#i also don't have any stats re: the names

[rozarens]

I'm thinking about the names of our protags.

Rafał/Rafal - "God will heal". An archangel, a patron of people associated with healing, sailors, runaways, wanderers. But also, a person with this name was chosen a patron saint of soldiers and the people kidnapped to Sibir. Polish Wikipedia article points to this name raising in popularity thanks to a book, "Znachor" by Dołęga-Mostowicz. And what's more, a Jolanta (the modern and more common name than Jolenta) also appears there and that naem rose in popularity as well. The name appears also in another book, "Popioły" by Żeromski. Both authours are associated with Young Poland/the interwar period, both were interested in social issues, criticism of the social stratosphere and wrote about selfless, desperate doctors working in an unjust, cruel system. The usage of pen names was also popular among authours in this period for various reasons. I also learnt about a novel for teens and young adults written by Domańska, where this name was given to an antagonist. Judging from the synopsis: the protagonist is a boy who wants to be a carver, but gets into err, situations, and has to leave his surroundings in the process. Firstly, it's his home village and later, a travelling circus. He ends up moving to study in Kraków (the previous capital of Poland). A clergyman and a scholar help him find shelter and give the means to explore his interest in art... The setting also happens to be the XV ce. Anyway, this literary period is something we like to come back to and reference in our post-modern media. Oczy's book reminded me of those short stories which were published to teach others about other people and/or to make them ponder, but I digress.

Oczy - "eyes". This name doesn't feel like a real name and I'm one of the people thinking it might be a way to conceal the real identity of a killer for hire. But then again, he lives in "country P" and not Poland or Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Or his carers wanted him to be unique, so who's to pass verdicts? This name probably sums up his whole character and ties the themes of Orb if you think about it.

Draka - this one's a bit tricky, but I choose to interprete it as "a quarrel" ("a drama" would be more of a modern slang, meaning-wise). While noun-derived names are not common among Poles, the articles about Polish Roma point to more variety in their naming traditions (czujczuj[.]pl, romowie[.]com, rodzice[.]pl; the first two are "own voices" websites, but the latter is a simple archive of names which I don't feel too comfortable to trust). Christian names and those derived from Latin or Greek seem to still prevail. Perhaps it is her name, but maybe it's a nickname given to her by her tribe thanks to her willingness to change or take up risks. Or perhaps the mangaka got inspiration from other Slavic languages, where this name would mean "dragon", because again, she lives in P, which could mean anything.

[jesawyer]

A big thanks to you and your team for making Pentiment, it's an amazing game and it'll be with me for a long time I think, especially the personal and emotional character writing.

I'm curious about what was the inspiration behind, and creative motivation for including, the motif of the labyrinth. The church's painting of the Virgin Mary with the labyrinth seems striking in particular, especially because I don't remember ever coming across a strong association with labyrinths in Christian imagery.

Thank you. I'm glad it was so impactful.

Labyrinths have a long association with Christianity going back to the 4th century, when one was placed in a cathedral in Chlef (now in Algeria). This is known as the St. Reparata or St. Reparatus Labyrinth.

The Chartres Labyrinth was built around 1200.

Christian labyrinths are meant to be walked while contemplating. The path twists and turns, but there is only one way to go. They also all clearly take inspiration from labyrinths of the classical world even if their purpose and origins are effectively lost to those who see them.

As Beatrice says to Andreas (paraphrased), the foundations of our memories become buried and invisible. And she is paraphrasing and abbreviating Plato speaking to Solon in Timaeus,

whatever happened either in your country or in ours, or in any other region of which we are informed-if there were any actions noble or great or in any other way remarkable, they have all been written down by us of old, and are preserved in our temples. Whereas just when you and other nations are beginning to be provided with letters and the other requisites of civilized life, after the usual interval, the stream from heaven, like a pestilence, comes pouring down, and leaves only those of you who are destitute of letters and education; and so you have to begin all over again like children, and know nothing of what happened in ancient times, either among us or among yourselves. As for those genealogies of yours which you just now recounted to us, Solon, they are no better than the tales of children. In the first place you remember a single deluge only, but there were many previous ones;

I also wanted the association with the labyrinth from The Name of the Rose, which in turn was inspired by the Reims Labyrinth.

The Reims Labyrinth was constructed in the late 13th century but was destroyed in the 18th century by superstitious priests. It was through the discovery of drawings that modern scholars were able to recreate and project the path of the labyrinth onto the cathedral floor.

The cover of the 1st Italian edition (and therefore, first edition overall) of Il Nome della Rosa prominently incorporated the drawing of the Reims Labyrinth.

Note the map of the Aedificium:

The final lines of The Name of the Rose are:

Stat rosa pristina nomine, nomina nuda tenemus.

The original rose remains only in name, we hold those names stripped.

This refers to a specific object in the story, but more broadly symbolizes historical records, art objects, and other artifacts lost to time. The Reims Labyrinth remains only in drawings, stories, and light projected on the ground where it once stood; the labyrinth itself was destroyed.

Nomen est; res non est. - The name exists; the thing does not.

As a side note, France uses the Reims Labyrinth as its symbol for historical monuments - an important reminder of how fragile their existence can be.

[ms-demeanor]

Hi! My employer's workplace wellness program was recently revamped, and I'm trying to assess whether it's slid into the nonsense side of wellness-world. Specifically, there's a webinar being offered by a guy named Abra Pappa on using an "anti-inflammatory diet" to "battle against chronic diseases… including heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, and even certain cancers." This sounds… sketchy to me, but I know you have both expertise in nutrition and a strong bullshit detector, so wanted to ask what you make of it.

Okay long story short never trust anyone who got their degree from a university that started off as a school for chiropractors.

Abra Pappa got her MS in Functional Medicine and Human Nutrition after getting a BA in Theater; I checked the requirements for that degree and the school's whole catalogue is throwing red flags but what's throwing the most red flags for me is that if I wanted to get a degree in nutrition from an ACEND accredited program I'd need to take a hell of a lot more than one bio class, one anatomy OR one physiology class, one medical terminology class, one nutrition class, and one biochemistry class in order to get into a master's program.

It's funny because she went from a BA in theater arts to an MS in Functional Nutrition and Human Nutrition and I've been trying to go from a BA in Theater Arts to an MS in nutrition and *aside* from the whole private school costs thing one of the major barriers is that I'd basically need to re-do all of my undergrad to get in a lot of chemistry, some calculus, and MANY nutrition classes before I qualified for a Master's program. But based on the program she took I'm only one medical terminology and one biochemistry class away from a Master's program instead of more like ten to fifteen classes (primarily in nutrition, chemistry, and physiology) away.

Anyway she says she's a Licensed Dietician Nutritionist. There are some states that allow LDN certification, New York is one of those states. *BUT* to be an LDN in New York you have to

Complete a program in dietetics-nutrition that culminates in a bachelor’s degree that qualifies for certification in dietetics-nutrition or has been accredited by the Commission on Accreditation for Dietetics Education (CADE).[Note: CADE is now ACEND] The program must include at least 45 semester hours of coursework in dietetics/nutrition and must include at least 20 semester hours of coursework in the area of human biological sciences and social and behavioral sciences

Pappa went to the University of Western States in Oregon, and the only ACEND accredited school in Oregon is at OSU, so if she's an LDN it's from someplace that isn't New York, where she lives and works.

She also claims to be a CNS, a Certified Nutrition Specialist, but in order to qualify for THAT you need to have an MS with some pretty rigorous coursework

And this is what the school required for her MS program:

And given that she didn't have a science degree for undergrad it seems pretty likely that she wasn't doing anything close to what an undergrad nutrition program looks like:

For the record, here are the MS requirements for an MS in nutrition with a health and wellness emphasis at that same school:

In order to get accepted to the MS in nutrition program in that school you either need to have a BS in nutrition or a BS in biology or chemistry and take all the undergrad level nutrition requirements ON TOP OF that BS.

I don't think that a theater degree and an MS from a woo-y correspondence school really count, even if you do pay $45k for your diploma.

If you go look at the requirements for any ACEND accredited school and compare them to the MS program from University of Western States it leaves UWS looking pretty shitty in comparison. Like, nowhere in her requirements is there a statistics class! Stats is required even for an associate transfer certificate in nutrition! EVEN AT THE 2-YEAR LEVEL FOR REAL NUTRITION DEGREES YOU HAVE TO DO STATS AND SHE DIDN'T HAVE TO TAKE A SINGLE STATS CLASS FOR HER MS. You will note that the cal poly MS program has one entire MS-Level class on vitamin metabolism and one entire MS-Level class on mineral metabolism for any of the three MS in Nutrition emphasis courses; her school required neither.

This shit makes me want to climb the walls.

I'm just going to start calling myself a nutritionist. California will let anyone call themselves a nutritionist, there are absolutely zero protections on that term and I can get myself a piece of paper for like three hundred dollars from a diploma mill that has some kind of bullshit accreditation.

Here are the programmatic accreditations her school has:

Compare with the Cal Poly programmatic accreditations (I cite cal poly a bunch because it was the program I was hoping to get into eventually so I researched it the most; that's where I got my BA, go broncos):

Note that the website for her school is listed with the department of education as wschiro.com because it was called Western States Chiropractic College until 2010.

Every time i dig into something like this it makes me want to stare into space for hours. No wonder college students are getting fucked on their loans and going to bullshit schools. No wonder everything is a scam these days. People bitch about credentialism but you know what maybe this lady is a CNS; sure, for some people that requires passing board certification tests, getting 1000 hours of clinical supervision, and becoming a Nurse Practitioner with real actual nutrition study from a solid program, but for other people it requires zero understanding of statistics, a theater degree, and three *whole* units of anatomy. Maybe she clears the bar on that one! She doesn't have the qualifications for an LDN in New York, she's not an RDN because she sure as fuck didn't take the classes required for a *VERY SERIOUSLY* protected title, but maybe you can be a CNS with an online diploma from the western states chiropractic college.

I fucking hate everything.

You know the whole reason I wanted to get a degree in nutrition was to yell about shit like this online, but fuck it. Fuck it, I'm a nutrition-isht because i live in california and I can say I am and who's going to check? Who's going to look up whether I took classes in public health or anatomy or the metabolism of micronutrients before they hire me to do corporate seminars on healing your relationship to food? I am legally allowed to do that so I might as well, right? If all I have to do is be charismatic and convincing I'm pretty sure I've got that down, actually, so who's going to check?

Nobody! Nobody is going to check and everything is a scam and I hate everything.

ANYWAY

The relationship between nutrition and inflammation and the relationship between chronic disease and inflammation are two different, complicated things that are difficult to point at and say definitively what the connections are.

I am of the opinion that any time you're getting deep into things like an anti-inflammatory, ketogenic, or PH-Balancing diet without a specific condition that calls for the avoidance of certain foods for very clearly scientifically reported reasons, you're dealing with a woo-woo biohacker who's looking to sell a diet plan.

The thing about nutrition science is that it seems like for most people the "answers" are pretty basic: eat enough food, get enough macro and micronutrients, eat a variety of food, avoid processed meats, try to eat more fruits and vegetables, get enough water, and stay as active as possible NOT for weight loss reasons but for metabolic health and joint/muscle maintenance. It's really, really, hard to sell that though, which is how you get people like Abra Pappa in 2013 writing out this bugfuck "Food and mood" handout with a midday snack that is so bonkers in the way the calories are distributed that I'm sitting down and doing math about it (it looks like about a third of the calories that day are supposed to come from the mid afternoon spinach, mint, cocoa nib, and coconut milk smoothie which is, as I said, bugfuck nuts).

It's hard to sell "please eat more fruits and vegetables, which is difficult because actually most places don't grow enough vegetables for the population's nutrition needs and it's cheaper to eat grains and industrially produced meat than it is to eat five cups of vegetables that you need to prepare daily and also maybe skip the bacon" but it's much easier to sell "five anti-inflammatory superfood milkshakes that will fill your belly and fight cancer" because it's packaging nutrition as a product and not as a massive systemic issue that happens to have very specific requirements for a large number of individuals who *do* happen to have disorders that are based on nutrition and inflammation (celiac disease! I've got one of them! Eating the wrong foods definitely causes inflammation in my body as the result of an autoimmune disorder! but that doesn't mean that the things that are inflammatory for me are inflammatory for everyone!)

Anyway I think like about 97% of workplace wellness programs are largely bullshit based, or at least import bullshit a lot of the time, and nutrition is a science that has, just, so much bullshit in and around it.

So I would take anything they say with a grain of salt, and hopefully less than 255% of your RDV of saturated fat (seriously that meal plan is ludicrous).

Side note: there is a subset of nutrition people who looked at the way that we got fat wrong in the 80s and flipped it and reversed it and went "actually you can have as much fat of any kind that you want as long as it is natural and you will have no issues" and this is how you end up with people on 100% natural clean keto diets who have cholesterol levels over 600. Abra Pappa recommends "clean/natural" eating and has taken continuing education on keto and has a recipe for a single-serving smoothie that calls for 8oz of coconut milk I think she's very much in the "'good' fat truther" camp (or at least she was in 2013 which is maybe why New York has a requirement for people to have some kind of nutrition certification for giving out nutrition advice and maybe she should have done that because she didn't even go to her bullshit "grad school" until 2017).

(We DID get fat wrong in the 80s and total avoidance of all fats is bad for you and there are 'good' fats that you should eat and everybody needs to eat some level of fat for proper nutrient absorption but even if you're only getting fat from nuts and avocados that's not going to prevent your arteries from forming plaques if you're having nearly triple the recommended daily value of saturated fat as part of your afternoon snack)

[lopposting]

I absolutely love your lore theories for LoP! Very new to the fandom :). Stayed up all night reading your posts abt it whahaha please keep making them!

Just wanted to ask what you think, if Camille was the recorded first puppet with an awakened ego and was Carlo's mom... does that mean Geppetto let his wife be experimented on by the alchemists upon her death or???

Another thought, do you think Sophia knew Geppetto's plans? Given that she reached out to P at the very beginning and called him by name ((geppettos puppet)) She knew Simon's plans yeah. But what abt Geppettos?

Thank you so much for your kind ask!!!

I panicked briefly because I thought I lost this ask somewhere. I have a LOT of thoughts surrounding Camille and parts of the game that I struggle to put together really cohesively, so on certain topics, i'm just going to ramble.

So, there is this image from the opening cutscene.

Maybe it isn't literally Camille and Carlo, but it may be alluding to them. [And what are they shown playing here? dundundun]

There is a particular affinity and focus the game has on the Piano as well.

Music is so linked to humanity in this game, i think it's very sweet.

There was also this really interesting post about the blue fairy (in the og collodi novel) that I don't think I can dig up anymore, but I remember it was something like this. It was pointing out that, realistically, the blue fairy really isn't a good parent. She lets a seven year old child be hanged on a tree, she watches by as he is enslaved; she makes him "work" for the right to be a real boy instead of reasonably granting him it, etc. The blue fairy also appears omniscient or goddess-like, appearing as a child, a young woman, a goat, and a mother (in perhaps her most adapted incarnation).

if Sophia's knowledge is endless, couldn't she have warned us about geppetto? wouldn't she know about carlo (someone she knew as a child) being tortured in a box? was it her discretion to let us suffer, because he needs to be able to suffer to be strong? Does that make her a moral or ethical person? Can any personhood with omniscience, who, in a sense, allows evil to happen, be moral or just? Perhaps, herein lies the philosophical, inherent flaw, in any relationship with an omniscient being, but I digress.

However, I think Sophia's endless knowledge that Arlecchino [sadly I write his name wrong every time] refers to is spiritual, or emotional, in a sense: that because she could manipulate time, all of it was at her disposal. When we wake up in the train car, her words are: "There you are, I've been looking all over for you!" She could not have known where we were, if she was searching for us (possibly through the blue butterfly figure we see). Also, I think she could've warned us about Geppetto.. but maybe then we wouldn't have gone to save her, and her goals are to get us to save her from Simon, which I believe she either says or suggests are "selfish" intentions (although I think she is very well within her right to have tbh). I don't think she is all-knowing in the way that Simon's world of truth would be. Maybe it's just a plot hole, perhaps it's just a "flaw" innate in writing any story with an omniscient character, but I don't think she was omniscient in that fashion.

And then coming back to Camille: One of my absolute favourite things about the game is the Saintess of Mercy Statue/Pieta Motif that we see in the Grand Exhibition. And Camille, who is inferred to have been the mother of Carlo, is said to have engineered the statue. She is directly connected to the game's central visual motif of death and rebirth. And then the statue also being diegetically[not a word apparently?] associated with rebirth and renewal ("Bring new life to puppets") in that you are "re-setting" and re-spec your character's stats there??? Equal parts beautiful and spectacular and touching.

[I feel SO sad that apparently, not every gamer got to see the statue. Opening those doors after the phone call riddle and then the camera panning up to the statue is such an amazing and special moment to me, and then the fact that it's also raining (another symbol of birth) too]

I don't know if the Camille puppet was literally the same Camille (who may have been the wife of Giuseppe), though. We know that she seems to have saved a baby from falling, on which afterwards she says "bring me back to my child". Not only is the Camille puppet a devoted mother character, she's also the first puppet to awaken (in other words, being associated with the idea of birth). "Camille" is so tied to the idea of motherhood and birth, that I think the Camille puppet is another connection here, and may not literally be the same Camille who was a technician. Although, I don't put it past Geppetto to be doing nefarious experiments with puppets, even if it were his wife. It might be a little ominous in regards to his attitude to P, that he doesn't see puppets as "people", but he does see people as puppets.

[malsfefanfics]

OC Profile: Rosamund

art by @/nessiemccormick, edited down to icon size by me

"You wish to know more about Rosamund? She's rather easy to talk to, once you get past that Vestra pride. Though I honestly don't know her that well, given how Hubert didn't even tell me of her existance until recently. She also tends to keep people at dog's length from her at all times. Yes, I mean 'dog'." -- Edelgard, about Rosamund.

Full name: Rosamund von Vestra Nicknames: Rosa (Raphael, Mercedes, Caspar, Constance, Claude), Rosebud (Hapi), Rosie (by Dorothea), Petal (For Hubert Use Only), Little Rose Wolf (Yuri) Birthday: Day 6 of the Harpstring Moon, 1165 Age: 15-16 (Pre-TS), 20+ (Post-TS) Crest: None Family: Marquis Iason von Vestra (Father, Deceased), Medee (Mother), Hubert (Older Brother), Tancred (Younger Brother), Rigel (Best Hound) Nationality: Adrestia Titles: Master of the Hounds, The Thorn Huntress, Devoted Bloom Voice Claim: Jeannie Tirado (leaning more towards Rose from Resident Evil Village in tone)

Interests: Hunting, History of Fódlan and surrounding nations, Weapons and training, Singing Likes: Sweets, Dogs, Her brothers, Fish, Healthy Competition, Saint Cichol Dislikes: Her father, The Church, Saint Seiros, Noble Society, Liars, Formal Dresses, Herself

Favorite Meals: Super Spicy Fish Dango, Pheasant Roast with Berry Sauce, Pickled Rabbit Skewers Liked Meals: Saghert and Cream, Sweet Trio Bun, Grilled Herring, Sautéed Jerky, Small Fish Skewers, Fried Crayfish Disliked Meals: Daphnel Stew, Bourgeois Pike, Cheesy Verona Stew, Gautier Cheese Gratin

Tea Preferences: Lavender Blend, Almyran Pine Needles, Mint Tea, Rose Petal Blend

Liked Gifts: Hunting Dagger, The History of Fódlan, Fishing Float, Smoked Meat, any flower, Stylish Hair Clip Disliked Gifts: Gemstone Beads, Goddess Statuette, Blue Cheese, Book of Crest Designs

Lost Items:

Book of Hunters' Fables: A hand written book of fables and folk songs shared by hunters from across the continent. Looks well read.

Family Dagger: A dagger with a pink blade and a green handle. Reminds you of primroses.

Children's Music Box: A silver music box that plays an unfamiliar lullaby. There's the coat of arms of an Adrestian Family on the lid.

Starting Class: Noble Preferred Class Path: Noble --> Fighter/Myrmidon --> Archer/Thief --> Sniper/Assassin Strength: Bow, Sword Weakness: White Magic, Black Magic, Dark Magic Budding Talent: Authority Personal Skill: 'Howling Shot', increases power against Demonic Beasts by +5.

Weapons Starting Levels:

Sword: D Lance: E+ Axe: E Bow: B Brawling: E Reason: E Faith: E Authority: C Heavy Armor: E Riding: E+ Flying: E

Base Stats:

HP: 25 Str: 7 Mag: 1 Dex: 8 Spd: 6 Lck: 7 Def: 6 Res: 7 Cha: 9

Learned Faith Spells: ??? Learned Reason Spells: ???

Recruit Requirements for Canon-Compliance AUs: Crimson Flower requires C-support with Hubert and Edelgard, and B-support with Petra or Bernadetta. Verdant Wind requires B+ Rank or Higher of Flying, Faith, and Reason, and must have majority of Black Eagles and Ashen Wolves recruited. Cannot be recruited on Blue Lions or Silver Snow.

Potential Supports:

Byleth

Hubert

Tancred

Medee

Edelgard

Petra

Linhardt

Caspar

Dorothea

Bernadetta

Ferdinand

Jeritza

Mercedes

Felix

Sylvain

Ashe

Annette

Claude

Leonie

Raphael

Lysithea

Yuri

Hapi

Constance

Seteth

Flayn

Shamir

Hanneman

Manuela

Crit Quotes:

You wish!

For my brothers!

How annoying.

I'll never lose!

You call that a shot?

I thought you'd be a challenge.

I'll cut you down!

Time for the hunt!

No goddess can save you.

Defeat Quotes:

I can't fall here. Best to pull back for now.

That...could have gone better.

I'm sorry, brother. I failed you.....

Your Majesty, please....look after my family.....

I guess I truly am....the weakest Vestra.....

Skill Level Increase Quotes:

I can use this on the hunt.

This is easy as pie.

Another day, another lesson.

I can do that? Explains a lot. (Budding Talent)

I....I actually do that? (Magic)

Level Up Quotes:

As to be expected of a Vestra.

Excellence comes with hard work.

Getting stronger and wiser.

Missed the mark, it seems.

I can hear the old man scoffing from the grave.

Not sure I have much left to learn.

Gift Quotes:

Liked Gifts: Oh, I love this! How did you know?

Neutral Gifts: Thanks. This will be useful for later.

Disliked Gifts: You might have better luck elsewhere.

[real-fire-emblem-takes]

Lemme do a small gameplay take cuz the takes ain't flowing much:

I think the Hoshido sisters are some of the best units out of the siblings.

Hear me out! And maybe this is just my luck with the rng gods but listen!

We know Ryoma is like the most OP with a rather good Def and Res and with Astra very early on (as in like a few levels after you get him), he is pretty great without using extra seals, anything else is a surplus.

However the rest of the siblings both in Nohr and Hoshido don't share this trait, you could make the case with Leo since he gets lifetaker not long after getting him but it takes SO.LONG. to grow his sword usage so he could use his ice blade that has a better attack than the Brynhyldr (yes i had to google the name).

So let me give you a run down, this is with heart and partner seals mostly btw (i didn't want to use friendship yet cuz omg i need to do a lot of math and give it a lot more time) not just growing to the one that makes more sense for the character.

I feel like after Ryoma in a 1 to 9 list of sibling units in Fates it's Hinoka. She can get without external help Rend Heaven and Quixontic (the latter helping any other active abilities) and can get Amaterasu which just really fits with the character because she is the nicest (besides Elise) to all of the army remembering their names and being considerate with em.

In my first run I married her to Hinata which gave her Astra and vantage and, because of the Quixontic, she was a fucking killing machine. You also can really make use of her magic stat with the bolt nagonata, she just snipes almost anyone that gets in front of her.

Camilla has a very similar situation, with Savage Blow very easy to get and Lifetaker as well, she is pretty great. However with her axe she doesn't snipe as often as Hinoka, maybe that's just my luck, i have them both on the same level. Bolt axe also works super well with Camilla. I think Camilla's biggest problem is her rather low Res compared to Hinoka, since both have very similar defense and both could easily crumble with a small arrow.

Then Sakura and Elise are super close in ranking but Sakura wins because she has pretty solid defense and resistence, which some might say it's not that big of a deal, bit with Mirage and Miracle and Renewall she is a great tank, just give her a shining bow and she is sniping bitches left and right, i also gave her Lethality with Saizo and can easily get Astra with Hana, so she is a BEAST.

She was the only one that could resist really an attack from Anankos, unlike the rest of the sibs (from what i was able to see, again my luck and opportunity didn't allow me to test all) that would end with like a third or an eight if their life after attacking Anankos, she was left with 5/12's like almost a half and with dragon ward it was better, she was chilling.

Elise is also fantastic, especially of you get her Savage blow and lifetaker, with the moonlight tome, she can take maybe 2 rounds at most, but she is still a glass canon all things considered, she does base like 70 HP a lot of the time but they can easily kill her.

Leo, again pretty great overall with Savage blow, Lifetaker and I was able to give him Sol with Charlotte which really helped him because he is also a bit of a glass canon just that he doesn't pack as much punch as Elise can, magic wise.

Xander, though a great tank, he really needs someone else active in battle to help him dispatch cuz both Siegfried and his Lance don't pack as much punch as like Raijinto for example. I was able to give him Luna besides Aegis and Savage blow because i married him to Beruka but it still had quite a but to be desired.

Takumi, maybe i didn't grew him right, bit he is more of a glass canon than Elise frfr, he can barely, maybe endure a turn tbh. The Fujin Yumi being only 2 range really makes him super vulnerable and, even with rend heaven and quixonic, maybe astra and vantage or lifetaker he could be better but idk he was just very brittle overall, which is interesting cuz he actually has a more than decent defense.

Azura for me was the hardest to grow, maybe because i married her with Jakob un my Rev playthrough, maybe with Arthur or Kaden (her husbands in my conquest and Birthright plays) she could be a bit better with Sol and 5+ HP or Rend Heaven and Quixotic, cuz i only was able to get her some falcon knight and kinshi knight stuff that isn't súper active or helpful. Maybe with miracle and renewal too but idk. She really needs some armor jeez.

Anywho my ranking from strongest sib to weakest:

Ryoma (good base, can get great surpluses)

Hinoka (super flexible in the best ways, could both be a super or an amazing healer)

Sakura (great tank with healing abilities, give her magic bow and bang bang)

Elise (Glass canon that could endure more if you train her more)

Camilla (Great unit but doesn't snipe as much and cannot heal so she is more of a one trick wonder, sadly. Maybe if she were a War cleric, she would rock)

Leo (also very flexible but not enough to be great, gotta kneed him and work him to be great)

Xander (Good tank, needs a lot of help killing tho and a lot of kneeding too)

Takumi (also need a ton of kneeding to be good but fujin yumi really leaves him vulnerable multiple times)

Azura (cousin, put on some armor you are gonna die for the 35th time PLEASE-) (maybe in a level with a ton of sourcerers, since she has actually a pretty good res, with a hexlock spear, a javalin and a good protect buddy and healing buddy, it would be a massacre)

.

[twistedisciple]

TOA Anniversary Munday

Celebrating TOA and the people who contribute to make our group what it is. Repost, don't reblog. Only fill in what you feel comfortable sharing! Happy anniversary, TOA! Here's to many more years spent together. Shared by Neffi | Template

Name: Ree

Pronouns: any

Birthday (no year): 4/23

Where are you from? What is your time zone? Currently in CST, US

How long is your roleplay experience? I grew up LARPing with the neighborhood kids so I want to say it's been a lifetime

How were you introduced to roleplaying as a whole? I don't actually remember, but the earliest formative memory was an AtLA fansite with a live chat and RP forum. I wrote Suki

How were you introduced to TOA? I made it

Do you have any pets? Two calicoes, and one of them is older than some members here

What is your favorite time of year and why? (Season, holiday, general period) Spring is so hopeful after the dreary winter

What is your IRL occupation? For simplicity's sake, data administrator

Some interests and things you like/enjoy? Languages, psychology, dreams, religion and myth, music, learning in general, the horror genre

What non-Fire Emblem games do you play? SMT, Pokemon, Monster Hunter, Genshin Impact, Honkai Star Rail, Wuthering Waves, Onmyoji, various indie horror games

Favorite Pokemon type & Pokemon: Dark: Scrafty

Tell us some funfacts and trivia about yourself! I have a good sense of hearing

How did you get into Fire Emblem? SSB

What Fire Emblem games have you played? All

First & Favorite Fire Emblem games: Awakening was the first, favorite is Shadows of Valentia

List your 5 favorite Fire Emblem characters across the series! In no particular order: Hubert, Griss, Marni, Libra, Salem

Who was the first character ever to make you go “ooh I like this one in particular” and why? Can be any context and reason! Tharja during my first Awakening playthrough. Love me a freaky goth girl

Any Fire Emblem crushes? 😳 Nope

If you’ve played (or are familiar with) the following games, who was your first S support? Who would you S support nowadays? - Awakening: Chrom > Now: Libra - Fates: Hinata > Now: probably also Hinata - Three Houses: Edelgard > Now: Hubert - Engage: none

Favorite Fire Emblem class? Summoners

If you were a Fire Emblem character, what would be your class and stats? Would you be playable? Some sort of pre-promoted res tank, recruited late and 100% missable without meeting the right requirements

If you were a Three Houses character, what would be your affiliation? Black Eagles all the way

If you were an Officers Academy student, what would be your boons, banes and potential budding talent? Boons: Reason, Bow Banes: Heavy Armor Budding Talent: Faith

If you were an Engage character, which nation would you originate from? Solm for the vibes

How do you pronounce TOA? 🤔 Toh-ah

Current TOA muses: Just Griss

Past TOA muses? Julius, Hubert, Aelfric, Pelleas, Berkut, Salem, Fáfnir, Limstella, Jeritza, Shinon

Who was your first TOA muse? If you no longer have them, can you see yourself picking them up again? Hubert. Picking him up again would depend on whether or not I replayed 3H

Do you believe you have a type of character you gravitate towards writing? It's hard to say these days. I like dynamic characters because I've hit too many walls over the years where threads stagnate because neither me nor my partner are able to move the scene in a meaningful way. I'm here to have fun, not slog through threads just to get the point at the end, so writing lively, aggressive, or bratty characters has allowed me to always have an emergency button on hand. Outside of that, I enjoy the concept of leadership in a guardian sense. What it means to protect a community, etc. I don't like writing kings and queens, so I prefer characters who have this on a smaller scale. Perne, for example, who leads the Dandelion Gang. I've also joked with Rai that I tend to pick up men who are subservient to some sort of powerful woman. With that said, lately I've been feeling the itch to return to my roots as a melancholy knight writer.

Do you have characters or types of characters you don’t think you can handle writing, but wish you could? I think I could give anything a good run if I tried

What kind of scenes, situations etc do you believe you enjoy writing the most? Sceeeeenes. I love describing vistas. I love placing characters in a fleshed out world. No one exists in a vacuum, and how characters arrange themselves and interact with the environment around them is just as important as what they're doing and thinking.

Do you have any scenario in mind for your muse(s) that gets you thinking “man I hope I get to write this one day”? Not at the moment. For Griss, I always take scenarios as they come, and that usually evolves into new and unexpected things

Favorite TOA-related memories? You!

Present or past tense? Past tense. But I'll match my partner

Normal size text, small text, no preference? No preference

Got any potential muse delusions to share? 😉 I don't think anything will come of it anytime soon, but lately Jeritza and Zeke have been stirring in the mind palace

[utilitycaster]

hi yes hello im the lowish int wizard anon! no offence was taken! ive never actually played dnd so i dont know the ins and outs very well at all, and it was an entirely hypothetical question as i have no plans to play either. that said, i do have ocs i made with dnd mechanics (ie classes and such), one of them being a wizard! his name is Vi :3. and yes. hes not the smartest man around. the largest reason i asked is because, he keeps his components in colour coded pouches - with matching bracelets (blue on the left and red on the right) - so he knows where his peices are because hes a little bit of a scatterbrain and i love him. it wouldnt do any good in a fight to go "ah shit give me a sec where did i put my amber" you know? i didnt think that would classify as low wisdom. i have 0 idea if he would work at all the way he currently is. lmao.

again, my man will more then likely never be used in a real game so this is all just food for thought and fun to mess around with. thanks for awnsering and offering to give ideas! i really value your metas and such. you appear very well spoken.

Hey anon! Thank you! Anyway good news. That is CLASSIC low wisdom. Absent-minded academic who is brilliant in a very narrow field of study and can't remember where he put a single spell component or his keys or literally anything? That is practically the definition of high intelligence, low wisdom. Give your wizard high intelligence and super low wisdom (and no proficiency in investigation - stick it all in arcana and history and nature and such) and go forth to your heart's content. (But also...at this point I would say that if you are using D&D mechanics to help create an OC but don't intend to play, you can kind of do whatever; just know that if you do get an opportunity and want to play this guy in a D&D game you should re-do the stats to fit with gameplay, ie, high intelligence)

[armoredisopod]

Arknights CN 4th Anniversary PVs

New Operators

Melanite, 5* Heavyshooter Sniper

Please check the status of your weapons again to avoid any mishaps on the battlefield.

Silence the Paradigmatic, 6* Welfare Abjurer Supporter

We should explore the meaning of combat, not just let it happen.

Ho'olheyak, 6* Core Caster

Doctor, are you really going to waste your time alone with me, preaching about Rhodes Island's rules and regulations?

Muelsyse, 6* Limited Tactician Vanguard

Rhine Lab, Director of the Ecology Department, Muelsyse, but i don't think there should be such a formal greeting between us, Doctor.

Friston-3, 1* Protector Defender

Greetings, my name is Friston. And yes, "Friston", not "Friston-3".

Operator Skins Update

Total of 9 new skins, 6 new additions for the Bloodline of Combat brand and 3 new additions for the Ambiance Synesthesia brand

Bloodline of Combat

Orchid's Twines of Time - Free Login Event skin

Ebenholz's Eine Variation

Specter the Unchained's Born As One - L2D Skin

Ch'en the Holungday's Ten Thousand Mountains - L2D skin

Kal'tsit's Remnant - L2D + Special Voicelines skin

Justice Knight's Tournament Fantasy Retrofit Kit - Event Reward skin

Ambiance Synesthesia

Irene's Voyage of Feathers

Lumen's Golden Dream

Roberta's Granter of Colors

Announced skin reruns

W, Rosmontis, Nearl the Radiant Knight's Epoque skins

Mountain, Eunectes, Ayerscarpe and Flint's Bloodline of Combat skins

Series I & II Ambiance Synesthesia skins

~74 skins as part of 4th Anniversary Celebration edition of Rhodes Fashion Review

Operator Modules Update

Melanite and Ho'olheyak being part of branches with modules immediately gets their modules

ARC-Y module base effect increases Melanite's ATK to 105% and allows her to ignore Physical dodge when attacking enemies directly ahead

CCR-X module base effect allows Ho'olheyak to ignore 10 RES

Hexer Supporter and Flinger Sniper branches gets 1 module type each

W and Kal'tsit gets their second modules

ART-Y module base effect allows W to ignore 100 DEF

PHY-Y module base effect increases Kal'tsit's healing effectiveness by 15% when healing units on melee tiles

Events and Stories

Lonetrail, a Rhine Lab side story event

Misc Stuff

CN regional dialect voices for Lee, Aak, Waai Fu and Hung (though for some reason the PV claims there are 11 new additions)

Suzuran, Ayerscarpe, Click and Friston-3 added to recruitment

2 new main menu screen backgrounds, Laterano and Rhine Lab

Livestream Stuff

Showcased Muelsyse being a 6* Tactician Vanguard utilizing a special reinforcement unit that you can deploy on melee and ranged tiles, her reinforcement also comes with a unique skill that lets you deploy any operator on it to clone (most of) the op's base stats and applies unique properties depending on whether the operator copied was melee or ranged, her 2nd and 3rd skills play into this and have different skill effects depending on what mode the reinforcement is in

Showcased Ho'olheyak being a 6* Core Caster that reduces the weight of enemies in her range and utilizes Levitate, her 2nd skill is a rapid-fire arts burst with a chance to Levitate enemies and her 3rd skill makes her attack by sending tornadoes down her attack range and Levitating the first enemy it hits + dealing massive arts damage

Showcased Silence the Paradigmatic being a 6* Abjurer Supporter that gives a Sanctuary effect without any HP prerequisite and the effect becomes stronger the lower the ally's HP is + has a talent that automatically heals allies below a certain HP threshold, her 2nd skill allows use of a drone that can give a stronger Sanctuary effect and her 3rd skill allows the first ally that takes lethal damage in her range during skill duration to survive and their HP will not go below 1 for several seconds

Showcased the event mechanic, adjustable artificial gravity that can affect enemy movement speed and ally operators ASPD depending on the direction it's set to and gravity-affected spheres that can block enemy pathing and ram into enemies, the spheres can be pushed by operators dealing enough hits to it or by operators applying Push to it

Showcased the new gamemode Pinch-Out, Experimental Operation

A different take on the difficulty-select challenge gamemode, you can choose contracts of varying difficulty that are placed on a branching path with rewards scattered throughout the paths, certain rewards are only unlocked by clearing all connected contracts or paths required

After completing a run you can start the next run from certain "checkpoint" nodes instead of starting over from the original starting point

The gamemode has daily maps and missions for rewards

Laterano lore video narrated in Latin, showing the history of Laterano's founding and racial conflict, which then cuts to a room filled with unknown technology, a teaser for the next Laterano event

An introductory video for potential surveyors of the Infy Icefields, the video advises people to go through Sami due to ongoing Ursus-Columbia disputes then elaborates on Sami's geography, culture and society. A teaser for IS4: Expeditioner's Jöklumarkar

Showcased a few of IS4's new content

Temperature which presumably replaces IS3's light levels mechanic

Collectable rune tablets that can be combined to gain buffs and special effects, for example the ability to change nodes ahead of you

Ability to scout upcoming nodes with a special device to peek at the contents, the device can break which will prevent you from seeing what the upcoming nodes are at all

Interference in the form of elements and weather that can disrupt your exploration

Teased the next summer event to be located in Siesta after the events of Heart of Surging Flame, with a title "Wanderland"

Showed teasers for more episodes of the Ceobe mini-series in progress and LDA anime

Showed a teaser for a new comic series centered around Angelina and her travels across Terra

Arknights anime adaptation 2nd season: Perish in Frost teaser

Talked about the Terra settings/world building art book and the Arknights Vol. 2 art book, which comes with an exclusive Planter skin for 3* Lava

Showed art for an Arknights tabletop game, planned to release Late 2023

Showed teasers for collabs with ANTA Sneaker and China Aerospace Science

Announced that Rhodes Kitchen Tidbits and Rhine Lab - Records of Originium will get physical book forms

Ended off the livestream with an animation starring the Rhine Lab cast, from the founding of the company to Saria and Kirsten's parting

Destiny 2 collab teaser, said to be a story collection event and will have collab exclusive skins

[sanaserena]

YAY, OPLA is still in the top 10 - top 4 most streamed last week - this week, in it's sixth week of airing! See ↓↓ from here: Twitter Link

In my personal opinion, that's looking good. It's also interesting to compare OPLA's streaming stats week by week compared to several other shows in the top 10 (but in saying that... I haven't had time to do a full comparison, just bits here and there, so I can't say anything for sure...still, it's very interesting to look at!! And considering, I usually don't have the time or effort to follow any other show in such detail... but One Piece has such a special place in my heart!)

I finally am back round with screenshots from Episode 6 - and my thoughts on the episode. I also really loved this episode, the cast has so many good moments, and I love how we see the crew bond and develop through one of the biggest trials of the Straw Hat pirates friendship.

Highlights of Ep 6:

Do you know how much I love these sets? Why sometimes I love live action? Because we get to see even more sides to the manga panels, to the anime scenes that probably weren’t important or thought about at the time. For example, I love that we get to see more of the inside of the Going Merry (we do see this in the manga, but there's something more intricate and detailed about the live action's adaptation)

The interactions between Koby and Garp. The more times I re-watch OPLA, the more I like these interactions. I like them because we get to see Koby develop and how Garp becomes his and Helmeppo's mentor (something we only see in cover stories in OP, before their big appearance at the end of a specific arc, where the Koby and Helmoppo have clearly grown up.)

The interaction between Garp and Mihawk. This is OP only, and we see a different kind of Warlord/Marine interaction past the East Blue Saga in the One Piece Manga. I liked that this was introduced in OPLA season 1, it does so many wonderful things like, give us more Mihawk time (those who know, know how rare he is in the manga, but beloved despite those rare appearances), show us more of how the Warlord system works/or does work, and of course hammers in other plot points for OPLA. (Also, Steven John Ward is such a magnificent Mihawk.)

The interaction between Sanji, Usopp, and Luffy. When Luffy speaks of Wado Ichimonji, and pronounces the name completely wrong in a very Luffy way, sometimes I ask myself, do I love this line in OPLA because I know it’s a very Luffy trait from the manga, or do I love it because Inaki delivers this line so well?

This episode gives us more wonderful expressions from the cast. Taz is such a fantastic Sanji and Jacob is pretty good as Usopp. They're both great in this episode. I've heard some people complain that Usopp and Sanji were done a bit dirty in season 1, but truthfully, I have high hopes that the showrunners will give them more space for development in season 2 now that they've been introduced. If you squash everything into season 1, that only leaves less space for character development on screen later on. So I'm looking forward to seeing OPLA develop some of our favourite OP characters in their way, but faithful to Oda's vision.

I love how they did Sanji's backstory. They did not skimp on the truth behind Zeff's leg, which the anime does, and the manga is a little more brutal on.

You know, sometimes I had my doubts, before OPLA was released, on whether Craig Fairbrass would make a good Zeff. There were so many white actors and I like hmmm. But, damn it all, he’s perfect. He brings Zeff alive with so much zest and flavour. Both in present and the past flashbacks. It was wonderful. (Also, it does make me laugh every time I see his braided mustache jumping when he speaks, love it.)

Christian Convery is also fantastic as young Sanji. He acts wonderfully. He's like a little angelic cherub, and thus for the extended starvation period, he was a little too fleshy, however, this is a child (and we can't ask him to starve just for acting at his age, and for something like this in a tv series, I'd much rather the vfx went to the bigger elements, like Buggy's devil fruit powers, Luffy's devil fruit powers, the Sea King, etc.), and his acting still managed to convince me that he had been starving for days.

And as usual, I can't fit all the screenshots here ... see Part 2: Here, and Part 3: Here.

[onlyhereforghosttrick]

I would really like to know more about your pmd oc's. Tell me as much about them as you want (if you want to of course). I'd love to hear everything about them.

Ooh thanks a ton for the very open-ended ask! Sadly, most of the ones I have have a greater story behind them that I don't really mind spoiling, but I can at the very least give you some from the archives of [admittedly mostly abandoned] works, including one I'm hoping to get the prologue out sometime this month!

The Other Side [Gti-inspired sort-of-sequel]

Only really one character I want to show off from this one- Ryei [pronounced Re-ay] the Snover, a human-turned-pokemon in a world that now seems to have been almost rewritten to think of humans being reincarnated as a curse, and finds himself now having to balance three things: Finding out the truth of what happened to change the perception of humans so drastically, Joining a Pikachu named Kishi in her exploration team, and the part where he's switching bodies with a Noibat named Daisukei every night, who seems to have been taken in by Outlaws who are really just looking to survive more than anything.

I liked the idea of it, but I couldn't figure out how to format it- how to decide who the perspective would be, the pacing, all that stuff- so it's basically been abandoned. I'll likely continue it if I'm ever hit with a double lightning strike of ideas or something, but for now I won't be working on it.

Curse of a Martyr [EoS AU]

A fairly simple explorers AU I concocted when board on the cruise I posted a few images of, but ended up abandoning because it wasn't that interesting, so here are essentially the culmination of what I had imagined for the [main three] characters:

Shomoto the Treecko - He's just your average Explorers hero treecko, with the one difference being the fact that he hits like a truck [i.e. a level 40], despite apparently still being level 5, and the fact he isn't even sure if he's a human.

Eifos the Zorua - Yeah, just about a normal Explorers partner, except with the insecurities cranked up a few levels thanks to Shomoto's sheer power, and also without Team Skull's harassment [they're scared of Shomoto's sheer stats]

Yuki the human - You know, most Pokemon recognize tales of humans arriving in the form of pokemon to assist with a disaster, not humans arriving on their own to cause a disaster.

Honestly, the only other thing I had settled aside from these characters was a scene during the lake guardians arc in which well... Let's just say a pokeball is involved, Shomoto gets in the way, and the level gap becomes far too apparent.

All to Nothing - A [Mostly] original actual project

This is the only of these with any active work being done, although currently being only halfway ready to release the prologue to the public- so I'll just give a few [admittedly summarized] character bios:

Aster the Ivysaur - Waking up to find herself in a cruel 'game' where the punishment for failure is death, and she has to place her faith in a partner she's never met before... And what's more, the memories she has are all faded at best, and the question of who she is would be one she might never find the answer to... if she doesn't take a risk, and fast.

Chera the Clefairy - When he finds himself thrown into a game meant to test the contetsants in an unknown aspect with memories that don't quite fit together... Including the fact they might have been a human in a past life. And yet, for some reason he can't quite recall... he knows he should never tell anyone that again. ...Or was it something else he shouldn't have said...?

Aside from that there aren't any characters I can A. write good descriptions for, or B. write descriptions with minimal spoilers in them.

But uh that's kind of it for OCs I can show? Sorry if it isn't exactly what you were looking for- the main set I have, I'm already doing lore posts for [the first of which you might have seen- it's here if you haven't], and I don't really want to double dip, and I don't think I'm great at talking about my own stories without spoiling them- I hope this slight middle ground is acceptable to you.

[xcal1bur25]

For those curious about Trails of Cold Steel and it's ideal party comp, this is the actual specialty of the various members of class VII in cold steel 1 and 2. Note that this applies only to those games, and not 3 where they change things up.

Rean: Appears to be a physical dps with high speed. Arguably is in fact that thing, and can be very effective when built to repeatedly spam 200cp ogre mode S-Crafts. His true potential, however, is as a Delay Spammer. Give him as many sources of Inflict Delay as possible, and have him repeatedly spam Arc Slash. The max number of different sources from items and special attacks should be 5, iirc. Cold Steel calculates status effects weirdly. If you have 5 sources of delay, the game rolls 5 times to see if it procs, and if ANY ONE of those sources procs, the FULL CUMULATIVE delay from all of them is applies to the enemy. So every arc slash (which has a very small amount of self-delay meaning rean's next turn comes up FAST, especially with his speed), has a 50% chance to inflict 30+ turns of delay on an enemy with 90% delay resistance. The only enemy with more than that is the final boss of cs2, who is immune outright. This strategy allows for essentially infinite stunlock.

Alisa: CP Battery. She spams heavenly gift and gives everyone the CP they need to use their own spam strats. Link her with Rean and give her gladiator items so she gets the steady supply of CP she needs to use it every 3 turns. Also, Heavenly Gift gives Insight, the best status buff in the game. Otherwise, spec her as a secondary mage.

Elliot: Best healer in the game. By a lot. Aside from that, his magic attack is second only to emma, so use the slots you aren't using to spec him as a healer to spec him as a magic nuker like her. Also his S-Craft is a full party res, which is nice.

Laura: Physical nuker. She's slow, has like nothing as far as magic stats goes, and while her defensive stats are good, high defenses only go so far. Laura is good at one thing, and one thing only. VIOLENCE. Her STR stat is through the goddamn roof, and she starts the game with an S-Craft, where most character unlock it throughout. This is a hint as to the correct way to use Laura: Keep her as a support member on the bench, swap her in at an ideal moment, take that turn to eat something to buff her attack as much as you can, and then immediately interrupt turn order with a 200cp S-craft. She's a pocket nuke.

Jusis: Spec as a magic knight, though as he should stay in the backline, focus on the "magic" part of that. Jusis is perfectly fine in the frontline, to be clear - several of his crafts even demand it. He stays in the backline (or rather, in the center of the party formation) for positioning reasons - namely, hitting as many party members as possible with Noble Command, an INCREDIBLE buff that increase speed, magic attack, and strength, and STACKS WITH ITSELF, meaning no, you want to spam this shit, not just use it when it's gonna go down. If he has a turn to spare, he should do some magic damage, since that won't force him to move.

Machias: His value comes from the craft Burst Drive, which lets him snap turn order in half. Otherwise, he's a ranged physical dps. I never used him that much but Burst Drive IS OP, don't get me wrong. I just tended to run Rean/Emma/Jusis/Alisa as my main party.

Fie: Seems like a speedy dps like rean, and can be built towards that same goal as a delayer, though slightly less optimally. Her true value, despite her diminutive size and misleading stats, is as a frontline tank. Specifically, an evasion tank. Use items to get her base evasion to 50% and apply the insight buff to make it 100%. Fie is now invincible against anything but magic (interruptible, also Fie specifically is good at interrupting it.) and S-crafts (rare, but also sort of a "you're fucked no matter what, have a full party res in your pocket" thing). Using a correctly built Fie in battle gave me permanent evasion tank brainrot. Evasion tanking is the coolest fighting strategy, in all games and all situations. Fight me.

Emma: Emma...is your nuke. Your beautiful, busty, glasses-wearing NUKE. Her magic attack stat is as bugnuts as Laura's physical attack, and OH BOY can you make use of that. Pandora doubles magic damage, but increases FP cost. Hades doubles the damage of the first spell you cast. Ingenuity lets you regen FP on the field so you go into every battle full. Claoimh Solarion is a spell that does obscene damage to EVERY ENEMY ON THE SCREEN. Do the math. Watch things BURN.

Gaius: Gaius is weird, but from what I understand the best way to run him is as an S-Craft spammer. He uses the ability to trade hp for cp, while a healer keeps him topped off. Then he spams his S-Craft, which i believe also inflicts a guaranteed status? I ran him as a status effect inflicter, but hey, whatever works.

Millium: Millium is a tank and defensive support. So she's not actually good. Just use offense. Or stunlock.

Sara: Sara has the best overall stats in the game, and a number of very, very hard hitting crafts. She is, unfortunately, kneecapped by that very versatility. Sara is broken on paper by having an absurdly high stat total and being second-best at everything. However, she doesn't have any uniquely broken strats like every other character, and lacks a specific niche within a party comp aside from "DPS".

[eurydicees]

what do you think about the nanowrimo situation?

hm. loaded question that i have a lot of thoughts on. under the cut because this got kinda long winded and maybe more than a little disorganized :/

first off, personally, i stopped using the website when the insanity with the YWP forums got exposed, and then when the ML stuff happened right after. i don't want to go into any of that in this post because that's probably not what you were referring to when you send this ask, but for anyone interested, here's a link to a pretty comprehensive breakdown of what happened.

overall, i don't think i'll be using the website this upcoming november either--they haven't actually effectively addressed any of the YWP stuff, imo, and this AI thing isn't helping their case with me. i'm probably going to do a final transfer of all my stats onto a google sheet or smth at some point, and that'll be it with me and nanowrimo's official organization.

but just because the organization itself is corrupt and is also making not so great marketing decisions outside of that, and just because i don't want to give their website traffic anymore, doesn't mean that the challenge can't keep going!

the idea of nanowrimo is bigger than the website at this point. it's a concept more than it is a corporation. we can decentralize it if we want to. track your words elsewhere, set your own goals. that's all doable, imo. but i digress. now. re: the AI stuff.

just to start point blank, nanowrimo as a corporation probably doesn't actually have an opinion on this as a debate. they probably could really care less about (a) the impact this decision has, and (b) the implications of it.

what they do care about is that they have gone through 1-2 years of absolutely horrific scandal, and now they have bagged a sponsor that happens to be an AI writing tool. so fucking obviously they've decided that AI writing counts for nanowrimo.

anyways. disregarding motives, my thoughts on this as a stance are that this uh. kinda sucks!

nanowrimo is about two things for me. first, it's about the community you can find in doing the same challenge as hundreds of thousands of other writers. you can find that elsewhere, off the website's forums! in fact that's probably for the best, given the, you know, *gestures vaguely*.

more than that, it's about the writing.

i know that sounds obvious, but i think a lot of people actually forget that. it's not about winning the challenge or losing it, it's not about reaching the highest word count of everyone you know, it's not about writing the next great american novel, it's not about having a project with no later edits necessary.

its just about getting words onto a page. they don't have to be good words. they don't have to be polished. they don't have to be poetry. they don't even have to be spelled right! i have drafts where i changed names halfway through and i'm 99% sure i didn't actually replace all the instances of that name.

nanowrimo isn't about writing the perfect novel in 30 days. it's about pushing yourself to try writing. to try to get into the groove of writing every day and to have a goal to aim for. it's a lofty, occasionally stressful, and sometimes unrealistic goal! it is! i will happily admit that. the point isn't winning, though, it's not the actual 50,000 words of it all, and i think that's what everyone misses in their critique of the challenge itself.

to me that's what's so insulting about the stance that they're taking on AI. whether or not you believe AI writing/drawing/whatever is real art, nanowrimo saying AI is acceptable for nanowrimo SPECIFICALLY is a fundamental misunderstanding of what the challenge is about.

it isn't about just generating the highest word count possible in the smallest time frame possible. it's not about reaching 50,000 words the fastest, or first. it's not about just pumping out words because you want a higher word count than you got last year.

nanowrimo is supposed to be about challenging yourself to just try writing. it's not about being good at it.

using AI to polish your writing during the month--like nanowrimo is suggesting you do--or even using AI to write anything for you--like it seems people believe other people are doing...it's defeating the purpose of trying writing. nanowrimo isn't about editing or polishing your sentences--thus, even more, it's not about polishing AI generated sentences into your own.

their belief that critique of AI writing is classist and ableist is...it's a take. i'm not arguing about that right now lol. that's a different post.

saying classism and ableism are barriers to writing a novel--oh absolutely. 100%. but using AI to combat those things for nanowrimo is missing the point of why you should be attempting the challenge.

nano's statement essentially centers AI use on making your writing good despite access issues. they cite needing financial help to get professional editors/outside eyes, needing AI to "see issues" in your writing, not having the same level of education as someone else participating, etc. etc. which is, again, a fundamental misunderstanding of what the point of nanowrimo is. it's not about making your writing perfect, it's about trying to write, knowing that it isn't going to be perfect.

in the nano's founder's history of the challenge, he talks about why the challenge persisted after the first time, and why he and his founding friends found it to be something worth doing. it's not because they got the next great american novels at the end. it's because "...the writing process had been really, really fun."

nanowrimo isn't about writing professional-grade edited novels in 30 days. that's just not possible. it's about writing because you want to write.

it's not because you want to win the challenge. it's because you want to try writing. in my opinion, using AI to write is not "trying writing." it's running AI and that is very, very different--whether or not you believe it's "art."

the founder says, in the same post, "I think the scene—full of smack-talk and muffin crumbs on our keyboards—would have rightly horrified professional writers. We had taken the cloistered, agonized novel-writing process and transformed it into something that was half literary marathon and half block party."

again, this challenge was never just about churning out 50,000 words. that's not how it began and the fact that it became that--to the point that AI is being deemed necessary, to the point that it's you have to "win" with 50k no matter how you do it--is really sad to me.

whatever your stance on the "critique of AI writing is classist and ableist" take is, nanowrimo isn't the place for AI writing when the challenge shouldn't be about churning out 50k via any method so much as it is about just you trying writing. trying to find time, and a routine that works for you, and a goal that works (or maybe doesn't work) for you.

some people are going to lose. for any number of reasons. and that's literally fine!! anyone who's done it more than a couple times has lost at least once. MOST people who attempt it at all lose.

the thing, really, is that we have to reframe this a little because it's not really losing. if you, even ONE TIME, had a pen/paper or laptop or however you write, and/or you even just thought really hard about a story you care enough about to create--that's a huge fucking win. no matter how many words you ended up with and no matter how "good" they are, if you tried writing, that's incredible and an accomplishment to be proud of.

nanowrimo saying "use AI to win nanowrimo with as many really, really good words as possible" is completely missing the point that "winning" isn't the thing that matters about this challenge.

(also, like. just as general blanket statement. nanowrimo doesn't work for everyone, for any uncountable number of reasons, and that's also literally fine. if you can't write 50k in 30 days, that's okay! you don't have to! no one is forcing you to, and no one is forcing you to try! i tapped out once because i was fucking up my wrists and it was starting to hurt to type. it's okay not to do it if you can't for any reason, or, really, if you just...don't want to. that's fine.)

all in all, it's an intimidating goal! it sounds kinda crazy! you don't go into nanowrimo solely to win it--though that's of course the endgame goal--but to try writing. using AI feels completely antithetical to that goal of just trying it.

it doesn't really matter where you stand on the AI art debate. nanowrimo as a corporation can't settle that debate for anyone. but what they have done, in my opinion, is just expressly miss the entire goal of their own challenge. and that's really, really frustrating.

(also, in this statement, they uh. kind of seem to acknowledge everything i just said. they know that using AI for this challenge specifically defeats the whole point. they just also want the sponsorship.)

[twopoppies]

Hi Gina... I need to rant 😠 lmfao

As a life-long Chiefs fan and KC native all I can say is this T*ylor shit is fucking annoying. I know you talk to a LOT of people in the fandom, so you may not remember, but I'm a fellow Sw*ftie hater (maybe that's too harsh but idgaf) and I didn't think it was possible to get more annoyed with this woman than I've been since I stopped being a fan in 2018. Boy, was I WRONG. I'm a die-hard Chiefs fan. I loved my team even when we sucked and couldn't make it to the playoffs (before Patrick Mahomes), so to see EVERYONE make the game on Sunday about her is beyond frustrating. People (Sw*fties) are seriously saying she's the only reason we won. Like we haven't won multiple AFC championships and two Super Bowls in the past three years. Maybe I'm just taking it too seriously, but when our boys played a kick ass game on Sunday after such a shitty season opener (that we lost), it was so nice to see that we're getting our mojo back but I literally can't look at any post, tweet, article, tv segment, etc that doesn't make the game about her.

God, please don't let her be around for the rest of the season 🙏🏻

Also, I'm not saying they're not hooking up, but this is 100% for PR. I've personally never seen them pan to a celebrity so many times during the game. I've never seen "candid" photos of Travis Kelce, Patrick Mahomes, or any of the other popular Chiefs' players leaving Arrowhead Stadium after a game like we just got with Travis & T*ylor, or "candid" photos & videos of any of the popular players driving through the city, which is so sus. And then what really sealed the deal for me was that T*ylor announced earlier today that her concert film will be shown internationally. She was also named as an entertainer of the year for entertainment weekly and is on the cover. Not to mention, she has a new re-recording coming out in a month and continues to announce new versions of the 1989 re-recording. "Someone" must not be happy enough that she's already broke records with the Speak Now sales, is selling the most number of albums overall, but she must be aiming to break those Speak Now records with the 1989 re-recording sales bc she's releasing new versions quite often. I mean, how greedy can one person be. Like you haven't sold enough albums? You don't have enough publicity? You don't have enough money? It's just gross to me.

Also, I personally just found her reactions over the top for someone who isn't even a fan, especially whatever that head shake thing is at the end. But maybe that's just because I find everything she does annoying and cringe.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CxmAHqjrACL/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

Plus, the stats around Travis and the Chiefs have skyrocketed. So they're absolutely getting a lot out of this as well as the NFL like someone mentioned earlier.

I'll attach an article but here are some numbers:

Travis' jersey sales went up almost 400%

Stubhub ticket sales for Chiefs' home games increased threefold in just 24 hrs

Travis gained 325k new ig followers - more than he gained after winning the last Super Bowl

Sunday's Chiefs' game was the most watched NFL game on any network last week

It was also the most watched game among girls and women 12 to 49 yrs old

https://www.axios.com/2023/09/26/taylor-swift-travis-kelce-merch-sales-up-chiefs-kansas-city

And yes, I know I know a lot about her for someone who doesn't like her. But she's inescapable even when I have muted everything related to her... And now she's taking over my everything related to my favorite football team and my city 🤢 Where's Pete Davidson when you need him? 😂

Ok, sorry for that rant. I know I probably sound ridiculous, but I prefer my life T*ylor free just like I prefer my life Ol*via free, and I thought you might understand 😂 Anyways, feel free not to post if you don't want to discuss her anymore.

I hope you're having a good night, Gina. Lots of love.

She really is a horrendous actress. Everything she did at that game was so embarrassingly fake. But clearly people want to believe it because it’s everywhere.

That’s bananas how much his stats already went up and just shows why it’s worth it to do this kind of nonsense, even to someone who’s already really famous.

I’m not interested in football at all, but I’m so sorry she’s contaminating your safe space. 😩

[fantasyinallforms]

It's an end-of-the-year recap!!!! And what a year it has been! Thank you, @fellowshipofthefics, for putting together this wonderful recap list! Thank you from the bottom of my heart to all the people who have supported me on my writing journey this past year. The Bagginshield fandom has been a haven filled with some of the kindest and most talented people I have had the pleasure of getting to know.

I look forward to another year with all of you.

Let's begin!

~~~~

What is something new you tried with your writing this year?

This was my first year as a fic writer, so everything was something new! I was really focused on building the "voice" of my writing, and I think I did that.

Did you participate in any fandom events?

Oh yes. I did the Thorin Spring Forge (TSF), Kinktober, and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Collaboration (THAUC). I also did about half a dozen drabble events and fotfics monthly events.

What's been your favorite project to work on?

There were not many, but I think for me my favorite was the TSF event. It was a big chance to produce my first ever long-format fic, and the reception it got was more than I could have imagined. You Should Be Safe With Me now sits as my highest kudo's fic.

What was the hardest project to work on?

Sparks & Gardens, for sure. The story is one I'm in love with, but bringing it to life in a way that does it justice can be a struggle sometimes. A struggle I enjoy, oddly enough.

Did you start any projects?

Too many.

Did you finish any projects?

I did! Happy Accidents is a completed Modern AU trilogy.

How many WIPS do you have now?

Four (two posted to AO3)

Share your favorite scene/line!

In chapter three of You Should Be Safe With Me, Thorin busts into Bard's house because he thinks harm is befalling Bilbo. I love how gentle and soft Thorin is when helping Bilbo in that scene.

Share your favorite story title!

I'm very fond of Not Yours To Touch. It took me forever to name that fic!

What does your writing system look like? (i.e. brainstorming, writing, editing - how do you do it?)

Usually, it starts with a scene I like or a general concept. Then, I daydream about it a little and determine if it's a one-shot idea or a long-format idea. One shot, I start writing and see where the idea takes me. Long format I start jotting down ideas in bullet form until I have a really rough outline. Then, I flesh that out until I have a plot. When I have a series of events in order, I want them to happen with maybe a few vague details I start writing. I pause and reread/ rough edit after every chapter and check that my continuity is still good. When it's all done, I ignore it for a few days and re-read it again, then edit. Then it's off to my lovely beta reader, who edits and tells me if something doesn't make sense. Once I get that stamp of approval, I post.

What's the best atmosphere for you to write?

Left alone and quiet

Any particular snacks or drinks while writing?

I'm a beverage girly. I have water, coffee, and some fruit near me at all times. I don't normally snack and write. Most of the time, if I'm writing, I've forgotten to eat.

Do you form playlists/soundtracks for your stories? Or even just for your "writing time"?

Playlist, not really. As I said above, I prefer absolute silence when I write. I do have Pinterest boards for all my WIP's, however.

What advice would you give to a new writer?

You're going to have to be bad at it before you become good at it. So be bad at it and enjoy the process.

What are some goals you have for 2024?

Finish Sparks and Gardens. Finish reputation be damned, and if I'm really lucky, debut my Biker Gang AU. But really just to have fun.

Last but not least, General stats

Words posted to AO3 this year: 191,187

Fics posted to AO3: 22 (all but one was Bagginshield)

Current active WIP's: 2

I can't wait to see what 2024 brings, and I couldn't have done this without you.

[zydrateacademy]

Current Activities in ESO #7

A lot of my gameplay has been catchup by day, RP by night.

I had a decent windfall of selling a chunk of crowns for 19mil gold, and I've spent the bulk of that decorating several households to serve as heist targets for thief-based RP with variable difficulty. I mentioned that in the last post.

I was trying to conserve my last few mil to buy and decorate the upcoming Merryvine villa in Gold Road. However I kept getting into gearing and re-gearing old and new alts to make them playable. Some of my older alts had a far too hefty reliance on Briarheart and Hundings when the new(ish) Order's Wrath set for crit is now the go-to baby. I set up one of my arcanists as a tank and following a build online got incredibly expensive, utilizing those runes that cost ~90k each (they buff all three stats). That tank set is stupidly well geared now, but I still generally prefer healing. I've been slowly but surely trying to gear up a lot of my "most used" alts for double duty. DPS in overland, questing, zone clearing, etc, but having a heal/tank set for faster queues and generally having more to offer my roster than others.

Exception being perhaps my werewolf orc, whom I've retooled with Oakensoul. She has some insane light attack crits and can almost braindead her gameplay but she's so much more viable than the basic bow/bow bitch that threw cliff racers at people.

I've discovered I don't much care for B/B builds anymore except in one scenario; Battlegrounds. It's fun to plug away with poison-based arrows, whittling down enemy HP bars while it takes them several seconds to figure out where all that damage is coming from. Sure I get spotted and gunned down like I usually do, I'm not invisible, but it's fun to join already in-progress fights and plug away before they realize where that damage is coming from.

An exception to this exception is that my main necromancer. The class just isn't very fun to play at all. Our main sources of damage are all deeply flawed. Their biggest his is the blastbones skill that every Necro build uses but it takes a full 3 seconds to even leave the ground. By that time the trash pack might be dead already, or against single target bosses that's 3 seconds of not doing very much else. You have a skeleton pet (usually archer, I don't even know what the other morph is because nobody uses it) that only lasts 16 seconds and only shoots every so often, but mostly serves as another corpse to use once it goes down. Then there's the corpse-based laser beam that's very awkward to use and position reliant, and in certain boss fights your position may matter more than the laser beam. So that's another DPS loss.

I couldn't even play melee necro because you spend your whole rotation summoning blastbones, throwing the skull, or using some other skill that I found myself not swinging my weapons at all. Just a clunky cooldown chase. Gross.

The good thing is, she has a functional heal kit so that's another queue in the bag usually. Not as good as my arcanist healer whom is amazing, but still feels better to play than any kind of DPS.

On an RP standpoint, I've joined and left a couple of RP guilds. Well, more on the cusp of being kicked before just quitting to maintain my own dignity.

I won't name any names but it was a guild based on the Brotherhood. I have an assassin character and wanted to put her to use. They had this fun little system where they had a discord bot that would spit out a target, custom added. It gave more variance to overworld stabbing because it feels like base-game DB radiants just send you to the same six places over and over. So it was fun to get a change in scenery, and even helped push my assassin girl to collect a few wayshrines from lesser-seen towns. It also tied in their promotion system. Normally I wouldn't like PvE achievements leaking into RP promotions but it was a fun thing to do. The guild was also heavily hybridized, they had a lot of their membership that don't RP at all.

I found this culture to be a bit taxing. They had this strangest system of using local chat for OOC and only RPing in emotes, which I have never seen before (in any RP setting, ever). They claimed it was for filtering purposes.

There was also a jarring moment where, after claiming I was doing OOC movements, went around to take OOC screenshots of their promotion event. I have a reshade and screenshot helper mod to help me get very cinematic shots but while my UI was hidden apparently I was getting yelled at for being on the main stage where all of the officers were. I had already specified I was OOC but they claimed I was "breaking the sanctity of the ceremony". So my first day in there, it felt as though I had joined a guild of people that were incapable of keeping their attention on anything specific. Can't differentiate any posts between IC and OOC, and can't handle a crouched, hiding character in a corner taking cool screenshots of your proceedings.

I was in this guild for a solid three weeks or so but eventually an officer contacted me about there having been multiple complaints against me. It felt like this post's situation all over again, though the officer here was significantly more diplomatic than that link. I just got the "I've gotten complaints about you" vibe when a large portion of this guild barely interacted with me at all to know otherwise.

Basically my style or personality was conflicting with people. Naturally I never got any specifics or names so I couldn't defend myself properly. According to this officer my previously mentioned conflicts about the way their do their RP, I was trying to set my standards as "THE" standard. While I was in fact, trying to make conversation and understanding their way a bit better. But it rubbed some people the wrong way. I decided instead of being shadow-shunned by several people I would just leave. The options were to shut my own personality down and be much more silent in the guild (which defeats the fucking purpose of RP as a hobby), or continue to RP and interact with a guild where I know there's several people purposefully avoiding interaction with my character because they didn't like me as a player. I just can't really handle being in a guild where I know most people don't want to interact with me. Or is it most? Or is it just two or three complainers? I have no idea! Because the officers that have these conversations never tell me!

This happened before in another guild I quite liked. Though a while ago, back when I was much more active in 2021. I liked that guild, its systems, but the officer of the 'roguey' sub-faction in the guild just decided he didn't like how I spoke to him (completely ICly, mind you) and chastised me for that.

And much like that guild from three years ago, this Dark Brotherhood one wasn't all bad. In some cases I'd even recommend it to people, but it would come with a few asterisks and extra thoughts on the matter to those who would care to hear it.

Kinda put me off for a couple days. I'm not really sure how to adjust my own self when approaching a future RP guild to replace my lost 5th slot. Do I just... talk less? It's certainly some food for thought.