#i'm tagging ships because this is useful info for fic writers lol

[daretolovemyrambling]

ARCANE TIMELINE

every Information confirmed by lore or the creators is green. Everything I found out through math is orange (because we don't know months, birthdates, exact ages etc.). Things that are purely my headcanon i'm putting in blue.

I edit this everytime I find out something new!

some background that is important for the timeline:

BN refers to "Before Noxus". Before the Runewars, there were several rivaling tribes of Noxi in Runeterra. But after the Runewars they had banded together into one nation, Noxus. They establish their own Calender, BN (Before Noxus) and AN which stands for "After Noxus".

"Zaun" was not build at the same time as Piltover. In League lore. Zaun, then called Oshra Va'Zaun, was build 3000 BN, it was part of the Shuriman empire and became independent after Shurima fell.

Valoran is the name of the continent the story of Arcane takes place in. Zaun and Piltover reside in South Valoran. Noxus resides in East Valoran. Demacia resides in West Valoran.

772 BN: Oshra Va'Zaun attempts to create a safe sea-route between East and West Valoran. Their plan is to create a passage with bombs, which results in them accidentally triggering a series of strong earthquakes.

Half of Oshra Va'Zaun sinks and poisonous gas leaks into the city. Janna, a goddess revered by sailors, hears the Zaunites prayers and blows away the toxic gas, becoming their guardian deity.

790 AN: Thanks to the passage, merchant clans aquire an immense amount of wealth and take residence in the newly developed district that was build over the Pilt River. They name it Piltover to symbolize it's position over the Pilt River. In honor of it's founding, they have their first "Progress Day". Heimerdinger becomes one of the founders of Piltover. He is about 114 years old.

940-950 AN: Vander and Silco are somewhere between their 30's and 50's but exact ages are unknown. Same goes for Felicia and Connol. They look like they are in their 30's or at most early 40's when they die. All four must be born around 940 to 950 but I couldn't really narrow it down. If anyone finds information from the creators, let me know!

957 AN: Mel is 26 during season 1 act 1, so she is likely born in this year.

959 AN: Jayce is born in 959 because he is 24 in season 1 act 1.

958-960 AN: Viktor is born sometime in those years. Viktor is around Jayce's age. It's unknown if he is older or younger though

965 AN: Vander and Silco work in the mines and meet eachother. (Putting this in blue because this detail comes from the Arcane artbook and we don't know at what age they meet, we just know they worked in the mines together) This could also be the year the last drop is bought or build by Vander!

967 AN: Vi is 14-16 during the events of season 1 act 1 according to Amanda Overton. I'm placing her at around 16 years old. Which means that she was likely born in 967. This is probably also the year the bar flashback with vanco and felicia happens :).

968 AN: Cait is confirmed to be a little younger than Vi. If we say she was 15 during season 1 part 1, she would be born in 968.

972 AN: Powder is roughly 5 years younger than Vi, so she would be born in 972 at the earliest.

978 AN: Felicia and Connol die in the riot at the bridge when Powder is around 6 and Vi is around 11 according to Amanda Overton.

980 AN: Mel says she was exciled ten years ago in season 1 act 3. So she arrived in 980 in Piltover. Mel is around 23 here because she is 33 in s1 act 2 & 3.

983 AN: This is the year were everything from season 1 act 1 takes place. It's not only the death year of Vander, Mylo and Clagger, Benzo and Greyson, this is the year Hextech was invented, Shimmer development was completed and the year the timeline splits into two (one where Vi lives and one where Vi dies)

990 AN: the 200th Progress Day takes place in 1x4. The events of episode 4-9 likely span not even longer than a week, so everything in season 1 act 2 and 3 happens in this year!

991 AN: between 2x3 ans 2x4 3-6 months have passed. I don't know how months and vegetation work in Runeterra, but if Viktor had enough time to build a thriving community and grow and take care of crops, i'd say that 2x4-2x9 takes place in 991 AN.

unknown dates:

- Dr. Corin Reveck (Singed) is born and becomes a respected Doctor in Piltover. He worked together with Heimerdinger but the two parted ways because Heimerdinger disapproved of the unethical and inhumane methods Singed uses to bring Orianna back to life.

- Orianna (Singed's daughter) becomes sick and dies/is in a comatose state. In League lore she becomes sick after trying to help Zaunites escape from a chemical spill.

- Viktor's age when he meets Singed, Viktor's age when he enters the academy and becomes Heimerdingers assistant. Amanda Overton revealed that their (non-canon) idea is that Viktor's parents used their life savings to buy Viktor a Piltover school uniform. Viktor sneaks into the academy and impresses Heimerdinger so much that he doesn't kick him out and makes him an assistant instead.

- Jayce's age when he and his mother are trapped in the snowstorm. The death of Jayce's father likely already occured at or before this time.

- Isha's birthday. She between the ages Powder has in 1x1 (6-11). Since she is wearing a miners helmet we can guess that either he guardian or herself has worked in the mines at some point. She might be getting chased by goons because she escaped her workplace... chilling thought.

- the exact age of Kino and Mel, the date of Ambessa travelling through a regions where she falls in love with a stranger and has an affair with him (in the blood sweat and tears music video she appears already pregnant)

EDIT: Jayce was 24 not 25 in s1 act 1, my bad. Edited it to be his correct birth year (959)

EDIT 2: In a watch party Amanda Overton says that between episode 3 and 4 about 3 to 6 months have passed.

EDIT 3: thanks @darlingitsagathaharkness, you are right. I found this post that pieced together the chronological order of events in season 1 act 2 & 3. That is one hell of a week.

EDIT 4: I found concept art of Mel that confirms that she is imagined to be 26 during season 1 act 1.

If you find any other date or event that can be included here, please let me know :).

sources: 1, 2, 3, 4

[mickeymagpie]

20 questions for fic writers

Tagged by @marypsue, thank you!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

106 so far!

2. What’s your total word count?

321,819, which is somehow both lower and higher than i expected.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

a whole lot; most recently Rise of the TMNT, my fandom on ao3 with the most works is Rise of the Guardians. lots of rises.

4. Top 5 fics by kudos

The Gravity Falls trans dipper one-shot, the FMA Ishvalan!Elrics AU, an into the spiderverse fic, raven cycle pov outsider, and a star wars force awakens one-shot. i give all my fics long song lyric titles so that's all the info yall are getting lmao.

5. Do you respond to comments?

I always start out trying to respond to everything when i post a new fic, but then i get overwhelmed pretty quick. lo siento mucho.

6. What’s the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I don't usually go for angsty endings tbh! I like a lot of angst in the middle, or i go for kind of bittersweet endings.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

probably that star wars one; force awakens had just come out and i was one of many kylo ren woobifiers who wanted him to have accepted han's invite to come home.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

The most hate i've gotten is on a Different star wars fic where i made Luke trans and some people were Not happy. luckily, i have a permit (i can do what I want).

9. Do you write smut?

yeah lol. i don't post a lot of it though; most of the time i just share it with my discord friends.

10. Do you write crossovers?

all the time all the time babey.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

yes i've been notified 2 or 3 times that someone copied my stuff onto wattpad or ffnet. i usually go report them but don't care enough to follow up.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

I don't think so? not that I can remember. I've had one or two podficced though iirc.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

nnnnot a finished one. my friends and i do a lot of half fic writing and half rp that usually doesn't turn into a polished product (but it's still fun <3).

14. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

ALL TIME FAVORITE FLYNN AND LUCY TIMELESS. i've never written fic for them and the show isn't even GOOD but god the way they look like "she fixed him" bs on the surface but really they're each so perfect to make up for the other's shortcomings. also i always wanted so badly for someone to tell her to get her dog on a leash <3

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you will?

ahaha,,,, the good omens roleswap fic is burning a hole in my document folder. i have an outline i just have no inspiration/motivation :(

16. What are your writing strengths?

characterization; particularly I've gotten the feedback that i'm good at writing characters in different circumstances from canon while keeping their personalities both Intact and Logically Justifiable.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

ending things, both in the sense that i start a lot of stuff and don't finish it, and the sense that i usually have too many ideas and don't know how/where to cut off a plot.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language?

google translate always does me dirty so now i usually just write the dialogue in english and use a dialogue tag like "she said in *insert language*"

19. First fandom you wrote for?

iiiiii think it was Rise of the Guardians! before that i mostly did over-dramatic RP on the cricket magazine forums where i had characters like a half-dragon bounty hunter.

20. Favorite fic you’ve ever written?

probably the ishvalan elrics fic! fma is already full of a lot of meaty concepts, and it was fun re-conceptualizing the canon plot and character beats while keeping the arching plot intact. stuff like that is like a puzzle to me, it's very satisfying when i finish one and it gets positive feedback!

tagging anyone who wants to do it, because im. so sleepy rn

[alifeasvivid]

fic writer questions

tagged by @fireandiceland :D

1.) How many works do you have on AO3

19... it was 39 but I had a major self-loathing moment

2.) What’s your total AO3 count?

word count? 166,516

3.) How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

if you mean currently on AO3? just Hetalia. If you mean only on AO3 ever: Kuroshitsuji, Hyouteki no Finder, BotW, and Hetalia

In total through my whole life uhhh >.> a few more than that

4.) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Thief of Spades Season One

Thief of Spades Season Two

Trust

If It's You

Desperate Measures

5.) What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

It's gonna be between Last Hurrah and Payback probably... Payback probably wins just because it is incredibly bleak

6.) What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

Uhhhh hmmm I mean I'd say everything else that's finished they're all about equally happy. I write most fics with the intention of reaching a happy ending that feels earned. From most contrast between the rest of the fic and the ending, I'd say An Impossible Situation

7.) Do you write crossovers? If so, what is the craziest one you’ve written?

Nah, I'm not interested in crossovers.

8.) Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Oh yeah. What else is there? XD I hope I write *good* smut. After Kuro, I think was really uptight about it and trying to be "clean," but I've loosened up on that a lot and I think it has greatly improved the quality of the smut I write.

I think I have a slight reputation for adding BDSM elements and of course there's my super hardcore kink of writing scenarios where everything is consensual and all parties involved care about and respect each other. It's pretty intense, pretty niche, not a lot of people are into it. LOL As for gender/sexuality >.> who really cares about that kind of thing nowadays?

I also primarily write UKUS, which many people find extremely offensive. 🤣 IT'S A JOKE!

9.) Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I used to forget, but I try to do so consistently now because it shows my appreciation because I really like getting comments.

10.) Have you ever received hate on a fic?

EEEEEEYUP.

11.) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not to my knowledge

12.) Have you ever had a fic translated?

I have! :D I consider it to be quite an honor ^-^

13.) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes. A long time ago.

14.) What’s your all time favorite ship?

USUK/UKUS. Nothing else even comes close.

15.) What’s a WIP that you want to finish but you don’t think you ever will?

T_T so many, but mainly Technicolor Heart. I just really like the concept, but that fic would have been soooooooo angsty..... also I don't wanna get ... fuckin.... run off of tumblr.

16.) What are your writing strengths?

Pacing. I know I just have a sense of how a story should progress so that everything feels earned but there's minimal to no dragging. I get told people like my characterizations a lot which is nice ^-^ also my prose is pretty nuanced, but I don't count that as a strength because I think most people don't even notice.

17.) What are your writing weaknesses?

>.> speed. or lack thereof. I can't write action scenes, which dramatically altered the direction of Thief of Spades in particular. I don't have a beta so there's always typos I'm catching months after posting P: I struggle with description/creating atmosphere using sensory info.

18.) What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in fic?

I agree with Riva that salutations or endearments are fine, but writing whole scenes that way comes across as pretentious and annoying. Not to mention it can just be really confusing. Write in the language of your audience, it's basically just that simple.

19.) What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Pffff. As if I'd say it in public smh. I'll spare 11/12 y/o me the indignity

20.) What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

Uhhhh hmmm

I mean the Thief of Spades series is always going to have a very special place in my heart but writing something that long with that much plot over such a long time, there's a lot of things about it I wish I could change.

In terms of canonverse type stuff, I love The Shape of Modern Imperialism. For shameless self-indulgence I think Three-Part Harmony is best. But I actually worked really hard on Precious Thing and I'm still quite proud of it.

tagging whoever wants to be.

[shineyma]

I know you will probably deny this but it'll be no use because I am 100% certain that you slyly faux-randomly mentioned you ship Nell x Callen early on in my introduction to Nell, so you would ensure I slip and fall for them as a couple and you will have another person suffering with you the non-canon status of this ship. Because I have checked. They are not canon. And you are sinister. Plying me with your eagerness to help out by writing up a list of Nell-heavy episodes, meanwhile you had been planning my descent into Nell x Callen since I asked you if you recommended NCIS:LA. Now, you will claim that you barely mentioned Nell x Callen twice and you didn't even go into any detail, but I am onto you. You're playing a long con.

I'm looking forward to moving onto later seasons so I can read more fics without spoiling myself. So far, I've only read a couple and Nell's characterization was rather off, so I didn't enjoy them as much.

The thing with Nell's character is that the writers have fairly managed to avoid many of the usual pitfalls in writing a young, female, genius, small-framed, tech wiz character working side by side with big bad agents, cops and the like. And I really love and enjoy that. Some of my favorite Nell moments so far attest to how they've deviated from that cliche character. I will be sending you a few of my favorite Nell moments so far, in vague details because my memory gets even worse than usual when binging.

I want to go on record to say that although I would prefer them dating other people because I think they wouldn't be as interesting together, however I don't mind Nell x Eric. Maybe it has to do the way both of them deviate from the cliches of their respective characters, and in fact I think it's mostly that, but the point is that I don't think they would end up toxic as many nerd x nerd type relationships end up written. But it's still tired to do this kind of thing. Of course, I skimmed the Nell x Callen tag and saw some spoilers for both ships mostly in the form of commentary, and I have the vague understanding that the writers will unfortunately do neither ship right. Well, I'll just ingore their bad writing as much as I can. I just love Nell and Eric individually so much, and you've told me I have things to look forward to with Nell, and I hope the same goes for Eric, because he also deserves his own heavy storylines and episodes.

Can I just say, in continuation of our talk on the team's body count, that I've noticed another pattern where several people die from a single gunshot that normally wouldn't be fatal, at least within a fictional setting, and mostly it's good guys or sort of good guys? Like, you have Callen who survived five bullets all over his torso, right? a

And then, if you recall the episode where they thought someone was leaking or selling classified information regarding covert ops or undercover operations, but it turned out that he was only putting together a tribute for fallen covert operatives and the like, who never received the recognition they deserved because of the classified nature of their work, instead they were just numbers, and the guy's tagline of sort was "names, not numbers," and he and sam were on a bus together, sam lied to the bad guys that he was the guy with the classified info and the other one was the agent protecting him, so they shot the guy instead, and he died. From a single bullet. To the right side of his torso. Maybe the bullet hit a lung in a bad way. I'm not saying it's not realistic. But the others haven't had a similar brush with death yet as far as I can recall, save for Dom (gone too soon, gone too soon), and obviously they would be as lucky as Callen if it was Kensi or Deeks or Sam, but still, the single-episode guys that fall dead from one bullet in a spot that in fiction is usually not lethal... I'm just saying. In an odd way, Callen surviving five bullets in his torso while other men and women have died from a single bullet somewhere ostensibly non lethal, whether the bullet came from the team or someone else, counts in the end toward the body count of the team and this show. It's not the same thing but it sort of falls under the same umbrella thing, if that makes any sense.

Phew. Six short paragraphs. Middle name is indeed "laconic," thank you very much.

*evil laughter* Yes, you've stumbled upon my evil plan!! Obviously it was my plot all along that you would be sucked into the Nell/Callen ship. Suffer, nonnie, suffer!!!

But really, nonnie, it's not my fault! The chemistry is there! They're perfect!!!

The fic is....something, I'll admit. I can recommend the fics by danakate but otherwise I haven't found many I love. But to be fair I am EXTREMELY picky, so. There's that, lol.

I'll be happy to hear any and all of your favorite Nell moments!!

I do not ship Nell/Eric AT ALL, which is part that they give me fs vibes and part that, in my opinion, the writers handled them really poorly. For a long time it seemed like they couldn't decide whether or not they wanted Nell to return Eric's feelings, so a lot of the time there was awkwardness that didn't make sense when compared to other scenes. I definitely prefer them as BFF.

Yeah, this show is just.....yeah. They want characters dead, so they're dead. Or they want characters to live, so they live. Even if it doesn't make sense most some of the time. But what can you do?

Thanks for checking in, nonnie! I'm happy to hear all of your thoughts lol.

[kuchenackerman]

you're an eremika fan so i figured i'll ask haha. i wrote my first EM fanfic and i'm so apprehensive about actually uploading it. i don't think i'm too bad a writer, but self proofing can only go so far and i'm concerned as to whether it'll actually gain any traction or not. do you know if people still read eremika fanfics/how do you gather the confidence to post your work? :/ also ur rad!

First of all, congrats on writing your first eremika fic! I wonder if by this time you already published it though? You sadly sent me this ask when I was focused on writing and editing an update to my own EM fic, so I probably was reserving my last two adhd braincells to be able to finish it lmao, which is why I didn’t reply in time and then... I forgot to do it and for that I’m very sorry!

If you still don’t publish your fic or you’re still interested on my answer, I’ve seen other people go through a similar struggle, and as a fellow writer I can understand your concern regarding of whether your fic will gain traction or not. When it comes to this last thing, it often depends on many factors, like on how active the fandom is by the time you publish your fic, on what people are looking to read about lately (i.e. fluff, angst and/or smut) and on the ship developments (or lack of it) currently going on in the manga. For example, as far as I remember, after chapter 123 dropped people were writing and reading oneshot fics about the “what am I to you?” flashback, and basically the same happens whenever we get some tasty (?) and especially angsty EM-related scenes in the manga (including chapter 112, lol). Writers get inspired to “fix” or develop these panels further and readers crave that content as well, so they kinda jump on it right after it gets published. In these cases, authors often get a quick and decent amount of feedback in a short span of time, which is amazing. When you are one of these authors with the ability to swiftly pull out a wholesome oneshot related to a fresh eremika scene, I guess you don’t have to worry THAT much about whether it will get at least a bit of attention or not, because people are going to be thirsty for that content and will consume it as soon as it’s available. Most of these readers are going to show appreciation for it in terms of likes, reblogs, kudos, comments, etcetera, without you having to wait too long. 

When we publish fics that aren’t related to the manga current developments and stuff, the first thing to do is to be able to get the reader’s attention with a catchy summary and the proposal of an interesting plot / situation between Eren and Mikasa. To increase the chances of people reading your stuff, it’s also important to make a post with the fic’s link and info here on Tumblr and on other social media platforms like Twitter, always using the eremika tag. 

And yeah, I assure you there’s a lot of people who still read EM fics. There’s even been an interesting influx of new eremika shippers thanks to what’s been going on during the timeskip and in latest chapters. However, between 2013 and early 2015 the SnK fandom overall was way more active and also fic writers got way more feedback. We have to consider that there was a more limited supply of EM fics back then of course, especially in 2013-2014, so I guess the feedback was also way more concentrated while the demand was kinda bigger than nowadays. If you’ve checked old fics mostly on FFnet that were published years ago, you probably already saw and know what I mean. I mention this because it’s important to not compare the amount of feedback that most EM fics receive today with what those older fics got. The reality of the fandom is too different now after the initial hype...

Regarding your question about gathering confidence, well, in my case I don’t have confidence issues in general and less when it comes to fandom. What I do is to just do something I feel like doing, enjoy the process of doing it and then put it out there without further questions. I don’t think I’m the best writer or anything, but I do believe in the value of what I write and of the other things I make. There are a few times when I look at what I’ve written and I’m like “pfft this sucks” and get very critical about it, while at other times I’m like “ohh, that’s some good shit! I really wrote that myself, huh? *pats own back*”, though most of the time I’m mainly conscious about the effort, love and creativity I pour into what I write among the enjoyment (and suffering lmao) I experience when I’m on it, which makes me appreciate it more. In your case, you already wrote something and you know it involved a degree of effort and time, so why not going ahead and sharing it? Even more so when showing it to others was your intent since the very beginning~

I think it’s totally worth it to share what you’ve written rather than never allowing it to see the light of day because of self-doubts. As with many other situations, you take a risk when you put something out there for others to see and dissect, but you also get the chance to receive nice responses that can make your day and, since readers provide you with feedback that help you to be more aware of your strengths and weaknesses, you also get the chance to improve your writing skills.  

We love the same amazing pairing and it deserves way more content and love, so please, give it a try and share your fanfic with the fandom!