#like. what. seriously

[yellowocaballero]

i simply must ask- what makes an OP character (protag or otherwise) *work* for you, vs what doesnt?

Hi! This is a very astute and good question.

It's tension.

When a character is in a fight scene, the basic question and source of the tension is "Will they win?". Logically, they're probably going to win, they're the hero - but there should be a push and pull within the fight, where the audience pinballs between "he's going to win!/oh no, he might lose!".

You can't do that with an OP character. There's never any question. He's going to win. So the tension has to come from someplace else. You have to ask a different question.

The question can vary. "Will he win under his self-imposed constraints?" (e.g., your OP character is a pacifist and wants to win without shooting his gun). "Will he win without going Sicko Mode, which is bad and distresses all of us?" (e.g., your OP character is only OP when he unleashes the Demon Self, which is bad for him). "Will he win without revealing his identity or secret? (e.g., your OP character has to win a fight without using his OP powers, because otherwise he'll face social repercussions).

Alternatively/in addition, you change the type of conflict. If your character is guaranteed to succeed at every physical fight, then the primary/'real' conflict should be on an emotional, intellectual, or psychological level. The story can no longer be about the physical fights. They have to be won through intellect or cleverness. The path towards victory has to be through intelligence, kindness, self-actualization, etc.

But absolutely most importantly: watching the OP character be OP should be fun. It should make us pump our fists in the air and go 'fuck yeah!'. It should be thrilling, exciting, and a spectacle. We know the detective is going to catch the bad guy - we're watching for the how. We know the clever protag is going to pull one over on the bad guy through sleight of hand and trickery, we're watching for the reveal of what exactly they did. Don't neglect the joys of watching Mr. OP be delightfully OP. But that is the payoff, and we need sufficient buildup to get there. Watching Mr. OP go sicko mode is the joy, but it's not the path. It's no longer about the if they're going to win, it's about the how. And that should be fun to watch.

My friend @lazuliquetzal has good commentary on this, as usual: that when we say "a character needs to have flaws to be interesting", what we really mean is "a story should not bend itself to accommodate a character". A character without flaws is fine, actually. But the story shouldn't backflip to give them everything they want. This is all really simple. For some reason people act as if this is extremely hard.

TL;DR: Watch Mob Psycho 100 and then sit and figure out why Mob Psycho 100 is one of the best anime of all time. Between One Punch Man and Mob Psycho 100, ONE understands how to do this.

[x0401x]

So I just saw a post by a random personal blog that said “don’t follow me if we never even had a conversation before” and?????? Not to be rude but literally what the fuck??????????

I’ve had people (non-pornbots) try to strike conversation out of nowhere in my DMs recently, and now I’m wondering if they were doing that because they wanted to follow me and thought they needed to interact first. I feel compelled to say, just in case, that it’s totally okay to follow this blog (or my side blog, for that matter) even if we’ve never talked before.

Also, I’m legit confused. Is this how follow culture works right now? It was worded like it’s common sense but is that really a thing?

[hinamie]

mentor

[idontmindifuforgetme]

Guys I’m going on an aggressive fundraising spree for one week (my own personal strike basically), and I really want anyone who can to join me in boosting the fundraisers I’m about to highlight. I’ll be particularly focusing on grassroots orgs and campaigns that have had little luck in the last few weeks. I encourage anyone to not only share the fundraiser posts but also write posts of their own. I’m only one person and without other people’s help it’s virtually impossible to get anything done, so please do what you can

[thetimelordbatgirl]

Imagine actually being so evil that you'd rather make sure your writers suffer financially instead of just paying them the pay they deserve. Hell truly has some seats reserved already, holy shit.

[dangeroustaintedflawed]

[demigods-posts]

i'm one hundred percent certain that after percy and annabeth made out underwater. and he wanted to make their relationship official. the question was not "will you be my girlfriend?" but "can i be your boyfriend?" i don't care what the canon says. percy gave annabeth the space to take the lead in the relationship. because after a lifetime of being abandoned by everyone she dared to care for. and then watching her on the brink of a panic attack at the thought of losing him the last four years. he wanted to honor a new beginning between them by follow her lead and moving at her pace.

[unofficial-project-2025]

GAY FURRY HACKERS HACKED THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION AND RELEASED THE FOLLOWING CHAT LOGS. WHAT THE FUCK.

EDIT: https://files.catbox.moe/i0tkbp.txt here's the entire chatlog.

EDIT 2:

Since this post is gaining traction, I'm adding a link to a good summary of Project 2025.

[thesunoficarus1]

to add on to my last post

[muppetfreak]

Mr. Riordan, it is truly a pleasure getting to experience your second draft.

[shblackwoodart]

i was sad because my laptop cant run veilguard so i painted foolish in inquisition tarot style welcome back to 2014 i guess

[forgetful-nerd]

We've all talked about Leo and his affinity with being thrown through windows, but has anyone else notice how frequently Raph get eye trauma?

[thecryptidzenith]

When Schrodinger was talking about the cat in box that's both alive and dead, he was talking about Kalina. She's a goddess's familiar, she's a plague, she worked for Fantasy MI6, she died, she came back, she got rage stared, she snapped her own neck, she came back as the companion for a god borne from a Fantasy Mormon child's misplaced belief. She's alive and dead, good and evil. She worked tirelessly for 800 years towards one goal and then fucking abandoned it (maybe.) Her goddess thinks she can fix her. Her goddess's wife always hated her. She is everyone's problem at all times and holy shit is she a Problem. What a fucking legend.

[jackalopescruff]

wikipedia is always trying to hit funding goals and all I have to say is if they made a cunty wikipedia crop top like the USPS did for themselves theyd be funded for the next 15 years on tgirl sales alone

[lilybug-02]

Pain is a great motivator…

Part 26 || First || Previous || Next

—Full Series—

Meanwhile Toriel:

(Loud noises don't wake her up usually.)

Artist note: I’m so proud of this :))) I know it’s a lot of dialogue and reading, but dialogue is grueling work for me. I’m glad with the art and for the amount of pages I made in such a relatively short time span -w- page 5 was super fun to work on. A lot of blood, sweat, and hours here... :) The backgrounds were a big bore tbh, but I finished them! Yippie!

[mohntilyet]

i promise i am not veering into caterina apologism i think lucanis and illario fans should unionise to kill her. but it is sooooo fun to me to think of how all her children and almost all her grandchildren are dead and all the terrible, abusive lessons she taught (presumably that she herself was taught by her own parents) were for nothing. it didn’t make them strong enough to survive in the crows. and then she becomes guardians to lucanis and illario and she carries the guilt and the cycle continues. the lessons just have to be even harder this time, and then it will stick. what it creates instead is a man who doesn’t want anyone to suffer as he did, and the spare who is convinced what happened to his family was inevitable. house dellamorte is so cooked