#i think he THINKS he's very sympathetic to the mages. but then you get that line in act 3 that's like 'but at the end of the day they have

[life-love-geekculture]

Okay, let’s talk Lucanis’s mind prison (Warning: Spoilers):

I honestly haven’t seen much discourse yet on how the “prison guards” reflect aspects of our favorite assassin’s personality. So, I figured I throw my two cents into the ring.

Let’s start with Caterina. Honestly, the most surface level of our four candidates, especially with Spite spelling it out for us. Caterina is Lucanis’ fear. Specifically, his fear of failing. Failing and disappointing Caterina. Failing the expectations set for him and by him. Failing Rook. Not killing Ghiln’nain at Weisshaupt was the cherry on top of an absolute shit sunday of what Lucanis would see as a year’s worth of failure. He’s been captured, tortured, and turned into an abomination by the very people he’s supposed to put the fear of the Maker into. It all just confirms those secret fears of not being good enough he’s been carrying for most of his life. And now he’s being confronted with a similar situation but with stakes on a personal level. Either decision he makes, he (at this point) loses.

Next up, Harding. Harding is his fear of Spite. Of what he could become, and who he could hurt, if he ever loses a modicum of control over the demon. It’s no accident Harding’s is the face he summons to project this. She might be the most sympathetic to his plight and still be willing to kill him if he ever loses control. Harding tells him in the real world that she would know it wouldn’t be his fault, but she wouldn’t let him hurt their friends. And Lucanis encourages her with this! Harding also seems to be the only other person besides Rook to ask if he would like a different room and to show concern with his isolating patterns. The fact she cares in spite of her fear (which he shares) makes her a perfect representative. Because he might literally kill himself then risk hurting her.

Neve. Ah Neve, a potential love interest or Lucanis’s best friend if you romance him as Rook. By this point in the quest, Rook has bulldozed their way past Lucanis’s fears and insecurities. Now it’s time to lash out. If you listen to his & Neve’s banter with each other and in general, they are the driest pair of a-holes you will ever meet. It’s great! So, naturally, when it comes to throwing that cynicism and sarcasm up like a freaking shield, Neve is who he thinks about. I also love the insight this section gives into how Lucanis groups people in his head (family, enemy, and contract). That’s not Spite. Spite, we’ve seen, tends to build the framework of his interactions from his host. That is all Lucanis, baby! We also get a little more insight into how Lucanis views Neve herself. I like to think Spite’s description is kind of the gut instinct, first impression our boy had meeting Neve in the Ossuary or later at the Lighthouse. On paper, she’s a Tevinter mage like the ones who held him for a year. His head knows she’s not the same, but I’ll bet she set off all his defensive instincts and now there’s guilt associated with that. Because he likes Neve. He gets along with Neve. He really needs to teach Neve how to appreciate coffee. But he can’t shake how he felt first meeting her and, like everything else, he carries it with him.

Fucking Illario. It tracks that Lucanis at his most self-hating would dredge up this dumbass. This is the crux of his current dilemma. He loves his cousin. They’re the last person the other & Caterina has. But if he’s going to do this the Crow way, Illario has to die & Caterina will likely fall in the crossfire. Or, worse, she will never forgive him. It is the surest confirmation he is the monster everyone thinks he is. After all, only an abomination would kill all the family he has left. And because it’s Lucanis and it’s Rook, who just keeps sidestepping every excuse he can come up with, his last card is to show the monster behind the man. To show Rook the demon of Vyrantium.

In case you couldn’t tell, I love this mission!

[v-arbellanaris]

To be clear, I'm sending this ask not to start an argument but because talking about S/amson's morality as a subject interests me. This is all intended politely, though I am bad at tone. While my personal thoughts on S/amson's stuff in act 3 are a little complicated (shit of him to do, and they have him be excited about the annulment on the templar route, the latter of which I do have to wonder if they did simply bc the writers hate addicts (they do) or not. Still it did happen and it IS odd when people try to act like he had less part in the attempted genocide of the gallows than C/ullen, who was way more hesitant than S/amson), how did you come to the conclusion that he was purposefully throwing mages at slavers? He says pretty explicitly that he didn't know and was trying to get mages out of Kirkwall, are you assuming he's lying or is there some extra information I'm missing? I guess I could see why he might lie here if that was his intention, but I don't… really think he is? there's nothing to point to it? I see "he gave mages to a slaver" as a point a lot in the S/amson discourse, but I don't know how people are coming to the conclusion that he wasn't genuinely doing the best with the no resources he had at that moment, and the smuggler he was using ended up being a slaver without his knowledge. This being said, the fandom posing him as super good compared to C/ullen is really weird, and while I understand why it happens, it is frustrating seeing people ignore his blatent flaws.

do i think he deliberately gave mages over to slavers? no, i don't think that. i also don't think a lack of deliberateness absolves him of blame. k/irkwall is notorious for slavers - how many do we kill in game? we find a bunch just hanging out in lowtown, and the docks, and near the wounded coast. but the guy who lives on the edge of the docks never suspects that the man taking runaways for free is a slaver?

with regards to f/eynriel, s/amson is very explicit about how he didn't help f/eynriel as much as possible because he didn't have money. instead, he directs f/eynriel to a ship captain he knows. he knew the slaver, and he sent both o/livia and f/eynriel to him. when h/awke says "of course your friend's a kidnapper", s/amson quickly says r/einer's not a friend, but someone who "isn't scared to try out this business". but what business is he referring to? f/eynriel doesn't have coin, that's the entire reason s/amson turned him away. what other reason does a ship captain in kirkwall HAVE to take people on for free? s/amson deliberately sends f/eynriel to someone else to deal with. and when he heard rumours that person was selling people, what did he do? nothing, until h/awke comes looking.

[shidoukanae]

Paris Valerian but i redesign his dragon form for funsies based on how i see him=. Not sure if I like this design bc im not a fan of bulkier looking dragons but for Paris I think this works??

Some headcanons about this design:

has a bit of a bull-like look bc I associate bulls with persistence and madness and idk that fits Paris well so if Fian has a “fox” motif Paris gets a “bull” one for his dragon form 

His design is based a lot on how a stereotypically evil dragon would look???? Because imo OG!Paris reads as a massive antagonist and I think giving him a look that fits that vibe in his dragon form works!! Especially because he still is an antagonist in a way (though god does he not read that way lmao)

he’s stronger in his dragon form than Fian is and he uses this to his advantage to bully Fian around whenever they playfight as dragons. That said, it seems Paris is surprisingly gentle towards Fian in this form and never hurts him.

he uses this form to intimidate people into getting what he wants. He’s not used to getting retaliated against while in this form and quickly respects anyone who does so (read: Fian, Lyla and Helene)

the silver scales on his body can glow in the same way his eyes do. Typically, he keeps them dull-colored (see above) but if he feels a strong emotion of any sorts they’ll glow brightly without him meaning to (noticeably: they glow constantly whenever Helene is around for obvious reasons~).

[notebooks-and-laptops]

Why Fenris could Never Cameo in Dragon Age: The Veilguard

In the run up to Dragon age: The Veilguard, I was almost certain that Fenris would be our main legacy character from previous games. Not only has he been central in the comics released between DAI and DATV, he is an escaped Tevinter slave who's plot revolved around magisters, magic and the structural prejudices surrounding elves in Thedas. Not only that, but he's canonically in Tevinter killing slavers currently so he's geographically in the right place for us to meet him.

About halfway through the game though, it was clear to me: Fenris could never cameo in The Veilguard. Because he'd break it.

How the Veilguard treats Thedas is...odd to me, to say the least. I will be writing another post about how much I adored the expanded big lore in this game (the titans, ancient elves were spirits, where the blight came from etc.) and yet while these large lore expansions worked for me, the actual culture of modern Thedas is entirely softened, its sharp edges filed down until it's a sanitised fantasy world devoid of what made the franchise so vibrant and compelling in the first place.

So let's start with Fenris and slavery. In all three games, the reality of slavery is pushing at the corners of the world. In DAO Loghain allows Tevinter Magisters to enslave elves in order to raise money for his war effort. In DA2 Fenris is fighting to be free from slavers who will not leave him be, let alone the reminders that the city was built by slaves which are everywhere. In DAI one of the two possible mini-bosses is Calpurnia who was a slave, and characters such as Gatt and Dorian both show us how much slavery is tied into Tevinters culture and success.

But DATV the first game actually set in Tevinter where we get to see the famed Minrathous...it's like the game purposefully wants to avoid the issue. I can feel it tilting the camera away to not allow me to see. Slavery is mentioned, but never talked about in depth or as a specifically ELVEN problem in Tevinter. This might have been done to be less problematic, it feels ignored.

We are in DOCK TOWN. We are at the DOCKS. You would think that slaves from all over Thedas who are being smuggled and bought by various groups would be everywhere. You would think that the injustice in dock town would be partly built on the back of ships we've seen in the comics crammed with elves in chains. This is the world Dragon age set up for us. And yet...nothing. zilch. A tiny easily skippable side quest where we free a couple of venatori slaves, but only one of whom is an elf.

None of our Tevinter characters seem to have been influenced by their culture even a little bit when it comes to how they view elves; there is no moment when Neve fucks up and says something prejudiced, no moment when Bellara or Davrin are distrustful of her for being a Tevinter mage.

The same goes for Zevran; a character who epitomised the issues with the crows. The crows have consistently been characterised as very morally dubious assassins who kill for the highest bidder and who buy children on the slave market and torture them as they grow in order to assure that they reach maturity able to withstand torture without giving away a client's name. Zevran is very explicit about the fact that if you fail a contract your life is forefit.

Nobody responds particularly to you if you're an elf. Nobody trusts rook less for it in Tevinter. Nobody treats Rook any differently. Even DAI had better mechanics for this; with nobles in Orlais less likely to trust you as an elf.

Considering one of the main plot points of this game and what makes Solas sympathetic is the fact that he was fighting against the slavery of ancient elves...you'd think the game might want to mirror that in modern Thedas. It might want to show us how characters fighting to end slavery in Tevinter are similar to Solas and how the society Solas fought against was similar to the one that characters we love such as Fenris have fought against in modern Thedas. Maybe we'd want to explore how in a world of slavery like this, how could the answer NOT be to tear it all down? Maybe we should have that option at the end of the game so it really can chose whether we agree with Solas and his plans or not.

Adding Fenris to this game would entirely break the game because Fenris refuses to allow you to look away from this horror. He is a sympathetic character who had to learn to trust mages again because of course he didn't trust them. Of course he didn't. Fenris wouldn't allow the camera to shift focus because he's literally covered in the lyrium scars that show how slaves are used as experiments in Tevinter. Fenris WOULD question Neve on how she feels about elves and slaves. Fenris WOULD have things to say about Lucanis and the crows (let alone the fact Lucanis is an abomonation). So he could never be in this game; he'd drop a bomb on it's carefully constructed blinders to the very society its supposed to be set in.

And yet, in DATV, the crows are presented as...a found family of misfits and orphans? The politician who opposes the crows having absolute power in Antiva is framed as a comically evil idiot who doesn't understand that the crows are ontologically good. Yet...they're NOT. Crows in this game act more like a secret rebel group than an assassin organisation. We see no crow taking contracts with the VERY RICH venatori magisters despite being hired killers. We see crows just refuse to kill people despite having a contract because 'its crueler to leave them alive'. The crows don't feel like the crows here, they feel like a softened version of a cool assassin group who are cool because they wear black and purple.

Our pirate group are also sanitised; the Lords of Fortune are good pirates who only steal treasure that's not culturally significant. Theyve clearly read the modern critiques of the British Museum and have decided to explicitly stop anyone levelling similar critiques at them. There is no faction of the Lords of Fortune who aren't like this, no internal arguments about it. Everyone just. Agrees. And is able to accurately tell what a cultural artifact is vs. what treasure that you can have yourself is. Rather than showing us why a pirate stealing cultural artifacts might be bad (like in da2 where such a situation literally causes a coup and a war) it just tells us it's bad. But also pirates are cool so we still want them in our world.

This issue seaps into Thedas and drains it of any of the interesting complexity and ability to SAY anything that this franchise had before this game. It becomes a game about telling and not showing rather than the other way around. The games have ALWAYS asked questions about oppressive structural systems and their interplay with society, religion and culture and how these things can affect even the most well meaning character. Dragon age at its best IS a game about society and how society functions both for and against it's characters and what happens to societies built on cruelty and indifference. The best bad guys dragon age has given us are those who are bad because they embody these systems or have been shaped by them. Our main characters have had to wrestle with questions surrounding how to exist in these systems, fight against them, learn and grow.

Yet every group you come across in DATV is sanitised and cleaned up to the point of being as non problematic as humanly possible. None of our cast of characters have to wrestle with where they came from or the world that shaped them. None of them have to confront their own biases. They start the game perfectly non-problematic and end it that way too.

And this just...isn't what Dragon Age has been in the past. It isn't why I love the franchise. The whole game just felt, in a way, hollow. And this was a CHOICE and it is why the legacy characters are few and far between. Too many dragon age characters are just too...angry and complex for this game. You can feel them pulling their punches on this one. I have to imagine they did this because they didn't want to be criticised or have too much controversy? But I think it honestly goes far too much in the other direction and just makes it bland.

I can't imagine what I say here will be unique, but it is the basis for a LOT of my other thoughts on this game so I wanted to get it out of the way first. The softened Thedas and characters make this game by far the weakest in the franchise.

[internalloops]

DA:TV rant … if you are of the mind that BioWare can do no wrong /its games can be criticize or if you truly enjoying the game and are loving everything that you’ve seen so far this post is not for you. Please move along and if you don’t want me showing up on your feed please block me.  I will not be engaging with any fan that will not allow me to take up space and vent my feelings on the disaster that is this fucking game.

*Also a lot of spoilers!!

.. it’s horrible, like I knew I was going to be disappointed but holy fucking shit …

I’m about to finish act one and .. they destroyed their entire lore … BioWare destroyed their ENTIRE lore /world build of Dragon Age

Minrathous has NO SLAVES !!! They are briefly talked about via shadow dragons but they’re are none visible at all in the city ( but they have the animation to give a poor person “fake money” )

The qunari who literally fought and tried to kill solas in trespasser have been turned into mindless brutes who willingly joined the evil gods … because they command dragons ?

The blight except for one mission is harmless. They purposely turned it into a bio weapon and then (besides the dark spawn spawning from it like something out of an MMO) due to *plot armor, no one actually contracts the blight ???

The black chantry minus one building that you go through in a side quest doesn’t exist? No chantry members , no talk of the black divine ..

Dalish are all engineers now and part of the veil jumpers ( which should not exist lore wise) and all elven magic has been converted into cyberpunk technology and artifacts. Very little talk about their oppression and they are all very willing to drop all their history , even their distrust of solas , to flight the old gods .

Varric Has been demoted to inspirational speaker and narrator he has no other role and the entire team acts like he died , even when he’s in the room with him ( I think BioWare actually planned to kill him but then chickened out ) and is a husk of his former self

Same with Morgan , you can’t interact with her at all and she’s given the same mysterious background as flemeth ( the theory that she carries mythal spirit is very strong right now )

Lyrim potions don’t exist, in fact lyrim doesn’t exist at all besides the dagger. All magic has turned into technology, and if you play as a mage mana just has an automatic replenish rate /cool down effect that you can level up.

Evil gods go back and forth between an actual intense adversary and threat to the world, and a typical Disney villain.

These are just the few I can think of off the top of my head, there is so much more than this …

The game can literally be summed up as Mass effect andromeda x2 with God of war animations and marvel style writing ( not the avengers I’m talking about the recent shit)

Also for the people who want to kill solas or simply dislike him, the game pushes a sympathetic view of him on you ,even your companions who outrightly want to kill him will feel sorry for him. And I’m saying this as a solavellan fan. Yes they’re options to be mean to him and antagonize him, but you won’t get anyone agreeing with your actions ,at best they’ll be neutral about it. Now this might play out differently for those who picked the “chooses to stop him “ option , but for those who’s inquisitions wanted to save him but they wanted their rooks to hate him … you’re not gonna be happy about what you get ..

The only thing that keeping me playing is the reveal of history of ancient elves and Titans and solas’s story. And Assan!! Assan can do no wrong !! Everything else is a slog to get through.

[geraskierfanficprompts]

Prompt 39

Geralt is standing above the unconscious bloodied body of his beloved, Jaskier. The mage Geralt was tracking down to kill had meant to blast Geralt, but Jaskier had tackled the mage and things got ugly. The mage chuckles, eerily, and prowls closer. "So the mighty witcher has a weakness after all. Perhaps it'd be best if I do let you both live. Eternal sorrow is far more delicious than a passing trifle." And Geralt falls unconscious. He relives his entire life through flashes of memories, though they're all cruel and wrong. Things happen differently, skewed and twisted. The first time he meets Jaskier, he punches him in the stomach. Jaskier is standing beside him, near a body of water, as Geralt insults his voice. His passion, his livelihood, his reason for living. Jaskier standing outside awkwardly as Geralt fucks Yennefer. Geralt can see him in his peripheral, and yet he doesn't stop, nor even have the decency to pull the curtains, he just continues. Soon enough, the blur of colors at the edge of his vision disappears as Jaskier runs into the distance. Geralt however thinks that the worst memories are the quick three-second flashes of him just endlessly needlessly insulting Jaskier throughout their decades of companionship. It's not banter, it's not teasing, it's just abuse. Then Geralt is suddenly on a mountain, and he's yelling at Jaskier. "If life could give me one blessing, it would be to take you off my hands!" ... Nevermind. This is the worst one. Geralt is sick to his stomach. Jaskier's eyes widen, and begin to tear up. His face pales of blood, he looks like he's about to faint. His lip even quivers, the way it does when he's well and truly devastated. And Geralt did that to him. "Right.. Uh.. I'll get the rest of the story from the others. I'll see you around Geralt." But then he wakes up in Yennefer's hut. "Where's Jaskier?" he asks immediately. "That bard you hated? The one that followed you around for a few years? I don't know. It's been years since you've even thought about that wretch." He explains that this is wrong. That he loves Jaskier. He adores him. And she tuts sympathetically before explaining that it was a spell the mage put him under. Fake memories of a life where he paired up with the bard. She mimes gagging at the sentiment and he feels hot with anger. As if Jaskier is such a bad choice of romantic partner. He storms out of her place and races off to find his bard. He needs to know for sure what their standing is, and even if he has been cruel, he can at least apologize to the poor bard. "I don't know what to do, Yenna!" A bandaged Jaskier shrieked as the afformentioned witch examined Geralt for the fourth time that hour. Geralt lay comatose in her guest bed, under some sort of spell. Every once in a while, Geralt frowns or winces in his sleep, but that's all they can get from him. "He hasn't woken up since we were fighting the mage." She has a feeling she knows what sort of spell it is. A very cruel trick to play. The mage was smart enough to trust Geralt's self-flagellation. That upon waking from a fake world he perceived as real where all he did was harm Jaskier, he'd most certainly distance himself from the real Jaskier in fear of becoming the version of him in the curse. The mage was dumb enough however, to not think of how far Jaskier would go to save his beloved.

[sarasade]

It's been pretty interesting to follow the

"Why Didn't Viren Get Redeemed vs Viren Got What Was Coming To Him"

discussion after The Dragon Prince's 6th season got released.

Hot Take

I think Viren got redeemed.

Because to me Viren humbling himself and acknowledging the hurt he has caused was redeeming. His conversation with Soren was the main event. His rather heroic death was only the cherry on top of the character development cake that has been baking since s4.

I think Viren dying wasn't as significant as what he did before that and how he tried to provide Soren with some kind of comfort and closure, you know, as a parent should, before going. Viren's redemption wasn't just him dying for Katolis but acknowledging his wrongdoings and trying to salvage what he could.

That was pretty redeeming for me at least. Viren did the right thing even when he knew there wouldn't be any reward for it. Even if he couldn't stop Aaravos from destroying Katolis or manipulating Claudia even after his death. Like, man, I kinda feel for the guy.

I think it has always pretty easy to feel sympathy for Viren. Viren wants to matter and wants to be important. However, his grandiosity, as psychologists would call it, keeps him from creating genuine connections with others. His friends, wife and children are only there to prop up his ego or get rejected if they fail to live up to his expectations. It's also pretty damn tragic that Viren opens up about his deep insecurities to Aaravos of all people. Someone who was the most likely person in the world to exploit these insecurities for his own gain.

Viren had to taste his own medicide but I don't think TDP says that's an objectively good thing per se or that we should enjoy this sort of revenge fantasy uncritically. Viren is still portrayed rather sympathetically and of course there is the part about his actions affecting others and the world in unpredictable ways. It's still a tragedy because Viren's actions and personal problems have caused so much collateral damage. The Why behind Aaravos exploiting Viren and Claudia is part of that tragedy, too. There are no winners here. In a way Viren is a victim of his own narcissistic tendencies, too.

This isn't just about the final episodes of Viren's arc. To me it's essential to ask What was Viren's biggest sin he should be redeemed or punished for? Depending on your answer you may have a relatively different reading of s6 story development compared to mine.

To me it's not a specific action he took but his whole worldview. Viren is a fictional character (duh!) so his story isn't exactly literal but metaphorical, a representation of certain values and morals real people and society holds. In s3 TDP draws a pretty straightforward, though brief, comparison between Viren and reactionary right-wing ideologues. It's not exactly subtle.

It's just one way TDP goes to show how toxic and abusive Viren's core values are. that gets reflected both in Viren's personal life aka how he treated Lissa, Soren and even Harrow and Claudia (last two more indirectly). Since he also had a ton of political power as a high mage and briefly as a king we see what he did with that power. It's a pretty clear take on people who dehumanise others, fetishise power and see all living things as something to exploit. TDP explores that both philosophically and psychologically through Viren. Dark magic encapsulates this philosophy well since using magical creatures like tools or objects is essential for it to work.

Also also- I don't really get why people see redemption or atonement as something black and white. It's not bad or anything but Redeeming Yourself For Your Sins is a very Christian concept and Christianity isn't the only way to understand villain story arcs. Like I wish there could be more discussion about WHY redemption is the main analytical framework we impose on villains when villainous characters have a ton of variety anyway.

I don't really have anything to complain about Viren's death itself and I'm not surprised that he ended up dying (for real this time). Aaravos seemed like someone who'd turn against Viren the moment he stopped being useful to him so Viren's life has been hanging by a thread since s4. Viren was the best part of TDP and every scene he's been in had been a delight, well expect the s5 dream sequence because it was too long-winded and obvious, anyway, I'm sorry to see him go and I look forward writing AU fix-it fics where he and Aaravos are married and run a hot brown morning potion shop with all their four totally not dead children. RIP Viren. You lived like a messy bitch and died like a messy bitch. Iconic.

[kradogsrats]

I've been kind of hesitant to voice this analysis/theory because honestly even I find it hella depressing, but... here goes.

At the end of s6e5: "Moonless Night," we have this kind of cryptic sequence with Viren:

Now, this isn't exactly subtle. It starts with a callback to Aaravos's "the human mage, already tainted by darkness and destined to play right into my hands," line (and a nice Callum > fake pearl > real pearl > Viren cut sequence) and ends with the kind of spider-and-fly imagery you bust out when you want the audience to really get the point. This sequence tells us in no uncertain terms, Aaravos will inevitably use Viren again... at least one more time.

I say it's cryptic because the eventual payoff is a lot more subtle, particularly since everything escalates so rapidly and is actually presented as a crazy, unexpected twist. Basically, there's no follow-up until s6e8: "We All Fall Down," where we have a highly specific series of events:

Sol Regem, under Phaaravos's direction, attacks Katolis

Viren decides to make the sacrifice of both doing dark magic again and losing his own life to protect the people from Sol Regem's fire

Viren successfully casts the spell and the people are protected

Phaaravos does this:

Once Viren has cast the spell (and is probably dying), Aaravos is pleased and ends Sol Regem's attack.

Aaravos needs three things to free himself: the pearl, the staff, and a sympathetic mage. He can't just possess Callum and free himself at the start of the season, because—whether that would work or not—he doesn't have the staff. He knows, however, that Viren is going back to Katolis, so he can influence Callum to switch the real and fake pearls. Then, when Viren arrives, the pearl and the staff are lined up... but Viren is no longer sympathetic (and possessing him wouldn't really do any good because like, come on... he's in prison).

The way that the attack on Katolis plays out gives him everything: the pearl and staff are abandoned in the chaos, leaving them free for Claudia. Viren, being dead, is also now unable to influence Claudia directly—not to mention that, despite what he told her in s6e1, he chose to do dark magic again.

There are several reasons that could be behind Phaaravos's smarmy little smirk there—either he's satisfied that the staff is in play and will be easily accessible to Claudia instead of buried under a castle's worth of rubble, or he's satisfied that Viren is going to die and that removes what could actually have been a very serious obstacle to Claudia's persistence, or... he's pleased that Viren has caved and done dark magic again, whether because that's leverage he can use with Claudia, or for a more insidious reason.

We can stop here, because "Aaravos uses Viren's loyalty to his family and Katolis to manipulate him to his death and to set up his daughter for digging herself deeper in aiding his own return" is honestly plenty of payoff as far as Aaravos "using" Viren a final time. BUT just to get a little tinfoil-hat, here:

How exactly are we supposed to understand the pearl got from the subterranean secret dark magic workspace to outside in the ground-level courtyard... except by Aaravos walking the dying Viren down there to bring it back out, then neatly arranging pearl, staff, and Dad's dead body in close proximity for Claudia's homecoming? Which is pretty fucking grim.

As a counterpoint, the one thing this series sometimes plays extremely fast and loose with is the space-time continuum: like, working out travel times? Good fucking luck—it takes exactly as long to get somewhere as the plot demands, regardless of distance, terrain, or mode of transportation. So "how did the pearl get into the courtyard" could just be one of those "how did Soren and Claudia get up the Cursed Caldera without Lujanne knowing"-situations where the answer is "it's fine, don't think about it."

Sure, the staff, pearl, and Viren's body are all suspiciously accessible, but we also don't have screentime for Terry and Claudia to do an extensive search of the rubble overlaid with sad music and intercut with flashbacks. Sometimes shit just has to be convenient so we can move along... but I'll probably still always kind of wonder.

[da2supremacy]

I think there is a non-zero amount of people amongst the loudest complaining about "what we could have had" in Veilguard that are bemoaning things that are actually there but things you have to read into to actually grasp.

They may or may not have taken out the codex that explicitly explains that "It's not enough to be right about things, you have to consider the consequences" but I do, in fact, feel that this message very much was in the game. Much like all the mages turning to blood magic and many of the templars being otherwise reasonable and even sympathetic characters in DA2 did not actually mean that the templars were right. The message you were meant to receive was something more along the lines of "Victims may not always be good people and oppressors may not always be bad people but you should oppose oppression anyway."

Sometimes you have to like, infer shit. It's not always going to be directly stated.

The crows are most definitely still borderline evil, but you're getting the story from the perspective of Lucanis and de Riva or someone trying to work with them. Zevran was the way he was about them because he was already mentally at that stage where he wanted to leave AND the crows were the Warden's enemies. De Riva and Lucanis are NOT. But you have force that one crow to kill his girlfriend to prove his loyalty to Treviso. You get that conversation in the market about how Viago MIGHT kill you but he would be very sad about it. Lucanis and de Riva openly acknowledge that training was literally torture in Lucanis' final quest.

No they don't show you slavery in Minrathous but it is clearly still a thing. Do I think that some of these choices were the best? Maybe not. But like. You have to use your imagination and infer some of this bc the story was not about those things and ultimately this game only got maybe 2 years of real development after being restarted FOUR TIMES.

[pruneunfair]

Hi okay- I’m a huge remarried empress fan, but I enjoy it seperate from tne fandom. That being said- you have so many great points.

1) I do believe the story may have changed, because this is supposed to be based off a web novel. Like an actual novel. Often times they will deviate from the novel to change the story. Take Who Made Me a Princess. The artist at the end of it did say they changed the story ending for it. So it’s very plausible.

2. SOUVESHU (look I’m a fan but I can never remember how to spell) DEFINETLY GROOMED RASHTA!! Though I don’t agree with her actions, I have 100% acknowledged and know she is deeply traumatized. And he most likely took advantage of that. He saw her as young and pure, something Navier was not. And he wanted to preserve that. Rashta is clearly traumatized, and her mental health is not healthy. It is easy to take advantage and manipulate sadly because she does not know the warnings. He groomed her and when she was finally trying to be more like someone she thought he wanted, Navier, he lashed out. No one gets she is constantly comparing herself!! She does not know how to love herself!! And that is the most damage. I wish they would pick up on that. I love Navier but she can be so oblivious to that due to her anger and betrayal at Soveshu. I think if Rashta had proper care and been trained,!- did Soveshu could just fucking communicate and not be a groomer, this could all have been avoided. Navier is also at fault for not see this red flag in him??? But she was so angry and maybe jealous and wanting to back stab I think it clouded her judgement. If she slowed down and actually had a conversation- it would be okay.

3) there is so much wasted potential in all the characters!! Is Navier is getting this magical stuff sorted why can’t she just acknowledge it and work for something with it? Use it to her advantage. I wanted to see her stand up to Heinrey for taking her mages. I wanted to see her stand up to Soveshu. I want to see her just fight for herself. But she doesn’t say much. She’s so strategic with everything and it’s like it wasted her potential. Why can’t she just speak out?? It does feel very much like she turned into a Mary Sue. I want to see more of her flaws. Like one we all think is pretty when is a flaw is that she has no want to speak out and is held back and refined! I think they are trying hard to point onto her upbringing and that she’s “higher” than everyone else. When like- yes she’s an empress. But there is so much more then that we should be able to read about!! We need more scenes of her having friends for peat sakes that isn’t gossiping or talking about men and other things. Where did the potential go??

I really wanna see how it ends and hope it turns into a better direction. I also need to read the book too.

TLDR: you make so many good points and I wanted to expand on it as a fan of the series who does acknowledge all these points.

1: I did read the novel out of curiosity since everyone was saying it was better then the manhwa. The manhwa was pretty loyal to the novel and while it was still really iffy with protagonist centered morality I felt it could get away with it more since it was in first person therfore it's possible Navier could be an unreliable narrator. Another difference I noticed is that while the manhwa felt actively malicious against Rashta and making jokes about her trauma when she cries or looks for attention, the novel is more complex about it and it feels more sympathetic then something to laugh at. The whole slavery being ignored and characters getting away with shitty behavior unfortunately still lasted but given how it was more complex with it's characters I think it was an unfortunate result of the author getting a little too carried away with the readers desires to see more fluff. Gotta say I don't hold as much animosity toward the webnovel but it's still not my favorite.

2: I'm really happy to see that I'm not the only one who thinks Rashta got groomed. Even if she's not a child, she's still mentally stunted and grooming can occur at any age since it is the desire to take someone who is easily influenced and molding them into whatever you desire. Honestly though I think it makes sense that Navier wouldn't immediately see any red flags from Sovieshu given that their childhood together was happy and geninune, it's common for victims in abusive relationships to not see who their abuser really is at first which really made Navier escaping even more satisfying.

3: on one hand Navier not being able to speak up makes sense since what is she really gonna do if the Emperor brings in a concubine without breaking royal protocol, on the other hand it is so OOC of her in later seasons when she is described as someone with witty comebacks and is no damsel in distress yet in season 2 and 3 she does absolutely nothing since Heinrey and her other friends do it all for her. They think this makes her really charismatic but that only ever works for villian characters who are mysterious and too classy to do the dirty work, when the protagonist does this over and over it gets boring and you wonder if she's really supposed to be the protagonist at all.

[oryu404]

What is your opinion on Sting Eucliffe's queer coding?

I’m going to try to keep this as short and sensible as I can, but–You know what? who am I kidding. I know me, and I’ll go ahead and predict this is going to be anything but short or sensible. Buckle up.

Queer coding. The implication that a character is queer through subtext. So the thing is that Fairy Tail is made by Japanese person in Japan, so there's probably a lot that gets lost in translation, or that I interpret very differently because I'm Western European. That being said, I'll share my thoughts on what's commonly pointed out as subtext, as well as the stuff that stands out to me.

First up: Sting's clothing. The fur, the crop top, the single earring (in his left ear; in case you were wondering, that's not the supposed Gay Ear from the 80s/90s)the whatever situation he’s got going on there with his pants that reminds me of cowboy chaps… Yeah, I see it. I definitely see it. I know not to judge a book by its cover, but Sting's outfits don't exactly scream heterosexuality to me, even in the world of Fairy Tail fashion.

Another thing that’s mentioned a lot is his feelings for Natsu. I say feelings because some call it admiration, others call it bromance, some like the idea that there’s romantic attraction involved. I personally think Sting views Natsu as a goal he has set for himself. He wants to be like him, measure up to him in strength and spirit. That's what I'm getting from the way their dynamic is presented. Sting has looked up to Natsu from a young age, when Natsu was 7 years his senior. This was already the case before the dragons slayers traveled through the eclipse gate, and it was the same way before the Tenrou crew disappeared. Because he was still so young when this admiration started, it feels more like a mentor/older brother thing than any queer hint.

What does stand out to me and I've mentioned this often is the harmony between Sting and Rogue. Everything about the way they were presented when we got to know them as new characters. Two mages wielding opposite elements in perfect sync. Their ability to do Unison Raids as if it's nothing. It's giving that “Historians would say they were best friends” vibe. They'll likely never become a canon couple, but they've been presented as a unit from the very start, their names are usually mentioned within the same breath.

I know you specifically asked about Sting, but I also know you love Rogue, so consider this a bonus track:

I think Rogue actually has more of that queer subtext than Sting does. His name alone, “going rogue” can be used to describe behaving against what's considered the norm. Now add in the fact that he was ashamed of his name and its meaning when he was young, and then chose to go by Ryos for a while. He later went back to Rogue, implying he reached a point of self acceptance.

Honoring his name, he was pretty much the outlier within the Sabertooth of the GmG. What made him stand out was that he was kinder, more caring and sympathetic–traits that were considered weaknesses in Jiemmas’s Sabertooth. You know what these traits are also typically associated with? Femininity, which also tends to be a gay criterion.

(Just to be clear, I don't agree with the notion that femininity equals to weakness or gayness, and I think gendering traits is frankly quite ridiculous. I'm just analyzing and seeing some parallels to the toxicity from Sabertooth and that of the real world. Sadly homophobia and misogyny go hand in hand.)

Then there was the “as long as he's here” line. Sorry Rogue, but entrusting your life and sanity to the hands of another man and his proximity to you sounds pretty gay to me.

Back to Sting.

Other, smaller things I'd consider possible queer subtext are:

- he sure likes to fight dudes and watch dudes fight each other.

- he’s never shown to have any interest in women, while I’m sure girls would throw themselves at him because he and Sabertooth were pretty popular.

I probably forgot stuff, despite this post already being longer than a Monday morning without coffee, but I'm calling it a day. I'll end with this official artwork. Are we still considering this subtext, or is this just text? A flashing, multicolor neon sign? Up to you to decide.

PS: past me was right. this was neither short nor sensible.

[vigilskeep]

What is Bea's perspective on her older brother in the Circle? Does this affect any of her ideas/decisions? For that matter, if he was still at the Conclave, does she even know he's dead?

there’s a big age gap—arthur is the eldest of his four, and then there was a gap after that before their father remarried and had bea—so because he was taken away in sort of his mid teenage years, bea truly doesn’t remember him very well. he remembers her fondly but as like the baby of the family rather than as a person you know

i don’t know how it affects her opinion on mages. (for clarity this would be two of her siblings in the circle, the youngest of arthur’s four is also a mage.) just those fractions of memories that things were nicer when arthur was here probably do encourage her natural open-mindedness. then again the other mage, cat, could sometimes be cruellest. (not a malicious kid exactly, i love cat, but she follows whatever role model she has, eager to be funniest, to impress. needs more parenting than she ever got at home.) i also think that kindly-meaning priests and her mother’s family and even maybe her templar aunt she really looks up to, they tried to be sympathetic to her getting bullied by her older siblings and maybe explained, you know, don’t pay your older siblings any mind, they’ve got the devil in them! of course they act out, they’ve got magic in their line, it makes them hot-blooded and cruel and bitter against the “pure”, don’t mind them, endure them, your father will see which of you he can rely on in the end. i think that’s the kind of andrastian superstition the people around her would have completely felt it was normal to casually say. so there’s a bit on both sides.

she definitely thinks of arthur and cat when she sees the mages in redcliffe and it does make her more sympathetic. she doesn’t have the right bones in her body to be resentful of them because of the connection like she maybe could. (she doesn’t even resent any of her siblings themselves really. open-minded and sympathetic to a fault, it’s not always for the best)

i... hadn’t thought about arthur and helena dying at the conclave in this scenario 😭 i might save them from that fate so i can have them around to play with. it’s only fun to have them both there if one must die and not the other. i’ll figure out where to put them instead

[mixupmycota]

also vis a vis lucanis and his romance, spoilers for the whole thing

one of my initial comments on it was that i wasn't sure if it had started to fire or not, it felt like friendship+

this was not a complaint

i again think that people had standards set by bg3 that it isn't fair to hold veilguard too and it wouldn't be fair if it had come out next year either

but aside from that

while we don't have an exact timeline for how fast events in the game happen, it's pretty fast

it's more than a month i think but less than a year for sure.

my own horrors make me deeply sympathetic to lucanis and his reticence around open displays of affection and his hesitance to actually initiate a relationship

especially since it turns out he's never actually been in one before and the only time he ever tried to show interest in someone else before it bombed

it's entirely possible lucanis has never had sex to begin with, and he's fresh out of a year in captivity, he's having to get used to sharing his brain with a demon, Rook is the first person he considers a genuine actual friend aside from his cousin and like

yeah

there

he hoards food under his bed in the cellar, and he stays there because, textually, it has choke points and a single entrance and no windows

the lighthouse reminds him of the ossuary as it is, and he has trouble telling day from night and tries to keep track of every hour.

he also forces himself into a state of extreme sleep deprivation and is reliant on caffeine to help with this and settle his nerves

and he blames himself for the way several plot events can go and thinks that he should have been better / faster / stronger (now i need to listen to daft punk but that aside)

he has no idea how to manage his own ptsd aside from pretending that everything is fine, and is harrowed and haunted by the idea that he fails everyone around him. while he shrugs off many of the cutting things that companions have to say over the course of the game until they learn to trust him, some of the things they say clearly dig deep into his mind and he takes them on to the point they influence his own idea of himself

lucanis is a character terrified of failing people, of the amount of responsibility he carries, and is convinced that he is failing people at every turn

he holds himself to incredibly high standards

so yeah he's slow to open up

i am genuinely disappointed by how many people have responded to everything going on with this man with "he should make out with / fuck my rook faster" when like

leave him alone he needs time

it feels like people are expecting him to be very sexual based on his outward presentation and charm and im just holding my head like the character's facade is meant to be dismantled by the viewer please

and when he does

when he comes to you the night he gets you back after an undisclosed but apparently extensive amount of time in a torment nexus, he has had time to think about how long it took him to open up

he makes the choice to be brave and to risk being vulnerable

and he does it in rook's room

in front of the fish tank

which mimics the view he would have had in the ossuary, but reflects that in this moment rook had successfully helped him free himself from its memory to be there and exist and live with them

he trusts rook enough to almost fall asleep in their lap, he curls inward facing them and it made me cry

my rook being a mage and a necromancer at that also made this especially potent

lucanis trusts kalin with himself, and spite trusts him too, and that's such a precious thing actually

[self-spaghettification]

ok so i accidentally deleted the draft but a while back an anon asked me basically saying they had read Gone (are the Days) and wanted other good fanfic recs. and this was my response LMAO

hmm !! this may surprise you but i actually don’t consume that much fanfic. partially because i’m picky, partially bc i tend to consume content slowly or bounce around a lot, etc

i will say a general tip is to sort by bookmarks or kudos to get the good stuff and filter by specific tags as well! like i just read mage pride which is the top bookmarked item in the viravos tag and it was definitely worth the hype!!

if you enjoyed gone are the days,

you’d probably like the Professor Next Door by detectiphoenix (also a professor au but high school teachers!) besides that, here are some viravos fanfic i’ve enjoyed, off the top of my head:

(for context i’m not hyper into smut personally or try to find variety/creativity and i’m biased towards certain things lol but)

VIRAVOS FICS I LOVED <3

Mage Pride by luminiex - This is the top bookmarked fic in the viravos tag, and for good reason! While it is written after S2 and has more sympathetic Aaravos than in canon, it is still very well done in my opinion. I also love whatever it takes by them, it’s great if you don’t like smut too! Aaravos and Viren living together in this plane together lives rent free in my head 😭 I also love their fic where Aaravos gets to meet Viren’s family :)

Recidivism by indefensibleselfindulgence/ @iamalivenow - the viren characterization is everything, it takes place in s2 prison era, and it’s very humorous!

The Sound of His Voice by portmanteau_press - very very cool setup/worldbuilding concept i think

Constellation of the Heart by @yurayuramiharin - This fic is one of my absolute favorites and has inspired some of the art I’ve done as well! As someone who loves vintage & goth subculture & IS a baby bat in college I feel like I resonate with it really well! I love the taking of the worldbuilding of the dragon prince recontextualized in a college setting and the way Aaravos was actually an inspiration for Bowie & caused Viren to question his sexuality!! It’s so deliciously perfect but sadly unfinished, but I would say it’s still definitely worth the read! It doesn’t really end on a cliffhanger either, just one of the best burns ever 😁

Touch of a Star by @detectiphoenix - really unique take on what it’s like to touch Aaravos, I adore it sm and think about it everyday too. Fluffy S5 extrapolation/continuation

To Serve or Slaughter by beastlybrooke - viravos recontextualized as vampires like castlevania my other recent fixation? sign me up. it’s interesting how viren’s prejudice towards elves is recast as a prejudice towards vampires, and aaravos’s fight towards the elves and view towards humans i love it everything

honorary mention ficlets:

the stars they lie by rikku - this is short but i really like the way they incorporate virrow and mindgames, as well as enby aaravos :)

Checkmate by @thrandilf is also short and sweet but i adore it, i think about the alternate versions of the s5 trailer sm and even tried writing my own a few times but they never went that far but yeah i love it and they have other fics that are great too

respect his decision by @vestaldestroyer because aaravos didn’t have to revive viren s4 but he did and ughgghhghh while i don’t think he cares that much cause he might have just been using the revival as a way in with claudia and continuation of all that, there’s always that off chance and he doesn’t even realize how attached he is and love is just that huge when you’re that old and powerful, large enough to move mountains and yeah </3

i’d put my own can you stay by @self-spaghettification but that’d seem a bit unfair lol

—

there’s probably others i’ve yet to read or that are cool but i don’t remember or that have some good parts but are kind of iffy imo but those are the only ones i can think of off the top of my head i’m sorry </3

but i’ve also have been compiling a list of fic ratings on a google doc and uhh its not really sharable in any way, but a while ago I also had a website concept where people could share fic ratings like goodreads but for ao3 with some other site inspo in the mix that i spent a few hours sketching out the concept of but idk if i should share but yeah :)

[ms-katonic-of-tamriel]

I have to say I absolutely love how you write Miraak. I absolutely adore the backstory you gave him. Like you made him sympathetic, but that doesn't take away from what he did. I don't have the words to properly articulate how much I love what you've done with him.

Anyway, I was wondering if you had any more thoughts on Miraak's siblings and parents. Like how did his parents, what were they like?

How did Greta meet that Jarl's son?

What were the names of Halbard's wife and kids?

What did they think of Miraak?

Yay! Miraak love! I try. I suspect he's not that true to canon, but I wanted to write someone who was redeemable and capable of learning from his mistakes.

Greta and the Jarl's son! Greta left the village for Windhelm to seek work there - there may or may not have been a boy in her village she was trying to get away from and while Miraak stopped him hassling her, things were still difficult. So she left for Windhelm and got a job as a palace servant. That's where she met the Jarl's son, an affair ensues, Greta gets pregnant and... the Jarl goes ballistic, forbids the wedding and throws Greta out and threatens his son with disownment if he goes after her. Greta goes home in tears to her mother, and predictably Ranna goes to see Miraak insisting he do something. Cue a trip to Windhelm where Miraak wants to know why his sister was not good enough for the Jarl's son and who does he need to feed to Sahrotaar and then the Jarl's son stands up and announces he'll marry Greta even if it means the loss of his birthright, if Miraak has a job for a warrior in his entourage. At this point, the Jarl gives in and says they can get married, at least with a grandchild on the way the succession's safe. Miraak brings his entire family over for the wedding and puts up the dowry and even officiates the ceremony.

Halbard's wife is called Svetla, she's about the same age he is. She grew up in the same village, was Halbard's childhood sweetheart from a young age, watched Miraak grow up as well and while she didn't expect her boyfriend's bratty younger brother to grow up into the leader of the Sonaak, she wasn't surprised either. Young Miraak might have been arrogant as hell but he was also magically gifted and clearly very bright. She was always quite fond of Miraak - as an adult, he was always friendly towards her and spoiled the kids rotten. Despite marrying in their late teens, Svetla and Halbard had issues having children - stillbirths and infant mortality taking every single one. Until Miraak became the lead priest at the Temple and suddenly a once neglected village gets a lot of attention and investment, with a proper healer assigned. Miraak personally ensured that no matter how hard the winter, his kin were taken care of and that village didn't suffer, and the resulting nutrition gains alone meant Svetla and Halbard's kids born after that survived. Svetla and Halbard knew who to thank for that - they'd been married eight years, no surviving kids, Svetla's mental health was in pieces, and then suddenly Miraak's the lead Sonaak, their village is prospering overnight, and Svetla's next kid lives as do the next two? Halbard forgives his brother everything and Svetla thinks Miraak is akin to the Divines for this. The three kids were Annalies, Ranmir and Saara, and they adored their Sonaak uncle. Saara would also have turned out a mage and quite possibly Dragonborn, and had things gone better, likely ended up adopted by Miraak once her magic kicked in. Alas she never lived that long. :(

Ranna and Harknir? I never went too much into their backstories before they had Miraak, but Ranna was a very beautiful young woman (Miraak absolutely got his looks off her), Harknir was besotted with her and personally hunted down three bears to present the pelts to her family when he asked for her hand. Ranna admired the furs greatly and immediately said yes. Not the most romantic of pairings but they were Atmorans of Solstheim and they weren't rich, so it didn't need to be. They had three surviving children, and nothing seemed out of the ordinary... but their second son seemed unusually precocious and once his personality emerged, it became very apparent that he was not only very bright, he absolutely knew it. Harknir never really had a clue what to do with him, and tbh would have preferred a girl, or a at least a proper man's man as opposed to this vain smartmouthed kid, but he tried his best. When Miraak did end up shooting up the Dragon Cult ranks, Harknir could content himself with thinking at least the vanity was justified. Ranna of course adored Miraak from the start, he was a very cute and charming baby and never failed to entertain her. Harknir was never terribly charismatic but Miraak absolutely was, and promptly got doted on non-stop by his mother. It's possible this contributed to tensions between father and son.

Anyway! Miraak's birth family, insofar as I've plotted it out. Nothing so terribly weird or unusual, they just had the dubious fortune of a Dragonborn son being born to them.

Thanks for the ask!

[tahopo]

Hi! Really in love with your art style and vibe in general. I was wondering if you have a masterpost or carrd I can read up on your ocs/worldstate? (I found you because of your Amethyne post but tbh I’m a little confused because your warden is dead? But maybe I’m getting your hofs mixed up?)

hello thanks so much :)

i don’t have anything like that but i do try to tag as best as i can.

you’re thinking of my cousland, my main hof who is sometimes dead because of the ultimate sacrifice and sometimes alive. it’s a schrödinger situation because i don’t prefer either or the other, they’re both an acceptable state for him in my mind.

kaleb dead — decided from the beginning he was going to die but only after doing his job. sensible and sympathetic choices. high alistair & morrigan approval. alistair remains a warden. refused the ritual. posthumously considered a success story, romanticised and respected. ten years later it’s revealed he had shared a bed and beget kieran. call it a moment of despair, of loneliness, a failure of character, ink pooled at the end of a straight line. or simply a terrified boy.

kaleb alive — imagine a will to live that grips you by the very last rib. this is where he begins to make rather brutal and acute decisions seemingly out of nowhere: conscripting loghain, arranging alistair with anora, accepting the ritual. post-dao he cures a blighted amethyne by Joining her. the denial of his borrowed time means he lives long enough to prove his fallibility.

then my hawke and inquisitor

mairwen — red personality mimicking her dead twin gareth’s more blue. if you think that’s creepy, that's because it is. it's also nobody's business. bethany and carver dead. was rather tender on fenris but ended it early on. killed anders. married and started a family with sebastian but allowed herself to succumb to the nightmare. many mens’ lives ruined but frankly many men hadn’t the first thing about her.

yasmin — rivaini-elf, adopted into the trevelyans. he married a fidelity spirit under (arguably) good intentions but warped it into a devotion demon; terrified by him under the guise of for him, his templar siblings conspired and deceived him into tranquility. the anchor reversed this and reunited him with devotion gradually turning into fealty as he led the inquisition. did not recruit the chargers, conscripted the mages, kept the wardens, vivienne made divine, did not drink from the well. he had a very serrated relationship with solas. no romance. reconnects with his dalish roots after trespasser.