#i am eternally greatful

[overwatchables]

Whoever the fuck on the overwatch team gave ROADHOG!!! SIGMA.. MOIRA and JUNKRAT valentines day voicelines… I am going to kiss you.

[spirk-trek]

Galactic Discourse Fanzine (1977-1987)

Monopoly: Merle Decker, 1980 || At Ease: Nan Lewis, 1980 || Sledding: Toni Hardeman, 1983 || Pillow Fight: TACS, 1987 || Sand Castles: ERIC, 1987

[antisocial-author]

arcane characters like "I have my whole life ahead of me" NO YOU DON'T THE MASKS OF THE KINDRED SEEK YOU

[idlesuperstar]

current sexual orientation: tweedy, warm, intelligent, wry, ping-pong playing, whisky-drinking, poetry-quoting, motorbike-racing, gloriously red-headed here-on-earth-I-am-your-defending-counsel Doctor Frank Reeves [Roger Livesey: A Matter of Life And Death, Powell & Pressburger, 1946]

[communistkenobi]

reading off-hand criticisms of marx in graduate textbooks is so funny because it’s never like, a substantial criticism of the things he said or the positions he took, it’s more often than not “marx did not consider that his political analysis bruises my delicate little intellectual sensibilities”

[teddybasmanov]

So, me and my father have been playing a lot of Pillars of Eternity in the past week and yesterday this happened:

it's late in the evening, we're playing, we're battling a group of enemies and one of them falls under a domination spell and my father asks what happened.

What I want to say: oh, while you were away walking the dog and I was playing alone, the unique sceptre which we bound to Aloth has levelled up and now has a chance of casting Domination and that's exactly what happened.

What I do say: oh, Aloth's dominating him with a stick.

[graveyarrdshift]

I wasn't built for this (being single)

[tytangfei]

You owe me nothing. Do you still want to be with me for the rest of your life? Correct. But I'm a man. Don't you think that's weird? You're a woman. How can you be so sure? Even an astute guy like Xiang Liu isn't sure about it. He hasn't seen part of you.

[yudrein-aile]

I'm just on a meta run today so more thoughts on the political situation in Orr! I'm going to elaborate on this in my big meta essay someday but for now...

So, when Thais Yulman and Alik come to visit the Cavalry, Yuder makes the following observations:

Yuder had seen in his previous life how sensitive the court mages were to power. It was only natural since those who wanted to gain power rather than improving their magic skills often became court mages. On the surface, they professed loyalty to the emperor alone, but behind the scenes, they colluded with various nobles and engaged in dirty dealings. (64)

This is rather interesting as the two institutions the imperial power in the capital is based on are the Court Mages and the Imperial Knights. Of course we also have the Southern and Northern Army, but they are also filled with commoners, manpower for open conflict, not particularly for the intrigues of court. While the corrent Commander of the Imperial Knights is on good terms with, at the very least Kishiar, several of his subordinates are not subserviant to that - Kiolle being our best example, and how the Cavalry in general receives harsh treatment from them.

Similarly, we learn that Hellem Caspirl used to be the head of the Imperial Mage Division, aka the Court Mages (378). She treats Kishiar like her respected Lord and Nathan like relative - she supports them and has an amicable relationship to them. Kishiar went out of his way to hire her when she considered retiring. Now, I maight be reaching a little here, but...

'Thais Yulman must have known that the Emperor and Kishiar wouldn't completely trust the court mages, so he came running. (65)

... wonder what it says that she retired, but is still more than capable of working and, according to sensing-powerful-individuals-at-master-level Yuder, still is quite powerful.

All while the Court Mages apparently keep detoriating further. And, to make this about my most special babygirl again, this also says quite a bit about the Cavalry and Yuder's time as Commander. We know the Cavalry dominated and quickly put every other group out of a job - all while, apparently, being the only group you could consider fully loyal to the Emperor. Naturally, this was in part because Yuder very much ruled with an iron fist of violence that didn't tolerate disobedience, but also because the Cavalry essentially was the institution pushing for, well, let's call it Awakener Rights.

The Cavalry has to perform well, or, to quote Katchian, "Show me your worth, the reason I should keep the Cavalry around" (1031).

All other imperial institutions are riddled with corruption, which Katchian himself used to get into his position, and then the Cavalry itself is kept on a short leash, standing, IMO, represent for the wellbeing of Awakeners in the Empire in general.

[hopeinthebox]

tagged by the fabulous @cordiallyfuturedwight and @jimin-gaon <33 here's the december list

apologies for being late again new year same me: @aprylynn @jiminsproof @pauls-mccharmly @thvinyl @visionsofgideontheninth @btsbs @kimchokejin @jihopesjoint @eoieopda @monismochi 💜 and anyone else who feels so inclined MWAH p.s. please do tag me anyway if you've already done it

[temunitu]

does ANYONE remember an artist making art of rottmnt leo working at run of the mill and getting into job shenanigans with senior hueso but SPECIFICALLY the entire prompt was from that one popular tumblr post/thread where op keeps getting into more and more ridiculous job situations. the boss suggested that they claim to be a family business even though they look nothing alike. loud rnb music playing during op’s shift late at night and boss says the neighbors were complaining.

i have bits and pieces stuck in my head but i cannot for the life of me remember the actual post OR the comic someone made of leo and hueso ughhh

[dykegeology]

art is fun and great until I have to sketch out where to put scales on a fish and suddenly I have completely forgotten how a cylinder works

[ace-whovian-neuroscientist]

finally watched the doctor who movie and it is exactly as gloriously weird as everyone said.

things i did not blink an eye at: goo snake, that regeneration, mcgann screaming "who am i" in just a sheet in front of dozens of mirrors, "lee is the son i have always yearned for", y2k being a thing, the laws of physics falling apart but specifically a glass door, that romantic ass record while the doctor thinks about the master, whatever torture device the doctor gets rigged up in, the master dying again in a seemingly unrevivable way

things i was not prepared for: the master having an american accent

[bayofwolves]

I’ve been obsessed, obsessed, obsessed with Raisha for a while now. I know you’ve said little things about her in the past and i want to know what’s up with her/Gerathon if you’d be willing to talk about it.

I really like Raisha as a character, too! We know so little about her, but in my opinion, she's one of the most fascinating characters in the series. Unfortunately, she meets a sad end in A Revised History of Erdas.

All we know about Raisha post-infection is that she was present at the final battle in The Burning Tide, still under Zerif's control and in pretty bad shape. She vanishes off the grid after that, never mentioned again, not even in the concluding montage of Great Beast summoners reuniting with their fallen spirit animals. My retelling offers some closure, but not the good kind.

In my version of events, Raisha is flanking Zerif when he emerges from the ship with his Great Beasts. Zerif, in an act of cruel irony, saw fit to keep Raisha by his side even in her mindless, infected state. Shane, up in the archers' keep with Abeke, hardly recognizes the girl who helped steal Halawir months earlier. Later, she reappears to restrain Abeke when Zerif brings the defeated Redcloak forces to the Wyrm. When the Wyrm is killed and the parasites lose their power, though, Raisha collapses to the ground and doesn't get back up. The Wyrm had pushed her finite body to an extent that it couldn't recover from. Many people and animals in Zerif's army are the same; their possession eventually killed them. The Wyrm was a child playing with toys, the mechanics of which it couldn't possibly understand. Thankfully for it, its parasites could go on controlling a body in the event of an untimely death. Indeed, Stead raises the possibility that Raisha had been dead for some time, and the parasite was only animating a corpse.

Like I've said before, I didn't do this out of dislike for Raisha or anything like that. She was ultimately another victim of Zerif -- a young, lonely, impressionable girl he took advantage of -- and didn't deserve anything that happened to her. I'll always support AUs where she is alive and well. In my eyes, though, her story was always meant to end in tragedy. By the time she realized her mistake and reached for the light, it was too late.

Gerathon, after reemerging in southern Zhong and feeling the loss of her human partner, disappeared into the brush and is currently at large. She is only an adolescent cobra at the moment, hardly a threat... but the Great Beasts are growing, and Gerathon's time will inevitably come again. (I like the idea of her becoming a maneater as she slowly regains her former size and power, terrorizing the locals and gaining a place in their legends.) Who knows how she feels about losing Raisha. I expect, under the excruciating pain that may one day drive her to madness, there is a sweet sense of relief.

[2129888]

little whistling abe i'm thinking of u

[spaceratprodigy]

sorry for how slow and sparse I've been getting around to everyone. I'm doing my best but genuinely rn I desperately need to take care of myself instead of always putting others first.