#for probably no reason at all tbh so.. kinda weird saying 'yeah i don't like any of the ones you read and were v nice about sorry Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[skrunksthatwunk]

HI IT'S SQUISHY fic ask game time:

F: Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

I: Do you have a guilty pleasure in fic (reading or writing)?

R: Are there any writers (fanfic or otherwise) you consider an influence?

X: A character you enjoy making suffer.

:3

YAHOO HI SQUISHY TY FOR THE ASK >:33

ok uhhhh uh uh

F: i think if i had to choose anything, it'd probably be the cat petting circle scene from and who do you think i'll be (without you)?, because i am. really really bad at juggling more than like 3 characters in a scene and this has FIVE and it's still really fun to read, at least for me. it's dynamic, though admittedly the attention still mostly falls on kuwabara and yusuke (sorry keiko </3 i wish you were more prominent in this one but alas) everyone carries some weight. i'm also not great at understanding (and thus writing) anger, so yusuke's bubbling frustration through the scene is like.. kinda cool to me. (a/n: eikichi is kuwabara's cat lol)

i'm also including another two from this same fic bc i think they're neat as well :)

(i'll put a transcript of the screenshots at the end under the read more)

honestly, i love writing yusuke's dialogue no matter what he's saying, so this fic's got a few moments i'm very fond of, but didn't include. anyway it's the only good thing i've ever written (<- exaggerating, but it's probably my favorite fic i've written, and maybe favorite prose piece)

i also remember enjoying some of the dialogue between sagawa and majima in tough love for loveless things, and i assume i liked a lot of the stuff for i long for you and your expert hands, but i... haven't revisited that one in a long time (idk why but i'm a little afraid to?? i haven't forgotten it though), so i couldn't point to anything specific really ^ ^'

I: hm... i think i overindulge in characters just talking about nothing, at least when it comes to my writing. if i like them, i like hearing them talk about nothing, and it tends to bloat scenes and drag on, i figure. i also tend to gravitate towards really specific intensely described points of imagery that barely come up again and totally break the flow of the scene (oops). in terms of guilty pleasures in reading, uh...? i'm kind of a sucker for werewolf stuff because i got that dog in me. im drawing a blank ig sorry <3 OH i've always been hopelessly fond of whump / hurt/comfort / sickfic STUFF. legit since i was a child. i like it when they're out of it i like it when they're woozy. and anything with dumb hijinks and/or slapstick is good to me. comedy's hard and i like seeing idiots be idiots. and really introspective/inner monologue heavy pieces are mmmmwah for writing and reading

R: oh man. whatever i'm currently reading often ends up influencing my writing in noticeable (to me) ways. one time i was writing smth for my fiction writing class and i typed out a sentence that felt at once like smth dr seuss would write (you'll never guess what unit my children's lit class was on) and a line from lolita (because that's what i was reading at the time). it's a mashup that worked weirdly well. ANYWAY to actually answer the question, the little prince ruined me as a kid, and a lot of the way i express sadness and emptiness is channeling saint-exupery there. currently, arkady martine and andzrej sapkowski have been influencing my scenery descriptions in particular, because that's what i was most recently reading, but earlier this year i remember cormac mccarthy's the road finding its way under my pen a lot. for really flowery stuff (i don't think you see it much in my fics, but it's not Never), i think of alfred tennyson's maud quite often. this is not a conclusive list im just empty brained :P

X: ohhohohohohhh. god help me but i love making all of them suffer. to love something is to vivi/dissect it. currently kuwabara is the one i'm putting through the most though (<- channeling personal issues into this orange guy), but majima and kiryu were always lots of fun to break down >:). perhaps that's the real answer to the guilty pleasure section

[SCREENSHOT 1]:

“Hey, why’s she goin’ to Kurama and you and not me?” Yusuke complained, pouting at Keiko.

Kuwabara piped up. “Maybe it’s ‘cuz they have manners, unlike some of us.”

“Or patience,” Botan offered.

Yusuke stuck out his leg and prodded Kuwabara’s arm. “Yeah, and how’re your manners workin’ out for ya? You still look like someone’s been playin’ tic-tac-toe on your hands or did she become a saint overnight?”

“Shut up, Urameshi.”

Keiko spoke up from her spot on the floor. “Aw, I think she’s just sweet. Right?” She put her chin on her folded arms and gently rubbed at Eikichi’s cheek. With a warm smile, Keiko turned her head into her arms further, squishing her face, openly endeared. “Even if she bites sometimes.”

“Finally, someone gets it,” Kuwabara moaned. “Keiko, tell Urameshi that for me, will ya?”

Yusuke didn’t buy it. “If she was sweet she’d be sweet to me, too.”

“Benevolence is nearly always conditional,” Kurama said, leaning over to rub Eikichi’s ears. “Perhaps she senses your standoffishness and simply chooses not to engage with someone who does not seem to want her.” Kurama’s brilliant green eyes swept back to Yusuke for emphasis. “You two may have that in common.”

“Wh—?!” Yusuke spluttered a bit, before settling on, “Watch it, fox boy.”

“Aw,” Botan giggled, “Yusuke, it’s alright, you know. Some of us just have an animal-like charm. Meow meow!” She hooked her hands like paws.

“Right, and I’m saying Eikichi’s not so charming. I mean, she’s been ignoring you, too, Botan, whaddyou think?”

“Oh, she’s just lovely! Simply adorable,” Botan cooed.

“Heheh, looks like you’re outnumbered, Urameshi!”

[SCREENSHOT 2]:

Rocking his chair back lazily, Yusuke noticed Kuwabara’s scratch-laced hands and whistled. “Damn, Kuwabara. It’s kinda beating you up, huh? That cat o’ yours. You look like you just fought me, only smaller.”

“For the last time, Urameshi, Eikichi’s a she! Quit it with the it crap or I’ll knock you into next Sunday brunch.” He jabbed his chopsticks at Yusuke pointedly. “And I don’t think you could get any smaller.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. She’s beating the shit outta you. But what’s with that? I thought kittens were s’posed to be all cute n’ cuddly.” Yusuke swirled his drink thoughtfully before taking a swig.

“You’ve never had a kitten, have you, Urameshi?” Kuwabara deadpanned. He had the right to do that now that he was a cat-rearing expert, as if he hadn't learned it very recently himself.

“No. ’M not really crazy about animals. Neither's my mom.” Under his breath, Yusuke added, “Knowing her, that’s probably for the best.”

“Wh—? How?!” 

Yusuke shrugged.

Kuwabara huffed. “Ugh, she’s teething right now, okay? And I haven’t got her a scratching post yet. She’ll grow out of it, you’ll see.”

“Whatever you say, man. Just try not to lose any limbs waiting for her to get manners, arright? Don’t wanna make our fights even more one-sided. That’d just be sad.”

“Yeah, right, Urameshi.” Kuwabara puffed out his chest. “Eikichi could take two o’ my limbs and I’d still wipe the street with ya.”

“Hey, try beating me with four limbs first, tough guy.”

The conversation devolved into threats and bickering from there, culminating in little more than wrinkled uniforms and mussed hair-dos, and one final exchange.

“You haven’t even met her, Urameshi, so how could you know what she’s like?”

“‘Cuz you’re carryin’ the proof right there, stupid! Look, don’t take it so personal. I just don’t feel like spending all day roughhousing with someone that far beneath my weight class, even if she is the precious little angel you say she is."

[SCREENSHOT 3]:

Yusuke lounged on the floor, Eikichi sitting on his chest and staring down at him.

“What’re you starin’ at, Stinkass?”

Kuwabara scoffed loudly, fluffing out the pillow Yusuke would use.

Yusuke smirked at him. “Oh, I’m sorry, your highness, I left my manners at home.” He cleared his throat. “What are you staring at, Her Royal Majesty the Queen Stinkass?”

“Man, why'dya only pick mean pet names to give ‘er?” It came out a bit harsher than he meant.

“What?” Yusuke began to sit up, but stopped when he remembered Eikichi’s place on him. He dropped back down and shut his eyes lazily. “These aren’t pet names, they’re, like, insults. That I don’t mean.”

“So ‘Stinkass’ is your idea of an affectionate nickname?”

“Gee, you don’t have to make it sound so damn girly. I’m just callin’ her that ‘cause I like her.”

“Ooh~ so you like her, huh?” Kuwabara sat up on his knees and—once Eikichi got the hint and clambered off—smacked Yusuke’s face with his pillow, holding it over his face. “Whatever happened to not bein’ mushy, tough guy?”

Yusuke wrenched the pillow from his grip and lazily swung it at him, not bothering to get up. “Hey, you told me she doesn’t judge about that sorta thing, right? And I’m learnin’ there’s benefits to bein’ mushy, like kicking ass better.” He shifted to crack his back, then sighed, relaxing into the floor. “I’m just sticking to my way, and sometimes that means calling her Kuwabara’s Favorite Little Shitblaster or whatever.”

[sabh0]

Is skk abusive? Other than the name calling and banter that I just don't take seriously, I've seen people say that Dazai is abusive since he planned for Chuuya to be tortured in stormbringer and didn't help because it would be boring, despite having the ability to do so. There's also the whole manipulating the sheep thing.

I've also seen people say that Chuuya is abusive because of how violent he is, how he punched Dazai to wake him up in Dead Apple and called him inhuman(? Ngl, I don't remember that part) and because Chuuya shot him more times than necessary in Meursault.

Personally, I struggle to see them as abusive r toxic, if only because of how much they trust and understand each other, and how they rile each other up for fun without letting it actually impact their relationship, but I may just be biased? What do you think?

Ok im just gonna say - dont take this post ad some 100% real wisdom or anything. It's just my personal opinion and it's definitely biased as well because of how much these two mean to me but yeah

I wouldn't call them abusive in relationship terms because all that banter and most of their fights are just, as u said it, unserious.

They're both fucked up a bit tho, so yeah there's definitely some toxic behaviours anyway.

Dazai manipulating Chuuya to join the sheep always made me real sad, but if you think about it more - Dazai knew The Sheep aren't any better for Chuuya. Plus if not like this, Mori would get Chuuya to join PM anyway in one way or another, since it was a plan from the beginning.

Dazai planned the whole 'helping Verlaine' thing to buy time so the PM forces could get ready to protect Mori and Chuuya later. That's mafia they're in - lives are not equal. Also Dazai wouldn't put Chuuya in danger he knew the other wouldn't be able to deal with. Either way, his whole yapping about wanting to see Chuuya being tortured is yet again that stupidly weird banter of theirs. After all, he's trying to find him and literally stop him from doing something he would regret. (Sab is trying to make some points but that still doesn't make whatever Dazai did something good. Just sayin. I just don't feel it's a black or white situation.)

I said it some time ago but lord, Chuuya is not abusive. Look, he knows when it's alright to fight Dazai and when he should stop himself not to hurt him. Even if they fight, he never does it seriously. Basement scene? He could've very well just punched Dazai without warning there. But instead he literally invited him to fight - and Dazai very much agreed to that sht with a smile on his lips. They're just very much not okay in the head on both sides. Later when Chuuya actually got angry, he himself threw his knife to the ground, which only shows he doesn't really have any intent of hurting Dazai seriously (In the manga. In the anime they changed it for whatever reason and he did strike him with the knife. But anime skk is just. Anime skk.).

That Dead Apple argument is so funny bc??? Chuuya was literally UNDER CORRUPTION AT THE TIME??? Corruption literally makes him lose control. He could kill a person with one touch. Instead??? Corruption Chuuya in dead apple somehow managed to hold himself back just enough not to actually hurt Dazai. Also, Dazai f knew he's gonna punch him anyway. I mean, bro kinda deserved it atp tbh /j

Cant really tell much about the shooting thing in Meursault - i stil have no f idea if these were even real, considering the fact Dazai is moving normally and there's no wounds/holes/blood visible on him or his clothes. These were probably just a play like the whole headshot thing?? (Tho dazai's scream and expression after that arm shot say otherwise),, really don't know, call it a better impression on Fyodor or Chuuya actually paying Dazai back for the other times

Ok so ,looks at all that sht i just wrote and tried to still excuse it somehow, I wouldn't call them abusive anyway just bc I've seen actual abusive relationships in real life and that's just uhh different in a way i cant really put my finger on,, there's some toxicity simply from the fact they're emotionally constipated and won't talk things thru like they should but,,, welp. Tbh i see most of their usual fighting as something unserious that both of em r okay with. Usually when they actually get into an argument about something it's because one actually got hurt by the other's words (for example that scene with Chuuya punching Dazai after he made jokes about Colonel's death). And they apologize without really apologizing, too (Dazai going to find Shibusawa and trying to take revenge on Colonel's death and later Chuuya going to rescue Dazai and saying to 'wait for him').

Unpopular opinion but i honestly feel that in the future they could very well form a normal, healthy relationship. They just really need to talk. Bickering and calling each other names for fun isn't imo really a form of abuse, when both sides know it's not meaning to hurt the other fr (if it was, then me and most of my friends would be fr abusing each other unfortunately) (and I don't feel abused even if we call each other names and say we hate each other, while watching cat reels together at the same time) (consider this some sibling-like stuff)

If nothing of whatever i just said makes sense, don't eat me please, it's just really hard for me to explain what i really think without being able to just talk for 5h straight while considering every ppint of view

[braisedhoney]

say hello to the first Official Canon Characters aboard the HIVE o7 (joking, but they are legit ocs which is kinda weird to say 👀)

random lore + some extra tidbits below the cut

OKAY this is all pretty loose bc i don't wanna get top restrictive with it, the vagueness is half the fun. but here's what i got:

in the “HIVE canon”, sector heads/ranking officers (which for now is just leander and COL ig until i eventually cave and make more lmao) are specifically given custom uniforms and number prefixes instead of the CR[insert number here] format.

the “M” in front of leander’s stands for medbay. COL didn’t pick one so it’s just his name lol.

crewmates can wear any accessories they want as long as the base uniform stays the same (bee arm patches, grey, etc). all crewmate numbers gotta start with CR to be canon, but that doesn't apply to shitpost comics or like. general vibes

(there’s a reason the crew uniforms are grey. it’s the same reason leander made the captain’s gloves. )

the ship shuffles itself! it's not random all of the time, sometimes you open a door and end up in the room you were heading to like a shortcut, but other times you can open a random door and end up in the kitchen, or the training hall, etc etc. i just think an eldritch abomination ship is funny.

weirdly enough though it doesn’t do this in crisis situations. guess it’s only fun if the pranks are harmless ;;

if you get lost, call the captain (ello! o7) or COLONY over comms. they can generally get you wherever you need to go bc COLONY is directly connected to the ship and the captain’s able to make [INQUIRIES], which let us pass freely.

it’s kind of hard to tell if leander has a similar ability. the running theory is no, but he never seems confused?? when he enters a room?? so either he has one or he really just rolls with the punches. both are equally possible tbh.

in actual lore these two were probably some of if not the first few people to be recruited. obvs that’s a retcon now but shhh.

random characters from fandoms still get dragged into our shenanigans. at the end of the day this is all just for fun, and that’s one of the best parts, so hell yeah i’m keeping it.

[lastoneout]

You know what, I just realized something that I can probably add to my list of reasons I'm more ND than I think I am...

So in middle school I found out The Princess Bride was based on a book I immediately decided to read it. But here's the thing, unlike the movie's framing device of a grandfather reading the book to his grandson, the book has one that's basically like an autobiography?? Where the author talks about his grandfather reading him the book as a kid and how it affected him growing up and how, eventually, he decided to "abridge" the original and publish the version you're reading. The author even says Florin and Guilder are real places, and gives "history" on them.

I found(and tbh still find) this part of the book exceptionally boring. It's mean spirted and depressing, and an absolute slog to get through. But I kept trucking through taking everything as complete truth, even though I was pretty sure these countries weren't real places. Europe is big after all and I was in middle school, maybe I just hadn't heard of them before. Thankfully once the "real" book, the story The Princess Bride, actually starts the intersections start to make sense and aren't as boring and I quite liked them more or less, even if they were a little confusing at times. I also read everything after the "real" book ends, an epilog of sorts about the author not being allowed to abridge the sequel bcs Steven King?? Was going to do it?? But there was a bit of this "sequel" included so I read that too.

When my friend, who had leant me the book, asked what I thought, I said I liked it but I didn't understand why the author included all that personal history at the start where he complained about his job and family, it just didn't seem necessary to me and was boring as hell.

My friend informed me that all of that "personal" history wasn't real. The author made it all up. It was as much fiction as the actual story itself. It was satire, you see, and apparently??? very important to read bcs without it you wont "understand" the story. My friend genuinely thought it was super weird that I didn't realize it wasn't true, and also that I didn't like it.

But nah, I thought it was true!! Why would he lie like that?? What was it even satirizing(I still don't really know tbh)?? Why would I need to read all that bs to understand the book?? The story of 'The Princess Bride' made perfect sense on it's own!! I ended up kinda hating the book after that. I felt SUPER betrayed. He said all that stuff like it was true, what on earth was the point of lying?? Didnt he know people would believe him?? Why wouldn't I, after all I almost always tell the truth, lying about all that stuff was dumb and mean and I hated it.

A while later when I brought it up to my godfather he ALSO thought it was silly that I believed all that and didn't get that it was satire, and insisted that it was important for understanding the story.

I still don't get why it's important, and I refuse to read any of it again. When I re-read the book I just skip to where 'The Princess Bride' actually starts and then stop once it's "over". The rest of it is probably important, but to this day I think it's mostly mean spirited and stupid, and idk why he didn't just write the book normally or do what they did in the movie.

Anyway I figure this is like...normal, right? I totally don't have any deeper stuff going on with my brain. When I take assessments I insist I'm great at picking up on sarcasam and satire. Totally great at it. Yeah...

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s2 episode 9 thoughts

whew! i had a busy day so it's nice to unwind with some scully and mulder time. although by the end of the episode i didn't feel very unwound tbh. it was still time spent with the babygirls, so i can't complain.

so we start with some volcano research. my only note here was "i know a geologist" which is true! shoutout to my one professor. you were chill but i hated that class.

there's a dead guy in the volcano which tbh doesn't seem too surprising... i mean volcanoes are very deadly. but it seems to be one of the dudes involved with the project so that's weird because why would he go down there?

there's this stream going on of the inside volcano and something is disrupting it... hate to see a streamer interrupted :(

then we had the title sequence but for some reason i was wondering, do you think if they got married they'd hyphenate their names... scully-mulder... mulder-scully... does it roll off the tongue? hmm...

so firewalker (the title of our episode) is a robot that goes into the volcano. noted.

here i wrote "holy fuck scully is beautiful". all she was doing was standing there but man.

the scientist who has come to them requesting help is like, this lead scientist named trepkos started this project, and scully says "i always heard he was brilliant", which raises the question: why is scully keeping up with volcano science? nerd

at this point the visiting scientist was explaining how he and trepkos had a professional breakup kinda thing and i'm very sorry for them but i genuinely could not take my eyes off of scully. hope they work it out or whatever. i have bigger priorities.

she wants to get out there and investigate but mulder says "i don't think it's a good idea for you to go" AUGHHH. i am wailing and tearing my shirt. she says that she's fine!!! really!!!

and he has this look on his face that says "i cannot tell this woman what to do, even after she just woke up from a coma, and i never will be able to" and he's very right in that regard

HELICOPTER TIME! mulder is such a gentleman helping her climb out

she has very messy hair at this point and the scientist seems a lot more concerned about his equipment than the fate of the people trapped inside the compound and she seems so thrown off by this

next we have some BIG ASS FLASHLIGHTS!!!! WOOHOO

at this point i made a note that i think i might have been going feral because mulder also looked SO good prowling around that creepy base. and i don't take back my observation but i will psychoanalyze it a bit later. reluctantly.

a creepy dude is hanging around the corner. OH SHOOT he tries to bash mulder's head in and he is MAD "do you always greet people this way?" LMAOOO he took it personally

the other scientists in the base seem to regard the missing trepkos as a threat... hmm...

i really like this jesse character, who is a student and is here to do some research with her advisor

mulder asks for the data on the research trepkos has been doing and she says he destroyed his field journals and computer discs. ahh, computer discs. my old friends. i used to have some games on discs when i was a kid. positive memories.

mulder sees scribbled in some of the notes trepkos didn't destroy that he had written about a "new life form" which honestly kinda happens a lot. like people are always discovering new life forms but the gag is they're beetles. everyday we find new species of beetle. they just won't stop coming. so i'm thinking, well they wanted this to be all dramatic, but statistically it's probably just a volcano beetle this guy found.

mulder and scully have an exchange and again i'm distracted by her freckles but she says he's being paranoid and i'm like. yeah that's kinda his whole deal. mulder being paranoid is like a fork spotted in the kitchen.

so the other scientist who was checking on his equipment was, at this point, killed by trepkos. with a rope. and we get the great closed captions "(neck cracks) (body thuds on ground)" which were very descriptive of the whole process

mulder and scully are having a science based argument on the probability of a silicon-based life form and it was really funny to me because it was a nerd off. and frankly i wouldn't go into a science debate with a doctor but mulder is going full steam ahead. it's getting heated and i'm like damn does this ever lead to them kissing because i can see it happening. anyway she's like no trepkos did not discover a silicon-based life form (spoiler alert: he did)

he's looking around like damn. i'm glad she's back but she's such a pain in my ass <3

scully goes to talk to jesse by knocking on her door and asking to chat and then not waiting for an answer and coming in because that is my girl!!!

jesse says trepkos stopped taking his pills that treat his bipolar disorder and he started being weird, saying they polluted his mind and that she was "polluting his body" which has... implications i prefer not to think about?

(why must we make erotic the bond between a student and their thesis advisor? there is no stronger connection! but. not in this way, tv writers, not in this way. i mean Maybe it wasn't meant that way but it seemed like it was)

mulder is streaming the descent into madness of trepkos because he recorded his ramblings which is probably what my friends on my private story think each time i post. but he's going on about finding a silicon-based life form.

this whole time one of the scientists has been very noticeably coughing and losing his voice and i knew it was gonna go somewhere but all of a sudden he collapses. and mulder yells for scully who is undergoing her shift to Doctor Mode. but we see his neck... pulsate? is that the best word to describe it? augh i don't want to even think about it so we'll leave it there

(jesse was also looking super suspicious but i liked her...)

anyway they put the sick guy on a stretcher and he's down and out until he isn't, and now he's making a RUN for it. he runs and runs and falls in a ditch until a THING takes over his body and explodes. i thought it was a worm at first and it was sososo gross i started sweating. i do not like body horror. the things i endure for these two.

so scully's doing some testing and she's like, yeah this is a silicon-based fungus. and poor jesse is having a nervous breakdown because she has been in this base for 8 months and she just wants to go HOME but now they have to quarantine and i felt so bad for her.

then i remembered the line about her "polluting his body" and things were adding up... and they were NOT looking good for her... no... i cannot do this...

scully's really worried about jesse which is justified because this poor girl is freaking out. but mulder is really worried about scully! he wants to go look for trepkos and he's making excuses why she shouldn't come and finally settles on the need to autopsy the body which he seems to both genuinely believe and also say to keep her back at the base

she knows he's being protective so she says "i'm here and i'm not going anywhere" which is sweet but girl you were in a coma. they had your gravestone made. you are lucky he has not put you in bubblewrap entirely. you can't blame the man for needing you to be safe!!!!

he says he's counting on her and grabs her shoulder with some heavily lingering eye contact that, when i see in gif form, i will surely slam the reblog button upon because. good lord.

jesse is talking to the other guy and he says something like "do what we said" and i'm thinking oh man, they're gonna try to get mulder (spoiler alert: they did not quite do that)

the guy is like "you need a guide to go get trepkos" and i'm even MORE suspicious but his reasoning kind of does make sense- it is a volcano maze, after all- still, when mulder goes with him i was tense

BUT THEN he immediately gets shot with a FLARE GUN? which i did NOT see coming. and trepkos emerges from the back of the volcano caves all burned and wild-looking.

he's covering the newly dead body with gasoline and mulder's asking why he's trying to kill him twice when we see the parasite wriggle in his neck (GAG) so then he shoots him with ANOTHER flare to burn up the evil creature. and he's explaining how if you're exposed to the parasite's spores you're gonna be sick...

and scully is back at the base with jesse... who was exposed... so she's not going to be safe...

and we see jesse in her room gagging and convulsing... oh man... it's not looking good....

trepkos is not letting mulder leave, but mulder does not give a fuck LMAO he says "you're gonna have to shoot me then" and goes to walk out... this man was really thinking "they are NOT gonna take scully from me again" and i know that is exactly right!!!!!

NOOOO the lights go off in the compound........... NOOOOO JESSE ATTACK.....

she's handcuffing her and scully together!!!!!! but scully was smart enough to get her behind a door really fast before jesse collapses and the fungus explodes...... but the handcuffs... was the door open a crack?? was it enough to get her infected???!?!?

mulder BURSTS in to see her handcuffed and she keeps repeating "i'm okay, i'm okay" but he must be so shocked because he asks "you alright?" and gently cups her face and at this point i wanted to do some powerful screaming to let out the things i was feeling

we see trepkos come in and look at jesse's body and he says that he told her how this experience would change her life... and i'm getting callbacks to when mulder told scully it would be a nice trip to the forest, but then the whole evil bugs thing happened in s1 ep20... and i am filled with a deep sadness...

so the duo has been sentenced to a month long quarantine, which i'm sure had to absolutely drive them wild. but i think my mutual wrote a fic on this subject so i just simply have no choice but to go read it now! and i assume that, since there are more seasons, the spores did not actually infect them

(and mulder, who was earlier suggesting time off for scully, must be some mix of terrified that any day now the symptoms will start showing and the end will be near, deeply satisfied that she has been forced into getting rest and healing like he wished, and regretting his words that she should take a break, because here she is taking a break. with him. and they're driving each other crazy)

we see trepkos hiking back into the volcano maze with jesse's body and it was actually really sad :(

overall a good episode, another one in the vein of s1 eps 8 and 20 where there is some sort of contagion and we must figure out from where it started and to whom it has gone... but the formula in these episodes keeps me on the edge of my seat and allows for a convergence of doctor scully and protective mulder, two things i am deeply invested in seeing. and seeing mulder try and keep her away from the case after her whole incident made me emo as hell!!!! he is never going to let her out of his sight again unless he has to go keep her safe by finding the wild man in the volcano!!!!!! and even that backfired!!!! ugh my heart!!!!! i love them so deeply!!!

rip my girl jesse i thought u were rad in the brief time we knew each other

[flickersprout]

hello would you be willing to say your million opinions about the mystery twins?

WHY YES

I am unwell about these people thank you so much for asking /gen (long post incoming)

I'm a little more familiar with Cellbit's character than Bagi's, so probably have more headcanons about him. I am actively trying to get more unhinged about Bagi because she is so cool and everyone should tell me their Bagi headcanons

Bagi headcanons/opinions:

She should be transfem. as a treat. her being transfem lets me make the twins identical, and anything that makes it more obvious how related they are makes them funnier

Her being transfem also adds fun layers to her relationship with Tina, as Tina is a demon pretending to be human. All I'm saying is you could do some fun parallels and contrasts about presentation and the self

Also if you make her and Jaiden and Baghera all transfem, you get the fun fed-sisters-plus transfem solidarity that exists only in my head

She can only barely cook. She never learned as a kid and then got fucking frozen, and she's tried to learn as an adult but it's not going well

When she thinks about raising Empanada, she gets kinda caught between wanting to pass on the pacifist, live-and-let-live mentality that she pretends to have and the more defensive/aggressive ideas she actually has. She does like the idea of pacifism and doesn't want Empanada to grow up bitter, but... peace isn't what's kept her safe and alive

Empanada's first death resolved a lot of those conflicts. A kinder world isn't coming, so she has to raise a fighter

Her "pretending to be an ethical vegetarian" thing is hilarious to me. girl you aren't pretending to be a vegetarian you just are one. you can lie about your reasons but girl. you don't eat meat

Cellbit headcanons/opinions:

He can't cook even a little bit. Federation pet -> child soldier -> jail-> struggling adult? yeah he never fucking learned to cook

Relatedly I think he's a picky eater but has weird tastes. Like i think he eats instant microwave/just add water foods raw and likes it because he learned to eat it like that at some point, but can't stand a lot of "real food" because he just never got used to it (this is partly based on me lsjkhd)

He owns a butterfly knife and he's good with it. He picked it up as a hobby after Fuga when he was in therapy because he needed something to fill his time and it was a socially acceptable way to carry a knife. He can do all kinds of tricks now

Just pre-purgatory (and probably still now tbh) sometimes the butterfly knife suddenly reminds him too much of a real knife or triggers some kind of intrusive thought that scares him. His reaction to this is to just let go of the knife midair. He's very lucky no one's gotten hurt yet

He 100% remembers more of his childhood with Bagi than he admits. He pretends he doesn't because even acknowledging that he was a child once undermines his image of himself as a monster (upsetting, unhealthy self-image, sure, but one that's kept him safe. monsters aren't afraid of anything. monsters can't be hurt. children, though?)

As much as I understand and will read about autistic!Cellbit headcanons, I don't agree (i am autistic, for the record). He's actually really good with social cues, like scary good, and obviously has really strong theory of mind. Like I get where people are coming from but we need to defend an allistic guy's right to just be a fucking freak (/lh /nm)

I want to call Cellbit and Baghera "hunters" instead of "chainsaw killers." again I get where people are coming from. it's funny and I'll use it. however hunters would go so hard. same genre as codebreakers and bloodhounds. do you see my vision

[mochiwrites]

Guess who's back? Back again? Anons back! Tell a friend.

Lol sorry I'm once again back. The same anon who sent a bunch of questions about night life a while ago since I was rereading songbirds blood au. Soo uhm here's more

1. Mochi why does scar say in villainous thing that he has put his head in a werewolfs mouth??!?!?!?!?!? Scar mah dude u ok???? (Lowkey would wanna try it but I probably would leave the werewolfs mouth with a head 😊)

2. Grian.Trans.Canon? (Or scar? Or maybe both???)

3. With the glyphs is there only one way to use them or could you possible make them a tattoo and still you them. Since they are then constantly touching the glyphs they could possible do the magic of a mage. If they had multiple glyphs he could mix the glyphs somehow.(like how Luz mixes the glyphs by drawing them with eachother but instead they do it with their ✨️MIND✨️)

4. Also I love the idea of papapulse. Like I imagine Pearl or grian (most likely grian:^P) and Impulse going full demon mode tl protect them. (I saw that you tagged "Parent impulseSV (Video Blogging RPF)" in troubke in the dead of night🥺👏😍) Also is there different types of demons and what type of powers do they have?

5. In the fic "sitting in the garden at your feet" they have a whole picnic and all the adorableness. Do they go on more picnics frequently? (I really hope soo) I would guess they do since in villainous things they were also on their way to a picnic...but then yeah...poor birb tbh and poor scar

6. Have Ren and Martyn already have their wedding or are they still waiting? I wanna see treebark and I want to see mumbo ask grian go with him as his plus one to the wedding<3

(Though treebark owns my heart, Grumbo will always win) Don't talk about scarian I've never left the desert and don't plan to either😘

7. Okay soo in the fic "weight of living" there was this one scene where etho stared at grian. Here's the quote: "Etho eyes him for a moment, his gaze unreadable as he does so. It leaves Grian with chills. Weird."

Is it possible that etho is a Watcher? I'm mean   he is definitely not human(or maybe he is an immortal human?)  Etho may recognize grian, either as an old Watcher or a new Watcher to be made. Or maybe etho just thinks it is weird to see scar with grian(A HUMAN) The last one is more logical <:^)

8. On that note with Etho. You never confirm nor deny if grian is the "lost watcher" but what if I were to ask you if EFFO is the lost Watcher. I don't have proof but-...yeah idk

Wait wait just had another thought what if Pearl is the Watcher???? When the dream bugs ate her dreams there was a purple mist! Huh huh gotcha!/silly this is purely a joke🤣

9. Will we see a bad boy grian phase or possibly a drag queen phase🥺👉👈. Since it often mention that grian was a dare devil(still is:^P) or did grian have such phases. One of my friends is kinda a dare devil and he did drag once and I feel since grian might be the same there...

10. What did Scott do with the shard? Did he just entirely get rid of it? Also is Scott pure evil or broken. Maybe with the lost of his brother(Xornoth) did he turn evil or was evil just in his genes?

Those are all the questions and theories for now thank you for listing to my literal brain rot<3

This time it was numbered

(There will possible be more to come>:^] )

YIPPEE WELCOME BACK NONNIE :D

see me rubbing my paws together with a big grin >:3c no apologies needed !!!! I love questions hehe. as always, I can't answer everything clearly, because of spoilers but I'll certainly answer as much as I can!

1- WHEEZE scar just feels like the kinda guy to me to stick his head into the mouth of a werewolf for fun, y'know? he'd try it once just to see what would happen (and I mean, he's got no reason to fear dying, all things considered LOL)

2- GRIAN TRANS CANON !! honestly, just operate under the assumption that any grian I write is trans JFGDHFKKJDFG it's my comfort character and I get to project on him /silly (no trans scar though </3)

3- WAUG OKAY -- I've answered this kind of question before but for the life of me I can't find it D: I'm gonna keep searching for it, and when I find it I'll reblog this with that information mjfdhkfghfjg I don't wanna contradict myself LMAO

4- PAPAPULSE MY BELOVED 🥺I really wanna write more with him ueueue. I actually haven't done much world building for sb!demons but I'm going to say that yes, there are different types of demons! and they all have a wide range of different abilities :3

5- they def go on picnics yeah!!! I think it becomes one of grian's default methods to drag mumbo out of the manor when he can <33

6- ren and martyn haven't had their wedding yet :3 I actually hadn't thought about when their wedding would take place but ;w; oh that gives me some ideas....

7- etho isn't a watcher! the current lore is well. no one really knows what etho is. except maybe bdubs and joel. but their lips are Sealed (he's not the lost watcher either I'm afraid </3)

9- so currently I don't have any plans for a bad boy or drag queen phase to pop up in the story (though that could change, if any ideas come up) but they were certainly things he did when he was wayyy younger

10- what scott did with the shard hm? he broke it :) and I'm afraid evil is just in his genes unfortunately </3

hehe thank you for your questions!! :D

[leoremin]

I just finished watching the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen...and I have...thoughts (along with some bad grammar)

This is an overall negative post, so if you don't like that keep scrolling. If you like this movie, go ahead and scroll on past if you don't want to read this. If you want to debate me, then hell, go ahead, I might be wrong in some areas and I'm fully willing to admit that. I'd love to see anyone's take on this movie.

To say real quick, I haven't finished reading Dracula (over 1/2 through tho), Sherlock Holmes, 4 billion leagues under the sea, and a few others.

Also...spoilers...obv

(last note: I am not against retellings or that stuff, I'm just rating it on MY OPINION of these little guys and all that stuff. This is depending on how much I like them from just a writers sense.)

Tbh I really love the idea of crossovers, I love so much seeing the babies all together (I am working on a crossover myself so...) but I feel like this one was just...mediocre

First up Jekyll!

Number one, assuming this takes place after the novella, that is not how HJ7 works. Jekyll turning back into Hyde is not right then. At that point, Henry would be living on a timer rather than Hyde.

Also, little pet peeve...THE POTION SHOULD BE GREEN!!!! THE POTION'S FINAL COLOUR IS GREEN AND THEY MADE IT CLEAR!!!

Also Jekyll is a doctor, he acts like the fucking wimpy Swiss man from Frankenstein. Jekyll is meant to be a (mentally) strong man who experimented on himself and kept good notes during the whole thing. He is a doctor; he is used to seeing some shit.

Also...why would you make Hyde look like that? One of the few clear physical descriptions in the book is that Hyde is much shorter than Jekyll, but he's...hulkish. I don't like that because it takes the monstrosity away, pinning it all on looks and not on action.

Also why Paris? Why did Hyde run to Paris? There wasn't really a reason for him to do that in a writing sense.

Upside: At least he continues to run on rooftops. All Hydes run on rooftops; it is not optional.

Next on the Chopping block is Dorian.

For a moment there, I really thought they ruined Dorian, but hell yeah! They kinda did it!

I wish they'd had another actor to play him, since the dark hair makes him look a little malicious, which is quite the opposite of what he's supposed to look like. He's supposed to be a child-like and innocent; deceiving.

Also...what the fuck was his ending?? Like he doesn't perish if he looks at the portrait. It literally says earlier that "the last time [he] looked at the picture" which literally contradicts what happens later. He can look at the picture, but chooses not to.

I am glad they decided to not have him redeem himself. That fits a little closer to the book.

For Mina!

Quick thing: I have not yet finished reading Dracula, so I have no clue what's happening there or why she's the vampire (please don't spoil it) so I won't say anything on that (cough cough...should've been Carmilla)

I don't like making women the sole love interest. It feels weird. Literally three people liked her (well only 2, Dorian was pretending) out of five. Make it interesting, make it something someone would ship...there is literally no chemistry between any of them (except Dorian, and we don't even get a proper "oh yeah I hooked up with him" moment. It's only implied. When did that happen???). Also, Mina isn't that kind of person. She's (in book) not looking for romance in that sense, she had a husband, and I'm pretty sure she'd probably stay faithful to him even after death.

Speaking of Chemistry, why tf is she a chemist? Jekyll should've been the chemist. Mina is literally known for being able to write in shorthand, and they could've used that to her advantage. Again, please excuse this if somehow Mina does become a scientist after Dracula, but considering people's views on women in that time period, it's unlikely.

Skinner:

I think that's his name...idk. I have not read the Invisible Man, but why would they kill off Griffin? Like Jekyll dies, but he doesn't have a replacement. I can't say much since I haven't read the book.

I think that's all.

Thank you coming to my Little Leo lecture, and I hope anyone reading agrees, or can hopefully handle this as a mature adult. If you have other thoughts on this movie (whether they agree with mine or not) go ahead and share them, I'd be thrilled.

I may update this as I have things to say, but idk.

[beantothemax]

Bean

The time has come

The blorbo posts are moving out of tellius, who knows how long it will be until they break even the fe containment

CRAB BLORBO NR. WHATEVER I FORGOT!

ANNA!!!!!

Back to the basics, list time!!!

She is in literally every game except fe2 and it's remake fe15

I adore her little finger chin touch that she does in every game

Every iteration of her is actually a different person and they're all a big family of sisters

^this also has the implication that Anna has interdimensional travel powers (and also time travel)(this is also hinted at in engages epilogue)

I believe there's two eras of Anna, pre and post-awakening. With pre-awakening being more down to earth and existing a lot more as the menu and secret shop person, with post-awakening being more high energy, and I don't want to say one-note, but more, let's say focused on a specific gimmick, which in Annas case is being a cuttthroat buisnesswoman, and this often comes along as borderline psychopathic (/pos imo), but I don't think this was the intention. I love both versions

Post-awakening she's actually a playable character in almost all the games, including Awakening (Very fun to use, trickster class which is staves and Swords, she does especially well with Levin sword and that's always fun), Fates (haven't used her, dlc), Three Houses (kinda sucks and has no supports, also dlc and one of the other dlc characters is just better in everyway gameplay wise) and Engage (also very fun to use, uses axes at base and bows on promotion which is very nice, she also has great magic and can be very good as a mage)

Sells you drugs

So Anna huh, the most reocurring fe character by far, and I love reocurring characters. She's a shrewd buisnesswoman and always have been, but she's a pretty chill gal pre-awakening and just hangs around and gives you tips. And sells you drugs, don't forget about that. Then in awakening she returns once again, but now with a more, high-energy personality. The reason I called her borderline psychopathic is that she here begins to make a lot of quips and jokes about killing people in ways that are some kind of money puns in a very lighthearted tone, "prices aren't the only things i slash" for exampel. I personally find this kind of endearing (this holds up with my other blorbo Henry also from awakening). Then in engage she shows up as a child who has been lost from her family (her anna sisters) Here in engage she has a wonderful childlike feel when doing all her merchant things, while still having that dash of psychosis. And I find this very endearing as well.

She also has a boyfriend who is also reocurring, just not as much has her. Meet Jake! His personality and looks vary a bit.

Then there was the final dlc to awakening, bringing one final challenge to all who played the game. Apotheosis, featuring the final final boss...

Anna the merchant

This is an insane boss, probably the single strongest boss in all of fire emblem, with insane stats like 99 hp, 60 str, 50 mag, 70 skl, 70 spd, 65 lck, 55 def and 55 res. So insanely much.

But that's not even the worst part, her skills are. Counter dealing all physical damage back, Vantage+ to always attack first, Aether which is usually only a main character skill, dragonskin (????????) which halfs all damage dealt and RIGHTFUL GOD

RIGHTFUL GOD????????

rightful god gives 30% extra proc chance to all proc skills

BUT EVEN THE FACT THAT SHE HAS A SKILL CALLED RIGHTFUL GOD IS SCARY ENOUGH AND HAS SOME WEIRD IMPLICATIONS

yeah, insane boss

But overall yeah I just like her, great vibe tbh.

I think me liking her might also have something to do with that she reminds me a lot of an oc I made a loooong time ago with pie who has a special place in my heart.

Anyway finishing picture of all of anna

I find it extremely hilarious that Anna just. has time travel powers. The single constant of the fire emblem universe is the presence of silly capitalism gal

ALSO SHE’S A SUPERBOSS?????????? RIGHTFUL GOD?????????? WH?????????? WHY DOES THE FUNNY SECRET SHOP LADY HARBOR THE POWER OF THE HEAVENS

[canmom]

on D&D

there have been many a Posten floating across my slice through the tumblr database of late on the flaws of Dungeons & Dragons. this is an old, old argument - pushed by the White Wolf fans before my time, raised to a furious pitch by the Forge movement (Ron Edwards infamously declared that D&D players have brain damage), and continuing to simmer as the Forge gave way to 'Story Games', and then ebbing a bit with whatever that movement have way to. i don't even especially disagree - most of the good times I've had with D&D have been more despite the printed rulebooks than because of them.

however, it's worth considering what D&D actually is.

"D&D" should not be confused with the books released by Wizards of the Coast or TSR. Nor even the other books in the D&D family in the OSR, Pathfinder, etc. these are an important part of it to be sure, and WotC would certainly like us to think that it all flows out of the books.

however, I think 'buying a D&D book without any expectations, reading it cover, and attempting to run the game as described in the book' represents probably a tiny fraction of D&D players. any more than you could discern the practices of a religion by reading their holy book.

D&D, as actually practiced, is something like that - a set of practices or sorta oral tradition. you learn what D&D is when someone invites you to a D&D group, or you listen to an 'actual play' podcast, or - like me! - you fall into forums and read libraries worth of arguments about which edition is best and game balance and funny game table anecdotes, which create a picture in your head of idealised D&D, and then off you go and try and get your friends on board. you use the books primarily as a reference. (or nowadays you go on 5e.tools instead and don't buy expensive books).

the thing is, this tradition is really good at perpetuating itself and it's as endless and weird to dig into as any long running media franchise. and because a lot of it is an echo of weird 70s shit that comes from, say, an off-brand tokusatsu figurine from Hong Kong, or an author like Jack Vance whose legacy has been kinda swallowed by D&D, there's real character. yeah, there's plenty of tedious wank too, but the density of it means it can serve the 'creative prompt engine' function of an RPG in a way that's very difficult for a smaller, more tightly focused, and tbh less stupid game to be able to do.

it's also got a huge body of folklore to immerse in. the Dread Gazebo. Tucker's Kobolds. Pun-Pun. and it's fractal. a D&D forum, a podcast fanbase, etc. will end up with their own niche injokes. (of course, so will an individual group). there's endless lore to learn about the game's own history if you're that way inclined.

now you might say, most of that doesn't depend on it being D&D, the janky system outlined in the books of WotC. and that's true! there's no reason (beyond copyright) you couldn't confront a Bulette in Burning Wheel, play a Mind Flayer in Fiasco, or even set a game of Apocalypse World in Dark Sun.

this is where one of the quiet strengths of D&D-the-product does come in though. the role of the book is mostly to lend a certain sense of concreteness. it's a rhetorical trick: if you can turn to a page of the Monster Manual and see a mindflayer with a statblock, an artwork and a couple of unique abilities, then mindflayers feel more 'real'. factor in the existence of decades of history, splatbooks expanding on the concept, articles in Dragon, modules, stories about other groups who've encountered a mindflayer, and you feel like you know something. nevermind that most of the mindflayer lore is kind of eh at best! D&D is a machine that rewards your autism, hard.

and in terms of actual game design, there are some things that D&D is very granular about, like what your character can and can't do. D&D certainly is an unbalanced grab bag of not-exactly-integrated systems with no unifying design philosophy... and that's largely to its advantage in terms of making the stuff on your character sheet feel concrete, rather than ephemeral like the freely chosen Aspects in FATE. by making the map more complicated, the supposed territory it describes (the shared fiction) might be made to feel more substantial. it's not the only way to do this, mind you - you can absolutely make something a strongly impactful, constraining part of the shared fiction without numbers and dice. but the numbers and dice provide a scaffolding, a thing to lean on when you draw a blank.

(D&D arrived at this more or less by accident mind you. you could definitely say that something like the Moves of a PbtA game are a more coherent and flexible framework for system and fiction engaging without sacrificing substance. and there's plenty of trad games besides D&D which follow the same paradigm, not least because splatbooks are good business. still, I think there is something gained by what seems at a glance to just be an unholy mess of jank).

for a new game, it can't work in the same way. it's a chicken and egg problem. if nobody's ever played your game before, you can't so easily introduce it by doing. (sure you can run it for friends, but you can't rely on most people being introduced to the game that way). there may be a small or even large community of people for any given game, or maybe fans of types of game, but you have to mostly rely on the book to build up the concept in the player's mind.

one of the most useful tools you have is genre, but that's a double edged sword. there are many games that are just 'PbtA for cyberpunk' or whatever, instantly forgettable. again, that's a tricky bootstrapping problem. somehow, a game book needs to get players enthusiastic about the premise using the familiar, introduce them to the unique quirks that make it interesting, and put them in a mindset where they're ready to extemporise in whatever idiom the game suggests. tall order!

the voice of Apocalypse World - the rulebook - is very casual, quite aggressive. 'to do it, do it', not 'when its condition is met in the fiction, the Move is triggered' as a later PbtA might put it. it swears a lot. the voice of a Jenna Moran game is full of little asides and wordplay. the voice of an Avery Alder game is exhaustingly sanctimonious, which has unfortunately spread to other authors. this aspect, the feeling you get reading it describe the stuff it wants you to do, is way more important in telling you about the game than the short story you skip over at the beginning of the book, or even any particular mechanical procedure.

the voice of modern D&D is... honestly in its current edition, painfully corporate and dull. nothing puts me off playing D&D faster than reading the class introductions! but where it has the most character unique sort of slightly arch 'game prose', kind of like an encyclopedia entry with dice rolls in the middle of a sentence. it's unabashedly nerdy, comfortingly so. this is why long lists of almost identical polearms are actually valuable. games need to have something weird and jank and inexplicable for your brain to hold on to.

however... that mass is also a weakness. because all that concrete stuff that you can lean on to flesh out and inspire your imaginings... is also a lot to digest for a potential new player. (this is a reason why I've found it hard to get into games like Shadowrun and Eclipse Phase, lacking a clear on-ramp, and my ideas clashing unpredictably with established stuff.)

compared to games with a hyper-defined setting, and games that create it all improvisationally in the first session, D&D's modular framework is actually pretty ingenious. if every campaign takes place in its own mini setting designed by the DM, there's huge libraries of stuff that could be there, so you can get that 'I recognised that' knowledge, but there's no need to digest a campaign setting or worry about lore conflicts. you can be ~intertextual~ with other D&D games - "oh yeah, my DM used that!" - without all the commitments of an official setting. (of course, D&D has plenty of those too, and many of them are pretty neat. but it's agnostic about whether you use them.) this also gives you a starting point for making your own setting. "here's a thing that's expected to be there. what's your spin on this?" is a really productive question, if the things are minimally interesting.

so being a DM is kind of a bridge between "run it by the book" and "make your own game". you have a lot of freedom, and you have fallbacks to lean on. that's actually pretty good I think.

the DM role is... you could spin it different ways. on the one hand, it gives one player vastly more work than the others, turning them into a mini game designer + master of ceremonies + multirole actor + narrative author + typically, organiser; the one who's responsible for carrying the whole thing. on the other hand... that's a stage. if you are lucky enough to play with a really good DM, the whole thing really does come alive in a way that a book, no matter how elegant or flavourful, could never convey - because it's responsive to you and you get a rapport going. of course by the same token an unengaged, unenthusiastic DM can't be saved by any procedures or rules you could imagine. in that middle ground... that's where tools like Apocalypse World's MC moves come in to help. for D&D, 'how to DM well' is in my experience communicated almost exclusively through stories and imitation - you could never learn it from the DMG.

viewed as a practice or a ritual, D&D likes to mysticise the DM, like the mad wizard who built the moldering pile etc etc. you have the pageantry of the DM's screen, hidden dice rolls, passed notes, asking for perception checks without explanation. if you play in to it (you should, it's part of the fun), you get to lean on the established image of the Dungeon Master, not just someone in a room telling a story. oh wait, is that actual magic?

incidentally, I never really ran Apocalypse World strictly 'by the book'. I was aware of the list of principles and vaguely remembered the moves, but equally, perhaps more so, I was thinking of the idea of an Apocalypse World MC suggested in discussions online. I was also of course leaning on previous experience playing D&D and other games. it worked well, better the second time when I was older, because it's like 75% about being genuinely enthusiastic and paying attention to people when you get right down to it.

all this is why it's hard to replace D&D with a suite of modern, elegant purpose built systems. most of what happens at a TTRPG table, with any 'system', is not determined by what's written in the book but some fuzzy social dynamic in a given group of people and their shared idea of what the game is supposed to be. you can try and introduce rules and procedures into that dynamic, even create a game like Firebrands where nearly every step comes from a prompt list. (the question of how much the explicit mechanics should touch social interactions and narrative structure is a matter of taste). it can be helpful, but you can also risk stifling something important that comes in improv.

viewing the broad space of indie RPGs as its own tradition, like D&D... 'indie RPGs' has its own content, a shared context of frequent ttrpg players, the type like me who are likely to try a new system every campaign. the more games you play, the more analogies you can draw and the quicker you can pick up the gist of a new game. you'll have cross-game skills in e.g. improv or breaking down systems, and an established habitus in terms of stepping into character or playing a GM-like role that can't be written in a book. if you've only ever played D&D, or no TTRPGs at all, you'll have some of that, but a lot will be unfamiliar and the benefit won't necessarily be obvious.

I do think getting into the broader space of TTRPGs is worthwhile, because... ok this is going to sound pretentious as hell but seriously, it's a ridiculously interesting art form, both the designing and the playing of them. but also that's given me a perspective to look back and say, oh, that's what D&D was all along!

what would kill D&D, WotC edition? hard to imagine. there have been splinters, like the OSR for people who like simple mechanics, high lethality and the flavour associated with older editions, or Pathfinder for people who... idk, who really like 3.5 I guess and just wanted a few balance tweaks, idk, did it diverge more? it's definitely just D&D in a funny hat though. oh and there's Dungeon World but lol, Dungeon World.

D&D-the-product-line has come close to collapsing a couple of times, once when TSR went under, again when 4e divided the 3.5e fanbase hard, but 5e being a 'pretty solid for the most part' game that managed to somehow appeal to multiple ideas of 'what D&D is', along the Actual Play renaissance selling a new generation on the idea of D&D... that saved it. maybe it's about to take another hit with this new OGL killing the secondary industry.

I don't think that most of the D&D groups out there, in it for the idea of D&D, would be playing other TTRPGs if only D&D was not so big. likely they wouldn't be doing any such thing at all, but some other dorky hobby. if WotC-run D&D goes under, I'm not sure what happens! D&D-the-practice would continue no doubt, and maybe it starts looking like the OSR, with numerous variations on a theme that don't carry the stamp of 'officialness', until one or another can become an unofficial standard. maybe it looks like open source software and some kind of nonprofit D&D foundation is created to control the source lol. would be interesting to see.

aaaaanyway. if you want your fave non-D&D TTRPGs to thrive as D&D has, here's what you gotta do. talk about them. tell anecdotes from your games, the stupid memes and injokes, what you really like about the mechanics, tell everyone about the weird fun fucked up bits of the lore. tell a story about what it means to play that game. and sure, talk about how it's different from D&D and why you like it more. that story is the bait that will get people onto that fun new RPG system and give them a handle to get started. what got me into 'Story Games' all those years ago was finding a forum with a whole bunch of people having fascinating nerdy discussions about sides of TTRPGs I'd never been exposed to in D&D.

[of course me being me, I took it way too seriously and made a whole thing in my head about how much better these new, progressive Story Games were better than janky old incoherent Trad Games. for years I wouldn't even consider playing D&D or similar. all I can say is, I'm really glad I got over that attitude. hence this kind of post.]

[bibiana112]

Kinda weird question- do you have any links to people talking about Mira from ZTD and ableist stereotypes? I mentioned that I was uncomfortable with her portrayal but kinda fumbled it and made some other ND people in chat uncomfortable. I searched for various keyword combinations but most of what I'm finding is like "and not to mention the ableism with Mira" and doesn't elaborate lol.

Not weird at all! And uh, you see, there's a recent post I made where what I complain about is the very fact I've never seen anyone post too in-depth about her at all, I'd love to see posts that do elaborate on that but I do not have any that I know of right now, sorry :/ hopefully someone else who sees this can point to one? Okay!! After some tag searches I have found exactly one post who kind of gets into it I like this take still would love to see. more than just one but hooray

And like though I complain I couldn't elaborate much on it myself I don't think, I believe most of the posts people make about Saito from aitsf would apply since it's a different uchikoshi take on the very same trope of "emotionless characters who cannot function without killing others" I guess he's a worse portrayal though since she's at least not stated to get reward brain chemicals when killing people and I guess her case also has the added layer of "femme fatale" to it? Which either makes it less bad or worse depending on where you approach it from As I said I am not doing a good job of being coherent on this oh and also there's her being "redeemed" and "cured" in the epilogue which in on itself is kinda not great to imply it just goes away like that and honestly I personally don't even buy it I think she'd just be like oh okay Akane over here has like a thousand reasons to hate me after all that oh and what's that she's the leader of a super wealthy underground organization who's organized one of these death traps before yeah no I'm better off going to prison I'll be fine there lmao bye

But I'll say as an autistic person with relatively low empathy I usually see a character who just doesn't understand other people's feelings and wants to feel them too and is just trying to survive despite getting no help and I just kinda go hm. yeah. shout-out to roxas kingdom hearts shout out to mary from ib shout out that's why I started hyperfixating on media art helps me with understanding others a great lot and Mira is just in a story too badly executed for me to care or even begin to wrap my head around tbh like god she's so fucking terribly used as a plot device in every conceivable way that it makes it difficult to see past it and into what she could possibly be if it weren't for the stereotype of equalling low empathy with no compassion what's with her killing off screen in ways that wildly deviate from her stated m.o? why or how was she even in cahoots with Zero why was that a thing? Honestly her dynamic with Sean could have been better fleshed out could have done something interesting about robot child and his aspd big sis but we just kind of don't get any attention brought to the subject of emotions and the authenticity there of except for the "reveal"...

YOU KNOW WHAT that's probably one huge reason it feels so fucked up actually! Like the whole fucking game is written so you could experience it in whatever order you want and therefore Mira being a serial killer at all is something that though not very well hidden it also cannot be a topic of discussion or explored Ever ever because the player may not have seen the fragment where that is revealed yet- problem being the menu design of that game sucks so bad and practically everyone gravitates towards the same few more interesting looking thumbnails first and then the rest is kinda just there, I mean that is part of the reason A Lot of characters feel half-baked I think but also I think it definitely does impact perception of her character specifically probably The Most and then there's just the general not being given nuance not being able to see the minutiae of how that disorder manifests in her character aside from the killings about how she acts aside from being overly flirty trying to lure in Eric but that affects pretty much all of the new cast we don't have last names and in her case we barely have any backstory at all like Saito is a harmful stereotype sure but we get So Much Context for him that people still love talking about him and delving into different aspects of his life since we have that very well telegraphed in the narrative meanwhile for Mira all we can do is fill in the blanks guesswork that only highlights the worst aspects of the surface level portrayal we got and ultimately that people just don't care enough to dissect because there isn't much there character wise once you remove it

[killingmyfavcharacterbcilovethem]

I live and breathe for the hc that donnie and mikey are both on the aroace spectrum (all of them are tbh, but i think those two are just more close to the strict spectrum so i feel more connected to them, mikey would be strictly aroace and donnie could be grey-aroace biromantic) and they bond because of that.

So I'll probably write a fic about it but I'll try to sum up my idea of how they figured it out.

Donnie kind of already knew, he never bothered to look into a name for it, but he knew he liked guys and girls, but never really LIKED them yk what i mean? He had crushs but they never lasted more than a week so he never really bothered telling anyone about it

When Leo starts dating Usagi and they spend a great part of their time in the lair, Mikey starts acting weird all of sudden towards them and Leo thinks mikey's mad at him because he's dating a boy, he knows there's probably another reason but he can't force himself to ask mikey, because yeah okay, he said it was okay if he was gay and would always love his brother, but waht if he didn't??

One time when Donnie went to the kitchen to het coffe in the middle of the night, he passed through mikey's bedroom and heard someone crying, so he decided to check. Mikey was the one crying.

After trying to calm him down, he asks his little brother what's wrong and Mikey just goes "Donnie why does Leo gets to date someone and I don't?"

Donnie doesn't get it at first "Well, you're still 15, it's fine if you didn't find anyone-"

"I don't want to find anyone," he would say "I mean I do, i just, don't feel like it's gonna happen, it's confusing-" he tries to explain "I want to fall for someone, but at the same time I don't like the idea of having to date someone or even liking them romantically, it's like wanting what you can't have"

It takes a few more tries and explanations from Mikey but when Donnie finally understands what mikey means by that, he tells him about how he kinda feels the same.

They take Donnies phone and decide to look it up on the internet and find out about the aroace spectrum, and god, finding a label that actually fits them is somewhat comforting. Eventually Mikey comes out to the family and talks to Leo about it, and Leo's relieved to know his little brother doesn't hate him for being queer.

Being aroace might suck sometimes, principally when everything around you starts to revolves around romance, and people actually expect you to fall in love at any moment, but it kind of gets a little bit better when you have someone around that you know feels something similar to you.

[thyme-in-a-bubble]

muffin blabbering away.. totally random but also interested to hear your thoughts on this, why do you think some men draw away when you give them affection or when u support them in the way that women support or reassure other women. idk it’s been a weird reoccurring theme. doesn’t bother me but it would be nice to know if there was a reason why. butttt anyways, been having a really good week, think a holiday was all that was needed or a break from loads of social interaction. got back into reading!! need to find some new recipes to make. wanted to attempt choux pastry but need to look at some more stuff or see if i need any fancy equipment for it tbh. looks a little scary to make but i can’t wait to have the kitchen to myself, put on some music and try it out. hope you’re doing well and having an amazing week!!!!!

oh, honestly? i don't know. that's not really a genre of men i'm very familiar with. it's probably a toxic masculinity thing. maybe it's some individuals who didn't grow up in an environment where that kind of affection was normal, so they sadly aren't comfortable with it or it confused them because it's kinda alien to them. there could be an infinite amount of answers that are all correct depending on the specific individual and situation. but yeah, i'm not that well-versed in that kind of dude. probably a cultural thing, idk. denmark is a hippie dippie country, so we're all just little flower children who hug and kiss and frolic in fields.

yeees, we stan a break (said the early retired person lol)

omg, what have you been reading?

choux pastry? a little puffy yum! in my limited experience with it, i don't think it's particularly difficult, or as difficult as the end result looks (then again, i'm not sure if my personal judgement of what is easy and hard in the kitchen is considered normal. the people around me say no since i casually just throw stuff like croissants together whenever the mood strikes). you don't really need any fancy tools, like you can just use a normal food/sandwich bag as a pastry bag, just cut a hole in the corner and pipe.

「 come join my 10k celebration 」

[sapphire-weapon]

I never understood that "Capcom didn't want fans to see Ashley and Leon as romantic and ship them", like where does it come from? Is it from an actual source ? or like a mistranslation?? or maybe like the same misunderstanding with them not wanting eagleone to hold hands thing?

bc if capcom didn't want people to ship them then they wouldn't have made the remake they made, like even people who don't ship it like some YouTubers I've seen think Leon and Ashley are flirting back and forth and now it's not even just a one-sided kinda thing with Ashley crushing on Leon like he is receptive to her feelings

Even some of the innocuous things Leon says and the way he says them sound flirty, dude the way he praises her is not just being polite not to mention all the touching and body language

Like I'm not even the best at getting these kind of things being a neurodivergent person that sometime has to be told exactly what someone's intentions are and yet even I see it. Took me a while tbh probably in late game but still lol

it's literally the holding hands thing -- which, again, without seeing the original Japanese as to what was really said (which I don't think actually exists anywhere) there's no way to know what was meant by "too close."

and even if it was meant in a romantic way, it's still disingenuous to say that Capcom didn't want Leon and Ashley to be seen as romantic -- as though there was a concerted effort on the part of the entire team to make sure there was no romantic aspect between them. the animation for them holding hands had already been rendered up, and one of the directors actively wanted it in. it was just the one guy who didn't like it -- and it's very likely that the main reason he won that fight despite being outnumbered was because Leon and Ashley holding hands probably would've impacted gameplay in a negative way.

and I say that because there's so much meta evidence that Resident Evil 4 Remake was purposefully and intentionally written as a romance between Leon and Ashley.

I have been shipping eagleone for eighteen goddamn years, and I have been very vocal about my stance that it is an objectively good thing that Leon and Ashley holding hands was removed from the game. it would have caused an extra half-second delay in Leon being able to ready his weapon (switching from knife to gun is sometimes annoying in this way), and having the two of them be that physically close to each other on-screen for an extended period of time would've fucked up visibility and made it difficult and frustrating to traverse/explore environments.

though I know I'm a weird anomaly in the sense that I'm a fandom person who actually gives a shit about gameplay, but.

it also seems a little patronizing to think that Ashley needs to be led around by the hand. she's not a child, for one. and for two, it actually undercuts her character arc of learning to be independent and finding her courage.

so, yeah -- any time you see someone go "Capcom said that Leon and Ashley's relationship isn't romantic!" know that they're being purposefully disingenuous because they feel threatened by the ship in some way.

[tomwambsgans]

I can’t find the post for the life of me but on reddit I saw somebody talking about homophobia in succession and interestingly the person with the second most homophobic comments (after surprise surprise Logan) was Shiv. I just wanted to know your thoughts on this I’m conjunction to tomgreg and in general Shiv and her self characterisation as “woke”

idk if it's the same post you were trying to find but i made a post about that too

my take on WHY it's shiv who is the most guilty of overt homophobia after logan is tbh quite simply that shiv has the most to gain from it. there's a lot of posts on here about gender in succession which i think essentially sum up the way that shiv is kind of required to be "one of the guys" or at least "the good kind" of woman in order to have logan's approval. shiv really is the most like logan in many ways and she's learned from him how to have power over men: it's to deny them their own masculinity. and homophobia is the main way a woman can do that to a man.

shiv's personal "wokeness" i think comes exclusively from her womanhood and basically all the ways she fails to get logan's approval or otherwise have power in a room full of men, because those supposed values are enthusiastically eschewed the moment that she has power. i think this same thing in essence happens with basically every character of course, like with kendall's own very performative feminism and supposed respect for women that he revokes the moment it benefits him personally to be misogynistic. and that's basically ALL it is - that they do what benefits them. sometimes it benefits shiv to be the moral voice of reason in the room bc she has nothing to lose otherwise and it's retaining a sense of superiority at the least. and certainly some things she does sincerely believe are wrong, like mencken being elected president, and in fact most of the main cast clearly thinks so but roman who is a lot more naive, politically. speaking of, there's then the fact that shiv has a career in all this so she's especially aware, basically, about how fake it kinda is. she's a classic rich democrat. that's simply the default horse she's chosen because it works for her.

as for how it relates to tomgreg... i'd say it obv firstly relates to tom and the fact that tom is shiv's partner because he's safe. and a huge part of tom being safe is frankly that he's gay. i don't think shiv is very consciously aware of this (but i don't think she's utterly oblivious either) but it's no coincidence that she's with a guy who's submissive and effeminate and also clearly insecure about those things. and it's not JUST that his lack of objectifying desire is safe, but also that it makes him easy for her to control him, and the thing with shiv is that quite like her dad she needs to have someone around to control.

now shiv being this way def overlaps with tomgreg specifically, since like tom's repression is linked to his stifling homophobic environment and shiv is a part of that, but i think that's one thing that shiv doesn't really know about. i think she has thoughts about gay little cousin greg, and they're all probably along the lines of just, yeah that's cousin greg and he seems pretty gay, whatever. if she has ever had a real whiff of tomgreg (prior to accusing them of double-teaming girls together) i doubt that it was along the lines of tom's desire and much more likely that she saw gay cousin greg sidling up to her man. and even then i really don't think it was on her mind. i think she saw tom having a weird relationship with greg and didn't mentally factor any desire in there, but just saw masculine posturing and respected it, maybe? like tom needs some outlet after being submissive to her and she prob knows that much.

but actually that does make me think of how homophobia in succession is almost always akin to a greek sort of bottomphobia, like being gay is bad because it takes away your manhood, it's the bad thing to take it in the ass or to suck cock, etc - almost never the reverse. the one instance of the reverse that i can think of is when logan is accusing kendall of trying to fuck the waiter in the sense that gay desire is predatory. that's of course the dichotomy of (male) homophobia, that it asserts either an unforgivable personal gender or the perversion that makes you ruin others. but the latter is as self-contradictory as manhood itself is and not nearly as pervasive as it used to be. the latter doesn't interfere with one's manhood at all and that's really what's at stake in the world of succession. logan is just an old, old dinosaur who will whip out any ol' homophobia as long as it gets his sons under his control.

anyway i think shiv could be driven to whip out similar accusations to hurt tom (and the "i hear you fuck models now" stuff did kinda feel along that vein) but isn't very likely to. funnily enough i think she wouldn't even know exactly how much that sort of thing would hurt him on the basis alone of making implications about greg.

[chaoticdelinqueerwithglitter]

you seem to be an avid sanzu enjoyer, and i'm still really curious about your harutaku hcs (please please please tell me anything you want i'm trying to get hooked so i can write this for you :3) so if they were, perhaps, in a different timeline, would their relationship change in any way or is this ship specifically for the bad toman timeline?

Yeps, you caught me, I love my lil pink gremlin a not at all normal amount 🙈

Write this for me? Are you writting a harutaku fic? 🥹 Thank you so much anon, we need to spread this ship around the world! 💜

(using his prettiness and fake angelic look for convincing everyone)

About HaruTaku in other timelines:

Tbh, I only pictured them in Bad Toman because is the only timeline when they could really interact, at least in the bad futures.

Buuuuut.... Final timeline!

Okay, here me out, in this timeline the dynamic will be totally different (healthier mostly xD)

Takemichi and Takuya were childhood friends and now Michi is friend with Mikey and probably Baji and Haruchiyo too, right? (clearly Haru was more difficult to open up with Takemichi bc he was so jealous xD)

So it will make sense that Takuya met the other 3 when they were all kids, Takemichi doing a "catch them all" with his friends/people he wants to save? Of course he will!

And what we know about lil Haru? That he was sweet and even kinda shy comparing to the others (ignoring the slashing Takeomi's face for a moment bc that was probably a extreme situation). Also weird and already a Mikey believer.

Is not difficult to imagine that even if he disliked Takemichi, it was different with Takuya. Because like Haru, Takuya wasn't thay bold as Baji and Mikey, he was more calm. Takuya was probably the one that noticed more when Haru felt like an outsider or didn't know how to fit in, bc Takuya felt the same way even more often.

It didn't took them a long time to start being friends and hanging out with each other. Don't take me wrong, Haru was still Mikey's fan, but it felt good to have a friend that saw him, that didn't expected him to be braver, happier. That never judged him for wanting to curl up and cry when things went wrong.

Without realizing, the others started to see this two as best friends 🤭

So yeah, they became teens and Haru started being more loud, more openly weird. He never did masking (metaphorically and literally) in this timeline! So... Weird loud Haruchiyo being kicked out of Toman meetings, hell yeah! He was wild and with no reasons to hide it or no one to "tame" him.

But with Takuya? Takuya balanced him somehow, his presence was soothing and calming, so Haru always felt comfortable. Ofc he was still weird, but he never felt the need to prove anything.

In the other hand, Takuya was still a people pleaser, ofc. But this time Haruchiyo got angry when people tried to take advantatge of that (yeah, he got angry at Takuya for allowing it sometimes too xD). Maybe that even helped Takuya to start standing for himself a little bit with a lot of time.

I'm having a mental image of Takuya actually standing up in a kamikaze way for deffending Haruchiyo of some idiots that were trying to annoy Takuya. Something on the lines of Takuya ignoring it when they were picking on him but snapping when they suddenly said something like "And where is the other faggot? The pink haired weirdo that always goes with you"

Because c'mon, no way this two going together all the time, being both so pretty and androginous didn't got homophobic comments more than once! Until everyone learned how dangerous it was to say this things infront of some one who had a katana, at least xD

Takuya learning how to stand up for himself a little bit more thanks to Haruchiyo. Haruchiyo learning how to not be so unhinged with his reactions and that slashing people wasn't justified in most cases thanks to Takuya 🥹

But also, Takuya knew Haruchiyo wasn't asking him to be some one else, that Haru enjoyed his company even if he wasn't a fighter or a confident person (Takuya comparing himself with the rest of Toman, poor baby 🥲). He knew Haruchiyo accepted him for who he was, that he was just worried about people treating him badly.

Obviously, as teens this wasn't that easy and Takuya got really insecure, specially when Toman was founded. Haruchiyo wasn't that shy anymore and he had friends that were also wild and trouble-makers, why would he want to still hang out with Takuya? What if when Haru got mad because he didn't defended himself it was actually that he was disappointed with Takuya for being so weak?

Teenage insecurities and misscomunication happening, yeeeey!

At some point they had a big fight about it with mostly Haru yelling and being a lil shit bc once more Takuya allowed some idiots to bully him. But surprise, Takuya end up yelling too, something in the lines of "I know I'm weak and boring comparing to the others, I know that! Is who I am, but you don't had to keep putting with me anymore, okay?" What made Haruchiyo snap of his rage and realize that Takuya understood it wrong. That Takuya was feeling what Haru always felt going with Mikey and Baji.

And they make peaces. And probably make out too 👀

Not sure when their friendship became something more, I would have to think about that, but the point is...

Childhood sweeathearts HaruTaku! 💜

That's all I got for now, but I'm loving this idea of them being more healthy and actually good for each other. Wholesome friends to lovers, yey! So I will probably keep thinking about them, who knows if another drabble would happen someday! 👀

(Also, in case some one wants to read the previous HaruTaku hc, here they are! With more contributions of a moot bc dae were so right with that 😌)