#does this make sense to anyone who isn't me

[esoanem]

Unlike the Leviticus verses, which do have legitimate linguistic oddities allowing other good-faith readings (albeit ones spoken against by the extreme consistency of the traditional interpretation of it prohibiting male homosexuality), the Corinthians verse is extremely hard to interpret any other way without extremely tortuous reaches

The Corinthians verse was almost certainly originally composed in Greek, and we have the relevant text. The two words in question are:

μαλακοὶ malakoì "effeminate ones" (literally "tender ones", and well attested as meaning "receptive sexual partners", especially homosexual ones, i.e. "bottoms"). Given

ἀρσενοκοῖται arsenokoîtai which is the one with a disputed sense because it's a hapax legomenon only found in this verse

That said, it's constructed in a readily understandable way that doesn't leave much latitude for interpretation

The first component is ἀρσενο- arseno-, the genitive stem of ἄρσην ársēn "male"

The second component is κοῖ- koî-, a stem of κεῖμαι keîmaI "to lie"

The last is -ται -tai, the nominative plural of a 1st declension suffix, almost certainly -της -tēs, a masculine agentive suffix (i.e. "-er"), but strictly also possible is -τη -tē used to form various feminine abstract or instrument nouns

As all the other nouns here are masculine, and refer to people, the masculine agentive is almost certain

The sense of κ��ῖ- koî- as sexual seems pretty certain given the exact parallel formation of ἀκοίτης akoítēs "husband, male bedfellow", and the regular feminine counterpart ἄκοιτις ákoitis "wife, female bedfellow" (both with the alpha copulativum ἀ- a- "together")

So we have a form roughly translatable as "male-fucker". I'm principal this could be a "male-[fuck-er]" (i.e. a male person who fucks) rather than [male-fuck]-er (i.e. a man who fucks males), but ἄρσην ársēn isn't really used as a prefixed adjective in this way, meaning it only really makes sense with ἄρσην ársēn as the object

As such, it can only really be reasonably interpreted as "one who fucks males"

Given that it immediately follows μαλακοὶ malakoì which appears to refer specifically to bottoms, it seems extremely likely that this is intended to refer specifically to tops (who were not generally subject to much prejudice in Greek society, and generally understood as just normal, possibly explaining the lack of other attestations). Even if not interpreted that way, it seems that it would have to be interpreted more broadly as gay men in general (or potentially anyone who fucks men, including women who peg men)

Whenever I've seen people try to defend alternative readings they don't even bother to actually provide an alternative analysis, and instead just throw their hands up at the fact it's a hapax, but if you are aware of one I'd be happy to see it, because as I say, it really does seem pretty unambiguous to me

[arc-misadventures]

Jaune being his normal kind, helpful lovable self causes women like Illia, Terra, and others to fall for him

LAJA

Coco: And, welcome everyone to the first meeting of the, LAJA. Lesbians Against Jaune Arc. My name is, Coco Adel, club chairwoman, and founder.

Coco: Now, since this is out first meeting we will each introduce ourselves, and tell everyone why you decided to become a member of the, LAJA. I'll go first...

Coco: I am a loud, and proud lesbian, I saw some guys, and I thought they were attractive, from as aesthetic perspective not anything romantic, or sexual. But, one day, I was trying on an outfit with my BunBun...

Ilia: Hold up! Your 'BunBun?'

Coco: Oh yeah, that's a nickname for my teammate, Velvet. She's a rabbit faunas.

Ilia: Ohh!

Terra: I like that.

Coco: Velvet isn't that good at fashion, but Jaune was there, he saw my outfit, and said no. Gave me some other clothes, and told me top try it on... and son of a bitch that was the greatest outfit I've ever worn!

Coco: After that, the two of us would go out, and do some fashion shows with each other, and some other people who needed a new wardrobe. It is fun, really fun hanging out with him. So, one day when we're having fun this random woman came up, and ask if, Jaune was single. And, Jaune was single... but, I said he wasn't... that I was his girlfriend...

Coco: I'm a hardcore lesbian! I never thought of dating a guy in my entire life! But, to keep some random floozie from, Jaune I said I was his girlfriend... I don't want to lose my fashion friend, my best male friend. And, I'm sad that I'm not... And, I really... I really want to be his girlfriend... So... yeah...

Terra: You fell because of his fashion sense? Makes sense, Jaune has superb taste in woman's fashion.

Coco: He did, I was looking at a wedding dress one day, and who is at the alter, Jaune freaking Arc...

Yang: Oh you got it bad!

Coco: Okay... You're turn.

Ilia: Okay... Hello everyone, my name is Ilia Amitola, I am a chameleon faunas, I can changed the colour of my skin. So, I was a former member of the, White Fang, I was a lesbian since I was in the, White Fang, and I hated humans on top of that. Then this stupid blond human just shows up, he flashes me that pearly smile of his. And, my body just changed to pink!

Coco: Like it did just now?

Ilia: Yes?! I just looked at him, and I thought how much I wanted to sleep with this guy! A guy, a human guy at that! It's just a crush, there's nothing more about it! So, I decided to learn things about him, I'd learn that one thing to make him the worst person I could possibly imagine!

Ilia: And, what I learned is that he is one of the nicest, sweetest guys I've ever met! He doesn't hate the faunas! He supports the, White Fang! To a point! He doesn't like the more radical side...

Yang: No one does.

Ilia: But, all I learned how a sweet caring a person he is! Then I saw him watch over some faunas kid one day, and the next thing I know, I'm thinking about having kids with him! This it total bullshit!

Coco: She's still blushing.

Emerald: It is a nice shade of pink.

Terra: Well... speaking of babies... My name is, Terra Cotta Arc...

Coco: Arc? Are you related to, Jaune?

Terra: In a way, I am married to a woman called, Saphron Cotta Arc. She is, Jaune's older sister, making, Jaune my brother-in-law. And, for a while I thought I was asexual, I was never interested in anyone. But, then I met my wife, and well eventually I married her. And, I'm happily married! But, then I met, Jaune, and if I met him before I met my wife, we probably would be married with three kids by now. Right now we only have the one though.

Coco: T-The one...?

Terra: I wanted a kid, so I asked, Jaune to... donate so I could have one. And, this is my son, Adrian~!

Yang: Oh gods he is so adorable~!

Ilia: Noooo... Don't do this to me, I've been trying to get rid of the baby craze!

Terra: And, well... I want another... maybe two... N-Next...!

Yang: Okay... glad I'm not the only one... Ahem! Hi! My name is, Yang Xiao Long, and I'm not really a lesbian, I always thought I was more of a bisexual. I always thought, woman, and men were attractive. And, when I came here to, Beacon the lesbian drive kicked into overdrive! I mean come on! There are so many hot woman here!

Coco: It's a buffet here!

Yang: And, my teammate is, Blake Belladonna! How many people didn't get a aroused , and want to smash that phat ass!

Ilia: Preach sister!

Yang: But then, Jaune Arc came around, and started acting like a big brother figure to my little sister! He looked after her, he comforted her when she was sad, he made her cookies! That was my job! But, all of a sudden big bro came in and stole my job! And, that's were all hell let loose!

Yang: So, I confronted him one day to leave her alone, to stop being her 'big brother,' that it was my job to do those things, because I am her big sister. But, he told me not to worry, since I was her big sister, and i would always be her big sister. So, he told me not to worry 'little sister.' He calmed me, 'little sister' rubbed the top of my head, and left. And, I swear to gods... I came when he patted my head!

Coco: Seriously?!

Terra: I'd buy that.

Yang: I don't like people touching my hair, but he just patted once, and he sent me so over the edge that, that's what happened?! I want, no need him to do it again!

Yang: I want my big brother to hold me in his arms, to comfort me when I'm sad, to run his fingers through my hair to calm me. And, above all I want him to spank my ass as he calls me his bitch, while I scream big bro as he takes me from behind! I used to imagine doing that to, Blake, and her phat ass! Now, I want, Jaune to be doing that to me!

Coco: (Whistles~!) You got it bad girl.

Terra: Really bad... Now tell us how you want him to do this, I need to know.

Yang: You're turn, Emerald.

Emerald: Okay... My name is Emerald Sustari. I am a lesbian, least I was... honestly I think I'm not that much of a lesbian, I was interested in my team leader. Her name is, Cinder Fall. She took me in, when no one else would, so I kinda fell for her from an emotional stand point. But, Cinder never saw me from that angle... she's more focused on how she can use me for her own gains. This often made me cry, that she didn't care about me... Then one day, Jaune found me when I was crying, and we just started talking. He became a shoulder I could cry on, someone I could go to for support, or just someone I could be around when I needed something.

Emerald: Then... then his mother came by, and he introduced me to her... And, I understood why, Jaune was such a nice, and caring person. And, I asked, Jaune's mom. Juniper if she would adopt me, so I could finally have the mother figure I always wanted.

Yang: What did she say?

Emerald: She said no.

Terra: What?! But, Juniper is such a lovely woman, why did she say no?

Emerald: Because she knows how much I love, Jaune, and that if I married him she would still become my mom. So, I get the best of both worlds. A mom, and the man I love...

Terra: Oh...

Yang: Now that's a good deal right there...

Coco: Alright... now that everyone has been introduced, we shall now begin the first meeting with the, LAJA. Does anyone have an items they wish to bring to the table.

Ilia: Yeah, I have one... We're calling ourselves the, Lesbians Against, Jaune Arc. But, how are we against, Jaune? I mean... we all want to sleep with the guy... that doesn't sound so 'against' now does it?

Coco: Uhh... cause I thought everyone would be upset, Jaune turned us straight. So, we would be against him, because of that.

Ilia: That makes sense, but in reality... we want to fuck him...

Yang: Yeah, we all want to sleep with the guy to one degree, or the other.

Terra: So how are we against the guy?

Coco: It sounded nice...?

Emerald: I vote we rename ourselves to the, Lesbians Attracted to, Jaune Arc! Where are new mandate is to help each other sleep with, Jaune to some degree. All those in favour say aye.

Ilia: Aye!

Yang: Hell to the aye!

Terra: Aye~!

Coco: Aye!

Coco: Okay, in that case I welcome you to the first meeting of the, LAJA. Lesbians Attracted to, Jaune Arc. First order of business: Who gets to fuck, Jaune first.

Yang: I move, Terra goes last, she's already slept with him, and had his child.

Terra: What?!

Ilia: I agree.

Emerald: Agree.

Coco: The ayes have it; Terra only gets to sleep with, Jaune after the rest of us do.

Terra: ...

Terra: Okay, that's fair...

[chelseamustdiee]

rant about Dae-ho (player 388) because I can't sleep and I love him so much + pic of him & tiger :)

Summary

Dae-ho is literally one of the best characters in Squid Game season 2. I don't make the rules, sorry (yes I do). He is considered a background character, but that does not mean he isn't important. He is a lovable character and deserves no hate!

His portrayal of ptsd

As someone who deals with ptsd and has triggers from certain things, the way Kang Ha-neul portrays Dae-ho struggling with his ptsd from when he was a marine was amazing. it was a great representation of ptsd to me personally and made me feel seen.

VIP theory

The VIP theory is basically (from what I've seen) is that he's actually a VIP and people's reasoning for this is the way he went and hid and didn't know how to use the gun... which is stupid because it's obvious why he acted that way, marines tend to have severe ptsd and I think anyone would've acted that way if they have been through the same thing he was its common sense and there's also people questioning "why he would get the marine tattoo then?" I really don't think he would go out of his way to get a tattoo saying he was a marine if he wasn't, but that's just me.

this is so autistic of me but I'm running off a monster and barely any sleep so idc! If you like Dae-ho MOOT ME NOW!

he's literally me! (credit : @ .sandykit on tiktok)

[utilitycaster]

i keep seeing people say that OF COURSE Bell Hell's haven't grown or changed, it's only been 3 months in campaign! and it's been nonstop! and every time I see that, I gotta admit 1. okay so you admit they haven't grown, cool. 2. that feels like a watsonian answer to a not-quite-watsonian complaint. iirc, m9 were only a few months longer than BH by the time their campaign ended, and it's been pretty comparable irl time. Both bell's bells and m9 had significantly less 'in world' time than vm and the m9 grew and changed plenty.

Because there's a discrepancy between 'time in game' and 'time at the table' for actual play, using 'in game' time as an excuse for...anything, feels thin. Because it still FEELS like three years both to us and the players! Does that make any sense or am i losing my mind? cause every time i see answers like that I feel a little crazy for feeling like it's almost entirely unrelated to complaint they're trying to address

No, it makes complete sense. I discussed this here as well but on some level it's like ok so they haven't changed! Turns out they suck, and the fact that they haven't changed means we have a party that still sucks. Like, if your point is "I don't like this character trait", someone saying "well it makes sense for them to have it" doesn't fix the core problem of you not liking it. This is a repeated problem in discussions in this campaign. I think Liliana dying would have been narratively interesting; I literally give zero fucks whether it's deserved, because she isn't real and I'm not a believer in Calvinism nor instant karma in real life and plenty of people die for unfair reasons and I happen to really enjoy exploring that and how people respond to it in fiction. You can't have a conversation with someone who, when you say "I'm not a big fan of vanilla ice cream, do you have chocolate?" says "but vanilla is literally a complex flavor made from orchids?" (Also yes, the Mighty Nein are a great example of a party who were already more closely bonded about a month and a half in, following Molly's death; the entire campaign was almost a year long though a bit shorter in terms of time together due to Happy Fun Ball time dilation. For reference, Bells Hells have been together 4 months and 5 days, and the Mighty Nein, at that exact same amount of time, were exploring the second Uk'otoa temple, and a number of them were already rethinking their whole deal at that point.)

I don't currently have any original posts to make re: criticism of Campaign 3 until next episode, most likely - I'm reblogging well-made posts I see, and obviously I'm answering asks, but I said this more briefly in the tags of another post earlier and I'd like to elaborate, but this has been a problem for me, at least, the entire campaign:

Campaign 3 has a small but loud contingent of fans who are utterly incapable of tolerating the idea that other people hold different opinions than they do and post them on their own blogs (often even not in the main tag). They respond to this with abuse and harassment; with a constant switching of direction to the point of self-contradiction; and with doubling and tripling down on statements I personally find to be bigoted. They are, in my opinion, small-minded, unintelligent, self-absorbed people who are so locked into, as I said here, an Us vs. Them mentality that so long as there is anyone who doesn't like them they will never be happy. They have gotten, narratively, almost everything they wanted thus far, but they'll never be happy so long as someone openly disagrees with them. Like, if the fact that your ship is the most popular one for this campaign on ao3 is so important to you, why are you so pressed about a few people disliking it? If liking Campaign 3 means you're a good anticolonial leftist and you're therefore allowed as a white person to mock the experiences of any nonwhite person actively dealing with the consequences of colonialism why do you need the support of The Bad People Who Don't Like It? If you can be broken by anything less than universal adoration, then, well. Break, bitch.

Essentially, think "the personality of Elon Musk in a broke 20-something whose main interests are cartoons aimed at a grade school audience, and a three sentence incorrect summary of Marxist theory that they use to justify whatever they already wanted to do," and you'll get the picture.

My advice therefore is that it's not really worth arguing, and frankly, there would be little to no discourse if they weren't so pathetically insecure that a post saying "The structure, pacing, and message of Campaign 3 are all weak and inconsistent, and Bells Hells have so little motivation they fail to be heroes, villains, nor antiheroes" sends them into an extended tantrum because the OP didn't append the words "I think" or "I feel" at the beginning of every statement, as most of us assume any reasonable adult would understand that a person posting on their own blog is posting their own opinions. (And, frankly, appending those words doesn't really help half the time because most of them are ultimately mostly outraged that someone would dare think or feel things that they don't.)

I am making posts about my thoughts on Campaign 3; I think most other people with criticism thereof are doing so as well. I will only be convinced otherwise by Campaign 3 itself being better, and I think it's probably too late for it to do so, and I will not be swayed nor intimidated by people who, see previous paragraphs re: my thoughts. My advice to you and anyone who's saying "wait a second" is to trust your gut; everything you said here seems like a pretty good assessment. If it helps, back away from the fandom and see what you feel without the influence of others (including me!) posting, and go with that.

[empressgeekt]

Transformers - TFO/Earthspark Time Travel fic summery - An Aged Reflection au (part 1...maybe)

Okay, so the recent movie (GO WATCH IT!) Transformers One, had reignited my hyper fixation for this franchise and as such I come barring a plot summery for a fic prompt. If anyone wants to use this plot in a fic, please just link me so i can read it!

Once more I'm assuming people have seen the movie and at least the first season of the EarthSpark cartoon.

On to the plot!

We start in the past. After getting thrown from the transport train, Orion, Dee, Elita and Bee, are stuck on cybertron's surface, and while a very beautiful place, it is also filled with unknown things, not all of them safe...though it doesn't stop Orion from being curious. What little vegetation the rust wastes have, is fascinating to him and it's only Dee holding him back from him faceplanting into his first patch of grass to "See what it feels like". There are abandoned buildings and some part of Orion wonders what they mean, likely there were some bots who lived on the surface long ago before the quintessions, and he wants to know what their lives were like. To live in a world underneath the sun, with stars to sing them to sleep.

Dee is the only one who actually entertains Orion's questions. Elita is too focused on her map, and Bee is rambling too much to pay attention to anyone else talking. And Dee has to admit, it does make him wonder too. Sure the surface is clearly dangerous, especially to some bots who don't have any survival instincts, but seeing all that was left behind before they were forced underground, there is a sense of loss. What would've been life if the Quintessions never invaded? It likely wouldn't have effect him being a no-cog, but would there be cities up here? The Primes would still be around, maybe they would've expanded globally. Some part of him imagines living a city built by Megatronus. It would've been grand, no question. Looking out on the horizon of his home planet, he hopes to come back here once it's all over. Maybe with the Matrix returned, Sentinel would start construction on a city on the surface. Maybe Dee could visit. He would like to see the sun rise again in his life.

However, Dee would later regret Orion influencing him with curiosity As half way through the journey, the ever shifting surface of Cybertron opens a fissure a head of them, and they can't cross until the landscape changes again. Deciding to camp out and try again in the morning. During the night a weird light comes from the fissure and long story short they all get sucked in...and blackout...

Orion wakes up in a pool of water, though he doesn't recognize the liquid. He's in an underground cave but the walls aren't made of the metallic stone he's used too, they are too soft and crumbly. The others are knocked out around him, but quickly come too. Thankfully the cave isn't too deep and they make there way back to a surface...but it's not the surface of Cybertron. The ground is too soft, the sky is blue, and the world is covered in "weird nature". First theory, the fissure transferred them to a new biome on Cybertron's surface, however that is quickly disproven when their map glitches out saying their location is not found. Much everyone's but Bee's frustration. Orion tries to keep the spirits up, saying they'll find help. If this is another planet they could be the first to make contact with aliens, to which Elita responds, "Oh great aliens, you mean like when the quintessions found us?"

His efforts are unappreciated...Especially when they were sudden surrounded by Arachnamechs.

All this is going down late season one of Earthspark, so Mandroid has already joined up with Croft, and once four unknown energon signatures showed up on their surveillance systems, they would be going after our no-cog crew. Especially since they don't read as a Con or a Bot.

Our youngling group have no weapons to defend themselves with, Miners weren't allowed to have any and they didn't have any built in, so they try to run. Dee making sure that the others have shielding from the laser fire, however the GHOST troops mistake him for a decepticon due to his Megatronus decal. So, they end up focusing most of their assault on him, eventually nailing with a T-cog disrupter. However, due to his lack of cog, the only thing the device can do is paralyze him. Which freaks Dee the frag out, like he already can't transform, moving is really the only control of his body that he has. These aliens are tiny, but they already have an effective way of taking them down. He sends one last comm to the others, to run, and find the matrix, the planet needs it more then him...even if he's scared out of his mind.

It takes a lot for Elita and Bee to pull Orion away from the sense but they can't help Dee if they captured too. They need to regroup, get more information.

Let's switch gears. Megatron had been sticking around the Malto home for the past day or two. Robby is supposedly cured from what ever was making him ill, but the big mech wants to stay close by just to be sure. He hadn't been able to be around while his Nephew was ill due to Croft sending him out on a useless assignment, but the moment it was over he demanded the time off he was in fact entitled too (all Ghost employees got two weeks of vacation a year). The only reason that the agents who did his release papers didn't die of fright was that he was more concerned for the children, and he was more pissed off at someone else. Quintus Prime. Fancy title or not, dead or not, Primus above you don't mess with his niblings. And as far as Megatron understood it, it was Quintus' cyber-sleeve that was making his nephew ill. Now he was grateful that the aliment was treated quickly, but it shouldn't have happened in the first place. Robby was a child, and didn't deserve what happened.

Though, maybe his frustrations with the whole situation came from his own personal experiences with Primes. Sentinel's betrayal against his people is something Megatron had never been able to forget, and the cyber-sleeve is sort of the same non-consensual body alternation that Sentinel pulled so long ago with the mining class's T-cogs. Don't get him wrong, Megatron cared about his niblings, all seven of them, but the other's lives shouldn't cost one of their siblings'. It's a good thing the little ones have him distracted with a game of dodge ball, otherwise he'd be researching how to hunt ghosts, despite him not believing in them.

Twitch gets him out and he's forced to sit on the sidelines with Dorothy. The human gripes about her signature scanner acting up again, and Megatron takes interest. Apparently for the last couple hour a few un-identifiable signals, popped up and three of them hadn't gone away. Seeing as the children were still far from done with their game, He decides to give the location a fly by before the next round started up. He doesn't notice Twitch sneaking off to follow him.

Meanwhile, with D-16, he's kept paralyzed during the transport and is eventually taken down to the brig. Which doesn't not make him feel better. Every decepticon inside of there is staring at him, and it makes him feel much smaller then he really is. The bots in the cells had cogs, weapons. They were taken down by what ever these aliens were, no wonder he didn't stand a chance. What were these little things, hopefully they couldn't get off world, if they invaded cybertron...Dee is uncermoniously thrown into a cell, where he curls up in the corner, trying vary hard not to be noticed.

Croft does however. The bitter human woman, when informed of the weird reaction that Dee had to the T-cog disrupter, is paranoid that the cons are finding a way to hack into their defense systems/weaponry. So, she clues Mandroid in on the new...specimen. She wants to know what makes this little con tick.

Soundwave, keeps his eye on the little new comer, for two reasons. One, no one had seen any cogless bots since before the fall of sentinel prime, and two, merely the age of this con. He's young far too young to be in a place like this. No way this little one committed any war crimes yet. And judging by the pity filled glances shared between him and his fellow decepticon's he's not the only one to notice. Heck, this kid wasn't even using a translation program, still speaking Iaconian and looking very confused whenever the humans spoke in English. Perhaps the little one was a recently activated protoform that was saved when they left Cybertron? Soundwave doesn't know and he doesn't get a chance to ask. The little con is paralyzed again and is taken to the room, where bots are broken.

The remaining miners are still wandering around aimlessly. Bee is now rendered silent after Dee was kidnapped. Elita is still trying to get the map to work, while Orion is just trying not to have a break down. He wanted to help his planet, not get his best friend abducted by aliens. They had stumbled onto what looked by a settlement, but even Orion's curiosity about these creatures was overridden by fear of getting captured. Clearly they weren't friendly. So needless to say when the Arachnamechs, track them down again. They run, and Orion tries to draw the attention of the drones away from Bee and Elita, and accidentally jumps off of a cliff. In the middle of his screaming as he watches the ground ever quickly rushing to meet him. and un-known voice calls out "grab on!" A rusty red colored drone flies over head and he latches on with all his might.

Twitch might have gotten lost, when she chased after he uncle, but in her defense his alt-mode was much fasters then hers, besides she wasn't really lost, mom had taught her all about navigating the woods. However, the weird bot that just leaped off of the water fall cliff, clearly didn't have the same training. Twitch immediately turns back and catches him, shooting the Arachnamechs with her emp, and then landing on the far river bank. It's only after she transforms that she realizes this guy is just a little bit taller than her and that's kind of surprising, after all, she's tiny compared to other transformers. Though his size is probably the only reason she could carry him.

She's not the only one surprised by the size similarities, Orion is as well. No bot with a cog was ever this small, or at least he hadn't seen one. Twitch as she introduces herself, is wonderful in his understanding, most cogged bots would've let him fall and Orion knows this, however she saved him and helped calm his panic ranting when he realized that only some of the Arachnamechs followed him when he broke off from the group. Twitch listens and is horrified to learn that Dee was kidnapped and offers to help, saying they need to find her "uncle" (whatever that word meant), and transforming to take off. Orion is baffled by her confusion over the fact that he's cogless. When he gestures to the empty slot in his chestplating, he wasn't expecting the heartbroken look on her faceplate, but thankfully Twitch doesn't dwell on it, and instead leads Orion through the forest on foot.

While running in the direction of where he, Eltia and Bee split off from each other, Orion just can't help but ask a number of questions on his mind. Like Where they were? How did a cybertronian get here? What were those little drone things

"Oh wow, lot's of questions. Okay first off, we're on earth, and I didn't get here I was born here. I guess you like call me a sub-species of cybertronian, created by Quintus prime."

"Quintus Prime? But he's been dead for cycles."

"Yeah I know, he once sent off little emberstones, to planets far out of reach to make new life on them, me and my family are the result of one of those stones."

"Oh, so, you're earthians???"

"*giggle* We call ourselves Terrons, thank very much."

Orion is fascinated to learn that Quintus had tried to make colony worlds before his demise, maybe it had been a last ditch effort to escape the quintessions, or some way to make new recruits for the high guard in secret. Either way it didn't matter, clearly Twitch or her "family" (what did that word mean?) hadn't been in contact with cybertron for a long time, likely meaning what ever Quintus was planning failed to happen. Still, this meant Orion could actually get help with a home team advantage, and Twitch did say she's help get Dee get back. Twitch had already proven she understood the weird planet around them when she pointed out that she was tracking Elita and Bee by following the footprints in the soft ground and broken nature surrounding them, two factors that Orion had completely missed. He'd have to meet this "Mom" to see if she'd teach him how to read an organic world like that.

Meanwhile with Megatron, tracking the signals had been easier then he thought, whoever these saps were they were not good at covering their tracks. When the signals split up he decided to go after the bigger group. One bot was easier to pin down then two. Besides one of them was screaming very loudly, and it was for a good reason as Megatron would soon find out. Two very small figures, one pink one yellow, were dashing away from a sizable snare of Arachnamechs. Later he could let himself ponder as to how Mandroid survived, and why he was still going after transformers, but first he needed to keep these little ones out of the madman's hands. He calls out for the bots to take cover as he swoops in to make quick word of the drones.

Elita wasn't expecting for a giant warframe to come flying out of nowhere, but she wasn't about to disobey someone of higher stature when they were helping them. She didn't recognize the grey mech, though Bee's quiet panic rambling through out the chase gave a couple of theories, a surviving member of the high guard, maybe one of the mechs sentinel trained, or maybe a rogue gladiator who decided to say frag it and go find real monsters to fight for the pit of it. By watching him fight it was clear that he was at least trained in combat. Then Bee mutters something that sends chills down Elita's nerve struts, "He's wearing the same sigil as the guys who took Dee!" Elita, in probably the most stupid thing she could do (she blames pax's influence), punches the unknown mech when he gets close.

Megatron was not upset at the pink bot for hitting him as soon as he turned, some bots just had lasting battle reflexes and would lash out against a stranger...or more likely a perceived enemy...it was actually a really good hit too. They wont come of the large rock they too cover behind, and the yellow one won't stop screaming, but eventually Megatron gets a good look at who he's dealing with and is suddenly struct with flashback galore. The first thing he notices is their cogless status and parts of him burn with rightous anger and need to protect them. Then he notices their faceplates, faceplates from a time before, a Bumblebee who was still slightly crazy from long term isloation, and an Elita who was young and brash before Optimus softened her drive for success with his love and dorkyness. Denial sets in rather then acceptance, no way was this happening now, then Megatron hears the voice of his young niece and with her is someone who makes it very clear THIS IS NOT A DREAM!!!

Orion was initally very concerned when he heard the sound of blasters in the woods, but Twitch recongized the sound, as her "uncle"s gun, so he tried not to panic. They end up catching the tail end of the scrummage, and wow, this Terron, as he was lead to believe, was huge! Big, silver, covered in weapons, and with red optics that burned with the fire of a great warrior. It was both awe inspiring and terrifiing to watch, sure Orion had seen violance in the mines, Darkwing was not a peaceful person, but it was nothing like this. Twitch wasn't shocked, clearly used to this, if Terrons had to deal with whatever those little creatures that took Dee were, maybe Terrons had to fight to stay alive. Twitch only added more to Orion's wondering when a lone Arachnamech leaped out of the trees, after the fight was seemingly over, and shot it point blank, ("Uncle Megatron! Look out!" "Well, done Little Bird").

Megatron never thought he would see Orion Pax again. Yes, he saw Optimus on the daily, has for centuries but Optimus wasn't Pax. When Orion was given the matrix, when he shot Orion, some part of Megatron was convinced his friend was dead, gone with the allspark. That he had killed his brother...his grief and guilt coming out as unchecked rage...when Optimus ascended, Megatron rejected him, this wasn't his brother, this was a monster, the Primes were using his brother's corpse to hold power over all bots like him, puppetting him around with that matrix they held so dearly. When he had swore to kill Optimus all those stellar cycles ago, it wasn't for revenge, it was to put his brother to rest peacefully. It had taken a long time, bad blood, and many mistakes for Megatron to see the Pax in Prime again. Yet, here standing in front of him is a perfect re-creation of Orion Pax. However, Twitch pulls him out of his trance by rambling, about everything that happened to her and orion, and hearing that his niece met the young version of his brother after he fell from a cliff, only convinces him that this is a case of time travel.

Orion tries to ignore the look the bigger terron gave him in favor of talking to Elita and Bee, he starts rambling about how this planet also had transformers and everything else Twitch told him, however his excitement is dampered when Elita pointed out Bee observation about the big terron's sigil. He doesn't' want to believe it, looking at the mech, and how he is so gentle with Twitch getting down to her level and paying close attention to her flurry of words, but at the same time, he was still such a fearsome warrior,. Orion really wants to the trust Twitch, after all she had no reason to lie to him, and she did save him from the fall. So, Despite Bee and Elita 's hesitanece, when the big silver mech turns to them.

The mech introduces himself as Megatron (big fan of Megatrounus, obviously, Dee would like him) and seems to be questioning Orion about everything that he had told Twitch, the younger cybertronian was a bout to ask why, when this jem of a line left Megatron's mouth, "Of course, you are from right before everything went to the slag, Dang it, Pax I just had to forget your horrible timing."

Orion never told this mech his name, nor did twitch, which prompted the young terron to ask if her uncle knew Orion.

"I'd recognize the mech i woke up to every morning for the first cycles of my life."

"Dee...?"

"It's good to see you Pax."

Megatron is almost surprised that he can still read every single emotion, that rapidly washes over Orion. Denial, disbelief, and everything else. Thankfully though it only took Megatron mentioning the incident where Orion tired to transform with out a cog, for the group to believe him. Though he could've done without little bee sobbing and clinging to his leg, saying "What did those monsters do to you!" Which led to an explanation about how he was not their kidnapped friend, but rather who D-16 would become in the future. There's a lot of very fast questions from all the younger bots and eventually Megs has to tell them to go one at a time, And that he'll answer their question as they walk, because he needs to get them all out of the open and back to the Malto farm to keep them safe.

And boy do they ask questions..."How long has it been for you?" "Couple million cycles." "Why are you wearing that sigil." "to stay our of trouble." "You changed your name?" "D-16 doesn't really count as a name on earth." "What's an uncle?" "Earth functions differently socially then on Cybertron, the youth are given to older members of society to be cared for and taught, rather then being put to work right after the well. I am not one of Twitch's main caregivers, her "mom" and "Dad", however i am close to one of them, making me a secondary role model for her, an "uncle"." "How'd you end up on earth?" "A very long story." "How'd you get a cog?" "A very VERY long story."

Twitch is a little baffled through out the ride home like, it's weird enough to meet the younger version of the older bots in her life, but they are all so different then their older selves. Orion is so much more energetic and reckless then Mr. Optimus (Uncle Megatron had to talk him down from storming the Ghost headquarters at least twice in the same conversation), B-127 is constantly chattering and Twitch feels so bad he doesn't have an actual name either (she tells him he changes it, and he asks if it's "badassatron", which makes bother her and Megatron laugh), and young Miss Elita is such a stickler for rules!

Bumblebee is the one who first sees them at the the farm, seeing Megatron first ....

Megs: Bumblebee! Do you recall how we met?! before all the slag his the fan?!

Bumblebee: Do you mean back in sub-levels? Yeah why?

Megs: Do you ever remember taking an unplanned visit to the future after we reached the surface?!

Bumblebee: What?!

-----

I'll do a part two if people want to see it

[romike]

I know I'm late to this but for everyone who saw that the "three waterfalls" transliteration might be accurate, it's probably not

The reason people have said this is because we got an extended video of the scene and it, notably, does not use any specific language that could throw off ai lipreaders. So an ai lipreader was able to catch a seemingly accurate lipread of it in the beginning(and im inclined to believe this part because i saw the same thing without any ai lipreader)

But there's an important switch after the very beginning where mike starts to move his head around more while speaking, they transfer to a more situational conversation, and presumably start using more specific language like names or supernatural terms that the ai model likely doesn't have in its vocabulary

It should also be noted that the published transliterations were also proofread by people before being posted and aren't raw material. I put the scene through an ai lipreader to see what it came up with and was heavily comprised of filler words, repetitions, and lookalikes. The "accurate" parts have dialogue that's easier to parse for both humans and the lipreaders people have used. Anything that's too complex for a human to interpret isn't going to be aided much by the ai and the people filtering, especially because I don't think most have much experience lipreading, probably won't be able to see the small distinctions in the words the ai reads

I'm also not too keen on the "three waterfalls" interpretation because at that point it starts contrasting with the characters' body language, and establishes very awkward sentence structures. Not a single person i know would say "improve your motivation" unless they're attempting to badly translate from their native language, and 3 waterfalls is a weird defining trait to use to describe your imaginary local village. Especially as a DM

Not to mention their lips just don't look to me like theyre moving in ways that coincide with the captions(as someone who uses lipreading as a crutch in my day-to-day life). But even if they did, many phrases look like many other phrases and without more context, they could be having a completely different conversation. Lipreading is never fully accurate, and unless I'm hearing roughly 70% of the dialogue, i can barely filter out the words correctly

The general ideas seem perfectly reasonable to me, though. Definitely something they'd have a conversation about, I'm just not sure how much the specifics fit into it

I could try again to read the video lol but when i tried with the first clip that came out in jan 2024, it was too blurry and lacked too much context for me to make any sense of it. If anyone wants it tho I definitely can try again

[bg3loredump]

Purge: a funny bit that turned into a legit tragedy

This is my Durge. Her name is Purge. She's based on the character Pearl from the movie Pearl. She's a barbarian, embrace durge, chaotic evil. This character honestly started out as a bit, but as I found out during her playthrough, the parallels between the stories of Pearl and the Dark Urge are very real and the resulting story was more tragic than I ever could have expected. So lemme break it all down.

I only knew snippets of the Dark Urge story when I thought of Purge as a concept - I really only knew that they were a Bhaalspawn and had seen their introduction monologue. The vibes of that monologue strongly reminded me of the movie Pearl; a killer who really doesn't want to be a killer, but something inside of them calls them to it against their will. Thus, the idea for Purge was born.

Lemme quickly sum up the movie for context: Pearl is an isolated farm girl that dreams of escaping her family's farm and dancing in the movies. She wants to be loved and adored by the masses like the "pretty girls in the pictures." Unfortunately, she's very obviously not OK in the head; she starts by killing small animals when she thinks no one is looking, and the more desperate she becomes to escape the farm and live out her dreams, the more she kills - and in her own words, the more "meaningful" her murders become. There's a FANTASTIC, chilling, extremely tense scene where her mother confronts her about "the things she does when she thinks no one is looking," basically doubling down on Pearl's deep dark fear that there is just something innately wrong with her and she'll never be adored in the way that she so desperately desires. And after she isn't selected at a dance audition that she sees as the one shot at her dreams, she crumbles and resigns herself to "making the best of what she has," which she expresses to her sister-in-law right before murdering her with an axe. There's a LOT more I could say about this movie but will hold back. I highly recommend watching it if you haven't already, it's truly a brilliant piece of art.

So, I bring up those scenes with the mom and the sister-in-law because they parallel the "nature vs. nurture" themes that are so prevalent in the Dark Urge's story; does this character - who was literally created for the sole purpose of being a murderer and being really, really good at it - resist and rise above what they were created to be? Or do they embrace the urge, resigning themselves to the purpose Bhaal intended for them? It's established pretty early on in the game that killing feels GREAT for Durge, so one could argue that embracing the urge is the "path of least resistance." But their introduction monologue and lines like "Was I sweet once?" make it clear that Durge does have a conscience and understands morality! And that's what makes the choice of embracing vs. resisting the urge a genuine conflict! 

So, with all that said, let's talk about Purge. For the first half of the game, she was a resist Durge. She wakes up only knowing two things about herself; that she's tortured by murderous impulses, and that she desperately wants to be loved. Everyone wants to be loved, but I mean she would do anything, for any reason, to be loved by anyone. Unfortunately, she's also prone to uncontrollable acts of murder and fits of rage which aren't exactly well-received by everyone. She kills a squirrel out of nowhere right in front of all her friends! That's not a good look! So the urges, even though they feel great to embrace (like she's "letting loose," if you will), are ultimately a source of great shame for her.

Given the context for this playthrough, I think the Alfira incident serendipitously works really well into Purge's story. Alfira is the epitome of what Purge wants to be, a beautiful and kind-hearted bard (SHE'S A STARRR!!!). So even though the in-game canon is that Durge kills Alfira unconsciously, it makes sense for Purge that her urges would subconsciously pick Alfira is a target. It sets up that Purge sees other people getting what she wants as her competition, and will literally kill to "win"... foreshadowing her eventual rivalry with Orin. Oh look, another parallel to the movie! Killing a sister figure! Who happens to be blonde! Wow!!!

I also went into the game knowing with absolute certainty that Purge would be romancing Wyll. First of all, he likes to dance. So does Pearl. Self-explanatory. But also, the parallels between Wyll and Pearl's husband Howard from the movie are UNCANNY. Both characters come from a well-off, high-status, comfortable background. Both have hearts of gold and make decisions that lead to them leaving their comfortable lives behind for what they think is the greater good. And both are incredibly forgiving of their batshit insane partners, willing to stick with them and make things work despite their many, MANY dangerous red flags (for context: Pearl is a prequel to a movie called X, in which Howard and Pearl are STILL TOGETHER 60 years later even though Howard KNOWS all that Pearl has done). Meanwhile, both Pearl and Purge are attracted to their partners because their comfortable, high status backgrounds promise the validation and lifestyle that they so desperately crave. Pearl and Purge also both know that their partners are objectively better people than them, and are grateful for their love despite feeling like they don't deserve it deep down. 

Despite all these parallels, I came up against one major contradiction when playing as a Pearl-inspired character in a Dnd world - the concept of killing, in a vacuum, isn't nearly as frowned upon in the Forgotten Realms as it is in 1910's America 😆. As a player,  I was not at all expecting the companions to be so forgiving and understanding when it comes to Durge. This makes me think that maybe in another life, Purge actually could have been a fully resist Durge because the acceptance and patience of Wyll and her companions would be enough to fulfill and heal her desperation for love. Sadly, this is not the way things went; it broke down completely the moment she learned that she was the child of Bhaal. After all, what could be more satisfying validation than having the blessing and approval of a literal god? As Bhaal's chosen, she would finally be the "star" she always dreamed of being! Furthermore, she could comfortably stop fighting the urges that caused her so much internal conflict, embracing who she was created to be; in her eyes, she would be "making the best of what she has," or rather, what she is. From there, Purge's fate was tragically sealed.

So obviously by Act 3 she has fully embraced the dark urge; she becomes an unholy assassin, kills Orin, becomes Bhaal's chosen, all much to the chagrin of Wyll (but he still proposes to her anyway 🤦‍♀️). Cut to the end; she betrays Orpheus and takes the Crown of Karsus in the name of Bhaal. Her first murder in her father's name is Wyll, who's final words are "I forgive you," because of course they are. Too forgiving for his own good, right up to the very end 😭.

The game ends with a vision of the future from Bhaal himself of Purge alone, the last being alive, surrounded by piles of bodies as far as the eye can see. The final line from the narrator in this scene shook me to my core:  "Then, and only then, father will be proud." Thus, the tragedy of Purge is this; she only wanted to be loved, and she was. She was loved by her companions, who expressed their faith in her on multiple occasions, encouraging her to rise above what she was made for and fight the urges. She was loved by Wyll, who wanted to share his life with her despite all she had done, and forgave her even when she had done the unforgivable. But instead she chased the love of her father, the glory and validation of being a god's chosen, killing all the people who already loved her in the process. Only to find out that Bhaal still won't extend the love she was chasing until all life is eradicated... presumably including her own.

(Thank you so much for reading! I appreciate you! 💜)

[strawberryeuphie]

this this this!! i hope you don't mind me responding, i just wanted to add to it because this is so true and real.

so many people love to say "life is hard, you need to grow up and be a productive adult" when it comes to these things, as if maintaining an interest in cartoons, disney, plush animals, coloring, and other "child things" is somehow incongruent with productivity across the board.

for me, my age regression has done wonders for my productivity as an adult. age regression is extremely therapeutic for me, and was involuntary for a long time while i was in crisis with my mental health disorder. once i harnessed it — beginning to actually cultivate my safe regression space and utilize it effectively — i discovered that the times when i had to go out and fulfill adult responsibilities like going to school, working, errands, etc. i was way more confident, relaxed, and focused. i'm so much further along in my life now than i ever expected. i'm successful in my career, live on my own, pay my own bills... these are all accomplishments that, for a long time, it seemed like i'd be unable to achieve because i was having so much trouble coping.

everyone needs an outlet to comfort themselves and relax. what's the point in being miserable? life is stressful, even for neurotypical people! but for neurodivergent people, this is especially true and many of us feel it profoundly, so anything that helps us get by everyday is a blessing. no one should be shamed, especially since "child-like" things are still part of humanity at the end of the day. imagination, laughter, peace… why are these things suddenly denied when someone becomes an adult? it's silly. misery isn't noble. it doesn't make you a better adult to suffer. i'm tired of this notion that adulthood cannot be a happy era of someone's life, and that all childhood imagination and wonder and softness must be abandoned to be an adult.

there are people who regress who are not "productive" in a capitalist and/or social sense, sure… but these people are usually facing barriers OTHER than age regression and child-like interests that are causing this, such as disability. age regression and child-like interests are things they use to cope with life difficulties.

tl;dr, age regression or an interest in disney or whatever does not inherently mean someone can't be mature and responsible when it's necessary. it's an insult to deny someone something that makes them happy when it isn't harming anyone else, and may actually be benefitting their mental health.

thanks for bringing this conversation up, undercoverbvnny!!! i always hated the cruelty towards and mocking of disney adults, even if they aren't regressors. i think people should really just mind their business when it's got nothing to do with them ;—; if the disney adult is shoving children out of their way in parks or causing a scene or something, that's a different issue. the fact that they are over the age of 18 and like disney isn't the issue.

Watching people hate Disney adults is how you know the people who hate regressors don’t hate us because they think it’s sexual. They just hate us and use that as an excuse. They’ll be more than honest about it if you ask them how they feel about adults that like Disney. Which coincidentally also happen to usually be people healing from trauma…

The reality is that people just hate seeing people healing because they themselves can’t heal and they’re mad at the world for it.

“Mental health matters” until it’s anyone else’s mental health but their own.

[podcastwizard]

muffin for breakfast and sandwich for lunch. gotta appreciate a really classic day of eating.

[journey-to-the-attic]

Probs a random question, but IK moved to England when she was quite young, right? Does that mean she developed one of the many accents there, and if so, could you tell us which one?

ooh i haven't really thought about this before... it's definitely not one of the posh ones, that's all i can say--

let me think about this... the boring answer is just "received pronunciation" but the thing about rp is that no one ever has a pure standard english accent anyway. now, this is going to be high specific, but!

take received pronunciation as the base, then make it softly yorkshire - but with an irish inflection on certain words that she learned from her aunt lisa

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Vibes based grading system.

(for @epistemologys, who wanted some post-canon, teacher WWX)

[ancha-aus]

Yaaay!

It does make sense that Cross would ahve his old things.

He isn't an idiot so of course he wouldn't leave his things. but then just didn't get new things. Mostly becasue he still cares abotu his home and doens't want to be a bother about getting new stuff. poor guy :( I do love that ink tried to get him new things though!!

And dream jsut so used to losing people or better said sending people off on imposible suicide missions and being left with stuff.

and then he just tried to clean up soem thigns and ink found out.

Ink was FURIOUS! (and yes he is friends with them. but maybe he saw what happened to others. and maybe he still... kinda knew/though/felt that dream would do away with him as soon as he stopped being usefull. Cross wasn't like that. Cross stayed with him from the beginning. Cross is HIS friend. Truly his friend.)

also ink holdong out hope. Cross WILL return.

stop my heart is breaking at the nightmare part. and the part where the camp sees Nightmare for who he is. a scared kid that just wants to go home and is terrified his fmaily will be hurt. (eplipse watching this. knowing their had been a bad feeling about this all for a reason. and steps in to help the knights when the option arrises)

And Ink just giving in. because it menas going with cross. and that is what he wanted. to be with his bestie. (pictureing the meme of "As yes. just me and my boyfriend and his emotional support best friend." Lust honestly likes ink though. dude is a riot and cross is so thankful that lust is always okay with ink hanging out.)

okay but nihgtmare swining the sword to open the door and seconds later error rushing and running into nightmare is so funny. Cross so touched to see nightmare wear HIS things. Knowing it brings comfort. just so soft <3

I also like the idea. that later in the jailcell.

Nightmare nad cross walk in. and before anyone can say anything Ink is like. waving out a hand through the bars like "hi! Hi! Little guy! hi!"

nightmare: ... hi? Ink: Hey!! :D I wanted to say sorry about yelling before! everyone in shock. nightmare: ... what? ink nods: I thought dream was going to throw away cross things. He tried before even when he promised to keep it safe! I thought he was just giving you those things and breaking his promise again! I should ahve figured crossy would be fine wiht you having the things! you know. because he helped you and stayed by your side and all that! But i was still worried. but sorry i yellew at you! nightmare: ... oh... euh... your forgiven? ink: yaaaaay!! :D

Ink and his quiet companion!

I think that Cross (in this era) still uses the armor he ran off with. It's a little small on him, but it works for his and Ink's devices! He *also* still uses some of the clothes, namely his drapes (the things hanging off his belt) and he just ripped off the portion with Ritten's crest.

Ink, on the other hand, is a little menace. He wears a lot of earthy tones but also. Just like. SUPER bright and obvious pops of color. Also, fun new lore for him! Ink does that thing where he remembers his new kills by painting/tattooing himself. Not out of any weird sense of accomplishment tho. Just because in his early days he kept forgetting when he finished a job. His solution was to start tattooing his ribs, and when those got full he moved onto his arms and spine. At some point in the story his arms will be fully tattooed like his og design!

Last note: Notice the cloth on Ink's hip? Cross has the purple one that usually hangs there :] but his canon design is missing it. Cross's stuff (armor, scarf, coin-purse, *sword*, everything) is still at Dream's encampment. I think it's stored in Dream's cabin somewhere, because Ink didn't want to risk losing any of it, and they had to repurpose the tent Cross had stayed in. After Cross' betrayal Dream just shoves it on some unused shelf and leaves it. (Maybe when young teen Nightmare is kidnapped he finds the stuff (he recalls Cross' confession about working for Dream) and he takes comfort in having the items nearby/on-hand. Until, of course, Ink spots him with Cross' old scarf and gets angry. Because that's Cross'! No one is meant to wear that but him! And that causes tension between Dream and Ink. Maybe that's part of why Ink surrenders so quickly upon seeing Cross.)

[fiapple]

i'm getting towards the end of the skypeia arc, & i'd like to say just how much i adore the way the female strawhats have been treated.

just... every aspect of how the way their characters have been previously contextualized influences the story-line is treated with a masterful amount of consideration. we're given so many layers to both of them that enrich not only their characters specifically, but the arc, and the one piece world as a whole. without nami & robin having their specific skills, and their specific values, without those being built upon, the story would have come to a halt.

you could not have skypeia without nami & robin being who they are as individuals. not just because they never would've gotten there without nami, but also because the way these women think is itself foundational to the machinations of the arc as a whole.

to be totally upfront, if you think any other strawhats were more central to the skypeia arc than nami & robin were you are full-on fucking lying to yourself.

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

The fact that Aveline is nicer to Carver when he's dead than when he's alive is so... oh, I don't know, super goddamn annoying?

"I would've liked him" Aveline, you called him a tit in this exact conversation when I played as a mage just because he didn't want to openly talk about his Ostagar trauma with you in front of everyone, you blocked from a job in the guard, and you're so condescending to him all the time, like???

I don't doubt that Aveline cares about him when he's alive but maybe I wouldn't be so bitter about it if she treated him better.

[musical-chick-13]

I hate when something looks like it would be RIGHT up your alley and the cast is pretty stacked, but there's one person in said cast who is just. Genuinely a horrible human being.

[oozeandgoo-art]

had an odd dream that i was reading a comic book. sketched a couple of the pages i could remember.