#but it just *directly* contradicts the previous two games

[sun-marie]

the issue for me with DAI is that for the most part, I do kinda like the story it's trying to tell. in a vacuum, it's well-written and has many thought-provoking choices.

but there is just no way around the fact that in order to achieve that story, it has to throw away like half of what both the previous games were all about, while still cashing in on them with returning characters and cameos, which results in a lot of "he would not fucking say that"

[notmeowse]

That AMA marks the end of Dragon Age.

In my opinion.

I'll start by saying that I have played all 3 of the previous games repeatedly, I've loved the series for 15 years, more than half my life. These games inspired me to become a writer and they've shaped a lot of my tastes and interests in shows and writing -- to say they were formative is kind of an understatement. Don't want to go on and on about how much I loved them, that's not the point here.

I didn't care for Veilguard for pretty much all of the reasons people have already discussed at length on Reddit and Tumblr. The writing is comprehensively bad, the romances are easily the worst Bioware has written by pure virtue of having the most cookie-cutter pacing and shallow characterization I've seen across their games, the lore has been shafted in every direction, and the nuanced storytelling and roleplay I came to expect from the series has been taken out back and shot in the head.

All, apparently, in the name of a "clean slate". It seems to me that, rather than familiarizing himself with the existing lore of the game he took the creative reins on, Epler clearly had a vision for Dragon Age (or perhaps a different IP entirely) in his head that he decided to transplant into the game (and possibly Trick? But they've said so little beyond defending their work that I can hardly theorize what direction they were coming from). That being a sanitized, wildly self-contradicting, morally absolute shitshow focused on distancing itself from the previous games as much as possible. Now, I know it's unrealistic to blame one person entirely, and I don't blame him entirely. Corinne was there. Trick was there.

But if it wasn't already evident from the numerous interviews Epler's given on the game as well as his participation in the Q&A's (while the actual lead writer of the game has been completely absent in not just the marketing, but in most fan-related interaction pre and post-launch outside of BSKY), this AMA seems to have confirmed, more than anything else, that Epler doesn't understand the game nor does he understand its audience. Neither does Corinne Busche, who despite being Game Director for only the last two years of development, has been answering lore questions a) like she has any fucking clue and b) like she thinks Dragon Age is a cozy-gamer IP, meant to appeal to people that want uplifting stories with uncontroversial characters, morally upright heroes, and unquestionably evil villains.

So as of today's AMA, I think I've finally had enough. We're just outright retconning the lore in Reddit AMA's now, I guess. Among other things. I'll provide a few examples, just so we're all on the same page.

This was part of Epler's response to why Solas didn't have his cult following in the game (insert "We Kind of Forgot" meme here):

Solas' experience leading the rebellion against the Evanuris turned him against the idea of being a leader. You see it in the memories - the entire experience of being in charge ate at him and, ultimately, convinced him he needed to do this on his own. And his own motivations were very different from the motivations of those who wanted to follow him - he had no real regard for their lives or their goals. So at some point between Trespasser and DATV, he severed that connection with his 'followers' and went back to being a lone wolf.

The fact that this (the not caring bit) directly contradicts the writing in the actual game is absolutely INSANE to me, moreso than the lack of Solas's spy network (which he apparently carried with him for 10 years only to conveniently drop right before the ritual? Because he clearly had them research Rook?). But in regards to the not caring -- here's a line from Solas's memory of killing Mythal in Veilguard, which. I'll get to Mythal in a minute:

Why should I not tear down the Veil, and bring back immortality to all the elven people? They deserve it!

Which is it? Does Solas care about the people he's saving (the venn diagram of people he's saving vs. the people following him is surely a circle, i.e. elves) or not? Does he even care about the spirits trapped behind the Veil anymore or is it just convenient to abandon them and have him only care about elves, now? What happened to saving The People? What happened to him not identifying as an elf in his conversations with a Dalish Inquisitor? And what the absolute fuck happened to him wanting to bring back the magical marvels (that the ancient elves did in fact achieve) that were greater than anything we see in Thedas today? Here's what Epler has to say about elven magic, now:

I do agree that the elves have had their place in the sun at this point. [...] The thing about the Evanuris is that, ultimately, they were able to take a very specific type of magic and shape it into doing what they wanted. But even their understanding of magic was only skin deep [...] Even the magic that Tevinter wields, the magic of the Southern mages, is different from what the Evanuris used. The magic of the Evanuris is powerful but it's sterile, and it's constrained. So while the Evanuris have made magic work in a way that's more predictable and understandable, it's not the only kind of magic out there, and even then, I'd say they understood it at a very surface level. People were confidently describing how the natural world worked back in the 16th century. Very few of them were right.

First of all, Tevinter has been stated in previous games to have clumsily adapted ancient elven magic for their own, but they did adapt it. To the point where even Solas is surprised that Corypheus achieved effective immortality -- by binding himself to a dragon the same way the Evanuris did. So, cool, more contradicting the lore here. "They understood it at a very surface level" you mean when all of the magic of the Fade wasn't locked behind the Veil? You mean when magic flowed freely through the world? What do you mean, Surface Fucking Level? The entire point of the Dalish elf culture is what they lost; this wasn't the ancient elves thinking the sun revolved around the earth, the Veil was their fucking Library of Alexandria burning. Oh my god. I still cannot believe he said this.

And how have the elves had their day in the sun? I'm sorry, was Arlathan not given to... the Veil Jumpers? Instead of the Dalish? What happened to all the Dalish clans in the south, who had no infrastructure when the world was apparently blighted to hell? I guess they're just gone now! They've had their day! The story of the Dalish and the Evanuris is over (also confirmed in this AMA), and it apparently ends with the final snuff of the candle that is their culture. Congratulations, Chantry, you've won! Only took two genocides and a double blight, but we're done with the Dalish now! We get your mind-numbingly superficial factions instead!

What happened to Mythal, by the way? What happened to "She was betrayed as I was betrayed, as the world was betrayed! Mythal clawed and crawled her way through the ages to me, and I will see her avenged!" What happened to the reckoning that will shake the very heavens? John's answer to this:

People grow and change over time. Mythal's essence - and in particular, the fragment of her spirit that Morrigan carries, that she got from Flemeth - is not the same Mythal who he knew millennia ago. Centuries of living in this world and being around the kinds of people Flemeth found herself around - the Hero of Ferelden, Hawke, the Inquisitor - changed her views, and made her realize her own culpability in turning Solas into the kind of person he is now.

Oh, right, okay. So she was pissed for like a thousand years, got her big speech about the impending "reckoning" out 10 years ago, and then she just chilled out because the last 3 heroes were neat people. What a fucking joke. And yes, here is the confirmation that the Evanuris story is over --

The story of the Evanuris is done - the gods are dead (or imprisoned) and Thedas is in a state of flux and uncertainty. I imagine that whatever happens next is going to be a surprise to everyone, including the people of Thedas."

So I guess Mythal's reckoning is never coming. One of the most fascinating characters in the series, shrouded in mystery for those first 3 games, PROMISING US a blaze of glory, only to fizzle out in this one. Again, and I can't emphasize this enough, for Epler's clean fucking slate. And we've not just tied up her story, but also the Veil and the Blight:

When Solas bound himself (or, depending on your ending, was forcibly bound) to the Veil, it severed the connection that the Blight had to the waking world. The reality is that the Veil has been leaking ever since the Magisters first entered the Black City, and the dreams of the Titans gave it its terrible and awesome power. Now that the Veil is fully repaired, the Blight lacks that motive force, and being so close to the epicenter of that change has stripped the Blight in Minrathous of its vitality. It's calcified now - dead - and Bellara/Neve no longer suffer its effects. If they'd been anywhere else, further from that epicenter, it would've likely been different and they still would be looking for a cure.

So the Veil is permanently fixed now because our half-dead Dread Wolf bound himself to it (a decision I still don't understand) and that somehow fixed every single hole ever poked in it. Fully repaired. No more holes, no more "Veil is thin here" because tons of people died in the same spot, nope, we're washing our hands and leaving it (and the spirits) behind us because we've wrapped up both the series-long Veil storyline and the blight storyline in a big red bow.

And Epler tells us Solas not only bound himself to the Veil but fixed it entirely in one fell swoop, no ritual required, just a little slice to the hand. Again, all in the name of a clean slate, so any future installments or media centered around Thedas can turn away from this story.

Then there's this. What we can expect from future installments, I freaking guess. The aforementioned roleplay getting taken out back and shot:

Q: "What lead you to the decision to step away from active conversations with the companions as in previous Bioware games, where you can initiate them at any moment and ask exhaustive questions?"

John: "For us, because of tech limitations, it became a choice between exhaustive investigate conversations, or letting the companions move more freely around the Lighthouse. With the kind of experience we were going for, one where seeing the team grow around you is paramount, we felt that seeing them interact in common spaces (and in each other's rooms) made more sense."

Literally confirmed that they chose companions moving freely about the cabin over ... interacting with them outside the handful of cutscenes we got. Who in their right mind would think this was a good call in a Dragon Age game? A series that quite literally prides itself on complex character interactions and storytelling? So they could... sit in different places? Are you kidding me?

They don't see an issue with the game's reception. They don't have any interest in addressing or responding to criticism. They're either happy with their choices or EA's got a gun pointed at their heads, I'm honestly not sure anymore. I used to believe the latter was true, but looking at both Epler's and Busche's responses today, I'm inclined to believe the former.

So I think that's it for the series. Not that I thought it was going to get another game after this, but on the absolute off chance it did, what would be the point? The best stories were ruined. Anything left they have to tell is going to read a lot like Veilguard -- superficial, morally absolute, flagrantly disrespectful to the lore, and delivered in a very poorly written package.

[vaspider]

So, something happened last night that has been sitting heavily on my heart ever since. I'm not naming names for a reason, so don't ask. This is a clear example of something that's happened with increasing regularity.

When the Amsterdam attacks started happening last night, the first thing I thought of was a pair of my friends who had within the last 48h - I thought - been in Amsterdam to get married. (I got the place they traveled to wrong, bc it was late and I was tired, but that's not the point.) These friends are a Black frum Czech lesbian & her new wife, an in-progress convert who's seriously ill. I shared the CNN link on it & spoke with friends on a very small Discord server about how terrified I was that my friends had (again, I thought) narrowly missed being in the city while Jews were being advised to stay inside and, if they had to go out, to remove any visible symbols of their Jewishness.

Here's where I reach up and underline the word frum in that previous paragraph. Got it? Asking that friend to remove her visible signs of being Jewish is like asking her to go outside naked.

And here's the thing that's gonna stick with me for a long time: someone that I used to consider a longtime friend, who rarely, if ever, spoke on that server, popped up almost 4 hours after I was talking about how much this scared me about the relative safety of my friends to share a tweet containing the phrase Judeo-Nazis in order to contradict the CNN article and bring up what she apparently thought was the important part of the story:

"The Israelis started it," according to her & her "Judeo-Nazis" source.

That was what she thought was important to that story. Not that random fucking Jews are getting attacked on the streets of Amsterdam, not that I was relieved that my friends weren't in danger while still dealing with the fear and the shock of feeling they had been so close to it, but that I had to know, right away, that contrary to what CNN (and every other major news outlet talking about it) was reporting, this random person on Twitter referring to Israelis at a fucking soccer game and random visibly Jewish people of any nationality on the street in Amsterdam as Judeo-Nazis said that the Israelis fucking started it.

And like, no, they fucking didn't, but in context, the context in which I was speaking in a small group about my fear for two friends who weren't at the fucking soccer match but who I thought might be close to the danger, does that fucking matter? What does that have to do with "fuck, I think my friends were just there"?

Nothing. And yet - for some reason - that's the first thing that needed to be addressed in this person's mind.

A lot of Jews find our circles shrinking these days. Antisemitism is on the rise, and if we're not experiencing the direct slap in the face of people we thought were friends prioritizing "you know, the Jews started it" over anything else, we're watching people we thought better of make excuses for it, or tell us that we should gladly accept "our share" of the blame for the actions of a foreign government. (Yes, that has been said to me directly, recently.)

If I weren't so fucking stubborn, I would fold into myself & just keep company with the few and the trusted, a circle that gets smaller and smaller every day. But... I'm stubborn as hell. Maybe that'll fuck me over someday worse than it already has, I dunno.

I don't have a pithy closing for this. I'm just sad. It hurts to watch people that I used to trust vomit up shit like that tweet. It hurts that it's getting worse.

[butchvamp]

i already said it but it does really frustrate me how little agency Taash has and the more i think about it the more insidious it gets. again their entire story revolves around Rook making choices for them, and they're also consistently talked down to by other characters, even if those characters are depicted as being friendly or nice. Isabela treats them like a child despite Taash being a very accomplished dragon hunter with the lords (which we see, repeatedly, when fighting the blighted dragons! Taash is not a child), and of course there's their mother (at least this is intentional) and both her and Isabela go behind Taash's back to throw them in with Rook, without asking for their input. Isabela just assumes without even trying to discuss it with Taash separate from their mother, despite seemingly being aware of the two's strained relationship... and from there Isabela continues to make unnecessary comments to Taash whenever you visit the hall of valor with them.

even Flynn, the nonbinary grey warden you meet in the wetlands, condescends to them about the Qun when discussing their gender, and Taash isn't allowed to disagree with them (apparently they give Flynn a Look but ultimately don't press the issue) and Flynn is depicted as being helpful in this discussion. Rook lectures them about gender and their own culture; their entire narrative revolves around Other People telling them what to do and how to feel-- it's obviously meant to be Bad when Taash's mother does it, because she (the Qun) is oppressive, but otherwise the game seems to be fine when it's Rook or literally anyone else doing it, because we're the enlightened Good Guys, and Taash is just helpless and confused and so oppressed. of course, i don't think it's bad for Rook to discuss these things with Taash or give them gentle suggestions, and i don't even hate the potential gender discussion you can have with a trans Rook; and for the record, their mother does treat them poorly. but we can't ignore the way Taash's repeated infantilization culminates in the player being the one to choose their culture for them in the end, because..?

well, the game clearly doesn't think Taash is capable of doing it themselves. at one point Taash links the ropes they wear for the Qun to the ones the antaam used to tie down a dragon and "blight" them. even if i'm feeling gracious and say that Weekes really meant that womanhood & their mother's expectations are restricting, they actively chose to use the ropes of the Qun to make this comparison, and so are also implying here that their mother teaching them the Qun has tied them down and "blighted" them-- that the Qun has "infected" their thinking and is as bad as the blight (this is also implied in the previous discussion with Flynn). this is.... really racist. it takes Rook and their, again, "enlightened" (white) ideas about gender to get through to Taash, nevermind that the Qun has its own ideas around gender that just get shouted down or completely ignored. the racism here results in the narrative contradicting itself, considering one of the first things Taash says is "you don't get to tell me who i am" but... Rook does, in the end, because intentional or not the game is clearly convinced that a person like Taash needs someone from outside of their and their mother's culture (aka free of "blight") to come tell them what's best for them.... 🤔 hm! and while it's true you can choose for them to align with the qunari in the end, that doesn't mitigate all of the heinous and racist writing that leads up to that choice (and that the choice itself is racist. and you have to make it twice!)

of course we can say that Rook makes choices for all of the companions, this is true, but it's obvious that none of the other companions' choices are in the same ballpark, we aren't directly deciding something about their identity, and none of them lack agency to the same extent as Taash. we can even argue that they need Rook to explain gender to them, no one else ever has-- well, sure. the thing with Taash is that some parts of their story, when removed from context, are perfectly fine. i'm not criticizing the way Taash talks or acts or "does gender," all of which are things some people may connect to for various reasons (all of our experiences are different) but unfortunately we cannot discuss any of this without addressing the racism that is so thoroughly baked into every aspect of their character.

i criticized Taash for being "childlike" previously and that really wasn't the right phrasing-- i don't think that Taash themselves is childlike, it has nothing to do with them-- it's the way the narrative treats them, the way other characters talk down to them, how it takes away their autonomy & forces us to go along with it, and ultimately educate them and "save" them, and i think it's worth interrogating why Taash, of all the companions, is specifically depicted this way (it's racism).

[ganondoodle]

it might seem like im just a totk hater, and to be fair, i AM, but its not bc i think its bad in every way- if it was all bad, ok, then its all bad and we can forget it happened and can all accept that-

but totk specifically hit the jackpot of -things that frustrate me so much i cannot let go and need to talk about it-

its part of my current hyperfixation (or whatever is the right word), botw is one of my all time favorite games, and that one had so many mysteries i was DEEPLY invested in, its got great music and some absolutely fanatstic moments, some ideas are great to fine, but it doesnt make sense, i hate time travel like little else in games, it constantly contradicts itself, the franchise, even its previous game its supposed to be a sequel to, i felt like i was made fun of by the game itself, for caring so much about what they had set up or done in botw, the moment i saw what they did to the shrine of life i felt so devasted i could hear people pointing and laughing at me for having cared about it, the writing treating me like i am so brainless i cannot connect dot one and two when there are only two dots in front of me labeld 1 and 2 that it then tells me to connect directly, to my face, multiple times, before showing me how to draw a line, its full, so SO FULL of missed opportunities, its got choices in there that are just nothing but frustrating bc there were a hundred other ones, i can see what you could do wit hthe basic ideas, theres people that worship it to a point you cant say anything even mildly critical, even about objectively bad things (there is no excuse for that godawful arrow menu) bc they will jump at you like a rabid animal-

i could go on but you get the point, never in my life has anything hit me like that

[randomthefox]

I don't know what's worse, the pulled out of nowhere fact the Sungazers are just around and fine or the fact they're all the same 2 color tones pulled from Trip's palette

Like, they really had not a better idea? Nobody thought of making one with the browns and oranges inverted from Trip's? Nobody thought of making one or two who were yellow and orange/brown? That's just so boring

Maybe the worst part is how Trip's grandpa just gives SCU Pachacamac vibes.

This is so fucking stupid and makes me SO ANGRY that I struggle to formulate my RAGE FUELED thoughts into coherent articulated explanations for why this doesn't make any fucking sense

Let's put aside the FACT that the TEXT of Sonic Superstars goes against this.

This actually directly contradicts previous COMIC material WRITTEN BY IAN FLYNN

BEFORE Eggman had even SET FOOT on the island, Trip was already being Shanghaied into working for Fang. If there were other Sungazers on the island WHICH THERE OBVIOUSLY WEREN'T there was literally no opportunity for Trip to "sneak away" and warn them about Eggman. What the fuck are you TALKING ABOUT Ian Flynn?

That shit wasn't in the comic THAT YOU WROTE, that shit wasn't in the Triple Trouble animation THAT YOU WROTE, that shit wasn't in the Japan exclusive Tokyo Game Show promotional comic

You are just MAKING THIS SHIT UP out of sheer ARCHIE WORSHIP without any thoughts to the fact that ALL PREVIOUS MATERIAL CREATED FOR SONIC SUPERSTARS INCLUDING THE GAME ITSELF ACTIVELY CONTRADICTS THIS

Ian Flynn you FUCKING HACK FRAUD

[thenasoneshots]

Sirius and Remus Oneshot - Never Have I Ever

Requested?: No

Prompt: None

Type of oneshot: Fluff/Smut

Timing: Marauder’s Era (Takes place before the summer of their 6th year, ik this contradicts the first part, but pretend that’s 6th year)

Reader's Relations: Remus/Sirius’ girlfriend (cause WolfStar)

Reader’s House: Hufflepuff

Warnings: Smut, Dom! Reader, Sub! Remus, Switch! Sirius

Other notes: This is part two of ‘Flirting Gets You Nowhere… Or Does It?’ I’ve had this idea for a while, but with the smut bit, I wasn’t too keen on writing it, but I want to write smut, I’m happy to, but not too good, and out of practice, this is also my first time writing a threesome so… you can skip over the smut, it’s marked where it starts (: also a small context that wasn’t necessary for the first part, but you come from a pure-blooded family, who don’t take lightly to half-bloods/muggle-borns

-------------------------- (Before summer of 6th year)

“Look what I got! Now who wants to play ‘Never Have I Ever’?”

I lifted my head from its previous position of resting on Remus’ shoulder, Sirius leaning on Remus’ other side, and started James directly in the eye, “Why? That’s a game that 1st and 2nd years play. I thought you’d grown up, but clearly not.”

“Oh come on, (Y/n)! It’ll be fun. Plus it’s nearly the Summer Holidays!”

“I’m in!” Sirius responded, lifting his head too, “If it involves free alcohol, I’m in!”

I rolled my eyes and turned to Remus, “Remind me how we both fell in love with him again?” Remus chuckled and pecked my forehead, “I don’t know, I ask myself that quite often.”

“Hey! You know you love me!” Sirius squeaked, falling off the sofa, causing me to giggle as James walked over, “So, are we playing this game or did I just steal this firewhiskey for no reason?”

“Fine,” I replied sitting up properly.

“Awesome! So how this will work is if you’ve done the thing you have to take a shot.”

“We know how to play, James, just get on with it.”

He rolled his eyes, “Fine, Little Miss Perfect Hufflepuff! Never have I ever…. Had two boyfriends.”

I narrowed my eyes at him before taking one of the shot glasses and downing it, “You better not target me the whole game.”

“No promises….”

I sighed, a smirk appearing, “So we’re playing it like that? Very well, never have I ever NOT dated a werewolf.” James’ face paled and his eyes widened as he reached for one of the glasses, causing my smirk to increase, “See, you don’t it either do you? Remus, it’s your turn.” Remus nodded, after putting his own glass down, “What? I can’t very well date myself, can I?” I let out a giggle, “You’re right, just say something.”

“Never have I ever… been an animagus,” Remus replied, smirking, causing me, Sirius and James to reach for a glass.

“My turn! Never have I ever… not been in love with the Amazing Sirius Black!”

I giggled as James took another shot, me petting Sirius on the head, “Good one.”

“Never have I ever…been sorted into Hufflepuff.” I glared at James, taking a shot while maintaining eye contact with him.

---------------------

The game continued with me and James getting increasingly drunk, the two of us targetting each other, Sirius rather tipsy, and Remus only having to take a couple of shots, so he was still pretty sober.

“Never have I ever… been caught making out while I’m supposed to be having a Head Boy and Head Girl meeting.”

“(Y/n)! You’re targeting me!” James slurred, reaching for another shot glass, now completely drunk.

“It’s your own fault!”

“Never have I *hic* ever fantasised about having a threesome.”

I felt my face heat up and I reached for a glass, waiting to hear or see the response of my boyfriends.

“You know… we could make that fantasy a reality, (Y/n),” Sirius whispered in my ear, causing my face to turn redder than it already was. I soon snapped out of my embarrassment and turned to him, “Oh yeah? Cause you’re really drunk right now, Siri…”

“And you’re really sexy, (Y/n)...” he replied.

“You two need to stop being all over each other, seriously.”

“Hey, Remmy, don’t you want a piece?” I asked leaning over and getting in his face, “I know you want to… I have an idea… never have I ever dated a Hufflepuff.” Remus rolled his eyes and leaned over for a shot, and I saw Sirius doing the same, causing me to giggle. For a few more rounds, I and Sirius continued to target Remus until he turned to me, “Get up in our dorm, now.”

I smirked, knowing he was now wholly drunk and stood up, kissing him and walked up to their dorm, hearing Remus say one thing to James, “You’re sleeping down here tonight… unless you don’t want to sleep.”

SMUT STARTS HERE

Once I’d made it to their dorm, I laid down on Remus’s bed, somehow remembering which it was,  due to the chocolate resting on his nightstand. I smirked to myself, hearing Remus and Sirius making their way up the stairs and taking off my uniform, leaving myself in my bra, pants and socks. The two boys eventually came into the room and their jaws dropped when they saw me, “Hello, want to take a piece of this?”

Sirius was on me in a minute, kissing me and forcing his tongue into my mouth. I could feel him growing hard, and I let out a moan as I brought my hand down, rubbing him through his trousers, causing him to let out a groan. I heard a whine and looked up from Sirius, who was now massaging my breasts through my bra to see Remus standing with a tent forming in his trousers too.

“Come over here Rem, and take your trousers off.” he did so and walked over. Once he was in reaching distance I took his hard cock in my hand, rubbing it causing him to let out a moan. I quickly picked my wand up from the floor and put a silencing charm, as well as a lock charm on the door to make sure we wouldn’t be interrupted, before taking Remus in my mouth, dropping my wand to the floor. I drew my attention back to Sirius when he pulled my pants off, and I felt him licking my cunt. I let out a moan and tried to concentrate on Remus’ pleasure, his cock still in my mouth as Sirius continued to eat me out. I soon came from Sirius licking me and removed my mouth from Remus, who’d had more pleasure due to my moans around him, “Don’t worry, you’ll get to cum soon.”

I turned back to Sirius, “Strip. Now.” His eyes widened but he complied, taking off his clothes one by one, starting with his jumper and shirt before moving to his trousers. While he was doing this, I instructed Remus to lie down on his bed, which he did. I crawled over and sat on his lap, slowly going down on his cock, loud moans coming from both of us. I heard a whimper and turned to see that Sirius had now stripped completely and beckoned him over, petting his head, “Good boy. Remus, lean over and suck him off while I ride you.” Remus obeyed immediately, leaning over and taking Sirius in his mouth, sucking on him. The sight as well as the pleasure, as Sirius had now leaned over and was rubbing my clit, was enough to put me over the edge and I came, releasing around Remus, him also cumming.

“Swap positions. Mummy wants you to fuck her, Siri.” Sirius’ face went pink as I moved off Remus, kneeling on Remus’ bed on all fours, my ass facing towards Sirius. He placed his hands on my butt before inserting himself into me hard. I let out a loud moan, “Rem, come here.” Remus adjusted his position and I started to suck him off again, noticing he was still hard. I soon felt Sirius’ thrusts beginning to get sloppy and I could tell he was going to cum, “Cum inside me, Siri, please!” I soon felt him cum in me before feeling Remus release into my mouth, me cumming again around Sirius. I moved my head from Remus and the two boys helped me lie down in bed.

—-----------------------SMUT OVER

A weeks days later, a few days before the end of the school year, I ended up having to go to the Hospital Wing due to the fact I was sick in the mornings and I’d been feeling a lot more tired.

“What’s wrong with me Madame Pomfrey?” I asked nervously lying on one of the beds in the hospital wing.

She didn’t answer, instead, she turned to Lily who was just leaving the Hospital Wing, after what I guessed was visiting a friend, “Ahh, good timing, Miss Evans, could you please ask Mr Black and Mr Lupin to come here?” Lily nodded, muttering an, “Of course,” as she dashed out of the Hospital Wing. I turned back to Madame Pomfrey, “Can’t you tell me what it is before Remus and Sirius get here?” Madame Pomfrey sighed and came closer to me, “Miss (L/n), may I ask you a few personal questions?” I nodded, “If it will help you to work out what is wrong with me, yes.”

“I have a prediction already. I just want to clarify. May I ask, have you been ‘intimate’ with either of your boyfriends recently?” I felt my face flush a bit and nodded shyly, “Please don’t tell any of my professors! I swear it was-”

“I’m not going to say anything, whatever you tell me will stay between us and your boyfriends. Secondly, when was the last time you had your period?”

Again, I felt my face flush a bit, “A-about 5 weeks ago.”

“I see, well that confirms my suspicions. You’re-”

“WHERE’S (Y/N)?! WHERE IS SHE?!” I hear Sirius shout as he ran into the Hospital Wing, Remus following behind him. The two spotted me and ran over, “Madame Pomfrey, what’s wrong with our girlfriend!?” Sirius asked in a panic.

“I hope you two are ready to be fathers. It seems Miss (L/n) is pregnant.”

Remus and Sirius looked at each other before turning to me, “Are you?”

Before I could reply, Madame Pomfrey had spoken again, “I’ll leave you three to discuss this. Miss (L/n), I know what I said before, but I will have to inform Professor Dumbledore about this… development.”

I nodded, “Okay.” She smiled at me and left, leaving me with my two boyfriends, Remus speaking first, “D-do you remember when... Y’know?” I knew what he was referring to and nodded, “Y-yeah, well I have my predictions. Remember when James forced us to play Never Have I Ever? Well, we all got pretty drunk and you both ended up fucking me. I think that due to the hangovers the next morning, we forgot to do anything that would stop me from having a child inside me…”

The two of them looked at each other again and then walked over to the bed, the two of them perching on a side each, “Y-you want to keep it? The baby I mean?” I nodded slowly, “Yeah, it’s not fair to kill the little one when they haven’t even been born yet. You two want to be fathers?” They both nodded immediately, “Of course, we’ll support your decision, (Y/n). You’re our girlfriend.”

“Miss (L/n).”

I looked up to see Professor Dumbledore standing a few metres away, Professor McGonagall and Professor Sprout standing behind him, the latter two being there I guessed due to being our Heads of Houses.

“Yes?”

“Madame Pomfrey has informed us of your situation. While I cannot state that I’m not disappointed that this has happened I would like to say that if you decide to keep the baby, then your professors will be informed in case you have to leave classes or anything.”

I nodded, “T-thank you, I already decided that I want to keep the baby.”

“In that case, just remember, me and the rest of your professors are here if you need anything. If you start showing before the end of term, we can arrange for you to go home early, how will your parents take this?”

“They’re not going to like this… To be honest. They’ve already pretty much disowned me for having both two boyfriends and, no offence to you Rem, but one of them being a half-blood.”

“If you need somewhere to stay, my parents would happily look after you, (Y/n).” I hadn’t even noticed James was in the room too, “They know how your parents are, and I’m sure they wouldn’t turn you away. I mean, if they let Sirius stay with us for all of the holidays, I’m sure they’d let you stay. I mean, this is my fault anyway, it was my idea to play that game.”

I smiled, “Thanks, James, and yeah, this is your fault! You were the one that brought the alcohol.”

Professor McGonagall gave him a harsh talking to when he heard that alcohol had been involved and it ended up with James in detention for a week, Sirius and Remus getting one-off detention, and somehow, Professor Sprout let me off scot-free.

—----------------------

Over the Summer Holidays between our 6th and 7th years, the four of us stayed with James’ parents, him having written to them about the situation, and they were happy to look after me and let me stay with them to help me with my pregnancy and the baby.

“Honestly (Y/n), it’s fine, we don’t mind. Any friend of James is welcome here.”

“I know, James has been telling me that since he found out I was pregnant. I really appreciate you letting me stay with you.”

“Do you know which of your boyfriends is the father yet? Biological father I mean.”

I shook my head, “I’ve got an appointment next Saturday which is when I’m going to find out, they were both going to come with me, but there’s a Quidditch match, and they can’t miss it, even though Remus isn’t on the team…but Sirius coaxed Professor McGonagall into letting Remus commentate and it’s apparently too late to find someone else to do it.”

“I’ll come with you if you like. It’ll be easier if you have someone there with you. Then you can write to the two of them and tell them the gender and who the father is.”

I smiled up at James’ mother, “Thank you, I’d like that very much, but I think I want to surprise them.”

------------------------REMUS’ POV (March of 7th Year)

“I wonder how (Y/n) is doing…”

“She’ll be fine, Moony, no need to worry! Seriously, my parents already treat her like she’s their daughter, sometimes I think they might as well adopt her with how much time she spends at our house over holidays as stuff! I’m telling you, if something went wrong, Dumbledore would have been informed and we would have been notified!” James replied, turning back to his potion.

“Yeah, I suppose, I just can’t stop worrying though.”

It was at that moment when Professor McGonagall appeared in the doorway, “Professor Slughorn, may I borrow Black and Lupin for a few minutes?”

“Yes, go ahead,” Professor Slughorn replied, nodding to us. I felt the anxiety come back as me and Sirius stood up, walking out the door, to where Professor McGonagall was waiting for us.

“Professor, what is this about?”

“Not here, Black.”

Sirius rolled his eyes and I subtly reached my hand out taking his hand, giving it a squeeze, and pecking his cheek while Professor McGonagall wasn’t looking. We soon realised we were in her office and she’d shut the door.

“Professor Dumbledore received an owl this morning just after breakfast about your girlfriend. She-”

“Is (Y/n) alright? Please don’t say something bad happened!” I asked, panic wreaking through my voice, “Please don’t tell us she’s dead.”

“She’s perfectly okay. The owl was sent from Potter’s parents. Miss (L/n) has given birth to a healthy baby boy. Professor Dumbledore wanted the two of you to know as soon as possible. You’re both officially fathers. You may return to class.”

“Professor?” I asked hesitantly, causing Sirius, who was already halfway to the door, to groan lowly.

“Yes?” she replied, looking at me, “Is something the matter?”

“Did the Potter’s letter say anything about the baby’s condition? Or what (Y/n) called him?”

“Oh right. You have nothing to worry about, Mr Lupin, the child’s biological father is Mr Black here, so he’s not a werewolf, like you,” I let out the breath I’d been holding in relief as she continued, “As for the name, the letter said she’d called him Orion. As for the middle name, he was given yours Mr Lupin and Miss (L/n) had given the child her last name. So his full name is Orion Remus (L/n).”

I smiled and thanked her before dragging Sirius out of the room the two of us making our way back to Potions.

“I’m glad your his father, Sirius. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I’d made a baby into a werewolf.”

“You’re still gonna be an amazing Dad, Moony! We both are. He’s gonna be my little Oreo, I can already tell.”

------------------YOUR POV (Summer after 7th Year)

I smiled as I sat on the sofa of the Potters’ house, Orion lying in my arms.

“He looks like the perfect mix of you and Sirius.”

“I know,” I replied, “I can’t wait for the boys to meet him and I hope they’re happy with the name choice.”

Just then the door burst open, “Where’s my little Oreo!?” I blinked and stood up, trying to calm Orion, as he’d started crying at the loud noise, as I walked out of the living room to see Sirius standing in the doorway, Remus, James and James’ dad standing behind him. My smile widened, “He’s right here, be careful though, he only seems to like me holding him at the moment, “Orion, this is your Papa Sirius.” I paused and tentatively placed Orion in Sirius’ arms as he’d now dropped his trunk onto the ground.

“Hello there, I’m your Papa! I’m going to be the best Papa ever! Better than your Papa Remus, yes I am.”

I breathed a sigh of relief as Orion didn’t start crying when I placed him in Sirius’ arms as he walked into the living room, oogling over Orion.

“Sirius! Your stuff! You can’t just leave it here!” Remus shouted after him, “And I’m not bringing it up for you!”

“It’s alright, I’ll bring both your bags up, you go and meet your son,” James’ dad replied to Remus.

“Are you sure? I can bring my bag up first.”

“I’m sure, go and see him.”

Remus nodded and placed his trunk down, walking over to me and wrapping his arm around me, “Shall we go see if Sirius has messed up yet?” I giggled and nodded, pecking him on the lips, the two of us walked into the living room where Sirius was sitting on the sofa, the now 4-month-old Orion in his arms, him smiling widely as he played with the baby.

“You are my little Oreo. I will make sure you stay safe.”

At this point, Orion started crying again and made small hand movements to me. I sighed and walked over, “Don’t worry, Mummy’s here, Mummy’s here, Buddy.” He started to grab ahold of the top I was wearing and I let out a small giggle, “Is someone hungry? I’ll be back in a few minutes,” the last statement made to the others, before I walked out the room.

REMUS’ POV

“Mum, when’s the last time (Y/n) had a decent night sleep?” James asked. It was clear that he’d noticed the bags under (Y/n)’s eyes too.

“I’d say probably about two days before Orion was born. She’s been insisting on doing everything herself. I’ve tried to tell her that she could ask us for help, but she just says ‘I appreciate the offer, but it’s fine, I can manage’. And won’t let us help in anyway. She’s going to make herself ill, but she won’t listen, saying that Orion is her first priority and that she’s putting him above everything else. Maybe one of you could try talking to her?” the last statement was directed to me and Sirius and I nodded, “I’ll try, but I doubt she’s going to listen.”

YOUR POV

I walked back into the room only to be pulled away by Remus after he taken Orion from me and handed him to Sirius.

“Remus, I already told you, Orion isn’t keen on anyone-” he shut me up by kissing me, “I know what you said, but he’ll be fine for a few minutes, plus he liked Sirius earlier until he got hungry. (Y/n) you need to rest. James’ parents told us you haven’t had a decent night sleep since before Orion was born. You need to take care of yourself too.”

“I can’t leave Orion alone, Rem, he’s still a baby!”

“I know that, but.. Just follow me,” he pulled me back towards the living room and I saw Sirius sitting on the floor with his legs crossed, Orion sitting in front of him babbling as Sirius played peek-a-boo with him. My heart melted and Remus pulled me away again, “See, he’s perfectly fine with Sirius. Perhaps he just knows who his parents are. You said he wasn’t comfortably with alone with James’ parents, so maybe that’s it.”

“I guess you’re right.”

“I know I’m right, now go upstairs and sleep, (Y/n).”

“Bu-”

“No buts. You need sleep.”

“Fine,” I muttered, pecking his cheek, “But if he starts crying, come and get me, okay?”

“I’ sure we won’t need to do that,” Remus replied, pushing me upstairs, “No go sleep!”

REMUS’ POV

I walked back into the living room to see Sirius still playing peek-a-boo with Orion, the small boy making sounds akeen to giggles whenever Sirius showed him his face again. I smiled and knelt down next to Sirius, leaning over and kissing his cheek, “So, he likes you.”

“He knows who is father is, that’s all.”

“I suppose. (Y/n) is getting some sleep now.”

“That’s goo-wait how’d you get her to listen?”

I just shrugged, giving Sirius a nudge, “That’s for me to know and for you to never find out.”

---------------------------------YOUR POV (Two years later)

I smiled walking into the living room of the house that I shared with Sirius and Remus, seeing the former sitting on the floor with Orion and Harry. I giggled, “Who would have known that Sirius Black would be the one to be good with kids. Would never have guessed.”

One of the children’s heads shot up, “Mummy!” My eyes widened and I rushed over, “Y-you spoke! Aww my little boy spoke. I’m so proud of you, Orion.”

“What happened?” I heard Remus’ voice from behind me. I turned around, “Remus, watch this. Say it again.”

“Mummy!” Orion giggled out wrapping his tiny arms around me, “I’m so proud of you!” Orion giggled and my smile widened as he turned to look at Sirius, “Papa!” It was like a light had been switched on in Sirius’ head as his face metaphorically lit up as he walked over, leaving Harry sitting on the floor.

“That’s right! I’m your Papa! Look, Moony, he knows his.. Moony?” I turned around to see Remus not standing where he’d been before. I then heard the sound of faint sobs and rushed out the room to find him sitting under the table in the dining room, crying. My heart broke at the sight and I bent down, kneeling next to him, “Rem? What’s up?”

“I-I… It’s nothing, just leave me alone.”

“Something is up though, I know that much. Tell me. I’m not leaving until you tell me. Remus, you’re my boyfriend, I’m not going to let you be sad!”

“F-fine, it’s just, I-I’m envious of the bond that Sirius has with Orion. There I said it.”

My heart broke even more and I wrapped him in a hug, “You wish you were his biological father?” I could feel Remus nodding against me and I pulled him even closer, “Rem, it’s okay to feel like that. It doesn’t help that Sirius is rubbing it in your face does it?” He shook his head and I lifted his chin, wiping his tears, “Rem, d-do you want to give Orion a little sibling?” His face perked up and he nodded shyly, before digging his head back into my neck. I heard a tiny giggle and looked to my left to see Orion, “Papa! I found Papa!” I then saw a pair of familiar socks come into view and Sirius’ face appeared, “There you two are.”

I felt a smile appear on my face and I nudged Remus, “Rem, did you hear that?”

Remus just shrugged and I sighed lifting his head again, “Come on, we’ll go sit i-Sirius, what did you do with Harry? You know James and Lily are going to kill you i-”

“He’s sitting on the sofa with his dad. James came while you two were here. I didn’t leave him unattended, don’t worry.”

I released a breath and pulled Remus out from under the table picking Orion up, “Can you say it again?” I asked.

“Papa!” Orion giggled out, making grabby hands towards Remus, who wiped his eyes, causing my smile to grow, “You’re his dad to, Rem.”

“Papa sad…”

I felt my smile widen more and I handed Orion to Remus, who just hugged him. Sirius walked over to me and kissed my cheek, wrapping his arms around me, “So what were you two up to down there?”

“Siri, can you, and James if he’s still here, take Orion and Harry out? I think Remus needs some ‘Special (Y/n) Love’. He was feeling a bit left out that you were Orion’s biological father.” Sirius got my hint and nodded. I smiled, “Rem, Sirius is gonna take Orion out for a bit, you want to help me with something?” Remus looked up at me and I manouvered my arms in a way so that I was squishing my breasts together, hinting at what I meant. His eyes widened and he nodded handing Orion over to Sirius before grabbing my hand and dragging me upstairs…

—----------------END OF ONESHOT

I’m ending this here cause it’s over 4000 words and it’s 10:52pm for me rn… so I’m gonna go sleep…

[hpe24]

please, I ask you for your rant about Riley not being related to Sir Aaron.

Um I don't know what to say when I'm one of those who support them being related??

Unless you're asking me to oppose against the contradiction ermmmmmm

I'd rather not divide what's right and wrong with headcanons😬If I may just list the reasons about my opinion:

The Pokemon universe already has an example of a descendant almost a clone of their ancestor i.e. Queen Ilene and Rin from the Lucario movie

Yeah there's the vague age mention, however I think GameFreak would have made Riley directly reference something from the movie like other side characters of AG movies appearing in gen4 games, if they are really the same person

This is only my deduction based on the Korean dub (please be noted that the dub has been faulty with translation on multiple occasions), but unlike the original version where Ash and his friends call Riley with the honorific '-san', the Korean version addresses him as '-oppa/hyung'(only used for men that are few years older than self). Even if Riley is like ten thousand years old and is keeping it a secret, allowing kids to call him older brother is.......................................weird. Idk if it's only a Korean thing but that concept is rather nauseous to think about

Riley's Lucario is not the same Lucario from the movie, judging by the lack of voice from the anime and no lines hinting such connection from the games. This would be a huge letdown to the movie's Lucario and Sir Aaron's character arc - the whole entire movie was about Lucario and Sir Aaron's relationship and the ending was clean as heck by sending Lucario off just like Sir Aaron and then reviving the two back in time so they can live happily ever after in the same era. Beautiful, perfectly concluded character arc for both of them. But having Sir Aaron living in the modern ages with a different Lucario can only mean that the original Lucario isn't with him anymore. Possible explanation could be that the new Lucario is the descendant of the previous one, though...........is there a reason that Sir Aaron MUST be alive till this day even if it means parting with his Pokemon that a whole movie built a story upon?????? And leave it unexplained???? This complex character plot for a mere side character appearing once or twice in the games??? Sure, at some point one will pass away ahead of another but why imply that when the character arc is already finished with them being together idk I'm a nitpicker for plot structures and character arc it might be only me overthinking this

If all of that is meaningless and the two are just.two random aura users who happen to look like twins.I really don't know uh

Anyways these are my thoughts on said topic I don't think there's more to add

[blender2902]

DEBUNKING THE NIGHT OF THE BLACK KNIVES ALLEGATIONS + Theory on Marika reviving the soulless demigods

This was originally going to be a small post on just my theory on Godwyn and the soulless demigods but as I kept writing that, I kept bringing up why the night of the black knives theory does not work. So, I just ended up dedicating the first part of this post to giving all the arguments against that theory. This turned out to be the majority of this post ironically lol.

Do read my messmer post as that will make what I say next in this entire post make more sense as the timeline I follow is based on that. It’s a long post so the TLDR of the post, Marika sealed Messmer away in LOS after godwyn’s death in order to protect him. (Only thing to add to that is the sentry torch being held by the tree sentinel outside shaman village and Messmer’s remembrance being mistranslated. The sentry torch was made after godwyn’s death and Messmer’s remembrance’s original Japanese descriptions mentions nothing about fear just that Messmer’s eye was sealed and then he was sealed in LOS which leaves the timeline and motives pretty vague

Marika planning Godwyn’s murder is what I will call the biggest conspiracy theory in the Elden Ring lore. However, I believe that this theory has very, very shaky grounds to stand on and fundamentally fails in logic when we go into the details. I will say it here, whether Marika had a hand in aiding Ranni or not I simply see no logical way Marika would want Godwyn dead. The problems with this theory can be classified under 2 categories- evidence and motivations.

Evidence: -

I have spent some time looking at all the common pieces of evidence that ‘supports’ this theory. Let me refute them one by one.

Black knife assassin Armor-

Like many have said before me, the original Japanese description of this armor is very vague about the ties between Marika and these assassins. It could simply mean that Marika and the assassins were from the same race and nothing else. Also, the eternal city is stated to have been banished by the greater will-

According to Rogier, the black knife assassins are scions of the eternal cities so it would be very odd for them to have helped the god chosen by the greater will (or at least said to have been chosen). All in all, this is way too shaky to count as anything solid.

2. Gurranq’s death dialogue-

Every person who believes in this theory loves to show Gurranq’s death dialogue-

Conveniently leaving out his final line-

‘why shatter’ hmmmmmmmmm.

So, the ‘gulling’ Malekith is talking about is not stealing the rune of death but shattering the elden ring. This line of dialogue pretty much confirms that entirely. It is kinda baffling to me that people confidently give this out as proof that Marika planned Godwyn’s death when the same speech directly contradicts it. I understand missing an item description or two (the game is huge after all) but missing this while citing the previous two lines is just ??? but whatever.

3. The black knife assassin ‘guarding Marika’s bedchamber’-

So, to decipher the implications of this enemy location let’s look that the environment-

A bunch of dead finger readers who do not pose a single threat at all, the assassin is implied to have killed them clearly. We do know that many demigods were slain during the night of the black knives so the black knife assassins were going for several demigods. This one here was likely trying to kill Morgott but failed. We do see black knife assassins at ordina(the town from which we access haligtree) so those guys were trying to kill Miquella or Malenia so this does check out. The environmental storytelling here is quite clear to me so this is not a good piece of evidence at all. I swear the next conspiracy we hear will be ‘Miquella planned godwyn’s death’ pointing at the black knife assassins in ordina or something like that. This is flimsy evidence at best.

4. Marika supposedly wanting to sacrifice her kids

Everybody loves to point towards the Melina dialogue outside of capital when they say this. Let’s fully break it down.

2 ways of interpreting this. 1) she will sacrifice them if they don’t become ‘aught at all’ or 2) she is giving them a warning that soon they will have to make something of themselves or they will be sacrificed by someone or something which she does not want so basically tough love through advice. Which is the more suitable interpretation based on actions? Well, the only way to judge is by seeing what happens next in the story. The guidance of grace is likely controlled by Marika as the greater will has left the damned place. How much control does she have is unclear but for the sake of this argument let’s just assume she had complete control over it as this will be the hardest and most interesting interpretation for me argue against. Now if she does not have full control over grace then nothing can be determined as we can make up an endless number of rules for grace. Let’s assume that Marika controls where grace points.

People who make this assumption always say that ‘Marika guided the tarnished towards her kids to kill them for (insert whatever reason)’ So yeah, the guidance of grace points towards the demigods right? Which would mean that this take is correct right? NO! First let’s take a close look at where grace points.

If you observe closely, you will notice that grace only points towards the demigods from Radagon and Rennala’s side of the family (who technically aren’t hers) and Godrick (who nobody likes and he disrespects the golden lineage)  with the sole exception of Miquella(I’ll talk about him later) and Morgott but in his case he is literally guarding the erdtree so not much choice there and if you want to go into delulu territory then in Godfrey’s cutscene Morgott turns into grace and points Godfrey towards us which kinda implies Marika taking revenge for Morgott in a way(like I said delulu). Another important point to mention here is Vyke. He somehow got to the forge of the giants without killing any shardbearer which means Marika at first had a way to get to the forge while avoiding Morgott but that ended up failing. It is also important to point out that no site of grace points towards mohg as you can see here-

So, it may not exactly be an omen twins thing but either way that is a discussion for another day, what matters most is that Marika actively avoids pointing towards her own children. ‘AHA you forgot about the divine beast grace pointing towards Messmer’ No I didn’t, because that grace does not point towards him. If you follow its trajectory with a straight line, you will see that it points towards scadutree avatar, you know the boss holding Miquella’s great rune-

Miquella at this point was shedding aspects of himself which would lead him to failure like his mother and he would be in the same prison as her. Hence death would be a mercy. It is likely Marika can guide us to the shardbearers because she can feel the great runes, hence we are guided here. Marika guides us towards Miquella’s great rune but we are too late and he sheds it. Now we can observe that no site of grace points towards Messmer at all. This is because Marika knows that killing Messmer is the only way in which we can reach Miquella. She probably thought ‘Tarnished please just take that great rune get out of that place. Let my son live please.’ Or something along those lines but we end up killing Messmer anyway. Now that the damage is done, might as well finish the job, and put Miquella to rest. Then Marika starts guiding us towards Miquella. There could also be an angle of revenge here as it is Leda and Danes notes which directly tell us to kill Messmer. They serve Miquella, so he got Messmer killed in a way. All in all, even in the dlc she is actively avoiding pointing towards Messmer and is trying to put Miquella to rest so she is not really sacrificing them.

Some other graces in the base game worth mentioning-

Castle sol and Millicent

Sorry for the low-quality pics

These are interesting as they point towards a npc and an item that leads to Malenia. However, if Marika did know where these are and points there, why not point towards Malenia? No grace on the map points towards Haligtree. If she can sense an offshoot of Malenia why can she not sense Malenia herself? She is holding a great rune for crying out loud. There must be another explanation for these. For Millicent maybe Marika is just pointing towards Radahn, it’s just that the road is not right. For castle sol, maybe it’s the same as castle Morne, where she is pointing towards a place where we can get stronger-

Ranni-

It’s a bit hard to see due to low quality but Marika points towards renna’s rise when we rest after ranni leaves. The simple explanation to this is Marika wants Ranni to be killed as she got Godwyn murdered. This is quite funny as most of us just ended up marrying her lol. The spicier interpretation of this is that even though Ranni got Godwyn killed, Marika does agree with Ranni’s end goal and is hence willing to help her out with that. In Ranni’s ending cutscene she does hold Marika’s head in a gentle way so that does imply some respect. Also in that ending Ranni does put Marika to rest in a way so that could play a role too.

So that covers everything related to grace. Now what we get is a Marika trying her best to get the tarnished to become elden lord while avoiding her children getting killed as much as possible. This pretty much refutes the perspective to ‘Marika wanted to sacrifice her kids.' All this to say that all the implications point towards the second perspective of ‘Marika giving her kids some hard advice which deep down comes from love’ being true.

Like I already said, if you think Marika does not control grace (kinda unlikely tbh) then we simply cannot determine anything about her motives behind this dialogue, hence it does not prove or disprove anything.

Now that is all the common pieces of evidence covered. As you can see, they were shaky at best.

Motivations

This is in my opinion the biggest problem with this theory. There is not a single motive that even makes complete sense. By that I mean that killing Godwyn would have been the best/only option Marika had to achieve whatever her motives are. Let’s go over all the common motives I have seen and explain why they don’t make sense.

Killing godwyn would show the flaw in the golden order-

This assumes that Marika wanted the order to change(which I believe is part of her motivations). Why would she even think this would work? Radagon had made sure everyone in the golden order blindly believes in it so why would they see this as a flaw? Like we do not see a single person in the game that sees               Godwyn’s death as a flaw. Instead, we see D (a golden order fanatic) hunting down those who live in death. There are literal incantations made to fight them off. Everybody who is discriminated by the order already know that it’s full of shit. This motive just does not add up.

2. To rebel against the greater will/golden order

This is similar to the last one but slightly different. This comes with the assumption of Godwyn being loyal to the golden order rather than his mother. We don’t get anything directly characterising godwyn’s feelings so we must look at implications, and they point towards him being loyal to his mom. The first one being the general development of Marika’s order. At first, during the age of plenty before Radagon, the erdtree was giving away plenty of blessing. However, as time moved on, the erdtree became an object of faith. Marika herself became doubtful according to her dialogue in the minor erdtree church. Also Marika does go inert during Radagon’s age while he is just doing a bunch of stuff(creating golden order fundamentalism). This plus the way Radagon shows a more dominant posture in his statue-

Implies that Radagon was being the more dominant half during his reign which further supports my take on the golden order changing as the timeline progressed. Godwyn was around during the age of plenty so naturally he would see how Marika developed overtime as well. The biggest clue though is the crimson, viridian and cerulean amber medallion +3 description-

These were made during Godfrey’s age where Marika had 100% free reign on what she could do. These were given to Godwyn’s death knights which was likely seen as a precious gift that would help them protect their master. Seeing this Godwyn would likely be loyal towards his mother. Godwyn being loyal to the order that is heavily implied to be changed by Radagon in many ways instead of his mother who gifted his knights these ‘precious jewels’ is just very unlikely. Hence if rebelling was the motive, then she would immediately shatter the elden ring.

3.To attempt to restore death (in whatever way) so she could die

If this was her goal then why would she not just go fight Malekith herself? She probably can teleport just like Radagon so it’s unlikely Malekith could restrain her. This means that either she dies (mission accomplished) or Malekith dies and the rune of death is free so she can die (mission accomplished). Fighting Malekith to the death in some remote location would simply be the best option instead of whatever ends up happening if this was motive. Now if you wanna argue Radagon was restricting Marika so she could not go ahead with the Malekith plan, then tell me how she could plan the assassination with him around? Also the rune of death was stolen and the black knife assassins were running around. Find one and accomplish your goal. Yet she did not do that. The logic just does not add up here.

4. All the theories along the lines of ‘Marika planned to grant Godwyn a higher state of existence of some kind.’

All these theories have one big problem, evidence. Pretty much all these theories are just ideas people have which have zero grounds to stand on. I do believe Marika tried to revive godwyn over her grief but I see no way that she could ever foresee what these theories suggest.

So that should be it for all the arguments I have against the night of the black knives theory. Now onto my personal theory and speculation about Marika trying to revive Godwyn and possibly the undead demigods in the mausoleums too.

In my Messmer post from earlier, I did touch on Marika allowing the death knights into the realm of shadow but I did not go too deep into that rabbit hole but I will here. Like I said in my Messmer post, the incantations that do more damage against those who live in death are all golden order fundamentalist incantations not erdtree incantations. Erdtree incantations are linked to Marika and Golden order incantations are linked to Radagon. This implies that the stigma against those who live in death was mostly Radagon’s doing. Also something interesting about the death knights is that the last rites ash of war’s effect that makes us do 2x damage against those who live in death suddenly does not work on them, I used the golden arcs incantation with min stat req and a plus 0 finger seal at blessing level 9 or 10 I don’t remember exactly, before the buff the incantation did a max of 126 damage and after the buff it did 138 damage max which I am pretty sure is the +25 holy damage that the buff adds which means the game does not count these guys as a part of those who live in death and hence are not ‘dead’. This would make it even unlikelier that the death knights got into the LOS through some death stuff. Anyways the death knights were sent to find and protect the ‘cadaver surrogate’ which means second body. Why would they need a second body? Well for his revival of course. So, during the period between the night of the black knives and the shattering, Godwyn’s corpse must have started to mutate and all the death cult stuff started. Now as to who sent the death knights to search for the cadaver surrogate, I have 2 answers 1) It was Godwyn’s corpse itself that somehow gave them a message and they went in search for the cadaver surrogate. They needed entry into the LOS which Marika granted them. Marika saw this as a possible way to bring Godwyn back so she was in support of this. 2) Marika herself got some sort of message from Godwyn’s corpse and sent the death knights herself. Either explanation results in the same story. Now I see many people talking about the dialogue of the ghost about the ‘unwanted child’ in weeping peninsula but there is one item description that flips this entire thing on its head.

Lhutel the headless spirit ash-

So, she sacrificed her life to protect an ‘unwanted child’ of Marika yet was awarded with the honour of Erdtree Burial, a practise which Marika herself developed. Also, she has an attack where she straight up throws a spear at an enemy which is quite reminiscent of the smithscript weapons (and messmer’s spear) we find in the dlc. A whole lot of dots here. All of this leads me to believe that maybe the demigods in the mausoleum maybe aren’t even unwanted at all as Marika is helping in their revival. Oh, and not to mentions that all this is found in weeping peninsula where we find a catacomb called Impaler’s catacomb-

This catacombs also has spike traps which are not quite the same as the ones found in the dlc but are similar-

Impaler’s catacomb spike trap-

Dlc catacomb spike trap-

So maybe Messmer used this place for early versions of his spike traps which were also used/tested in other catacombs in the base game like the seeth water catacomb for example. There are a lot of things in weeping peninsula connecting to death and Messmer which is very intriguing.

Maybe the stone tablets in Marika’s bedchambers which look exactly like the ones in shadow keep were being studied by her to find a way to revive Godwyn along with finding a way of curing the jar innards.

So, this is how I believe the story went. Godwyn was murdered in the night of the black knives and Marika fell into depression. When all the death cult stuff formed, Marika sent the death knights to find Godwyn’s cadaver surrogate. She saw this as an opportunity to possibly revive the undead demigods (maybe the ones that died in the night of the black knives as well) hence honouring Lhutel. However, before she could do anything, Messmer’s base serpent got revealed to the public and she sealed him away into the Land of shadows where he would be safe. In the process she also gave up the opportunity to revive godwyn(and the undead demigods). However, it does seem that Marika still tries to have godwyn revived in a way by granting grace to Fia. Godwyn’s corpse does fight back if you attack Fia, so it appears some part of Godwyn might be kind of alive in a way and is trying to protect Fia. Marika might have learned about Fia somehow and granted her grace so that she could go on her quest to help Godwyn. Not too sure on the logistics of everything but I feel this is a very interesting theory and the Lhutel descriptions + all the minor details provide quite a bit of support.

[open-hearth-rpg]

Retellings: Great RPG Mechanics #RPGMechanics: Week Six

I’ve taken an extra week with this one, trying to figure out how to approach this. RPG have always been about telling stories. There’s an interesting bit in Jon Peterson’s Playing at the World talking about the months in 1974 after TSR launched D&D and the disconnect between it being written as a war game– a rules set for medieval fantasy at a certain scale and how it actually got pitched. Very quickly Gygax & Arneson realized that the real pull in advertising was to present stories and suggest players could create their own. That became the key draw of role-playing.

At the same time the idea of “retelling” has been a little less evolved. On the one hand we’ve had licensed rpgs which aim to place players within a specific, existing story– not just a setting– and have them play out their version. The most notorious example I can think of that is Mayfair’s AD&D module for The Keep, the surreal Michael Mann horror movie set during WW2. That has you as fantasy adventurers dropped into the movie’s plot directly. 

Other games have played with the idea of tellings and corrections. For example InTERRORgation contrasted, Rashamon style, several testimonies by the PCs about an incident. There’s also The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen which revels in lying and contradictions. So we have two senses of retelling: an exploration of a previous story and the act of stopping and correcting in mid-story (done either by ourselves or another). 

Ma Nishtana: Why is this Night Different does both of these things. Subtitled “A Passover Storytelling Game,” playing this remains one of my all time favorite storygame experiences. Gabrielle Rabinowitz and Ben Bisogno did an amazing job with this. It’s a beautifully crafted games, so I fear my description isn’t going to do it justice. 

The game draws on the tradition of the Passover Seder, the ideas of sharing, involvement, ritual, and storytelling. As the designer say it is not a replacement for that, but a way to echo those aspects. Each player takes up one of the six possible characters– Miriam, Moses, Zipporah, Aaron, Bityah, and the Pharaoh. They then place through a set of ritual steps of play– with a physical ritual, reading, and then roleplaying– to tell another version of the story of Exodus, unpacking what the story means and how it sustains across multiple versions. 

I’m not Jewish, but playing this made me feel welcomed into the stories and feelings. It offered a kind, accepting, and vibrant entry point. There’s a lot to be said about the physical ritual component of this– it is striking and works, even online. But I want to focus on the concept of story and retelling. 

The game includes safety and collaboration as an organic moment in play. At any point when someone is narrating, another player can say “Wait Wait Wait!” to pause the moment. They can then ask a question for clarification & expansion or they can make a suggestion. This can add new elements or it can be used to revise material. This approach giving the feeling of friends and family gathered together, with the gentle butting in and interruptions that create a sense of camaraderie rather than conflict. I love this idea of playful collaboration between players. 

But the other sense of retelling lies in the broader concept: the retelling of a story with cultural weight and importance. The formal structure here points us back to the themes of the Passover story, but each retelling– with different characters and players– may show us new things about those themes. I wonder what other kinds of stories, echoing important cultural content but perhaps at more of a distance might be explored? What would Gilgamesh or Beowulf look like in that context? 

What Ma Nishtana does is create engagement with a cultural history, allowing for a new and novel understanding and unpacking the stories and concepts. That’s why it's a dynamite game everyone should read.

To swing this to other rpgs, there’s a parallel here with HeroQuests from Glorantha and Runequest. These quests are in-game enactments of the myths and stories of the player character’s culture. Heroes gather together, supported by the energy and will of a community, to work through a particular tale. They ascend to the Heroplane for this tale– there they face challenges and act out the stories. The power of the stories worked through in the Heroplane can then have an impact on the real world when they return: bringing prophecy, restoring crop fertility,  empowering a relic. It depends on the story. 

But the story isn’t always the same. The basic concepts exist, but they may be told in different ways. Failure in overcoming challenges can have a negative effect on the real world. But, like Ma Nishtana, the choice of different characters being played and how they react will change things. Heroquests have always been a part of Glorantha’s setting– with different kinds of HQ rules to simulate them: some abstract and some highly mechanical. I love this as another approach to collaboratively building new stories– the telling of which actually impact the game world.

[blueeyeswhitegarden]

I wanted to vent a bit about some stuff I noticed in Duel Links, but it got a bit longer than I thought it would, so I’ll put it under the cut here.

There’s something about the current Duel Links event that kind of bothers me. I like to see Yugo interacting with the Arc V cast as much as the next person, but his interaction with Yuya felt off to me, mainly with Yuya saying that Yugo escaped from his body. I think that the wording threw me off a bit, but it also felt like a contradiction of the Yuto event. At the end of that event, Yuya said that he still felt like Yuto was a part of him and it was heavily implied, if not confirmed, that the Yuto in Duel Links was recreated from his memories. I thought that this made sense. It fits with the lore of Duel Links and didn’t contradict the anime’s ending. It felt like a way to have their cake and eat it too. The counterparts are fan favorite characters with popular decks, especially the Dragon Boys, so of course they were going to be playable. This was just their way to make it fit within Duel Links.

But Yugo saying that he isn’t part of Yuya anymore feels like a completely different message. I could be jumping the gun here when the event just started and it could lead to the same conclusion as the Yuto event, which would make sense, but something about that line just felt off to me. It probably doesn’t help that it instantly reminded me of people using the previous Arc V world events to complain about the ending or that Duel Links was fixing it. As someone who likes the ending and has been tired of people complaining about it for years, the idea of the counterparts magically getting their bodies back is probably less appealing for me than for other fans. Granted, there’s a good chance that they’re using the counterparts appearing in Duel Links less as a way to change the anime’s ending and more so to build up to Zarc’s eventual appearance in the game years down the road, especially when he did come up in Yugo’s interaction with Reiji. It does make sense for Duel Links to focus on the counterparts appearing since it provides mystery and some buildup for more events in the future. If I wasn’t so tired of the complaints about the ending, maybe this would be less of an issue.

I think I also realized why the Arc V world feels like a post canon AU fan fic to me. Some of the characterization or the framing feels a bit off to me, or at least off from my own interpretation of the characters and events. While Shun wanting to see Yuto and Ruri post finale isn’t out of character, I feel like his event really fed into the fan interpretation that he was sad and lonely after the finale, something which I honestly don’t agree with at all. Yuya being happy to interact more directly with Yugo also might not out of character exactly, especially when he was happy to talk to Yuto directly as well, but saying that Yugo escaped from his body just felt so weird to me when the anime didn’t really treat the merging as the counterparts were trapped exactly. Not just in the last two duels of the series, but even when Yuya and Yuto could communicate more easily in season three, the idea of getting Yuto his own body back or figuring out how to undo their merge never came up. It’s one of the reasons why I didn’t mind that the anime ended with Yuya and Yuzu as permanent fusions with their counterparts. Framing Yugo’s appearance as if he somehow escaped just feels too strange to me. Even in Sora’s event, Yuya saying that he wouldn’t date Yuzu felt out of character. Granted, that was to recreate a scene from the anime and I don’t think that Yuya would be openly confessing his love for Yuzu either, but even that felt kind of off putting for post-canon Yuya.

Now I’m positive that I’m really overthinking things about a mobile game designed to get people to spend money on cards. Trying to connect any of the worlds, not just the Arc V world, to the continuity of their respective anime wouldn’t make sense either. There are multiple versions of Judai alone running around in GX World and plenty of characters who are actually dead or should not be able to exist are playable too. There were just some details that bothered me where I wanted to vent about it. There are still moments that I have liked so far. Yugo being worried about Yuya being weaker is actually pretty sweet. I like the idea that merging together allowed for the Dragon Boys to instantly understand each other through their link. Yuzu seemingly regaining some memories of her counterparts based on her interaction with Yugo is pretty cool too. As much as I love and respect the anime’s ending, Yuzu dealing with the aftermath of merging with her counterparts was something I wish we had gotten too. I should probably just try to go with the MST3K route of just relax and enjoy more Arc V content because I do love being able to play as these characters, seeing their interactions and playing with their decks. I just also really tend to overthink about this kind of stuff and it can get overwhelming enough where I need to vent about it.

[thiriumhound]

You're right that Connor can spare Hank without deviating if he has no significance to CyberLife- that's what happens in canon if you decide to leave- but in my theoretical scenario, Hank does matter to CyberLife: he is directly getting in the way of their goals. As such, he presents enough of an obstacle that Connor has to decide between 1. neutralizing him, 2. leaving him alive but thusly facing constant interference that might cost him the mission (and Amanda does not like when Connor makes stupidly inefficient decisions like that, just see her rep drop when Connor merely says anything but "I'll ignore him"), or 3. the secret third option, reconsider whether his mission is worth it at all. Because of the sheer misery, effort, and significant risk of option two, and his emotional obligation against option one, option three manages presents itself as a possibility under all this duress- if he can actually face his doubts and decide "actually, no, killing all these innocent deviants is wrong" because of the stress of someone he cares about finally being in his crosshairs, then all that strain is lifted and he has deviated "thanks to Hank". To solve the strain posed by the scenario (and the unsustainable option 2), it's a choice between killing his unwillingness to harm Hank and killing his unwillingness to face his doubts- whichever is stronger is the one that will be left alive.

Not a fan of y'all "Connor should deviate with Hank". Totally breaks the whole deal for me and I never gets why is this a thing.

Moving past the previous stuff- we both just have different angles on details and semantics, which is totally fair- I can def agree with this! I don't think he should have deviated with Hank, just that in a story more focused on their relationship as a central aspect rather than the android revolution itself with Hank on the side (such as a fanfiction working off this "Connor deviates with Hank on the roof" premise), it can still function- and considering how widely beloved their dynamic is, it wouldn't be an unreasonable direction for a story. It'd be quite dissonant in the actual game as it's written now, but I don't consider it a terrible concept for fanfiction if that's the direction someone prefers.

Also, there's 3 reasons for Amanda not interfering until BfD (even tho these chapters are totally inconsistent for cut content reasons) [...] They were expecting Connor to come to CLT (CL also expects Connor to have deviated);

Honestly, this is where my point of confusion comes in. Why did they go through all the trouble of sending another Connor to neutralize the deviant Connor (and kidnapping a high-ranking officer of the law in some routes to do it, no less! Are they going to try to sweep that under the rug, too? Is Hank already doomed to die for a coverup??) instead of just... taking him over and stopping him? Sure, the moment he does get taken over is very opportune, but I don't think him breaking out their entire stock of androids is just a little thing to test him over- it's pretty drastic. In fact, I'd argue after Connor breaks out all those androids, we're past the point of no return where shooting Markus ultimately does very little to solve the problem- someone else will probably rise up, who cares? They've already overtaken Detroit. Somehow even the contradictory leader!Connor makes more sense to me than this.

I might just be missing context from the cut content here, though. A lot of CyberLife's and Amanda's motivations are highly confusing and oft self-contradicting, so it might just be best not to think too hard about it, lol.

broke: connor should've been able to deviate on the roof with hank when choosing hank over the mission

woke: connor should've been able to deviate after failing to find jericho with high enough software instability because he is audibly and visibly afraid to die there and realizing that he fears death could lead to him realizing his victims felt the same, thus motivating him to live for the people he hurt and those cyberlife is still hurting (and likely for hank) instead of just marching back to cyberlife for deactivation

[ahsoka-in-a-hood]

My new favorite thing on tumblr.com is the discourse around how hard it is to leave the order you guys, they leave their members ‘with no life skills’ etc etc, ONLY THE CLOTHES ON THEIR BACKS, it’s so darlingly melodramatic that I’m low-key picturing some kind of ritualistic drumming out ceremony, possibly involving the knights chanting ‘shame,’ ‘shame,’ ala game of thrones, while every single council member gazes down upon them from on high, faces carved from judgmental stone, culminating in the poor sod spending their first night in rags sleeping at the foot of the temple steps,

okay, I am getting distracted. What I’m actually amusing myself with is picturing what Ahsoka, 16 years of age, can put on her CV. It’s a lot. Now I hate CVs so like I’m not about to write up hers but. It includes military command, references from at least two GALACTIC SENATORS who worked with her, references from at least two HEADS OF STATE. Engineering, piloting, teaching, combat, military command, special ops, investigation, geo-politics....... She is 16. This is an objectively insane CV.

Her level of education is so respected that a head of state invited her to guest lecture at their top academy when she was 14, to kids her own age, and she was poised and confident throughout. Her schooling gets outright called out as privileged by her coruscanti friends. Also like, please let me know when the standard US high school curriculum comprehensively covers shit like astronavigation.

Every time she is depicted with non-jedi kids her age she is depicted as generally more worldly and prepared than them. The mandalorian kids. Lux, Trace, etc. She’s never encountered deathwatch or the Pikes directly before she’s rescuing her friends from them, but she immediately knows what’s up because she is simply. Well informed. Unlike her friends. It’s not like she doesn’t also learn things from them in these episodes, but. She just knows a lot.

She also left the order with at a minimum multiple contacts in the senate, a friendship with the king of Mon Calamar (I think?) and the duchal family of mandalore, as well as some shadier contacts.

(Now it’s true that tcw never answered, or even asked, what kind of financial or otherwise situation the temple itself provides to help a jedi who wants out to find their feet. That’s not a question you can ask in Ahsoka’s case without also asking: where the hell was Padme’s support? Why wasn’t Ahsoka sleeping on her couch? That’s her sister-in-law! Actually this is a trick question because Ahsoka tells Anakin she needs to figure this out on her own. Without the council, and without him. So we’ll never know. Until disney churns out yet more content that may or may not contradict previous content.)

(Absolute props to Ahsoka that is 100% what I would have done at 16. That’s just what being 16 is like. Bad things happen and then GOODBYE I AM PUTTING A SANDWICH IN A HANKERCHIEF AND TYING IT TO A STICK AND WALKING INTO THE SUNSET I AM GOING MY OWN WAY I WILL SLEEP ROUGH I WILL GO WHERE THE WIND BLOWS THIS WORLD IS STRANGE AND CRUEL AND I MUST RELY ON MYSELF GOODBYE)

(and obviously like canonically the door was 100% open to her returning, anytime she saw them they were like so... any chance you’re done with your walkabout?... we still have your room ready... your frog grandpa feels so bad he literally had a bad trip vision quest where you were like dying and asking him why he abandoned you and we had to commit him he is very sad. except maybe we’re not actually going to say this because that would sound like a guilt trip.. but... lightsabers ? :3)

(Generally the disaster lineage are a deeply ridiculous dataset. When Obi Wan was contemplating leaving the order he was contemplating becoming the Duke-Consort of Mandalore. Anakin not only married money but was offered a job by the Chancellor at 12 (comics). I mean ANAKIN RUN but also imagine being 12 and the president of the galaxy says well if you don’t like it with your dad I’ll give you a job)

Ultimately when Ahsoka left she tripped and fell into job as a mechanic, immediately found herself bailing her new boss out of trouble, and was headhunted like a week later to be on the command team for a counter coup of a whole system. She was still 16. The rest of us can only aspire to these kinds of job opportunities.

[stonesparrow]

dr stone characters playing among us because cringe is dead. Also realistically since among us only got really popular in 2020 none of these people would be playing it. Also I’m including the ishigami villagers which renders my previous statement completely useless. Hmm.

Senku: White with a doctor outfit and no hat. His memory is so precise that if all the details in someone’s alibi don’t line up then he’ll launch into interrogation mode. As an imposter he’s great at playing it cool, but his luck is so bad that every time he kills someone another person manages to show up just in time to see it happen.

Taiju: Brown with the little two leaf plant hat. Also has a great memory but unlike Senku often gets confused when someone contradicts what he himself remembers as fact. Usually just follows Senku and/or Yuzuriha around the map, and as a result ends up hampering them when they’re the imposter(s) because they can’t bring themselves to kill Taiju. Never kills anyone when he’s the imposter and is just happy when the crewmates win.

Yuzuriha: Pink with the flower hat. Is often the one catching Senku in the act of murder by sheer coincidence, and since everyone always believes her he gets booted very fast. As imposter, she typically wins by sabotage rather than directly killing anyone.

Tsukasa: Red, no hat. Doesn’t really...get the game, and ends up wandering around aimlessly and messing up tasks. Card swipe is his mortal enemy. Senku usually kills him when he’s imposter (the irony is 100% intentional). As imposter, he usually follows people around and acts so strangely that they figure him out right away. Like he’ll go right up to someone but then forget how to use the kill button and stand still for a long minute just staring at them.

Gen: Purple, changes outfits frequently. Because of his reputation everyone thinks Gen is lying all the time, but after a few rounds of reverse psychology and reverse-reverse psychology (and reverse-reverse-reverse psychology) it’s now impossible to tell when he’s lying and when he’s not. He ends up getting voted off early most games as a result, costing the crewmates multiple games. As imposter he’s actually pretty good until the inevitable “gen is lying this time for SURE” conversation happens.

Kohaku: Olive green, no hat. Has a hard time keeping alibis straight but if someone gets killed within her field of vision she will absolutely figure out who it was based on a sliver of a pixel that she glimpsed. Likes to stalk the security cameras. As imposter she is methodical and ruthless. Never targets Suika though.

Chrome: Blue, goggles. Really just likes doing tasks. He’d be happy if the whole game was just tasks and hates getting interrupted by meetings. Though he’s also rather good at picking out imposters. Is the other person who ends up catching Imposter Senku a lot. As imposter he’s not that good and usually only manages to kill a few people before getting caught.

Suika: Lime green, pumpkin hat (duh). Also really likes tasks because they make her feel useful and productive. Pretty bad at telling who’s the imposter though because she gets confused easily by the twisty turny arguments. By some strange occurrence though, she always knows if Gen is actually telling the truth or not, not that it helps Gen at all. As Imposter she basically lurks in the vents until an opportunity presents itself and is shockingly good at destroying people. 

Ginro: Whatever color is available. Gets killed first almost all the time, like within 30 seconds of the game starting. Can get one or two kills in as imposter before being caught or chickening out completely

Kinro: Black, usually. Doesn’t get the point of the game until Kohaku explains it as a “training exercise.” After which he absolutely DESTROYS at it. He’ll get his tasks done faster than you think is possible and then patrol around methodically. Though as imposter he’s not great at lying when asked a direct, specific question, so if Senku starts an interrogation he’ll cave pretty fast.

Ukyo: Banana, you know the hat. Despite being only a millenial, the video game that Ukyo is most familiar with is Pokemon...up to gen 2. Suika convinces him to join a few games and he does decently, though his main goal is to make sure the debates don’t escalate into full on shouting matches.

Ryusui: Changes colors frequently but always has the pirate hat (once had a serious fight with Gen over being purple). Annoyingly good at every aspect of the game, and is frequently seen trying to teach Tsukasa how to actually play. He sounds so earnest all the time that people can’t help but trust him and his judgement. Will never hurt Suika though.

Kaseki: Who let grandpa into the discord server

[totodiletears]

Oh I have THOUGHTS on this.

Okay. So. Every single Zelda game has had a basic idea: YOU are having these adventures. There's a character acting as your "link" to the game's world, but you're not just watching that character save the world. YOU are saving the world. Every single time. As such, I find any explanation that comes down to "oh that didn't really happen that was just a story that probably wasn't at all accurate!" to be deeply unsatisfying. Ocarina of Time didn't happen the way the original game says it did? You sure? Because I'm pretty sure I went through all of that. Saw Ganondorf bow down to the king, lived through his betrayal, did the whole awakening sages and fighting Ganon thing. What do you mean the old game is just a heavily-distorted legend and the truth is different? I LIVED THAT. You trying to tell me I DIDN'T actually go through all that? That all the effort I put into saving Hyrule isn't me actually saving Hyrule? I don't like that at all.

Now this isn't to say I don't understand where people are coming from. Heck, I myself am reluctantly leaning toward "reboot/different continuity" as my explanation. I don't like that this seems to be the best explanation right now, but there you go. That doesn't mean I think the old games are just legends and retellings, though. Within their own continuity, those stories are all totally canon. We're just in a different continuity now because Nintendo got tired of the old one I guess????? But, like, okay, consider Batman movies. There have been a lot of them, right? Did the movies starring Michael Keaton just not count anymore after they made the Christian Bale ones? Are we supposed to just think of all previous Batman movies as "retellings" and only consider the newest Batman to be the real canon one? Nonsense. Even if they aren't all in continuity with each other, each movie is canon within the continuity it is part of.

(Also the timeline was never a priority, but if Nintendo didn't care about a timeline at all maybe they shouldn't have kept making obvious prequels and sequels??? Like seriously the hardest ones to place are the Capcom ones, for the rest pre-BOTW Nintendo kept either a. marketing games as prequels/sequels to existing games or b. making it very clear in the games themselves where they go in relation to other games. The difficulty in timeline crafting pre-Historia is largely due to how Ocarina, despite interviews making it clear it was intended to be the story of the Imprisoning War, has an ending that directly contradicts what we see in LTTP, and then Nintendo made new sequels that don't make room for LTTP anyway. That one didn't get cleared up until they told us about the downfall timeline. It's part of why I'm leaning toward "new continuity" versus, like, an unchanging Hyrule getting destroyed/forgotten/refounded or two-Ganons-at-once or whatever. We have a previously-established history of Nintendo adding new timelines so they can do what they want, and a new continuity isn't really meaningfully different from that.)

Gotta say, I don't like all the theories that botw/totk are the only canon games/everything else is a retelling

[itsbeaker-bxtch]

There are two Nervous Subject

I, like some people on here, like to considere the Sims 2 PSP story canon. Sometimes the storyline doesn't add up with the PC one...or so we tought! Why is Nervous Subject story different in the PSP Version ? I thought about it, and everything makes sense ! 

Let us start with a little bit of context. In the Sims 2 PC, Nervous Subject is a roommate of Loki and Circe Beaker who used him for unknown but horrible experiments. If we take a look at their memories, we can see that the couple adopted him when he was a child. Nonetheless, he didn't recognize them as parents, probably because they never really were. He is just their guinea pig. His gloomy room is directly under the lab, even if the castle has a beautiful room upstairs they don't use. There is no family ties, nor love. It's all about science and practical access to a subject. Nervous twitch a lot, his bio says. No matter why he's called like that. I can totally see the Beaker giving him this name, something so impersonal that reminds him his place. The huge, and first problem with this storyline could be the age gap between the Beaker and Nervous. They may have been too young to adopt him. But, there is plenty of explainations I could come up with. The Beaker have memories of him growing up badly, I think they did adopt him when he was young. Maybe it was a choice or mistake by the developers. Well, Loki and Circe are mad scientists who did who knows what to him. They could have easily messed up his growth somehow. Or maybe he didn't age like other Sims, because he's not like other Sims...

The Sims 3 Midnight Hollow (love it, beautiful hood) confirmed what we supposed in the previous game. Here we learn that Olive Specter used to live with toddler Nervous in this dark city before coming to Strangetown. I think the devs didn't bother changing their names: 1. Because the town was poorly rushed (or so I think) and 2. So we could recognize familiar characters. We can all agree that Nervous is obviously Olive and Death lovechild. So, as I say, he isn't like other Sims....

Did the Beaker knew about him being the Reaper's son? Well, I believe they soon discovered it, but that's my own take, we can't know for sure. What we know is that, according to the PC game, they « welcomed » a young Nervous who became their test subject. Problem is, the PSP game tells us another story.

As the protagonist, we are informed by our maid, Emily, that the house we bought from Bella Goth is haunted. Emily tells us that she doesn't like the ghost in the bedroom because he is depressed. Why? He used to date Annie Howell and couldn't say his goodbyes before passing. Upon seeing the ghost you can clearly see... it's Nervous! But wait, didn't he ran away with Pascal? Well, the storyline in the PC version doesn't mention him running away or starting a relationship with Pascal, it's only strongly suggested. It's all up to the player so, no inconsistencies... for now. Emily goes on about the Nervous Ghost's story: 

« Well our friend here was always short on money, so he signed up to be a test subject in Loki Beaker's experiments on the nervous system. You don't know the half of it. Loki kept his nervous subject so miserable that one day, one of those machines just shocked him to death ! ». Then, the player asks « so what can I do to help this Nervous Subject guy ? ».There is a lot to unpack here. 

We have two completely different stories about how Nervous ended up in the Beaker house, each story contradicting one another. Nervous signing up to be a test subject would explain why he is the same age as Circe and Loki in the PC version. But then, why do they have the memory of him joining the family and remember all of his life stages? Another thing comes to mind: WHY IS NERVOUS POOR? The Specter Family bio in the PC version mentions him inheriting from his rich mom Olive. Also, why is Nervous hair different in the PSP version? Well well well, I think I have an answer. 

Nervous did volunteer to be a test subject and died. Nervous was adopted by the Beaker. Because there is two Nervous ! There are two different characters with two different storylines ! That makes sense to me. First, let's get back in time in Midnight Hollow. The bio for Olive and Toddler Nervous reads: she was left with something to remember him (the Reaper) by. Now, it's just her and her young son, who is quite the Nervous Subject indeed.. I don't know if I'm super-over analyzing it, but see how it's written THE Nervous Subject, as in THE ONE. This one is the REAL Nervous, the child that ended up being taken by the social worker and adopted by the Beaker. The one we met in TS2 PC Version, Pascal's friend (and lover if we choose). So then, who is PSP Nervous?

 I think he is an impostor who tried to scam Strangetown to get Olive's money. In the Game, inheritances play a huge part: one of the mission involves a legal fight between Ophelia and Pita Florica regarding a will. PSP Nervous tried to impersonate PC Nervous Subject because he was broke. His plan fails, he ends up staying broke and asks the Beaker for help, since they were PC Nervous parents (more or less). 

I think Loki and Circe did see he wasn't the real one, but hey, don't reject a subject right? He died because of course he isn't Death's son so he couldn't survive the all deal like Real Nervous. This broke Fake Nervous was spending a lot of time in bars, that's where he met Annie his girlfriend. In the French version of the PSP Game, Nervous Subject is never really mentioned. It's either « the nervous ghost » or « the nervous guy ». I also get this kind of vibe in the English version. Emily calls him « the depressed ghost » and the protag says « this Nervous Subject guy ». It's like nervous subject is not his name, rather a way of describing him. What gets me the most is the weird phrasing, Emily reveals that Loki « kept his nervous subject so miserable ». I mean, there isn't even a majuscule! It's because it's not our Nervous, he is just a nervous subject, like Gimi Branko. It's like, they named all of their subjects Nervous Subject because their names don't matter. 

I don't think PSP Nervous is a clone either, because why would Loki make a clone, release it, just so he can get a girlfriend and get back to them when he is broke? That also could explain why Loki was interested in experimenting « the nervous system ». I mean, the career reward in the Sims 2, the Sims 3 into the future, even the Sims 4 confirmed that Loki was more into genetics, not the nervous system. What if it's a play on words? As if the « system » is referring the elaborate scheme of a scammer? Did fake Nervous, tried to rob the Beaker? Did Loki and Circe planned his death as a punishment? That's a silly idea but I like it. 

I think Olive's son, our Nervous, escaped during the PC timeline (and I hope he got with Pascal, but come on at this point the fanon is canon). I also think that a random guy heard about Olive's mysterious heir and upon discovering it was Nervous tried to impersonate him. It fails, he got a job as a test subject for Loki and died. That's could explain why his hair is different : he is not the same guy. That could also explain the strange glitch in PC Strangetown. In the PC game, there is actually also two Nervous! One in Olive's memory and one playable in the Beaker house. They are two completely different Nervous. What if Olive, who was old and on death bed, got confused by fake Nervous trying to get her money? What if that random guy tried to scam Olive in the PC version while really Nervous was in the Beaker's lab? That makes sense and the storylines can coexist without contradicting one another. 

Of course I know that I go too far and that I think too much about it. But I like everything to make sense and my lore to be organized. Also because it’s fun.