#i am not articulate and i apologize

[multifaceted-memoryspace]

you know, i& don’t think it’s talked about enough the unique experiences with caedgender (and the non-exclusive equivalent, dispargender). thought i’d& give a shoutout/positivity post a go.

☔️ to those who lost their gender due to transphobia, by being denied their feelings as their gender so much that the feeling of gender and enjoyment their gender used to bring them at all has been taken from them.

⛓️‍💥 to those who lost their gender due to spending so much time masking as [a] different gender(s) that their true gender is missing or only remains as a void.

🔐 to those who lost their gender due to the way their systemhood/multiplicity/plurality affects their gender disconnect.

🐦‍⬛ to those who lost their gender due to disorders and/or neurodivergencies that include having an unstable sense of identity (like dissociation and BPD) and the struggles and/or traumas associated with lack of a consistent selfhood.

🩶 to those who grieve and mourn the feelings of euphoria and joy their gender has at one point brought to them.

🫥 to those who’s lack of gender affects their other identities, like how they experience attraction.

⛈️ to those who’s experiences being intersex affect their ability to be connected to their gender in a typical or “correct” way.

💫 to those who -dream or -regress as a way to cope with their loss of gender identity, wether voluntarily or not.

🎶 to those who embrace their disconnect in their gender, to those who are indifferent about their gender and the way it feels to them.

❔ to those who collect/hoard genders in an attempt to regain control of their identity despite not feeling connected to any of them.

🧣 to those who pick and choose gender identities that match more with their aesthetic or other identities (like special interests).

🔥 to those who feel their connection to gender is atypical, or that they link/stel/etc. their gender, or otherwise feel that their alterhumanity/otheredness affects their disconnect from their gender identity.

🫶🏻 to those who feel disconnected from the community, to those who feel “wrong” or “incomplete” due to their gender experience(s).

🫂 to those who i& haven’t mentioned in this post.

it’s okay to grieve. it’s okay to be angry. it’s okay to be sad. it’s okay to love yourself/selves anyway. our experiences deserve to be heard too. you’re not alone.

[mr-magoriums-im-sorry-emporium]

ummmmm musings about the ghost trick ending, under the cut because yknow. spoilers. tldnr i am not The Biggest Fan of the ending; i love the game and always will but i dont think the ending stuck the landing

and no i am not talking about the cat reveal. that was fire

so like, in the good timeline.... everyone's super happy and stuff, and yomiel was in prison for those 10 years instead of being dead, and sissel now lives with jowd

and i. well first i have some thoughts about yomiel being in prison being the good ending because yeah, he wants to atone for what he did, but jowd also wanted that and everyone around him worked together to make sure he didn't do that. or is the difference that yomiel actually did the thing he thought he did?

also, prison is not exactly like... The Best place to be. there are a lot of problems with prison, most notably the isolation that comes with it. especially since yomiel seems to be the only prisoner there, and yeah sissel (fiancsissel) visits him, but are they allowed to hug? or is it one of those prisons that makes you do the phone-call-thru-plexiglass thing. and i dunno man, it just kind of sucks that yomiel went thru 10 years of isolation and then had to go thru 10 years of different slightly less bad isolation

but fine. whatever. what ever! its fine.

but.... the whole climactic moment was how sissel (cat sissel) loved yomiel so much. how they literally WERE each other for years, how sissel was yomiel's only compaion, and how yomiel was sissel's. they were each other's only friends. sissel wanted so badly to help yomiel- and he did! i'm not saying he didn't!

im just saying, like, it feels a bit wrong that he ends up with jowd's family and is just content to be a part of a family, any family, with no real mention of yomiel. like it kind of makes the emotional climax of the game hit a little less hard, knowing sissel doesnt seem to miss yomiel and is just fine living with a different family

but thats just meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[battle-subway-aftershow]

// for the post youve turned into an ask game /silly

im just curious on if you have any more thoughts about esper, completely fine if not !!

RAHHHH ESPER!!! I love esper she’s incredibly silly! I haven’t been keeping up nearly enough, but dshsiahks I love her more so much!

The way you develop Spikemuth as a place and how it was affected by the Darkest Day is scarily real, and the way the after effects of the darkest day as a whole seem to affect Esper? Amazinggg

Esper feels very authentic and I love seeing the way she interacts with other people (the mystery neighbor saga for example!) and I can’t wait to see where everything goes!

(Also side note I love her art style! I love it when people give their muses different art styles from theirs, it’s really fun to study and examine!)

[music-for-fuckers]

Follow You — ouch

[potatobugz]

Noelle Holiday? (Yes this is a bingo request that I guess is a semi-sequel to the previous one for Susie)

thgey call her noelle holiday the way she. brightens up. your day

[berkeley-mews]

hareton earnshaw was 23, he should have been at the club!!

[qrowscant]

how are you able to incorporate imagery (not as a metaphor but the actual images and gifs) so well into your games? thank you and i love your work!

if you just want the actual command, its a pretty basic html tag you can just google. its like <img src = "INSERT STUFF HERE "> iirc

if you want my process, here:

figure out the style as in like. the art style. the vibe. i like each of my works to have a distinct visual style i can follow because that makes actually drawing things a lot easier. for childhood homes it was ditherpunk black and white, for my brother;the parasite it was painted images run through a crunchy pixel-y filter. buy PIxaTool its good

draw a rough layout / reference something else a visual reference is very helpful!! i like to read through different works and steal parts i like, then sketch up something, then actually build it in html.

Code It this part sucks. i'm a novice at twine/html/etc so i am bad! but i am also very stubborn. get comfortable combing through forums and not understanding why the image isnt where its supposed to be. things will break and thats just the way it is. try again and again and eventually things will work. w3schools and stack overflow are my best fucking friends as a newbie.

beyond that, a lot of it is just coding, testing, and then tweaking things over and over until i like how it looks alongside the text. also!! keep in mind the mood of the scene!! how the reader should feel!! and adjust your images accordingly. never underestimate the impact a minor change in a picture will have. people notice, especially when its the only thing TO notice.

[daz4i]

i dont want to kill you anymore i want you to live a full healthy life and never get hurt

ah. *wipes away a single tear* unrealistic. blocked

(sorry sorry just joking. this is very sweet 🥺🖤)

[idrisofficial]

WOOO FINALLY DONE WITH THOSE ASKS

geules

1 for zephyr

2 for rowen and adrian

3 for grace

4 for lennox and rowen

5 for adrian

1. Does your OC have any experience in the military? Perhaps they come from a long line of soldiers or army leaders? Or were they conscripted or press-ganged into an army at a young age? If they have not had a formal position in an army, then what is their view of the military mindset and hierarchies they have observed?

idris is the kind of fucked up where the public education system ends at 13 years old so that teens can be conscripted into the military, and zephyr happened to be part of the unlucky population to be drafted. his experience was…anything but pleasant. making good friends was never really his strong suit, so he ended up with some shitty acquaintances who more or less ordered him around to do their bidding. he also took one of his military mentors as a fucked up surrogate father figure, which really burned him when he was discharged after less than a year of service because of his explosives accident. it also instilled a lot of really harmful, nationalist sentiments in him which he’s still working to unlearn. zephyr in canon time is only 15, but he has a whole lot of military trauma attached to him from only a few months as a soldier.

2. Does your OC believe in the concept of a "just war" or do they believe that all conflict is to be deplored? Could they conceive of a justifiable reason for one nation to invade another - perhaps to free an oppressed people or prevent the development of a dangerous technology? Or would they only support a war of defence against an aggressor?

rowen: rowen is absolutely in favor of a just war. growing up in idris has taught her nothing if not that authorities will only suppress any form of subtle resistance, so violence and war are really the only way forwards to a better future. it’s easy to see how she’d already internalized this by her teen years by the fact that she opted to burn down her reform school at 15 rather than make a simpler plan of escape (also says something that evander let her!). rowen believes in a pretty black and white fashion that violence is always justified against tyranny.

adrian: adrian thinks of war in very removed, political terms. his only personal connection to the concept is through artemis’s rebellion, which he fears and deplores because he’s been propagandized against political dissidence from birth. war, to adrian, is a last resort to be taken when diplomacy between two countries has unequivocally failed and cannot be reconciled. in adrian’s eyes, civil war is pretty much never justified because of how severely it upends society as a whole and causes patriotic confusion and domestic chaos. most other nobles share his same opinion; for the most part, he doesn’t think very much outside the political propaganda fed to him.

3. Is your OC usually magnanimous in victory - whether against a defeated foe, or against a friend in a game or competition? Or perhaps they enjoy exulting in their success at the expense of others? Perhaps with ribald mockery or spiteful vengeance?

HAHAHA this is a great one. grace absolutely likes to gloat a little. …maybe more than a little. it’s not particularly good noble etiquette, but fuck that, right? it’s exhausting for her to pretend to be stoic all the time in order to cover up her political opposition, so she deserves to be smug over her little victories. and her big ones. glory and mockery on planet grace.

4. What has been the most difficult thing your OC has ever had to forgive (assuming they have ever done so)? Did they do this of their own accord? Or only after they felt justice had been done or penitence suitably demonstrated?

lennox: this is a surprisingly difficult question to answer. i think i have to go with brinne executing natal. probably the only significant wrong in his life that he’s forced himself to forgive. he’s also had to forgive himself for letting it happen, but he doesn’t fault himself as much as he faults others, so that comes second. lennox fought for days on end with brinne to lessen natal’s punishment for seeking out artemis’s rebellion (which natal never even found), to very little avail. he was able to convince her that it was not within the bounds of the law to execute natal before he turned 17, but really all that did was stall his execution date. he really fucking hated brinne for that one, not even only because of his gay little crush on natal, but it was also one of lennox’s first meaningful legal experiences as the head of his noble house, and he lost. that was real humiliation. he only forgave brinne because he didn’t have another choice if he wanted to stay sane and in power within the noble court. he’s forgiven her just enough to not let it affect him and his job.

rowen: rowen doesn’t do a whole lot of forgiving. unless she has very good reason, she won’t trust or absolve those who have slighted her unless they’ve shown real incentive to rectify the harm they’ve done. the best example i can think of is her forgiving grace for her noble birth, which sounds pretty basic because it’s not something grace had control over, but it is actually a big deal. rowen’s prejudice against the upper class runs deep, and she really enforced the divide between her and grace for a long time. if not for her own gay little crush on grace, it’s hard to say whether she ever would have been entirely over their class differences and forgive grace for her upbringing.

5. Does your OC harbour resentment towards a particular person, group or faction? Or are they perhaps part of a widely resented group themselves?

yes to both, to some extent. from both a political and a personal standpoint, adrian really loathes artemis’s rebellion more than he’s ever loathed anything else. resentment is a bit of a difficult word when applying it to his political feelings, because on that basis there’s a lot more fear than anger, so the full spirit of resentment isn’t quite captured. from a personal perspective, there’s a lot of anger going on, especially from someone like adrian. if rowen hadn’t, y’know, mutilated brinne right in front of him, maybe he would only be afraid. but he wants them fucking obliterated for that. not the best move on rowen’s part! to answer the second question, idris’s nobility is largely respected by its population, and political dissidents are a minority, so adrian isn’t exactly resented by a large percentage of citizens, but the people who hate him really hate him. this goes double because he’s idris’s high priest, not just any noble. most people have a lot of respect for him, but some people absolutely despise him.

[wlw-cryptid]

thats the one yes i don't want to rush you or anything. to be clear. just remembered this was apparently something tumblr does sometimes

no worries no worries no worries i totally understand

[thakillingmoon]

So, I plan to write that Hazama-centric fic I've been teasing soon, and was curious; what's on your wishlist for this story?

This is the first time I've ever been asked smth like this lolol.

Idk if I have a whole wish list, but I'm really excited to see how you handle Hazama experiencing true heartbreak and his reaction to it (maybe not the right phrase to use when talking about a guy who has a hole where his heart should be but you get what i mean lol). Like would he react to it the same way as physical pain, or would it take a bit longer for him to process??

I thought I had more, but I think I forgot, sorry! If it comes back to me, I'll def PM you! Thank you so much for the ask!

[mermaidslabyrinth]

hi 👋

i have a question! what inspires you when crafting an oc? i, for example, cannot write an oc without them being practically a self insert. (skill issue, i know) i was reading your oc’s facts and he seems very interesting and feels like he could actually belong to the hotd universe. so i was wondering what is your creative process in writing him. <3

First off if this sounds long winded, doesn’t fully make sense, or you have more thoughts/questions let me know. Putting a read more because I wrote a bit.

I’d like to thank you for reading my facts. It would be easy to say they were a breeze but that document is many months of additions of ideas that came at random times and subtractions of things that didn’t work.

I did a lot of self inserts in my life. They were just me but with different hair or eye color. And they got with the character I was smitten with at the time. A lot of the time they didn’t make sense and were rather shallow in development but I had fun. Self inserts are the first step to figure out what you like and not like about creating a character. They all helped with my creativity.

So, I’m going to be honest and say Rhagerys is the first character I put actual time into. I mean come this April it’ll be a year since he was created. And I’m still working on him and helping him feel somewhat real. It’s a lot of work and thinking. And I’d be lying if I said he didn’t have a few things I personally like or do. For example I have a stuffed bear that I cherish, so I decided to give Rhagerys a stuffed dragon he cherishes. It’s the small things like that helps me build on giving him some depth. (Because then it’s like well why does he have a stuffed dragon? And I made a little fact on why. If needed I could write a little story on how he got it). I'm left handed so I made Rhagerys only be able to write with his left hand.

My creative process when it comes to writing Rhagerys I always start with, and this is my process, a simple word or phrase or a thought. One night I was getting ready for bed and it was a full moon and I thought “What would it be like for Rhagerys to ride Starsong during a full moon?” And I wrote a little snippet of him asking Daemon to let him do so the next full moon. That he would be good and listen to everything Daemon told him during that month leading up to it.

I definitely want to expand on it sometime but the important thing right now is that I wrote it down and it exists. So, no matter how small the thought is (ex. A 215 Drabble about Daemon snoring) to something lengthy but not ready to be part of the story (ex. A 1.3k about Rhagerys trying to avoid Jace’s name day celebration). Write it down. You won’t regret it. You may not use it but you can draw from it or see it as a practice in writing.

I have so many snippets I’ve lost count. I have a full outline, categorized in years with bullet points, of my story as well. From beginning to end. I’m happy I have them because I can go back to them and expand or change certain parts. If I didn’t write them down, I’d forget them and they’d be lost forever. Will I ever get to them? Idk. But they’re there sitting and waiting if I do.

So, if I had to pin down my creative process it would be that I write down any thought, no matter how small (I have a folder full of literal 1-5 sentences or a line of dialogue that I’d like to build around). To a straight up outline of a plot bunny that may be hopping around in my head.

Like right now a plot that wouldn't leave my mind until I wrote it down is a long part of my story and it all started with me wondering “What if Rhagerys rejected his father one night and fought back? How would Daemon handle that boldness?” Well, it turns out that it’s a week worth of manipulation tactics on Daemon’s part.

I wrote down a day by day outline of what I wanted to happen in the mentioned plot above. Just detailed enough of what I was going for. It’s a slow process getting it written out. I’ve been working on it since December.

I have very few full chapters written. The handful I do is because I put all my other pieces I was working on to the side. What I learned by writing those few chapters is that I do so much better in small writing increments. A full length chapter drains me (I have an 11.8k that I adore but it was such work). However, a 5k at most is much more doable for me. I learned that I am capable of writing lengthy chapters but it felt like all my creativity went into writing and perfecting such a hefty task that I didn’t feel like writing for a while. And I didn’t like that feeling because I had so many ideas I wanted to write down.

Also to help flesh Rhagerys out more, for the past month I’ve been filling out OC questions. It helps immensely on figuring what makes Rhagerys tick. Get inside his mind. There were questions I would start answer and realize that doesn’t sound like Rhagerys so I’d delete and really thought on it. From frivolous answers about the position he sleeps to deep ones like does he even like himself. The questionnaires are a big help in me figuring out my character and getting his personality believable.

As well as all those “Your OC Does What?” posts that I have been bombarded the dash with these past 3 nights (apologies to whoever follows me). Those have helped me write down little ideas no matter how random they may seem. They help me in understanding Rhagerys more.

I would say my creative process is, that no matter what, is I never stop wondering. I never stop playing a scenario in my head. From basic moments (Rhagerys at breakfast and he eats a piece of moldy bread) to moments that drastically effect him (him being 15, very drunk in Pentos, and Daemon takes advantage of that). My mind is always trying to create where Rhagerys can come alive, even for just a couple pages worth.

Creating anything takes time. Practice. Patience. And understanding that what you create is for you first and foremost. If other people like it, that's wonderful. If it's just you marveling at what you've done, that's just as wonderful. You put your heart and soul into something and whether you share it with the world is completely up to you.

If you chose to, like I did (and that took almost 9 months of me building up the courage), you'll be amazed at how many people out there are so willing to listen/read/see what you created. To see them say "Omg, I love your OC." It's a great feeling and something I do hope you get to experience. Because there is always that one person out there who is waiting for character just like the one you created.

Also, as a bonus, you meet and interact with so many great people. Letting others see Rhagerys, read about him and his story (I was so terrified about that because it is not a normal one) is one of the best decisions I have ever made while being on this website. I was scared at first. But now I'm practically shouting from the rooftop "Look at my boy!" I will always feel indebted to the four people who started the ball rolling for me. @emilykaldwen. @ewanmitchellcrumbs. @selfproclaimedunicorn. @murmel-malt. They helped me feel comfortable enough with myself to feel safe and let Rhagerys become part of the ever growing HotD OC world. (Sorry to tag you guys but I need to give you credit)

When you're ready to shout from the rooftops for people to look at your OC, I'll be one of them. I'm rooting for you. I do hope this helped. If you, or anyone reading this, want to reach out and just randomly chat about OCs, or whatever, I'll always listen and chat right back. Thank you for reaching out.

[grace4867]

Guys am i a horrible little creature for wanting attention

[sseras]

shocking how i am how i am

[crossbackpoke-check]

Fixed point (mathematics) // The History of Perspective // "Point of Disappearance", Dennis Held // How the Hughes hockey family stays grounded // Fixed Point Photography-- // "Portrait of A.", Tung-Hui Hu // Mic'd Up | Hughes NHL 25 cover shoot // "Burnt Norton", T.S. Eliot // "Circuitry", Janine Joseph // Bruce Bennett // Nick Wass // from obedience [maybe one day, during a point in time], kari edwards // Bill Rapai // "Errand Upon Which We Came", Stephanie Strickland // Benchmark (surveying)

art kid luke hughes

[drdemonprince]

The conversations about accountability & apologies that we've been having in social justice circles these last few years have basically trained everybody to fawn.

We've been telling people that if they are accused of any wrongdoing or of hurting anybody's feelings, it is their obligation to apologize immediately, and never to hedge, disagree, or to explain their rationale what they've done.

In their apology, we expect them to articulate every single thing that they have done that was damaging in the strongest language possible and to declare outright that they have harmed someone, often multiple groups of people, even if they are not sure of the impact (or could not even possibly be sure).

If a person's apology is anything but immediate and entirely self-excoriating, we accuse the person of downplaying the damage they have done, failing to be accountable, and manipulating others.

In this way, we've made it impossible for a person to ever take their own side lest that be taken itself as a form of wrongdoing. We have trained our fellow social-justice-minded people to believe that if they do anything but worsen the case against themselves, they are being irresponsible.

I say we, in all of this, because I have partaken in all of this rhetoric, made these kinds of criticism, given accused people this type of advice.

And I have followed it myself, often to a damaging effect.

I have taken responsibility for problems in which I truly did not believe I played a part, I've overstated the damage that I've done so as not to risk understating it, I've ascribed malice to my intentions when I knew it wasn't there, I've agreed with people's most negative, bad-faith narratives about conflicts involving me that they were not even present for, offered up information about myself that was not a third party's business in the name of transparency, apologized for things I haven't done -- and in doing all of this, I have denied my loved ones the opportunity to really hear me about what I was going through and my motivations when I was in conflict with them, things that any true friend or close associate would obviously want to hear about if they cared about me.

This aim of giving the perfect apology and taking perfect accountability has been nothing but an isolating force in my life, because it has barred me from openly entering into necessary conflict with people when our needs were incompatible or they had hurt me just as much as I'd hurt them. The fear of being a manipulative, unaccountable DARVO-er has led me to roll onto my back and expose my belly, falling over myself with panicked apologies and the most unflattering information possible cast in the least explicable light, almost outright begging for others to become angrier at me and believing that it was only way I could ever possibly be accepted back.

We've drilled into people that the way to be good and responsible is to allow people to view us as negatively as possible, to even arm others with information that will confirm that point of view, and to never insert our own perspective or needs on the matter at all.

And yeah, there are a lot of shitty people out there who dodge accountability easily because their power ensconces them from any consequences. but the primary problem with that was never that they wrote a shitty notesapp apology that used the unforgivable phrase "I am sorry if you felt XYZ." The real problem was that there was no community that held enough influence to hold them to account, and for their victims there weren't ever adequate supports or protections.

instead of addressing any of that in a remotely systematic way, we have taken to picking apart every accused person's every word and deed for evidence of inner moral failure and created a culture in which we think we can determine a person's safety by how artfully they put words together when they are under threat. and what do you know, plenty of bad faith actors and conflict avoidant cowards and people who just dont understand what they are even being accused of can do that just fine.