#drifter Tamm

[holistichiatus]

drifter is a terrible influence

[andr0nap-wf]

misha is the type of person to break down crying when they discover that krubies are actually fluffy and soooo soft

[detaylor]

things my drifter does on her day off

cave exploring (still wants to know what is under that loin cloth)

climb incredibly tall buildings (tubular bells are for wimps)

people watch (hoping to catch a glance of luscinia) 

admire the local wildlife (get chased by tamms)

[theterribletenno]

Warframes even Ballas was ashamed of

Vote for your favorite [here]!

Max the Monster Truck Warframe: Half machine and half beast the creature whose name need only be "Max" lived as entertainment for the Orokin. Less than human, he shall have no civil and proper weapon, no sword nor shield shall he wield. Let his iron fists be his weapon, let him show where man, machine, and monster meet. Maximum strength, maximum fury, maximum execution was served in the arenas by the monster of steel, Max! Embody the spirit of bloodsport with the armored heathen, the gravedigger, the abominable gladiator Max! Max! Max! Max! Max! Monster and machine! Soldier and entertainer! Maximum carnage! Maximum brutality! Maximum dominance! Max! Max! Max! Max! Max!

Saluuknir the Telekinetic Warframe: A brilliant mind is a terrible thing to waste. Better to send those great minds to the warframe project than to rot in a cell or a penal colony. Such was the fate of many a fallen Archimedean, whose gifts for science run from their brilliant minds through their defiled veins, pulled out by the helminth seed and woven through every fiber of their being. The warframe Saluuknir is one such warframe, born from a great and terrible mind and blessed with dominion over the laws of physics themselves. He enters battle with an enormous object, a perfect cube of gleaming metal, and with the power of his mind throws it to and fro just as easily as he does his foes, reducing them to red paste with a mere flick of his wrist. Defy the laws of nature and make physics themselves your weapon as Saluuknir the master of telekinesis!

Ariel the Duviri Beastkeeper Warframe: The stories of Ariel are not written in any tome or tablet, only spoken word can tell her story. A heroine of the past, master of beasts. With every telling her story becomes more fantastic and incredible. Is it true? Did she command every beast of the land? Did her familiar truly shapeshift from bird to ram to hound at her whim? In the gestalt egregore lands of Duviri the stray thoughts of Ariel's story give her life, a warframe and her shape-changing animal companion for the Drifter to encounter. Discover the true power of the beasts of Duviri - the Paragrimm, the Tamm, the Kexat, and the Krubie - and awaken the power of their master Ariel. Make her real, Tenno, bring Ariel the beastkeeper of Duviri to life!

Tsurugi the Greatsword Master Warframe: The Tenno love for melee combat is more than abundantly documented, and so to suit the needs of the Tenno operators warframes were made specifically to suit their bloody needs. Tsurugi, the lady of the greatsword, was tailor-made for Tenno brutality, a master of the heaviest of melee weapons. Clash and smash with greatswords, hammers, and other super-heavy weapons to unlock Tsurugi's potential and discover a new equal to the venerated Excalibur. Tsurugi advances with reckless bloodlust and crashes into the battlefield like a falling star.

Shamir the Wyrm Queen Warframe: The ravening mistress Shamir is queen of the golden maws, summoning them at her feet and commanding them to crush her foes in fang and coil. Shame of the Orokin, Shamir was kept the most hushed of secrets but nothing made of ivory and gold could be hidden forever. Though she exists in the enmity of the empire that made her she is a necessary evil, queen of the corpse-eaters and muck-rakers, keeper of the horrid worms and tamer of their gnashing golden maws. In her true form Shamir ascends from worm to wyrm, limbless dragon of the empire's final fury. Take the legend of Shamir and rise from the dirt, Tenno, the queen of worms sits upon a throne of death.

[chronicler-of-narrative]

hi chronicler!! is operator chronicler friends with drusus at all? do they swap notes or compare stories? maybe drusus has even allowed "contributions from an esteemed colleague" in his leverian? :3

Hey, uh, sorry for taking so long (like a month or two?) to respond to this. I'll be completely honest I forgot about it. But regardless, here we are and I'll do my best to answer your ponderings.

So, for Operator Chronicler specifically, the answer would actually be No. This is for two major reasons. The first being that while Drusus focuses on tales from the System's past, The Chroniclers focus on the System and it's people in the present. Its less history and more archiving, saving what is so that those who will be can look back with a clear lens. The second reason is tied to the backstory of Operator Chronicler and, specifically, the idea that Drusus might actually recognize him. Now, the two never met before, but Drusus would know Operator Chronicler but a very, very different name, one almost scrubbed from history. Operator Chronicler doesn't want to be recognized, which is why he would probably just politely ignore Leverian's existence and do his own thing, writing about people and places young enough not to feel a sense of recognition upon seeing Operator Chronicler.

However, your ideas are not unfounded. For the "esteem colleague" in this case is definitely Drifter Chronicler. Being stuck in Duviri, drifternicler (as affectionately refered to by a mutual of mine) has not experienced the System quite as much as his younger counterpart. Being the curious goofball he is, he would definitely also enjoy poking at the past as well as the present, investigating details about any stories he may hear in passing just to sate his own wonder. And, indeed, this might lead him to the Leverian, where he could meet and make acquaintance with Drusus. Of course, he wouldn't have much to share about the System, what with being stuck in a magic fantasy void realm, but I feel like he would definitely help Drusus flesh out the stories from his library by, as I've mentioned before, investigating any strange details or lack thereof that catch his eye. This, combined with his extensive and plentiful history in Duviri, could actually end up creating a whole new area of the Leverian, one about the many misadventures of a certain Scholar in the 'definitely fictional' world of Duviri. After all, when you can claim you've beaten Kullervo by batting Tamms at him with your Sampotes, you've very much deserved it. (oh, and btw, the Tamm thing wasn't some challenge. It was just an experiment that popped into drifterniclers head one day)

Thank you for this ask, sorry again for taking so long, and hope you got the answers you seeketh.

Oh, and if you or anyone else has any questions about my blorbos, feel free to ask!

[novustrad]

I triggered a bug with Koral's mission, and now I have a tamm following me

It saw me but then I got attacked by dax so the tamm was standing still a ways away so I shot the orbs and healed it as normal

But there was no Koral or Drifter dialogue and no option to pet the tamm, so it didn't lead me to a chest

Don't know if it can follow me into the Undercroft but it teleported to me when I got too far from it

I love my new (temporary) buddy

Edit: My temporary buddy abandoned me at Archarbor ☹️

[nek-ros]

im so goddamn gay for my drifter ever since duviri came out and we get to hear the drifter talk more. especially when she helps animals and her voicelines "whos a good boy" im immediately googling how to become a tamm and when you're fighting the assassin on a horse and drifter fucking tackles them OUGH

ough i feel you so hard with the animal petting lines 🥴

running around duviri makes me wish there are drifter outfits that show more skin skfjsjdn

also seeing the horseback assassin makes me think drifter should be allowed to joust or melee while on horseback and i think that would look So Cool :3

[ivararara]

thinkin bout how the animals drifter sees kind of correspond to the archon “animals”

tamms as the ram

kubri as the wolf

the owl by the puzzles as the uh. owl

idk about the snake though?

[grineerios]

Insomnia won and I got around to writing things down about my Operator and Drifter instead of just letting my thoughts do laps of my brain. So uh. Long-ass backstories, I guess?

I do have memory loss so I'm not entirely sure how canon-compliant this is, but I guess there's no harm with a few tweaks if I had fun doing it lmao

New War/Duviri Paradox/Main Story quests spoilers(?)

(I do not have names for these nerds, but I'll update whenever I figure that bit out. I've debated calling them Sigma (O) and Lavan (D) after railjack parts, but it just doesn't suit them. I guess only time will tell)

Both Operator and Drifter are He/They, and AroAce. I haven't figured out their gender(s) yet, because gender is hard.

THE DRIFTER

Drifter is a very different man when interacting with Duviri and the Operator, versus everyone else. To most of the world, he's a stubborn individual with a streak of having a short temper. His seemingly obsessive need to have some kind of control can easily get on folks' nerves, making him a hard person to work with. Occasionally, though, one can see a small glimmer of the man behind the persona.

When it comes to Duviri, as well as with The Operator and other children, a laid-back, almost jovial man emerges. He has a very strong "what happens, happens" philosophy. When faced with adversity, he mocks it. When faced with hardship, he pushes through with a stiff upper lip. When faced with loss, he waves his hand dismissively.

But this isn't the full truth either.

In reality, The Drifter is an extremely anxious person with a desperate need to protect The Operator, especially after the events of The New War. This manifests as him flip-flopping between letting the Operator do what they want, and needing to control and have a say in everything the Operator does.

When in Duviri, this anxiety manifested slowly over time, starting with the Void's subconscious influence on Duviri. The landscape's shape was the first to change, next the sky turned to Void-like clouds, followed by the fracturing point- the Zariman itself appearing in the sky.

Up until this point, the Drifter was a mere side character in Duviri's story, a manifestation of an unimportant and uneventful life far away from the horrors of 10-0. Primarily, he was a Tammherd, moving flocks across Duviri's verdant islands, even as the Void's influence poked and prodded at the memories he'd repressed.

After the 10-0 appeared in the sky, however...

Everything changed. No longer could he pretend that things were well, that the Void-spirals didn't poke at his mind, that the Void-forsaken ship wasn't real, that Duviri was all he'd ever known.

As his anxiety grew, Dominus Thrax became more and more maniacal, pushing new laws and standards that began crushing at Drifter's soul and personality, hardening him into apathy after being hunted again and again for seemingly infinity.

Long forgotten were the days of falling asleep under the stars, having nothing but a Tamm for a pillow- no, now his days were split between the void-contaminated Zariman and being hunted and executed by Thrax. The songs of Void Angels and the scream of arrows and blades set the soundtrack for his life, replacing the shawzin music he'd formerly enjoyed playing.

No matter how Thrax decided to execute him that day, he'd always wake up, lost in the world foreign to him of the Zariman, a horrifying feeling tugging at his mind as he wandered the halls, confused and lost. But.. he'd always find his way back to Duviri. Through a vent, a door, a mirror, or a broken screen- it didn't matter. He always found his way back into his personal hell away from hell, doomed to live in his damned loop forever.

On one of these loops, before Teshin beats into their thick skull that yes, you can just leave this situation dumbass, while stuck in the Zariman, he was injured by either a void-touched item or a Void Angel. Throughout subsequent spirals, void crystals began to grow from the wound. And it hurt like a bitch. If he'd ever let you look at the wound- or the scar, as it presents itself in the Origin System, you might faintly see the curled spikes, if you squinted, as they're mysteriously mostly invisible when exposed to direct and indirect sunlight. Under artificial light, they're slightly more visible, but the Drifter intentionally wears clothes with baggy sleeves so as not to worry The Operator. Regardless of where he is, undercroft or origin system alike, the crystals feel like it buries itself deeper and deeper into his flesh when he uses transference.

We all know how the story ends. With the help of Teshin, the Drifter finally Gets A Fucking Grip On Things and is able to voluntarily exit and enter Duviri at their leisure. The only real difference is that instead of Lotus' hand granting the Drifter Transference, it's his void injury that allows for weak Transference within the Undercroft. He must make physical contact with a Warframe to transfer into it, even after his Void abilities are strengthened in the New War.

THE BEFORE

Before the void-jump incident, and before Eternalism made the Operator and the Drifter, there was the Before.

The Before was an isolated and distractable child. He didn't do well at school, often losing himself in thought and awe over whatever was outside the nearest window. His parents were botanists and agricultural specialists who helped to tend to and monitor the Zariman's agricultural biomes. Sometimes, much to his parents' frustration, he'd skip school to watch them work. They often would joke that they wished he'd pick a normal activity to skip school over, like Lunaro.

Although he did eventually pick up Lunaro and tried to learn shawzin, he never was far from the agri-zones if he could help it. There was something that pushed away his fears. Besides, if these plants could grow here, then who was to say he couldn't thrive cultivating life in Tau?

Aaaaand then the void jump incident happened.

Of course he wasn't paying attention when it happened. He was wayy too distracted by all the amazing colors in Saturn's rings. Melica's words all sounded like the same stuff he'd hear her say after day. Blah blah blah Entrati this Golden Masters that and who could forget the Seven? Drivel. Meaningless drivel. It mattered a lot to the adults but not to him at all.

The jump hit him like a truck, when the force knocked him out of his seat, and when beautiful Saturn was replaced with the eerie, wispy void. That's when he felt fear nag at him.

In the time before Wally made their deal with him, he somehow managed to get a grip on his emotions and channeled that fear into taking control of the situation, despite shaking the entire time he was checking in on folks. He buried his emotions, focusing on the new drive in his heart, to protect the others. Even if he was a little... Blunt. Or rude. Or aggressive about the whole thing. No matter how hard you try to hide intense emotions, they'll bubble out somehow, and I doubt the Void helped with that very much. But, his practical and stubborn mind kept most of the kids he was with safe- until the Orokin dubbed them Tenno for the Operator, or until he decided to go search for more survivors alone in the Zariman, wandering the vents while the others were found and taken away; Left behind, becoming the Drifter.

I don't think the Drifter ever forgave himself for letting that happen. Even if it was because Wally twisted words.

THE OPERATOR

In the present, the Operator is less angry, and less socially isolated than the Drifter. What they lack in comparison to the Drifter's temper and isolationist tendencies, they make up for in flippancy and spite.

He took well to transference, and his training as a Tenno under the Orokin empire gave him a sense of purpose. He'd protected his kind on board the Zariman, and he'd continue to protect them even now. With the help of his warframe, a Volt, he'd stand by their sides, and ensure everyone made it out alive. They were his Tenno fellows. His Clan.

As time went on though, his faith in the Orokin evaporated, as he saw how little they actually cared about his friends and himself. Vowing to never trust Orokin word again, he relished the Night of Naga Drums, when he finally got to strike back at the Orokin for their foul play.

His distrust of the Orokin carried over from Margulis to the Lotus, instead, looking up to the Dax remaining after the fall of the Orokin empire, knowing that they too had likely been manipulated and used by their Golden Masters.

Even knowing he'd been hurt and exploited by the Orokin, he had (and still has) a hard time seeing himself as anything but an Orokin weapon, the confusion and intensity of which only became more overwhelming after awakening from the Second Dream.

Things only got worse from there, really. His distrust of Lotus burned into outright hatred and he isolated himself from his fellow Tenno, occasionally doing mercenary work for syndicates like the Arbiters of Hexis and Steel Meridian. What purpose the Lotus had offered, he rejected, leaving him with a void in his life. Depression set in, and all he could do was wait for purpose to find him.

THE PRESENT

(My memory is fuzzy on details of The New War, so I'll need to replay it before getting into specifics about what Drifter and Operator were doing at the time. but.)

In the aftermath of the New War, the Operator has brought himself to understand that Lotus too was manipulated by Orokin power. This doesn't completely nullify his feelings, but does certainly mellow them out a bit more, to the point that he willingly participates in Tenno culture once more.

Drifter and Operator are working together, although Drifter insists on doing most Tenno missions, saying that the Operator should "catch up on being a kid" while they have the chance. This of course, does not help the Operator who desperately needs to get out and do things, as they're prone to going stir-crazy if they can't do anything for even short periods of time.

Despite having the transference circuits damaged in the Old War, the Operator almost exclusively uses his Volt, who's probably the closest thing he has to a best friend post-New War.

In the times when he chooses to, or is forced to use transference, the Drifter uses primarily an Oberon, followed closely by a Kullervo and Excalibur Umbra, the latter being an ideal choice as he doesn't require transference to be useful.

TL;DR

My Drifter is typically stoic with a hotheaded streak and a tendency for intimidation as the solution to problems. This, of course, is all fueled by a desperate need to protect people, and keep the Operator above all, safe. He's kind at heart, but it's a side rarely seen by anyone other than children or animals.

My Operator is an immature ball of spite, nigh-dependent on other people for his purpose in life. He shares Drifter's anger and aggression, but it's tempered with a strong sense of justice. He's deeply bonded to his Warframe, and the two are nigh-inseparable. Has an insatiable thirst for action, and is high-energy.

Both of them desperately need therapy and ADHD meds.

[gillyeowalters]

That is a very good observation! You could say that the choice of making Duviri an open world perfectly fits the narrative; children rarely base their stories on a pre-written script, they go on tangents, re-write things. We have the questline, but that is directly based on the Tales of Duviri. Everything else is a side distraction. Fishing, repairing the towers, herding Tamm's, they do not directly help the story's progression.

But we still do them, and we are rewarded with some type of progression-intrinsics and decrees. Children learn and develop through what we teach them, but also by all the things that suddenly, spontaneously capture their attention. Eg.: a child passing by a windmill might feel the sudden impulse to learn about it. Just like that we can randomly decide to do side quests, an option that can't really be found in any other mission. And we grow by doing them.

Playing Duviri and gaining Intrinsics/decteew mimics the Drifter maturing and learning as a child in their self-created fantasy world. Children have the intrinsic need (heh) to grow and learn and that is another reason why Duviri is so important for them, not only a safe haven but a necessary place to mature.

"Summoning" enemies is a challange they set themselves, to grow.

I love the small things about Warframe's design so much. Like, the Duviri architecture.

[Spoilers!]

The houses obviously are just wall parts of the Zariman, arranged to look like settlements/towns. The same goes for many of the harvestable plants, that also mimic Zariman design elements (especially noticeable with the cactus-like Ueymag, that has an unnaturally symmetrical shape, mimicking the often repeated tuning fork-shape).

Duviri has multiple bioms, plains, snowy mountains, a desert, but they are all way too small to exist naturally.

All this paints the picture of a world created by the mind of a child, who might have never seen anything else but the inside of a spaceship. They might have never seen other architecture, so all houses have to look like they were ripped straight out of the Zariman's structure. They know that mountains and deserts exist, but they do not understand their scale, so they become just one more small piece of Duviri. Just like cartographs back in history they fill the unknown of their world with set pieces and the skeletal structures found all over Duviri lend themselves for a comparison to this "Here there be dragons" mindset.

Children build and recreate what they know all the time to learn and better understand it, but also to express their wishes and creativity. This gives the idea of a child, confined in space, wishing to get to be somewhere else, visiting the places they have heard of.

We get to see quite a few rather large settlements in Duviri, but the amount of houses and people does not seem to match. In general, only very few people seem to be roaming the streets. This is not an adult doing extensive worldbuilding, this is a child with a lot of building blocks but very few dolls building a world on which they can project their emotions and memories onto.

Most of Duviris normal inhabitants are just decorations, not existing to be characters, but because a town "needs to have people in it". They are not defined by who they are, but by what they do- and what they do is react to the player, sit around, talk and cower in fear when enemies approach.

The simple shapes of the buildings are very close to the concept of real life building blocks. Paedagogic toys often are simple, to allow for easy handling and more creative freedom.

The theme of death is also omnipresent. Every animal resembles a carcass build from metal plating and even the Dax enemies are skeleton-like, the Gladius' helmets lower part even resembling a rabbit skull. We obviously know how the story of the Zariman ended and the skulls and bones might be just an indicator of potential danger, but what if the skeletal design of Duviri's inhabitants are not supposed to indicate not (just) death, but an infinished state? They are walking skeletons, yet missing a skin, their shape, just like the fractured bodies of the townspeople, not fully formed out in the child's head. Since the townspeople are humanoid though, they look more finished, while all the child might have ever seen of sheep, cats, dogs, horses and owls could have very well been just pictures in a school book, maybe next to a diagram of their underlying anatomy (after all, one of the few things we get to experience of the daily life on the Zariman, is school).

There is also an enemy called the Dax Herald. A Herald was a specialist in ceremonies, making sure that they were held correctly (besides also having diplomativ tasks). Their head resembles a security camera, adding a layer of oppressive social norms normal humans certainly suffered under in the orokin empire

[holistichiatus]

<3

[holistichiatus]

silly things my friends inspired :]

[holistichiatus]

[holistichiatus]

i don't really have enough to do a 2023 summary but i'm really proud of these pieces i did last year :]

this year was also the start of my drifter/chipper brainrot with this drawing of them

[holistichiatus]

happy pride month y'all

[holistichiatus]

definitely looking forward to the fishing :]

reference pic below

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