#i want it to be substantial! but i also don't want to set myself up for failure

[thehardkandy]

i think i am just getting the impulse for a big life change but i dont actually know what it would be or what it would look like

[lttawnymadison]

TGCF Revised Version Afterword by MXTX

Since I kept seeing snippets of this, I wanted to read the whole thing for myself. I'd already bought the book on JJWXC and did an MTL for this. It's so wonderful that she's back and sharing new things and that the revised is finally done! - Tawny --------------------------------------------- The author has something to say:

Seeing the small red clay stove again.

———— Afterword of "Heaven Official's Blessing" 2022

■ Finally done!

Long time no see! It's another afterword starting with "finally." Without further ado, seasoned readers would know that I make substantial revisions. For instance, scenes like the Bai Feng Mountain Hunt and the ending recognition of Sizhui in the serial version of "Mo Dao Zu Shi" were not originally there.

The revisions in "Heaven Official's Blessing" are the most extensive of all my works. It was a huge project, as it is also the longest in terms of length, serialized over eight months. Due to poor health and other reasons, the revision process was interrupted for a long time before I picked it up again, and it sporadically took about five to six months over several years.

In the era of web novels, there are endless new entertainments, and honestly, not many people re-read a story. Plus, some problems in the serialized version are structural and can't be changed, but I still tried my best to address my regrets. After all, when I was serializing it, I was almost always in a feverish and sick state, barely pushing through. Additionally, I often enjoy comparing different versions of my favorite authors' works back and forth, finding pleasure in the process. So, for readers, discovering "Wow, this part has changed!" is like starting a new journey with Easter eggs in a second round.

■ The new revised version includes about 100,000 words of new content!

These 100k words are mainly concentrated in the latter half of Volume 1 and Volume 3, but there are plenty scattered throughout the text. For example, I fulfilled a promise to A-Hua, giving him several new outfits. Seeing A-Hua dressed beautifully in a new hairstyle to meet his gege made me happy.

In terms of the intensity of revisions, personally, I feel it goes like this:

Volume 1 and Volume 2 > Volume 3 > Volume 5 > Volume 4.

Additionally, the new version cuts some redundant words and plots that weren't very meaningful. However, I tried to keep all the original interactions between Hua Lian as complete as possible. If some minor interactions are missing, they weren't deleted but moved around.

■ One day, I suddenly dug out something.

An antique from 2017, a folder called "Heaven Official's Blessing Setting Collection."

Curiously, I opened it and read with interest.

● Comparing the original setting outline and the main text, the highest fidelity is in the main storyline between Hua Cheng and Xie Lian.

A-Hua, restored at a ratio of 1:100.

Hua's character setting is the most detailed, and virtually every point made it into the main text, including details like "ghosts don't like the sun, so Hua Cheng sometimes drapes a red cloth over his head"...

Points not used, listed a few:

As a child:

· After being saved from falling off a city wall, he foolishly followed a parade over and over again, grabbing people to ask, "Who is that? Who is that person?" People told him, "That's the royal son, the future Celestial God, the most outstanding Crown Prince of Xianle Nation ever!"

(This point couldn't be used because in the text A-Hua was held in the Crown Prince's arms after being saved)

· At home, he was often punished to stand or kneel, not given food, and wore old clothes, accused of stealing money. Whenever he argued with his family, he would stubbornly sleep in the Prince's temple overnight.

· Went to Mount Tai Cang to volunteer sweeping red leaves at Huangji Observatory, just to sneak peeks at his future wife happily swinging.

After becoming the ghost king:

· One of his hobbies is buying and building houses everywhere.

· Very protective of his leather boots, would (badly) polish them until they shone.

· To other devout followers of Xie Lian, he said: "You have good taste."

· Secretly prepared many betrothal gifts for his beloved god, wanting to marry him!

The character setting of Xie Lian as a teacher in the serialized version compared to the initial draft, the serialized text subtly differs. The initial draft was more... exquisite and elegant, very serious. The serialized text is more... humorous. I think perhaps because some plot points were tragic, Xie Lian thought he should be happier to make the readers more relaxed, so he drove me to adjust his mental state! But due to the spiritual oppression at that time, the character's depth was not enough, while in the new revised version, I hope he can show a more self-content state on the same core basis.

Excerpts from the unused original setting:

· Super easy-going. Easy-going means: if given fifty bucks, he would happily dress in drag and dance. Accepts haggling. Thirty bucks works. Twenty bucks too!

· The observatory is small, the house is broken, wants to grow flowers. Leaks during rain, so he uses a bucket to catch rainwater.

· Because he can't afford a caretaker, he cleans himself, and also feeds chickens. Chickens eat flowers. Keeps a cat.

· Completely engrossed in discussing serious matters, he unknowingly finished all the broken sweet dumplings!

● Water, Earth, Wind original setting:

The highest fidelity is the main line between Hua Cheng and Xie Lian, followed by the Water, Earth, Wind subplot.

The main conflict hasn't changed. Just... how could the original setting of Water, Earth, Wind be so dark and terrifying!

The character morals in the main text improved a lot, otherwise, the original Black Water would be sheer scheming + murderous! The ending for the Wind Master would have been more tragic.

The Venerable of Empty Words suddenly became an improvised character. It seemed like an ancient fable-like monster, making the main text more interesting than the original setting.

Overall, the formal version is a bit better written than the original draft.

● The unfortunate life of Lang Ying:

Lang Ying? Is there such a character? I don't remember!

Ah? It seems there was such a person, but I don't remember any of his plotlines.

This is most people's feeling towards the character of Lang Ying. It's not a delusion because he barely had any significant plot. In fact, any valuable scenes could have been replaced equivalently, so in the new revised version, I deleted this character.

But, in the 2017 setting collection, I suddenly found that I had actually opened a separate document for Lang Ying, and his role was defined as a "growing-type BOSS!"

I was silent.

And immediately opened the document, curious about my initial setting. A "growing-type BOSS," how did he become someone whose deletion went unnoticed...? (I even don't know how to address him!)

Who knows, perhaps out of excitement, I accidentally pressed the wrong shortcut, and somehow it became irreversible, leaving only an empty document for me to stare in disbelief. The once "growing-type BOSS" has now forever become a mystery!

This is the unfortunate life of the deleted Lang Ying.

· There was another document in the setting collection called "Swordsmith." I opened the document and read it with interest.

I was shocked. Because I completely forgot I had conceived this story. Why didn't I write it?!

Darn.

I know why I didn't write it. This story... it had no ending!

——————— Thus, the magical glimpse into the "Heaven Official's Blessing Setting Collection" concludes!

■ I like men with stories!

Maybe because I watched an outstanding work as a child. It was a memoir, the protagonist in the biography was gentle and affable, and the protagonist in the memories was cold and ruthless. The story was scattered with the poignant fragrance of white plum blossoms amidst bloody and stormy circumstances.

This almost perfect work deeply influenced my aesthetics, leading me to be most interested in the memory parts of characters in various works. Although many viewers prefer the present scenes, often asking when the memories will end, I actually find these intense and painful memories to be the most fascinating!

A story is the history of a character, as well as the key to their personality. A person with a story stands before me like a puzzle. The way to solve this puzzle is to understand their story. Because the biography makes one curious to know more about a character they like, loving them more now because of their past. When serializing "Heaven Official," my greatest pain initially was telling myself, "This time I don't want to write a memory slaughter," deliberately trying to avoid a structure similar to previous works, yet I still hadn't found a better way to express it, resulting in my deep dissatisfaction with the later part of Volume 1. I was also hesitant to fully commit to the memory scenes in Volume 2, and with the heavy mental burden, this part was very painful to write. When revising, looking at Volume 2 was almost unbearable, because I'm the type of person who, as a child, would immediately switch channels when a TV show's protagonist was about to be wrongfully accused or embarrassed. I couldn't help but knock on a friend's door and ask:

Me: Was the author suffering some kind of mental trauma at the time? This negative energy is too horrifying, the protagonist is so pitiful, I really admire anyone who could read through Volume 2 completely.

Friend: Do you even have the right to say that?

But the memory slaughter in Volume 4 was much freer, written in one breath, so the revisions for this volume were also the least.

So, will you still write large segments of memory slaughter?

Um, well, we'll see, haha, hehe...

■ Closing Remarks:

Lastly, I'll address the question some asked me, "Will the new revised 'Heaven Official's Blessing' be more torturous?"

Me: You're talking nonsense. 'Heaven Official's Blessing' is a sweet pampering story, thank you!

Acknowledgments:

Shi Nai'an wrote in the preface to "Water Margin": "On snowy nights, about five or six people listen to my storytelling; on rainy days, about seven or eight; on bright and sunny days, about ten. I read, everyone listens, and we are all happy, with no other thoughts." When I read this as a young person, I was delighted. What divine days! Writing first to entertain oneself, then to entertain others. Self-expression and self-acceptance are certainly primary, but the affection of others is also a significant positive feedback. Thus, first, I thank the steadfast readers who have accompanied me all this time. I've thought about just walking away amidst the noisy disputes; abandoning the account amidst the tumultuous world! It seems not bad. But looking back, I can't bear to leave some truly sincere readers.

I've had authors I liked disappear from the internet, and I always feel like a part of my youth has vanished, a feeling quite distressing, reminiscent of overly grand and harsh things like the tears of the era or the torrent of history. So, I want to accompany my readers as long as possible, hoping that the day of parting comes later. Perhaps I'm not good enough now, but I will strive to be better in the future. Or perhaps you've never truly understood what kind of person I am, or even completely misunderstood me, but as long as you genuinely like my stories, we can sit down and chat.

And, I must mention my friends, who can be described as having the courage of a hero. Long time no see, Teacher Changyang's illustrations are still as beautiful as those of a celestial being, I hope Teacher CAS can go to bed earlier and worry less, and Teacher Kuohao, who despite a heavy workload, still fully honored our agreement. The "Heaven Official's Blessing" radio drama is really fantastic! It reminded me of the original intention of writing this story, and I was very moved. If it weren't for the silent companionship and efforts of these old friends, Mo Xiang Tong Xiu might have stopped writing back in 2016, disappearing from the world of martial arts, and thus, "Heaven Official's Blessing" would not have been born. I look forward to retracing the paths we once walked together when gathering ideas. And many friends who reached out to help and encourage me, thank you for accompanying me through the snowy nights.

[kaizokuou-ni-naru]

Hello. I’m an English reader of One Piece, and confidently know *nothing* about the Japanese language (atleast how to read it). I own all 4 box sets that are currently officially available in English. I was wondering, considering your expertise, is the VIZ translation good (in terms of how reliable it is in accuracy)? Does it convey what it needs to? If not, do you think any scans you’ve read are better compared to the official? Curious what you think as a translator. Thanks!

i think that these days the viz translation is basically fine. it conveys what it needs to. often there's little quibbles i have with it, like little differences in how i might personally have phrased things, but i certainly don't think i could do better at translating whole chapters of manga on a week-to-week basis.

my new chapter reading process now that i'm properly caught up again starts with reading the raws in japanese, and then i skim both the unofficial scans from tcb and the official release from viz when they each come out to see what choices they made. doing this, i do see more mistakes in the unofficial scans than in the official viz translation. and that makes sense! the people who do the official viz translation are professionals who are being paid for their work and they have more time to do it.

like, just for one low-stakes recent example i noticed, in chapter 1112, the unofficial scans (left) messed up this panel by attributing both of the lines on the left to vegapunk, when in fact the second one should be spoken by pythagoras (something made clear in japanese by his distinctively polite speech pattern), a mistake which was corrected in the official (right).

and i'm not saying this to insult the scanlators, by any means! it's something i've wanted to get into myself, and they provide a really cool and valuable service largely for free as volunteers. i love scanlators. but if you are wanting the most accurate experience of the current manga as an english-speaker, the official is probably still your best bet.

however, from what i've seen (bearing in mind that my actual experience with the official translation is pretty limited, i mostly only look at it when people ask me questions or i have a specific curiosity) i do think the official translation has a lot more problems in the older arcs, roughly from east blue through, like, skypiea?

i've seen or been asked about a pretty substantial number of mistranslated lines and questionable choices from that stretch of the manga. for just one example, there's this one from drum i posted about a couple months ago, where a line that's quite thematically important to the series as a whole got cut up because of the translation's former unwillingness to use the word 'god' (also very visible and annoying in skypiea).

the anime for those arcs does use, from what i've seen, a better translation than the official manga. however, i personally don't know of any better manga retranslations of the early arcs (it's something i've actually considered trying to attempt myself, if i ever have the time for a project of that scale). if any of you have any to recommend, please let me know!

[canonkiller]

Hi, I'm trying to do art commissions, but no one has commissioned me yet. Do you have any advice for attracting customers?

I wrote a lot of words for you in hopes that at least some of it will be helpful, so I'm putting the bulk of this answer below a read more to save people the scrolling. The quick and easy two tips that I find people forget to do the most are:

Is your art easy to find? Having a pinned post with a tag for your art, a link in your bio, or an art-focused / reblog-light blog (like this one!) make it so that people know you draw, and knowing you've been posting art for a while makes you less likely to be a scammer.

Is your commission info easy to find? People can't buy things that they don't know you're selling; clear and accessible links to your prices and terms are important.

Now for the real bulky meat of advice giving, where I say a lot of words that may or may not be relevant:

I have a lot of advice, but I do want to say before getting into it:

A lot of selling art (especially in a non-industry setting, like with social media commissions) is luck.

There is no one size fits all method for selling art, and it's best to go with what feels right to you (I'll go more into this later)

Tips for selling are not necessarily tips for creating, and there will be advice in here that I don't apply to myself. Determining what you do and do not implement is something you should decide for yourself and your work flow.

Your art not selling doesn't mean nobody cares about it.

Personally I think the idea of intentionally curating a single subject demographic of Customer and Consumer for your work is limiting and doomed to burnout in a non-industry space. I will also touch more on this later.

Now for the rest of it in varying orders:

✨ Attracting Customers

This one is going first because you mentioned it specifically. It is kind of vague though, by nature of the term, so what I advise doing is specifying.

When you are thinking of a customer, are you trying to appeal to:

People who will buy pre-made art products? (Pins, stickers, prints, etc)

People who will buy custom work? (Commissions for specific subject matter)

People who will buy art resources you've created? (Fonts, bases, texture packs, 3d models etc)

There's also frequency: a repeat customer of custom art will usually be appealed to more by a wide range of options (like illustrations), while you might get more single-purchase customers if you only offer a limited range of options (like only icons).

Demographics also, of course, play a substantial role in just custom art commissions; furries get lauded as high spenders, but they're also a huge community that is focused around OCs, so by statistics alone they will have more people with spending money and will be frequent customers of people drawing OCs. A narrower audience means fewer people, but often the spread of the people within that audience is the same - and at the end of the day, selling an art piece only requires one other person, it's just a matter of happening to find them.

The follow up question is of course the finding: the average artist in fandom spaces selling commissions does not have the platform or budget for an ad campaign. This, however, is also its own category:

✨ Posting Online

Right out the gate: anyone who has told you that just drawing x thing is the way to get easy money is wrong.

"If you draw more fan art, you'll -" wrong.

"Nobody cares about that, you should be drawing this instead -" wrong.

"if you need to sell fast, just sell porn -" wrong. And also re-evaluate your perceived lack of quality or value about the subject.

The things you will be able to create easily and consistently will be the things YOU, SPECIFICALLY, like to create. It is also entirely impossible that you are the only person on earth to have ever liked those things, which means that if you create them, there are people out there who will enjoy them.

It feels itchy to be like "and those people are Potential Customers", but it is true; your work will resonate with people. They will want you to create it. It is vitally important to your own well being that the things you create, that you want others to enjoy, are things you enjoy as well.

(This is also why the "just draw porn" joking advice that gets tossed around is particularly fucked up. You as the artist should not feel forced into drawing things you aren't comfortable with, and the vast majority of customers for explicit content also don't want the people making it to feel forced into doing so. It's basic consent. I have strong feelings about this.)

If you are creating things and putting them out into the world, they will find an audience. That audience may be one singular person! The number does not matter, because that's still a person who - again, sucks to frame ig this way - has the potential to buy things from you.

If you're constantly chasing a bigger follower count, more interactions, etc etc for the future, it can genuinely be pretty taxing on the people who want to support you in the present. When you enjoy someone's work, and want to support them, being told constantly that that support is not good enough is frustrating. Trying to follow your work should not lead to seeing more "likes are WORTHLESS and NOBODY reblogs my things" posts than it does art. You are a person making things to share with other people, and you have to remember it or you will burn yourself out into a desiccated husk.

TL:DR consistency is key and the easiest way to be consistent is to just draw whatever the fuck you live drawing in whatever ways you want to draw it, and then slap it on the internet somewhere and Keep Doing That

✨ The Actual Commission Information

this one is just factual really. A lot of artists have really shitty commission sheet layouts, because advertising graphic design and illustrative art are different skill sets. That's fine. You don't have to remake the wheel. A good commission sheet should include:

More images than text (if you can't see what the examples are when zoomed out, you have to rearrange or cut down on words)

Examples organized by price / type, and clearly labeled

Your personal favourites for examples - one really strong example piece is better than twenty tiny images of work you think is just "okay"

Contact information - having a method that works WITHOUT a social media account (email.) Is important and way easier to keep organized, imo

A SIMPLE list of strengths (the things you draw the best) and things you won't draw (common example: mechs). You do not need to list every fandom or subject matter. Limit yourself to a top five.

A clear and easy to type link for your terms of service. Carrd, and sites like it, is good for this. This will go into details about your process, what you will and won't do, permissions granted to the commissioner (like "no, you can't make an NFT with this"), your privacy policy (saying you won't sell commissioner details to third parties), and other stuff. You do not want to have all of this on your original post, because it should be thorough and you want your main post to be showcasing your work and not your legalese. Here's mine as a reference; if you have trouble writing your own, feel free to copy from it and make the necessary alterations for your work.

✨ There Was More I Was Going To Write But I Forgot

I have a different document of commission related talk here, which is also incomplete but in a different way. It's in my nature. Hopefully some combination of this and that can be useful to you. Sorry if they're not. I love you have a nice day

[sigmaleph]

today my currently-ongoing writing project reached 25 000 words. a milestone as arbitrary as any other, but I am focusing on it because my previous longest writing project ended up around 20k and this is the next roundish number after that.

also half a nanonwrimo, for another comparison. i definitely can't do a nanowrimo right now, getting this much done took me substantially longer than half a month.

i set myself a goal of writing around 400 words per day every day and I have basically kept it for multiple months. given my previous pattern of writing tiny amounts of a story and then giving up immediately, it is encouraging. it would be personally very meaningful to me if I could complete a long-form writing project ever and this looks certainly more plausible than every previous attempt.

if this ever turns into a complete story, well. it will be my 'best work' in some sense out of lack of competition but there are many ways in which it is not, I think, my best work. the setting, while i am fond of it, has a substantial amount of thrown-together-at-the-last-minute-ness to it, because it was. I would like, some day, to do better than that. I don't think this is the time for it, though. this is the time to just build the habit of putting words in front of each other every day without quitting.

one day i would like to show this to other people, because i have spent months on this and some people have said nice things about my writing before and they might like this one. but i am in some ways worried about it. in the obvious way of 'maybe it sucks' ofc but also like what if i want to do this over but better. am i burning something by exposing it to the light? who would read the better version if the bad one exists to make it look unoriginal and derivative. i already worry about all the ways this is derivative of my last project

ah well. i still think it's worth it. one day i will write something Good but i have a bunch of becoming a better writer to do on the way and this is the most successful attempt at that so far

[theokusgallery]

What do you think about middle aged sunflower ????

Okay I'm going to pretend I'm normal and didn't just have a conversation about it yesterday within which I had to restrict myself because of Discord's stupid character limit

Anyway. Gonna talk about fanfics briefly, because fics tend to get more complex with characterization.

A while ago, I got really into Marvel, and for two months I did nearly nothing except read spideypool fanfic all day and night. If you know anything about these two (that isn't from the MCU) (I hate the MCU, I hate it so so much, this is not who Spidey fundamentally is, he is supposed to be a friendly neighborhood loner loser and you Cannot just give him an Iron Man suit and a mentorship with Stark and intergalactic missions at 16 or however old he is in those movies when the essence of the character is that he is an average struggling teenager who just happens to get superpowers and fucks up a lot at the beginning of his journey and mostly works alone and quit the fucking Avengers himself) (wow I started rambling sorry. Ignore that), you'll know that they are both around... 25-30ish, currently. Something like that. The only other fandom that I read as many fanfics of was Ace Attorney, where depending on the timeline, they can be from 23 to like, 35 with a kid. So I'd say me being so invested in a ship with 16 year-olds is... kind of an anomaly.

I don't usually like the coming-of-age, teenage love stuff, and I honestly have never found a single sunflower schoolfic I liked (except Spiral of course but even then they're in college) because all of them tend to... infantilize both Sunny and Basil at great length. And also tear down anything that makes them interesting characters. I think a lot of OMORI artists (that includes writers) are very afraid of doing anything substantial with teenagers, despite, you know, the actual plot of the game, and as a result, a lot of the time most fics where the characters aren't aged up tend to be... incredibly boring. Of course there are some that are good — exceptional even — but in the end all I can think of is the huge gap in... quality? that sounds wrong to say about a creative thing... interesting-ness, let's say (a very personal and subjective concept), when I stopped reading Marvel and went back to OMORI. I stopped reading fanfics altogether because I just couldn't find one I liked as much as the average Marvel fic that I hadn't already read.

Maybe it's a result of the writers themselves being young? I know OMORI's fanbase is generally a lot younger than Marvel's, so that could affect it. I mentioned schoolfics because there's a lot of them and because they were mentioned in my rant yesterday, but it's not really about the fact that they're schoolfics, it's about the fact that more often than not, the setting is the plot, and since it's just your average highschooler writing their favorite blorbos into their own environment and projecting (which is very cool btw, 99% of my own writing is projecting), the plot is... basically nonexistant. It's boring. It's boring and the characterization is usually dull. But even outside of schoolfics, I think I stopped trying to read fics that start with Sunny getting out of the hospital after the True Ending for the same reason : it's often plain and plotless and boring. And, fuck, my favorite books and mangas and such are slice of life, I'm all for mundane plots! But there's a difference between a mundane plot/realism and just no plot at all.

(This is not, like, an attack of OMORI writers who make schoolfics or fics that start with the above mentioned premise, btw, I want to make that very clear. It's very much a personal preference. I think it's boring because all of the fics I read in Marvel had a very unique plot/premise is my point. And also because the characters were a lot more mature and complex. Different strokes for different folks)

I think that's what I'm kind of sad about. OMORI characters tend to be complex and morally grey in their own way, and people tend to forget about that because they're teenagers and obviously no one can do no wrong before the ripe age of 18. Children are all innocent and therefore cannot be more morally complex than cinnamon roll soft boys/girls (looking pointedly at Sunny, Aubrey and Basil. But mostly Basil). Also, I think people tend to straight-up forget that 16 year-olds aren't, like, 10? Of course they're not going to be as mature as grown adults, especially Sunny OMORI, Dissociative Amnesia World Champion, but like... When I was 16 reading OMORI fanfics, half the time I was like "a 16 year-old would not fucking say that". But also generally more mature characters are inevitably more interesting to explore to me because I prefer more mature themes — I'm simply extremely upset at the fact that people don't explore the complexity that's already there when they're 16, including the very mature themes that are already there.

TL;DR: I love middle aged sunflower, I love middle aged ships in general ! In fact, I will tend to prefer sunflower when it's aged up.

(... I probably should've led with that.)

[remyfire]

I don't know if I'll keep this post up because this is not what any of y'all are here for, but I have to get it out somewhere. This is just a lot of gritted-teeth venting, so if that's not your style, scroll on, I love you, I hope you see a cat photo soon.

Truly every day of my life I find myself gritting my teeth when I see another joke or article or post or anything at all about booktok romance novels, that specific style of book cover, the disdain about promotional graphics like trope maps, that whole kerfluffle because I just! Wanna be like. Hey guess what! None of us wanted things to go that way either!

Like it really is remarkable sometimes to remember how readers don't necessarily get to see us smaller romance authors gritting our teeth and bitching in our spaces because we hate the trends that are being pushed forward, but also we have to compete somehow, right? We have to be sell books. We have to find a way to be picked up and read in this oversaturated sea. We have to try and gain traction against those people who hire 50 ghostwriters at a time for pathetic rates to churn out romance novels so they can release one literally every month. We have to fight against the 99-cent expectations even though we're lucky to make 35 cents per book sold if we offer it at that rate.

I think one of the most insulting things that publishers did was decide that it was the author's responsibility to go viral on booktok. That way, the publishers got to save a hell of a lot of money on marketing budgets, right? No, we won't be arranging tours unless you're lucky, we won't be pushing your book as hard as we usually should. It is your job to have a social media following that is broad enough that you make your books go viral, not us giving it a boost as your publisher. If you don't go viral on booktok, we will probably not be signing you for another book, sorry, bud.

Cannot express to you either how many of us erotic romance authors especially were gritting our teeth when the cover trend started leaning toward basic primary colors and splotchy abstract shapes. I completely understand that not everybody wants a shirtless man with a 12-pack just slapped on the front cover of the book they're reading—I actually thought it was brilliant when I saw several self-pub authors offering both the traditional steamier cover but also an option of paperbacks with a more tame, understated cover that just makes it look more like a literary novel. But god, it felt so lazy, these aforementioned abstractly illustrated covers. They told me nothing about the book. There was barely a sense of themes or important objects and these shapes had no defining characteristics that set any of the characters apart and they just looked like YA novels, which is fine for YA novels, but how do you market your extremely high-heat romance novel in that cover trend? If you throw together those blotchy illustrated shapes, people are going to think it's sweet or closed-door, and then they get in there and there's 12 graphic sex scenes on the page, and they're furious about it. I loved seeing illustrated covers that were more detailed start to make a move forward, especially because it meant starting to separate the American cultural assumption that illustrated = childish. Letting them be sexy, letting the author be able to represent any kind of protagonist they wanted without being restricted to the tiny selection of mostly skinny white able-bodied cis models on stock photo sites? Incredible. Love that. Want more of it. Wish it was easier to get publishers to really buy in on that.

The fact that readers will complain about promotional things like trope maps when the publishers require the use of them. The publisher makes them, they hand them over, and now you are the one who will be using it because that is contractual and because even if it wasn't, you want your goddamn book in front of people's eyes. And if you are self-pub or indie, if you don't have a substantial marketing budget to spent thousands of dollars on ads, promotions, and whatever the hell else, you are all but required to follow the trend because that's the only way you're gonna get people to share your shit.

And god, the way that it's all reduced to just 'booktok romance novel.' I get what that's referring to, that exact grouping of authors and why they're frustrating, but holy shit, I wanna know how many of those readers have picked up a self-pub or indie romance by a marginalized author. I'll see people complain about the quality of romance novels as compared to the quality of romantic fanfiction and I wanna shake them by the shoulders and say, "It's there! It's out there! It's self-pub and indie romance authors out here doing the goddamn work and you! Aren't! Looking! For it! Because it's easier to mock the genre instead!" Especially self-pub/indie queer romance authors who are marginalized, they are out here revolutionizing the genre and not getting anywhere near the accolades they deserve.

It's just irritating and exhausting. It's frustrating enough to have your genre used as the constant butt of jokes, treated like it's a substandard genre, like all it is is trash, using 'bodice ripper' as a disparaging term for modern romance novels when that is a relic of a very distant past and a historical pinpoint about which we can have an in-depth discussion about the decades-long process of making it socially acceptable for a woman to talk about her sexual desires rather than the 'bodice ripper' days when a woman had to have them forced on her instead before she could ever dream of admitting that she might know her own body and its cravings.

It's frankly embarrassing to see my genre so poorly understood. That's all. The one genre that is devoted to making sure that every marginalized person can have a happy ending of their choosing—marriage, pregnancy, queerplatonic, no sex necessary, no marriage or kids necessary, whatever feels right—rather than just the skinny white able-bodied cis people, that's the one that is always getting the potshots taken at it, and it's really a goddamn shame.

[breakerwhiskey]

163 - ONE HUNDRED SIXTY THREE

Please visit breakerwhiskey.com for more information or to send a message to Whiskey's radio. Breaker Whiskey is an Atypical Artists production created by Lauren Shippen. If you'd like to support the show, please visit patreon.com/breakerwhiskey.

Transcript under the cut. For more episodes, click here.

[click, static]

Except, if I were dead, how does that explain Harry? I obviously have some…guilt over what I did that I think would factor into my brain making up a weird purgatory of no people and mysterious, possibly all-knowing beeps on the radio that feel like they’re taunting me more than they’re helping me. But, even if I didn’t spend my life thinking there was an afterlife, I could see my subconscious deciding that the best way to process what was happening was to justify my death somehow through creating a punishment.

Because, let’s be honest, if I’m dead, I know how. I know why. What I did—what I was trying to do in this case, in this case—that failed and I didn’t make it out and deep down I decide that “hey, this is probably for the best, because here’s what would happen if you did succeed, do you really want to live like that? But even if all of that was true…I don't know that my brain could resist giving me something I did want. Someone I want.

Harry seems real to me. Annoyingly so. Real and exactly who she’s always been to me. No substantial change, despite everything we’ve been through. And I’m not sure I’d punish myself that much. Maybe I just don’t want to believe I would.

So if not dead…then what? We’re back to square one, which is me as the stone, setting a ripple around the world that destroyed nearly everything.

[click, static]

I’m not sure I should be so cavalier about this stuff. Talking about my own death, my own final gasping breaths of life. But ever since finding Leann, there’s a sense of unreality that I can’t get over. I’m sure there’s a real name for it, something a psychiatrist would immediately be able to identify, but I never did see a shrink back in the world. Because I mostly didn’t have to deal with shit like this.

But I’m outside my body. Outside everything. And I want to figure out what this all means, find the truth, the answers that I’ve been wanting for so long and also….it feels almost inconsequential now. Like nothing I uncover or grow to understand will actually change anything.

I’ll still be alone in the world. I’ll still have done what I did. Harry will still have betrayed me. And I’ll still be in—

[click, static]

It’s not like learning certain things changed anything. Knowledge can’t kill love.

[click, static]

[familyabolisher]

Would you be willing to share anything about your writing process for the essays you write? I really enjoy your work so I was just wondering!

Hope ur having a good one :)

i don't know that i can be all that helpful here because my writing process is very much just like, "just write it innit" lol! i usually start with a broad sense of what i want to write about and narrow it down until i can get from a constellate set of concepts to a coherent argument that i can outline in my introduction and then explain and supplement throughout the piece. so for example, i'm writing on tennessee williams at the minute (and i'm v much still in the planning stage)---i went in knowing that i wanted to write on williams and that the parts of his work which interest me often have to do with how he writes about sex, sexuality, desire, and death. from doing a bit of reading i then narrowed that down into the outline of an argument about his use of contained spaces as mediators of contained (and therefore controllable) desire in streetcar, cat on a hot tin roof, the glass menagerie, and suddenly last summer. (this is all v provisional, i started planning this thing two days ago, i suspect it will look v different by the end.) so i now have a thesis statement and a handful of key points where i can substantiate and explore my claim better.

planning for me generally just consists of establishing the arguments i want to make and the best order in which to make them---salolita turned into a 25k four-essay monster but it was planned out as just one piece of writing, and the order i chose to make my arguments in (relationship the texts' discourse holds to hegemony -> containment and entrapment within the terms set by hegemony -> how that containment and entrapment creates the aesthetic subject -> how the aesthetic subject is contravened and why) was supposed to be the most coherent formulation, allowing me to segue into a new argument after having laid the groundwork in the preceding section. (i suck at this btw, i constantly find myself having to go 'i will return to X in greater detail later,' but it's a good habit to try and be better at than i am.) so i usually just bullet point out each section of the essay and sub-bullet point my arguments + the specific points in the text(s) that i'll want to reference.

honestly after that i kind of just write it lol! if there's reading that needs to be done then i do the reading and adjust my plan accordingly, but i personally find that my arguments only really start to come together and make sense once i write them out in full. i almost never write in order---i pick the part i want to write in the moment and i write it, and i leave linking everything up and stitching it together and whatnot for the proofread/edit stage. if i can't think how to finish a sentence or a paragraph then i mark it with a '[]' and come back to it later. the parts which are harder to tease out will feel a lot easier once you've written out the parts that you know really really well.

i think the most important thing for me is the thing that you will hear literally all the time forever but is unfortunately very true, ie. that you should try and write a little every day. i hate this so much but regrettably it is literally the only thing that actually lets me get stuff done. also get comfortable with writing on your phone and write wherever, like on the bus and shit. i write on my phone at work lol.

i hope this is helpful!

[jonathan-samuel-smith]

@jaybirbie sent me a request in the replies to write Jon getting mind controlled and Damian breaking him out of it, but I was having trouble not only avoiding writing what other people have written but what I myself have written!

In my fic Dos Oruguitas Jon returns to the present after realizing that saturn girl is mind controlling him to stay with her. It's the start of my little au where freshly aged up Jon and regular Damian spend a lot of time together and are dating. i love this au. I thought about having Irma come back to mind control them again but I didn't want to turn her into a cartoon villain. I just think she's a kid and she doesn't realize how awful she is being, but if he expressly states to her that he hates her mind control and she keeps doing it anyway I feel like that becomes character bashing and i don't want to do the "evil straight woman tries to break up gay couple by seducing bisexual man" trope.

a remedy for all things by WizardEffect has Jon mind controlled by manchester black and Damian snaps him out of it.

Here's my notes anyway, I couldn't really lengthen them out to anything more substantial.

-damian gets captured while jon is being held in a different place with red kryptonite chains, but jon is able to laser off the wall its attached to and drag it with him as he looks for revenge. Damian breaks out and finds jon fighting the batfamily who are trying to stop him from beserker rage killing the people who captured them. Damian flips, jumps, somersaults midair and says “Jon, catch me.” jon goes “Dami!! I missed you so much, i was so worried!” and he holds him bridal style and starts kissing his face and nuzzling him and holding him tight. “Let me cut these off for you, habibi.” Damian says, so Jon sets him on the ground and damian pulls out a dremel and cuts through the kryptonite. “Fly us out–” jon picks him up and soars into the sky “Of here. Heh, wanted me alone that much?” jon kisses him on the mouth. He pulls back “I’m so embarrassed. I just outed our relationship in front of your whole family. And also almost killed some people.” Damian caresses his face. “But you didn’t. And they were going to find out sooner or later.” jon buries his face at the juncture of Damian’s neck and shoulder “But not like this” he whines, “My dad is gonna be so pissed I didn’t tell him.”

I couldn't actually find any other mind control fics without smut so that does show a need for more fics but I just don't feel like i can make this long enough to be worth posting on ao3. I was gonna draw a comic of it but i hate drawing comics actually, they take so much time. and it would have been 3 pages and still not as clear as my text.

[canmom]

mmo rp is kind of fundamentally not so different from RPing in any messaging program, something we've been doing since the days of IRC. the story you co-create is primarily driven by what's written in the text box. no matter how well made the emote animations are, they are not communicative enough to really tell a complex story, so you always fall back to prose. your character's voice will be limited to a handful of nonverbal expressions - a laugh, mm-hm, uh-huh. you are constantly having to reinterpret bits of game jank as you construct your mental version of the 'real story'. and yet

these visual aids do make a really substantial difference in how you experience it i think. to honestly a kind of surprising degree. of course having a character design on screen helps avoid writing tons of descriptive prose - but there's also a lot that can be done with simple movement through space, like a character positioning themselves besides another, retreating to sulk, getting up to dance.

like in visual novels and manga, you have essentially a set of codified, symbolic expressions - but in FFXIV, every race has its own set of very charming and polished animations for nearly every emote, which adds a huge amount of info in how you interpret that character (and slot them into the otaku database). a roegadyn will by default be loud and brash, a viera refined and dreamy, a lala mischievous and childlike. a mi'qote is a cat. since all of these are chosen by the player, they act as a strong signal of what your character's deal is - their body language comes across even if it's not like the actual scene fully acted out.

and what's fascinating to me is that even when i know what the player looks like irl, i still find myself responding to their game embodiment in how i think about them, i don't picture them irl... but also, having the embodiment helps me get into character. I have two alts, and with each one i feel drawn to a different style of roleplay. just like a list of prompts in a ttrpg sourcebook, the embodiment you've chosen gives you something to bounce off when you're improvising.

roleplaying is very similar to improv comedy, and many of the same analysis concepts - 'offers', 'yes, and' - apply. we're essentially improvising a digital puppet show. building up an RP venue and customising our model is a way of laying out props to help that process roll smoothly.

i often dream about an mmo animation system that would be less janky - more control over camera placement, better handling of interactions between player characters and characters with their environment, more ability to plan out timing and blocking and so on - essentially trending towards multiplayer source filmmaker.

the problem is that such a system would probably have way too much cognitive overhead to be usable in real time improv. i think what something like ffxiv shows is that even very simple elements - besides the emotes, your character looks towards your target and moves their lips when you talk, you can adjust their expression and there's animation hooks all over the place line chairs you can sit on - can actually be a very expressive palette and people are pretty good at filtering out the jank when they want to create a story together.

indeed, it becomes a skill - knowing what animations you have, how to reinterpret them, how to line yourself up with other players. and in the end you don't remember the time spent shuffling forwards and typing /hug again and again, or standing up and sitting down repeatedly until it lines up right. you remember the cute sight of your character sitting beside your friend, looking fondly at each other.

there's also another angle which is like... i find real life 'going out' very difficult - usually hitting a point of information overload very quickly in a pub environment, and while music is easier to manage than a wall of conversation, i never really learned how to interact with strangers at a club, concert, convention. I'm not good with alcohol. when i try to a pub, i usually end up retreating into myself and ducking out. in mmos, though... i find prose much more easy to be expressive in, and the limits of the animation system kind of level the playing field a bit in terms of The Autism when it comes to body language and the like.

still, sometimes it feels like a very sad existence - i rely on this simulacrum, pretending i am being intimate and social with people i can't touch through a computer program that draws triangles. everything in an mmo is muted, blunted by the medium - which makes it 'safe', but also tinges it with a loneliness that can't really be broken. but for now, i guess the simulacrum is all I've got, you know? and i can appreciate how it's put together, all the effort that has gone in from devs and players alike to realise this alternative channel for connection.

but yeah. i guess it comes back to this again... there's a reason my online 'face' is a low poly approximation of an animal!

[dotster001]

Can i ask for clavis x fem reader prompt 16 🥰❤️

(there are so many Clavis requests compared to everything else. Are you guys okay? You know his route is playable now, right? The dark times are over 😂)

16. I could see myself marrying you.

It wasn't often you had a chance to just sit with Clavis, mostly because of his busy schedule, but also because he wasn't one to just sit still. 

Turns out the only way was to compromise; you had to sit on his lap, and read aloud your book. You also had to be okay with him poking or tickling you randomly if he started to get bored. It was really more of a lose situation for you, but in the five minutes before he got bored of just sitting still with you, you could almost pretend you were a normal couple.

You also had to be prepared for psychological warfare.

You were reading him a romance novel, and had come up on the hero proposing to his lover, when Clavis decided it was playtime.

He traced the outline of your ear nonchalantly as he calmly asked, "what kind of person do you want to marry, Y/N?"

You were dating Clavis, so, obviously, he was the kind of person you were currently considering marrying. But you could tell he was trying to mess with you, and telling him that would give him ammo to make you squirm. So after a pause,

"I don't know. Probably someone tall, and strong, and cold. A man of few words, maybe he scares the average human," you hummed, thinking you had outsmarted him. You made the wrong move though, because his eyes narrowed, even if his smile never left his face.

He began giving you featherlight kisses along your jaw, too light to feel substantial.  He nuzzled closer to your ear, as you were filled with fear and excitement.

"You know, that's very interesting, because I," he placed a kiss behind your ear, "I could see myself marrying you."

You were going to die. You were going to die because your boyfriend was a master at flustering you. He hadn't moved since he said that, so his breath was tickling your skin. But you couldn't squirm away, or he'd win.

He abruptly picked you up, and set you back down in the seat, giving a cat like stretch as he said, "Too bad I'm not your type."

He turned to leave and muttered like he was talking to himself, but loud enough for you to clearly hear, "I'll have to ask Sariel to return the ring."

Then he left the room… Deep down, you knew he was baiting you. But you still ran after him anyway. Just in case.

[findroleplay]

You rp finder groups need to stop promoting posts from people who dont properly rp. I've liked dozens of posts looking for rpers but when those rpers reach out they don't have a rp blog set up, they don't have a muses or rules page and they don't even have threads on their blog. No one have pinned posts of a self promo with the information about their blog. You're not promoting rper's you're just giving people who just want to write smut a platform. Which makes it harder for ACTUAL rpers like myself who are looking for people to write with.

I think you may have a substantial misunderstanding of how people use these blogs tbh.

Most of the blogs that use this page don't write on Tumblr anyway, so you wouldn't find any thread on their blogs. It's also not surprising that they don't have RP info ready because these aren't RP blogs, they're personals. They just wanna connect with other muns and move to Discord. What you're looking for is joining the Tumblr rpc but they hardly use these blogs to find partners. You gotta start searching the tags, making promos hoping they'll get reblogged, and following people if you're looking for that kind of interaction because they just don't hang out around here (not against the rules but I guess most tumblr rpers like to handpick their partners rather than betting on strangers liking their ads).

Also: 1) You can absolutely ask them for info when they contact you. Most of these people are serious about writing, they just focus on Discord. 2) Even if some people just want to rp smut, it's not a bad thing. 3) That last line is so ridiculously stereotypically gatekeeping that I honestly think you're taking the piss so I feel kinda dumb for taking this seriously.

[puckish-rogue-archive-deux]

Lore Dump: Regarding the Supernatural

Note: This is gonna be a bit of a short one as it's more of a clarification for people who have Muses that are tied to the supernatural.

So, let me just get this out of the way and say that yes, there are elements of the supernatural present within the original SR games (although more so the first two, and that expansion I don't even consider canon). And while they aren't exactly anything that substantial, I've always seen that as an invitation to explore the concept further. Cause really, how the hell do you not love the idea of mashing organized crime and stuff that's far beyond the realm of comprehension together? It's definitely had a hold of me ever since a particular boss fight in the second game, but that's something I'll get to in a second.

Anyway, let me just lay it out like this; in the first SR, after the death of an important character (no spoilers on the off chance one of you actually wants to check out the series), you are given the chance to call up a number you might have seen around the map for a business known as Eye for an Eye. They are run by voodoo practitioners who can revive the aforementioned character, and have them come back as a zombie homie. This can also be done in the second game after the death of another major character.

Now, in addition to Eye for an Eye, we have a character introduced in SR2 who goes by the name of Mr. Sunshine. He is the second-in-command of the Sons of Samedi, a Haitian drug cartel led by a man who goes by the moniker of The General. Mr. Sunshine is important to our discussion because he is the first instance of The Boss encountering someone tied to the supernatural in the main plot, and not have it be just some silly little easter egg.

This is mainly shown during the fight you have with him (the mission is fairly graphic by the end), where Mr. Sunshine pulls out a voodoo doll that's able to both knock The Boss around, and keep himself invincible until the doll is shot out of his hands. Yet even on the brink of death, Mr. Sunshine is seemingly capable of reviving himself over and over again, right until The Boss decides to just decapitate him.

With all that said, you're probably wondering just what in the hell does any of that mean. Well, I think it's pretty simple; if the game is going to go out of its way to depict something as abnormal and clearly supernatural as that was, in a main mission no less, then what does that tell you about the rest of the world? What else might be lurking around that people might not be fully aware of? And yeah, I know it's kinda silly to go that buckwild over tiny little hints of shit being a little weird in this universe. But like hell am I keep myself or anyone else from taking the opportunity to explore that further.

And let me be clear, I'm not looking to do anything totally out there. There is a way to depict something regarding magic, the supernatural, and anything else that may fall under that category in a way that's both very interesting, and acknowledges that in a modern setting such as this, it's not commonplace. So I would absolutely love to do that with y'all. I love those kinds of settings, I love throwing Django into these situations where he has to deal with things that are soooo out of his league. It's a lot of fun! And I hope you can see that vision as well.

[hesitantdream]

Future plans

Hello everyone! It has been a WHILE. I've been thinking about what I want to do with this blog and with Poketwich, because it's become clear that what I'd planned for Poketwich was simply too much.

When coming up with the idea, I already knew I should set the bar low, because it'd be my first time writing an interactive fic, and writing an entire story as a whole. But I still got too excited and planned too much.

But I still have this following, and I still don't want to abandon the idea completely. So I'm going to try to narrow the idea down even more.

When outlining Poketwich, I had the most success in developing Raziel and their story. They were already basically the main character besides the player character, so it made sense to develop them first.

I'm an artist first and foremost, it's what I plan to do as a career. And I still have some passion for this project - I say some because right now I'm very burnt out as a whole, but given time and inspiration I'm sure I could find the very same drive that got me to create Poketwich in the first place.

So my current idea is this - I take Raziel and their story, and I either create a visual novel or a comic.

I lean towards visual novel, but I'm not about to make the same mistake twice by biting off more than I can chew. I want to set the bar at a reasonable level while also challenging myself to finally create something substantial, something I can be proud of and something I can use in my portfolio.

I can't predict how long any of this will take me, because I'm still a student and it takes all of my time and energy. As to what I'll do with this blog - I'll be removing the intro post and replacing it with this one. I've no clue as to what I'll be posting, if anything. Maybe I'll start lore dumping about my vampire story - who knows.

I hope above all someday I'll have something to offer you lovely people. I have a huge love for the interactive fiction community on here. Thank you to everyone who followed me and gave me support <3

[crystalelemental]

I keep trying to post something interesting about this and failing, so forgot it: general thoughts now that I've finished all the I'm in Love With the Villainess light novels.

Overall, pretty fun! I enjoyed it quite a lot. Rae and Claire are very cute, and I love them. To the surprise of no one, I really like Claire, very much my character type. I was surprised how much I wound up liking Rae, though. I find her very...relatable. Like, the tendency to respond to anything serious and therefore uncomfortable with goofs, the desire to just be apolitical at all times, hiding insecurities by over-exaggerating things and avoiding disappointment by self-sabotaging. There's something about how she is that just connects.

The rest of the cast is generally good, but far less significant. Which is a weak point overall, I think. I found myself wanting a lot more of some of the side characters that don't do as much directly. For as right there as Misha always is, she doesn't contribute much, which is hindered all the more with her relationship with Yu, which doesn't get a whole lot of development. They get like two scenes. It's a bit disappointing, because I would've liked more of their dynamic. Similar situation with Lilly, who is my girl, and who not only doesn't get many scenes, but also is Possessions Georg, being mind controlled or otherwise possessed by every entity capable of doing so. Poor girl.

I think Book 3 was when, character wise, I started to lose a bit of interest. Like, we already had multiple side characters I really liked who weren't getting substantial play at this point, and now we're going to introduce a whole new set that are...frankly not as interesting to me? May and Aleah are adorable, I love the kids, but the rest aren't quite as interesting despite how many there are. It's not even that they don't get a lot of time; Philine, Hilda, and Dorothea get as much time as any other side character, but I don't really connect with them as much. Couldn't entirely tell you why. ...well, I might be able to in part.

I think Book 3 is when it became a bit much that every character was interested in either Rae or Claire. Manaria was excusable as the one hidden route in the original game, so like sure, that checks out in the same way as the princes. Lilly, sure, I'm willing to accept that, since Manaria kinda backs off even if feelings are still there. But then Philine's interested in Claire, and Lana's interested in Rae, and at the point Rae and Claire are basically married it gets to be a bit much? I'm not saying I wanted nothing but cute domestic wives like the first chapter of Book 3, but also maybe that's what I wanted. Because I do legitimately love that dynamic through the rest of the series.

For what it does do, I think it does well. The story's fun and engaging and there were multiple points where I was squealing with excitement over the recent developments. I think if there's one thing they did well, it's building tension. Which is impressive for an isekai where the protagonist knows, more or less, what's going to happen in advance. And it's nice that every twist isn't another stomp against the protagonists. I think it's pretty common for the twists to build tension being things that work against the protagonists, but just as often the story sets up some hint at Rae being up to something that isn't revealed until later, and it's a fun little hook. The quickest example I can think of is when May and Aleah are kidnapped, and they reference May having a bag as their trump card, but not revealing what that was until near the end of that encounter. Related: Ralaire is hilarious. Like it always shows up to save the day, at like the perfect interval that I forgot it was there.

The Book 5 reveal is...a mixed bag for me. I generally don't love the kind of switch from hard magic (barring the isekai, which I think counts) into a more sci-fi "it's basically the real world adjacent" narrative. But I think it's relatively unobtrusive? Like, once it's out, they never stop talking from that angle. But I think the way things work out for characters is still interesting. I love that initial Rei's whole deal was that all these cycles wore down her affections until it didn't feel right anymore. I love that they have an AI that's focused on keeping humanity going at all costs, willing to fuck with everyone here to achieve that goal; very Etrian Odyssey 2 of you. I like that, in the re-written world, Lilly has no idea what's going on but still wants the best for Rae.

I think if there's one thing I expected to matter more, it's tandem casting. They made a huge deal of this, and about how it links to the secrets of the world, and it...doesn't really do much of anything. It's pretty unexplained how this was so linked to the hidden truth of reality, or why it works at all. Or how it's associated with the ring that Torrid made. There's a lot of gray area on that one. Which is a shame because I do love me some magic systems. Related note: I love how the initial explanation for wind is "yeah it's like support I guess, don't worry about it," and then it's easily the most overpowered element, being able to project or silence sound, power up physical attacks, be used offensively, create a shield, dispel certain kinds of magic, and goddamn manipulate time. Like oh okay, wind just does everything. Water and Earth have some stuff, while Fire is just...fire. You do damage. That's it. I do like that overall proficiency is secondary to skill, though. Like, Salas' hypnosis magic is super powerful and dangerous, and he's only like mid-proficiency as I recall. I think the applications of the system are more interesting than the system itself.

The only odd bits from magic that slightly bug me are Dark magic, and the void. Dark bugs me just because it's better than all of them by default, and also because they designated Earth as the color black, but Final Fantasy rules say that should be yellow and Wind should be green and yes this bothers me. The void is just...what Dorothea and Aleah have going on. Like oh, sure, they can completely negate all magic used against them, or absorb that magic to create their own attacks. Don't get me wrong, big fan of Spellblade Aleah, but it feels hysterically overpowered for little reason, and kinda undercuts the significance of their whole discussion with the kids about how not having magic won't make them any less important.

As a last note, I don't think I'm legally allowed to just...not mention that yes, as many others have pointed out since episode 3 of the anime, there are a lot of discussions around sexuality and gender identity. It's very direct in calling things what they are, and it is nice to see things discussed so openly. I do think it sometimes comes across a bit heavy-handed, but then you kinda need to for people who don't have a baseline understanding of these things.

I think I'm running out of things to talk about. The short is, I had a good time. They're fun books, would recommend.