#hazardverse

[bitegore]

Let me pose a thought experiment to you.

You are a powerful reality-warper who has the ability to mind-control people, travel through space unaided, survive almost any physical conditions, and change shape at will (though you have to go through a year-or-so long process to change what those forms are). You can, essentially, do anything you want. Except this is also true of everyone else around you, because this is just kind of how your species is built. (Everyone isn't necessarily built like this, of course - aliens are aliens. Some aliens are much more powerful reality-warpers, and some are much less, or they don't warp reality at all.)

You want Ultimate Power™.

There are only a few ways to get it, because mind-control is frowned upon for political expedience in the broader galaxy, and there are more than enough people hitting above your weight class that you can't just waltz in, force people to agree with your whims, and walk out with Ultimate Power™. You'll get thrown into the Space Hague in like, five minutes, if someone doesn't outright kill you for the insolence. Not everyone can shake it off, but enough people can, when you're getting into the realms of Ultimate Power™

Similar laws govern the legality of using mind-control to rig elections and semi-legally get you involved in the political arenas that get you involved in Near-Ultimate Power (which is, natch, good enough for you). You can't do that either.

If you really want Ultimate Power™, you have to work with a coalition, which is true of basically everyone after Ultimate Power™. This isn't the end of the world. Having a coalition working for Mutual Ultimate Power™ means that you guys can all share in the spoils, once you have them. The problem is still having them. Even working together, it's still difficult to successfully grab and hold power, isn't it?

There are very few ways to take power, and doing it legitimately is a sucker's game. The only accessible pathway to true power is through building a majority party that will acquiesce to your demands within a pre-existing intergalactic governing body of planetary and planet-system governments (we'll call it the Inter-Galactic Senate, ISG for short; this is backstage so no names are set in stone). Representatives in the ISG get their votes for each member state they represesnt. You want to gain position in the ISG by being "elected" as a representative. You can be the representative for multiple planets or planetary systems, but pretty much every member so far is already spoken for.

The obvious move is to find a non-member planet with aliens on it and convince them to elect you their ISG representative. Or, you know, "convince", and, you know, "elect". Heh heh. Whatever gets you your Ultimate Power™.

And naturally - the more the merrier. Every planet you can pull under your sway gets you a little closer to the goal.

Any overt use of mind-control will still get you tossed into the Space Hague.

You have essentially-unlimited material resources, including money for mercenaries, aid, and organizations. You have all the time in the world.

There are only two conditions.

You cannot appear "evil" (no force-backed dictatorships beating votes in favor out of people)

These people must not only back you at exactly the right moment, but every other time they're called upon, they must always stay in support of you.

What do you do?

[bitegore]

:D

I really like all of this, especially how much of a focus it sounds like you have on replayability!! What with so many endings and so much that can be discovered on reruns. However, it all feels really trapped as a game itself? Which I love. It allows players to learn just about everything there is about the murders (which I think the scenarios mechanic is esp good at reinforcing this), but that's most of what a player can ever get from the sounds of it. Try as they might, play over and over again and again, the satisfaction of uncovering everything about Erica and Haven will be just out of reach. And that adds to the helplessness!! In a way, it feels like a reminder that this is a game contained to a plot, but the antagonists are so much further beyond it. They're so much more than the plot, and therefore, they're so much more than both the player and their experience.

i really like how you put this! Which is funny, though, because I do intend to have, like, an extra-secret-you're-not-really-supposed-to-do-that bonus "win condition" if, specifically, you kill Haven/tutorial guy and then kill Erica (because after doing that, the game will continue on as normal for three game 'days' and then people will be like hey what happened to that guy whose farm you bought. where'd he go. and then erica will come Get you.

But I can't decide if that should mean everything continues as normal infinitely (which would mean I run out of material) or like, if then you should get a different system-shock - that without Erica and Haven pulling strings, this situation is hideously untenable, because the bad-guy you're supposed to be playing economic wargames against is getting all of his money from investing abroad, and you are running a farm.

Also maybe when i run out of material I'll j;ust write "in the future..." style endings for every main romance and call it quits there, LOL. Like i do want it to be rewarding at that point theoretically, even if the point is to pull the rug out from under the player LOL

Oh!!! And it's a really nice touch to have the route where you help Erica murder and the one where you don't both have the same ending of getting framed. Considering how many tries it would probably take a player to get the 'murder with Erica' route, and that they would probably get the other framed ending in that time, it would feel like a horrific punch in the gut to do everything right, go back to the farm, and then proceed to get a very familiar not-quite-cutscene!! Absolutely miserable sounding to play, very smart.

YESSSSSS... yessssssss you get it :D I even have a bit in my notes for like, prelim/planning dialogue that deals with this, too, because it's the only thing that changes if you take the accomplice run (w/ placeholder pronouns):

ERICA: Let's leave them alive. THE REDHEADED MAN: Oh, really? ERICA: Yeah. ERICA: Who's going to believe them if they about us? THE REDHEADED MAN: Ha! True. ERICA: And when they come to find out why everyone's dead... if you fought her: ERICA: ...well, it's not like they were any help. if you were an accomplice: ERICA: ...hell, they killed half of them off themself!

No concern or anything. She just didn't kill you and keeps not killing you, that's the best you're getting. Evil foxgirl </3 she doesn't love you after all </3

What is just as much of a punch, but less miserable, is how Erica's ranged attack for a stalling player and Haven's complimentary dialogue are basically the same thing? At least that's how I view them. Both would horrifically catch a player off guard, and they feel almost as if they're taunting the player for not paying sufficient attention?

Absolutely. I want especially Haven's lines to all be kind of like... something that makes you raise your eyebrows, every time he says anything. Like of the game, I want the tone - at least until mid-game - to be... maybe not, like, saccharine but like edging into that like "cozy fantasy" space where people are nice and even when they don't like you they're not, like, mean about it?

And then the first thing Haven says when he's not like briskly explaining what a plant is is, like... you're chatting up the baker's wife (who is cheating on her husband with you in her romance because i think it's fun that way) and he's like. [looks up from where he's standing by the wall] "Her husband definitely knows she's fucking around behind his back, but he still gets mad every time he hears about it? What a loser. He should just watch and jerk off like the rest of us" or something like. Abruptly weirdly crass for a guy who isn't allegedly one of the Crass Asshole NPCs, genuinely judgemental and mean, and like... just visibly operating on a slightly different logic that is not so nice as everyone else is.

And Erica kicking rocks at you is just me punishing cowardice rather than not paying attention. But it IS because she loves needling people, you're right, it is some needling-type behavior. The kind of combat system I want to do, though, if you go AFK around Erica she just kills you. Not turnbased. You can't hold still without having her Get you.

but as for the dialogue, it makes me imagine that the easiest way to stumble upon it would be afk-ing around Erica- as she sounds unlikable enough that I have a hard time imagining someone wanting to spend enough time with her to get that line/lines (at least not on a first run).

I'm assuming this is about the like, murder route dialogue? In which case - I do actually have a lot of thoughts about the reasons why you'd want to talk to specifically either Erica or her brother, given they're supposed to be your enemies. Both of them give you "trade secrets", which are like mechanically important for the farming part, and the more friendly you are with them, the more they're going to give you - but the brother is more loyal to his family, so he has to be at a certain level of "liking you", whereas Erica will tell you all sorts of things even if you barely know her. Also all of this is late-game dialogue - which is after she's dropped her nice-person act and is during, like, cutscenes with story importance. Before that, she's... well, I wouldn't say she's that interesting, but she ideally would have some charm points and come off nice, which is why peppering some of that stuff in would (I think) be less odd than it might sound in description alone.

As a side note, do you have any place or tag to find out more about your characters? I see your art of them frequently and really enjoy it, and this has only piqued my curiosity more. :]

I'm working on being a little less precious about my lore! I wrote up a post here (it's a lore primer i originally wrote for my subscribestar) that covers the basics and the "plot" these two and one other, later character who is also involved in, actually have going on - but at the moment most of it is on my subscribestar. which costs money. like i will absolutely link it still but it costs money. I guess i've also tagged a bunch of posts with them and tag commentary, but that's not a great way to actually Get It so much as to get, like, a baffling baffling baffling picture of some bizarre as hell characters.

one day i'll finish writing a single story with these people and then i'll be able to share stuff for realsies :3

Stardew Valley-inspired Erica animation, drawn sometime in January while I was sick as a dog. This took ages, and all because I wanted to animate the bloodstains moving properly. The framerate isn't even quite right lol.

[hazardverseofficial]

My contribution :D @xpau-official

hope i'm not too late lol

[gnine2]

Haven't been drawing much of late. But recently got obsessed with the m/m novel series Hazard & Somerset by Gregory Ashe, and its proved inspiring.

[austenwazright]

Still trying to get over the fact that North saw John-Henry (after being beated up as fuck) and though that he was of average height "but that was the only average thing about him". Can you imagine being this pretty and not working with entertainment??? I mean he just goes through his life like that, no wonder my boy got some problems

[scarletenvy]

whenever i hear tarasenko mentioned im like that’s not a real man that’s john-henry somerset’s favourite hockey player in hazardverse

[eloreenmoon]

Follows With Intent (Hazardverse: Sidetracks) by Gregory Ashe #LGBT #Mystery #MMRomance #DuoReview #Audiobook

Dana and Erryn review Follows With Intent (Hazardverse: Sidetracks) by Gregory Ashe. (Audiobook released Jan 31, 2025. Narrated by Kale Williams. 7 hrs in length. Ebook published by Hodgkin & Blount, May 24, 2024. 246 pages.) An audio code was provided in exchange for an honest review. Keeping your eye on the prize isn’t always a good thing. Nico knows he’s difficult; he has the string of exes to…

[epiphainie]

shilling my favorite books again

[screaming-internally]

Ive finished reading the new addition to Hazardverse Sidetracks series and OH MY GOD! I liked Fer from the start since he was introduced as August brother. I mean it was hard not to, he loves his annoying, troublesome family for which he would do everything and anything to help them including sacrificing his life!

So I was incredibly happy when book with him came out!! I devoured it when I could, lost precious sleep but it was so addicting. Fer sense of humour, finding out how his life really looks like, how generous and loving person he is! Plus it’s contemporary so no crime cases this time! Thank goodness as Fer and Ze had enough problems as it was. I’m rambling but omg I already miss them! Why Ashe’s characters have something in them that I always get too attached and then can’t forget abt them

[bitegore]

@ratscrap has done it again. everyone go get an image for serious

[hazardverseofficial]

Don't Forget... Bakar lore Fun fact: He kept his promise. The only sans (in HV) who could.

[rolltobreathe]

After their victory against Gorgon & Python, our team of heroes heads over to the Cape N' Shake for some celebration.  Though tensions run high as Yoshiko's personhood is once again called into question, the situation diffuses, and Reverse-All shares a private moment with his future role model.  It seems that our heroes have successfully saved the day and returned to their mundane problems-- that is, until a strange shifting metal creature makes headlines attacking the downtown area...

Episode art by Bee. Sound editing by Kyle. Theme music by Avery Stemmler. Background music by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons 3.0.

Roll to Breathe is funded by Patreon. If you like the show, please consider backing us yourself!

[scarletenvy]

fuck fuck fuck gregory published a nico book i’m gonna fucking combust this better come out as an audiobook or i’ll cry

[bitegore]

The best way i can describe Erica is that she's been suckered into a very high stakes game of what she expected to be poker but which turned out to use a deck she's never seen, with rules no one will explain, against someone who has not only stacked the deck in his favor but is also actively cheating, and which she is physically barred from forfeiting or quitting. and not only does she get on the ball fast enough to stay a player, she eventually gets good enough at it to not only win but to figure out deeper rules and strategies than any of the other players (who know the game and have been playing longer than Erica has been alive) have never realized. And then she starts winning, and doesn't stop until she's taken not just the pot but also destroyed the entire illegal casino on her way out, just because she can.

[hazardverseofficial]

"This is what must be done to ensure the survival of my race. You die so that many more may Live." 12 years into the epidemic in his AU, Nightmare approached Horror offering a way to save his world in exchange for his service. Horror now lives in the castle with Dust and Nightmare. He is banned from the kitchen because he cannot cook to save his world. He would do anything to go home, in his eyes, this is what's best for his world.

[bitegore]

"oh yeah this is my oc, he vaguely looks like conan the barbarian. he is seven feet tall and kills people for fun and about 90% of my art with him he's shirtless in. his job is data analytics and his hobby is spreadsheets" im so good at character design