#i find it interesting some of the responses people have gotten in the game based on my choices cause i didn't get those ones so it makes me

[aarontveit]

just realized in order to watch earth abides, i'll have to stop listening to this song on repeat. i realize i can just begin listening to it again once i'm done the episode, i'm just....bad at explaining my relationship with music but music, ya feel?

[night-market-if]

Spoiler Ask

So I'm going to address it all here under the cut because I've gotten a few asks in that are pretty similar and I'm sure I'm going to get more. So I thought instead of answering the same thing over and over, I'd just do a response below. Warning, spoilers for the end of book 1.

Full disclosure. I am sick. We are going through a lot of family things at the moment. My patience is probably thin.

For everyone that says MC is already too forgiving of Milo. Milo has not even come into the story yet. You've only observed memories of him. If you feel like you need an inner dialogue to tell you how angry you are over this "betrayal" or "death", I don't know what to say here. Because MC is literally just observing things at the moment. Any options that have been put forth to comment on Milo and what has happened, have been more to lay ground work and to also give a scope of the type of emotions that will be offered in the game. But literally, Milo has not even shown up yet into the story in a real capacity. So please stop sending me asks about how you are upset that MC has "forgiven" him because there has literally been no real interaction between Milo and the MC.

As for this betrayal and death thing. I am going to state this now for those who aren't going to like where my story is going so you don't need to read if you don't want to. As the Night Market, you knew you were going to die. You gladly came down and wanted to experience death. You looked at what Milo (a non magic user) was doing, and said "hey, this would be a cool experience" and then you came down here. So, yes, you are going to feel the full range of emotions that come with it. But you are also going to need to take some personal accountability for your actions. That is what is going to be explored in this book. An entity that didn't realize what emotion actually meant, came down thinking it wasn't going to be a big deal to die, and it turned out it was a big deal. A big fucking deal, in fact and that by doing so, they actually hurt people they loved. So, don't forgive Milo. I'm not forcing anyone to. But, I will not be writing an MC that puts all the blame on him. Because guess what? The Night Market would have died if he didn't do what he did. So, everyone also saying that he killed the MC? No, he literally saved the MC and billions of people. And I don't care what way you spin it? One person is never worth a billion souls. And with the MC being someone that literally cut themselves open over and over again to save most of the people living within the world, I would think they would probably not be too keen on Milo sacrificing them so they could die together in some bullshit Romeo and Juliet act.

Now, I am all for exploring how an MC comes to terms with the feeling of betrayal along with the feeling of needing to take responsibility. I am all for exploring an MC that goes "holy shit this emotion thing is way bigger than I thought and I'm angry and confused". I'm there for it. I'm excited to write it. But, I will not be writing a willfully ignorant MC that doesn't take into account that they did this to themselves as well. And yes, if you choose to not acknowledge it in game, others are going to acknowledge it for you. If you want to not read because you can't become a villain, rock back and forth in a corner and weep, or violently get mad at someone who saved the world? That's cool. I'm not offended by someone not reading it. Anyone coming into my ask box and saying "I just am not going to read now because you aren't doing xyz" I wish you a good night and hope you find something else for you because there are thousands of stories out there.

I am not interested. Nor will I ever be interested. In writing a story where I add to the plague of ignorance that is this world. Aren't we kind of all struggling enough with that in our own lives? MC is a being of compassion. They will always be a being of compassion. That is going to shift and change based on circumstances and there are going to be moments where that compassion can fall into question. When it comes to Milo, it is going to be a messy bit of confusing emotions because there is so much more than just the black and white strokes of "OMG he killed me" that seemed to be the rhetoric on here. Now, you don't want his character around? Alright. Other than when you have to see him for Gatekeeper purposes, you probably won't.

To all of you guys complaining or sending me ask after ask stating how you don't like what I am doing. I am going to tell you this and it will not ever change. If you don't like reading this, then don't read. I am not here to write a story for you specifically. You don't like the direction of a work and can't ever broaden your scope of fiction to give it a shot? Then please don't. But to have this kind of messages coming through when literally we are a chapter in? Seriously. The instant gratification is bullshit. I'm going to suspect this is coming from the younger half of my audience who is way too accustomed to a confirmation bias internet algorithm and who has had a very small scope of real life. This is of course not all of the younger crowd but it's starting to seem like a pretty good amount.

I love having conversations with everyone. My discord is always open but most of you anons hide because you are far too scared to come at me with your user name or engage in a conversation feed where more than just me can answer. I mean, you guys send me asks, citing others user names, to call them out through me. It's laughable at this point.

I love having discourse with all of you but I'm not going to keep answering the same thing over and over again and justifying my work when it doesn't need to be justified. This is a small little bit of fiction in a vast sea.

If I sound pissed, it's because I am at this point. And I'm sure I'll get more asks in that are stating they are jumping ship or that they are disappointed in me or what not. I'll delete them and move on with my evening.

To all of you who are here for the ride and just want to experience what I'm writing? Thank you. Fiction is just meant to be a form of entertainment. I am not writing anything profound. To anyone that is looking for something more, move on. I'll see everyone who wants to get mad or saying I'm too harsh, in my inbox, I am sure. Thank god you can block anons.

[doshmanziari]

Shadow of the Erdtree: Some Reflections

Well, folks, since no one asked, here are some thoughts I've had while exploring Elden Ring's add-on, Shadow of the Erdtree.

The existence of an alternate shadow realm has solidified my conviction that what Elden Ring is depicting on micro and macro scales is the phenomenology of etheric bodies -- extending even to the moon, the double of which is visible from the Moonlight Altar plateau (this is reflected by Rellana's Twin Moons spell). Each of these bodies possess a regulating function. Although each might be generally described as doppelgänger, the occult scientist Rudolf Steiner wrote of the Doppelgänger proper as its own sort of body, responsible for the tension between aspiration and temptation. It's interesting to me that this is such a major preoccupation of the game, because it indicates a layer of esoteric involvement, on the part of Elden Ring's narrative conceptualizations, that I don't think anyone in the so-called lore community has picked up on yet. The shadow realm helps explicate the otherwise inexplicable Godefroy the Grafted, too.

Various details have also strengthened my impression that the revolt against Nature we see in Elden Ring is a revolt against motility -- motility being the ultimate enemy of utopia: a human conceptualization reliant upon infinite stasis. In the base game, I think we see this revolt most profoundly in the narrative of Ranni, who first abandons her own flesh and then strives towards the realization of an Age of Stars, that "thousand year voyage under the wisdom of the Moon." Although the Seedbed Curse represents its own revolt against Nature, it remains within the organic order. Ranni's vision is of the inorganic and remote. And I don't think it's unrelated that, in certain esoteric cosmological systems, the moon stands as most distant from the Absolute.

The colors of the landscapes and sky are amazing: vivid, autumnal, and strange. These palettes have only made me dislike the game's rain effect all the more, which does not deepen the arboreal colors (as it should) but drains all surfaces of color and sets them into a depressing, bland grayscale. To say that the rain is a part of why I consider Raya Lucaria to be Elden Ring's low-point in the realm of major level design could be seen as a trivial complaint, but visual drudgery will wreck even the best schemes; and Raya Lucaria is as far as you can get from that anyway. FromSoftware has done fine with types of snow (see, e.g., the Frigid Outskirts or Painted World of Ariandel), but I think they've yet to figure out rain, among some other graphical technicalities.

The forges are among my favorite instances of discrete level design, even if, or maybe because, they tend to contain only two or three enemy types, feature no bosses, and severely scale back the level of challenge. I happened upon one yesterday that I did find a little dull, but the other two were wonderful, brief, atmospheric knots, quiet sequences of colossal architecture, that sort of evoked shades of Stonefang Tunnel from Demon's Souls. On that note, I'd call special attention to the forges' theme music. The only other piece of music from the DLC that's gotten my attention is the theme for Belurat.

Plants are People, Too.

Torrent is just... a terrible inclusion for this game. It's maybe obvious enough to not warrant being said, but -- any design decision has to be evaluated on what it contributes to the system it's been set into, and Torrent adds nothing outside of the occasional, brainless convenience. I could maybe see an argument for Torrent's presence if he had some emotionally charged narrative integration, maybe like what Shadow of the Colossus did. Without this, Torrent is nothing but a tool which perpetually problematizes the overworld's scale (a bit too big, yet no fun to traverse at high speed) and trivializes all of its gauntlets on a potential and actual level far worse than anything the Spirit Ashes could ever do. Better to me would've been if the only way to use a mount were by defeating a mounted knight without killing their horse and then sneaking up to the runaway to gain ownership of it.

I'm finding the map much more engaging than that of the base game because of how it plays with abstractions and builds anticipation through that. One part of the map, for instance, shows a bunch of trees with red leaves. Reaching this place reveals these "trees" to be enormous red flowers. Another section shows pink, purple, and orange specks. What are these? And what are the gray, finger-like lumps erupting from the mass next to it? I've also found it tough to figure out how to progress from one plane to another because of how densely stacked and knobby the continent's features are, so consulting the map has been helpful in a way I rarely experienced with the base game's.

Love how much the Ancient Ruins of Rauh resemble The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, from the explosion of verdure, to the crude, architectural naivety defining the pseudo-Gothic structures.

With Shadow of the Erdtree, I keep coming up against an unresolvable simultaneity like the one mentioned above regarding the overworld. There's a lot of good level design to be found here among the dungeons, castles, and forts, yet the abundance and enormity of it all seems to have deprived the game of significant contrasts, and those special spatial moments, which I found much easier to locate and reflect upon with, say, Dark Souls or Bloodborne. Sure, the sky-piercing spiral of Enir-Ilim is a sight to behold; but soon enough the sequences of grand staircase upon grand staircase, great bridge upon great bridge, creates a perpetual climatic grandiosity that diminishes the very effect of a climax (and I'm not even sure that Enir-Ilim is the DLC's intended final location). Anor Londo or the Nightmare of Mensis could feel special because the qualities and features of their spaces stood apart from everything else. Elden Ring, I think, has gotten itself into a predicament by trying to one-up its internal material and all prior FromSoftware games through the enormity of its scale -- and challenge. More and more, I've been craving a new project from them that resets these terms of engagement, even while enjoying the consistency of the material at hand.

That's all for now! In time maybe I'll turn these thoughts to an essay for my Substack page, perhaps with a focus on the first two points.

[cindylouwhooo]

Chapter five

Gigi’s POV

Loud, loud, loud music plays over the speakers and the floor underneath us vibrates with the power of the base and the force of people jumping up and down.

I would be dancing too, had I not chosen to wear my Louboutin heels. But, alas, fashion overtakes dancing.

Francisca is hung on Pierre’s shoulder, seemingly tipsy and in the mood for PDA, and I try to ignore the intense stare coming from the other side of the club.

Monaco has its perks when you’re rich and have a crush.

Kika mentioned he’d be here, though after I’d already sent him the invite—you know, to make him feel better.

The lack of a response should have gotten me out of that silly, little infatuation I’d grown over the McLaren driver, yet the excitement of the imminent game of cat and mouse strikes over my body like lightning. And his attention hasn’t been on anyone else but me, all night long. He had the advantage of arriving later than me, forcing me into a routine of checking the entrance every other second and sweeping the club with me eyes; trying to find him.

But the moment he stepped foot in the building…my eyes didn’t get remotely close to his.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t choose this dress specifically to get him to notice me. It is my lucky dress, and it seems like it’s done the job once again.

“Gi, do you want another drink?” Pierre asks and I nod with a smile on my face.

“It’s so crowded tonight.” Kika complains, but her eyes shine in mischief the next second. “Maybe it’s time for you to go get some.”

I bark the most unflattering, loud laugh in Kika’s face, forgetting for a moment that I’m supposed to seem sultry and mysterious in an interesting way. “Get some? Sorry, but I’m not about to get some with the people who come here.”

“Girl, we’re here.”

I roll my eyes. “We’re here because Pierre dragged us here. Everyone else is here because they want to get with the drivers who were supposed to be here—because it’s the Monaco Grand Prix! they have to go out! But in reality, they’re sweating ass in their hotel room, knowing they have three days of driving in the narrowest track of the year.”

Kika laughs at my paranoia, “Please, as if you wouldn’t get with a driver.”

“No, I would. But that’s cause I’m awesome and everyone else sucks.”

Thankfully, the music is so loud that no one else hears our conversation unless everybody on the internet would know that Gigi Santos is an overbearing, dick-headed asshole who thinks too much of herself.

Honestly, this might be the time I’ve felt the least of myself.

But fake it until you make it right?

Pierre comes with our drinks a while later and Francisca and I chug the whole glass in one go, cheering like college girls before running off away from the tables to dance.

Like Kika said, the place is crowded as fuck, but we still slither among the bodies enough to find an empty spot to dance with comfort—as much of it we can find.

The back of my heels cut my skin and my toes are squeezed into each other, inviting pain to take over my feet and up my legs, but I wrap my arms around Kika’s neck and dance like I’m in my pyjamas.

The lights go low as Lights Down Low starts to sound off the speakers in a slowed, reverberated version of the original. We move to the rythm of it, the energy of the club shifting in an instant and in a sudden turn of my body away from my friend—I find a l’air of honey brown eyes staring right at me.

Locked.

Darkened.

Hungry.

A shot of lightning zaps through me as I stare back, a smile forming on my face. I keep dancing on Kika as I lick my lips and wink at Lando, whose jaw clicks. His fingers wrap around the glass of his drink and he raises it to his mouth, taking a sip without disconnecting our stare.

Once he’s put the glass back down to the table, he stalks towards me and my face heats up in the immediate reaction of his.

He gently pushes through the crowd, teasingly slow pace to reach me. My heart is thumping at the base of my exposed neck and I’ve nearly stopped dancing—my body to concentrated on waiting for him.

Then Lando is so close I can feel his breath hit my lips; exactly where his eyes are focused. His smile is drawn in mischief and I no longer feel Kika behind me. I actually no longer feel anyone, anywhere.

It’s just him and I.

“Hi.” My voice crumbles with the intensity of the feelings weighing me down.

What the fuck is going on with me?

It’s instant, heavy lust dropping down on me with just one look of his.

And when the tips of his finger trace the shape of my face, then the curves of my lips and down to my neck…then I’m fighting to keep myself out of the fire Lando Norris lit within me.

His hand is now covering the back of my head, and slowly, he brings me closer to him. Electricity lingers where his touch is and our chests bump with each heavy breath we take. And when I can barely taste the smoothness of his lips, Lando stops, and looks at me.

He just looks at me.

My ears are ringing and I can’t tell which song is on. “Hey.” He whispers against my mouth, but doesn’t kiss me.

I frown, almost pour and he softly laughs at my obvious frustration. He moves his head left and right, just so his lips heavenly trace my own. “Kiss me.” He whispers.

And I do.

And it’s all lips and teeth and his other hand cups my jaw, bringing me impossibly closer and my fingers curl into his buttoned shirt and I pull him closer because I need him, I need him to keep that fire he lit up going and his tongue opens my mouth and now the kiss is deeper and needier and I’m so close to jumping on him and and and and and

And I think I’ve just lost my mind.

I place my palms on his chest and his groan vibrates on my lips as I feel the frantic beat of his heart connect with mine and beat in sync. Just by a touch. Just by a kiss.

My world is spinning when we part and once I open my eyes and clash with his, I know we have the same thought.

“You have any things?” He says against my ear. I shiver and make no effort to hide it.

“Just my phone.” I nod where my table is when his head is back to facing me and he kisses my temple before walking off to where I showed him. Moment later, he’s back handing me my phone and placing his hand on the small of my back, gently pushing me towards the exit.

The chilly air hits my heated face and I wince. His hand leaves my back and grabs my hand, lacing our fingers together as he leads me to the hotel—just a few steps away. Or maybe it’s miles away, I wouldn’t know. Because he’s honking my hand and graving the skin of it with his thumb and smiling at me and…and it’s, just—it’s hard to focus on anything else than him.

We reach the hotel, and before we get on the elevator he stops.

“The room is a mess. Give me five minutes?” His voice is dripping with uncertainty and his eyes search my face for signs of disappointment. I bite my lip and nod; gaining one of the biggest smiles in return. “Do you want me to come get you when I’m done?”

“No, there’s no need. Just give me the number of the room. If that’s okay with you.”

He smiles again. Ah, shit. “Room 509B. Five minutes.” He kisses my lips in a haste and I try not to deepen it.

Five minutes seem to be five hours and by the time my knuckles knock on the door with the number 509B, my heart is beating out of my chest and the heat has traveled all over me.

The door opens, and

Well, that’s weird.

I stare, not really knowing what to do.

I red-haired woman stands with her underwear on the other side of the door, lipstick smudged and brows raised. But the weird part is not her. The weird part is Lando standing right behind her, three buttons on the top of his shirt that I last left intact, open and stained red from—what seems to be—lipstick.

“Can I help you?”

“Uh,” I dare not to look at the man behind her. I give her a smile, take a step back and speak. “No, sorry. I must’ve gotten the wrong message.”

I turn around and leave before anything else can happen.

Lando’s POV

Fuck.

[sandyca5tle]

Slime HRT - 10 Months

So - the past few months have been interesting.

My arms and legs are now fully slime except for the bones, which are now mostly just floating around in the goo. I can push them around if I put my hand inside them, which is weird on a few levels, but also pretty neat. That has been a new experience, being able to stick things in and through my limbs, but i’ve also found it kinda useful - if I need to hold something, or keep something safe, I can just kinda put it in my arm, or leg and it’s there for when i need it… have gotten a few weird looks for that though, especially if I forget I’ve got like a pencil or something in my arm.

As I somewhat alluded to, the changes in my limbs weren’t all smooth sailing, in fact so far this period has been the most awkward. First of all, once more of my feet had turned to slime, I actually found I had some trouble with my balance - turns out not having a fully solid base on your body messes with your ability to stay upright - took me a while to readjust to the new squishier ends to my legs. 

At the same time, I had to manage a decrease in fine dexterity in my hands. Part of this has to do with not quite being used to my fingers kinda sticking together, so sometimes I all but lose a finger in its neighbour. The other part is that turns out goo isn’t quite as easy to manipulate, and moves and squishes a lot more, making some finer motions harder to perform/perform as fluidly (ironically). While I can still use a keyboard, I definitely make a few more spelling errors, and I can’t game quite as smoothly, and it’s become almost impossible to type on my phone touchscreen, which has continued to become less responsive as I’ve turned more and more gooey, and combined with the loss of dexterity kinda leaves me screwed.

While both of these issues were a pain at first, I’ve learnt to adapt, and can, on the whole, still live and operate as normal (sans phone). Fortunately the slow nature of the transition gives me plenty of time to work out new ways of doing things.

The next major hurdle after that was the morning I woke up and, upon trying to stand up, had my legs just kind of pool beneath me - as in, I didn’t have legs anymore, I just had a pool of slime underneath my body. On one hand, I was very happy - I’d kinda been looking forward to trying out the ‘pooled legs’ thing I’d seen in art, on the other hand however (and in the moment the more poignant emotion) I was panicking. Turns out after 20 odd years of legs, suddenly not having them makes it pretty hard to move. 

It took me a bit to calm down enough to feel out the slime enough to find control of it and work out moving around - it’s kind of like conveyor belt logic: you move some of the slime forward, which, if you do it right (took me a few tried to do so) pulls the rest of you behind it, and you just kind of move the slime like a circle to move yourself in the direction you want. 

I actually spent about half a day managing with that, since a) it took me a bit to work that out and then I spent some time playing around with that then b) it took me even longer to work out how to get my legs to reform, and even when I did manage that, they were nowhere near stable and strong enough to hold me, so I spent a while doing that and somewhat relearning how to walk. The worst part is that for about a week/week and a half it became a morning routine, standing up, only to fall into a pool of my own slime, and it wasn’t just in the morning - while I was usually good once I got started in the morning, my legs weren’t quite as stable as they were beforehand, and so I’d sometimes end up pooled once again. Honestly, when I wasn’t in public, I usually just moved around in a pool until I needed legs, but a lot of the outside world isn’t built for people with puddle-’legs’. On that note, having to form legs took a bunch of effort to start with. I felt like I was trying to lift my whole upper body, which I guess in some respects I was, but fortunately I began to get the hang of it, both the lifting, and forming legs. Nowadays I can pretty much freely switch between pool and legs when I want, although I tend to keep to legs at the moment, as going from legs to pool has already lost me a few bones, and while I may not really use them any more, apparently they’re worth keeping so your body can convert them to more slime mass. Unfortunately I think I may have lost a couple small toe bones over the course of that week/week and a half.

The other issue with the pooling, and more slime content generally, is that I pick up all kinds of random crap off the floor. On one hand my floors have never been cleaner, on the other, I constantly have to pick shit out of myself, which while generally satisfying, is kinda a pain after a while.

The small blessing from this is I’ve actually now gained a bit of control over the shape of my slime parts. While at the moment I can really only do small things with my arms/hands (which condensing my fingers a little has helped with recovering some of my fine dexterity), and go between legs and pool with my lower half, I’m hoping that soon I’ll be able to do more exciting things. One thing I have managed is being able to extend/shorten my limbs a little, which is useful for reaching things, although I can’t go super far since I don’t have the mass, although I did work out a neat work around: I can send a little bit of slime from one arm to the other through my ‘blood’ vessels in my body, to transfer mass between them - it’s not super fast though, so it’s still pretty limited, but hey it’s something!

The other thing to report on this entry is that showering is funky now. Since my limbs are less solid now, the water kind of penetrates a little into them, and I get little bubbles of water within. Have found that this does wonders for my thirst, and when I shower I can usually drink a more normal amount, for a human, without having issues, which is nice. Have had to watch the water pressure, so as not to wash any of my limbs away, or blast my bones out of my body though, so pros and cons, as ever.

Oh! Additional notes for this update: I no longer have hair growing on my arms and legs - for obvious reasons - and not having to shave those has been nice, and I can’t wait for the same on my face - it’s cheaper than laser. I’ve also stopped taking my ‘normal’ hrt, since the recommended application spots are now slime, although I did have to shoot off an email about the non-gel parts of that since I forgot to ask about those originally, and apparently I can stop those too, so.

All in all these past four months have been… and experience. Fortunately I’m coping, although I am a little worried about what else I’m gonna have to learn to cope with over the coming months, but so far it’s all been worth it, so hopefully it’ll stick that way. See ya in the next one! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

First - Prev - Next

[maggacammara]

okay, it’s my turn to obsess over the minor details we get about background NPCs and come up with elaborate headcanons based on scant information. Rolan, Cal, & Lia have had their time in the sun—let’s talk about Doni & Rikka!

I recently saw Doni’s letter to his father in-game for the first time. if you haven’t read it, here’s the text. you can find it in the Festering Cove in the Underdark!

Dad,

Sorry I stopped writing - we ran out of paper on the road. I got this from the druids. Maybe that’s why they’re so mad at us.

I hope this can find you. Zevlor says you got lost and that our old house is gone, but I read a book that says all rivers find their way into the Styx.

When you get it, you can write me back in Baldur’s Gate. Or maybe come visit?

I’ll write again when I can get more paper.

- Doni

while I was looking for this note on the wiki, I also noticed that Doni is listed as the ward of Rikka, one of the tieflings who is guarding the gate at the Emerald Grove. I can’t find the source for that exact bit of information, but I did find this description of a quest line I’ve never gotten in-game before.

Find Doni only occurs if the leaders of the goblin camp are left alive and learn the location of the Druid Grove. In this instance, the goblins come to raid the Grove and the tieflings and druids prepare for the assault. As part of this, Rikka is wandering around the Hollow searching for Doni, who has gone missing. Rikka has instructed all of the tiefling children to hide in their hideout and she will lock the hatch so that no harm comes to them. She can't do that until Doni is found.

I couldn’t find the actual dialogue that accompanies this quest, so maybe Rikka specifies in this interaction that she is Doni’s guardian! either way, it seems like she takes responsibility for all of the children in this scenario, as well as in the alternate scenario where you kill the goblin leaders—when the tieflings are preparing to leave the Grove, she can be seen giving the children instructions on how to stay safe on the road.

so here’s what we know—

Doni lost his dad back in Elturel, but he either seems to not know or not accept that his father is likely dead.

several of the other tiefling children seem to be orphans or not have parental figures present, and Rikka appears to take on a caretaking or protective role towards these kids, particularly in the Grove.

there must be dialogue somewhere revealing that Rikka has taken on caring for Doni full-time since they began traveling together.

and here are some questions I still have—

who is Mol’s guardian? Mattis and Silfy’s? Mirkon’s? it’s interesting that Doni is the only tiefling kid without parents present that seems to have a guardian-ward relationship with one of the adults in the group of refugees. it leads me to wonder if Rikka knew his family before their exile, or if perhaps she simply grew more attached to him than the other children.

what becomes of Rikka and Doni after they leave the Grove? in my only full playthrough so far, I neglected to convince Rolan, Cal, and Lia to stick around, so most of the tieflings died :( I’m wondering if these two make it in the scenario where you do convince the siblings to stay!

my budding headcanon about why Rikka has taken on Doni as her ward is that he seems to be having a harder time dealing with the collective trauma the refugees have undergone than the other children. people have debated whether his lack of talking & eye contact points to the possibility of him being autistic, or whether it’s more of a trauma response—I think it could be both.

he was perhaps always a closed-off child who struggled with social mores and sensory issues, and the chaos of the past few months has only made it more difficult for him. Rikka, an empathetic character who is seen to care for all the children, might have felt a particular responsibility towards caring for him and helping him feel safer.

most of the tiefling kids who do make it to Act 3 seem to be doing their own thing, no adult supervision necessary—Mol running with the Guild, Silfy selling papers, Mattis continuing to run his little shop. it’s lovely, seeing the freedom they have, but it is still a little heartbreaking to see them have to work for their livings, to imagine the sort of hardship they’ll no doubt endure as orphaned refugees in the city.

so perhaps it’s a bit optimistic of me, but I do like to imagine that Doni and Rikka survive and make it to the Gate together. Rikka will need to find work, and Doni may still spend time with the other kids, helping Silfy with sales or hanging out with Mol when she’s not lurking in the sewers. but ultimately, he has a home with Rikka, and as he deals with the grief and trauma of displacement and losing his father, she is able to give him an opportunity that none of the other tiefling children seem to have—to just be a kid.

I would love to hear any thoughts, headcanons, or more canon information about these two that I may have missed! I hope you enjoyed reading this and sharing a glimmer of hope with me :’)

[super-antelope]

So the Gollum Game

Way to many of my thoughts on Gollum, Daedalic Entertainment and the click-and-point genre.

Recently a new game about Gollum, made by Daedalic Entertainment, came out. It has gotten very bad reviews and a negative response, so much that Daedalic came out with an apology. Now, I haven’t played it myself, but I’ve seen enough clips and screenshots to come to the conclusion that it is exactly as terrible as people say it is.

When this game was first announced back in 2019 I was actually very excited, because I really like some off Daedalics other games. In fact, my favourite game of all time, The night of the rabbit, is made by them.

This was also about a year after the company released the final game in their click-and-point adaptation of The pillars of the earth, which originally is a book by Ken Follett.

It’s a beautiful looking game with a good story and I enjoyed it very much. I thought that if they tackled Tolkiens world in a similar manner, it could make for a really cool and unique game. However, as soon as I found out that Gollum wasn’t gonna be a click-and-point I lost all hope.

Cause here’s the thing, Daedalic games tend to be very much not great when they do games that are other genres. They started out as a company that only made click-and -point, and it’s definitely their strongest suite. I’m not saying that all of their other games are terrible. I haven’t played any of them, and can therefore not make that judgement. I can however look up what people who have played them think, and if you look at the steam reviews on some of their games, there’s a clear pattern.

Here are some of their click-and-point games:

And here are some of the others:

They haven’t released any new click-and-point (as both devs and producers) since Pillars of the earth, and it also seems to be the last game since, that was actually really good. They were gonna release a click-and-point called The Devil’s men, but unfortunately it got cancelled in 2018, which is a shame since it looks sooo cool!

It’s a little unclear why it got cancelled. I’ve seen some people say that it was because Daedalic didn’t think people was interested in that genre anymore, or that they thought it wasn’t gonna make them enough money, but I haven’t been able to find any direct quotes or sources to these statements. So take that with a grain of salt

So where am I going with this??

Well, my point isn’t that I think Daedalic should stick to just click-and-point and nothing else. I totally get that making games that are always in the same vein and/or genre can be boring and uninspiring. I don’t wanna blame anyone for wanting to try something new or different. You should be able to make games and projects that you find fun and enjoyable to make, that you actually want to make, even if other people want you to make other games that you might not find inspiring. However, I just can’t help but feel like this isn’t the issue here.

Despite my love for them, most of their click-and-points has several flaws, some more than others. They are in no way, shape or form perfect, far from it. However, these games are still great and obviously loved by many, and I think the reason for that is that there’s so much heart in them. You can feel that they hade a blast making them while you play them, and that, combined with beautiful artwork and incredible soundtracks, is exactly why they work, despite the many flaws. The best example here is Deponia, one of their most appreciated game franchises.

It has the absolute worst main character I ever played as, some of the puzzles makes absolutely no sense, whatsoever, the “dark humour” often leaves a bad taste in your mouth, cause instead of being actually good jokes, it feels like it crosses the line just to cross the line. Do I still love the games to death, and have replayed them multiple times? Absolutely yes

And once again, take this with a grain of salt since I actually haven’t played any of them and I’m basing this of reviews, but that heart seems to be missing in their other genre games. They don’t feel as genuine and as cared for, they lack passion and creativity. And the same goes for Gollum more than anything else.

It just makes me so sad that it seems like Daedalic have given up on a genre that they did so well. Not because they don’t want to make more click-and-points, but because they think that there’s no longer an audience for that genre, and therefore there’s no gain in making anymore. This might of course not be the case at all, but that’s how it feels to me. And it sucks, because while the audience for click-and-point might be smaller than some other genres, their point-and-click games are generally more appreciated, and better received, as I pointed out earlier.

I truly think that Gollum could have been great, if they would have been brave enoughto make it click-and-point. It would have been a risk sure, but I think that even a mediocre click-and-point about Gollum would have been better than what we got. And look, I understand that its unrealistic to wish that all games should always be passion projects. At the end of the day, capitalism is a bitch that has power over all of us, whether we like it or not. Making a game a certain way because you’ll think it’ll be more financially successful, is very fair and valid. But still.

Anyway this ended up being waaaay longer than I intended lol (no one will probably read this, but if you did, hey!! Thanks, my pal!!🤘) I hope that the flop that is Gollum doesn’t hurt the company to much, and I hope that they will continue to create games, whatever genre they may be. And if they’ll make a new click-and-point, then you can be damn sure that I’ll play it!!

[palidoozy-art]

EDIT: We've gotten a lot of requests, so I'll have to close this for now, just to make sure I don't overwhelm and hurt someone by inviting 34083048 people in when I can only effectively cycle between two groups of 5. But thank you everyone for your help!

Hey, this is kind of a weird ask, but I'd rather go to here than Reddit or another group finding website first (I like it here better, I like the people here more, and I know I have a cluster of people who like D&D here).

Me and two of my current players (Ellerian and Kelogul, if you were curious) are looking for more people to play with in some one-off sessions. We thought about this back when the whole OneD&D debacle was going on, but we wanted to try looking into some other games with different people.

Current games we're looking into trying just as various one-offs:

Pathfinder 2e

13th Age

Genesys

Shadow of the Demon Lord

Worlds without Number

I'd also like to try running an Out of the Abyss campaign again. I began running one with Kelogul and Ellerian where we went hardcore survival (everyone started naked and you had to find your materials/craft your own stuff/find your own material components) and it was a lot of fun, but we wound up dropping it because I got too busy. One day I'd also like to run Rime of the Frostmaiden as well, and I wouldn't mind running CoS again... but all of that is extremely long-term. There's also joining From the Mist/Into the Horizon as well, but again, I'd like to just try things out with one shots first.

General information about us and how we run things (below the cut, because this is already long enough):

We don't use voice. We could if it's a huge hurdle to get over, but we've been just text based for 3+ years at this point so we're used to it. If you want a kind of example of what that looks like, here's a screenshot of one of our sessions of From the Mists.

We use Foundry VTT. I've already paid for it and you connect to it similar to roll20, so it should involve no extra work on your part. I also already have all the books and a google drive to share them, so there should be no additional costs there. If you need help learning how to use Foundry, we are more than happy to teach.

We tend to be higher on the RP and story side than average, though I'm not sure how much of this would really come across in one-shots where characters are more throw away.

We're located in the CST time zone. The date would likely be on Sunday, as it's the only day other than Saturday we can all get together (and Saturday is when From the Mists/Into the Horizon happens). We're flexible to run anytime from 11 am CST to 11 pm CST.

We are in our late 20s/mid 30s.

We are LGBT+ friendly (I'd hope so, I'm a dude married to a dude)

We've been playing for 3+ years (almost) every week at the same time on Saturday. The only time we've missed sessions have been family tragedies, medical issues, and planned vacations, so between the three of us we're pretty stable and consistent.

In general we're looking for 2-3 additional people (4 players total would be perfect, 5 would be stretching it but I could manage). If there's a lot of interest somehow, I'd also be more than happy to cycle people around so people get a chance to play. I would likely be DMing, but I'm also not hardcore bent on it so if someone else wants to dip their toes in it I'm more than happy to step aside.

If you're interested, message me or send me an ask and I'll give you my discord so we can talk about it. Into the Horizon (legacy campaign of From the Mists/CoS) happens at 5:30 CST, so I'll be busy around then but I'll try to get a response as soon as I can.

Thanks for reading.

[motheatenscarf]

I beat the base-game story for FF14! Yaaay! \o/

I have... SO many thoughts, I just kinda powered through the last bit after the Scions got got, most of my thoughts are relatively positive, but also I have some very mean, very stupid opinions about some of the writing choices happening here.

I'll probably make a few posts in greater detail later, but for now my strongest opinions can be summed up as follows;

Holy fuck, I hate Minfilia, the literal child was a better leader than her. She's weak and indecisive and written as a terrible leader without the narrative addressing that fact at all. So it's not just irresponsible misogynistic writing, it's just lazy and laughably incompetent writing.

I wound up liking the villain quartet more than I thought I would, namely the big dude you have to kill first. His devotion to his men and belief in the empire due to his ability to rise to his station really stood out. That was probably the most nuanced this game has been so far, I was impressed, I genuinely felt bad I had to kill him. He was written from a perspective of empathy with the full breadth of emotion, like a real human being.

I had not come to expect that from this game!

Namely because all of our villains until this point were cartoons who wanted to blow up the moon and all of our heroes were made of unflappable cardboard. That's not to say they don't have their charms, I love a good "Mua ha ha!" as much as the next person, but y'know, largely forgettable. The worst example of this comes from Cid and Thancred. Like. Hey, Cid, these are your childhood friends we're slaughtering. You really gonna no thoughts, head empty your way through this?

Yeah?

Okay... cool...

god forbid someone have an interesting reaction.

The WORST example of that, however, is Thancred. I really thought we'd get something out of Thancred being possessed by Lahabrea. Like, even if he didn't make a choice or a deal to get possessed and had no agency in that, he would at least have a reaction to knowing he'd gotten his people killed or tortured. That's going to at the very least cause reflection in a character and an interesting change in his perspective if not outright trauma he's going to have to work through, and that's a good emotional hook to have someone your character needs to look out for. Real vulnerability, maybe, if we're lucky.

Haha,

NOPE!

Like. I've played Kingdom Hearts. I'm getting big Organization XIII vibes from the Ascians, and I'm looking at Thancred like, oh, okay, you're just... older Riku. Sure. I can work with that, that's a good source of angst, at least someone's feeling SOMETHING in the narrative at that point.

But fucking lol, no, he's just like "Thanks for saving me, I've been a real inconvenience, I should take some time off to recover so nobody has to help me again."

ANd like...

Buddy, that is the reaction you have when you're hangry and you get kinda snippy before somebody hands you a candybar and tells you to calm down. You're REALLY not gonna talk about this?! I have a whole subsequent sidequest to help Minfilia find her MOMMY so she can grow the moral fortitude to refuse bribes, but Thancred spends months being possessed by THE bad guy and gets the Scions nearly wiped out and he's FINE and we're MOVING ON!

REALLY?!

I know I JUST compared it to Kingdom Hearts, but it's not even that! Kingdom Hearts, for being TERRIBLE, at least understood that the way to get people invested in a narrative was to give them characters who CARE about things and react accordingly! Oh my god, Kingdom Hearts was more competent than this! OH MY GOD, it's so bad, I'm so ANGRY! It was starting to show promise, how did it turn around and do itself this dirty, who was responsible for this?!

GOD.

That said, the things I like are, like, everything else about this game so far. My god was I frustrated the entire time I was sitting through some of this shit storywise, but the gameplay was very fun. The game is otherwise the single most functional, deep, and FUN mmo I've ever played gamewise. I'm ASSURED the story gets better, and like, frankly, it wouldn't take much effort for that to be true, but if they can also make the story GOOD, I will be pleasantly surprised because right now we're in "so incompetent I burst out laughing" territory.

And then after all that they called it the 7th Astral Era like, job's done, go home team, ignore the multiple other looming threats! We're admitting Lahabrea isn't dead even in-text among the Scions and there's still countless Primals being summoned and I'm pretty sure somebody needs to talk about these giant talking crystals, but NOPE, 7th Astral Era here we go!

I give it ten months.

Anyway, I'm gonna go read up on how to kill the Moogle King so I can progress this narrative, but I'm in like, humorously SHOCKED disbelief at how bad this was. Like, the FUNNY kind of angry, not legit angry, the "Oh, here's a new rant I could go on about for ten minutes EASY" kind of angry, it was so bad.

[talenlee]

Cancon 2023 Wrapup

Cancon 2023 Wrapup

As I write this, I have gotten home from Cancon 2023. The day started at around 7 AM, then started on the con floor at 8:30, and following that we had to pack down at 12:30 and finally got ourselves on the road at 1:30. It’s now many hours later than that and much of my time has been spent recovering from the drive and the weekend of standing on my two feet and shouting at people a lot. What follows is memories constructed, as best I can, from the notes I took of the time, and the information present to me now.

First things first, this is a convention that differs from most I do by being so far away from my home that I have to sleep near the event. This year, we got lodgings in someone’s spare room, with myself, Fox, and the driver who took us. That driver, who I won’t name on this blog so as to not blow up their spot, was super helpful the whole time, didn’t have to be there and was generally 100% great. I do not know how to repay them the effort they put forth to help us get the convention run.

But anyway, we drove down on Friday morning; this gave us time to get to the convention centre, register our presence, then set up our table area and the display of our goods. Our displays this year featured three 3-meter long tables arranged in a L shape, and we had some card tables as well, that put some of our stock out away from us, and meant that you didn’t have to approach us as people to look at the products we were selling. I thought this was a bad idea because I thought our most useful tool for converting attention to sales was me, talking to people, but I also didn’t think it was good to argue about it, so I just let it go.

Turns out I was completely wrong: By having the table there, we invited people to stop from the flow of traffic, then I saw them slip in closer to avoid being an impediment, then they’d come to the table and just… buy things. Just buy them! No explanation, no hard sell, no rules explainers, just… they’d buy them based on the boxes.

That’s weird enough as it is, but know what made it weirder? The things they chose to buy. There are a bunch of games I sell that are, in my opinion, aggressively weird. Some of our games have a great clear aesthetic that pulls the eye – games like You Can’t Win, Hook Line & Sinker, and The Botch and The Botch Is Back are all based around clear and bright designs that I think hold attention. But Winston’s Archive is a game I made with an incredible niche theme: Sorting books. What’s more, Winston’s Archive is a game where, thanks to trying to incorporate dysexic-free fonts, the cover kind of looks a bit… drafty? Like a first draft. Like the things that would normally make it look more interesting make it harder to read, so the result is a box cover that I feel a little awkward about.

We have one copy of Winston’s Archive left.

I have no story about it, no viral hit, no explanation from some source about a game that infected a group and then they all came back to play it more. I have no story about that. I just know that somehow, left to their own devices, a bunch of people looked at this game box and went ‘oh yeah, I’ll have that for $15’ and they just straight up bought it. That’s really exciting!

Another memorable thing is that on the first day, I wore my This Shirt Says Trans Rights shirt. I did this because I figured it’d be the busiest day and if I was going to get into a fuss over it, I’d rather get it over and done with. What I got instead was a consistent response from strangers, even people I walked past, complimenting the shirt, which was really nice. What’s more, I wound up having a lot of conversations with queer gamers and parents of queer gamers who wanted to be able to connect to people, and also get games that didn’t seem they were going to be likely to shock anyone with anything upsetting.

It reminded me of that awkward phrase I don’t like, ‘find your tribe,’ where the whole point in our disconnected landscape of socially unmoored people-bubbles, there are definitely factors that let us anchor ourselves to one another, and bereft of anything else, finding one another is helpful, it’s a way to be able to say ‘I can connect on at least this.’

We sold a bunch of Queer Coding too; a game that I think of as just an icebreaker, something you want for cons and meetups where you’ll be dealing with people you don’t know. Similarly, Senpai Notice Me flew off the shelves, but it always does: people love a meme and this one is also very pretty. Finally, You Can’t Win continued its weird presence selling itself, because despite the game being very clear about how hard it is, people kept buying it.

The other thing I usually bring back from Cancon, aside from stories of people I yelled at and a sore throat, is a haul of games I bought, and this year I didn’t buy any. It was a conscious decision: I was busy, and afraid of spending money at first, but then as things became more relaxed, and the large stall I was excited by dropped their prices more and more, I found myself nonetheless deciding to instead not buy new games this year. This wasn’t a wholly painless choice: What I wanted to ‘buy’ effectively, was more space in my house; by not buying new things until I had exhausted what I owned, I was making sure I didn’t have an ever-growing stack of games I didn’t know if I wanted any more.

There are a few things I kind of wish I had picked up, but not enough to have actually done it; Red Rising was down to $20, B’Twixt: A Game Of Thrones is a game I want to have a copy of but not a Game of Thrones copy, and that’s all we have so far. Wise Guys, a $100 big box game, was going for $10 and I passed it over, and I even saw games on my wishlist – like Not Alone and Fog Of Love at steep discount, and decided to not get them.

I am thinking about this feeling, this decision to do things this way and about how excited I was to see how many of the games I took to the Bring-And-Buy had sold. I want to make sure I’m not focusing on acquisition and instead on what board games are; Experiences.

The last story of Cancon – at least for now, as I remember it – is of my Tyranids. I have some Tyranids, a whole army’s worth, from 2004. I have played with them once, and then they sat in a drawer, in a box. I decided this year to try and rehome them, to put them in the bring-and-buy and sell them on to someone else. Since it’s a whole army, it’s expensive, and people interested in the field have told me it’s a good price for them… but also someone needs to want to buy a whole army’s worth of Tyranids, even retro metal ones.

They didn’t sell, but I’m not upset about it. I want them to go to someone who wants them, not someone who was afraid of missing out. We’ll try again at MOAB and maybe if they don’t move after enough tries, we’ll find some other place to put them. Who knows, maybe the spaces for play will have opened up enough that I get to play with them. I know One Page Rules is a cool looking system with something Tyraniddy in it. Could be useful there!

But this is the joy of material games: They are material. I can share them with people and I can give them away and nobody controls the central authority on how people play with them.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

#Diary

[nat20marketing]

Welcome to part two of this week’s Nat 20 Marketing!

In the last post, we covered what makes a BIG IDEA good. Part of a successful delivery comes from knowing the audience’s needs and where to find them. The other critical part is choosing the right tone and right message for it.

What are tones and why do they help in marketing?

To simply put, tones give messages an emotional touch and help the recipient picture the scenario better. A birthday party should be a happy occasion, so the invitation should sound joyous and exciting. A funeral is a serious and sad occasion, so it would be much better to sound sincere when asking people to visit the memorial service. If the tones are not used correctly, the message is going to sound jarring and possibly triggering. When people say “read the room”, it means using the right tone and saying the right things at the right time to match the emotions and energy of others.

I have seen promotional campaigns for charities and I have a rather personal gripe against the tones the organizations usually use to send their messages. Some organizations prefer showing the harsh reality of what is happening to those in need in addition to using severe and depressing tones. The use of people’s empathy is often highly effective in marketing. It helps raise awareness and catch people’s attention extremely quickly. Despite this, I find these advertisements to be rather guilt-tripping and manipulative. Whether this take on marketing for not-for-profit organizations is ethical or not is subjective, but as a consumer, I will be brutally honest here: I tend to skip these advertisements in a heartbeat and if I can, I will also send a report to whichever platform I am currently on that I am not interested in such promotions.

So how do we make tones obvious for text-based communication?

Over the pandemic, we have all gotten used to online chatrooms and forums to replace in-person conversations. As a moderator for a rather popular server on Discord, I have since recognized the importance of tone usage. Let’s use the example of “Guess what happened last night” here to demonstrate. Without the tone, you can’t really guess what possibly could have happened and what the appropriate response should be. Your friend could have broken up with their significant other (sad), or your friend received a thoughtful surprise gift from their loved one (happy). Neurodivergent people have already struggled to detect tones when they converse with others face-to-face for a long time. The lack of tone in text is worse for essentially everyone.

As an avid online chatter, I find the use of emojis and tone indicators to be quite useful in solving this problem. Emojis are little pictures that show emotions and reactions. We are starting to see more companies adopting emojis into their social media posts to generate excitement and become a closer part of the community they serve. However, it’s not always that marketers can use emojis in their messages. For B2B companies, it is almost impossible to do so since emojis are often perceived to be casual and unserious. It is extremely dependent on the brand image whether using emojis to emphasize tones is a feasible solution.

The next best option is the proper choice of words. Language is evolving all the time. Ten years ago, we wouldn’t be seeing phrases like “slay queen” and “poggers”. Now, the word “cook” doesn’t always mean “preparing food”. People have started to use it for “making things into reality”. I can even say what I’m doing right now is “cooking up a blog post”. I wouldn’t use the word “cook” this way if I am writing a professional email to my senior at work, but I would use it when I’m talking with my friends. Using the right tone and the right words for the right occasion is the key takeaway.

Perhaps a blog post by a video game company would use words that are more formal, but daily social media updates should sound far more casual and even humorous given the audience is often gamers and from both Millenials and Gen Z. We can take a look at Larian Studios’ posts and replies on X. The studio uses a good mix of images, gifs, emotes, and casual phrases to connect with its customers (i.e., the players) every day. When Larian Studios was celebrating its achievements after the Game Awards last year, the tones were more heartfelt and thankful for the community’s overwhelming love and support.

Okay, and what about the message content itself?

As mentioned in the previous blog, people’s attention span has declined significantly over the past two decades. Short videos that are no longer than a minute have become the most popular media for content creators to reach their audience. People multitask all the time. They can be working on a research report, watching a YouTube video, and replying to their friends on WhatsApp all at the same time. A short, catchy slogan or even a musical tune is probably one of the best tactics to have people remember the brand.

A few years ago, I watched an advertisement by PepsiCo called STACK YOUR SLEIGH. It was a very short video but it left an extremely memorable impression because of the song that was rewritten and sung in it. I still remember it to this day to use it as an example. The video was made for the holiday season, so the company chose an uplifting Christmas carol classic as the base. The advertisement was rather well-received judging from the positive comments on YouTube. Even without watching the video itself, the audience can already easily tell what occasion the commercial was targeting. On the contrary, if PepsiCo chose Silent Night as the base, it might not have worked as well due to the slow and peaceful tone. This directly links back to the key point of this blog post: CHOOSE THE RIGHT TONE FOR THE RIGHT MESSAGE.

This is it for this week’s Nat 20 Marketing. Stay tuned for next week’s post on Right Message, Right Time, Right Place!

[randomkposts]

jeh517 left the following comment on No easy way from the earth:

I was wondering if you would like to write a Magic Tree House fic request for me.

---

Well, you deleated this, but it still shows up in my emails.

And I kind of want to talk about requests.

To start with, I'm usually not great at compleating things in a timley manor.

People reading my ask responses have probably realised this, lol. I have so many partially written things bouncing around in my google doc's, and when I will finish them is usually based on many things such as current fixation, enthusiasm for writing, time, ideas of things I can do with them, the cooperation of the muse, procrastination, ect.

Asks, are in a lot of ways easier, as I bounce them with Eclipse, usually. Or idea bouncing in general, is fun, as we have done for other fandoms that haven't gotten as much attention on here as the death note ones.

Such as, for instance, the fun we had with the twilight ones. Or yansim, or KHR.

Or the persona (5 mostly) X Death note fusion that we haven't actually talked about on this blog, but have a bunch of notes and converstions between each other about it stored in the google docs. We call it PDN. Or sometimes P5DN. Mostly the first. It's set in P5 time, but other characters from the older games are planned to appear in it from time to time.

Secondly, I am flattered that you think highly enough of the fic to hope to ask a fic write request based on it, but also I have no idea who you are or what you liked about my writing. Which is important if you want to convince me to write something for you. I want to know where to focus. Also yes, butter me up a bit (or a lot) , it will help me feel enthusiastic about working on the project, which is a good motivator for probably having it done sooner rather then later. Writing is easier when you feel excited about it. Editing is not, but I hope that after the work I put into it, I will get a response to it. I think most writers share these sentiments.

I do not have a beta. My spelling might not always be amazing, (Sayu or Syau?), but I'm not good at being on time generally, and would not want anyone else to be waiting on that too.

So yah, if you have sent me an ask, or a request, sorry for the wait, and thank you for your patience. It will be ready when its ready.

Oh yah, while I'm talking about random people making fic requests of me, I should probably tackle this one (again)

"Hi. My question is, would you be able to write the story of Midoriya Izuku x Alice according to my idea. You don't need to know the whole bnha universe except for a few things (what is quirk, Midoriya Izuku character, Midoriya Inko character) from Wiki and that's it. The plot would have been set in Alice's time so the bnha canon is rejected so you have freedom then"

Very random request to find as a review to a "we know the devil" fanfiction, Guest. Thats a game with 3 named characters, none of them named Alice. In fact, I'm not sure which Alice you are refering to, as it's not exactly an uncomon name, with many characters across different fandoms sharing it with me.

So maybe that's something to go idea bounce with me in PMs on FFnet, if you are interested. I'm aware I'm kind of a lot, but you did ask, stranger, and I'm curious to see where it goes.

So long as we stay fairly polite, and you don't come in with an army of harassing sock puppets (the pokemon fandom was bad for this for awile. Hope its clamed down since) or go for suicide bait (a very rude guest, so I was able to delete them), or something else mean that I haven't thought of.

And some might make an argument for growing thicker skin ir whateves, but this is a hobby, it shouldn't make you miserable. That's just not productive to progress, or fun to take part in.

Overall I guess I feel really mixed, about getting fic requests. I'm intrigued and flattered, but also "I'll write it when I write it, if I write it. It might take years. " So I find myself hesitent to agree or commit, knowing that.

Asks, on the other hand, should not take a year. Can take months maybe depending on busyness and what the brain is focused on, but it will come.

[misskasu]

We Got This! Misinformation Education Creation Activity

In my last blog post, I will explain a concept related to misinformation to a specific audience. Certainly! Here you go:

It's crucial that we, as members of Generation Z whom are in high school and college, can educate ourselves and others on the dangers of misinformation on TikTok. By doing so, we can empower ourselves to use the platform safely and responsibly and protect ourselves from harm.

As I mentioned in a prior paragraph in my blog post, when we teach young people how to recognize misinformation and tell the difference between fact and opinion, it feels like a game of cat and mouse. There is no need for despair because we have gotten to the root of the problem: excessive social media exposure with little or no regulation because of how fast Ticktok has grown:

when it comes to learning how quickly misinformation can spread worldwide and how fast it can find its way into people's minds, it is crucial to comprehend how quickly misinformation spreads.

In today's world, distinguishing between trustworthy and unreliable sources of information is vital. We can achieve this by promoting media literacy, enabling access to reliable sources, and teaching critical thinking skills. Let's become well-informed individuals who make sound decisions based on reliable information.

The key to avoiding misinformation is to search for it and verify it from reputable sources. It is also essential to think critically and question information online. Additionally, it is vital to be aware of sources' potential biases and be skeptical of claims and how you can stop it.

As a result of my research, I have come across some links that can help young people understand and navigate the world of misinformation. These resources will help young people make more informed decisions and become more media literate due to using them.

Here are some tips from the Washington Post for older kids who are coming of age. It was interesting to read the following quote in this article: "There's a flood of real, misleading, and fake breaking news and information online. Proceed with caution." This quote reminds me so much of any social media platform, including TikTok.

According to this article The TikTok algorithm is designed for doomscrolling," Volland says. "Being so overwhelmed by information volume makes distinguishing high- from low-quality content difficult. It can make us feel more anxious, and we should be cognizant of that for young people who spend so much time on the platform." As a result, it is critical to help young people develop the necessary thinking skills and understand how to identify false information.

It is scary that anyone with an internet connection can watch breaking news unfold in real-time, or at least some version. It's not uncommon for posts on social media to fly up faster than fact-checkers and moderators can keep up with, and they're often a mix of real and fake, out-of-context and propaganda. Current events are difficult to understand, which makes people need help to make informed decisions. Both social media sites and parents are responsible for moderating content to help kids from spreading false information, and Tictok is no different.

Volland finds it challenging to fight misinformation on TikTok due to its mysterious nature. However, in its current state, although it is a good platform for young users, it is a concern to them as it stands. Children's limited ability to sort accurate information from unwanted information impacts their mental health both positively and negatively. Nonetheless, at least they are doing something to let people know what is happening with #FactCheckYourFeed to support media literacy by putting up warning signs to let people know what's happening.

As a final point, we need to create an environment that allows people to feel comfortable discussing and debating different issues of view safely and comfortably. Teens are vulnerable to misinformation, which can lead to negative consequences such as spreading false information, eroding trust in institutions, and even causing physical harm. Protecting vulnerable populations and ensuring access to reliable information is very crucial. I hope you learned something new today and checked out the links above to help educate yourself and your peers.

Here is the workcited:

Kelly, Heather. “How to Avoid Falling for Misinformation, Fake AI Images on Social Media.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 22 May 2023, www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/05/22/misinformation-ai-twitter-facebook-guide/.

Tamez-Robledo, Nadia. “For Teens (and Adults) Fighting Misinformation, Tiktok Is Still ‘uncharted Territory’ - Edsurge News.” EdSurge, EdSurge, 7 Dec. 2022, www.edsurge.com/news/2022-12-07-for-teens-and-adults-fighting-misinformation-tiktok-is-still-uncharted-territory.

“Tiktok Launches #factcheckyourfeed to Support Media Literacy.” Newsroom, TikTok, 16 Aug. 2019, newsroom.tiktok.com/en-gb/tiktok-launches-factcheckyourfeed-to-support-media-literacy.

[escape-rock-bottom]

Journal Entry #12 - Fearing the Beneficial (Discomfort Challenge Journal)

You wanna know what I think is silly? The fact that we often fear things that can be beneficial to us. Things such as success, money, relationships, being alone (different from loneliness), ambitious goals and dreams, happiness, et cetera et cetera. Writing that out and reading it back, they all seem pretty counterintuitive. These are all things people desire, right?

Well, it seems that the things we want to succeed in most tend to be the things we fear the most. Frankly I think it’s down to the fear of the unknown and the fear of change, and if you’ve never gotten comfortable with those things it makes sense to avoid it. Humans don’t usually like to be uncomfortable. It’s a survival mechanism.

So, what does someone do if they put down “socialize more and make new friends” as a goal, but avoid achieving the goal they desire? My solution: Get over it. Let me explain. 

As part of one of my discomfort challenges, I wanted to face my fear of social gatherings. I am a very sociable guy, I actually greatly enjoy talking to and meeting new people. For some odd reason, my fear of rejection stops me from pursuing the very thing that I want. The easiest method? Make myself go to the gathering. Just do it and get over it by proving to myself it wasn’t as big of a deal as my mind was making it out to be.

My original plan was to go find some sort of group based event surrounding one of my hobbies or interests. However, one of my old friends was having a party and I said yes before letting myself overthink it. Luckily, it was on one of the days I had off of school so that worked out. The thing about parties is I tend to get pretty socially anxious about them - Especially if there’s plenty of strangers.

As expected, my feelings going in were a mixture of excitement and anxiety. “This will be fun!” then all of a sudden, “What if it’s awkward as hell and I end up just sitting in a corner feeling all pointless and bored? What if people find me odd or weird or uninteresting?” General self-deprecating social anxiety stuff, basically. I arrived early mainly to help set things up, and was promptly introduced to some strangers my friend knew.

My response was simple: A “Hi, I’m Eissac.” with a wave and a bit of a smile. Not exactly the “I want to be here” greeting. I did come around eventually though, and ended up relaxing after starting a few conversations with some of the strangers (who oddly enough, were the guys I stuck around chatting with most in the party) then just allowed myself to be more myself while playing a game.

It was insanely fun, actually. It would have been stupid of me to decline something I would enjoy simply because of some irrational negative thoughts and fears. It would have been sad to miss out on the social opportunity I was looking for. 

Realistically, a lot of the things we become anxious and scared of are irrational. The situation itself often turns out nothing like the big bad wolf of a scenario you conjured up in your mind. Saying yes and going for it regardless of your “what ifs” and “maybe laters” proves one thing: The thing you feared isn’t even that scary.

That’s what courage is. Facing your fears head on while still being afraid of them. Having courage opens quite a few doors, and you just may stop fearing or worrying about the thing all together with enough practice. 

I think I might try going out more often, even though it still kinda scares me. You probably should try it too, honestly.

[eigwayne]

TL;DR: Wizards leak source possibly called into question. Wizards’ new OGL proposal is Creative Commons apparently? This maybe mean progress because this license is common among indie games and Wikipedia I still don’t think we should trust Wizards too much- the response survey is on a service most opponents have been canceling (can you say selection bias?). Either way, though, nerds are still raging, I’m not sure most of them has ever actually read a license, and after this display? No, I will not to switch to Pathfinder.

As a note, Legal Eagle and Stephanie Stirling have both done overviews of the OGL situation but they’re meant as intros for non-tabletop fans and only cover it cursorily. I would recommend them for a chuckle, maybe, but not actual reporting- especially since things have changed, yet again, since those videos went live.

Yes, there’s new OGL info today, and heads-up I should not be the one you get your info from, gentle readers, as I’m clearly not a journalist or even keeping up with things. So if you’re interested, please try to find details from reputable sources. Please just know that the entire thing still stinks of half-informed nerd rage, corporate baloney, and on top of that, “reputable sources” has gotten harder because the veracity of one or more leak sources has been called into question. So that’s fun.

There’s a new OGL proposal but the survey is on D&D Beyond, I heard? Which means there’s probably going to be some selection bias in the results because a lot of people have canceled their accounts in protest. I haven’t read it but I heard the new proposal will be based on a Creative Commons license. That’s what a lot of indie video game devs/resource makers (and Wikipedia) function on, so chances are you’ve seen the term around even if you haven’t read the actual text of the Creative Commons licenses (hell, I make indie video games and I haven’t read all those licenses).

But like, if the license holder makes a new license, the old one can no longer be applied to new works published after it goes into affect. That’s just sensible. More than one resource creator who does stuff for video game engines has had to update their terms and if there was a giant stink, I certainly didn’t hear about it. When a change applied to something I was using, I did get lucky and it was minor, have to admit that, but I just updated the attribution according to the new licensing and moved on. That is, admittedly, a much smaller scale issue and it doesn’t erase the stupid shit Wizards/Hasbro was trying to pull at first, but I kinda feel like we’re in “mountains out of foothills” territory now. Not molehills, nothing about this will be molehill-sized again, but foothills.

And maybe I’m being too cynical, but the majority of really clickbait-y and inflammatory video “news” are coming from Pathfinder fans. It’s hard to stay objective and rational when one’s favorite system is possibly under fire, and there’s an overtone of “how dar they target the bestest system” anger to some of the responses. But that certainly doesn’t make me less annoyed at my video recs being nothing but rage headlines, uninformed fans weighing in live, and calls to switch to Pathfinder.

Overall, I think all the people who are staying quiet have the right idea (and yet here I am...).

[the-hype-dragon]

The Zelda stuff in particular drives me batty because there were already non-white humans/humanoids in Zelda games... the Gerudo and the Sheikah, who are based on Arabic and Japanese cultures, respectively. and note that this is a series that features races of fish people, rock people, and plant people... yet it's the black characters that get people pressed... ok

I was typing out a different response to your answer (thank you for the answer, btw) but while typing it finally hit me that yeah... it's just that these dudes are so used to being catered to that anything that doesn't cater to them is offensive by default. like it is an attack on them personally that Aloy has facial hair (like, regular hair, not a full on beard or something) and looks weather-worn and grungy lmao

American gamers in particular are really annoying. it was popular years ago to label certain Final Fantasy games as the "low point" in the series, just coincidentally all these games were more emotional stories about guys dealing with issues of abandonment and parental abuse, or FF13 and its sequels which center on the story of two sisters trying to rescue each other. FF8 is basically a shoujo manga so of course guys shat on it; 10 has gotten more slack over the years but Tidus still gets labeled "annoying" for uh rightfully being upset about his parents neglecting him and being vocal about it?? idk there is this weird disconnect with a lot of people wanting men's issues to be humanized but also they mock humanizing portrayals of those issues lmao. note that his abusive father gets lionized by the western fandom because "he's manly" :v

they also get really upset when a game gets changed between the Japanese and English releases... I have found whenever I hear people complaining about "censorship" of Japanese games, it's one of two things: 1. an offensive stereotype gets removed or 2. some pornified under aged character gets a more age-appropriate redesign. I remember when Chrono Cross got a remaster people were whining about some 13 year old getting redesigned so she's wearing shorts under her skirt and not constantly flashing the player, like come tf on. there is absolutely nothing offensive about a change like that lol

I should also note, the game I sent the ask about, 13 Sentinels, has a character who cross-dresses a few times to disguise himself... the localization chose to imply he's nonbinary but the thing is, the rest of the game goes out of its way to make fun of him every time he's dressed like a girl. or to make fun of male characters who find his disguise attractive. it's a big joke in-game, even in the English script. so any time I see people complaining about that line I'm like, "ok so you just didn't play the game lol." the gay relationship is still portrayed as a good thing however so I guess it's pushing an evil anti-straight message... oh except 99% of the other characters are in straight relationships... and the game even has a "based" epilogue where two of the straight couples have had kids... hmmmmm...

honestly I am surprised people who complain about this stuff can enjoy fiction at all... it seems more like they just want something to parrot their own opinions back at them. not unlike the "snowflake SJWs" they complain about, interesting

you are right, "woke" has truly lost all meaning as a term... one of my new favorite games has a very basic and positive message to it but because the localization inserted some nonsense about a nonbinary character it got labeled as "woke SJW trash" even tho the rest of the script is pretty accurate to the original Japanese

I also saw comments about how just including a gay relationship in this game is "agenda-pushing" like I really don't get that tbqh. it just reminded me of people complaining that the new Zelda game is "woke" because it has a few characters who aren't lily white and Zelda has short hair lmao

LMAO Dying at the "woke" Zelda bc some characters are Black. Isn't that a fantasy game? like, with magic, talking trees, trolls and shit but Black people existing is a reach?? (they did the same for Lord of the Rings TV show)

I think the reluctance of these folks to see non White people in fantasy content is bc White people want to gatekeep fantasy as a 'White only' genre. Which is funny because White people have no problem reappropriating foreign genre for their own gain 🙃

Funny how these woke hunter always forget those Hollywood movies adaptation of foreign stories where the studio ALWAYS need to shove a WHITE hero for some reason or purposely use a story where a White character can outshine others?

Remember the samurai movie with Tom Cruise? 7 years in Tibet? Also Mulan love interest was supposed to be a White man initially, but people complained and it's been scrubbed off. There are whole think piece exposing how the Whites LOVE inserting themselves into POC stories to elevate themselves as heroes. Even woke storyline don't go that far with their non White characters ; they are always confined as side kick and minimum screetime (is it true that all the dark skin characters of the house of dragon ended up dying after the first season?? lmaoooo)

And I always said that the issue wasn't non White people being shoved in "White people story" because when Black Panther happened their were still mad and were seething about that movie catering to Blacks (but don't you dare saying movies featuring mostly White people are catering to White, it will make you an awful wokester lmao). Whites will always feel entitled for other races to relate to their stories, but never the other way around. There's a post floating around cathblr with Catholics raving about Arabs discovering the Lord of The Ring and enjoying it a lot. And I couldn't help but think: would those catholics turn the favor and rave about an Arab movie with islamist undertones...? 🙃 lmao.... Those people are soooooo transparent 💀

Everything is woke if you try hard enough, anyway. Scrotes are seething because they consider some video game female characters are purposely made ugly (like Aloy from Horizon Dawn. A scrote was coping bc the mocap actress was much more beautiful and he couldn't wrap his hand as of why they would change her face to make her look more 'rough' ...when he's just too stupid to grasp that this choice is actually pretty coherent with the storyline since homegirl is nomad WARRIOR.).

I also remember when they made a revamp of Mortal Kombat chara design and changed characters body proportion to become more realistic, scrotes got mad lmao It's hilarious how they think they're really doing something 'counter-culture' but they only show how porn fried they are. There's no way to think this

...is better than that

Btw, all those ANTI praising Japan for being anti woke are up to a very hard wake up call. Many japanese celebrities are vocal LGBT+ supporters, a significant amount of online stars are gay/queer (Ryuchell, Peey, Kemio...). Even recently a member of AAA (a famous pop band) came out as gay 😬 there's a huuuuge push for LGBT visibility into the Japan entertainment right now, so it's obvious they have no idea of what they're talking about... The other day on Twitter I've seen a post summing up why Western conservartard scrotes love Japan

This post was in a thread about nuclear bomb and American burgers saying it was oKay tO kIlLs thOusaNd of CivIlIanS bEcAuse jApan wEre tHe bAd GuYs 🤡

The USA humiliated Japan in the non threatening " tech/anime obsessed pacifists". Unlike other countries that still have a minimum of pride and honour, Japan doesn't remind the USA how bad they are and the unchecked harm they done to them. They are also completely economically submitted to the USA (there are still American base out there.....). So the USA give them a cookie and constantly elevate them as the perfect non White country 🙃