#i think it could have been integrated way better with even less work

[ganondoodle]

you know, i talked about it before but i still, for a much more rare totk gameplay complaint-

i still cannot wrap my head around how it went all the way to the finished product to have 5 ghosts that love to glitch around and threaten your frame rate (espeically bad in combat) help in combat, 4 of which are MELEE fighters, AND have their abilities tied to their model forcing you to chase after them constantly if you want to use any of it AND ALSO give them collision so they can get knocked over cancelling their ability if it needs charging (RIJU!!), the one needing a long time to charge being not jsut one of the most useful and fun to use but then making that one also be one of tHE MELEE fighters meaning anytime you manage to catch her and activate it she instantly charges into battle and due to her being rather small and using short swords she basically sticks to the enemy like glue and keeps gettign knocked over, i swear yelling riju was my most spoken word in any type of combat in all my playtime

also how they teleport back and forth in and out of your arm the second you dare to look at a climable surface or are in one thats too small for them (even when you need them the most like yuno in one of those caves stuffed to the brim with destroyable rocks thatd take out all your swords if you did it by hand) or just .. randomly teleporting around but then can still get stuck on environmental collision until you cant even see them anymore (stares at sidon giving me a heart attack in the underground when he got caught on a light root until i was so far away he was barely visible and instead of teleporting he started to sprint at me with inhumane speed when i turned around making me frozen in shokc bc he turned dark in the distance for some reason making me think one of the creepy ghost soldiers was out to murder me, granted that was one of the best moments in the game for me, but also, imagine if they actually did that with one of the creepy ghost soldiers instead of it being a glitch??? another missed opportunity tbh)

how did that never come up during playtesting?? if they really were done somewhere in 2022 and spent the rest of the time with polish like they said how did that never come up?? i loved having the champ- sages around in their dungeons but the ghost version thingy wasnt really that optimal and id rather have their abilities be either integrated into your controls like in botw (tbh i find that really thoguhtful, to have your dead friends abilities they granted you inegrated into your basic controls as dynamically as they did) or in another ability wheel (like i did in my rewrite) with maybe mineru beign the only one you actually need around via summon since you can ride ... her

idk about anyone else but i only had them around bc i liked them walking around with me and was too lazy to constantly de and reactivate them but tbh i think it caused more annoyance to me than it brought anything interesting to it

[mutalune]

hey siri how do I stop feeling gutwrenchingly anxious in the guilt way for using the treatment methods available to me to not be in constant misery

[flavorcountry]

I got a cold and watched that Jenny Nicholson video about the Star Wars hotel (it's very good) and fully lost my mind: even after experiencing a comprehensive four-hour deconstruction of why it didn't work for Star Wars, I still think a version of this would absolutely work for Star Trek. Take my hand and walk with me on my journey into madness, where I have infinite money, talent, and team to make it all happen!!

Overall vibe

If you want to make a hotel/resort experience that takes place inside a fake spaceship, I still think Star Trek is the way to go: so much of Star Trek takes place on ships, and we've seen the rooms are pretty nice!! Like the Star Wars one, my Star Trek hotel is also a simulated starship, but with better rooms and more fun stuff to do.

Are you ready for this shit

Can you tell I drew this myself

You'll arrive at Farpoint Station,* where the concierge checks you in and your luggage gets whisked away by station staff. Gift shop's also here. When you're checked in and ready to head to your room, you're brought to one of several transporter rooms. If you never went to the Star Trek Experience at the Vegas Hilton when it was active, I am truly sorry for you, because they had a ride whose boarding process included getting beamed away: you and your pals were herded into a zone where you were clearly meant to board a run-of-the-mill 20th-century simulator ride, and then there were jets of mist and a sound and suddenly you were in a transporter room on board the goddamn USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D. It was fucking magical and I never, ever want it explained to me. Anyway, that's what happens to you at my Star Trek hotel: you step onto a transporter pad and get beamed from Farpoint to a Galaxy-class Federation starship. Exit the transporter room and walk down the ship's corridor to take the turbolifts to Cargo Bay 1, where a "temporary muster point" has been set up (this is where the guest services desks will be), or just follow the lit-up companel signs to your cabin. Yes, it will look like guest quarters aboard the Enterprise-D, more or less — maybe a little smaller — but it'll have the carpet, the plant, the glass coffee table, and most importantly a window that looks out into space.

Or!!! If you booked the resort, keep heading down the hallway and take another turbolift to a different section of the ship where the holodeck entrances are. The holodecks, naturally, are running a Risa program, so you walk through the doors and under the arch and suddenly you're outdoors looking at a beautiful landscape with a pool and whatnot, plus the resort accommodations where the more conventional fancy rooms are, and also the restaurants and entertainment venues, all themed. There's a Quark's. There's a Klingon bar and grill. A Bolian salon/spa. Talaxian arcade?? Nausicaan axe-throwing pit?!?! Come on!!!!!!!!!

Here, have a floor plan

Key learnings

Two things stuck out to me that the Star Wars hotel fucked up that I think the Star Trek version can do better:

🤷‍♀️ LARP too complicated: Give 'em credit where it's due, the Star Wars hotel fucking swung for the fences trying to make a multi-hero story guests could integrate with, but it just didn't work. Technical failures! Possible conceptual flaws! Too much stuff packed into the schedule!

The fix: Just make it mostly a hotel most of the time. One or two weekends a month, there's a two-day fully-immersive LARP adventure that people explicitly book separately, and it's more expensive (more on that later). But at all times, hotel staff will be in uniform with division colors that make sense: concierge and guest relations in red, support and janitorial in gold, teal for any medical personnel. I think that means the people working in food services have to wear that plaid/vest combo the Ten-Forward staff have on, but there are certainly worse outfits.

🌴 No resort: The food at the Star Wars hotel was good, but there was no pool and no other luxury resort type stuff to do. It didn't sound relaxing.

The fix: Putting an actual resort in the Star Trek hotel under the guise of a permanently-running Risan holodeck program. The sheer elegance of it!! When the weather is bad, hotel staff in gold uniforms can make apologetic comments about how the sim's malfunctioning.

Roleplay though

People are going to want to stay onboard the ship. That's good! The thing about the ship cabins is you can build them in maybe two semicircular layers (the rooms will need to be curved because these are quarters onboard the saucer section, naturally) and just bury them underground. They don't need real windows — you're putting screens in that'll show a space view, especially when the ship goes to warp and you can see those rainbow trails. Inside the semicircle there's a lot of space where you can put the other, bigger sets: the bridge, main engineering, Ten-Forward, etc. None of those have real windows either, and also I don't think it matters where you put them physically: just stick a pretend turbolift in front of all the entrances and make guests take those whenever they need to go there! One thing we're also doing is putting little hidden speakers everywhere that put out a small amount of shipboard white noise; it may not even be noticeable on a conscious level, but it'll be there and it'll be soothing. This speaker network is also a great way to make an actual announcement if there's a real park emergency.

During most of the month, I think the bridge and main engineering are mostly just photo ops — maybe you have to book a timeslot? Just so you're guaranteed some time with just you and your buddies? But I also think there should be opportunities for what I'm going to call mini-LARPing: you and your pals can book an hour-long session and the staff trains and then runs you through a short scenario. If you've ever played Artemis or the actual Star Trek VR bridge crew game they put out a while ago, you know where I'm going with this: for however long, you and your friends are now the crew of a genuine-ass Federation starship trying to survive a battle! It's fuckin' Kobayashi Maru time, motherfuckers!! Everyone gets their own station! Lights flicker! Mist shoots out of stuff! The whole bridge shakes! There might be a warp core problem — better call down to main engineering! Whoever's down there gets escape room-style minigames and puzzles to work out and help their shipmates. At some point — and this will happen in every run of every scenario — there'll be a very mist-forward "coolant leak" near the warp core that forces whoever's in the room to duck and roll beneath a descending garage-style blast door before heading up to the bridge to activate their station up there; bonus points if the player can work in a "We lost a lot of good people down there, Captain." Maybe there's an actor in makeup who menaces the crew on the main viewer from time to time (pick beforehand from a list of villains! want to fight Klingons? Romulans? a rogue Borg tactical sphere? etc). Can you see it? I can see it, and it fucking rules.

I must at this point mention that in my world, you can buy an add-on where a camera crew joins you, and they cut up the footage afterward to make you and your pals your very own mini-episode. Yes the editing and post-production are expensive and time-consuming; I'm creating jobs here!!!! Maybe …… okay, hear me out: there's an array of hidden fixed cameras and microphones built discreetly into the set, and also players are issued a combadge with an individual RFID tracker that pings the cams and mics, so they only save footage when a player comes close. After the players are done, a machine algorithm uses the data gathered to assemble a rough timeline of each player's material and create a draft movie that a human editor can pick up and fine-tune. Yeah?? When you check out, you get handed a USB drive that looks like an isolinear chip with your mini movie on it, and maybe another one with all the raw footage just in case you're feeling ambitious!!!!

For one or two other weekends during every month, there's a heavily advertised, much more involved, and way spendier LARP for people who really want to get into it. It takes place over two days. There are lots more actors portraying characters necessary for the plot/gameplay. Don't bother packing for the daytime: all players are issued a uniform they get to keep afterward. Do I have any details on the scenario or RP? I do not. But I fully believe it's possible to construct something you could run over the course of a weekend that would keep a hundred paying guests occupied, amused, and delighted, provided you have a truly ridiculous amount of money and people, which I do because this is utter fantasyland.

Also it probably won't cost six grand. Probably??

Let's gooooooooooooo

The rest of the time — and I cannot stress this enough — the Star Trek hotel is just a very heavily and specifically themed all-inclusive resort that has nice, fancy rooms and luxury amenities plus bookable ship cabins and opportunities for photo shoots or quick one-shot roleplay adventures for the real heads. You don't ever have to enter those latter parts if you don't want to! You can just hang out at the resort and have fun with all the themed entertainment, which I must stress is going to be both in-universe plausible and great, with something for everybody. Yes, there'll be a daycare, and yes, Flotter will be there in some capacity to entertain the kids. The food hall is my favorite part by far; I could pitch you Trek restaurant concepts all day. Romulan gourmet soup stand. Gummi candy store staffed by Ferengi where all the offerings are shaped like alien bugs. A vending machine where you can get a jumja stick or a three-pack of those nutrient pucks Picard and his new friends kept getting in "Allegiance." There will be an entire plant-based food vendor with a wide variety of delicious options for all meals, and it will be run by Vulcans.

A word on the gift shop

Question for you: have you ever watched a Star Trek show and seen a Starfleet officer pull on a jacket or shoulder a duffel bag that had the words "STAR TREK" on it? If so, then friend, I want to know where you get your hallucinogens because I want to experience this exactly once. All of the gift shops on my hotel grounds sell responsibly sourced, highly thought-out, well-made items that would be in-world plausible and have no obvious branding. Of course you can get a hand-carved horga'hn, but let's go bigger. Why not a light-up Tox Uthat for your nightstand? Ressikan flute for you, queen? How about a whole-ass knife store that's nothing but various kinds of Klingon cutlery? There will absolutely be an entire tailor's shop whose whole job is to put you in the Starfleet uniform of your choice; there may or may not be a Cardassian managing the place who's got a 50/50 cheerful/menacing vibe going on. There'll be not one but two stores that sell little models of ships: the regular ones and the gold ones. Don't tell me you can't picture it!!!!!

I think that's about it

Thank you for coming along with me on this bespoke journey into 100% insanity; now can somebody put me in touch with the Star Trek licensing people and also give me a billion dollars to build all this? Okay, thanks a lot!!

For timeline purposes and because it's fun, I'm positing a version of Farpoint that got built after the events of the TNG premiere where the Denebians got their act together and just built a normal surface base without suborning an interstellar lifeform.

[tumblingxelian]

Crossposting from SV:

https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/iwiw-rwby.125050/post-32676154

Regarding the expectation of perfection, yeah, I don't think the team expected it. The one who could be arguably said to have put the most "pressure" on Ruby is Blake as we saw in V8, but having faith in someone isn't the same as demanding perfection. & Blake showed she was fine stepping up and trying to help or support Ruby when she needed it.

The others applied even less pressure, at least knowingly, but none of them are aware of how Ruby had internalized Ozpin's lesson (& from what I know of Coco Second Semester does not make his lessons better)

But Ruby definitely took a lot of these things to heart in a way likely never intended. & more to the point that likely wouldn't be nearly as bad if not for the trauma conga-line the last volumes have been.

For instance in V8 Ruby does seem briefly hurt by Yang noting that following her lead hasn't worked out, but Yang's language is still rather casual, this isn't her trying to deliver some cutting barb to wound Ruby's pride. & given their reunion in V8 it didn't have a lasting impact... Up until V9 landed because with everything that went wrong, suddenly those words pack a lot more sting.

In regards to Yang & Ruby in particular, one thing I find interesting is that in early volumes, even after Ozpin's leader talk Ruby was more comfortable showing uncertainty, discomfort, fragility and the like.

Especially around Yang. She was sulking in V2 about Blake not coming to the dance and feeling overtly helpless, she was fine with being uncertain about her decision to reveal the WF's location to Ozpin & co, also in V2.

But more integrally, in Volume 3, after everything had gone to hell what is the first thing Ruby did once she could move under her own power?

Was it go to her dad for comfort? Seek Qrow for advice? nope, those two came to her, with Tai mostly being used for an intel update and Qrow being prodded for info, and only seeing a flash of vulnerability.

The person Ruby went to was Yang, Yang who she was surprised to find wasn't in a good head-space, and who when Ruby asked what to do couldn't answer her, seemingly leaving Ruby unsure of what to do. In essence, there have been periods where Ruby also expected others to be more sturdy than they could otherwise be expected to be. This isn't a jab, just an observation.

More integrally however, in V4 we see Ruby really hit hard on the repressing.

Oh she did it before, the fact she's modelled her entire persona after her missing mother and was raised by a girl two years her senior should already make it clear she's gonna have some issues. But it becomes a lot more overt with her being all smiles around JNPR but sad when unseen until she's hitting a breaking point. One that is... Sort of countered though of questionable help by being told she's inspiring.

The time we really see it break in in Volume 5 when Yang & Ruby reunited, she cries, she fumbles her words, she gets a damn hug.

But then, the next day, she sees that Yang is not nearly as recovered as she's trying to act. When Yang is upset & removes herself from the situation to calm down and mourn silently, its Weiss who has to help her out of it, because Ruby has no idea what to do.

That's not just her sister in there, its the girl who raised her, & this stuff is not Ruby's forte, but more integrally, Yang is the one who has always been 'all right', the one who Ruby could turn to whenever she needed and who she never had to worry about in combat.

But she's not OK the one person Ruby could always rely on is more fragile than Ruby ever realized, and so clearly, Ruby can't go to Yang with her problems either.

& thus closes her final person to really, properly, well and truly reach out to.

& the thing is Yang would have no idea this is happening!

She didn't hear Ozpin's speech, or Ruby re-phrasing it. She wasn't present when Ruby was really building her walls in V4, and any that existed before that will have been interwoven with Yang's own issues and thus be something she deemed as normal the same way Ruby deemed Yang's self sacrificing penchant as normal.

Put simply, Yang isn't aware that Ruby's mental image of her has shifted and so is not aware that Ruby no longer sees her as someone viable to reach out to.

None of which is helped by the fact Yang canonically admires Ruby and so is prone to see the best, strongest, most idealized side of her, and so like Ruby would need to be told Ruby needs help before keying into it.

Both these girls are very traumatized and damaged and they care about each other so god damn much, but also just cannot wholly see one another.

Its agony, I love it.

[nostalgicmiscellaneous]

Rewatched everything carefully. And i stand by my opinion: i love season 3. Do i have things i wish we had more and things i wish we had less? Of course, but it's the most satisfying one so far. I'm always not one to justify things much, if i like, i like it; if it touches me, it touches me. I cheered, i cried, i was upset, frustrated, i smiled and i finished with a soft smile on my lips and happy for the characters and hopeful for what's to come for them. And when a show does that, it worked. Sure, we all wish we had more Penelope and Colin together but what we did get is so touching and theirs was a season about the depth of love and the idea of keeping oneself while still giving everything you can to love. About loving and accepting yourself and the realities of love. I also like they kept the integrity of Colin as a character. He's an introspective character, he needed to handle a lot of feelings by himself, and his struggle, turmoil is important to understand everything, including himself. He's very vulnerable and his insecurities were very well portrayed by Luke Newton. He was so compelling to me, with his eyes shining with love for her but trying to repress it, because of his own self-doubts, but eager to protect her. As for Pen...Nicola, the strength you gave Pen within her own vulnerability, her traumas and her apparent conflicted aspirations. I love how Pen never lost who she is, she let her personality free and she didn't settle for what could be easy. Because she learned to love herself, she was able to love Colin deeply, better, without losing her sense of self. Her identity and her courage to take her life on her own hands. I think we could've had at least one more scene of them with real intimacy, i don't even mean steamy, i mean intimacy, with a deep conversation about them. But his love confession was, in my opinion, flawless. I also think the way they conducted Eloise and Penelope's friendship was beautiful. The Featheringtons were a welcomed surprise, Portia and Pen finally trying to see eye to eye, trying to understand each other was something i really needed to see. I love the little nods to the book and the focus on the letters Pen sent Colin, how he missed her and how much she influenced his decisions and actions. I love the very end, their little family. As for Cressida, Benedict and the Mondrichs. I understand Cressida was not to be given a redemption, just that we could understand her better. But i think less would've been more with her. Same with Benedict, we get it, no need to have so many scenes with him having threesomes. The Mondrichs...i'm sorry, but completely irrelevant to the story. With that said: I enjoyed very much and i'm really happy. Because i think compared to S1 and S2, it was a much more engaging season. It had deeper conflicts and romantic love, profound discussions that elevated the plot.

[lgbtlunaverse]

My stance on literary criticism in fanfiction communities is and will stay "only if it's explicitly asked for" and my usual go-to reply to the followup of "But you need criticism to improve!!" is: this is a hobby space, people are putting stuff out for free on the internet, it's not ABOUT quality, it's about fun.

And that's true. But the thing is that I do care about quality, actually. Controversial opinion but I like it when things are good. I want to make good things as a creator and enjoy them as an audience member. I think high quality art is just... a good goal to strive for inherently. And fanfiction is art (We're not having a debate about this. 'Art' is not a word that means high quality or high value. Because then bad art could not exist. Art means that it's art. Artistic expression. Nothing else)

And I think where me and the people talking about how criticism is necessary lose each other is that when we talk about quality, we both want good art to be made. But does that mean "I want a higher number of good works of art to exist" or do we mean "I want a higher fraction of all art that is created to be good"

Because those are 2 very different things.

See: if we mean the first, bad art existing is irrelevant, we only care about making sure good art comes into existance. But for the second, guarding against bad art is an integral part of reaching our goal. We not only have to encourage people to make good art, we have to discourage them from making bad art.

And those dual goals are important. Because criticism can make someone who is less good at art into a better artist. But it can also just make them... not make art.

And THIS. I think. Is where the distinction between paid professional art and hobby spaces, like fandoms, becomes important. It's not that I think you only get to criticise something if you paid money for it. It's that professional art spaces have a finite amount of resources. People need to eat, and they need to be paid, and art costs money to make. And if it's spent on the creation of bad art, that means less good art has the resources to be made.

(Even in something like indie e-book publishing with a lot less gatekeeping or upfront costs, this is still true. Resource allocation is perhaps more direct, directly from audience to author, but even before factoring in things like marketing and amazon's algorithm the truth is that writers have bills to pay and if they're not selling they'll need to find a different job)

What all of his means is that criticism is essential to professional art spaces. Because in order for quality to exist, you need to encourage the allocation of resources to good art and discourage the allocation of resources to bad art.

(It's more nuanced than that. Everytime a bad tropey romance book blows up people start whining about all the superior art this money could've been spent on. But there isn't ONE singular art money pool for the entire world. There are several thousand smaller resource pools that will be distributed among different regions and niches. The money spent on that tropey romance book was never going to be spent on an experimental sculpture. The work that lost out here is another better tropey romance book. Which is why you actually need to know and respect a genre to critique works in it effectively– ok I'll stop now)

And if there are more good artists than you can give resource to (which, by the way, is always true. Every moment of every day there truly great art not being made because the resources weren't there. From rejected ideas to talented people who never got to be artists in the first place because they needed a more stable job) then it doesn't matter whether an overall increase in quality comes from someone improving their craft or from them leaving the industry, leaving more resources to someone with higher quality work. They both have the same effect on the overall quality within the space.

But... in hobby spaces, those limits do not exist. People make stuff and put it on the internet for free. it's not just that they're not making money– even in professional spaces many people don't make money off their art– it's that making money isn't even an option. So that pool of limited resources doesn't exist.

Which means that the ONLY limiting factor for fanfiction is interest. The amount of fanfiction you get is dictated by the amount of people who are interested in creating it. That's it. Someone writing bad fanfiction does NOT mean that a different better fic writer will not get to write theirs.

"But criticism can make the bad fanfic writer better!" This is true, and it's usually what people who advocate for constructive ciritcism want. They do not want bad writers to be replaced by good writers, they want the bad writers to become good.

This makes sense, because as we just established, individual improvement is the ONLY way of improving the level of quality, because the only limiting factor is the amount of interested people

So, do you know what criticism can also do?

Make someone stop creating.

Well phrased or not, constructive or not. ANY critique that wasn't asked for has a chance to make someone want to stop creating. There really isn't a way to make sure you're not hitting someone in their deepest insecurities. And in unregulated spaces like fanfic you also don't have a way to screen for critique quality. There's no professional reviewers here. You can say "criticism is fine as long as it's constructive" all you want, but complete assholes giving absolutely useless critique can and do regularly think their criticism is the best writing advice in the world.

And if someone does stop, you have less interested people. You have decreased your one limiting factor.

And the thing is: people improve by just writing on their own. They might (keyword: MIGHT) improve faster if they had regular audience critique, but they'll improve by the mere act of repeatedly writing. It's the most important factor in improving.

And removing someone from the pool of interested people inherently means they stop writing, and thus stop improving. You have unavoidably DECREASED the amount of quality work that could be created.

The bottom line is: in spaces with limited resources, people either improving or quitting is the point. It's how you gatekeep, and get more good art to be made by freeing up those limited resources. In places where the only limiting factor is the people themselves, anyone being discouraged from making art because it's "not good enough" is a NET LOSS for quality.

Regardless of the fact that human enjoyment should be the first priority in hobbies, if you primarily look at it through the lens of caring about quality, unsolicited criticism hinders quality instead of serving it. The people who want to improve and who will not be discouraged by criticism will seek it out via beta-readers or editors or writing groups, or will explicitly invite their audience to give constructive criticism. At that point, go wild! But if you weren't asked: stay quiet.

[bibibbon]

people have been debating whether mirio really was a better successor for ofa has given me an idea for my rewrite. In my universe, izuku is much nore attentive and analytical of his surroundings, and due to facing discrimination for his quirklessness, he has a less rose tinted view of hero society and wont just follow orders like lemillion. An example is when he and lemillion first meet eri and lemillion give eir back to overhaul, a long tongue snatches eri from his grasp and darts away. Lemillion tries to chase after the villain but izuku recognizes it as my oc herpeton and due to them already having worked together in the past izuku trusts his instinct enough to stop lemillion and get both them out of the alley and away from an angry overhaul. Also after izuku discovers who herepton is with nezu and after nezus deal, izuku acts as a benefactor to herpeton and gives him intel on what pros patrol the cities that herpeton is visting for the first time and what their tactics are. This willingness do what is right instead of just following what the commision want is why all might chose him as his successor. Speaking of which, nana shimura and the rest of the ofa holders were also vigilantes, which explains why they most people have never heard of them. What do you think?

Hi @suchusoid 👋

This has been a long and ongoing discourse that's been reignited a few weeks back after the series ended.

Personally, in Canon itself we aren't truly given a concrete reason as to why izuku is better than mirio and why he deserves OFA more than mirio. This gets even more annoying as the series ends with izuku not even claiming the quirk or making it his but simply still viewing it as a gift from his favourite hero.

I remember @mikeellee asking a similar ask as to why izuku was picked and not mirio and Canon doesn't give us a concrete answer heck it's even worse when you realise how non existent izukus relationship with all might is.

However, I think that you're changes here to izuku are honestly what was needed!! Having izuku carry and cement the idea of no man is created equal and making sure to make that an integral part of his character would allow for izuku to really see the grey morality and messed up system especially since Canon does try and point this out but constantly fails due to the lack of introspection and development izuku has.

Izuku understanding the cruelty of the system yet still trying to save everyone is what makes him different to mirio who has a goal if 1 million people but izuku has an ongoing gaol that in reality would never be achieved and will always be added onto and altered to help produce a fairer society one where people can at least have the same opportunities.

Making Izuku much more attentive also makes sense and is crucial since Canon misses that part of his character completely. In Canon we do get some interesting analytical moments from izuku but they are inconsistent and its a shame because with a bit more digging and thinking izuku's character could of became so much more.

Mind you this is the same character that saw Hawk's once and said that it's weird that he is only 6 years older and so much more mature then them.

This is also the kid who ended up copying his classmates move multiple times with his quirk like shooting blackwhip from his mouth to mimic froppy or the use of his legs when it comes to ofa mimicking iida.

Due to his analytical abilities I feel like midoriya would be able to peice together that herperton is one of his classmates friends.

They would form a partnership of sorts. Izuku wants to help herperton out in hopes of helping achieve a better future and society so he would give him information in return and maybe he would even give him some quirk advice.

A part of me thinks that herperton would get a sense of deja vu especially when he finds out that izuku was quirkless. This would all remind him of his own quirkless mentor and from that they would slowly grow closer to the point where they both trust each other to make the right move if needed. This means that izuku allows for eri to be taken and then herperton and izuku manage to get her into safety.

In the end izuku wants a better society and he has already done many things to show us that he would do what is morally right over following the rules. This is the same izuku who ran and intervened the moment he realised iida was in hosu and trying to kill Stain. This is the same character who tried to take down gentle criminal so the school Festival wouldn't be disturbed. Even if it means getting himself into trouble or being hated izuku midoriya does what is right and that should be his character

[aalghul]

read boywonder and exploded died (in a bad way)

talia... what have they done to you... what do they always do to you... ‘there is no honour in assassin’s work’ talia... where are u... the apple of my eye, i adore her sm very close to sending pipebombs to GM everyday waow...

watching people talk about how good this was for talia feels like chewing glass. boy wonder was clearly written by someone who has not read anything involving talia prior to grant morrison and doesn't care about her outside of whatever can justify her becoming an abusive backstory for damian.

boy wonder completely disrespects her struggle during the time when she was so conflicted because she wanted to be loyal to her father but wasn't sure if she believed in him entirely anymore. the struggle existed because talia knew she would not abide by nor aid him if she did not agree with him. because talia has her own moral compass and beliefs that she follows. juni ba disregards this very important part of her journey to instead make her an entirely different character apparently did not disagree with ra's at any point before her own son was threatened (going as far as making her uncaring towards damian's former caretaker to show us how twisted her way of thinking is. mind you, this is supposedly the same talia who cried the first time she accidentally killed someone and has risked her life to help strangers, the JLA, jason todd, etc). she has to be turned into a different person just because boy wonder needs her to be framed as a somewhat sympathetic villain who gets what she deserves by having her son leave her for a better family. her "happy ending" is knowing that damian's other family is making him happy, which she never could because the story deems her incapable of that.

along these lines is another thing i found insulting: juni ba insinuating that talia's love for bruce may have been caused by talia wanting to please her father, who wanted bruce as an heir. when in reality, ra's only took notice of bruce after talia fell in love with bruce. it was because talia was outspoken enough in front of her father to bring up bruce that ra's cared about him at all. it was because talia had been off in cairo studying medicine that she had been caught up in a scheme that took her to bruce. all of those were her own choices, and juni ba wants us to question whether any of it was real because he doesn't believe talia has ever had agency. all because he himself clearly has never read talia outside of recent comics.

related to the above: juni ba insists talia wanted to be the heir to the league of assassins. pre-GM talia has never expressed this. she's never even implied it. from everything we've seen, it's pretty clear she would never want to nor would she able to stomach so much death. because it's canon that talia's heart hurts for everyone she sees killed. but, again, juni ba does not care about this whatsoever because his story is about damian and the bats. talia's characterization is always acceptable collateral damage when it comes to damian and the bats.

the more I think about it, the more I hate juni ba's misinterpretation of her. people so readily accept things like boy wonder and WFA when it comes to talia because they know so little about the most foundational parts of her character and it's really upsetting that big projects will continue to give such ooc stories as the best case scenario for talia. this is equivalent to someone writing a story where bruce decided to not take in dick or jason because the mission's more important than one kid. that would make bruce a different and less compelling character, right? that's exactly what happened to talia here (and in wfa and in everything GM wrote and in pretty much every story written since then). these are very integral parts of her character. if boy wonder as a story can't function without talia being so thoroughly destroyed? it was never a story worth telling (and it really isn't. because it's truly not a good story at all, which makes talia being wrecked for it even worse).

it makes me so angry because things like this are exactly why people don't see talia the same way they see selina or bruce or any other character ever! she continues to be pushed into the role of the harmful past who can only atone for her mistakes by now becoming an obsolete observer.

[subsystems]

Hello -

As a person with DID who has successfully fused alters/parts, do you have any information, resources, or advice for systems hoping to do the same?

My system is hoping to reach a point where we can act and function as one, but it’s been horrible trying to find resources on fusion. Nearly every article about fusion we could find places this second to functional multiplicity and seems to confuse fusion and integration. Or worse, claims that fusion is a way to kill alters!

Our therapist has been immensely helpful, but we find ourselves wanting to read more about this process or hear from others who have successfully managed a fusion. Any help would be greatly appreciated - thank you!

Hi, anon. I'm so sorry that you've been struggling to find resources on your desired recovery. I went through that struggle too, it's hard. I'm glad you have a therapist to help you out through all of this.

If you want, I've talked about my own experience with final fusion on this blog and I'm always open to talking about it more if there's anything in particular you want to hear about!

Definitely seek out other systems who have experience with partial/full fusion, too. Off the top of my head, there's @system-of-a-feather, @reimeichan, @hiiragi7, and @smokee78 (hope it's okay to tag you guys!). They haven't been active recently, but back when I was working towards final fusion, @puppydeathfarts made posts that I found really helpful. If there's anyone else who has experience with partial/full fusion, though, please leave a comment!

I also recommend checking out Rachel Downing's experience with final fusion/full integration and Jess's from Multiplicity & Me:

Their experiences helped me feel less alone when I was pursuing final fusion. There was also another person, but unfortunately they left the community due to harassment and deleted their posts. I will forever for grateful to all of them for being brave enough to share this vulnerable and personal part of their lives, they've certainly given me the strength to share my own.

As for articles, unfortunately I don't know of too many that don't stigmatize final fusion. DID-research offers a good summary of final fusion and a few interesting links to check out here.

You can find a bunch of free downloads for self-help books here. Out of all of them, I feel like Coping with Trauma-related Dissociation is a great self-help book for people who are a being supported by a therapist and interested in pursuing harmony and stronger integration within their dissociative system. I don't think it would've been possible for me to achieve final fusion or even functional multiplicity without the techniques I learned from this book. I cannot emphasize how useful it is!

Some extra things from me:

You have to work with your parts, first. You can't skip ahead to fusion. Aim to pave for understanding, acceptance, and harmony within your system. Fusion, if you want it, is the natural progression to that!

There are ways to test out fusion. Talk to your therapist about "blending" (it's also described in the coping book, but definitely mention it to your therapist). You can test out what it's like to be fused as many times as you want.

Fusion can feel weird at first. It shouldn't feel bad, but it can be strange. It took me time to get used to it. It can also feel differently depending on what stage of recovery you're in... ->

When I still had amnesia and less co-operation in my system, fusions slid under the radar and surprised the hell out of me! As I continued lowering those dissociative barriers, developing better communication and co-consciousness as a system, things become way clearer.

After you become fully fused for the first time, it's completely okay if you fall apart a few times before it really sticks! Final fusion is a process, not a destination.

You're allowed to choose whatever labels you want after final fusion. Call yourself a system or plural or say you've become a singlet or whatever you want. It's also okay to go unlabeled!

Your parts aren't gone after final fusion, but that separation is gone and it's okay if you need to mourn that. Sometimes I miss what it was like being fragmented. It's not because I want to be fragmented again, but because that was how I lived my entire life up until now, it was what was most natural to me, and it had its good and bad sides. I'm thankful for it because it was that separation which allowed me to survive! I view this similarly to how it was like to move recently. Sometimes I miss my old home, but that doesn't mean I want to go back or that I'm not happier where I am now. Things can be complicated like that!

After final fusion, you continue to learn new things about yourself and your system. It's a new journey in of itself -- a very, very wonderful one. 💚

I hope you find something helpful here. Either way, know that you are not alone on this journey. I support you whole-heartedly. Good luck with everything!

- Sunflower

[matthyeu]

why they can't be with you ― ot9.

pairing ⇢ ot9!zb1 x gn!reader 

genre ⇢ angst, heavy angst

warnings ⇢ mentions of food/eating in jiwoong’s

word count ⇢ 3k (about 0.3-0.35k per member)

synopsis ⇢ as much as the boys love you, they know they cannot have you.

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ KIM JIWOONG - your circumstances were not favorable.

the two of you met at a wedding. you were both at the age where people around you began getting married, so it wasn’t surprising when jiwoong found himself with yet another invitation to a wedding. of course, he had to attend. who didn’t attend their friends’ weddings?

it was one of the best choices of his life, for it was where he met you, a friend from the other side of the wedding. 

he had seen you first at the ceremony, sitting beside you as the seating arrangement had told him. it seemed they wanted to integrate both sides instead of separating them. that way, it would have been less awkward getting to know people to make the whole experience more comfortable. 

and they were right. sitting next to you had let him know more about you, even if you didn’t speak. the way you cried for your friend and stood to clap showed how kind you were. you were someone he wanted to get close to in a sea of people he did not know. 

you two hit it off like old friends at the reception, sharing life stories about what you knew about the newlyweds. you talked for what seemed like eons, only pausing momentarily to eat your food. jiwoong knew you two had hit it off perfectly, and he wanted to get to know you more outside of the wedding setting. 

alas, he found out that was not possible during your dance. “oh how i wish i could stay here for longer,” you briskly murmured. 

“hm?” he asked as he held onto your waist. 

“i’m not from here,” you admitted, “i flew out here for my friend’s wedding and i ought to be going back home soon. thank you for making this day wonderful though, jiwoong. i was very afraid of being in a foreign country where i didn’t know anyone. you made my stay very enjoyable.” 

there was nothing he could do but accept it was not meant to be. “it was my pleasure.”

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ ZHANG HAO - you both could not commit to it. 

although you loved each other dearly, there were some things that were never meant to work out. 

the first time such feelings were unveiled was upon your university graduation. so many people throughout the years had confessed their feelings to him and been rejected, but you felt if you never tried, you would have regretted it for the rest of your life. 

the circumstance was a surprise to both of you. hao never thought he would actually utter anything other than a rejection. he was far too focused on other things to be caught up in a relationship, but you were the only one he could actually see himself with.

“let’s wait it out until we are both more free for each other.” 

he didn’t anticipate the waiting to be long, a couple weeks or maybe even a few months at most. however, it had been about seven months since. hao had been busy, but so have you. you hadn’t texted him wondering about what he mentioned during your graduation. 

after thinking about it more, he began to see less for the two of you in the future. he was far too busy to make time for you, so why would he give the worst of himself to you? he didn’t want to show you that part of him, the part that didn’t have time for you. when accepting your confession, he only wanted to give you his best. 

so that’s why he called you to explain himself, exactly why he knew it wouldn’t work out between you two. 

“i’m glad you told me. admittedly, i don’t haven’t the time to think about this much either, but you made great points. if we want to love each other, we should wait until we have the time to do so. i can’t commit either, so i think this is for the better.” 

“i’m glad you understand.” 

“thanks for being a wonderful-almost boyfriend.” 

“same goes to you.” 

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ SUNG HANBIN - he wanted to see his friend happy.

when you approached hanbin, he really thought it would be his chance. he had been in love with you for times he could not even count, and this could have been the time where he found out you felt the same way. well, he was wrong. 

“hanbin, could you…help me get with your friend?” 

oh it was what he feared would happen. his friend had spoken about you countless times before, proclaiming their interest in you, not knowing that he felt the same way about you. though, for the sake of the friend, hanbin continued to listen. sometimes he did feel bad that he wished everything would be more in his favor, but now that he knew they were not, he could not  refuse your request. 

“sure, i can do that.” 

after all, why ruin his friend’s happiness just because the one he liked didn’t like him back? 

it was a series of long weeks for hanbin, all of them filled with assisting you and his friend in realizing the two of you reciprocated the same feelings. many planned “random” run-ins. many nights of coaching you about the things his friend liked. many conversations to his friend where he dropped your name.

and when he received that text from you, a picture of you and his friend enjoying a picnic at the local park, he knew he had accomplished what he started. however, he didn’t have the energy to even respond to your text to congratulate the two of you on your relationship. 

although he was happy for both you and his friend, there would always be a knot in his heart, a knot screaming “what if.”

what if you had been interested in him instead of his friend. 

what if he had said no. 

what if he wasn’t as nice as he was to feel obligated to help his friend out. 

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ SEOK MATTHEW - he had always been in the friendzone.

matthew’s love for you started long before he knew what love was, when you first became friends in preschool, vowing to marry each other when you two grew up because of how compatible the two of you were. 

of course, it was just a proclamation from preschoolers who talked way too much for how small mouths were. it was something most people wouldn’t remember. after all, the first few years were often blocked out by the brain, many barely even able to remember their first friend, their first partner in crime. 

not matthew though. because you had been around him all his life, he could never forget the small things you did. he noticed far too much for a young boy who had a short attention span. he didn’t understand why he remembered all of it too well until he understood he had always been in love with you. 

you, however, did not seem to remember anything from that time, let alone the silly pact you made. matthew never brought it up though since if it wasn’t that important for you to remember, it was probably not something serious. he was probably not as serious to you as you were to him. he knew you only ever saw him as a friend. 

even then, somehow he thought your perspective would be different. 

“hey look, it’s us when we were in preschool,” you commented upon entering his home, picking up the framed picture from the living room table that was littered with several pictures. 

“yeah, we just clicked then and always have been together since.” 

“remember when we made that pact to marry each other when we grew older?” you pondered. 

his heart dropped. so you did remember? it was important to you? 

he only nodded his head in response. 

“we were such dumb kids then. you can’t just marry someone because they’re like you. it would be so weird dating someone you’ve known all your life, not to mention marrying them.” 

oh. so that’s why you remembered such a silly pact. because that’s what it was to you: silly and nothing more. 

he dryly laughed. “yeah, what dumb kids.” 

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ KIM TAERAE - he could only love from afar. 

you knew nothing about kim taerae, but he knew a lot about you. he knew your favorite color, the color almost all your belongings were. he knew the foods you liked and didn’t like from the way you would pick some off your plate and devour others. he knew your small habits. 

this wasn’t to say taerae was weirdly obsessed with you. this was to say that he found a lot of interest in you, someone who always found your way wound up in his life. it seemed everywhere he went, you were there. 

somewhere along the way, he developed some sort of feelings for you. it felt silly for him to say he was in love with you, a random person that had wandered into the background of his life. it was true though. there was something about you that lured him in. you just seemed like someone who would be fun to be around. he used to think there could be some way for him to muster up the courage to talk to you. 

however, he quickly found out it was impossible, at least in the way he originally intended. 

you already had someone else to be that person he hoped he could be in his head. he had seen the other man come up to you on several occasions during the times you found yourself in his line of view. 

and eventually that man was entering that line of view with you, hand in hand. your eyes seemed to shine brighter when you looked at him. 

sometimes taerae thought about if he hadn’t just been a faraway admirer. maybe the one you were currently seeing used to be like him, someone who found you admirable because you waltzed into their life like nothing. maybe that could have been him. however, he was a coward, so it could never be him. 

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ SHEN QUANRUI (RICKY) - you saw him as your little brother.

ricky had known your brother since the 3rd grade, so he became a frequent visitor at your home.  he especially loved it when you were at home, his friend’s older sibling of four years. 

he loved it when you would pause your homework to head downstairs whenever you heard the two of them come through the door. he loved it when you would walk with them to places when your parents were wary of two young boys walking alone. he loved it when you drove them around places immediately after getting your license, laughing and sharing all the wonderful memories

and somewhere along the way, he began to love you. 

which was why it was hard for him when you started to attend university far away from your hometown. it meant that he would only see you a couple times a year, when you would come home for holidays or for summer. 

that was why this time, now that he was an adult, he really wanted to show you how much he had really grown over the years, how he wasn’t the elementary school student you once knew.

it was the holiday season, so he found himself at your house more, both hanging out with your brother and waiting for you to come home. 

at the click of the door opening, his ears knew it was you. even as your brother called out to him, nothing could stop him from rushing down the stairs to see you, a smile forming across your face once you noticed him. 

“ricky!” you exclaimed, holding your arms out for a hug. 

as he pulled away, there were so many things he wanted to say, but something suddenly stopped all of it from coming out. 

“honey, where do you want me to put these things?” an unknown voice asked as they entered the home, “oh who’s this?” 

ricky looked at the newcomer and then back at you. was this…? 

“oh he’s one of my brother’s friends. we’ve known each other for so long that he’s basically also my brother,” you explained before turning back to him, “ricky, this is my fiance.” 

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ KIM GYUVIN - he realized too late. 

“i have something embarrassing to admit.” 

he turned his head to you. it was late at night at your house. you both had built a blanket fort while you watched movies. though, the movies eventually got boring, so you two opted for talking with the tv as background noise. 

he raised an eyebrow. he wondered what this “embarrassing” thing was. typically he associated you and “embarrassing” as something cute as he always found your declared embarrassing moments to be some of your cutest. it was what he had come to find out as he began to take more interest in you as more than a friend. 

“i used to have a crush on you.” 

his ears immediately perked up upon hearing both the words “crushed” and “used to” in the same sentence. what? 

“huh?” 

you gasped. “oh, you really didn’t know. i tried to make it obvious, but it was about a year ago. i really tried to give you hints. i thought you were ignoring me because you weren’t interested, but i guess you never noticed them anyway.” 

he thought back to the year prior, trying to remember any moments that stuck out to him. that’s when he realized it all. the way the vending machine would always give you an extra drink. the way you would always sit closer to him if anyone sat on your other side, even if there was perfectly enough space. the way you laughed at his jokes that weren’t really jokes. how could he not see it all then?

“you really used to?” he asked for confirmation. 

you nodded but made sure to wave your hand to dismiss the idea. “that was a year ago. i got over you when i realized you probably didn’t like me back. i hope that doesn’t make things weird between us.” 

oh but it did. it made everything weird for him. if he had seen everything you were doing, he could have had you with him. now, however, it was too late for that. you had already moved on while he was stuck on you. 

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ PARK GUNWOOK - he thought you deserved better. 

gunwook knows when you love someone so much, you know what they deserve, and sometimes, you have to own up that you are not what they deserve. 

not in a way that meant he was too good for you. no, in a way that you were too good for him. you were able to give him everything he ever desired when loving someone, but he always felt he could never return the favor. everything you did seemed to be too good, too good for him to even try to do the same for you. 

whenever he did, he continuously thought about how you deserved someone who could actually do these things casually, someone who didn’t have to worry about returning your kindness because they already did that on their own. it was never a chore for him to do nice things for you, but it was the fact that they didn’t come naturally for him that bothered him. 

you effortlessly knew everything to make him better. you never had to try with your actions because you were the kind of person who understood him enough to know the ways to comfort him. 

yet he knew nothing about you, at least nothing he could do to love you in the same way you loved him. he thought too much about it. the intrusive thoughts soon overtook him until the pain was unbearable. 

you deserved the best, and the best was not with him. 

it was why he called you out of your home one evening to explain everything to you. he wanted to you find your own person who could treat you in the way a relationship should be, two-sided. 

“if you care so much about me in this way, doesn’t that mean you do care enough?” you asked once he finished his spiel about not being good enough for you. 

no. that did not mean it. if he continued on like this, he would only hurt you more. this was the only thing he could do to actually care for you. he needed to let you go. 

ع˖⁺𖤐ミ HAN YUJIN - you both were too young to understand love

“i like you.” 

yujin thought it would be easy like that, telling the person he liked how he felt, the feelings that had been bothering him for the past months. he wasn’t even sure really what they meant, but it had been his friend to clarify for him. 

“you’re in love.” but what really was love? he didn’t know. 

“no you don’t.”

and it seemed you didn’t know either. 

embarrassed, yujin didn’t know what to say after your flat-out rejection. it was the end of the school day when he told you, both of you being put on cleaning duty that day. he hadn’t expected his confession to be while sweeping the classroom, but his friend had urged him to tell you as soon as possible. now he was regretting ever following such advice. 

“what?” it was all he could say to express his confusion. 

you paused your sweeping, leaning forward onto the broom for support as you explained yourself. “yujin, how can you be so sure that’s how you feel. love is so ambiguous. we’re only 16. there’s a whole life ahead of us for those types of romantic endeavors. your first experience shouldn’t be wasted on me, someone who doesn’t even know what love is. i don’t even know if i feel that way about you. i just don’t know anything. i just think you’re mistaking it for something else. we’re in this age where we want to explore, but i don’t think this is what’s best, whether it’s what you want or not.”

your words were moving, and it really had him thinking. was this love? did he feel love for you? when he could barely answer the questions in his own head, he knew you were right. you both were both too young for these matters, so why bother with it. he should just focus on the high school experience with you as his friend. 

only future him could see what he had back then truly was love, but he was too young to understand what that feeling in his chest was. 

[ludinusdaleth]

a travesty ive barely posted meta for artagan here when anyone who knows me knows ive written universes about him. so, a bit to ponder on:

something interesting about artagan - and by extension many fae in cr in general - is how thoroughly he's defined by selfishness as the core value of a fae, when we are shown time & again even before artagan gets his redemption arc that that isnt true.

now, arti is selfish. hes the definition of lust, & sloth, & sheer debauchery. he'd rather sit back than help even his favorite little tiefling (at first - more on that later). he would rather abandon his followers to an island that would destroy their memory than attempt to lead them.

but.

he planned for his followers to land on rumblecusp because to him, a fae, losing memories was completely Insignificant - and he literally did some of their paperwork to help them along, and did the work to ensure travelercon left them with each other. he was benevolent enough to vm their first meeting, showing incredible patience despite their disregard for him. he saved vex from drowning. he chose to befriend jester after seeing her be hurt by lord sharpe's son. he comforted jester when he could, when he never needed to. this is all before The Travelercon Kick, before he agreed to help the m9 into the feywild & shift time for them for no price, before he helped jester battle trent/omentis and made sure his spells did not hurt innocent bystanders.

this isnt some garuntee that he, pre-jester, was any saint. but what sticks out to me is how much the trait of selfishness is vastly applied to him. not only does sehanine's angel refer to him as a selfish creature twice, but he refers to himself that way the episode before. it is as if he has endless history with being called that, as if he is the most vile creature by virtue of being an archfey, and he made peace with that, leaned into that until jester walked into his life.

which always leads, in my head, to thinking about the fae of this show in general. they are so vastly blanketed as dangerous. and some are. but the more you analyze it the more you see how it's less integral to their being, and more what they accept they are. if youre seen as a monster, and whimsy is inherent to you, you will play the role to see what happens (i see this in characters like ira immensely). we see the younger generation of fae raised away from these generalizations - fearne & morrighan - break the stereotype near entirely. sure, fearne picks pockets and loves her friends lowkey possessively - but weve seen time & again how thats playful, and gives way to so much selflessness she's falling apart at the seams, only just now telling the party her fears. and morrighan shows no possessiveness at all, being shy & near subservient as a waitress. they are living proof that a fae's worst traits are a matter of nurture.

watching artagan is watching some of his peak fae-court upbringing begin to break down by exposure to a different world. i always recall how both he & ira hiss at the feywild for its contradictions, its rules when it's a land built for free wills - which implies the fae are not let to be themselves, but have their culture shaped by courts so strict they wont even let fae leave to exandria. the worst ideas about them begin to shatter the more cr tells us how fae society has fallen into something like an oil slick into an ocean - literal imagery used by athion & yu. the fae's free existence has been polluted.

artagan was our first example of all of that. and how it's possible to become better.

[thefirstknife]

I know it may not be the most popular of opinions, but for me the "hard reset" and lack of content would actually be the *appeal* of a Destiny 3. Give us a brand new major story arc, give us new characters (the old could feature but focus attention on new ones), have us create an entirely new Guardian--total reset. (They could have new races, too--playable Hive Guardians! Okay yes I just wanna have a playable Eliksni Guardian that would be so fun). Current D2 content is... Honestly kind of overwhelming. Sometimes. Fresh slate with less content that the build back up would appeal to me a lot. I know they're not interested in doing so at this time, and I respect their preference to keep supporting D2 instead (especially given how many players WOULD throw a fit over the hard reset and lack of content), but I've definitely put in a lot of thought to what a D3 would mean and the big "negatives" are huge draws for me. (Especially if they kept the D1 and D2 servers online so people would have all that content at the ready to go back and play)

I totally understand that! The concept of there being D3 is really interesting and I think it's really neat to talk about possibilities!

There's definitely some appeal in this for me as well, but I think that unfortunately most of the other issues would vastly overshadow this feeling of getting to start fresh. I'm not too bothered with a lack of content overall but I don't think a lot of people truly understand how much of a lack it would be. We're so used to so much stuff to the point of it being overwhelming, but a full restart would be quite the shock.

I think some middle ground would be nice, but even when they did that (in BL, after initial vaulting), people were.... very mad. A lot of people were fine as well, and it's hard to judge because of the very vocal fans and content creators, but to this day people are still seething about how "bad" BL was because of all the stuff that was removed, despite the fact that a lot of stuff was also added.

If you've not been there during release of D1 and D2, it's hard to really imagine what the game looked like and played like, but these are completely unimaginable differences. I can't speak for D1, but vanilla D2 in comparison with even just a year after is an entirely different game. Basically, it would be a gigantic risk to do this, on top of splitting the community, and hope that maybe this time around people will accept a lack of content with the promise that in a few years there will be more. On paper it sounds reasonable, because it is, but unfortunately gamers aren't reasonable. We're currently witnessing this as well with people absolutely losing their minds about the possibility that for the next year or two or whatever we'll have smaller updates. This is very strange coming from these people because if we truly want D3 and for it to launch better than vanilla D1 and vanilla D2, then we'd have to let the devs work on that for years and not be occupied making constant huge updates for D2. More under:

Also! I know we would all love other playable races and that's definitely a big dream, but it will never happen as long as there's pvp in the game. Because of the hitboxes in pvp. As in, if they made playable Eliksni and Hive, they would be bigger than normal Guardians and it would not be possible to integrate them into pvp because of the natural disadvantage of having a bigger hitbox. Maybe if they did it in a way that genuinely just did not allow them into pvp modes, but that would be strange. The hitbox issue would also be a problem elsewhere too, even in pve. This is the most basic problem with this idea and a very difficult one to solve when the game is a first person shooter at its core. Other playable characters would be such a cool thing in Destiny though.

In a way, a lot of what we want can be done in the current game if the devs had time to work on a lot of fundamental changes and updates to the base game. It's just really difficult to do. They would probably need a dedicated year or more to do this, during which we wouldn't be able to get many updates. And this is less requirements than making a new game from scratch and risk a lot in the process.

I'm also wondering if both D1 and D2 could be kept around if they added a D3 as well. I feel like one of the old games would probably be shut down. This is definitely not possible with the reduced workforce, so unless they expand the studio again in the future, I don't think, realistically, we could get any of the positives with D3.

It's a discussion worth having for sure. Unfortunately it's dominated by the weird gamer bros and I genuinely don't think they understand anything about video games. There's this idea that "D3 would fix everything" and I simply don't understand what they're talking about because the same people are also the ones crying about content droughts, sunsetting, hit-and-miss features and activities and so on. And launching a brand new game would contain absolutely everything these people complain about every day. I've seen them also saying stuff like "I'd be okay with D3 if they don't make us repeat collecting everything again." And like. That's exactly what will happen. Do they think items will just be in their vault? No, we'll have missions again to re-earn the same exotics for the 5th time, just spaced out by years and then they'll be mad about how nothing new is being made and they're just reusing assets or whatever.

They could always just do a complete and total fresh start: nothing old is ever returned. No armour, no weapons, nothing. But people underestimate how much they'd miss their old builds and old options, and how new ones might end up not clicking with them all that much, but this time they wouldn't have anything old to fall back to. You know when a new weapon or exotic armour releases and they're brand new concepts? And they end up not really being something you connect to? You try it out, go "eh" and return to your old stuff? Imagine that but without the ability to go back to the old stuff. The idea of it is is exciting, but in execution it doesn't really work most of the time.

There's a lot of interesting angles when considering a potential new game, but I feel like at the end of the day, it's too big of an endeavour with a lot of very real risks that makes the whole thing not worth the effort. If anything, to make D3 into this perfect dream game right from the start, they would 100% need to just work on that for the next 5 years and we'd have to accept even fewer updates (if any) to D2 in the meantime. Otherwise we'll be in the same situation as with D2 launch and I know a lot of people don't remember or weren't there, but vanilla D2 was actually for real a time when Destiny almost died.

It's definitely something cool to speculate about, I just wish the weird gamers out there weren't completely hijacking this option while also doing everything in their power to tell devs that they have zero patience to wait for a good product, and that they can't survive 3 days without new content. Because that's just reinforcing the inherent risks with making a new game, on top of all the other risks involved and the potential that people will just not be willing to move away from what they've been collecting for years.

[ohwell-itsme-but-danganronpa]

Antag Swap Ideas

Clown: Out of all of the 3 main games what cast do ya'll think Ouma would thrive with?? And why is it sdr2?/j Hina: Trigger Happy Havoc It is not SDR2, no way sksksksms Clown: Nah but I'm curious if any of you think he would have genuinely had a better time with the others Also shhh, let me pretend he'd have an easier time with hajime hinata Me: It's true, no pretending Hina: Well Makoto is the calmest dkdkkddk I just think THH as a whole tends to get less angry Not as many loud personalities to conflict with Me: There's no need to fight, he'd be way better off in either of those than in v3 Ves: kokichi in thh would be so funny. he is pulling celeste's pigtails

Hina: (Also I am going under the assumption by joining these casts he is replacing either Byakuya or Nagito respectively) Clown: Yeah same

Hina: Nagito would thrive in V3 Ves: he would be friends with tsumugi ..frenemies maybe Clown: HE WOULD BE Nagito would attach himself to kaede so fast And it will go so bad, but in a very funny way Hina: Byakuya in SDR2 would go well tbh There’s two of him Ves: I'M THE REAL BYAKUYA, KILL THE CLONE- Clown: He's the less cool byakuya everyone's gonna vote him off the island Me: Twogami [handshake emoji] Fuyuhiko - being the Cooler Dan to him

Me: Sdr2 Works because they're all like that. He wouldn't be outcasted. He doesn't reach the levels at which Nagito managed to cross the line of their tolerance Hina: See my thought with THH is having more calculated personalities, more people who are willing to work together. I think he’d have a better time as a leader in that cast Thh never outcasts anyone in the way the other games do Me: Oh yeah, he would be still able to antagonize a few people in thh and keep his shtick, it just would not escalate like in v3, because they have more integrity (low bar) and can be more normal about disliking someone. Sdr2 gang would be just not phased by this clown, they'd sense he's one of them (freaks) Ves: he'd fare better even in udg i think v3 is a uniquely unhinged cast Clown: Yeah!! This combined with the fact that hajime is just the type of person to push pass any frustration and think about what they can do (asking nagito for help when he needs it), akane being suprisingly good at reading people (like fuyuhiko), and even Hiyoko with her not being shy on putting out there that she has a grudge and doubts. For ouma in THH tho, what would his relationship with kirgiri be like? Hina: I think it’d be a mutual respect Maybe not besties I don’t think she trusts him But she can respect him Clown: I could see him getting along with chihiro and sakura too, and sayaka Okay yeah I can see how he would've been Ballin in literally any of the other two casts Sakuras gonna shove him to the side and go "Actually I'm the one who's gonna sacrifice myself to further our goal to end the killing game" and then they fight/j Having a play fight over who takes the last bottle of poison (the rest are shattered on the floor) Apollo: I love Kokichi and Chihiro friendship

Clown: Okay but imagining ouma in thh oh man, so much. IF the first murder still is Sayaka breaking down and going for it I can imagine him doing his silly little warnings towards her. But since she is not the main driving force of the group like kaede was how differently would it affect him?? And with the sakura situation, that fucker never sleeps. Like kirgiri he is sticking his nose everywhere. I could see him finding out that sakura is hiding something, and begin to needle her about it. Offhand comments here and there. And sakura is smart, and more than that she isnt rash, she'd confront him about it in private almost immediately. And she wouldn't try to kill him. Maybe she would tell him or maybe not but she isn't violent with him and she doesn't fit his view of a murderer. DOUBTS.

[bangtannism]

(Clarification that when I say 'X member biased' I'm referring to fans who are shippers. This does not include fans who don't ship at all.)

I think the reason the vast majority of yoonminers are Yoongi biased is because most Yoongi biased pick yoonmin as a ship while Jimin biased pick jikook. So after most of the Jimin biased left to ship Jikook there's not a lot left to ship yoonmin and the ship ends up being mostly Yoongi biased. Similar situation with taekookers. Most Tae biased fans choose taekook while only half (give or take) of the Jungkook biased fans pick taekook, the other half picking jikook. Jikook also has more Jimin biased then Jungkook biased, but the difference is bigger with taekooker because I think Tae has way more fans who are shippers then Jimin does. So Tae' 90% of shipper fans that decide to ship taekook are more than Jimin's 90% of fans that decide to ship jikook (actually it would be less than 90% for Jimin because probably more than 10% will ship yoonmin).

And we have to wonder why most Yoongi biased pick yoonmin. Unlike a ship like jikook where people choose it because it makes sense, yoonmin doesn't really work like that. I'm not trying to be mean but I swear there are like zero reasons to ship yoonmin if we're talking about how likely they are to be real. Honestly, vmin and jihope have way more 'proof' than yoonmin ever had. I was actually shocked to find out yoonmin was a bigger ship then vmin when I first entered the fandom. I sincerely could not see why so many people would ship them when, while watching all the BTS content, yoonmin didn't even seen closer than the usual for all members. Like, Yoongi would not even have made into the top three closest members to Jimin if I had to make a list back then. That would've been Jungkook, Hobi and Tae (though Yoongi might be third now since I feel like Tae dropped in that list).

But I have a bit of a theory now. I think it's because Yoongi fans who want to ship him with someone think that Jimin is the best match. Some of the most popular shipping dynamics are opposites attract and bad boy/good girl (they actual are similar tropes). If we look at the stereotypical interpretation fans have of Yoongi, he's seen a savage, somewhat cold, badass rapper. Of course that isn't necessarily accurate but it's what a lot of fans think. Then if we're using that version of Yoongi and we're looking for an opposite to him, a 'good girl' to his 'bad boy', than which member fits best? Why, of course it's sweet, gentle, affectionate, feminine, vocalist Jimin (again, inaccurate stereotypes are inaccurate, yada, yada). The other members just don't fit as well. Joon and Hobi are too similar as they're also rappers. They're also viewed as masculine, and oh no, who's gonna be the bottom if we have two masculine guys???!!! Jin and Yoongi is just a weird ship, so not that. Jungkook is seen as another 'bad boy', so again, too similar (and again, two masculine guys so no obvious substitute for a woman, cause a lot of m/m shippers are weirdly heteronormative). Taehyung could work a bit better (he's put in the feminine role by taekookers), but not as well as Jimin, and Yoongi biased can't have their alliance with taekookers if they try to steal their favorite boy. So Jimin it is. Also Jimin is one of the most popular members, and popularity can actually be very integral in what ships people pick.

I'm not saying this is the only reason yoonminers ship yoonmin, but I do think it's a significant reason. You can tell me if you agree or not, and if you have any of your own theories.

hi there! there's some things i agree with and some i disagree with.

i think there is basis for shipping ymn (as in liking the idea of them together, not believing they really are). yoongi has shown some favoritism toward jimin over the years, which imo most of the members do but that's a dif convo lol. i also think that yoongi as the more "cold"/"tsundere" member and jimin as arguably the most affectionate and warm member fit well together as a dynamic. it's fun, and grumpy/sunshine is a tried and true trope. i would agree that if i had to pick the three members jimin considers himself closest to, it would be jk, hs, and th (disagree that tae has fallen off the list), but obviously ordering bts in terms of favorites is a bit reductive and jm loves yg too.

((note: people are going to interpret relationships differently and people are welcome to disagree with that assessment.))

i also think that a big reason ymn is popular is because it's the typical side ship for tkk. it's good to remember that not everyone who ships bts members are thinking they're dating. especially back in the day, when ships were being "solidified" as popular or not, the vast majority of shippers were just there for the fun of it. it's also why nmjn is relatively popular in fics despite not being as close as plenty of other duos: they were convenient "leftover" members to pair up. fandom has a habit to imprint on ships (even joke ships), so those early years are very significant. this is why people refuse to let "jk has a crush on nj" go – genuinely i get at least one video a day on my fyp of how jk wont share nj, wants to marry him, etc. they're joke videos but i'm just making a point that fandom has a long memory and people get attached to things. and this fandom is attached to ymn. this imprinting phenomena is also why it took so damn long for people to start letting go of the idea that jk and jm arent very close or that jk is uncomfortable with jm's affection, though as we have seen a lot of dumb shit still gets said about jikook.

stereotyping does definitely play into shipping as well, unfortunately. and yes, there is a lot of heteronormativity (and varying degrees of homophobia as a byproduct) that goes on in m/m ship spaces because plenty of shippers are cishet women and also we live in a heteronormative society.

from what i've personally seen, jm bias tend to ship jikook, th bias tend to ship tkk, yg bias tend to ship ymn, hs bias tend to ship ynsk, and jk bias tend to be y/n but when they arent they lean to being jikookers (i actually did a poll abt this shortly after i opened this blog lol). generally, i think people just pair up their bias with whoever they think their bias is closest to / likes the most.

[within-your-eyes-if]

about the Ly's scene apology.....honestly I think it's fucked up that people (I assume) attacked you with this issue that you had to write that post.

I hate that this gen is so fucking sensitive and is trying to make everything to THEIR liking. Making YOU change YOUR work to make them feel comfort is absurd.

I love your story, your writing and the sceneries, everything in your story has a purpose and tells a story you want to tell....even uncomfortable scenes or showing moments have a purpose to the story and characters......so its fucking unbelievable that you need to rework some things.

I hope at least you wont remove the scene or any other explicit scenes and just put a warning for the others that need this....

btw, the more people win when they complain and make writers rewrite their original work for them, the less beautiful unique work we will have in this world....it's like a new way of censoring work

I hate this people

Thank you for loving my story, and I understand your frustrations. Rest assured, I will absolutely NOT remove my explicit scenes, and it is important to me to keep the integrity of my characters and story.

I ended up not really 'redoing' the scene, just added a couple choices so you can control how it plays out. In this particular scene, it was the player character that did something unwanted, not Ly. There is a similar moment but with Ly that I'm still deeply contemplating, but this is just who Ly is, they are a flex/dom who likes getting frisky.

Right now, I think I will attach warnings to these scenes and do this from now on while being more mindful of the choices I can give.

Regardless, maybe I'm overthinking what was stated to me, but I definitely don't want to make my readers uncomfortable. In my mind, if there was one then there are others. I don't know how to properly address these things, and it wasn't my intention to make anyone upset when I made that post. I just wanted to acknowledge I may have been able to give you better control of things, especially if there are others who felt that way.

And rest assured, I wasn't attacked. This report was made in a way to inform me how these things can be greatly disliked. Maybe I misunderstood, I don't know. But I promise I'm okay.

Your last point is correct and I know it's impossible to make everyone happy, and my story won't be for everyone. There have been a few suggestions here and there on things that I won't budge on. But because I felt like this was something that could bring discomfort to others, I wanted to address it and be better prepared on how to prevent it in the future.

I was ready to go to bed when I saw this but wanted to answer now so I hope I made sense!

Thank you for your concern!

[nacrelysis]

wanderer as nahida's right-hand is perfect. they both have a history of abandonment, neglect, and exploitation, plus for similar reasons.

nahida was imprisoned in the sanctuary of surasthana for centuries, left to wither as a failed god her people chased the shadow of a 'better' ideal: greater lord rukkhadevata.

wanderer was abandoned by his mother in shakkei pavilion because he was the failed prototype for her ideal ruler of eternity: a puppet who could execute the lightning's will without regret, whom she intended to create after having makoto die in her arms.

the people involved in wanderer and nahida's pasts - both, in a sense, have convinced themselves that their actions were for the greater good. the sages don't even see nahida is a god, much less a human - to them, all she is is the reminder of what sumeru once had and never could again.

raiden ei abandoned kunikuzushi because she saw him cry, and, knowing he could never be the shogun she needed, left him to his own devices. it's been stated in canon that ei believed she was setting kunikuzushi free. and maybe she was, during those dark days after inazuma's first archon died. but, perhaps, what drove kunikuzushi to assign her actions as 'abandonment' was the fact that he was, in a sense, a lesser god. that he was created for reasons he didn't know. the first thing kunikuzushi did upon creation was cry - in the same way that a baby's first instinct is to cry, because their first impulse is to seek help. from this perspective, the thing kunikuzushi needed the most was guidance and acceptance from his creator (because he knew he was created by someone), while the thing ei thought he needed the most was solitude. miscommunication in the delivery room, am i right.

raiden ei's motives were not the same as the sages - you could argue that she really did believe she was doing it for kuni's benefit. i think she did. but what stands is that both these acts feature a theme of abandonment and neglect. they were carried out by people in the aftermath of grief, executed as neglect upon the people they were done to. and these acts catalyzed nahida and wanderer's development into the characters they are now.

they are not the same as the other archons.

venti's arc is focused around mending the wounds of the past, though it could be implied that he is re-assessing what "freedom" means for his nation. zhongli stepped back as yanwang dijun to allow liyue to move forward on its own while he could re-integrate as one of their common folk. ei is brought forward to re-evaluate her decisions as inazuma's absentee god.

good or bad, they all have experience with being a god.

nahida doesn't. she was intentionally kept from fulfilling her duties as archon for hundreds of years. anything she learns now, once free, is the first time she's learning it as kusanali.

wanderer can't. he tried. he took the electro gnosis and tried to transplant it into his own body - but, at the moment as we know it, gods technically can't be artificially created. the closest dottore could get was a mimicry.

so you have this unique circumstance, where nahida and wanderer both have no idea of what being a god really entails. but they don't need to know what being a god is like, do they? they just need to know how to be an archon: how to protect, how to decide, how to execute.

nahida is very forgiving. in my opinion, she's too forgiving (only because i hate the sages and would've called cps on them if i could). she sees the best in humanity. she works to engage with her people. she tries to listen to their hopes and dreams while moving towards a collective vision for the nation.

wanderer is cynical. he's been betrayed three times, in his words, and been taken advantage of far more than thrice. wanderer has seen the worst of humanity, and he continues to carry this critical eye. he's not afraid to do what nahida can't do (go undercover + beat up people) and he's not afraid to confront people when their motives stray towards the worse.

wanderer can demonstrate the things that define the worst of humans, while nahida can show wanderer the things that make humanity worth preserving. wanderer can execute orders with precision and make decisions on the fly (ha), but nahida is here to level his head and point out clues, motives, or implications that perhaps were not considered before.

and, isn't it a fitting conclusion to the sumeru archon quests? two former puppets, both alike in dignity, in sumeru where we lay our scene. together, they can reconcile the pains of their past - and together, they can build a better, kinder future together...the kind that both must have, at their worst, dreamed of living.