#mavrus

[averyho]

There's no way siobhan making the dieing minions say love is love isn't a reference to zack guesting on nadpod and having mavrus yell love is love in a battle!! I refuse to believe anything else!!

[spellslinging]

hot boy summer wip 

[elieasal]

Mavrus the Unskooled on the cover of the Gladeholm Gazette

Mavrus isn’t the most popular choice for Champion of Gladholm, but that’s not gonna bother him. Renn can eat it

Based on The Gladeholm Wizard Tournament Arc

[charlilil]

Wait, you’re saying I can have one of these?

[nemospecific]

Shoutout to NADDpod, where he is both.

While I love Zac playing himbos, there is something so fun about him playing assholes

[maxbarthelemy]

Mavrus the Unskooled, keeper of the Matrix Sunglasses. Just finished a hot boy summer relisten.

[tiredbread]

can i sidebar with you real quick?

[emiko-matsui]

not zac oyama my beloved. zac oyama THE beloved. of all time.

[joenhead]

Hey yall, we still talk abt hot boy summer ‘round here?

anyways hiii I think about them a lot theyre so silly ESPECIALLY hungry dave hes just a lil guy in a big guy body so guys lets please include him when we talk about the girls and the gays i think he has earned it !!!

I also made this:

[dykesynthezoid]

There’s something so #feminism about hot boy summer + blazing babe to me and it’s not even just bc it’s Emily dming, it’s specifically how she said well unlike in real life nothing will ever be easy for these four fuckass dudes literally ever. Her skill at setting the most perfect situational, social, and conversational traps is unparalleled. And she is so QUICK with it too. She is laser focused. It’s just like, fifteen hours of four guys actually experiencing Consequences. It’s incredible. It’s like getting schadenfreude directly in an IV.

[operationslipperypuppet]

here’s an insane chart of how the female naddpod npcs fall on a scale from grandma to aunt and hinged to unhinged because it’s clearly the best way to compare them to each other

everything is color coded by campaign based on first appearance (bc some c1 npcs have shown up in c3, etc).

[thevalleyisjolly]

There’s a weird recurring take in D20 fan circles that Zac doesn’t play “complex” characters and that people are just waiting for the day when he “finally” plays an asshole, which kind of baffles me.  Quite apart from the idea that only morally grey characters are complex or compelling, are you sure we’re watching the same show?

In Fantasy High, we have Gorgug, an adopted biracial teenager whose journey includes realizing his self-worth, coming to terms with his rage (literally), seeking out and navigating new relationships with others (his birth parents, the Bad Kids, Zelda), and discovering what he’s capable of. 

From The Unsleeping City we have Ricky, a second-generation Japanese-American, who has a very personal struggle across two seasons between doing the dutiful/sacrificial thing for other people’s benefit and expressing his own needs, wants, thoughts, and feelings; it’s a very particular exploration of immigrant generations and the relationship between the sacrificial model of your ancestors and the culture you grew up surrounded by which emphasizes the self.

There’s A Crown of Candy and Lapin, whose snark and one-liners are honestly less interesting than the way he engaged with and sought to understand religion and faith; the different yet similar ways in which both the Sugar Plum Fairy and the Church exerted control over their followers, and the search for spiritual meaning beyond these figures/institutions.

Then there’s Cumulous, whose every character aspect navigates a space of tension - the ultimate war guy who made himself hardened (literally) and pragmatic to get the job done but who also remains soft and caring and empathetic at the same time; wielding the power of death without glorifying or giving into it; the cousin who both is a member of the family and yet who remains at somewhat of a distance from the centre; a literal warrior-philosopher who is single-minded in battle and quietly thoughtful about the mysteries of life and death outside of it.

As for actual assholes, we have Norman Takamori in A Starstruck Odyssey, a bitter man who is the living embodiment of both the Superior Orders excuse as well as scapegoating.  On a side note, the amount of absolute vitriol and double standards which people threw at Norman during ASO for being an unapologetic asshole -and he had less than two full episodes of screen time- kind of underscores the calls for Zac to play a “real” asshole.  Zac can and will play whatever type of character he wants, but is fandom really ready for him to play an asshole if that asshole doesn’t have a secret heart of gold?

From the same season, we have Valdrinor/Skip, who starts as the “prince running from his destiny” archetype with a dash of brain slug possession, has a humorous yet oddly profound exploration of what humanity is and what it means to be human, and springboards from there into “wait, who am I really and actually, why are we doing things (brain slug possession) this way when there are other ways to engage with the universe.” 

Most recently in Neverafter, we have Pib, who apart from the fascinating meta element of being a literal character archetype, constantly straddles the line between self-absorbed self-interest and putting himself on the line to help others; his repeated demonstration of both at various points throughout the season is a subtle yet intriguing manifestation of free will and choice-making in a story all about lacking free will and agency.

So, I mean, lack of complexity where?  Does a character need to be an asshole in order to be deep or compelling?  And because I’ve heard this specific rebuttal quite a few times now, does a character need to vocalize their innermost thoughts loudly and frequently in order to prove their complexity?  If a character is “less vocal” compared to other characters, does that mean they lack interiority? 

Also, other people have brought this up before, but I am once again asking that people remember the difference between fictional characters and real life people.  Zac playing one (1) himbo on the show does not make him a himbo in real life, nor does it make him incapable of creating or playing complex characters (especially as said himbo is himself an extremely complex character), nor does it make him a lesser player than other cast members.  You don’t have to find all or any of his characters interesting or complex, but can we stop conflating character with player?

[jennegatron]

It's frankly a hogust miracle. I'm so excited that everyone will get to listen to blazing babe. I genuinely think it's my favorite naddpod story. The bon freres are my exact brand of shithead dumbass dirtbags and Mac Son of Mumford has one of the funniest lines of the whole entire run of the show during blazing babe. Please everyone do your best to observe a dry july because the reward of a hogust well earned will taste all the sweeter.

[definitelysapphic]

Emily doesn't get enough credit for how good she is at running mysteries. Between Hot Boys Summer and Twilight Sanctorum I'm blown away by her pacing. She reveals enough to keep you hooked but not so much that it ruins the suspense. Her clues aren't super obvious or too difficult, and they piece together so perfectly. I hope we get more mysteries from her in the future

[charlilil]

I relisten to hot boy summer so often and this bit always kills me

[evans-endeavors]

CALENDAR SNEAK PEEK

HOT BOY SUMMER!

What could Mavrus and the Bon Frères be up to?

~~

Me and some awesome artists got together to make a NADDPOD themed calendar for 2025!

You can get a physical copy at the Not Another D&D Calendar Etsy page!

Or a digital PDF on Gumroad!

All proceeds are going to The Palestine Children's Relief Fund (PCRF)