#like even if ur not feeling the that games story

[gristlegrinder]

tag screenshot 1: #see also: i could write you a whole essay on the plush elder dragon trinkets #<- prev I would be thrilled to read that #I didn’t even realise there could be meaning behind those stats and will now look at the wiki page for every plush dragon #guild wars 2

tag screenshot 2: #yes yes yes and also UR TAG ABOUT THE STUFFIES #yes please write it cus i feel the same #i wish so badly theyd turn them into homestead decos #or something bc their icons are so cute and i love the flavor text

YES OKAY this took me a bit to get back to but!! elder dragon infodumping!!!! as fair warning, i am not an expert on buildcraft, but i’m trying my best.

anyways, i think all of the dragon plushies are actually really interesting viewed as deliberate character choices for each of them, both in terms of general vibes and how those stat combinations work. here are all of my thoughts, in story order:

zhaitan has grieving (power, condition damage, precision, ferocity) stats. first off, in the game, grieving stats are deeply intertwined with relics of the dead, beyond just the melancholic name. most of the gear that comes preloaded with grieving stats is in some way associated with death and burial— funerary armor and weapons and trinkets from the tomb of the primeval kings, the elegy armor set from season 4, and halloween weapons like the carapace of chaos. intact elegy mosaics are literally tiles that were originally laid inside of the tombs of monarchs, displaying representations of their triumphs in battle (which is why you receive them from bounties and metas). there’s a very specific vibe that grieving gear comes packaged with, and while it’s not necessarily orrian, it is very much in theme with zhaitan’s interests and domain. and, more than anything, zhaitan has everything to mourn. “like all ruins, they become what they are, not what they held” is a reflection on orr, but it’s an insight that also suggests a family dynamic that has been left to degrade. zhaitan’s death was always going to be the beginning of the end, and it’s implied that he had always accepted that.

as a stat combination, grieving is a hybrid power/condi set where your conditions don’t last very long, but you can maximize bursts of damage output by focusing on crits. necromancers have always been the favored profession for grieving builds— scourge (at least historically) does really well with it in world vs world, and grieving gear is still used on condition reaper builds, where most of its condi damage comes from maximizing bleeds on a grandmaster trait and it otherwise prioritizes power damage. giving it to the undead freak seems like the obvious choice. but also, the stats and the playstyle feels appropriate for zhaitan in other ways. he lacks the defensive toughness/vitality attributes of his family, and is in some ways the weakest dragon; caught off-guard by the pact assault and blinded and starved. like, he can cause massive destruction through direct assault (see: claw island), but it’s easy to take him down once you know where his weaknesses are (and any survivability associated with grieving builds is less about the stats and more just that you’re probably playing necro).

also, it feels fitting that zhaitan is the halloween dragon. i don’t really have much to say about that other than the obvious— during halloween, the barrier between tyria and the mists weakens, and the underworld is within reach through the mad king’s realm. so it’s death, death, death.

mordremoth uses trailblazer’s (toughness, condition damage, vitality, expertise) gear. this is one of the heart of thorns’ prefixes, although nothing really comes in trailblazers stats besides the gear you get from its crafting recipes. it’s kind of an interesting one, in that i have no idea who the trailblazer archetype is supposed to be. commander’s gear is the commander (duh), vigilant armor is associated with the vigil and laranthir, viper’s is for the forgotten, wanderer’s is for the exalted, and minstrel’s gear is largely associated with the virtues of the bardic profession. i would almost venture to guess that trailblazer’s is a prefix that is meant to represent the hylek, or even the jungle itself— first obtainable in tangled depths as you venture deeper into mordremoth’s nest. either way, the jungle provides.

(also, fun fact, trailblazer’s gear is crafted with maguuma lilies, and one of the only other uses for them is in crafting an orb of natural essence when reforging caladbolg. haha.)

trailblazer’s gear is surprisingly solid all-purpose condi gear for open world and wvw, having a lot of personal durability without sacrificing too much condition damage. mordremoth is a tanky guy who bites hard— he and zhaitan are similar beasts in fights like harvest temple, loving poison AOEs and fears (so many poison AOEs), but mordremoth throws his own weight around more, with headbutts and crowd control skills. mordremoth is the most hardened of the six of them with that toughness, as well. he’s a character that sees the world in terms of domination and submission, but also as an existence that requires the constant challenge of survival. anything in the jungle can eat you if you can’t defend yourself.

i think it’s interesting that you get plush mordy during lunar new year, and plush ess during SAB. for the longest time, i could not figure out the reasoning for that, especially since soo-won is tied so closely to cantha— and then it hit me. the heart of thorns campaign lasted from 30 zephyr to 74 zephyr, meaning the initial assault and mordremoth’s call would have been around the equivalent of january 30th, right around when the new year starts. his plush is commemorating that. discovering this while writing all of this did make me shout and i am now sharing it with you.

kralkatorrik uses diviner’s (power, concentration, precision, ferocity). this is one of two stat combinations introduced during season 4, alongside plaguedoctor’s gear for the joko half of the season, and it has a lot of personal connections to kralky: frodak steelstar (the ascended namesake) assisted glint in crafting the original dragonsblood spear, diviner’s gear is crafted with branded masses, and dragonsblood weapons in-game are diviner’s pieces. there’s also perhaps the obvious connection between “divination” and the prophetic sight that kralkatorrik, glint, and aurene all possess. it’s kind of kralkatorrik, it’s kind of glint, and it’s all family trauma all the way down.

not a lot of meta power boon support builds actually use diviner’s gear, though, because a lot of them reach concentration cap without it. whatever. it’s more interesting that kralkatorrik is a boon support build. concentration as a defining attribute gives him an almost mystic vibe, in line with both the visions he’s had in the past and the connection to the mists he gains from consuming part of balthazar. he’s wise beyond his years, but also hurting tremendously under the burden of all of the magics inside of him. he’s still primarily a dps build, because destroying everything will cease the torment inside of his head, but he has further insight into the weight of the cycle, and he does find ways to support the commander and aurene in moments of clarity.

finally, plush kralk is available during the festival of the four winds, which is both a summery festival and one largely centered around the zephyrites— so again, it all circles back around to glint.

jormag’s plushie uses bringer’s (expertise, precision, vitality) stats. it’s one of the two prefixes associated with wintersday, being crafted with snowflakes and found exclusively on wintersday rewards outside of crafting. hooray hooray. admittedly there isn’t much going on with bringer’s gear outside of tixx and wintersday. like, okay, jormag is associated with snow, and icebrood corruption is often framed as a gift bestowed upon the lucky. what else is there to say? but i do think you could also draw parallels between jormag’s vision of the world encased in endless winter and the original spirit of wintersday, grenth and dwayna (child and mother, even!) fighting over the changing of the seasons and their cycles.

bringer’s gear is uh… nobody really uses it because it’s not good. it has no damage or any real synergy between its stats. from what i understand, bringer’s gear is (in theory) largely best at focusing on non-damaging conditions— meaning you mostly use it as a supplement mixed with more damage-heavy pieces. i think the lack of damage on their stats is really interesting, both in contrast to primordus (and everybody else, really) and in that it highlights how jormag doesn’t like getting their own claws dirty in a fight if they don’t have to. they’re largely enabling somebody else’s ability to do damage on their behalf, like with ryland. the conditions that benefit the most from bringers are also generally non-damaging, movement-based conditions— such as, most fittingly for jormag, chill. it’s very much jormag’s style, and claw of jormag is always a never ending cycle of being chilled over and over again get me out get me out get me out—

as discussed, plush jorms is the wintersday collectible and there’s not much more to say about it. obvious pick. i think jormag can cloak the world in eternal winter if they want. my one additional comment is like, hey, side note, do you guys ever start thinking about how jormag’s blood canonically tastes like peppermint?

primordus, meanwhile, uses marauder’s (power, precision, vitality, ferocity) gear. of all of the prefixes, marauder has the least to do with primordus thematically out of all of the stat combinations— it’s associated with pirates and mariners, originally having a connection to grymm svaard from the sea of sorrows novel and in more recent times being retroactively associated with the aetherblades. the crafting materials don’t really resonate with primordus, nor do the characters associated with any related gear. this one, i think, is meant to be all about the actual use case for marauder’s gear, more than anything else. unless you could, like, maybe make some argument about naval marauding + barbed thorns (primarily dropping from mushrooms, mordrem, and treants/druids) suggest an association with draconis mons and the ring of fire, but that feels like a stretch to me.

so, marauder’s gear is about raw power damage, but it’s more protective than berserkers— its what you take if you just want to hit things until they’re dead, but you also don’t want to die immediately. he’s not tough, though; it’s a vitality build. he’s not mordremoth, who has armored himself against the world. primordus is soft under the surface, warm lava under volcanic rock— he can protect himself, but he doesn’t want to throw himself into fights until it hurts too much to do anything else. he’s a character that hides underground in the depths of tyria, and any destruction in his wake erupts recklessly when he’s provoked. now, that destruction comes in instantaneous, hard-hitting bursts, meteor strikes and wildfire blazes, but at least they’re over quick.

you can get him during dragon bash, which in its modern iteration is largely associated with the dragonstorm. and braham’s there in hoelbrak! braham’s his best friend! also, dragon bash and wintersday are on direct opposite ends of the year (june/july and december/january). that’s real balance, baby. although, i do tend to forget that dragon bash is considered a summer festival when its events are placed in the shiverpeaks.

lastly, soo-won uses ritualist’s (vitality, condition damage, concentration, expertise) gear. it’s one of the two prefixes added in end of dragons, and soo-won is deeply tied to cantha— it’s where the world, her world, started; and it’s where her world ended. you tie ritualist’s gear to spirit-workers who were pulling magic from the void of the mists long before the six arrived in tyria, when all we had were the dragons. additionally, the luxon weapons are ritualist’s gear, tying her to their traditionally-seafaring culture. i also think it’s fun to associate her with togo’s ascended gear, when togo is called the defender of cantha, something soo-won and kuunavang have similarly stepped up as in the wake of the tsunami following the rising of orr.

it’s our other boon support build, although it just feels different than kralkatorrik’s diviner’s set. i think that’s because ritualist’s isn’t really the direct condition-based equivalent of diviner’s gear, as it sacrifices power for additional vitality. it feels like we ultimately met a soo-won that has been divided into two, between the maternal character that she is— soft, protective, resigned to her mistakes— and the corrupting void that she has always carried inside of her. soo-won is, by all accounts, not a particularly violent dragon, not until the dragonvoid finally wraps its tendrils around her. (unless they’re planning some fun lore drops whenever we get the deep sea horror expansion). so, while kralkatorrik is primarily a dps character who happens to have boons, soo-won feels like a character who was originally more support-oriented, but now has more of a bite, one that’s been festering and threatening to spread.

plush ess is available during super adventure festival. we’ve already discussed why mordremoth is associated with lunar new year instead of soo-won, but i think it’s also fun to associate soo-won with SAB when she’s the most technologically-forward of the dragons, shedding her excess magic into the energized jade that powers cantha. i think soo-won could have been a gamer if joon gave her the opportunity.

dragons! rawr!

i’m always delighted when i realize the gw2 devs have done something playful with the stat combos on gear. right now i’m looking at the sinful weapons from SOTO for reasons, and you should’ve seen the big goofy grin on my face when i realized they gave the greed weapon (avarice’s command) celestial stats… because it wants a little bit of everything

also envy’s bite having vipers stats, despair’s lament and regret’s memory both having grieving, rage’s fist having berserkers…….. very cute 10/10

[gifti3]

ppl r desperate for a demon otome/dating game where they are more demonic and w.hb was touching on that but ig they r getting ahead of themselves

[cyrantelnovapaleorayeeso]

"i dont see what ppl see in the lore its so boring"

shuffles my feet around, most ppl talking about the lore are exclusively talking about love nikki and shining nikki, the two games most ppl started the series with and have been around longer so theyve had time to explore their stories

now granted im assuming this person has only played infinity nikki, if not then hey not everyone is gonna like/care for the lore thats just how it is with video games

i havent spent too much time with infinity nikki bc i move at a snails pace and only play a little bit at a time so i cant say much on its lore

but these games tend to slowly move towards the more out there lore ok you gotta wait like a year before someone dies off

its also a gacha game so ur not getting all the lore at once ok they gotta have reason to keep ppl coming back and playing

[yuwuta]

something i think is absolutely bonkers is when fans of an anime/manga start publicly saying fuck you to the mangaka—who is still a very real person—just because the villainous character, who is not real at all, they wanted to fuck died

[obsessivefangirl]

"Stan favors Mabel and Ford Dipper" WRONG!!!

[rintoki]

can someone give me a quick guide to liking sylus bc it’s been a like good month of me unlocking him and i just .

[twinklefantasia]

on one hand wanting them to bring over features from style savvy

on the other hand wanting fashion dreamer to be able to be its own game....

[asmodeusamaryllis]

I don't think I can keep being open minded to n@tl@n guys

[bananasfosterparent]

[seventh-district]

so uh. that 2.2 Special Program, huh

[toestalucia]

this tagline...T_^ thinks about how main story alrdy referenced other timelines such as boundary power captain & like all of the events currently on the anni page? isnt only the sara & cagliostro events missing? along with all the different jobs, like its ssooo cheesy but i alrdy rly loved that they rly do lean into the timeline thing with 'everyone experiences granblue differently', so seeing this...regardless of the intention of it

[theladyfae]

nothing to me will ever be more iconic than my beloved mutual managing to get me so invested in a (rarepair) ship for a media i had no previous interaction with that i was actively making my own headcanons abt their potential relationship dynamic and making song associations and engaging in others’ brainrot for months before i ever even considered getting in to said media. and now a year later i’m finally writing fic for them but still know next to nothing abt what they’re like in canon cause i still haven’t made it to that part of the story, the memories of the shared delusion are genuinely the only thing keeping me going.

[gifti3]

its been a long time since i found a game that had me excited for whats to come

this is a me thing that im talking about below... usually when i play games, its mainly about it preoccupying my brian with tasks and goals. this is why i gravitate towards sim and management games! to me thats whats enjoyable

i feel like its rare that i just play something just cause its fun to me if that makes sense. and i think infinity nikki is managing to do that like im not progressing through the story super quickly and kind of just letting myself explore, dress up and take pictures at my own pace and im really hoping it stays like this for me for a long time

[opens-up-4-nobody]

Naruto shippuden things that made me lose my mind (ep 424-season 20 ep 30):

Madara just shot a laser out of his mouth?

Madara: he can see my limbo???

Madara sailing thru the air: I'll be taking that *rips Kakashi's eye out of his skull*

Madara, casually: sasuke sure is quick *gets sliced in half by sasuke*

Kakashi, thinking abt young team 7: I misunderstood you all then, in some ways I probably still do (Kakashi, u just said it was sakura's job to pull sasuke from the darkness, that is the most fundamental misunderstanding of team 7 u could have)

*apocalyptic things happening* shikamru: I think something bad's happening over there (thanks, dumbass)

Tenzo's dream is for team 7 to accept him as their captain 😭

Sasuke getting purple snake goo spit in his face made me laugh aloud

Madara, talking abt chakra: I will get rid of this curse upon humanity (do it, king!)

This is from a filler english dub episode but: Christmas exists in naruto -> ninja Jesus confirmed

It's so unbelievable in tenten's mind that she could protect and be valuable to her friends and village that the infinite tsukuyomi put her into the Menma AU. That's fucked up.

Jesus. Karin's backstory. Pretty fucked up that she's gonna end up working for orochimaru forever.

Tsunade's infinite tsukuyomi dream: I would like to join the audience in watching the TV show Naruto

I feel like it says a lot that senju tsunade set a huyga at the center of the Akatsuki plan instead of a uchiha

Everytime they talk about neji, the more you can feel how hard they fucked up by killing him

Fuck sasuke being a cop. I hate it. But also sasuke is the type of person who would become batman. He ran around calling himself an avenger. I hate it but it doesn't feel wrong. It is funny tho that instead of joining orochimaru, sasuke's evil arc is becoming a cop.

[llegato]

when i was 11 corpse party fucked me up so bad like i was lying awake at night thinking oh shit what if i wake up in heavenly host

[orcelito]

Not sure how I feel about persona 5 x.

Like a: it being a mobile game means I won't be able to play it bc I got No room on my phone lmao

But b: I'm just like. Why. Why? If the setup is the exact same as persona 5, then Why tell the story again? Get a different mascot, a different white girl, a different school uniform of checkered pants... lecherous teacher?? Exact same mechanics??? Literally what is the point of this?

I do enjoy the velvet room concept & the protagonist's design, but everything about this just feels... pointlessly redundant. Maybe I'll be proven wrong, but it feels like the sort of spin off of the likes of Trinity Soul. Just riding off the original's popularity, but doing Nothing new with it.

I'd love to be proven wrong! But also just. Why.