#but i tend to treat demons as an ‘anything goes’ sorta deal lol

[sindumpster]

On another note about partial mammals, i have this OC of my own who mostly looks human but has some avian bits added to him (wings, claws, digestive system similar to a bird's etc), and i'm kinda debating if he'd also classify as a "pseudo-mammal" or how his body temperature would also work, what are your thoughts on this? (He also kinda classifies as a demon and demons can do whatever the fuck they want with their bodies but still-)

FRICK realized this has been in my drafts for months instead of posting so I am sorry it took me forever OTL

If they’re avian, then the pseudo-mammal classification wouldn’t work (at least not in the same way, along evolutionary lines).

Like mammals and birds both diverged from reptiles, but at very different times. The first mammals predated the first birds by at least 60 million years, and ancestral mammals branched off before dinosaurs. Birds, however, evolved from dinosaurs. So mammals and birds are fairly isolated from each other.

Or like idk if a visual is better for showing that, but here’s my (badly) drawn attempt to explain how the two evolved separately from each other. Mammals evolved separately from dinosaurs, so a proto-mammal-bird wouldnt really occur, and “pseudo-mammal” specifically refers to those ancestral mammal-reptile mixes though mix isn’t really a good term for them either, since they’re not like hybrids, but ancestral forms that modern mammals and reptiles are derived from. Anyways this is just to explain why calling them a pseudo-mammal or using it as an explanation wouldn’t really work.

You could hybridize traits though, depending on how your canon defines demons (and especially which religion/mythology you are using as your base or if you’re going completely original, but also how they operate within the world and rules you set). And based on how you define them, it’s gonna affect how they appear/work physically. Like with the demons in Jake’s verse I tend to pull from nature, and then distort it, to give them a sort of uncanny feel that’s based a little more in aesthetic than functionality, because they’re not inherently physical beings and don’t really need to function the same way. Which means I can also bend and break the rules however I feel without getting too caught up in the biology of it.

But for something that either is physical, or full on trying to operate a physical form, then probs just throwing in whatever traits you feel and going “because demon is trying to copy life but didn’t use only one reference” is probably fine.

Regarding temperature regulation, they shouldn’t have issues based on avian/mammalian traits. Birds are warm-blooded too, and tend to run fairly high. So a combination of two warm-blooded animals is probably going to give you something warm-blooded.

But that doesn’t mean you couldn’t use some other justification, if you really wanted them to have that issue. Like maybe it’s cuz they didn’t nail the physical biology stuff right, or maybe they’re used to the fiery environment of hell so they didn’t think to account for colder temps. Maybe supernatural creatures just run cold. Maybe it’s a cost of using magic. Like nice thing with fantasy is you can always make up something completely unrelated, and it often works better than shooting for purely scientific explanations.

[bigskydreaming]

About all the stuff you were talking about, do you know any fics that handle those things well? It is exhausting trying to go through the Dick Grayson tag to try and find ones that handle even one of those remotely well so any you can tell me would be wonderful.

I use my Bookmarks page as a go-to for people looking for that sorta thing. I haven’t added to it in awhlie which is like, a useful reminder for myself to rectify that.

I’m not sure off the top of my head what fics on there address these particular areas of canon or fanon issues, but they’re in there, and I don’t bookmark anything I wouldn’t reread since that’s....the only reason I bookmark stuff lol. Aka nothing that contains elements or fanon tropes/issues that would’ve pulled me out of the read on the first go-through.

Specific authors who I consistently like for their takes on all of that, hmmm....off the top of my head, @dustorange only deals in Quality Stuff and her Hierarchy of Needs for Dick’s characterization has similar enough rankings to my own personal one, that I’m always like, yes, this hit all the beats I was hoping for from this summary, I am full, I could not eat another bite. But maybe a dessert course later. I guess. If you insist.

In terms of specific takes and tropes I’ve been talking about tonight, @themessofthecentury has a fic that delves into all the Spyral aftermath in a really satisfying way. Y’ever been like, ugh can someone please write a lengthy beast of a multi-chapter that takes all of that and says ‘Lo, there is Gold in these hills” and has a range of POVs but that all consistently prioritize and center Dick in the areas and matters he should be the one prioritized? That’s the one, that’s Fault Lines, its a WIP but its alive and kicking and very much what you’re looking for to read something actually catharctic after the way all of that was handled in canon and most related fics.

Umm, lessee.... @hood-ex is all about Top Notch Tropes, especially for great scenes where Dick’s with a wide range of characters, and its like, casual slice-of-life stuff, but delivered in a way that Just Says No to fanon and even when writing Dick as light-hearted and having a good day, its like...actually in character for him and he’s not Dick Grayson, The Balloon Animal That Walks Like A Man (but is actually 70% sugary cereal). You gotta follow her on tumblr though to get all the fics, cuz she’s like me in that she writes a lot of done-in-one scenes that never get moved over to Ao3 because eh, we’ll do it tomorrow but also we’ll forget about it by tonight so no actually we won’t. And thus there’s a lot of hidden gems to be found there.

@ckbookish writes a lot of stuff set in the early Nightwing days when Jason was Robin, and from what I’ve read there’s a lot of focus on Dick and Jason bonding and also exploration of Dick’s thoughts and reactions to Bruce’s “Bruce NO” behavior of that era that’s very much in character and IMO hits all the right notes in the complicated arrangement of allowing Dick his Feels there and placing the appropriate blame where appropriate but without demonizing Bruce and over-embellishing the more than enough to work with fuck-ups canon helpfully provided for that era. 

In fact, in general I’m inclined to say the author sticks as closely to canon as possible while just....making it better by just adding the little ingredient that is ‘Actual Exploration of Dick’s Feelings and Choices As Viewed Through Empathy-Colored Glasses By Someone Who I Feel Actually HAS Met or Been A Teenager At Some Point in Their Life and Thus Is Aware They’re Not Actually Unreasonable Wild Animals Whose Behavior Even When Rational Is Actually Irrational Cuz Hormones Yeah I Know I Was Surprised Too’. So I’d say their work consistenly delivers the story and emotional beats I look for from Bruce, Dick and Jason in that era, actually humanizing all three of them without going overboard with adding flaws all willy-nilly just cuz.

The only reason its not on my bookmarks page is cuz unfortunately, the sticking close to canon means Dick joining the Bludhaven police force to try and clean it up from the inside, and like.....not a criticism or condemnation of the execution of that premise at all, like, Dick’s clear in his reasons and from what I read goes about it in a way that actually fits if Dick had criticisms of the institution as a whole and an earnest belief he can effect change to it from the inside, its just like, purely as a personal subjectivity thing, Dick Grayson and Being a Cop is like my ultimate NOTP, I see it and I reflexively hiss like a vampire who forgot the sun was a thing. Its just not for me in any execution, but if that’s not true for you then its got everything else I’d look for in fic and thus while I can’t vouch for his characterization or the dynamics in later stories, like, I’m pretty sure you’d still be in Primo Characterization territory. 

There’s stuff on my bookmarks page from an author named discowing(amelia from a fairytale) - something like that. I can’t recall their tumblr off the top of my head but I know she says it somewhere in some of her author’s notes. Anyway, her stuff runs the gamut but consistently delivers on moments I really wish we could see in canon, so def worth a read. And I know her views on the Spyral aftermath and what’s needed for actual catharsis there are right in my wheelhouse, just in general, so if that’s the barometer you’re going by, then like.....idk whatever a barometer says or does when it gets the readings its supposed to, look its late, that’s the metaphor I’m going with, just pretend it was solid.

Those are just some of the authors where I’m familiar with more than one of their works off the top of my head and tend to like their focus and narrative/character choices across the board. I don’t know the full extent of work of every author linked on my Bookmarks page, like a lot of people write a lot of fic in a lot of fandom and I see a long list of fandoms and fics all organized by date posted so its more like one DC fic per page, and my ADHD self is like hahaha what if it was naptime tho zzzz.

But yeah, that’s not nearly enough to sate my greed and want for Good Dick Grayson Takes but it should get you started. There’s some good stuff out there, that’s never been in question, its just that like you said, it can be exhausting trying to wade through fics that you can’t tell at a glance if they’d be to your liking or not because the tags are all complimentary of Dick but two chapters in you’re like wait is this the other kids’ brother or is this their nanny, I feel like I’m reading about what if Fran Drescher wore tights and fought crime with flippity-flips. Which I mean, that’s a Premise right there, alright, its just not remotely the premise I look for out of fic where I have the weird expectation that Dick should be treated and regarded more like equal family to his siblings than like, okay what if he was actually just an au pair that was mostly hired to be eye candy.