#learning with Mage

[enneamage]

Greetings everyone, today I’m going to talk about Fawn™️ and Fawning.

Fawn is the people-pleasing instinct that comes from a similar place that Fight Flight and Freeze do. Talking about fawn is a bit complicated because unlike explaining stuff with “you see a bear wyd” panic responses, fawning happens 90% between people and the way it can present is as complicated as interpersonal relationships are.

A lot of the conversation around Fawn is in complex ptsd circles because of how prevalent it can become after being exposed to dangerous power dynamics where someone can’t afford to upset someone else, but the ‘ability’ to fawn is a potential in most people even if they don’t have trauma. Going back to the bear for a minute, giving the bear all your food so you stay on its good side and doesn’t attack you would be an example. Outside of the bear example you could start people-pleasing at the threat of the loss or disapproval of someone (both very subjective- this is the more textured human part) by offering things, faking agreement, minimising your own needs or bargaining/begging.

Not all people-pleasing is fawning in the same way that not all arguments or fear are fight/flight responses, so it takes some eyeballing to get a sense of when someone is fawning. Keep an eye out for situations where someone is in a (subjectively) high-adrenaline situation or under stress. On the flip side, fawning can kind of get watered down into patterns everyday life in the same way that fight and flight can in terms of traits/patterns- someone who ‘prefers’ to smooth things over (at all costs) vs someone who ‘prefers’ to get angry vs someone who ‘prefers’ to just leave.

[vir-dirthera]

solas was a yapper in dai for sure but now that he doesn't have to hold back anything about who or what he is I bet lavellan is getting hit with a category 5 infodump every day

[jeeaark]

For a spell that's called the void blade, Rookster sure gets two blades out of the deal. Now the question is: Can they only conjure up a knife or can it be any blade?

Rook discovers the new void blade spell does not toast, but, in fact, explodes

[unionizedwizard]

one of my favorite (minor?) things about g'raha tia's characterization is that he Doesn't know what a wizard *is*. Like historically he plainly has no idea about the history of magic and how it works (fair, he was not a mage before and his studies have relatively little to do with magic. phd specializing you know how it is). Which is what the absolutely baffling, "blink at him in confusion"-style line he says (as the Exarch!) in post-SHB ("I am not a skilled mage, just making use of the crystal tower's boundless aether reserves") implies. He seems to labor (still!!) under the impression that the *actual* great mages of the past (or present) just Did That all by themselves and without relying on extra sources of aether, Because They Were Just That Good, which of course is patently untrue especially if you play magic classes yourself. The Mhachi raids and the BLM quests both establish that black magic was refined by great sorcerers of eld mages who were extremely skilled......... at finding new ways to exploit aether: 1) summoning and enslaving voidsent and 2) siphoning aether from the environment (with the consequences that we know). All the great feats of magic in history have been supplemented with concentrated aether from one source or another, no matter how clever or skilled the mages might have been otherwise! Actually, like 50% of the feat seems to be about figuring out new ways to acquire sufficient stores of concentrated aether (and this is a highly conservative estimate). But somehow this doesn't register to him, and because he "merely inherited and perfected" the summoning spell from his ironworks comrades and "merely inherited" the crystal tower's command, he doesn't "count" as a "real mage" in his own mind....... impostor syndrome king & #biased narrator alert

[unsanctitude]

⭕⬅😨THE SQUEEMERRRRRRR

[backtofiction28]

Rook: Lucanis, hear me out, but what if Spite did learn fire?

Spite (Lucanis): Give me! Fire!

Lucanis: NO.

Rook: But think about it, though. If Spite learned fire then you would have an easier time disposing of the bodies.

Spite (Lucanis): Rook! Is my! Favorite!

Lucanis: Mierda...

[itseghost]

sketch of my warden :] really enjoying origins so far

[masterrainb0w]

Obsessed with the way that they crave violence because that is the only time they are allowed to touch. I do not reflect that in these sketches.

[nami-moittli]

Y’know what I wanna see? Malleus being bullied. More specifically I want to see Idia bully Malleus. I wanna see that boy snap and forget his social anxiety and just absolutely let it off on Malleus.

Btw. This is based off of this text post:

Like:

Malleus, getting annoyed: “Shroud. I think I know how to discern different shapes from each other.”

Idia, fed up with this BS: “Oh? Oh really? Because I just told you ‘the square at the top right’ and Y’know what you pressed? Do you? Because let me tell you, it wasn’t fucking that

“Shro-“

“No. No I don’t fucking care. What are you gonna do, huh? What’cha gonna do to me, for trying to help you with something that you asked for help with. It’s not my fucking fault if you can’t tell the difference between ‘the square’ and the fucking printer icons. Sounds like a major ‘you’ problem honestly, a real skill issue on your part!”

“Shroud.”

“Ah, so you’re gonna threaten me, huh? Saying my name and bringing your magic to your palm. I’ll ask you again, what are you going to do? Kill me? Nah, you care way too much about the frailty of human life to actually consider doing. ‘Make me wish I wasn’t born?’ Yeah, like that’s not vague as shit. And newsflash buddy! I already feel that way anyway! What else? You’re gonna strike me with lightning? Go ahead and try! As if I haven’t already lived through that! No. You’re not going to do anything to me. You’re going to sit the fuck down like the kindergartener throwing a tantrum you are, and you’re going to do this stupid ass block puzzle, because I genuinely don’t think you can do it! But if you want to storm off and/or attack me, then that’s fine too! Not like you have to go back and face Lilia or anything. And you know what! I don’t want to do this either! I’m only doing this because Lilia, who I might remind you is like, 700 years old and still knows more about technology than you, a mere 178 year old, gave up on teaching you and is using me as a last resort! So if that’s what you want to do, fine! You can go back knowing that you’ll live another fucking idk, 10000 years, with technology leaving you further and further behind, and you can sit and stew about how your guardian gave up on you and you attacked the human who was trying to help you, because you couldn’t fucking do it! Ugh!”

“…”

“I’m sorry Shroud.”

“That’s what I fucking thought. Now sit down and tell me which hole this block goes into.”

[vigilskeep]

Your child inquisitor has given me thoughts

Specifically about what specialisation they’d pick.

Though honestly only the Mage ones cause I only played a non mage once

But

Lil baby Necromancer. Tiny Knight Enchanter. Smol Rift Mage

The Necromancer one they could raise themselves a friend 🥹🥰

Aaaaaah I do not need another wip 😱😉💞

mage child inquisitor: i just wanted to raise myself a friend :(

dorian: well! that’s creepy

varric: you’re the necromancer!

dorian: oh, no, no pinning this on me! i took necromancy to get on a study abroad programme, not to explain this little horror. i do not have friends—

sera: pfft. well we all know that

dorian: however will i recover from that bruise to my ego from someone currently hiding behind a sofa

sera: make it stop doing the skeleton thing!

[saphira-approves]

The Ancient Language and True Names: Some Musings

So as a preface, let’s first recount some of the rules of the Ancient Language we’re told/shown through the books (spoilers through Inheritance):

One cannot lie in the Ancient Language

This doesn’t mean you cannot say something objectively untrue—so long as you believe it is true, you can say it (see: Murtagh tells Eragon at the end of Eldest that they are both sons of Morzan, which Murtagh can do because he doesn’t know about Selena having an affair with Brom)

Magic, however, is a bit trickier—intent can go a long way, but a grammatical or syntactical error can obliterate your intention (see: Eragon tries to bless a child, uses the noun form of “shield” instead of the verb form, accidentally curses the child)

So what am I getting at? Well!

In Inheritance, Eragon and Saphira follow a riddle-prophecy to Doru Araeba, the magic-nuked seat of power of the previous incarnation of the Order of Dragon Riders, and find their way into the magically-hidden fallout shelter with a forgetting spell on it that holds several Eldunarya and dragon eggs protected from the magic nuke blast and hidden from Galbatorix’s reach.

Or, put another way:

Saphira Bjartskular, the first new dragon in a century, the only living female out of five living-or-soon-to-hatch dragons (the others being Glaedr, Shruikan, Thorn, and Fírnen), literally the LAST CHANCE for the existence of HER ENTIRE SPECIES… finds out that she isn’t, actually, the last chance. That dozens, a few hundreds of eggs survived, and statistically at least a few of them have to be more females, and dragons will be fewer than before, certainly, and it will be centuries before they reach their previous numbers, but they won’t be doomed to a drawn-out spiral of inbreeding and decline and eventual, final, end.

And then she forgets.

Temporarily! But the memory is removed, excised for her protection and the protection of that precious maybe-future. Saphira’s view of the world, of herself, of her very place in the world, is completely overthrown… and then she returns to what had been the status quo (admittedly with the souls of several other dragons—but functionally this is just Glaedr, multiplied).

The question I pose is: what happened to Saphira’s true name?

On a broader, more generalized scale, the question really is this: what happens to a true name when the memory of a major name-changing event is altered somehow—either by removing the memory of an event that happened, or implanting a false memory of an event that did not happen, or changing the elements of that memory? What rule of the Ancient Language applies here—belief, or The Words Themselves? Is a true name built on memory? On how life experience physically shapes the brain?

Does Saphira wonder at the giddiness in her chest when she thinks of the Eldunarya, quietly thinking that the instinctive chemical reaction is an overenthusiastic response to ghosts that can advise, but never repopulate?

Would Galbatorix, if the battle had gone differently, have been intrigued by the curious lack of I am the last in Saphira’s true name?

Or would he have seen exactly what he expected to? I am the last—and hope is lost.

[therestofmyfandoms]

okay but brennan describing the Rat Grinders as "level 20 features, but without the builds to back them up" when, all season long, the Bad Kids have proven time and time again that what wins their fights are not the sick ass abilites that come with higher levels, but the basic, most fundamental of cantrips and first level spells. the work that Bless has done for them is so incomprehensible to the Rat Grinders. this is why they're being fucking slaughtered. they just dont understand

[assmaster-8000]

𝑪𝒍𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒐 ✧

✧ Regret

✧ Rememberance

✧ Reunion

✧

All men are equal in death. To Clotho, such is their reigning tenet.

And to Clotho, a man like them sheds no tear for the departed. A necromancer need not fear death, for it is a cycle devouring upon itself, and they are the ringmaster of this primal instinct. As in— need, should, must. One must not fear, one must not ache or pine or rage. A snake is still a snake. Death is still a wild animal. Show your soft palm within the ribcage of your fist, and it will not yield to you. Clotho, for all their cool expertise, knows this through trial and error.

All men are equal in death. So this mantra becomes their epitaph for every sentiment buried under the grave of their tongue.

It's a corpse beneath the floorboards; this memory. The tremble in their fingers - the shortness of breath. Their prized coherence pooling out their ears like brains on a sidewalk. Black is all they've known the world to be, but this time it is blue. Saliva spilling past the shore of her lips. Piercing red lightning streaking through the sky of her eyes. She does not respond when they shake her. By God— what have you done?

All men are equal. Their mother was no man, no monster. Mother, simple and sweet, was cruel enough to damn her. As they were.

Their tears come soft on the linen of her robes. She is softer still. The used crowd of spellbooks and artifacts and alchemical instruments behind them laugh hollow at the display. Wire is taut, so is cloth. Neither will hold them now, after destroying the muscle that stretched to cradle their wretched self. So they bind her in her day shroud. And they bury her in the belly of the primordial Mother.

On her grave, they plant a singular Asphodel. Their one specimen.

And when they shakily kneel back to look down at the mount of soil, for a moment - just a moment, their nails slip back beneath the dirt. Back to where home was.

A moment was all it took. Soon as it comes, they rip it out her shabby resting grounds and lay it on their crown. That brain-shaped gilded mausoleum of theirs. So it has remained all this while - so has she, with that memory just as equal as a dead man.

But you know they never stay where they're supposed to for long.

In the land of the dead, asphodels are for the gray in between. They are the sustenance of the dead. They are my regrets, following you to the grave. O, Mother. You raised a walking corpse. As long as I hold you in my heart, the grave goes where I go; and dead men tell no tales, so... I love you. Isn't that the worst thing you've ever heard?

[dirty-bosmer]

Mages Guild doodles I drew while sick

[freelanceplatypus]

Dragon Age Origins demon got me by the shoulders "ooohhh you wanna play a blood mage so bad. Ooohh blood blood blood"

[randomname3]

Old minecraft magic mods joint lore my beloved