events in canon? (@pedanticlecturer)

It’s mostly determined by like. How we choose per story? If that makes sense. Like, we just take story by story, and decide “is it happening, has it happened, and when?” And then we fit them together in relation to each other just by dint of. All existing at once. Like, I knew I wanted Macbeth to be in aftermath, because like, even though there’s no murder, the way I’ve translated it to the AU is still kinda heavy, and it’s something that I don’t know that I could do properly if it were happening right now. Also, it’s more interesting IMO to have them at different times. Tl;dr we wing it per story and slot them together— mod aster (mod star agrees I just can word better, in theory)

If you could tell the story of shakespeare high in a different format than an ask blog, would you? Obviously y'all are making very good use of the format, but would you want to write this as a animated series or like? a comic book? or is the form inseparable from the story? (@pedanticlecturer)

I kinda wanted to do a webcomic or maybe to plot develop through like, animatics but the element of surprise comes from the asks we get and really makes us think so the blog is a good start. We didnt think we’d get this far -- mod star

Pretty much what Star said— there are certain elements where it’d be neat to do as a comic or as an animatic. Like, the fantasy dream is like, an anthology webcomic of each story, where you can like, see other characters in the background and stuff. But to be honest, we develop a lot by what we’re asked— there was a post about developing worldbuilding by being asked questions and then pretending you’ve thought about the answer, and it’s not far off. Personally, it’s hard to just lay out a story, because I have a whole WORLD and what’s relevant? What are people interested in? It’s by getting questions that I can then focus in on an area to develop. And yeah, we Super didn’t think we’d get this far lmao — mod aster

Any headcanons about your characters that you don't think will ever come up on the blog through asks or plot posts? (@pedanticlecturer)

I could make a whole separate post for this!!!!! Mostly its voice headcanons (and by mostly i mean like 1 or 2) or relationship hcs!!!! -- mod star

Honestly same. I don’t think I have voice headcanons for mine, though I bet I could find some. I’ve got a bunch of miscellaneous headcanons that just kinda float around, but like they’re scattered, too numerous for this post, and also not always things I’m sure are canon yet.— mod aster

#mod post #mod aster #mod star #q and a #birthday #we cant seem to read more AND tag so like brb gonna go kill god

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maichancreating · 6 years

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MaiChan.Creation FAQ

(It has finally come...)

ART TOOLS 🥝

🍀What program/tools do you use?

Photoshop CS6 with Wacom Intuos Pro Medium

🍀What brushes do you use and where did you get them?

I primarily use these two brushes when painting + the soft round brush (excuse the language lol)

I think I got them from this guy named, Houstonsharp. If I’m wrong it’s one of these people (whom I’ve also possibly downloaded over the years): Jonas De Ro, DanLuVisiArt, TheEchoDragon, AaronGriffithArt, Sakimichan, WLOP

For the character, I use a combination of the soft round brush and “THE SHIT” brush. The “AWESOME” brush is usually for hair and sometimes part of the background. Any other type of texture you see is from whatever brush I pick out of those downloaded ones I mentioned above 😅.

🍀Canvas size?

11 x 12 in. canvas (usually) with 300 dpi :)

ART TIPS 🍯

🌾How did you get so GOOD!!??? PLZ TELL ME UR SECRETS!!!

Take a deep breath and hope for the best.

🌾Any advice for beginner digital artist/realistic portraits!?

This is all based on personal experience so whether this will work for you or not will depend on your learning style (I suppose??) lol.

I’m a visual learner so I just watched a bunch of speedpaints on how other people approached the medium. I had to read a few tutorials to learn what the tools were in Photoshop (i.e. keystroke commands, lasso tool, liquify, etc,), but the major bulk of my learning was from watching the pros do it and trying to emmulate/integrate their methods into my own paintings.

Some good channels include sakimichan, sinix design, brushboost, etc. :)

I also have a pinterest board filled with my favorite speedpaints/tutorial vids to check out if you want.

After I became accustomed to the tools, I just did a lot of photo studies and photo-referencing because the only way to learn how to do realism is to practice from the source 😉

🌾How do you draw [something actually specific]?

You can click here to see if I’ve covered that topic.

If not, as long as it’s specific and not just the general question, “how do you draw???,” I’ll try my best to answer you (a secret: the more specific, the better 🙃).

🌾How do you handle Art Block?

Other than getting frustrated and crying internally from my lack of creativity, I usually do photo studies to force myself back in lol. If I can’t be creative, I study....

PERSONAL 🍑

🌷How long have you been drawing?

A lot of seconds since I started.

OTHER 🥐

🌟Do you do commissions?

Yup! Check my prices and conditions here!

🌟Can I repost [a certain artwork] on [whatever website]? I’ll give you proper credit!!

Yeah, as long as there’s credit and you don’t remove my signature (essentially not altering the painting) -- it’s cool. Thanks for asking :)

🌟Can I use your artwork as my profile pic?

Yup, as long as there’s credit, its totally fine :)

comment below or message me any more questions you'd like me to add onto the list :)

#faq

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denouementism-blog · 7 years

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( rome flynn / 25 / he/him ) is that ( mason danvers ) ordering a ( black eye ) at mocha? i heard they’re a ( club bouncer/aspiring singer/songwriter ) who’s known as the ( halcyon ) around here. however, they say ( mason ) is very ( ardent ), but ( lethargic ). well, better get their drink before it gets cold! ( astra / 17 / she/her / pst )

oh boy !! if u thought me, a muse hoe, was going to settle for one character in mocha ?? u thought wrong !! anyways, go ahead and shamsh that like button if u wanna plot ?? idc if we already plotted w/ dani. just shamsh it regardless. cross ur fingers that this shows up in the tags.

alright so for starters ?? mason is a reincarnation of an old muse of mine but it’s like.. an au younger version that the muse bcs his original storyline was rlly meant 4 apocalypse-esque rps. anyways, let’s begin !!

so ya boi mason ?? is a baby ok. he grew up in a super strict household where it was a thing to go into the army or the marines or whatever. in general, his family rlly thought that doing stuff like that equated to success so he was raised to fit that role. his parents made sure he did well in school and filled his time with extracurricular activities and sports to keep him off the streets. rlly, he had little to no freedom as a child. he also grew up moving all over the place bcs his dad was constantly being moved around and consequently, he is a pretty cultured dude ?? like, he’s live in a lot of countries so he can kinda, vaguely speak a multitude of languages. english and spanish are his strong points, tho !! along with that, he knows ?? the smallest amount of japanese and french... but like.. dont test him on it

all the moving ?? rlly got to him tho. he hated it and he really just wanted to have a home. like, a real home. a place where he actually felt at home. so he kinda grew up feeling v out of place and in general, just felt ?? disconnected ?? so he ended up running away from his home when he was abt 15 and never went back. he had to live in the shadows for a while bcs his parents were.. not the type of just let their kid run away and not do shit abt it, but he basically ?? just somehow managed to survive on the streets and made some cool friends who would secretly let him sleepover. once he was old enough, though, he got a job and slowly worked his way up.

he ended up finding happiness in writing since it was the only thing that he could rlly do without having money. it was his only source of entertainment and he just ?? would get lost in his own little world of drawing and writing. it wasn’t until he found an old guitar in the trash that he found his one true passion. he ?? quickly caught onto it and started to create his own rhythm and beats and he would sing on the sidewalks and ask for money and stuff. then he started to actually write out lyrics and that’s how he RLLY found his passion.

currently, he is just ?? chillin. he’s really into being active so he ended up getting a job as a club bouncer and he’s a sweetheart ok !! i love him. i love my son. but yeah, he also writes songs and sends his mixtapes to record labels and he’s just rlly passionate but also super lazy ??

he also basically just ?? walks around in leather jackets and rides a motorcycle. looks like he could kill u just with one look, but as soon as u talk 2 him, he’s the softest sunshine baby ever

he also has a youtube channel on the dl where he posts things of him singing like the damn nERD he is. bbut the youtube channel hasnt blown up yet so he ain’t famous

that’s all i can think of at the moment so ?? let’s get into some plots i want

ok so... im lit open to anything for plots, but here are some suggestions:

possible romantic interest (??) / friend: okay listen !! give me “i saw a creepy guy trying to do stuff with you while you were drunk and i wasn’t about to let that happen so i made the guy go away and i made you sit next to me while i bounced people to make sure you were safe then took you back to my house and let you sleep and made you tea in the morning” type of things. i will love you 5ever.

possible romantic interest (??) / friend: same basic idea as the other one, but give me “i saw you leave the club while you were crying and i stopped to ask if you were ok” type of things. rlly.. just give me those good Emo plots

childhood friends: maybe ?? friends that he used to know before he ran away and they think he’s probs dead but whoops ?? guess not !! maybe they’re mad @ him for not telling them, or maybe they’re happy. who knows !

ride or die / savior: people that he may have met when he was around 15-19 that would have helped him out & possibly let him secretly stay at their house ?? or maybe not even secretly ?? just chill ppl in the chicago area that probs pitied my poor bby runaway

partner: look.. this is a v specific plot but like.. i kinda want someone who’s a singer to partner up with him so they can be cute singing buddies ?? he could write songs with/for them and it could be rlly cute ?? they can have a cute band and jdfnhiuhgierj give it 2 me. maybe they even start a youtube channel together. who knows!!

ex-romances: ok so ?? please give me a cute plot based on the sleep on the floor music video by the lumineers. just an relationship where they were super care-free and probs did impromptu roadtrips and just.. the cutest fluff fest ever. but now it’s not rlly like that anymore and they broke up bcs they lowkey had a rlly bad relationship ?? like toxic af bcs they were too passionate and ended up arguing 2 much & shit. or ?? they didn’t even break up. one of them just up & left the other. it would probs be mason bcs hes a flighty mo-fo but who knows !

#mochahq: intro

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blackwoolncrown · 7 years

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1/2 (Dipper anon) Yes I totally agree it seems like more of Thomas just being too proud of his fanbase to shut down things that could be seen as harmful even if he didn't intend it to be harmful, and while that may not mean he's a pedophile it's still shitty, so yeah I totally agree with you. Like also you're v right about how vague accusations with faulty sources are stuff we have to be wary of and not something someone should about to base an opinion on whether he is or isn't

2/2 (sorry idk if the message went through) but yeah agreed Thomas is not someone I’m a fan either and I agree with u about him not shutting down harmful things in his fandom that he should and while it may not make him a pedophile it is shitty for him to do and like you’ve legit already countered the arguments against you but people keep using the same reworded argument because they don’t want to admit they’re wrong since they can’t counter your argument back lmao

————

Exactly like I’m not saying he’s not a pedo and that he’s not up to some nefarious shit. And if he is, that’s beyond fucked up and something needs to be done before he victimizes anyone.However sadly it’s actually possible he’s a fucking idiot going along with his fanbase’s whims which is actually something I think is the Dark Side to social media marketing fame- you, in deciding to adhering to your fanbase (”give the people what they want!” it’s torn down HOW many youtubers now?) become molded to and too dismissive of what they/their fanbase is doing bc they start to live in a bubble of acceptance from their fans who are at the same time rewarding them for certain stances/behaviors and afraid to go against it ever because you fear a drop in revenue. There was no better way for him to have handled it bc there’s too much shit it’s not just one issue and the only thing that should have happened is him knowing the fuck better in the very beginning and never doing anything that could even LOOK like cosigning such behavior in his fans. Like real talk he should have been like ‘hey if ur a minor don’t u ever do that shit again’ but he’s probably a coward who again is afraid- and this is a very real (not right, just real- bc morally you’re supposed to do what’s right regardless of the consequences but capitalism tends to shift people from this) fear- that ANYTHING he said would blow up regardless because this is tumblr.Like again, fuck ‘im but it’s also very likely that the Dipper thing was liked as a joke and to appease the fan who sent it to him because part of his marketing is seeming ‘real’ and ‘accessible’ to his fanbase so he not only can’t ignore things they send him too often but he’d also need to specifically support their engagement with him. Which is why you see artists doing shit like reblogging all fanart of their characters even if it’s like…weird or ugly. They just think they can’t afford to turn anything away. It could very well have just spun out of control. However I will say that if that Dipper pic wasn’t sent to him and he just did that on his own…what hte fuck I take this argument back and it no longer applies to him.

See, I know there was a period of The Early Internet when people would LOL about drawings of nude cartoon characters and share them w people not because they thought it was sexy but because it was like, shocking and hilarious to see a character from a childhood cartoon behaving in a morally OOC way. If that was happening nowadays y’all would be out here saying everyone who laughed at and shared those emails was a pedophile. So coming from that angle it’s possible for me to see how maybe he wasn’t doing it in a mm Dipper is hot way but rather a ‘lol a wholesome cartoon character in the nude!’ which is an ACTUAL joke kids cartoons make because kids think being naked is shocking and funny!! And young/mid teens get caught in this weird period where things are strange + funny AND strange + attractive at the same time in a way they haven’t inspected but instead they just make art/talk about if that makes sense? Like I clearly remember me and my friends going through that and it’s weird. Anyway…

still idk it’s kind of questionable bc at the same time you have that pedo working on PPG who made a fucking self insert romance interest for Blossom so really you can’t give men toooo much credit or even benefit of the doubt with their bullshit.

#Anonymous

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zacfaq · 8 years

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PLEASE DON’T SEND ME “PASS IT ON” MESSAGES !! as sweet as some of they are they can be really annoying. i don’t check my PMs here! if you need to get ahold of me either send me an ask, or email me.

apparently necessary reminder: google exists! i’m not a know-it-all source, honestly i shouldn’t even be your second plan after google unless it’s a question specifically based on me or something relating to me

i try to avoid fandom drama as much as possible and keep a generally positive space, so please don’t come and ask me about stuff like that. thanks.

if you want to commission me please send an email to [email protected]. do not email me through this address if your intentions are purely social and not work related

-what do you use to record and edit your speedpaints?

i use OBS to record, and edit in sony vegas

-what do you use to draw?

huion gt-191 and clip studio paint

-what are your pen settings?

just the default settings. all my custom stuff/things i’ve downloaded from CSP assets are just things i think look neat but probably never end up using.

-a blog called papersans is claiming to be you! are they a thief?

that’s literally me, i use it to archive my art so i can find stuff easier without having to hunt through my tag. also available for people who just want to see my art n not my other posts

-when is your birthday?

february 6th!

-what is your sexuality?

gay. i like men.

-how long does it take you to draw?

idk like. awhile? sometimes 45 minutes sometimes four hours sometimes a week.

-can i draw you/your ocs?

of course! pls show me after it would make me very happy !!!!!

-favourite band/singer/musician?

i don’t know a damn thing about myself here’s a spotify playlist

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0Zk5o5g7nMnGt0vrJVEcDq?si=7cd248a0b64046ee

-will you do art for cheap/free?

nah. art is currently the only job/income i have, if ur interested in commissioning me you can either find my prices on like, any of my pages, but if not ur more than welcome to email me @ [email protected] and i can give you prices there !! -(venting or something involving abuse, suicidal thoughts, self harm, bullying, eating disorders, or other similar things in real life situations. even in fiction i’m iffy.)

i hate to sound rude or not be of help, but please don’t send these messages to me. they send me into horrible anxiety for several personal reasons. if you’re having such negative thoughts i implore you to speak to someone you trust without an anonymous mask, or do your best to seek help from a professional. i have my own things to worry about and as much as i’d like to help, i simply can’t.

-(asking for advice that isn’t related to art)

i would love to help but i’m not an ~all knowing source~. i can’t give you tips for school. i can’t give you tips for life. not only will i probably not know a solution for you but there’s likely a chance i’m in just as bad a situation as you/going through the same problem, as silent as i am about my personal life. also don’t use ‘asking for advice’ as an excuse to vent about things or to send me a paragraph describing in depth something listed above/that’s potentially triggering. thank you.

even if you’re looking fr art tips i’m not a great source i’m still learning, ur best bet is looking for already existing sources and reading through those bc i don’t preach the word of Art God. i’m also awful at explaining things

-why didn’t you answer my ask?

Main reason is i’m just really really bad at socializing, so it’s not anything on u. i’m almost always low on energy and when i do talk to people it wears me out really quick. i’m also just. not gr8 at talking in general so if i can’t think of a reply i tend to just leave things n then end up forgetting about them

-how do you draw [blank]?

honestly my art style is such a fucked up thing that’s so personalized to my own use i can’t do or make tutorials. the best i can do is direct you to my youtube.

-can we do an art trade?

sorry, i’ll have to say no. i’m not necessarily busy but i get stressed very easily, so i try to keep my art to either personal stuff or work ! if you would like art from me, please considering commissioning me! mutuals and friends may be the exceptions here if they catch me at a good time or we make plans well ahead to do smth when we’re both free to work on stuff

-can we be friends?

please don’t ask this. i’m awful enough at socialization as is and i just don’t fit well with most personality types. not to mention this is just overall a bad question. it backs the person being asked into a corner where they either have to say “yes” and end up in a friendship that actually isn’t working out and is maybe only good for one side bc they’re getting any and all of the benefits, and if they say “no” they look like a total dick bag and come across as an ass. don’t ask this question. it’s not how socializing works. it’s not how friendships work. thanks. -can you tag [blank]? unfortunately i’ve been a real bad place in terms of memory so i can’t tag tons and tons of things. i try and tag more general/basic things but i’m sorry i’ll have to pass on specifics. if i post or reblog things that trigger u or harm you it might be best to unfollow for ur own safety!! very sorry

if it’s specific words you’d like tagged please consider blacklisting the word itself.

-how tall are you?

i’m 5'11".

-can you promo me?

i’d rather not, doesn’t sit well with me. if you have a commission post you want me to reblog i’m happy to! but i won’t just do text based handouts, y’know? not a fan of being used for visibility for no reason, and chances are if i do it for one person it’ll happen with hundreds of others and i don’t want my blog to turn into a free advertisement zone that just floods peoples’ feeds with promotions.

-you reblogged something from someone extremely problematic/unsafe

thank you for letting me know! tell me what it is they did, even better offer proof on it. i’ll likely delete the post and blacklist their url to hopefully prevent their name popping up on my blog in the future. i won’t publish these asks mostly to avoid discourse or in the event false information is provided. sorta just safety precaution i guess

-you’ve done something bad

again, thank you for letting me know! if i post or say something questionable please feel free to message me and i’ll try my best to address the issue and adjust accordingly. i’m aiming to grow as a person so critique is welcome, both on me and my artwork. don’t just come up and call me an asshole or a prick or something, actually point out the errors and explain why they’re wrong so i can better understand and it doesn’t just turn into a defensive round of who’s worse, because i tend to be a very defensive person.

-i think someone is stealing/reposting your art!

thank you very much for telling me! don’t message them right off the bat, come to me first and i will deal with it. i’ve dealt with this shit tons of times and it’s tiring as fuck but i’d rather repeat the same stupid civil message over and over again than start a giant calamity over something and end up with someone getting hurt. if you do get involved please stay polite about it don’t throw insults just a simple “hey this art was done by princeofmints/tv-headache/zachary jack/dirtypip/(etc my other account names) and he doesn’t want his art reposted, please take this down or add proper credit.”

-can i use your art as an icon?

sure man. only on places like instagram, tumblr, or twitter though, and proper credit in an easy to see place must be given. if a piece of art is of my ocs or especially vent art though never use it for icons. thank you.

-can i repost your art?

the answer is “no” but i know you’re going to do it anyways. easy to see credit is mandatory. if you see somebody reposting my art please let me know and i’ll talk to them. if you want to use my art in things like image edits, i don’t allow that. want to use my art in a video? if it’s something like an AMV sure fine just credit me and inform me beforehand, if it’s something like a cringe/comparison video. no. i don’t want any association with work like that whatsoever. you may not use my artwork for fanfic covers.

-can i colour/finish one of your sketches?

no. even if you don’t intend on posting it.

-what is [insert some form of media/fandom]

https://www.google.ca/

-why do you have an entirely separate blog for your FAQ? you know you can make blog pages, right?

i’m well aware of that and originally my faq WAS set up on a blog page, but unfortunately many folks proved to be either lazy or just couldn’t figure out how to get to a blog page on mobile so i had to set it up this way for accessibility purposes.

-tons of your videos are gone, what happened to them? will they come back? can you repost them?

i set old videos on private for my own sake, i don’t like having my old content available bc it just looks old and stale and i don’t like it. there’s nothing deep about it, i just don’t want people interacting with my old stuff. as deep is it gets is i just deleted videos related to fandoms i’m sick of bc the association is fuckin annoying. these videos will not come back into public. i do keep them posted for my own reflection sake, but that’s it. don’t ask me to bring them back. don’t whine about me not putting shit back out just bc ur a little sad n gonna cry. guilting people is gross, reevaluate yourself.

if you want a song from an old video, just ask me! I’ll happily let you know what the music is in case u liked ‘em and can’t remember the titles or artists. i’ve also got a playlist full of the music i listen to so u can comb through there n see if the songs u want are there

#prince peeps

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sneakyhomunculous · 5 years

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Last PT Report PT 2

Day 2: After day 1 we went to a nice dinner, 5 of us somehow spent 600$ [it may have had something to do with Rocky ordering 3 Apps a Salad a Soup 2 Entrees 3 Sides multiple glasses of wine and dessert) and we ended up staying pretty late. Continuing my hot run I got to pay for the whole thing! I didn’t get to bed until 12ish and unfortunately woke up around 4:30 to some obscene snoring. By around 5 it calmed down and I was able to sleep until 7:30. I woke up OK, but not fresh like the previous day. I went through the same routine as before and managed to catch the shuttle at the last second with Wily Edel and fellow Embercleavers. Draft 2, Pod 1 Featured Pod I was excited going into this draft because what I percieved as the toughest players Eli Brad and Hauck all drafted non blue decks day 1. In fact in all the drafts I did with Brad over the years he was basically never blue! He’s allergic to non green cards. I sat down to find the seating. Hauck was on my left and Brad and Eli were sort of across the table. Max Mick was feeding me, and I knew very little about him. Hauck and Brad’s drafts were both covered and you can watch them on the VOD. Unfortunately there is no draft viewer. They recorded every pick from every player, but unlike the old days they don’t really post the draft viewers anymore. It’s hard to do these draft caps off memory but I will do my best. The draft starts with a high, as I see many blue backgrounds on the magic cards in my first pack. Charmed Sleep, SecretKeeper, Didn’t Say Plz, Apprentice, and Vantress Gargoyle. I like Gargoyle more than most (I always have at least 4 cards in my hand) so I take it hoping one of the 3 good cards will wheel. There was a RW knightlord and not much else in other colors so a bit worrysome of a signal to send (and in fact Hauck 2nd picked the Charmed Sleep) Pack 2 was one of the worst packs I’ve ever laid eyes on. There was a steelclaw Lance and a B and G Paladin, and luckily a Frogify as the clear best card (Frogify isn’t very good). I take the Frogify Pack 3 is interesting; outmuscle improbable alliance tome raider covetous urge. It’s not that interesting, covetous Urge is completely busted. Alliance is a bit overrated and just fine, I do always have lots of opts and tome raiders so I like them I have it, but I know I will never play less than 11-12 blue sources and Urge is just so good. 4th pick Opt!!! This is the only blue card in the pack that otherwise really stinks. It was the last card I looked at and a huge sigh of relief for me. 5th pick didn’t say please and sage of the falls, a good sign. This is somewhat of a close pick but I value hard counters very highly and sage is just a much worse draw 3 scry 3. Take the counter 6th pick only one blue card tome raider, there is a henge walker as well but otherwise a weak pack. I take the raider as it sends a better signal and I don’t see myself being particularly aggressive after this start. I honestly don’t recall the rest of this pack but I know none of the 3 good cards tabled. I think maybe the overwhelming apprentice did but I don’t find that much of a playable magic card. I got a few playable like wishful merfolk and a forever young etc but nothing exciting. Pack 2 is where we make our living. Now I don’t want to go divulge off into a long theory piece, as this is supposed to be a silly fun report that is already bound to go absurdly long. But I have to say this. (and boy is it going to be fucking long. I just came back up to add this disclaimer. I am about to go on a massive rant about throne of eldraine limited. About how good Blue is. About how good unexplained visions is. About the theory of everything, and how Ben Stark is sometimes even wrong. If you don’t care about it you can skip past it. But you do care. That’s why you clicked this. Read it. You’ll laugh. You’ll learn something too; I think.) Rant on Drafting and Eldraine and Theory- Shoutout to Ben Stark the 🐐, and all the lovers of booster draft out there. Ben is great and much better than me. Shoutout to Marshall and Eduardo. They are both great players and great commentators as well, and they definitely understand limited and booster draft on a deep level. That being said... Ben Stark may tweet PT trophy records and shoutout his piece on “drafting the hard way”. Eduardo and Marshall may mention it multiple times during every draft. [See almost any draft ever, or specifically see Haucks draft on day 2 where he is completely handcuffed on my direct left “staying open” while ending up with a really embarrassing collection of cards after pack 1.] Multiple times throughout his draft Eduardo mentions how he and other good players and great drafters like to “stay open” by taking the “best card” in every pack. Well you see what Eduardo didn’t tell you and what Ben stark didn’t say in his trophy tweets or his piece on drafting the hard way is that... EVERY DRAFT FORMAT IS EXTREMELY UNIQUE [bolded and italicized for effect, but idk how] (Again Ben, Marshall, Eduardo, Riley, and Paul are all great. Commentating is absurdly hard and they do an unreal job. This stuff I’m talking about is way too deep for live on air stuff, and I can tell you that all 5 of them know most all of what I’m about to say already. “Drafting the hard way” is a great lesson for drafters, even experienced good drafters can learn a ton and will do well to remember it.) Throne of eldraine happens to be very dynamic. There are a TON of viable color pairs and options and “decks” but the thing is, some of them fucking suck. Shoutout again to Marshall for letting everyone know that RG was not really a thing when Brad was taking red and Green cards. Now we just need to admit that all the non U color pairs are not things either! The other thing is, a ton of the decks are really reliant on very specific cards. And of course the decks all have varying degrees of malleability. The fact of the matter is, 2 color decks just almost do not work at all. GB food is not a deck. Shoutout to Collin for somehow drafting it every time GW adventures isn’t a deck. RB and RW and BW knights are not decks. GR grumgullies isn’t a thing. UR draw 2 isn’t a deck. They are all complete traps and most people sort of understand this, but they don’t seem to know what to do about it. What you need to do is focus on the good decks, and then develop a draft strategy that gives you the best chance to end up with a “good version” of one of the [playable at all] decks. Now I’m not going to sit here and pretend like it’s easy. A magic the gathering 8 man booster draft with 3 of the same large set packs is one of the purest art forms to ever exist in our universe. Eldraine draft is mostly dead, but I’ll give you the [short; for how much I could write about this format] rundown anyway. It may help you develop a strategy in future formats. I can only hope R&D continues to make formats even close to as good as this one or Khans or Ravnica City of Guilds. Rule number 1: Blue is so much better than every other color. It would honestly make the format super awkward/Interesting if everyone was aware of this, but what I gathered before the PT and certainly during it, was that most people are not aware of this. And that’s despite the arena bots being so bad they force everyone into being blue every draft, and all the spreading of that info and complaining on Twitter still led to no1 really figuring it out. Rule Number 2: The color pairs are traps, fixing is very scarce and also very good, many cards look good but are TRAPS as early picks because the completely pigeonhole you into only 1 or maybe 2 playable decks/archetypes whatever you want to call it. If you watch theHamTV draft you’ll see him say it all the time. He first picks a card, and then by pick 2 or 3 he’s already tilting off because he says “I am never going to play these 2 cards in the same deck” this is not standard for a draft format by any means, but Throne is its own animal. Searing Barrage isn’t good unless you are Mono Red. That isn’t intuitive at first glance. Red white or Red Black are just not playable as color pairs. Same for Red Green or Green Black or Green White. You can obviously always splash, but the mana requirements are too heavy and the incentives to staying mostly one color are so high. This means you cannot afford to first pick Bake 2nd pick Charmed Sleep and then decide to take like Outmuscle over decent artifacts and U or b cards, and then decide to take Lochtwain Paladin over other blue cards and artifacts. The Paladin and to a lesser extent Bake are only good in mono black exactly (Bake is fine in UB). If this is the way the packs break that’s fine, what can you do? But Christian had a few better options I believe, and then soon I think he takes a red card. And then a malevelont Noble, And then another green card and then maybe a white card!? And look, I feel for him. The packs were weak overall and Throne of Eldraine is hard. He was also on my left, with Max on my right. Max and I both drafted Mono U. Christians draft is a perfect example of what many poor players drafts would look like if everyone realizes how good blue is. We probably don’t have time for it all here. But I’ll give you the short rundown. Exhaustive list of playable decks in throne of eldraine limited. Uxxxx Unexplained Visions Bury Their So Tiny Asses Alive I try to force this every single draft, but I do it in a delicate manner making sure to keep myself open to any of the other 10 or so good decks. After all we may not open any Vision, and they may not get passed to me. I sure as hell wont pass one. This deck is a malleable machine. It is so good because you can just take whatever nobody else is taking. If you get late pixies, you go green, if u get late mad ratter or alliance, u play those, if u get late Wicked guardians or a 6th pick lochmere Serpent or u open epic downfall and Bakes, you play those. If you get danse and have artifacts, you go dansing in the wind. If u get secretkeepers and counters you go mill. If you get stuck with Fae vandal and henge walkers and Vantress paladins you can even salvage with some runnaway together and tempo them out with fliers (I don’t recommend this tempo plan, but some drafts 5-6 people are blue and u gotta make it happen anyway. Your deck will still be better than the average deck in other colors) But ultimately all this deck truly needs is 2-4 visions/into the story (visions strongly preferred. Story only great if u have 3+ secretkeepers and or didn’t say please type stuff) You also would like some number of opts and witching wells (not necessary though). I’d play 6 opts at least and usually 2-3 wells. The less visions and into the stories you have the more wells I’d play. But even with 3 visions I’d play 4 Opt and a well or two. Any cheap magic cards that preferably block really well or gain more advantage in themselves like opt witching well clockwork servant wicked guardian etc etc, and then stuff like secretkeeper so tiny Charmed Sleep 1/4s and 3/2s for 2. and finally some good way to end the game (this doesn’t need to be a traditional big flier. It’s nice to have lochmere serpent or something absurd and easy to kill with, but a few secretkeepers and didn’t say pleases and mystic sanctuaries also works just fine, or some weird danse kill, or ratter/alliance army (watchout for revenge of the ravens!)) The real beauty of this deck is getting absurdly mileage out of other players dregs. Lochtwain Gargoyle is just actually a good card in this deck usually. Crashing drawbridge type stuff is not ideal, but totally serviceable. Corridor monitor and wishful merfolk can both be fine to actively good. You can see quickly how easy it is to consistently end up with this deck when you can play 5-8 cards nobody else would ever even take and other people are passing visions and playing non blue decks. Just wait until you hear what BEN STARK thinks about Unexplained Vision Ux Mill This is usually splashing black, sometimes mono. You know the deck. The arena bots give it away. In real life it doesn’t actually happen, a pipe dream. Sometimes my Visions Bury em decks end up winning via mill, bc secret keeper is just a fine to good card if u have drown in the Loch/into the story/ lots of visions and need 1-2 drops/the combo didn’t say pleases and no good finishers. But sure if no1 takes any secretkeepers and u get lucky clover or Folio and lots of didn’t say pleases this can be a great deck that’s hard to beat. Ug This is usually splashing for some very specific cards like maraleaf pixie, trail of crumbs, some rares I’m not thinking of, maybe Edgewall inkeeper/maraleaf rider and some eggs and some weird 3 color thing. I’ve had some wonky decks like this. It doesn’t come together often but I’ve had at least 3 drafts where I get multiple maraleaf pixies for free bc no1 can ever take them, and you can see how having an early trail of crumbs/outmuscle can lead to some weird mono u splash these cards shell Uw This deck has multiple different routes, you never want to shinechaser really, but you certainly always want owl. I think the best versions play a few plains for things like all that glitters and trapped in the tower or Danse of the manse type stuff. It’s silly but realm cloaked giant or that archon are other good reasons to end up this deck. Emry and eggs and witching wells any cheap artifacts you know what I’m saying. Ub This is mostly just an extension of the bury em visions deck. One note almost all of these decks want 11+ blue sources. Mystic sanctuary is busted in all of these decks. Clockwork servant type stuff is busted. Blue is completely busted! Now I know all these decks I just mentioned are sort of the same thing. But they really aren’t. And the big takeaway is that blue has all the best cards, and is also the deepest color by a lot, while also being able to support 3-4 different types of strategies in a single draft. It’s a crazy revelation when you realize it. Blues 8th best common is better than the 2nd best common in all of the other colors. Syr Elenora Urge Loch dragon Owl Snapper Vandal all great, so many more I’m leaving out basically every blue card in the set is a dreamboat. Tier 2 decks Mono Red aggro Searing barrage and embreth Paladin are not good in any other deck, but great here. Same goes for weaselback redcap and oftentimes even fling. The issue is lots of people don’t know that about searing barrage, so u may not get them for free. This deck just wants to curve out but have some serious burst potential with the haste Paladin/fling/barrage and then just fill in with any of the henge walker/joustin dummy type stuff and play redcap raiders/barge in/scorching dragonfires etc. I find it’s hard to get enough early creatures so prioritize them when you can. Mono G aggro This is a spicy deck that lots of people considered the best and so it’s well known and out there how to draft it. Go to Hamtv on twitch to watch Kyle play it all the time. Green has some good cards that no1 else wants like wildwooftracker the halberd gingerbrute maraleaf rider garenbrig Paladin etc. and while people do want outmuscle and Witchstalker, those are really strong. You can splash here, but you would almost always prefer to not have to. Henge walker etc can help you avoid having to. Mono W or Wx aggro. Tactician and cheap plays. White has no shortage of 1-2 drops and good value pump spells like guidemother and the squire. Flutterfox with some things to turn it on happens often, I think Banner and Wheel are just always great but they shine here in the flutterfox versions of this deck. Fliers/evasion is massive to get around my pesky corridor monitors and wishful merfolk and sectretkeepers. You can certainly have a knights theme and even splash black or red for some knights or removal/good cards. But you really want to prioritize actually being able to play your cards and being able to pick up Hybrid WWWWxxxx uncommons and cast henge walkers and ritual and Paladin and stuff with adamant. Same goes for all the mono color aggro decks, you really have to do your best to stay as mono as possible throughout the draft, and ultimately you don’t ever want to end up with a 10-7 or 9-8 manabase. It will obviously happen and with fine to great decks sometimes, but it’s super rare and you should actively be trying to avoid it. Some players have success with Knight strategies. I believe they need lots of uncommons and rares and then to get lucky to end up with a distribution that lets them play 11-6 to have good mana. I’ve 3-0ed with quite a few mostly white knight decks that splash the drain guy, epic downfall, reave soul, maybe some black rare idk. Things like that are fine. But taking the RW Knight uncommon 2/2 or the steelclaw Lance are recipes for disaster. I didn’t see Eli’s Draft, but see our round 10 match for an example of a steelclaw Lance deck. Mono B value/midrange I haven’t drafted this much but it’s mostly self explanatory. Usually it comes about by first picking bake into a pie or getting passed an ayara in a weak pack and just having black be wide open. You play the Lochtwain Paladin and the reave souls and bakes and whatever Hybrid Uncommons u can find and usually some rares and fill in with dummies and henge walkers as needed. Can splash for things like garruk or serpent obviously, and this comes up quite a bit, this is another good reason to try and stay mono going into packs 2 and 3. That is the end of the playable throne of eldraine draft decks list. Every other deck is a pipe dream. They do exist, but rely heavily on exact uncommons/rares like troll king or savy hunter in BG food. And even if u get them you will still lose to an average U deck with 3 unexplained visions. Avoid like the plague. Ok yeah, rule number 3 time I promise this is the last rule. Draft as though you know what the good decks are and you know how the format works. Stop acting like everything is a vacuum and Throne of Eldraine limited is just another Magic the Gathering Set that can be easily mastered by following the guidelines outlined in Ben Starks Timeless Piece “Drafting the Hard Way”. Taking random ass cards in different colors throughout pack 1 bc they are powerful is a recipe for absolute disaster in this format. It is true that Ben is right about draft theory in general terms, and in most formats drafting by taking the “best cards” you see in the first few packs is a sound strategy. Because you wait for a “signal” and then u move into what deck you are “supposed” to be in for your seat. Losing a few early picks is nothing when you end up in the perfect color pair that neither of the 2 players on your right or even the player on are touching at all. Right??? Yes it’s right, but not in throne of eldraine. Throne rewards cutthroat discipline of sticking to the blue cards and artifacts. You want to leave yourself open to being able to draft blue as long as possible, while at the same time not forcing it in case it just isn’t there. It’s very delicate and not easy, but some sample picks could probably illustrate my point better. Maybe review my 2 drafts from the PT and checkout my decks. I’ll try and post the pics again underneath the tweet linking these. Im exaggerating blue (a very small amount, it’s the best by miles), but sticking to cards that are good in multiple decks is huge. Youthful knight and flutterfox and tactician and guidemother and any other fine white card are fine white cards. There is only one deck that wants fine white cards. Mono white aggro. If this deck is not 100% wide open and you are taking these cards you will train wreck. I have drafted mono white 5+ times, but it was always because I started with a blue card, an egg, a banner or spinning wheel, a henge walker or dummy, and then started seeing late trapped in the tower or tacticians and the flutterfoxes or other white commons tabled. So this being said if you are faced with the decision of outmuscle or Tactician or Scorching Dragonfire or Even Reave Soul/Bake VS golden egg or banner/spinning wheel/Fabled Passage/clockwork servant always take the latter card. In their respective mono color decks the top cards are a bit stronger than the bottom cards. The problem is this isn’t a normal format. When you take a tactician in a normal format u can play it in 5-6 different decks. Any white deck. There is only one white deck here but 15 other decks. Don’t take tactician until it’s clear u are the only white drafter. Take opt. Or take run away together. Or if you’re lucky take spinning wheel. If you’re the luckiest person alive take Unexplained Vision The player on my direct right was Mono U in this day 2 draft. I drafted Mono U right behind them and 3-0ed with a great deck. It isn’t because I got lucky. The pack distributions were kind of ugly, and many players were blue or taking blue cards. None of my cards tabled. But it doesn’t matter. I stayed strong and took artifacts and fixing high, and I never let a good blue card go by. It’s a simple strategy really, but certainly hard to execute perfectly Some weeks before the PT, shortly after I had come to the realization that blue in throne of eldraine was approaching mandatory force levels; I saw Ben the 🐐 Stark first pick Emry Lurcher of the Loch and then 2nd pick a BOG NAUGHTY over a DRAW 3 SCRY 3! The best limited player of all time!! I certainly believe Ben is unbelievable and a very strong player and incredible mind. His willingness to search for the truth above all else is what I believe really makes him special. But Bog Naughty is not remotely pickable in any early pack 1 scenario. You have to be mono black and also have some food? It’s just not reasonable. GB food again isn’t a thing, and even if it is it’s likely heavy green. If it’s heavy black sure u can use the naughty to some good fun magic. But even if you do it’s like a slightly better card than what a filler card like henge walker or tempting witch? Don’t take Bog Naughty if you want to win your matches. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t missing anything so I asked him about it. I said “Yo Ben, you passed the literal dreamboat card for a Vantress Paladin that cost 5 mana double black after first picking one of the most busted rares in the set that is guaranteed to make your deck after first picking it, being as it is in the best color and it’s now so easy to prioritize artifacts in the draft.” What gives??? His response: “Not a big fan of vision. Especially when you already have Emry milling 4 giving you a source of end ess card advantage. I’ll play 1-2 copies of vision in my deck if I don’t have other card advantage, but it’s near unplayable vs mill and aggro and I don’t draft it highly.” Now I always look to give someone like Ben the benefit of the doubt. And this is twitter where nuance is obviously lost easily as we are limited to a few sentences. But breaking down what he said; he starts with saying he’s not a fan of visions, later saying it’s near unplayable vs mill and aggro and that he doesn’t draft it highly. This is when I realized I made a mistake asking him about it. The PT is still 3 weeks away and I don’t want him to realize he’s wrong and teach all of his friends. It is true that Visions have diminishing returns. Most decks can not afford to play the 5th, or even 4th copy. A lot of decks may end up not really wanting a 3rd either, but I think that is extremely rare. This is such a minor thing though, and it’s the literal most important card in over half the blue decks. You don’t say “oh I’m not going to take the best card ever because I can’t play more than 3 of them”. Like imagine a 5 mana card that said draw 10 cards. Sure you cant fill your deck with 8 of them. But now you want to fucking pass it because of that? No you fucking slam it to guarantee you have it. And if you get more, you slam those too and you play those too. And yes, once u get your 4th or 5th copy you can chill out, or you can bear down and play those too while figuring out a way to find some cheap shit to stay alive until you cast your first draw 10 and win by default . But the fact that you have this card, combined with the mere fact that it exists and you value it highly (properly) means you can now literally draft whatever u want, so long as you draft a sufficient number of cheap/defensive cards. More about his statement. Just because you have 1 Emry doesn’t mean you can’t take more card advantage??? He says Emry is an endless source. Yes it’s a 1/2 that needs an artifact stream and you also have to draw it and have it live. I would prefer to have 10 Emry type cards in every deck. If you’re tired of reading about this I’m truly sorry, but not really sorry because there’s no fucking way anyone is still here this deep in and not absolutely loving it. “It’s near unplayable vs aggro and Mill”. While the card is usually somewhat weak against mill (it actually ends up being the best card against mill a bunch of the time. I say this because I have a ton of experience with visions against busted mill decks in the arena streets. If you have 2-3 visions and you play against mill; There will obviously be games where visions is awful and you cannot even realistically cast it. But in the other games, the games you actually have good chances to win; you usually do so by burying your opponent in cards and killing them by default before they can mill you. No slow blue deck is going to aggro through a secretkeeper deck. You beat it by hoping they draw too many secretkeepers/defensive weak cards and don’t draw the counterspells. Mill vs U Visions control literally comes down to who resolves the visions! (I will concede that drafting like this means you are absurdly soft to Folio of the fancies/didn’t say please/Mystical Dispute and any really fast milling. But this is why I prioritize the counterspells very highly myself, along with cards like covetous Urge and cards that can kill efficiently thru walls of defense and kill alone like Syr Elenora/ratter/alliance and sB options like Vantress Paladin/steelhaze griffins or forever young, and also sbing in 8 more islands and 6 more blue cards if I need to.) But saying it’s “bad vs aggro and mill” is just silly. On its “bad vs aggro”- “Aggro” is a weird concept in limited. You really want to avoid being pidgeonholed into “aggro” at all costs. Being aggro means you are relying on having a strong opening hand with a good curve while also relying on your opponents to not have sufficient defenses against your onslaught. In theory this sounds like a fine strategy when executed properly. You fill your deck with powerful 2 and 3 drops with high power or menace or flying or haste or first strike, maybe even some one drops. Cheap burn and plays that help removal blockers/push through damage. And then u top it off with whatever powerful finishers you can find. In reality this is an inferior draft strategy to taking cheap/defensive cards, card advantage, and busted magic cards like the RARE MYTHIC RARE and UNCOMMON type cards. The reason is twofold, the draft portion + the games portion. In the draft, ending up with a great aggro deck is hard. You have to be in the exact right color for your seat, get the necessary amount of aggressive 2-3 drops, the right pump/cheap removal/burn/reach and the right mana base to be able to function well. In the games you have to avoid mulliganing, avoid stumbling on lands, and avoid drawing your 2 drops on turn 10 when you need your few finishers. Meanwhile you have to also avoid your opponent having any of the Stonewall Jackson type cards you dread facing. Like say Corridor Monitor into Clockwork Servant into Wicked Guardian. But this is the beauty of drafting. In a perfect world, we’d sit down for an 8 man where most of the players agree that being “aggro” is inherently bad, and we all lean towards being defensive and open to whatever the best ways to gain incremental advantage we can come up with in the draft. In this world the player(s) who recognize what’s going on and moves into the aggro lane will be rewarded and end up with a completely busted deck that has the highest win expectancy at the table. In many formats, this is actually exactly what happens. Aggro is [slightly] worse than just drafting a good defensive curve removal busted cards and card advantage. So if no one is drafting aggro you will end up with a broken deck that should crush everyone. That hidden factor is that you still have to avoid mulliganing and or flooding/stumbling/drawing weak cards in the mid game/overcoming stonewall Jackson so despite maybe having a slightly higher winrate than decent defensive decks, you still have to run well in your games and the medium deck can still stonewall you. You’re often prone to flooding as well. Look, I’m not saying aggro is unplayable. But I am saying you should do everything in your power to not draft it. Now back to the point. I would argue that visions is the BEST possible common you could ever have against aggro. (I wouldn’t actually argue that, I’d prefer wrath of god and moat and shit... but it is a very sound and good strategy of playing defense and then burying them with one broken draw spell. And this card is really really good, even vs aggro) Ben has this notion that in limited magic, card draw is often cheapened because of the low value of extra lands. I challenge this proposition in most scenarios, as finding a use for extra lands is easy when you are drawing tons of cards. And “getting past the lands” to find your specific answers/good cards is often very useful. But that is not super relevant here anyway. Visions isn’t just a draw 3... You then scry 3!! It’s a fucking common!!! Personal wheel of fortune!!!! End Rant Recap I have Hauck now feeding me for pack 2 My picks so far are Vantress Gargoyle Frogify Covetous Urge Opt Didn’t say please Tome raider Forever young Wishful merfolk Some dregs I forget Pack 2 I think I opened Fae of Wishes and 1-2 other decent cards. Fae is Busted so I slammed it. I am passed a pack lacking in good cards. It has a pixie, a queen of ice (not a good card, like the 10th best or worse U common) a Corridor Monitor (a good card, but obviously not happy to take early) and luckily a Fabled Passage that I slam! 3rd pick is full of busted stuff. Charmed Sleep So Tiny Danse of the Manse Trail of Crumbs Pixie (have to consider the other pixie tabling now) Ultimately I settle on charmed Sleep. I like So Tiny more in some decks, but you need multiple visions and preferably some mill stuff before I start taking my first So tiny over my first Charmed Sleep. 4th pick Covetous Urge number 2 over Opt and Mystic Sanctuary Urge is completely busted 5th Charmed Sleep over So tiny and Egg 6th pick So Tiny! Over wishful merfolk (Sorry Max) 7th pick Loch Dragon! Over So Tiny (You’re Welcome Max) 8th Pick Castle Vantress over nothing (Truly Sorry Max) 9th Pick Skullknacker Ogre over nothing (I boarded this in vs Brad who was Gr with no pump spells no removal. He had 2 Syr faren a few merchant of the vales and a bunch of Fierced witchstalkers a henge walker etc. I drew it and played it t4 and won bc of it!) 10th Pick the pixie tables but I’m Worried about my cheap creatures and plays and feel it’s unlikely I play G at this Point. I honestly may be confusing a pick in the draft and may have already had a mad ratter or improbable alliance bc I somewhat confidently took queen of ice over this pixie (2 Urge and Loch dragon mana requirements also weighed on my mind) 11th pick the other Pixie tables too. And I am on massive tilt bc I just pulled up the viewer to check this pack thru Christians eyes. There was a so Tiny in this pack he hate drafted here 😂😩😬 12th Pick he hate drafts Opt 🤦🏻‍♂️ But there is a mystic sanctuary anyway! He hates a Runaway Together with 3 cards in the pack and I don’t get anything Pack 3 I open a weak pack but it has a secretkeeper and an Into the Story. I timebanked this pick to the max and wasn’t confident. I really need early plays but also really need some more ways to draw extras. Bc of my two urges giving me some advantage in long games I decide to take the secretkeeper and pray I’ll see an Unexplained Vision Pick 2 Max does me a favor and passes me Syr Elenora. There is like a slaying fire and Yorvo as notables. But Syr Elenora is preeeeemium. Pick 3 I think I take either Mad Ratter or Improbable Alliance over Animating Fae and Nothing. Pick 4 Mystical Dispute over Moonlit scavengers Pick 5 Tome Raider over Queen of Ice Pick 6 Either Improbable Alliance or Mad Ratter (I ended with 1 of each, forgot which was which pick they are the same card in my brain) over Merchant of the Veil no Blue cards Pick 7 Opt over nothing Pick 8 Run away Together over nothing Pick 9 Into the Story Tables!!!! I end up deciding it’s my best Fae of wish Target and I only have 1 secretkeeper one Didn’t say please to mill, my removal is 2 Charmed Sleep So Tiny, so I figure the Into the Story being in my sideboard makes a lot of sense. I end up wishing for it 3-4 times and it was gas. Final deck is 12 islands 1 Mystic Sanctuary 1 Castle Vantress 1 Fabled Passage 2 Mountain 2 Opt 1 So Tiny 1 Merfolk SecretKeeper 1 Vantress Gargoyle 1 Fae of Wishes 1 Wishful Merfolk 1 Queen of Ice 1 Improbable Alliance 1 Run Away Together 1 Frogify 2 Tome Raider 2 Charmed Sleep 1 Didn’t Say Please 1 Mystical Dispute 2 Covetous Urge 1 Loch Dragon 1 Mad Ratter 1 Syr Elenora 1 Steelhaze Griffin (23rd card and I was torn on this. Card is whatever not good at all, but it can block and it can attack) R9 Dylan Lerch (The only White Drafter) Because we were the feature pod, we exchange pools. We don’t have decklists, but pools of all 42 cards drafted. Quickly I see that Dylan has a completely busted mono white deck, well likely splashing red. Dylan was two on my left. I figured Hauck was probably white, but since he wasn’t it all got to Dylan. Dylan was certainly the only white drafter. I am trying to imagine my gameplan for beating this deck, and I’m failing to come up with scenarios where I win any games. 4 Fairie Guidemother 2 Giant Killer 1 Worthy Knight 2 Youthful Knight 1 Inspiring Veteran 1 Shepard of the Flock 1 Glass Casket 1 Ardenvale Tactician 1 Clockwork Servant 1 Linden the Steadfast Queen 1 Brimstone Trubuchet 1 Slaying Fire 1 Outlaws Merriment 1 Archon of Absolution 1 Resolute Rider 1 Oakhame Ranger 2 Fireborn Knight 13 Plains 4 Mountain I know I clown aggro, but this deck is no joke. My wishful merfolk is downright embarrassing vs this. My queen of ice too. My charmed sleeps aren’t very good vs 1/1 fliers. As a matter of fact without Fae of Wishes I don’t see how I stop this onslaught. Game 1 starts off about the only way I could ever imagine for a game that I’ll win. I play turn 2 Fae of Wishes after Dylan played a turn 1 Fae Guidemother. Soon after he plays out a giant killer, and then some 2 power thing. He starts tapping my Fae and Building a force, but I find some tome raider chain into some real cards I can’t remember exactly, but I know I stabilize and then bounce my Fae with Run away Together and then Granted for Into the Story. I draw 4 then covetous Urge him a little bit behind now and at around 8. He still doesn’t have a mountain, so his Outlaws Merriment is stranded and I kill him with it over a few turns after I stabilize around 5 life. I feel I got very lucky that game with his draws being poor and being able to steal his merriment. G2 he plays 1 drop 2 drop turn 3 2 drop plus giant killer and turn 4 I am left conceding with no outs. Disgusted while shuffling for G3 I wonder where it all went wrong. How is Dylan’s deck so good? Why am I paired vs him now? I know I can beat the other 6 decks! I have a decent hand but slow, luckily he makes no play turn 1. He plays a few creatures over the next few turns and misses his 4th land drop. I have a singleton medium blocker I forget what it was but it’s getting tapped bc It’s facing down vs his now worthy knight giant killer Fae guidemother and I think Youthful Knight plus 1/1 as i cast my Covetous Urge, assuming I am just dead with no outs. Dylan is stuck on 3 plains and reveals his hand of fireborn Knight Outlaws Merriment another 2 drop anddddddddddddddddddddddd Archon of Absolution hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaa I go ahead and take that. He doesn’t draw a land and makes some attacks putting me to 12 and plays another 2 drop. I untap and casually place his protection from white ghostly prison into play hahahhahahahahahah he has 7 creatures and 3 plains and draws land, but it’s plains. So all he can muster is fireborn Knight. He plays it then lines up attacks and there is under 10min in the round and a big crowd is watching. After a bit more of him thinking about who to attack with I just finally say you cannot attack they all cost a mana and he realizes it and shakes his head and passes. I untap and covetous Urge him again and take Merriment! His only out from here is mountain then slaying fire, but he doesn’t find them. I actually cast didn’t say please the next turn after playing Merriment and he mills a mountain and the slaying fire! Turns out Archon of Absolution is good against Mono White aggro 1 drops and tokens!! 8-1 and ecstatic to steal one. Round 10 Vs Eli Kassis on RB ~18 Playables??? Eli and I are featured as the backup match and a few parts of our games ended up on camera. When we exchanged pools we have 1 minute. I scan through and see he’s clearly black. He has rankle malevelont noble and some random assortment of ok black cards. He has Covetous Urge and Memory Theft. He also has like 5 red cards and a Steelclaw Lance. A crashing Drawbridge and maybe one other artifact. But overall if he plays every single black card artifact and red card that I deem playable it wasn’t even 20 cards. I ran out of time confused how he built his deck. It seemed that he was in fact just red black so maybe I miscounted or missed something. The games are somewhat interesting. Game 1 I kind of flood and awkward covetous Urge his hand of covetous Urge and weak cards, and he already has some 4 power attacker and shortly produced another. I had to urge his urge and I eventually get to Urge again to play something OK but I am just a little to much behind and can’t get a foot on the game before I’m forced to chump and then die. I’m still confident as his deck seems weak. Games two and 3 are pretty straightforward. He keeps drawing crashing drawbridge and steelclaw Lance and I’m Able to deal with his actual cards one at a time while producing a board of stupid little fliers. I did get lucky g3 on camera. His t2 crashing drawbridge I t2 Vantress Gargoyle He t3 memory theft and my hand is 6 spells no land. But it’s wishful merfolk Fae of Wishes charmed Sleep Run away Together tome raider and something else cheapish. So I don’t really need lands too badly and I also don’t have anything that broken. I think he takes my Fae or maybe a diff good card, but I immediately peel a land and tome Raider. I draw into another raider. He t4 covetous Urge off quad swamp and takes my Charmed Sleep and uses it on my Gargoyle the next turn. I’ve been milling with Gargoyle and I play tome raider 4th land go. From there I don’t miss lands for a few more turns and end up burying him beneath fliers once i draw Loch dragon and he only has some anemic beats with a solo rimrock Knight. 9-1 2-0 in the draft At this point I know Brad is playing vs Max Mick and I’m really hoping Brad wins. Max was on my right and I know he’s mono U with Folio gadwick. Unfortunately he won. But the good news is Brad Started 8-0 so he’s also 9-1, and we get paired!!! R11 Mike Sigrist on Gr Monsters His deck is a steaming pile of large creatures and bad mana. I kept going over the list looking for a spell and all I could find was a crystal slipper, 3 Fell of the pheasant, a Sundering Stroke and a Thrill of possibility. He’s mostly Green with 2 Syr Faren 2 Fierce Witchstalker 3 Garenbrig Paladin. He has a henge walker and a rosethorn acolyte, and then like multiple merchant of the Veils and Ogre Errants. I don’t even see how he has 23 cards either, he must be playing all these pheasant plummets (he is) We are main feature match. The whole thing was on camera. Brad won the die roll and mulligans to 5. I have 3 lands perfects with like a tome raider charmed Sleep counterspell and some 2 drop. I sort of draw only lands for the first lot of turns but Brad has a mono green deck and starts mountain mountain mountain henge walker. I charmed Sleep it. My plan was to save those for paladins, but with his mull to 5 and triple mountain start I figure I can race easily. He does put up some fight but I just take it slow and have Dispute and didn’t say plz and eventually find like an Urge and or a Loch dragon to close the game in short order. Game 2 is really interesting as I have to let him filter 10 times with merchant over the game but I maneuver my way to a winning position eventually on the back of both my Covetous Urges. 3-0 GG Y0 10-1 I know it’s way too late for subway or anything as the lines will all be unreal. So I pack up and find a message from Collin that he is grabbing convention center pizza. He grabs me a slice and it’s so terrible I can’t take more than a few bites. I’ve been staying really well hydrated and eating a decent breakfast at least, but these no lunches are brutal. Luckily I’m riding the adrenaline today and feel completely fine. R12 Vs Josh Utter Leyton on UG food Josh has 4 Growth Spiral instead of paradise Druid and is playing 2 Kraul harpooner I think. He has 25 lands but is on a pretty normal list otherwise. No Mass Manipulation or anything. Game 1 he’s on the play I think but starts tapped land tapped land goose. He has a turn 3 Oko I think but I have a decent hand with vraska and grasp and I think I end up vraskaing his Oko and Grasping a nissa and winning with my Own eventually. G2 is blurry but I think he mulliganed and or had a bad hand. I do remember having to take a big risk though. I could use my vraska and make a big attack to guarantee his nissa died, and he had no hand, but I would leave myself dead to a topdecked nissa Oko or aether gust. I decided to go for it anyway as I didn’t see any other way to guarantee nissa dying. He drew a kraul harpooner which was not good enough and I got to untap and put the game out of reach with a krasis or something. 11-1 I know that one more win should lock top 8, and I have at least 3 rounds to find it, maybe even 4. No pressure. I honestly didn’t it feel much. I’ve been here before after starting 8-0 in a PT a few years back. That time I went 1-1-1 in the draft and started 2-2 in constructed so I had a win and in the last round, and lost it in rather unfortunate fashion. But I didn’t really feel too nervous that day either. I think it gets to me more when my back is against the wall. When I’m just winning every round, I just keep going! R13 Mack Smith Bant Food He is playing Stock Bant from the European GP. 3 Maindeck Mass Manipulation Growth spirals etc. G1 I get ahead and I think I am fading mass manipulation in the later turns (nothing I can do about it) but he doesn’t have it and I win. G2 I feel ahead but have no answer to manipulation and the turn I thought he would play it he didn’t so I got excited, but he played it the following turn and I died. G3 i play t1 goose he t1 goose. I play Druid t2 and he just untap and says go. I go for t3 Nissa but he has a Negate to counter, down to just goose forest no food though. I think I have to spend a turn doing not much because I may be missing land as well, and he actually discards to hand size and then I wolf his goose. I win that one a couple turns later 12-1 and locked with 1 more match point. I feel like I would have been more excited if it were a few years ago. My first PT Top 8! But honestly it felt all a bit weird. The PT is moving to the Players Tour, and so much history is fading away. This PT top 8 literally means nothing if I don’t win first place. Just 2 years ago a PT top 8 would mean almost all the points you need for gold and over half of the way to platinum. Getting 2nd in a PT would all but assure you could make Platinum if you played some magic. Plus everyone was around and into it, the hall of fame talks etc etc. Now with the MPL and the PT going away everything is a bit cheapened and everyone is sort of automatically Jaded and unsure of the future. I was still feeling good; I just expected to feel more. I also know I still have to find a draw. My instinct says even if I lose r14 I’ll get the draw R15 with another X-2 though. R14 Andrew Cuneo on GW adventures This match was main feature and all on camera. Cuneo is great and we have some banter before the game about die rolling procedures. He also tilts off when I mulligan and say I’m going to keep before putting a card back. That’s not actually how that works he says. What does work is noxious grasp maindeck against GW little kid. I play multiple and Andrew draws plenty of lands and dies. In game 2 I keep a very sketchy hand of Wolf Massacre Girl Krasis 4 lands on the draw. I only have 1 Massacre Girl, He mulliganed, I’m locked for top 8, what the fucking hell could go wrong K3333pp! He puts a card to the bottom and announces keep. OUAT finds inkeeper, forest inkeeper. I draw land 5 and say to myself u are the dumbest fucking shit in the 7 kingdoms for keeping this. Land go; He untaps, aggressively pushes his inkeeper up at me and I right the 1 life, he shuffles his hand briefly and says GO. Wait what? He took inkeeper with OUAT and then didn’t play a 2nd land turn 2. How unlucky can this guy be??? I continue to draw only lands and he does hit a land next turn, but it’s a forest and no play. He eventually does find plains and puts up a fight. Eventually marching for 5 or 6 and convoking loxodon with a card still back. I have tons of Mana at this point, still have Massacre girl and can cast it + wolf to wrath everything. But I drew legions end the turn before and realize there is no reason to kill my own 6/6 krasis, just legions end the tokens and I’m ahead on board anyway. He dies shortly after. 13-1 R15 ID with Louis Deltour! 13-1-1 1 Seed Locked up R16 vs Paulo Vitor Damo Da Rosa Right before the match I had been talking with Tom Ross and I see the pairing and he says you should dream crush no? He won’t make it if you beat him. I honestly hadn’t even looked at the standings and wasn’t considering playing before talking with Tom. But then I started thinking. This last Pro Tour Ever here... it is so Top Heavy. True winner take all scenario. What do I have to lose by playing and trying to knock out the best player in the room? Well for starters I like Paulo. He’s just really likeable, and has always been friendly with me. I know he will be upset, and it will cause some drama as this type of situation is rare and they have probably already considered him in after seeing pairings. But the more I think about it the more it makes so much sense to play. I don’t owe Paulo anything, and this old mentality on the etiquette of IDs/Scoops makes a lot of sense in the old Pro Points/Level System. Or when PT top 8s really meant something. But what the hell does letting Paulo in the Top 8 actually do? Make it that much more unlikely I win the tournament is about all I can think. Greg Kowalski and his non green deck will be in if I beat Paulo. If I draw with him Paulo and his perfect mass manipulation gadwick list will be in. So anyway, I tell Paulo I want to play. He is obviously a bit surprised. And a huge crowd is forming. Shahar is behind Paulo and giving me the absolute stare of death throughout the whole thing. I tell Paulo the truth. I think he is great, and a random player making t8 would be very beneficial for me. I said this tournament is winner take all for me. If I go on to get 2nd not one person will care. In 6 months no1 will remember my name. They won’t know I got 2nd. I’ll get my 42 Mythic points and they will be worth nothing. I’ll be qualified for the next PT only and that is it. 20k and a fuck you have a nice day. But if I manage to win? 50k an invite to worlds (62,500$ in equity). All the clout, the trophy. There is an Arena PT in a month I’m Not qued for. Odds I get invited if I win? Not as high as Ondrej’s odds since he won (100%) but pretty high. You get the point. Winning first matter a lot. I told Paulo this. I said 3 years ago we would high five he’d say yay PT t8 number whatever triple digit number. I’d be happy I’m locked gold tons of pro points everyone cheers everyone happy. But we ESports baby. T8s don’t mean shit. So I ask to see his list and of course, it’s great. I told him this isn’t looking good for you. U got mass manipulations no shitty colorless land only 2 temples this shit is perfect. Let’s play. But I was not in it. I felt a slight bit of pain for Paulo in the moment, and I also was just tired. LSU was beating up on Alabama and I had planned on watching the 4th quarter before Tom mentioned I should play. But at this point I felt I had to at least go through with a game or two. I may just write ID on the slip even if I win, we will see. He beats me in a game 1 where I play ok, but not great. It’s a short game and I go to put my Sb Into my deck. As I’m shuffling through trying to find cards to cut I realize I forgot his SB. And I also can’t even think and don’t care anymore, so I offer him the draw and of course he happily accepts. I tell him I just couldn’t do it to him, sorry I made him sweat! 13-1-2 1 Seed going into Sunday. Paired vs 8 Seed Sebastian Pozzo on stock UG food, Paulo V Cuneo are the other match on my side. I will write about day 3 and the T8 games in another post. This one is a LOT of words and it’s unreal if anyone read this whole thing straight through with no breaks. I’ve been typing this all day, and I don’t feel like proofreading. Thanks for reading; GG Yo

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