#it's plot critical to *me*

[jq37]

truly the only person who Gets my paladin aelwyn vision. also i am sooo ;-; about your post on her moving back to mordred.... baby girl u r so loved.......

sorry for the late reply I've been traveling for the past month basically

yesssssssssssssssss this is like my favorite topic.

Abjuration is like, the most paladin-adjacent school of wizardry there is! In this season, we even see her taking a piece of magic that in-universe is basically only used by bad guys and turning it into loving protection. We got so much Aelwyn content this season and I am so so grateful for it but if all we'd gotten was that it would have emotionally wrecked me in and of itself.

Considering being a paladin mainly is about devotion, not necessarily following a specific god, I can so see her becoming a paladin initially by accident as well. Like, just being so frustrated with her lack of heals as a wizard in a situation and so-so-so wanting to do something about it and then suddenly, boom healing. Everyone's like, whoa was that some kind of weird, wizard healing? Nope, Lay on Hands. Welcome to multiclassing by the power of just giving too much of a damn.

And haha, the Mordred post is prob my fave FH post I've made this season and the kicker is that it was only supposed to be a couple of sentences long tops. But as I wrote it it turned into this whole exploration of her arc this season because I am obsessed with it. She was just playing out an entirely different story adjacent to the main story and there's such clear growth not just between seasons but across this season. She starts with the season with an aloof "enjoy the nemesis ward" and ends with an open declaration of affection and deep love in public with ice cream all over her face. Like what a 180. Like, the love was always there--from the start it was always there--but the way it's expressed is so different. You really get the sense that, of the two, Adaine is actually the more aggro sibling by nature and Aelwyn's aggro-ness is more nurture than nature because, besides the fact that a lot of what she was doing was a shield to keep n her parents' good side, she doesn't even fight back against Adaine's teasing very much--she mainly takes it good naturedly (submitting to Tasha's for instance).

At this point I'm just rambling but yeah I am an inaugural member of the Aelwyn Abernnat fan club and I'm so happy that Siobhan decided to pull Aelwyn in so much this season, even if it wasn't plot critical.

[andrewknightley]

saw someone saying something like "do you really think veilguard story would be better if you could do evil choices?" and actually yeah. i think if they let us act more like the dreadwolf on the "you are a paralellism to the dreadwolf" game, it would be more significant when the story tells you "you are a bit like him/you are nothing like him" because , thats how you chosed to play it.

[toodrunktofindaurl]

new sweater

[drag0nagedatingsim]

I love how people's response to critiques about the companions not noticing or being supportive of Rook's mental health is "you're too stupid" and "you don't understand the game like I do" and "here's my headcanon why you're wrong."

Why are y'all doing all the heavy lifting for the writing and then giving all the credits to the writing.

"Emmrich is taking you to the graveyard to help with Varric's death."

WHERE IN THE TEXT DOES IT SAY THAT. Does Emmrich even know how close Rook was to Varric? That's a nice headcanon to infer, and it would make a LOT of sense. But this is literally the "tell don't show" game, where they tell you everything three times, unless it has to do with Rook's mental health, and then it's suddenly secretly an understated genius story that I just don't understand because I'm too stupid? Okay?

No, it's once again the framework of something great that is ultimately unfinished and underutilized and a lot of people are doing the heavy-lifting for the plot and seeing their heavy-lifted headcanons propelled across the fandom, and then thinking that's just what the text says. When it does not.

I do think this is also a result of the later half of the 2nd act and all of the 3rd act being really good. Like, the later parts of this game are so good that it has me doubting my sanity about the first parts, but then I replay it and go "lol no it was bad."

[amaltheas-garden]

AND ANOTHER THING

this episode, despite not having the laughable plot points from 2x03, has run into some irreconcilable issues with the source material, but not in the typical "this event didn't happen in the text" way, but in the "these themes are in direct conflict with everything asoiaf stands for" way.

asoiaf sets itself apart from most fantasy because, in a genre chalk full of stories with divine, predetermined heroes destined to save the world, kings-to-be whose causes were always righteous and whose wars were always glorious, decided to flip the script. grrm wanted a story where no one's actions could be excused by vague notions of serving the "greater good", where divine purpose and prophecy held little weight compared to the very real damage done to actual people, because at the end of the day, nothing can justify the violence inflicted onto innocents in these endless quests for power.

the dance of dragons is a very easy story to comprehend when the rose-tinted glasses this fandom insists on seeing the Targaryens through are removed. it's about two siblings growing up in a time of peace and prosperity, going to war over daddy's throne, and everyone either dying or becoming a hollow husk of who they used to be. thats it. thats what war does. it kills you, or strips your humanity away bit by bit till you're hardly recognizable as a human and might as well be dead anyways. if there is one theme grrm wants readers to walk away with, it is that the price of war is NEVER one worth paying. I'm sure Rhaenyra thought that, sitting on the throne, haunted by the ghosts of her dead sons, and I'm sure Aegon II thought that, to broken to even climb the stairs of the IT, wishing only for his brothers, and sister, and children back.

while having Rhaenyra only willing to go to war over something "more than a crown" certainly paints her in a noble light, introducing a catch all justification for anything she does going forward to place herself on the IT is ridiculous. hotd essentially saying Rhaenyra actually HAD to go to war to save the realm from certain destruction years down the line because she was gifted special knowledge of her ancestor Aegon the Conqueror's prophecy (the Song of Ice and Fire *eye roll*) is a level of propaganda the "biased maesters" of f&b could only dream of.

[cenfitto]

i miss viktor oh my god they robbed us i was nutting in my jorts when this shit came on in season 1 with the fucking framing to pose the arm over his shoulder oh my god. can you imagine up at 3am to watch this on release and here comes a direct foreshadow teaser for your fucking Boy. i am chasing that high for the rest of my life like actually. and then they DONT EVEN FOLLOW THROUGH ON IT. WHY IS HE MAGIC. FUCK. WE COULD HAVE HAD IT ALL

[peace-hunter]

tfone au where OP is created as the last of the primes but way after them, a sparkling born at what were thought to be the last days of the war against the quintessons, the beginning of a new generation of peace after eons of war. a child meant to be loved and raised knowing nothing of war nor sacrifice.

he's kept mostly out of the spotlight by his siblings, who don't wish to expose him to everyone's optics so young, and want to wait until the war is done and over to properly introduce him to their people.

except of course the primes are betrayed and murdered by sentinel, the war is lost and everyone who knows and cared for the truth is either banished or outright killed in order to suppress it.

and the high guard, the ones the primes trusted the most, the ones that were supposed to protect them, the ones who failed in their most important duty, have to make a choice. to take the last prime, their last hope, with them to the surface, a hostile environment where there's little to no supplies and where they'll be hunted down by both sentinel and the quintessons as the biggest threat to their regimen.

or hide him in plain sight. place him where sentinel won't think to look for him. one more sparkling among many. and hope it will be enough to keep him alive. pray to primus that he'll protect his last child long enough for them to come back for him when it's safer (even if most of them have already lost their faith on him when he allowed the rest of his children to be massacred like that)

they almost lose their resolve when they realize they will have to take the little one's cog away in order to make him blend in with the rest of the newborns (and oh do they burn with murderous intent when they see what sentinel has done to their people but it's not the time yet-) but in the end they decide an impaired little prime is better than a dead one.

and so in the chaos of thirteen dead primes and a sudden energon crisis, a little sparkling who very few mechs really knew about and even fewer had seen completely vanishes. and in the depths of iacon a mech in charge of a new batch of newborns scratches their helm in confusion as they realize they must have miscounted the first time.

optimus prime is quietly erased from any official records by sentinel, written off as dead when they find a sparkling's frame mangled beyond recognition after an attack on the base of those rebels that insist on being a thorn on his side. killing the sparkling hadn't been precisely in his plans, he probably could've found some use for it after all, but he's not particularly upset about it either.

and orion pax grows up with an ache on his spark that tells him he's missing something far more important than a t-cog and dreams of gentle and loving hands, cradling him against the frames of mechs he cannot recall the faces of.

[lizzybeeee]

Am I the only one who thinks it's fucked up that the Mortalitasi are parading about King Markus's corpse...as opposed to letting the next in line rule??

He's alive in DAI - old, but very much flesh and blood - and we know this because the venatori use blood magic on him to get him under their control. So, what is he in DATV then? Are they implying that he's a lich? That he still has his mind? That they've got a spirit in there?

What do they gain from this? Cassandra's, what, 64th in line for the throne? So there's a bunch of potential heirs just hanging about -> potential heirs who want the crown because we know that Cassandra's parents were executed for trying to overthrow him.

Cassandra may not be fond of her family, but I can't imagine her letting this slide. This is the type of shit that gets an Exalted March called down on you! Especially if she's divine?! Nevarran's can be 'death-focused'* yes, but they let the living rule and not the dead.

It's their belief that when their soul passes through the Fade it results in a spirit being displaced - so they have the Mortalitasi find the spirit a new home in the Necropolis. That is their job - they maintain the Necropolis and, according to DATV, sometimes deal with awry magic.

The potential relation to a Divine or the Head of the Seekers, the King of Nevarra, is having his corpse puppeted about by a mage...and no one seems to care?!

Is this not super fucked up to anyone else?!!!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Edit - I put this down in the tags but I think it's important to point out: In all the previous games up to this point not once has a mage, manipulating a corpse like this, ever been portrayed as quirky or funny. This is not the norm of what the Mortalitasi are supposed to do - they honour the dead they do not puppet them.

Thedas is a world very strongly intertwined with faith, especially the Chantry. It is Nevarra's attitudes towards death and their burial practices that distinguishes it from other Andrastian nations - they still have the Chantry, the Templars, and the Circle of Magi just as the rest of Southern Thedas has.

It's impossible to imagine any Divine (Leliana, Cassandra, or Vivienne) hearing of this occurring and not taking action against this. It's extremely strange that Emmrich bemoans that half the nobility know this has occurred when this action should be seen as nothing short of an abomination to the faithful - including Emmrich.

[utilitycaster]

If I may, as we go into what appears to be the clear endgame for C3, I think the lessons to take from the ending of C2 within the fandom are:

Do not freak out about the possibility of the campaign ending sooner than you expected nor you personally wanted

Last minute twists are not impossible, but if your enjoyment rests on a sudden reversal in the final hour you are likely to be disappointed

Just because it happened in prior campaigns doesn't mean it will happen in this one

Don't count your chickens before they fail to hatch

There will probably be one shots if it's a serious enough plot hook that we can't get to

Disappointment and anger are fine but eventually you do need to get over it

For the record, I think the particularly unpleasant responses to the ending of Campaign 2 boil down to the fact that it wasn't nearly as clearly signaled (the formal announcement was like two weeks in advance and while in retrospect it makes sense, at the time it felt very abrupt); that despite two relationships being established and a third clearly on the way people had convinced themselves that there would be some kind of last minute twist and their anger is entirely because that didn't happen even though there was literally zero sign it would; the fact that Molly didn't come back; and the general atmosphere of the world in June 2021 - I watched the finale while on my first trip to see my family in over a year and a half. I also think the ship wars for C2 were as bitter as they were because of both the strength of the party's bonds; but also the echo chambers that developed during a lengthy hiatus; and Campaign 3 does not and never has had anywhere near that level of serious ship warring.

The structure of Campaign 3 has been different in many ways from that of Campaign 2, which was different from Campaign 1 - that's not to say you can't make comparisons across campaigns, but I would not make assumptions based on the length of prior campaigns (plus, we're already in the same ballpark of number of episodes as C1, and the same level going into the BBEG combat as C2).

If your happiness rests on any of the now three current couples in Bells Hells breaking up, you are a weirdly bitter person, and you are likely to be disappointed. On the other hand, if you're already annoyed that a plot thread will be dropped, while there's like...maybe three plot hooks I can think of and every single one is related to Chetney, who I think will only survive the finale if Travis is unable to find a satisfying way to kill him off, we've had some excellent one shots post-campaign for both Vox Machina and the Mighty Nein and I don't see why this would be any different.

And as always I will never tell you that you can't dislike something, though there are things that, if you dislike them, I will think less of your judgment. But stick to expressing disappointment and anger; if you find yourself wanting to write out violent threats on the internet, you need to back away for a good long while. But certainly wait to be disappointed by a campaign that's already ended, and not pre-mad at things that haven't happened (or failed to happen) yet.

[midnightcatharsis]

The meme is not mine and I have no idea who made it. I found it in this video

Episode 6 still doesn't make sense to me.

[rawliverandgoronspice]

Always a bit puzzled by people saying that anyone who wanted long-term consequences for TotK Zelda's sacrifice are "edgy".

I'm not even particularly in the camp that she should have remained a dragon forever (I think this should have been Ganondorf's fate, it would have been sooo much more impactful than to explode him and move on but anyway). To be honest, I wish the rules for turning back would have been 1) clear 2) active gameplay on the player so that it feels like it's something we have earned, and 3) not make her have amnesia about it and/or at least having her gain some crucial insight because of the experience.

(also: doesn't she crave knowledge? isn't that insanely mean to have her watch over every civilization and every bit of history ever and then take it away from her? kind of dislike how totk privileges the comfort of the player's feelings over what the characters would actually want or need tbh)

To be perfectly honest, I fully expected us needing to turn her back before engaging Ganondorf so we would fight him together, especially since Zelda as a compagnon exists in the game code already (though in a very subdued state). It feels very very strange to me that all of this mechanic of Sages following us existing and yet we never have the very climactic cool Zelda-staple moment of facing Ganondorf or Ganon together (OoT, WW, TP, ST and probably more that I'm forgetting all did this in some way --even BotW had Zelda more involved than in TotK). I'm not sure Mineru was a compagnon that was needed over Zelda honestly, especially given the kind of non-insight she gives us on the zonai (even if the idea of the mecha is cool, it really could have been Zelda using her zonai + sheikah knowledge to pilot one for us or something).

But anyway: yeah, even if this isn't what I would have wanted personally, I think wanting Zelda to remain a dragon is kind of arguably more respectful of her relationship to Link, in a way, that what the game ended up doing. When she enacted this sacrifice, Zelda decided to trust him to such a extent that she lost herself, reciprocated his trust in her and his devotion to her, and now the future of Hyrule exists beyond her and beyond what Hyrule once was, but she trusts them to follow through and be happy and she will watch over them from the stars moving on. It's fine if we manage to save her from that fate, but even if we don't, honestly this sounds like a beautiful story/tragic romance to me, if you want to read it that way. Tragedy doesn't necesserily involve edginess. Fictional pain isn't always mean, or out to get you.

[afterthelambs]

Okay I caved and checked in real quick for the MHA ending specifically to find out if the hero ranking still exists and the fact that it does is what's really disappointing. From the beginning the theme was that hero society was corrupt because they were all focused on status and celebrity and wealth over helping people. The hero ranking was the prime representation of that. Logically speaking if the story was about improving society, I expected that ranking to be abolished by the end of the story. Even if the villains couldn't be saved and Deku can't be powerful again, maybe society can be changed so history doesn't repeat itself. But the fact that it's still there means no progress was made. The cycle continues

[sinnbaddie]

Naruto as a series is perfect if I ignore the lack of change to the systematic oppression and the victim blaming and the child cruelty and the oppressors being forgiven and the clear classism and the regression of character development and the-

[arson-09]

thinking about the lost potential of feyre/rhysand mating bond but the plot is feyre deciding that FUCK the mating bond. she picked tamlin and no matter what hes who she wants to be with. Tamlin, despite his hate for rhysand is like no i mean, the bond :( and feyres just i WILL break this, my title isnt feyre cursebreaker for NOTHING. Rhysand actually continues to be a villain and no one gets character retconned

does anyone know a good fic with this concept/similar? i know im not the first to think of this

[night-triumphantt]

I have some thoughts about the arcane ending w nowhere to go but uh, if ur not here for some critique keep it pushing loll

Now that I’ve had a day to digest I’m actually v disappointed w the way the story gave up on its revolutionary messaging. The focus of season one is the piltover and zaun plot, the oppression of Zaun and its impacts on the characters, it is how vi and powder are orphaned, it’s why viktor is disabled, it is why the undercity struggles, Zauns independence is what silco was fighting for, vander and silcos ideological disagreements are based on it etc etc. the tensions between the two cities is rising and rising and then it just, fizzles out and pivots and makes viktor the main antagonist without any recognition of how he got here. And don’t get me started on how there’s zero consequences for cait who is?? Still an enforcer??

The plot highlights through Vi that the enforcers are an oppressive arm of a system w how she was treated as a CHILD and even as an adult and she betrays her ideals, to do what she thinks is right bc she thinks she has to take out her sister and bc cait asked her to do so as an enforcer. And then in doing so she betrays her ideals so aggressively that she is now the exact thing that hurt her, an enforcer, traumatizing a child, utilizing the gas on the undercity, excusing the consequences. And when she faces Caitlyn, cait obfuscates and says she wouldn’t have missed even tho that’s not *better*. Bc ok let’s say she didn’t miss, she just kills jinx in front of isha? and she just gassed the city w what we know is toxic gas? And then she discards vi bc vi isn’t going along with what she wants. Cait then is never shown reckoning w the biases and cruel things she’s done and said after that. There is ONE conversation w her and Vi and it’s framed as Ambessa is the issue which, she is partially but like, topside enforcers were all behind her and Cait was quick to lean into all her preconceived notions of zaunites. (Speaking of making what’s her name a mole was stupid and imo done just to make it so Cait doesn’t have to have that convo w her?? Idk)

Also, Vi goes on a drinking spree in which we never actually see her reckon w what she did as an enforcer, (it’s mostly framed around Cait) and then she hurts isha and,,, nothing?? No sorry?? Nothing. Vi has no plot that shows us her thoughts, her reckoning w what she did, or anything. In my opinion it’s bc the writers wanted cait/vi to work and if Vi actually had to think about what happened and what she did then they wouldn’t have worked out. Vi w/ no one to protect who has to rebuild her identity and really decide how she ended up where she did, I would have loved to see it. Her and Jinx’s convo where she says u don’t need me to protect u was actually rlly good, them reconnecting as equals & Vi seeing how jinx became a symbol of the undercity, fighting for it together, finding how she lost her way, like, cmon. Jinx not ending her story w yea actually u should die previously suicidal character, (don’t worry, this is a good way to die) and instead doing the hard work of rebuilding, and seeing a future for herself that isn’t painted in tragedy, surrounding herself w ppl who love her and help her grow (while silco loved her he could not help her grow bc of his own unhealed wounds) using her ingenuity to rebuild w ekko, like, ugh. These are very rough thoughts that got kinda, long, but yea in conclusion, while I loved the characters, the refusal to *commit* to the political message they started hurt the show a lot, and I’m rlly sad for what could have been.

I have a lot more thoughts about sevika and Mel as well but I’m mostly just bummed.

[genericpuff]

Now that I think about it, since Persephone was the Barley Mother mascot, shouldn't she have some money? Wouldn't she have gotten royalties from her likeness being used?

so at best this is sort of explained away in S1 when Persephone has her interview with Hades and he asks this exact question, why does she need a job if she's an heiress? And her response is basically that she doesn't want to be reliant on her mother's money, that she and her mother both want her to pursue her own path in life... and also she's an immortal from the Mortal Realm so being an heiress makes no sense because Demeter will logically never have to pass down the role in death which is usually how it works.

And honestly, that on its own would have been fine and makes perfect sense for the context of the comic at the time, but then that context changed, and now we have:

1.) Rachel later making Demeter out to be a villain for being a "helicopter parent" and "controlling her daughter", when in reality she was literally supportive of Persephone wanting to go to school from the get-go, she just wasn't certain her daughter should outright move to Olympus, she wanted her to commute, that was it (and was she really wrong to worry about her daughter's safety in Olympus when within her literal first day of living there she was intoxicated by Eros and dumped in Hades' car with the intention of embarrassing her, and then literally the next night was assaulted by Apollo?? Like I don't think Demeter would be all "I told you so" but maybe... maybe there was a reason she was worried and wanted her daughter to commute 💀😭) and;

2.) Persephone going from trying to be independent so she's not reliant on her mother's money... to being completely co-dependent on Hades and his money. How feminist lmao

That said, yes, technically Persephone does have money, and I'd like to think that if she did get royalties, it would be in an account for her and wouldn't just be taken by her mom (though apparently neither of them use banks so ??? where is Demeter keeping all this money LOL) and at the VERY least she's due to inherit what's presumably a massive fortune and company for herself if her mother ever steps down. So the comic does play a very frustrating tug-of-war between Persephone being the "comes from nothing" valley girl who marries into wealth... and a trust fund baby who was always wealthy and became wealthier after marrying into more wealth.