#character's main thing here is groups of three when describing things

[conteststarribbon]

another oc ramble... vague part of backstory for peacekeeper / aa player oc. warnings for harm and/or mutilation (some self-inflicted and some left ambiguous as to the cause of it), implied memory loss, mentions of death. Takes canon and runs with it! (mildly fucked up au with no name, suggestions welcome)

It thinks back, to the first memories.

Not the scattered memories of the ashes of those who were laid to rest so long ago and then dug up from the Sea, not the rusted yet only slightly chipped memories of the one this vessel was made for, now a barely conscious spectre dragged back here by force that accidentally pulled in so much more than just what was Its own...

Nothing but Its own memories of rebirth.

-—--——-———-----—-/-—--——-———-----—-/-—--——-———-----—-

They were without any real thought, It was unable to sense or communicate (or do much of anything, truth be told...), needing to begin the process of reacclimatisation after almost a thousand years of being nothing, of not being at all.

Awareness came in waves, back and forth and back again, eventually settling into a puzzle of fragments held together by fine dust.

The dull ache that should've been a sharp pain. The chisel slamming into Itself, carving out fingers, a fortunately hazy memory. Every crack and chipped fragment scattering ashes, memories, stardust-

Everything coalesced back into Itself, once It put Itself back together. Returning, replacing, restoring what was taken away by the Fracture with what the Sea had blessed It with.

(It didn't know the name back then, only knowing it as the chaotic, blinding, painful light that took everything and everyone away. It only remembers bits and pieces of the world Before, fragments of fragments stolen from the ashes residing in this shell, the glue that kept It together.)

An unknown amount of time passing, the passing of the torch into Its own hands, now free. Grasping, clawing, grabbing at the handle, much like the desperate attempts to bring back those who were long gone done by the creator of the unfinished vessel.

(Everything he held, touched, connected to - the marks remain, even after so long.)

It gave Itself a mouth.

(Nascent cries releasing themselves on instinct, mixtures of lost languages pleading, begging, praying. The taste of sea salt, ashes and blood.)

Then came the eyes.

(Searing, pulsing, burning light of old enchantments sparking back into existence to be dulled by time no longer. The twinkling of distant stars, the much closer flicker of a bonfire belonging to Its future mentor.)

The ears.

(The crashing, humming, whispering of the waves, it felt like home. The sound of multitudes of voices vocalising together in unity, but not harmony.)

-—--——-———-----—-/-—--——-———-----—-/-—--——-———-----—-

It completely ignored the present during Its reminiscence, almost like It was back there again.

Every memory past this was built on those first moments, that reaching past the fog, haze and static of returning to existence as something completely new and imperfect and despite it all, successfully changing it, refining it, polishing it...

[beepborpdoodledorp]

alright, I'm in need of a palate cleanser, TADC Episodes ranking because why not

Now that Episode 4's marked the (almost) halfway point of the show it's as good a time as any to do a personal ranking and also I want to procrastinate working on more angsty fanart as much as possible for my own sanity

Mystery of Mildenhall Manor

What is there that I can even add to this conversation, the episode is fucking stellar. Pomni and Kinger's dynamic is impeccable start to end and I'm a sucker for anything remotely resembling the found family trope so that just further elevates my opinion, and as both an avid Zooble enjoyer and a very un-cis person their subplot hit me hard. And oh my God, the hallway scene, it's still my single favorite moment in the entire show. The soundtrack, the atmosphere, the gorgeous visuals, the emotional build-up from the conversation beforehand, I want to just absorb the essence of this scene into my bone structure. I've watched this episode twice so far and both times the hallway scene almost made me cry. I'd recommend this in a heartbeat to someone who isn't even interested in TADC or the wider genres it belongs to, it's just that fucking good. 

2. Fast Food Masquerade

It is. Probably not that hard to figure out where I stand on this episode considering how much I've been annoying every TADC tag under the sun the past 72 hours. I absolutely adored this episode, was literally everything I wanted and more based on the promo material. I love Gangle, her storyline about hiding her depression hit way too hard, I love Zooble, I love Gangle and Zooble being gay as fuck, I love Ragatha being absolutely fried the entire episode, I love Jax showing three whole seconds of human decency. Gummigoo. Oh my God. With how much praise I just threw Episode 3's way it's probably weird to learn I actually think Episode 4 is an overall better episode (by a very thin margin, but still), it just gave us a lot more interactions and development with the group as a whole which is something we were mostly lacking in up until this point usually due to the group being separated at some point or another during an adventure. In all honesty if Episode 3 didn't have the hallway scene I'd probably put it in this spot, but it does and the hallway scene fucks so Episode 4 is down here. 

3. Candy Carrier Chaos

Again, what can I even add to this conversation. A great expansion after our first taste of TADC, Gummigoo solos, I love sentient AIs undergoing existential crises as they come to terms with the implications of their existence. My one major complaint (which I had back when the episode first released and it's just been amplified with the last two episodes' releases) is just that we don't get much content of any of the main cast besides Pomni, their interactions are surface-level and don't offer us basically anything new from what we saw of them in the pilot. But that also wasn't what the episode was about so I can mostly give it a pass.

4. PILOT

The pilot was a very good jumping off point for the series and is decent as a standalone, but after rewatching it about a month or two back I don't think it's aged all that well. Again, it's still a perfectly fine watch and does its job of setting up all the stepping stones for the series, but the best way I can describe the pilot is…cluttered. It's just a lot of information and events you need to fit into one twenty-minute episode, so most of the episode goes at a breakneck pace in between a lot of back-to-back jokes that sometimes miss the mark (mostly the fault of Caine, I love him but he is definitely a character who is most effective in short bursts of screentime). You can definitely tell they were still trying to get a feel of things while making this episode and that's completely fine! It's a pilot, that's the whole point. Just doesn't really hold up when compared to its successors.

[cinnanamii]

Ganjis 3rd year birthday letter and the heavy mischaracterization of the characters in game 3/just ranting about the birthday letter

(⚠️⚠️‼️THIS POST WILL BE DISCUSSING LEAKS/SLIGHT SPOILERS FOR GAME 3 OF IDV!! IF YOU DONT WANT TO BE SPOILED ON GANJIS 3RD YEAR LETTER OR GAME 3, SCROLL AWAY PLEASE! AND ALSO KEEP IN MIND, I AM NOT A GAME 3 EXPERT! IF I GET ANYTHING WRONG FEEL FREE TO CORRECT ME!!‼️⚠️⚠️)

Ganjis 3rd year letter was leaked recently (you can probably find post about it on tiktok and on discord servers) and I am so far beyond unimpressed and disappointed.

To start out this yap session/rant, I’m going to list the characters serial numbers, so that you can know who I will be talking about so that you can get a grip on what I will be discussing.

• 3-1-2 is anne

• 3-?-1 is aesop

• 3-1-4 is ganji

• 3-?-3 is Victor

The fact that netease decided to fill the letter with shock value racism, ruin annie as a character, and just ruined Ganjis character arc, and basically made Victor useless is so BEYOND me. This is a a lot, so I wanna start by talking about the blatant mischaracterization of annie and ganji in this letter.

To start off, they made annie so unnecessarily, hateful and racist towards ganji. It would make sense for annie to be afraid of loud noises, as they did introduce her as a timid woman, but making her afraid of ganji and becoming violent to him because of his accent is so beyond me. The whole reason why annie attacked ganji was originally because aesop manipulated annie into hurting him, not that annie got scared of the way he spoke? Plus, due to her timid and sweet girl type personality i could never see annie physically fighting/attacking ganji, it’s just not something that would happen. How could she ever have the confidence to do that, when she was literally scared of ganji? Then, on top of that, annie wouldn’t be provoked by his accent so easy? In her trailer, she was literally described to be like her mother, who was very nice, that being a trait annie had. So for her to just go attacking him so so EXTREMELY out of character for her.

Then, next screenshot I’m showing right now is the shock value racism randomly put in this for god who knows why?

“unfavorable impression” caused by 3-1-4’s accent? This is so ooc for annie, it feels like a poorly written oc/au. The antagonization of annie feels so unnecessary and just not needed. Game 3 might not have had a Hunter, but it did have an antagonist, that being aesop. The whole antagonization doesn’t feel right for her at all.

Then now, I wanna talk about Victor. One of the main things in game 3 is that they were not able to talk or communicate with each other. if they were able to do that, what’s the point of him even being here if they could already speak verbally? His writing was already kinda not the best, but this entire letter takes whatever relevance he had to the plot away. He needs to get something consistent, or else in this case his character is just useless. It’s completely unfair that aesop is able to get clear motivations and goals, but the other characters goals and aspirations just get handled horribly.

Game 3 was so unique in the way it functioned, and with the characters that were so similar, but so different at the same time. What could have been a group of compelling a deeply well written characters now feel like a dumpster fire or mischaracterization and the severe lack of coherence. All just from one letter too. This feels like a big fat slap in the face for me as someone who loved game 3, and all of the characters for game 3, ESPECIALLY annie, and if you loved game three, also this should feel like a slap in the face for you too.

**im aware that this is a leak, and it could be potentially false, but this has been on my mind practically ever since I heard of it, and everything is just so absurd.**

edit: the letter was updated and changed, a few things did change (examp; annie isnt racist anymore) but that dosent mean I don’t have issues with the letter, I’ll probably make an updated post eventually if people r still interested in this

[verdicloud]

pouncival ideas

before, i never really paid close attention to the ending of the show “the ad-dressing of cats”, there wasn’t much dancing or plot, and i just listened to ken page’s legendary singing. but i recently noticed something. pouncival. he’s front and centre of all the cats, and he even does slightly different poses/choreo than the rest of them. pouncival is also one of those cats that i never paid too much attention to, but he’s been nagging me ever since this discovery.

the more i thought about it, the more i realised that he doesn’t really have a proper “role” in the tribe other than being a troublemaker, which doesn’t help anyone. when i searched for inspiration on tumblr, there were hardly any pouncival hcs that were exclusively him. and even then, it was just things we already know about him.

i NEEDED to know him better. he would not let go of my brain for the past three days. but i’d like to thank him for giving me something to think real hard about. here’s my ideas for him!

this next part is a review of pouncival. feel free to skip to “finally, my ideas” below the screenshot of pounce —

what we know :

- pouncival is the youngest tom cat in the tribe

- he’s a mischievous and childish kitten with a knack for troublemaking

- he’s carefree and playful, just a happy kitten, sometimes callously so

- his alternate is carbucketty, a name invented by t.s. eliot for a “knockabout” cat

what we can infer :

- he loves his friends! (he pranks grizabella at tumble and plato’s idea, and he lets victoria snuggle up to him at the start of “mister mistoffelees”)

- he’s a comedic kitten who loves making people laugh, even at his own expense

- he’s the type of kid to roll in the mud and eat dirt (affectionate)

- he’s the class clown who’s lowkey an icon

• in my personal list of the cats and their three words (or more specifically “three adjectives describing their personality”), i gave him childish, blithe, and puckish.

his main character moments :

- causing trouble, and being the first “cockroach” to appear, during “the old gumbie cat”

- pranking grizabella twice

- getting reprimanded by jellylorum and electra during the jellicle ball “chant”

- being the pollicle who leads the march (it goes wrong, naturally)

- falling over a bunch, the little rascal (he’s very good at it too. top job, karl morgan /srs)

finally, my ideas :

other than the “boys group”, pouncival is also close friends with electra (and therefore etcetera). electra is something of a fussy and uptight kitten, like the type of girl who always wants to be the “boss” of the friend group and twist the story so she wins during roleplays. pouncival gives her the perfect excuse for someone to yell at as a frustration outlet. his carefree and playful attitude means that, not only does he not mind, he plays along and sometimes does cheeky things on purpose to rile her up or lift her spirits (electra is secretly very grateful).

pouncival’s childishness also means that he has a vivid imagination, and this lead to him being very inventive. also, as previously established, he has no qualms with being unhygienic, so he is very resourceful in digging through the trash, no matter for food, supplies or props for electra’s roleplays. as such, he was actually the one to make the costumes and props during jennyanydots’s number and for munkustrap’s play…

once, electra got really upset during a group roleplay, so as an apology and also to cheer her up, pouncival made mice and cockroach costumes, and along with the rest of the kittens, they performed a hilarious, modified to comedic version of the nutcracker for her. the costumes ended up being reused for jenny’s number.

another version of this could be: once, electra was scolded by jenny, and being especially sensitive to the disapproval of the older cats, especially one she admired, she got really upset. so pouncival and etcetera “took revenge” for her by sneakily asking demeter and bombalurina to help them write a musical number about jenny. pouncival made the costumes and they secretly performed it for electra, twisting the meaning to make fun of the old gumbie cat instead. normally electra wouldn’t be too happy about this, but she was still upset at jenny at the time and it gave her the catharsis she needed.

both were more than successful.

pouncival also made the notorious candy cane bagpipes. plato, being tugger’s other biggest fan, begged pounce to help him create a special birthday gift for him to give to tugger. pounce isn’t sure what tugger’s response was, but it left plato smiling for days.

during the production of “the pekes and the pollicles”, an extremely stressed out munkustrap gave pouncival the job of costume design, collaborating with mungojerrie and rumpleteazer. with the help of their smart looting skills, the three made exceptional costumes for all four breeds of dog as well as rumpus cat, earning them lead roles (though munkustrap might have regretted that) and a pat on the head.

pouncival the knockabout cat lives!!! or maybe pouncival the invention cat?

(also why are his eyes lowkey so beautiful)

[codenamesazanka]

I need help writing the league of villains for a fan fiction. Like can you give me tips on to write their dialogue and stuff like that

Thanks for the ask! Here are some things that I think would be helpful, but please be aware that it's my approach to writing the League the way I interpret them. I'm sure there's people who finds my fic wildly inaccurate in terms of characterization. Sometimes I go back months later and disagree with my own stuff, given new information or outlook. You'll have different interpretations than me, and that's okay. And thus,

Tip #1: First of all, it’s fanfic, it’s fun, and it’s yours. You can do whatever the heck you want! It does not matter at all what you do with the characters, their dialogue, their personalities, their relationships, etc. I’ve read plenty of AU fanfics where I could not recognize Shigaraki Tomura/Shimura Tenko, despite the character having the name, but I still liked the story okay. Really, it’s all up to you and what you want. 

That said, to actually answer your question:

Tip #2: Re-read the manga. Read the scanlations - multiple versions from different scanlation groups. Read the official. No version will be perfect, some are better than others (Viz Official has its issues, but it is done by a professional translator and I tend towards it; Fallen Angels (Chapters 1-150s) was the first to scanlate and iirc they even included translation commentary at the end of their chapters; I found mangastream to be more accurate than Jaimini (Chapters 150-250s)), but having a variety of translations will give you insight into the intention of a dialogue, and different ways of achieving it. Read the original Japanese, if you can. 

Tip #2.5: Best way to figure a character, I find, is to describe the panels they’re in as if you’re writing a very plain, objective, impartial image description. Now you have an overview of their outward behavior, their actions, their dialogue. Using that, you have the basis for developing their motivations and personality. It’s the difference between ‘Shigaraki used gamer lingo a few times here, so he is a gamer... therefore he’s obsessed with games and that’s all he does’ and ‘In the first 100 chapters of the story, despite speaking sometimes like a gamer, Shigaraki is actually seen reading newspapers rather than holding a game console’.

Put another way, don’t assume generalized descriptions or traits for a character and write them based on that. You risk writing a trope or archetype or situation rather than the actual character. 

When a loved one dies suddenly, people will be in shock, before sobbing and weeping uncontrollably. That’s generally true, but the character may manifest grief in a different way. Someone close to Toga is killed - what does she do? You can write her breaking down crying, that’s perfectly reasonable. But if you look at the manga, when Twice is killed, she doesn’t cry right away. She gets angry; she lashes out. She’s deeply hurt by his murder, of course! But the tears she sheds for his passing are few in the immediate aftermath - her grief mostly takes the form of slicing Heroes’ throats.

Tip #3: Read everything else, for inspiration, for background knowledge, for tone, for your own gain outside of fandom.

Just the other day, I read Real, the wheelchair basketball manga by Inoue Takehiko. Its three main characters are marginalized by proper society - two because they’re disabled, one because he’s a high school dropout - and there were moments where I was reminded of the League’s situation. In the first chapter, the high school dropout makes a final visit to school where his teachers didn’t think much of him, and his classmates looked down on him. As he leaves, he thinks to himself that everything he does ends in failure and he’s an idiot, all the while he takes a dump at the school gates as a parting gift.

While I can’t see anyone from the League doing that exactly shot for shot, the spirit of it - being seen as a fuck up, being unwanted, being defiant in face of that, even in a inadvisable way - is similar.

Tip #3.5: Another book I’ve read years ago is Codes of the Underworld: How Criminal Communicate. It was very informative, and I think back to it sometimes when I write for the League. 

Criminals face severe constraints on communication imposed by the action of the law, and, unlike the rest of us, cannot easily develop institutions aimed at circumventing them. This central feature of criminal lives makes communication and above all reliable communication exceptionally hard to sustain. For instance, the same secrecy that protects criminals from the law hinders their opportunities to advertise their goods and qualities… In the underworld, moreover, punishments for mistakes and irrational behavior are harsher than they are elsewhere. In the world of regular business, failures of communication can lead to a loss of business, but in the underworld they can result in years behind bars, or worse.

I don’t follow it exactly, because the League is in a children’s fantasy story, and maybe this was obvious but now that it was written out to me, I know how to give the Villains an “edge” to them that a non-Villain might not have, because as Villains, they do often logically would to be secretive and brutal and cautious. Dabi walking around in broad daylight meant their hideout was discovered and All Might literally took down the wall to the bar; a breakdown in negotiations with Overhaul meant Magne dying and Compress getting his arm blown off. 

Tip #4: Related, let the League be assholes, because sometimes they are. Let them be mean and cruel and problematic. Sometimes they’ll be jerks to each other. Nearly all of them grew up in bad circumstances where they probably were not taught important lessons and details about respect and boundaries and being nice. They are definitely not going to be aware of the intricacies of fandom's (oft-American and oft-terminally-online) consensus about problematic behavior. And that’s fine. 

I remember once receiving an ask about why Shigaraki would pull Twice’s mask off in Chapter 224. Wasn’t that terrible of Shigaraki? Yeah, it was. It was also the quickest, most efficient way to get Twice to quit his arguing with the rest of the League, so Shigaraki can announce that they are going to rescue Giran (what Twice was arguing for). After that, he puts the mask back on for Twice. If you ask me, I’d say Shigaraki thinks this evens out - he does something mean that he knows will freak out Twice for a moment, but it’s because he’s arguing for Twice’s side, and he’s putting on the mask back at the end. 

You and I would likely never do something like that because we know taking away someone’s important assistive aid, even for a moment, hurts them and we don’t want to cause them pain for even a second if we could help it/there’s not ‘evening it out’/it demonstrates a power unbalance that perpetuates ableism/there are other ways to stop someone and grab attention/we know not to touch someone even the slightest without permission/etc. But does the character you’re writing know all this? Does he care? Does he think it’s worth following these rules? Does he have time for it, does he have incentives for it, does he have the lucidity, does he think he’s an exception because of this and that, etc, etc. 

A lot of things, most people often just don’t know until they’re taught to be specifically aware. As an example: When I was younger, I knew broadly that taking things without permission was bad; but what if I took these pair of scissors from my friend’s desk and used it and put it back before the owner knew? The owner is my friend. They once told me it was okay to take it, so it counts even today, right? It was just a pair of scissors, a common household item. My friend did not care; still does not care. But knowing what I do now about things like violations of boundaries, explicit consent, the continuation of these concepts for the most trivial and mundane things even in the deepest of friendship or familial ties - I feel the need to ask to use something. That’s me and what I’ve learned through the years, though. It’s probably not going to be [fictional character].

And sometimes the League are just bad people. Shigaraki tried to kill Toga and Dabi at their first meeting. Mr. Compress is seemingly a-okay with kidnapping and murder despite his ancestor being more of a Robin Hood type. Spinner likely knowingly doomed his family to even worse ostracism and harassment from his fantasy-racist hometown when he ran off to join a group of well-televised terrorists. 

That’s also fine. They’re not real. They’re fictional Villains, and you’re temporarily using them as hand-puppets to tell a story. 

Tip #5. For dialogue, it helps knowing what each character’s voice/speaking style sounds like. Some basics:

Shigaraki: 

“Shigaraki speaks with the normal masculine contracted speech, but with a sinister tone. Surprisingly not very cussy. He likes aggravating other people though.”

Caleb Cook notes that Shigaraki talks like an overgrown kid. (In comparison to ReDestro, who “uses more SAT words, since he’s had a formal education.”)

He can be a sarcastic smartass.

Kurogiri:

“Kurogiri is Extremely Polite”

He only refers to Shigaraki as ‘Shigaraki Tomura’. Always the full name, always just that.

He speaks very formally and respectfully; however, there is also a nastier side to him that comes out when he faces off Heroes: Saying to All Might, “I can't say I like the idea of having blood and guts inside my gate, but… if they're yours, I’ll happily oblige.” (Chapter 18); mocking Eraserhead and Mic when they're being sad over him, “Have you mistaken this place for a confessional of some kind?” (Chapter 254)

Dabi: 

“Dabi is like Shoto but ruder, though not to Bakugo’s extent”

He calls people names: Toga most often, as 'crazy'; he called Spinner 'lizard' once; when he first met Shigaraki, he said 'gross'.

Note that all the examples above are people younger than him; as far as I know, Dabi refrains from name-calling his allies who are older than him: Compress, Twice, Skeptic.

He inexplicably politely calls Ujiko ‘Ujiko-san’.

Compress:

“Compress is kind of like Sero. He’s got that trickster tone to him. Gets rougher when things don’t go his way.”

Likes to call himself an ‘old man’ at age 32; talks like an older gentleman as well. 

Twice: 

Twice contradicts himself a lot. Generally, he says one thing, his alter then says the opposite of that immediately afterwards. 

However, when things are urgent or serious, his alter’s speech fades. See Chapter 148, when he confronts Shigaraki about the Overhaul plan - he spills out his feelings with no contradiction. See Chapter 224, after they find out Giran’s been kidnapped - when arguing with the League about whether to say Giran, he’s completely coherent. 

Twice argues back with the alter sometimes, rather than the alter simply blurting out the opposite of what he says. 

After he gets over his clone trauma, the alter seemed to have…integrated into himself? He still speaks in contradictions, but less so, and it doesn’t seem to be a separate voice speaking out involuntarily

Spinner: 

“Spinner also speaks the normal masculine contracted speech like Kirishima and Kaminari, but he talks like Tokoyami during the Forest Lodge arc because he’s a Stain chuuni.”

An average, normal guy, compared to the rest of the League: not very polite, but not particularly rude; no great wit or affect (after he stops being a Stain fanboy), but not unintelligible; game references infrequently.

Giran: 

“Giran is also like speaks the normal masculine contracted speech similar to Shoto, but he’s a lot more mature.”

He calls Shigaraki “Shigaraki-san”, being polite towards him as a customer. 

He calls Twice by his last name, ‘Bubaigawara’, likely because they seem to be friends beyond just business. 

Toga: 

Toga is a generally polite girl, talks like a teenager. 

She can be bad at explaining herself! Seems to forget the people are lacking context for the things she says. “Hey, my best friend Jin just got killed by a Hero, which makes me sad, as well as worried that I'm going to be cut down like nothing as well, especially because I've been told how abnormal I am, even though I think I'm a normal person just like you, because I have emotions like love and fear, as any regular human does, and that lifetime of repression has hurt me.” -> Whatever she actually says to Uraraka in Chapter 289.

Only Toga uses first names with honorifics with the other League members. This is her being cute and desiring familiarity, but still polite. 

　◦ Twice is ‘Jin-kun’

　◦ Shigaraki is ‘Tomura-kun’

　◦ Dabi is, at first ‘Dabi-kun’; after she finds out he’s Touya, he’s ‘Touya-kun’ 

　◦ Spinner is ‘Spinner-kun’

　◦ However, Mr. Compress is simply ‘Mister’ 

Conversely, only Mr. Compress and Twice call her ‘Toga-chan’. All the 20-somethings dudes call her just ‘Toga’. 

*Note what the League calls each other. They all call each other using Villain names. If the male members of the League are using first names and honorifics for each other, they’ve either gotten extremely close and intimate and weirdly polite, or they’re being possessed by AFO. 

Tip #5.5. Instead of fretting over writing good dialogue right away, just write whatever you need to get a scene over with. You can go back later to change the tone and speaking style of the sentence.

Here’s a line I had for Dabi at first: 

“Whatever hospital he works at should be shut down for incompetency in background checks.”

Wayyy too formal. Here’s the line after I went back and fixed it:

“Whatever hospital he works at should be shut down for being shit at background checks.”

Still not my best shot, but better. Sometimes all you need is just to change a word. 

Tip #6. Humor. The League is ridiculous and hilarious. Always try to have fun with their interactions and antics.

[ponyprideful]

⚠️ High Voltage, Element of Perseverance ⚠️

(These last three are going to take some time, since I’m back in college at the moment. But I’m still excited to post them! I love them all dearly.)

High Voltage (they/them) is one of the main characters in my oc Mane 6, the master post for which can be seen here!

Voltage (which they go by more often than not) was honestly pretty excited about the whole Elements thing, especially when it came with a new group of friends! But being part of such a group is an uphill battle when it comes to how the public perceives them. An adult unicorn, without a cutie mark, who refuses to use magic? Even if it’s hard for most ponies to stay mad at them, it doesn’t change the fact that there’s very little going their way.

That’s a basic summary, but there’s much more information about them under the cut, if you’re interested. :}

(Family tree icons courtesy of UnicornGutz)

Voltage comes from a community that formed in the last thousand years, establishing a place for themselves in the formerly unoccupied Winsome Falls. The story goes that the colors of the rainbow seeped into their fur, creating bright patches of color that can be seen even on the darkest-colored ponies. The place is described almost like a storybook, with ponies and other creatures resembling those from medieval legend.

However, a curse befell Winsome Falls. It’s unknown what exactly happened, but Voltage and a few of the other foals and fledglings managed to escape before the village was enclosed- their families unfortunately left behind. Voltage doesn’t talk about it, but it’s clear that whatever happened affected them deeply. They haven’t used any magic since they were young.

They work as a repairpony for hire, even though they’re… not the best at it. They get the job done, they work very hard, and they’re willing to tackle any challenge they’re presented with, but it’s clearly not something they’re fully passionate about. They know that. But they also feel so close to a breakthrough, something important. If only they knew what…

Regardless, they do their best to stay optimistic. They enjoy talking to their clients and always try to offer a positive perspective on things, so they are generally liked despite their less-than-ideal repair jobs. They’re also very innovative, and more often than not use their horn to hold tools and objects, such as their goggles. Sometimes the intrusive thoughts win and they end up acting without thinking, but they mean well. Unfortunate circumstances be damned, they’re persevering.

[sunkissedliterarylightofchrist]

all the end-of-year questions >:3

LOL okay :)

Song of the year?

creature by half•alive

Album of the year?

Vessel or Blurryface by Twenty One Pilots

Favorite musical artist / group you started listening to this year?

Tie between Twenty One Pilots and half•alive

Movie of the year?

The Lethal Weapon movies (I skip the super-graphic parts though)

TV show of the year?

Rings of Power or Blue Bloods

Episode of tv or webisode that defined the year for you?

Rings of Power Season 2 Finale

Favorite actor of the year?

Lloyd Owens (Elendil in RoP)

Game of the year?

Zombies, Run!

Best month for you this year?

I don't know for certain, but maybe May

Something that made you cry this year?

Life circumstances and emotional pain from them

Something you want to do again next year?

Do everything I can to glorify God in all that I say, think, or do

Talk about a new friend you made this year

DDUHNJA:LFHNASDJNCQOIWADJS IRL I'm pretty lonely so thank you SO MUCH to these guys who I've known since I first got here for being my friends for the past 8ish months you guys have made my life a whole lot better

@ebony-reine-vibes @thiachildofgod @artist-issues @book-girl4evaaa

@thomasstaples @ramblings-of-lola @pinkwisteria @partlysunny15

@hiddenvioletsgrow @lilliesandlight

And thank you to all of the other wonderful friends I've made since then! <333

How was your birthday this year?

Nice :)

Favorite book you read this year?

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, by Betty Smith! It is SUCH lovely writing, the description and the way she tells dozens of tiny stories to build up to the main story is so so beautiful.

What’s a bad habit you picked up this year?

lying about my emotions when I'm in a bad place to people who care about me again

Post a picture from the beginning of the year/Post a picture from the end of the year

dont have my phone rn but I'll add to these two later

A memorable meal this year?

Killer steak tacos from a small place in NYC when I went on a trip there for two days for work.

What’re you excited about for next year?

There. Is something. An opportunity. An INCREDIBLE one. That I have been praying for for YEARS. And in the past few weeks all of the logistics of it suddenly dropped into my lap. And God has given me the green light on it.

I CAN'T SAY WHAT IT IS for privacy and its the internet but just praise the Lord because I now get to fulfill the spiritual burden that He has placed on me and I am so utterly excited to do the thing that He's been leading me up to do for years now.

What’s something you learned this year?

Where do I begin? Three main things I've learned are 1) Mastering discipline, routine, and consistency 2) Learning how to forgive horrible people again and again and again even when they don't deserve it and haven't apologized because God has got this 3) Being utterly happy in the little and day-to-day and not letting the dread of big life stuff to overshadow my joy in God's goodness.

What’s something new about your place of residence (room, home, or general location) now vs the start of the year?

New paint!

Favorite place you visited this year?

The Staten Island ferry, getting to see the Statue of Liberty

If you could send a message to yourself back on the first day of the year, what would it be?

DON'T KEEP COMMITING THAT SIN IT WILL WRECK YOU STOP NOW BEFORE IT GETS WORSE It'll save you so much pain if you cut it now and don't keep doing it until September

Did you keep any New Year’s Resolutions?

Every single one of them :)

Did you create any characters (in games, art, or writing) this year? Describe one

*cackle* RUNNER FIVE! the basics are here and more fanfiction is COMING

[kurenai-works]

Hello everyone, today is my 29th birthday.

With that in mind, I figured it would be the best time to talk about this, so I'm proud to present to all of you 東方雷秘儀 ～ Strike in the Holy Apex, my very first Touhou Project fangame!

The game's story will be centered around a mysterious thunderstorm that's raiding the entirety of Gensokyo, so it's up to a group of heroines to investigate the situation and save the day.

As some of you may know, around November of last year, GameMaker has become free to use for everyone, which prompted me to take the opportunity to create an engine that looks roughly similar to ZUN's original Touhou Project games. I showcased it in greater detail on YouTube sometime around late February and I was very pleased by the generally positive feedback it got.

Taking that into account, I continued to expand the work I've done and it has grown a lot during the past four months; menus function properly, game settings can be modified, controller support has been added, several gameplay tweaks have been implemented, and so on. There's still a number of things that need to be ironed out by the time I'm writing this post, but considering the progress I have done on it so far, I have faith that a trial version for the game will be ready for release soon. This has to be the biggest project I've worked on... by a country mile. Speaking of the trial version's release date, that will be disclosed at the very end of this post.

GameMaker being free to use has given me a joy I genuinely can't describe, and I bet my inner child would’ve been happy too by hearing those news. After all, I've had experiences with GameMaker for well over 15 years, basically almost half of my entire life!

So, what should you expect by the time the trial version is released? First things first, it'll obviously consist of only three stages.

Secondly, you'll be able to play this adventure as the usual duo; Reimu and Marisa. More playable characters will be available in the full version.

Thirdly, the game's main mechanic. It's called the Brave Gauge, and it has functionality almost similar to the Season Gauge found in Touhou 16: Hidden Star in Four Seasons. It's not the most original idea I've had, but for the record, and coming back to my familiarity with GameMaker ever since my teenage years, this system was taken from a very old draft which dates all the way back to 2014, while making some adjustments to it. Here's a little bit of proof:

I'm going a bit off tangent here, but seeing these filenames kinda makes me feel embarrassed. The game has "Ascii" on the name because all of the graphics in there were made using ASCII characters, which was done during a time when my artistic talents were non-existent, so they looked quite messy and overall made the game have a goofy aura to it, haha.

And lastly, considering that I'd like this game to be played by a wider demographic, it's gonna be available in three different languages: English, Spanish (my native language, hooray!) and Japanese. These can be selected anytime via the options menu.

I don't know any people who are fluent in Japanese, and the few friends that I have don't seem to know much about the language either, so that translation is gonna be handled 100% by myself using tools like DeepL. I know that translating all the stuff in one go can lead to heavily mistranslated results, so I'll be making sure to convert my game's text as meticulously as I can. If there's anyone out there who understands Japanese fluently and is willing to translate the text for me, please hit me up because that'd be really appreciated. In case that happens, I won't be able to reward the translation financially, but I will be adding your name to my game's end credits.

So yeah, I don't have much else to say. The game's trial version will be available on Itch.io this August 30th.

The game has a long way ahead from being completed, so anticipating a release date for the full version is not feasible, at the moment. Regardless, I'll make sure to update on that once I have made abundant progress on it.

Both versions of the game will be released as pay-what-you-want. In simpler words, they'll be available free of charge with the optional choice of depositing a sum, in case you're feeling generous. After all, not to brag, but it goes without saying that I'm handling every detail in the game; not just the programming, but also the art, music and writing. While I have used some code libraries to facilitate the inclusion of certain aspects in my game, most of the heavy lifting is carried out by me, so it'd be really appreciated to have some compensation for the work I have been doing for almost half a year. It's not by any means mandatory, so it's fine if you can't for whatever reason, hahaha.

Anyway, I hope you look forward to this game of mine as much as I do! See you then!!

[sadlybluespirited]

Scrambled Hater Thoughts

Maybe this is just me being an absolute hater but I have to say that I hate when white authors make a race or group of people to be these "senseless violent killers/warriors" because it is rarely (if ever) done well.

I'm thinking about this because I'm thinking about SJM and the Night Court again. Maas does very little with the Illyrians that's interesting to me. It reminds me a bit of when I read (a while ago), Veronica Roth's 'Carve the Mark' and I was reading about the Shotet people. Albeit that book was much more racist and egregious in hindsight (language being described as guttural for a group of people who are mostly represented by darker skinned main characters), I still don't like what Maas attempts with the Illyrians. Rather than having Cassian, Azriel and Rhys being characters where we can explore the implications of being born in such a society, the Illyrians are instead just a background for essentially how exceptional the three dudes are (very much feeling like "not like other guys"). Unlike those violent males, these ones are good. I just really feel uncomfortable about that because it feels so pointless to the narrative. Maybe this is also my own personal experiences as a black woman but characters like Rhys, Cassian and Azriel who want to divorce themselves from their own people can develop a complex about it. They may want to be in some proximity but too close. For example, seeking measures to distance themselves by dating a partner who is far enough from them culturally. Interestingly, Maas doesn't make it a deliberate choice for Cassian and Rhys to have their partners, rather they have their predestined mates. Which....I have not nice thoughts about.

There's just things to explore here that Maas honestly doesn't have the capacity to do but I wonder about anyway. For example, whether Rhys feels some type of way if (to outside courts) his evil mask is chalked up to him being half-Illyrian (does it make him hate them more? Feel guilty? Perform more/less?). Perhaps even having a conflict where Cassian wants to be more stringent or punishing and Rhys only sees the value of the Illyrians as his military. What about the theme of change? I know Rhys says at some point that change takes time and human perception of time is different from fae time. However it would be interesting to me if that was explored as potentially Rhys stalling, hesitant about changing the status quo because he cannot see the Illyrian males as redeemable or that his own traumas of being in the camps so young have shattered any potential positive idea he has of them changing. They're the court of dreamers but what the hell does Rhys even dream about when it comes to the other half of his identity? I mean he orgasms to Feyre having wings so there must be something there? Right? (or is just Maas sexualising and being weird...again). Perhaps he wants to be more accepted by his Illyrian side because he was seemingly closer to his mother (and sister) than his father.

As a final muddy note, I wonder what each of these characters (Rhys, Cassian, Azriel) would've done or thought had any of their mates been an Illyrian female. I wonder if Rhys is happy to have Feyre be close enough (don on wings) but not actually be Illyrian. I wonder what exactly Rhys was thinking when he called Nesta (a non-Illyrian Made fae) Illyrian as a 'compliment'. I wonder if that's what Cassian loves about her (I refuse to read ACOSF. That book sounds horrible). I wonder if he loves having spats with a female fae who is Illyrian-like but never truly one. I wonder if that makes both Rhys and Cassian feel better that they could treat their mates with the utmost respect and love freely and not seem hypocritical because again...their mates are not Illyrian. They can still be attached to their culture, their society by their positions of power and explaining their culture to their mates but still maintain distance from the parts they may never want to face.

[connectionxterminated]

❛⠀⠀🪽﹔aerith gainsborough ﹒shift intro

➽ " we need to make the most of the time we have — to live our lives the way we wanna live. every minute... every moment, matters "﹒⠀🕊

「 ✦ aerith , aeri , ria , rita — she / they ✦

☁️⠀ @satyrsystem ﹒ @spareeees ﹒ @the-wammys-house

﹒ ➽ more info under the cut !

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀Hi there! I'm Aerith Gainsborough! Most, if not all of you know me by Kratos, previously C and/or Crow! This is a shift of mine I've had for years now! Longer then most if not all of my shifts, including my consistent Kratos shift! I've actually had this shift since I was 8 years old, I've just never noticed until recently! <- that seems to be a recurring theme on my end...

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀This shift youre seeing now, is the most, if not always prominent! It usually makes me seem way more energetic, hyper, very happy-go-lucky, and super optimistic! Because what's life if you're not living it to the fullest, right?

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀There is also a split of me within the system who too, is Aerith! She's also really sweet and very kind! If you see her around, say hi, okay?

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀I go by she/they pronouns within this shift and my gender identity is incredibly fluid, so I'm absolutely genderfluid if you were curious!

﹒ 🌸 ;⠀ I really adore flowers, gardening, a good book and conversations! I consider myself to be a social butterfly and I'm always willing to help others out and I'm always willing to make new friends along the way! So don't be afraid to drop on by and say hello!

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀My aesthetic switches fairly frequently, but most of the time, if not all the time, my main aesthetics are typically; kidcore, grunge, and very cutesy and soft aesthetics!

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀This is by all means not a roleplay account, I am genuinely this character and I'd appreciate it very much if you respected this! I'm also many other characters, but I'm not going to be making an intro post for them because then we'd be here all day, and I'd much rather prefer to stick to one post for my most prominent and consistent shift!

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀Most would describe my personality as fun-loving, energetic and playful! But I can also be pretty shy and rather introverted, despite me being a social butterfly! But don't let that stop you from saying hi! I promise! I'm really nice when you get to know me!

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀Polyamorous and Pansexual throughout all my shifts, by the way! That doesn't change at all! I have many spouses and I love them all so very much, they genuinely don't understand how much they mean to me!!

﹒ ☁️ ; ⠀Source wise, I remember dating Tifa and Cloud! So all you claerith, cloti, and aerti shippers, it's canon. All three are canon. We are very happy!! I also remember meeting Vau after meeting Biggs, (kind of funny, because I am also Biggs) and after Biggs' death, if I remember correctly, I helped Vau out of the rut and depression he got stuck in. We hit it off and next thing you know, another partner has been added to the list! I don't know if he was also dating Tifa and Cloud, I don't think he was, I think it was just me! Either way, I love those three very much and if you have a problem with it, blehhhh!!!

﹒ ☁️ ; ⠀Me and Vau were the more "rambunctious" of the group, funnily enough! We always stuck together and agreed that wherever we went, chaos would follow!!!

﹒ ☁️ ;⠀ Vau did get sick a lot which also meant the group had to stop pretty frequently for however long, but that was okay! As long as Vau was okay and healthy then so were we! I'd take care of him as much as I possibly could with the help of the others! And he'd do the same!

﹒ ☁️ ; ⠀I remember when I went on stage and sang for the whole world to hear, he sat in the front row, bright eyed and bushy tailed! He looked so happy and proud that I couldn't help but feel like I did something right and I felt really happy that he was so happy!

﹒ ☁️ ;⠀ He couldn't really fight alongside the group so he was mostly just the healer and the provider whenever we needed something! He was also there to keep us company, and overall he was our best friend and he became apart of the family just as he was with Avalanche

﹒ 🌸 ; ⠀There are a lot more memories I have with Vau and company, but I know that if I keep going on and on, this introduction will never end! So that's all I'm going to write for now! Thank you for reading!!♡

[wanderersrest]

Some Idle Musings on Patlabor

I've talked about Patlabor twice in some capacity, so I figured why not go for the hat trick, no? (EDIT: The hat trick was ruined because I got tilted by a certain bad take involving Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans)

Patlabor is probably one of my favorite anime series of all time, especially when it comes to mecha anime. Granted, a big part of that is due to me recently coming into ownership of pretty much the entire series on blu-ray, but still. And seeing as how the second post on here was about how people should check it out (among other mecha shows), I figured I'd dive a little bit deeper into at least Patlabor. Who knows, I might touch on all of the other series at some point. I'll definitely cover G Gundam at some point, that much is assured.

Anyways. Patlabor. This isn't going to be a super deep dive, but there are three things I want to highlight with this series that I really like.

The World is Carefully Crafted to Justify Its Giant Robots

A common point of praise for Patlabor is due to how the worldbuilding is set up to accommodate the giant robots. A quick synopsis of Patlabor: giant robots known as Labors were created to help with construction projects. Following the creation of Labors came Labor-related created crimes. To combat these crimes, a special type of Labor was created to stop these types of criminal activity: the Patrol Labor, or Patlabor for short.

And it's not just there that the series fleshes out the Labors. The titular Patlabors (specifically the Model 98-AV Ingrams employed by the main characters) require a whole team outside of the pilots who operate the Labors, including spotters, transport platform operators, and mechanics. The television series also makes it a point of highlighting that the important part of the Labor is not the Labor itself, but the pilot data stored in the machine's computer. The world is so thought out, that the television series even touches on Labor insurance (yes really, and it's probably one of my favorite episodes of the TV series, maybe out of every anime series I've ever watched). This is, if I understand things correctly, why a lot of people love the OVA timeline (which consists of the Early Days OVA as well as the movies).

Great Characters Part 1: Noa Izumi

If the OVA timeline has more of a focus on the worldbuilding and the politics at hand, then the TV timeline (consisting of the TV anime and the New Files OVA) hones in on the character interactions. It's a real shame too, because the main cast are a pretty likeable group. Our main character in particular, Ingram Unit 1 Pilot Noa Izumi, is a delight to watch in pretty much every scene she's in, especially in the TV series. To it's credit, the OVA timeline does keep a lot of the appeal behind the characters. If anything, I'd argue that the change in tone of the OVA timeline is both natural and an extension of the pessimism following the bursting of the Japanese Economic Bubble.

But back to Noa, part of what I like about her as a character is her resilience. There are moments throughout the various entries in the franchise where she gets knocked down, but due to the nature of her work, she gets back up to finish the job. That kind of attitude helps to round out her more usual cheery and kind of naive attitude to most things. Also, she's very hot-blooded. Which is great for any mecha series, regardless of the style of mecha show you're watching. Speaking of hot blood, I think I'd be remiss to not mention my other favorite character in the series (that's not Division 2 chief Kichii Gotoh, because that's cheating)...

Great Characters 2: Isao Ota

I think the YouTuber Argonbolt described Ingram Unit 2 pilot Isao Ota best: "...he's 50% gun nut, 50% [ego]." It's almost impossible for me to talk about how great Noa is as a character without bringing up Ota. I could just say that he works great as a foil to Noa, but I think I'd be selling our red-blooded gun nut short. Part of what makes Ota such a great character to me is the fact that, whereas a lot of Noa's growth pertains to her as a person, Ota's growth is essentially tied to how he handles his Labor.

This is because Ota is a hothead.

No, seriously. Ota's hotheadedness is a large part of what makes him such a great character, and that's just going off of the sheer entertainment value of it all. It also helps that Ota being an American-styled cowboy cop (even moreso than the American Kanuka Clancy, and she's already a bit of a cowboy cop) oftentimes has consequences. Heck, a lot of Division 2's notoriety stems largely from Ota's hotheadedness. But Ota's hotheadedness often hides aspects that betray the manly image he's crafted throughout the series. It's little things like how he frets over Noa like an older brother when she runs off on her own to chase down a bank robber, or the change in his demeanor when Kanuka and her replacement, Takeo Kumagami, start getting into an argument with each other. This depth of character is better explored in the episodes that focus squarely on Ota, with my favorite of the bunch being the aforementioned insurance episode (TV Anime Epsiode 37, "I'm Selling Peace of Mind/Safety on Sales"). Without getting into spoilers, part of what makes it great is how the episode highlights how hard it is to avoid a lot of property damage when it comes to piloting giant robots. But I'm now rambling a bit too much, so let me jump ahead to the last bit about what I like about Patlabor.

This Series Loves Giant Robots

More than anything else, Patlabor loves its giant robots. My first time learning about this series was seeing some random user on Reddit go "See, unlike Gundam, Patlabor is cool." And if there are two things that make me, as an ardent fan of mecha anime, really upset, it's one of at least three things:

Bashing series X in order to prop up series Y (Bonus points if its Gundam)

Saying X is unlike other mecha shows because X focuses on the characters (No 86/Evangelion/Code Geass/Gurren Lagann fans, 86/Eva/CG/TTGL is not special, especially when Fang of the Sun Dougram/Space Runaway Ideon/Mobile Suit Gundam/Getter Robo exist.)

Denigrating a series because it's not super realistic (Basically the whole "Real vs Super" debate. I'll touch on it when I talk about G Gundam.)

But after watching Patlabor on my own, I realized that this series really loves its giant robots. It's often shown through both the worldbuilding, which is really just an excuse to justify having giant robots in the setting to begin with, and also the fact that it's main character is, for all intents and purposes, a mecha otaku.

Final Thoughts

Off the top of my head, I don't really have much else to say about Patlabor for now. Granted, there were a lot of things I didn't get to talk about in depth like how the computer systems the Labors employ are, in my opinion, a great example of a seemingly realistic take on AI (not the generative kind, just AI in general), or how one of my favorite character interactions in the series is the pseudo parent-child bond between Chief Engineer Sakaki and Noa and how their relationship reminds me of my relationship with my dad. Most importantly, while I do have an overall preference of the TV timeline over the OVA timeline, I don't think it's necessarily better. The two timelines have their own strengths, but both timelines benefit from the other existing. It also doesn't cut down on the fact that there are still people out there who enjoy Patlabor, and that's really all that matters.

Anyways, I'm going to go crawl back into a hole and wait for any morsel of news involving Patlabor EZY.

[ultraericthered]

A tale of two "tragic downfall" villains.

Really think about this - the villain is someone who has suffered greatly in his life to the point of being a traumatized, fragile wreck of a person but is a close friend of the story's main protagonist and works alongside them for years until certain events make his hatred, pride, and need for power, control, and the loyalty of others grow and put him on a worse path, on which he betrays the protagonist and leaves them for dead, taking over his friend's group and making all of them follow him now, and when the protagonist returns to face him and get him to relinquish his control of the group, they have a fight to the finish where the villain proves once and for all that he is too far gone to see reason and beyond hope of redemption, so he ends up meeting a terrible, painful demise. Which one did I just describe?

And I don't want to tear either one of them down, since they're both phenomenally written villains who star in their own dark, tragic tales that were both very well executed. ....BUT, I have to go here: I believe there is one thing that one of them got down a lot better than the other one. And it ain't the damn dirty ape.

I am referring to the quality of pathos, which is derived from, for lack of a better word, humanizing the character. Matt Reeves has expressed very clearly that we are intended to feel pathos for Koba, and for his limited screentime in Rise of the Planet of the Apes and in the first act of Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, we do. The poor bonobo was terribly abused, tortured, traumatized, and damaged by callous human scientists and has the physical scars to show it. Even after joining with Caesar and being allowed by him to personally kill his abuser, the deep hatred of humans and fear of what might happen to him and other apes should humans find some way of striking back at them remains with Koba for years; the one thing he ever learned from humans was hatred and nothing else, as Caesar puts it. But the deeper into Dawn we go and the worse Koba gets, the issue arises. Caesar and all these apes were family to Koba for a good many years, years lived in peace and relative happiness, with Caesar even likened to a brother to Koba. However, after a heated dispute with Caesar over his willingness to work with humans turns violent, Koba is beaten down and sees none of the other apes are on his side, he turns his thinking around to view any "weak" ape who'd side with or have leniency on humans to be no better than humans, and that he needs to secure the loyalty of the stronger apes (including Caesar's own son) by taking Caesar's life and framing the humans for it. So he goes for it. And keeps going. And going. And going. And in all this time he's being a villain, the whole second half of the movie, there's not a single moment where Koba ever feels conflicted over what he's doing, no visible traces of remorse nor any sign that he's internally pushing back against remorse because second-guessing himself and surrendering to feelings of shame would reflect weakness. After he's shot his "brother" and left him for dead, Koba is stuck playing the one note of being an evil, wrathful, deranged, murderous monster. There is no metaphorical dog he won't kick, no one he won't mow down in order to assert his dominance and satisfy his rage, and no limit to his blatant hypocrisy. And yes, it was the narrative intent to have Koba slide so far down the slippery slope that he becomes this twisted caricature of his former self who must be put down. But at the time he's condemned and dropped to his painful demise by the ape who was once his brother, there should be a tiny twinge of pity and sadness that it had to come to this....but I think most audiences just cheered when it happened, as there was nothing in Koba left to feel any pity towards.

For Simon, being the equilvalent to what Koba was in the second half of the film occurs only in Book Three's final episode, "The New Apex". In the episodes prior to it, throughout the course of Book Three, Simon is one of the main protagonists and has a wide range of facets and emotions to his characterization; we see moments of him and Grace having the sort of camraderie with each other that could only come from years spent together as friends that makes them both a bit easier to like despite their apalling actions, we get funny bits from him that endear him to us, we see him get sad, get frightened, get confused and unsure of the direction Grace is taking things in, hear about his personal interests, learn about his past trauma, see him vulnerable and interally torn up by conflict. When he works together with Tuba in the Color Clock Car, even sharing a laugh with her, figuring out she's colorblind, and learning more about the sad past with her deceased daughter that also shows him how much Hazel means to her, we can tell that all his views about "Nulls" and about the train are being challenged and he's starting to second-guess himself, to think that this "Null" might be so much more than he'd written her off as from the start, which would lead to guilt and shame over all the "Nulls" he'd mistreated and killed in the past...and so naturally, there's the internal pushback from Simon, because he not only cannot admit to being wrong, he cannot let himself be wrong: he has to be right all the time so that all the years on the train and in the Apex can mean and amount to something beneficial to him rather than having all been a sad waste that'd render him a pitiful, insignificant failure. So with all doubts dispelled from his mind and clear from his consicence, he deliberately and cold-bloodedly sends Tuba to her death, and feels proud to have done so. Things only spiral downward into further darkness and madness from there.

Simon finding out that Grace learned the truth about Hazel before he did and withheld it from him as a secret between herself and the "Null" is the tipping point for him. He snaps, turns against Grace and leaves her for dead, and like Koba, now feels there is no one in his life that he can trust to be on his side unless he were to force their loyal devotion to him through fearmongering and shows of dominance. And yet even in "The New Apex", even with Simon at his most irredeemably loathsome and psychotic, the writing allows for some pathos. When Grace saves Simon from falling off the train, he asks her why she did it. Grace responds "I don't know." Looking at Simon's face in the brief silence that follows, we can tell that deep down in his heart of hearts, he was hoping for Grace to give him a different answer. Something like "because I love you" or "because you're my dearest friend", or "becuse I didn't want to lose you", or "to make amends to you for everything" or even "because you're not the one who deserves to die; you were right about me, about everything." But instead, he hears a vague, ambiguous "I don't know", as it was just basic human decency from Grace and nothing deeper than that. And thus goes away whatever was left of Simon's mind and heart, as he kicks Grace off the train to her apparent death in an act that rescinds years of love and friendship built up with her, raises Simon's number higher than even Amelia's, and sends him into a complete mental breakdown as we see a surge of conflicting moods all over him. So then even if his grisly end that follows elicts some cheering from viewers (I certainly wouldn't blame them!), that tiny twinge of pity and sadness that it had to come to this is very much there by the time Simon is dust on the ground that Grace is sobbing over.

Two exceptional villains in two exceptional works, but only with Simon do I get the sense of a victimized and vulnerable not-all-bad person who tragically descended into becoming a mega asshole. With Koba, I just see a mega asshole.

[myrmyrtheorca]

Ignore me, just adding some more stuff into your inbox pile hehehehehe

🌈 Rainbow: What is your favorite character dynamic to write? Give us an example from your WIP!

💧 Raindrop: Describe your antagonist/villain in 5 words.

P. S: Take all the time you want bud, I know the battery is currently low 🫂🫡

*chews lix* hi friend- (ask game)

thank you I'm doing my best to keep up with everything, also redirecting here @upsilambic because she asked for the same prompt

🌈 Rainbow: It's not a character dynamic per se I think, but I really like to tackle the tension between two characters that are obviously up against one another but can't openly fight it out/quarrel/express their disdain for one another. I guess you could call it forced collaboration?

Two scheming characters, each one with their own goals, who have to constantly outsmart and keep up with the other's moves. They KNOW the other one is out to get them but cannot ask for help or flee: they have to play the game or itìs their end.

Let's see if I can find something from the next chapters:

"For the past two months, Madam Nifate has instructed us to divide the sample pools into two subgroups. [...] The second group, on the other hand, is dedicated to collecting data on conscious subjects."

"Which we know to be very scarce compared to the resources we use to obtain them," he interrupted again, finally deigning her with his cold gaze, "How many subjects died this time?"

Anemone's heart was gripped by a mixture of shame and fear: it seemed that young Tristam had done his homework before that meeting. She guessed that, perhaps, he had planned to confront her about it personally, preparing to debate with the data held by Nifate. At least, she thought, a subtle difference between him and the Nera Signora was slowly becoming identifiable: he was much less patient than his mother.

"We... we lost two girls," she replied, struggling against the urge to clench her fists, "Thirteen and twenty-three years old. The other three subjects lost consciousness during the experimentation... and so managed to survive."

Tristam's reaction to that information was a silent raising of his eyebrows. "I understand. And why did it come to letting three subjects faint? Why didn't you proceed? Keeping them conscious by force shouldn’t be that hard."

Anemone's self-control failed: she bit her lower lip before answering with a trembling voice: "Signorino Tristam. Our approach as a research and development team prioritizes the safeguarding of our specimens when possible."

"Yes, mother mentioned things have been like this since you took command."

"And since then, branch productivity has increased by 30%. Collaboration with the study subjects allows them to re-present themselves as such multiple times. With all due respect, signorino... under these premises, it's not accurate to describe our work as 'lacking commitment', if that's what you're insinuating."

💧 Raindrop: oh god. who's KW's main villain? I feel like that's Tristam right now, at least.

Treacherous. Forlorn. Adored. Repaired. Vengeful.

[publishinggoblin]

playing What We Possess

Come on over to Take Me to the Dark before the end of October to claim your own copy of What We Possess!

What We Possess is a ghostly storytelling game for 2-7 players. It's GM-less, and takes 1-2 hours depending on how far your group decides to take the scenes you'll be setting.

So there are 5 card types for this game. 

Vessels, which have the living and objects for you to interact with and possess. Humans, animals, objects, and machines. These are the primary things you interact with throughout the game.

Ghosts, which show how your character died, how much energy you start with, and what unique power you have access to.

Hauntings, which give you the primary mystery you are trying to solve. It is a leading question and mystery, and whatever story you tell from this is what you are trying to uncover.

Clues, which are objects or situations that give you insight into the answer of the mystery. The game builds up towards the third clue being revealed. 

And Locations, which are the settings for your games. These help you know what the space is, what time of day it is or what is happening in the space, and how many vessels are present.

You begin the game by rolling 2d6, two six-sided dice. These determine what state the location is in (generally pristine and new, a little worn down but used, and abandoned or in a bad state), and what time of day it is (generally day, evening, or the dark of night.)

Then you look at the bottom of the location and see what 3 vessels are almost always here. Depending on what time of day it is, some of these might be missing, as noted by the Sun, the Setting Sun, and the Moon.

And finally, you draw a set of random vessels equal to the vessels shown under the State of the location and the Time of the location. In this case, we had the main 3 of the space in the day and 8 more random ones. These are setup around the Location card, setting our scene.

Players are then each dealt a Ghost card, which determines how they died, their starting energy, and of course, their unique power (and its cost.) From there, the last thing to do before starting is revealing the Haunting card. This particular one was Unseen Grave. Your bodies are hidden somewhere in this space, and you want to bring them to light, and figure out why you died here.

Game play unfolds by players taking ownership over scenes. They spend Energy from their pool to spur the living the action. Using one Energy on a vessel, you can set the opening shot for what they are doing, grouping the vessels in whatever order you want, showing how they are interacting in the space. A good deal of this game is improvising the scenes, explaining what the living are doing, and leaving it open for another player to use an Energy to claim what happens next. Each player has a different color energy counter to help them see how much each player is taking part in the story, opening space for people a bit behind to add in and catch up.

Players can also use an Energy to open dialogue for the ghosts to speak to one another, setting a scene among the players.

As things happen, players can move scenes ahead by spending energy and begin to describe scary or strange events. Their goal is to raise the Terror level of the space, adding it in Red on the Location card. Whenever a player thinks they've done something scary, or set a weird scene, they ask the other players how scary it was, 1-3 (a bit scary, spooky, or outright horrifying). That's how much the Terror raises.

The goal of the game is to ultimately reveal clues.  Whenever vessels in the scene reveal something about the story or mystery, perhaps when vessels are talking to eachother, or doing a strange action, the group can decide the scene revealed a Clue. The active player (who is running the current scene) draws a Clue card and explains how it relates to the mystery. 

When three Clues are revealed, the mystery is unraveled entirely. Players can suggest how they want the clue to relate, or how the mystery unfolds, but ultimately the player who drew the Clue card should set what it was for certain. 

Ghosts don't need to wait for the living to reveal the secrets, though. They can take part directly, by possessing inanimate objects for an Energy cost, perhaps raising the terror level of the space. As Living vessels experience this terror, they reach 3 levels. Their first, a screaming mouth, is when they are terrified, and their terror releases energy the ghosts can use to recoup what they've used. Their second, a held vessel, is when they can be possessed, and the cost of it. Their third, though, is when they flee the scene if possible. It can become too scary, after all.

Between pushing the living to interact in the space, using ghostly powers (like controlling or creating smoke, making people angry, or affecting their dreams), or directly possessing objects or people, the players will uncover the story.

But Ghosts need to be careful about how they use their energy. Once it's out, their ghost fades away into the haunting Whispers that surround the location, keeping them here. This can happen during play in dramatic scenes where players want their ghost to go out in a big way, or it might happen at the end of the game.

Once the mystery is revealed and the story put to bed, it's time to resolve how things end. Vessels are living people, too, and have their own stories for what happen to them. They may not live through this, may be traumatized, or may be moved to help the Ghosts in revealing what happened to them to the world. The Ghosts then need to resolve what happens to them. Once the story is done, they may explain how they use their final energy before moving on, now that their task is done. They may hold onto their energy and haunt a vessel, leaving with them. Or they may stay to protect the space. It's up to the players to decide how their story ends.

And that's the game! Play is meant to be 1-2 hours long, and made for one-shots, meaning one game session alone. But you can choose to carry a Ghost on from one story to another if you feel it matches the story that's happening, if a vessel has come to a new space perhaps!

There are currently 15 Locations, 15 Hauntings, 15 Ghosts, and 60+ Vessels, but I have plans for more of everything in this core game, as well as large size expansions set in the City and in the Wilderness that expand the game as much as the core game did. These can be played on their own as their own play sets, or merged into the core game. Who doesn't want a Ghost who died by being Mauled to Death when the game takes place in a Theater downtown? Or a Bear on a Cruise Ship? 

If this looks interesting to you, and you want to tell a Ghost Story of your own... consider coming over to Take Me to the Dark before the end of October and pledging for your own copy!

[raviollies]

Hey! I love what you've done to characters and Lorelei is now living in my head rent free! Raha and Blythe are amazing and adorable!

It's very inspiring the way you keep yourself together even when everything falls apart! Keep it up!

If my question is annoying or if it bothers you, you may not answer on it.

Originally I followed you when I saw your Ireena and Blythe art. It amazed me how much both of them and Ireena in particular got fleshed out!

In my dnd game and tbh in many other games, players don't get invested in Ireena's journey, they don't fall for her and don't care for her sadly. That's why many DM's usually replace her with a player character, in order to raise the stakes. In half a year I will be running a new cos game, for the group of three and I am honestly considering to replace Ireena with the PC, but don't really want to (especially fearing how the game might go, if the player will turn into strahd-simp).

Could you please describe Ireena's character in your game? Perhaps her bonds and flaws? So other DM's and I can do a better job of her portrayal!

Thank you for the kind words! Here is an updated Lorelai WIP for your to pay rent

(and Blythe and Raha are very married yes)

So rather than referencing my game, as I am not the DM, I will provide my own suggestions as I was planning on running CoS as well. Spoilers for the campaign

I will also suggest against a Tatyana PC. Everyone is very much free to write and interpret the character however they want but to me it is very important that the Tatyana reincarnation does not want Strahd. In fact I would remove the interaction with Sergei too. Having her instantly forget herself as this new person in favour of Tatyana erases the entire point and kind of proves Strahd right in him refusing to see Ireena as her own person.

The way I would approach Ireena; she is her own person. She grew up with her family that wasn't Tatyana's. She lived a life that wasn't Tatyana's. She's met different people. It doesn't MATTER if she's a reincarnation of someone else, after all everyone in Barovia is a reincarnation of someone else. It's very important to establish that the main crux of the issue is that Strahd does NOT see her as Ireena, but Tatyana. He does not know Ireena. He only knows Tatyana. I would even have him call her that rather than "Ireena".

Ireena's story would be one of becoming independent and confident in her identity. To no longer be just Ismark's sister, Burgomaster's daughter, Tatyana's reaction, Evil's bride --- she is Ireena Kolyana. Nothing more, nothing less. I would start her off as unsure of herself, and being hesitant to take up space and over the course of the story become more confident in standing up for herself, with an eventual climax of expressing extremely clearly to Strahd that she is not Tatyana. She never was. He doesn't know her. That that person is gone, and she will never be back. He can chain her, do whatever but that will never make her Tatyana nor will it make her love him or know him. She is a woman who is constantly assigned identities by other's, but she want's to just be Ireena, she wants to do her hobbies, decide on where she wants to go, what books to read, what food to eat.

The relationship between Strahd and Tatyana is irrelevant. It could have been real, or a figment of his imagination, but the point is that...she is gone. If he had a soul of someone else, would it be fair for them to lay claim to him?

As for personality wise ; I would write her as sheepish at first, she is someone taking their first steps into adulthood in a way, outside the comfort of their home, their village. She should be curious and wonderstruck, curious and wishing to explore every nook and cranny. Because of that she would be unfortunately naïve to the problems that arise in bigger cities as Vallaki. A village and a town are very different - a big thing she's be stupefied by how impersonal everyone is. Rural villages often have people knowing everyone, it's commonplace to help your neighbor because you KNOW them. Vallaki is different...people go about their day and do not care, after all there is so many people. You physically can't know everyone.

She is down to earth and finds camaraderie with someone simpler than a noble, providing practical suggestions and being very handy with most tools and identifying local flora. On a flipside, I would say she struggles when dealing in very formal settings where it's less about honesty and more about saying a lie by omission to get what you want. When interacting with Vargas or Lady Wachter, she's visibly uncomfortable and stumbles over her words; they speak in such a way to purposely confuse her, like a lawyer would. Not only that but she most likely would refuse to do anything morally questionable, her heart is very pure!

So in all, a kind hearted, down to earth little lady who values honesty, hard work, and family but is naïve, stubborn and socially awkward. She will support and protect the party, even to her detriment but she will not stand with them to commit Crimes (so RIP if your party is murder hobos)

[odinspattern]

The other day I suddenly remembered the very short-lived project where people on the Scroll of Colors forum were doing a gender bent version of Hidden Years/Shards war arc. It fell flat because people got too controlling about it, thus everyone lost their desire to write on it.

That and now the unlikeable female characters post made me think.

How Chot would have been received if he was a female character?

For this excersise, we are using they/them pronouns, to keep track.

I mean, here are the facts. When the character is introduced., it is as an accomplice to Zhey, who is a chief for the Go-Backs, who feels threathened when Kahvi returns. He orders Chot to go along with Kahvi, and they follow Zhey’s commands. They then attack Kahvi after she has gotten the Little Palace.

They then get overwhelmed by the preservers, and then makes the trek up to the frozen mountains. When they get there, they claim that Kahvi died. They convince Zhey to attack the Sun Village, that the Little Palace is a great prize. In tge skirmish both Chot and Yun get fatally injured, it goes really bad…

And then they wake up several hundred years later, trapped in the Sun Village, knowing that everyone they knew is dead, and that they do not know the present location of the Go-Backs.

As personality goes, they are described as lazy, arrogant and glutenous.

Which is true.

They believe that they are the fucking best dancer that ever was (and shown to be not) and the best swordsman ever.

Now this is conjecture on my part, but I always thought that the insistsnce of being lazy while in the Sun Village and eating three times their share was actually about being resentful about being trapped, and bored.

In the Forevergreen saga they develop a crush on Shenshen, and when the rest of the group decides to leave Jethel, who is missing, behind to start the Fire-Eye saga, they stay back to find Jethel.

Final Quest hints that Chot did not find Jethel, and was kidnapped and abused by Ekolin … but honestly, Final Quest is confusing about what they were doing so we are skipping it.

Anyway. Honestly, I love Chot. Chot is not like most of the elves, Warp allowed Chot to be different. They got a design with hair fringe and brown, a little plain clothes. They allow Chot to be a little incompetent but very proud of what they do.

In Elfquest, it was refreshing to see a character be bad at the things they like doing, be arrogant and resentful about what they cannot do. Even the atagonist characters are very competent and have storylines about it. Rayek had to reinvent hunting and is a powerful magic user, Winnowill has her blacksending and dark healing, Surge is a powerful watershaper. And the main characters, even Skywise is defined by being great at something… or being written as if they are. And if we do not get a special talent, they are pretty.

But Chot was not and I love that. They gave us rough edges that almost no Elfquest character was allowed to have.

I personally think that a female character like that would be even cooler. As much as Elfquest treats it’s female elf characters well, having one who is not perfect would be even better. But honestly, I often feel alone in my camp over here with him being a male character. Can you imagine a female character being allowed to be do against the mold of their own comic?

I’d love it personally, but I am weird like that =P