#not the friend playing the game and who made me start berserk

[bluastro-yellow]

I don't know how much legitimacy MBTI with a focus on functions actually has but my friend obsessed with it says I'm ENFP like Harry Du Bois so I'm happy

[honey-milk-depresso]

Batboys x reader who is a game/singer streamer

So I'm assuming that s/o is a singer + game streamer from what I can see soooo yeah! I think I went to focus on the gamer part than singer though. Also I could only do this for Dick, Jason and Tim because 😭 sorry ;-;;;

TT o TT

Batboys with a game (mostly) + singer s/o

Dick Grayson

Don’t even get me started on how hype Dick’s gonna be. You game??? And stream?????? Epic-

Dick has played video games with Tim before it’s just that he sucks at playing the modern one sometimes-, so he probably wants to do co-ops with you and maybe join your streams and play with you.

He sucks ASS though in Among Us because he’s bad at lying when he’s imposter and too trusting when he’s just a crew mate. He’s so funny though when you record him while playing with you and your other streamer friends.

“Awww, look at me and s/o walking together and building snowmen! We are so—”

*Kills him* “…” “s/O WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME ARE YOU TRYING TO BREAK UP WITH MEEEEEEE????”*loud sobbing*

Obviously, no, it’s just what you had to do as an imposter and you have to apologise to your sulky boyfriend.

Fun fact: bought your two of those matching cat ears headphones and he’s so sappy, dear god- he loves those earphones.

Also your voice?? IT’S SO GOOD??? You made your own songs and that’s so cool!! No wonder your fanbase is so big, damn-

And he’s obviously your biggest fan! <

Jason Todd

He’s trying, he really is. Because the last thing he played before he died were Game Boys and then he awoken to Wii Games, Nintendo Switches and whatever the fuck those online games are.

Those sus game ads he clicked randomly made him question what happened when he was still dead-

Jason thinks it’s pretty cool you stream gaming content and all, although don’t ask him to play any RPG with you because he’ll rage quit. He will go insane.

Jason keeps insisting on wanting to join your streams in Among Us but like come on- WE ALL KNOW HE’S GONNA START RAGING MORE-

When he gets killed, he calls the imposter a “Joker” 💀 Sometimes you have to calm him down and tell him it’s their role as imposter to do this. Also, when he gets imposter, he’ll kill everyone except you. Like he’s your bodyguard or something and everyone’s out to get you. You don’t even need to be imposter. If you did kill him before, he’ll kill you back though-

He’s okay if you let him play Minecraft together though, he finds it peaceful (on creative mode).

Listens to your songs on repeat while he’s repairing vehicles or hear it live on your stream when he’s reading. Wholesome supportive boyfriend stuff. <3

Tim Drake

Immediately follows all forms of social media you have, and give subs to every time you go live and stream. No hesitation.

He thinks it’s cool you stream games and all, something he wished to do but just doesn’t have much time to do so, and that he has no idea how to start up a fanbase anyways so-

Tim would join your streams every once in a while to play with you and he doesn’t mind any sort of games, he’s pretty good with the controller… well, maybe RPG. Because if he’s doing a multiplayer game like with Genshin needing to join servers and all, most of the time, people wouldn’t listen to his plans and end up dying and then he goes berserk. Only you listen s/o… wHY?? WHY DOES NOBODY LISTEN TO HIS STRATS????

Also, cat ears headphones?? He has one and he looks so cute in it and would ask if you want one too- he only wears those headphones in private though, or in front of you.

Anyways, Tim loves your singing too! Would listen it live or hear it on Spotify if it’s available. If you sing covers, it’s gonna ruin him. He can’t listen to the original track anymore because it’s just not the same-

Overall, gamer boyfriend you got here. <3

[hash1ras]

jjk hcs -`♡´- modern au

part one: yuji, megumi, nobara note: characters are aged up in this, early-mid 20's | banner image made by me ♡

⋆˙⟡♡ yuji

definitely the comedian of the group, he's always making you laugh

literally has thousands and thousands of followers on twitter, he's so popular fr (but so humble about it)

sweet tooth!!! always eating sweets, one night at a house party you watched him pull pocky out of his jacket & start snacking in the middle of the kitchen like ??? yuji please eat a vegetable im worried about your health smh

literal sweet baby angel

street style fashion king!!

loves hip hop music, his current favs are isaiah rashad & childish gambino he knows the words to every song (yuji’s playlist here)

carpool karaoke sessions w him and nobara!!

he's your best friend, you guys have sleepovers and random day trips together

gives the best hugs!!! (😭)

you two have a joint playlist on spotify

has a polaroid camera that he brings with him everywhere

his bedroom is covered with pics he's taken of you and the group<3

⋆˙⟡♡ megumi

the quiet one (ofc)

has his headphones in almost constantly, its usually deftones or nirvana

he also loves old jazz music????

the type of guy to send you 50 tiktoks in a row but never reply to yours smh

he's your go to video game partner

you love going over to his house just to snuggle with his dogs on the couch

he acts annoyed and gives a little "tch" as he walks by but secretly he thinks it's the cutest thing in the world

he likes playing soccer in his free time, like he's actually an insanely good player (okay go off blue lock)

manga collector

his favorite is berserk, like damn who hurt you bby

when he gets drunk, he's the life of the party and will even pull you out on the dance floor

but then he's grumpy as hell the next day because he's violently hungover and you're showing him videos of the night before (now he's burying his head in the pillow bc he's embarrassed)

his closet is literally all black clothing

you love stealing his jackets and shirts when he's not looking lmao

megumi is the one you go to when you're struggling with anything, he always gives the best advice with 0 judgement

⋆˙⟡♡ nobara

shopaholic!!!!!

will usually take mall trips with you, she'll facetime you from the dressing room to get your opinion on outfits and now you two are having a virtual date from across the dressing room hallway lmao

fortnite champion

she always kills megumi anytime they play together and he gets so mad, now he's screaming at nobara while you and yuji are dying from laughter on the couch

"the sweetest bitch you'll ever meet"

thats actually her instagram bio

loves cherry coke

club girl, you two love spending your weekends out dancing, occasionally you'll drag megumi & yuji out with you

you know those platonic codependent friendships? like does anyone wanna hang out for 15 days in a row? yeah that's you and nobara<3

has a sanrio obsession & a plushie collection to match (she calls you the kuromi to her melody)

she's a swiftie

her favorite album is reputation

gives the best boy advice

requests are open!#

[vvluvmai]

𝑭𝑺𝑴 ✩ 𝑰𝑵𝑨𝑹𝑻𝑰𝑪𝑼𝑳𝑨𝑻𝑬

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ(adj.) incapable of expressing oneself clearly through speech

warn. Fem reader, ooc kaiser?, Tiny spoilers, mentions of alcohol, drunk kaiser, nicknames (mein singvogel [my songbird], princess, bastard), not exactly proofread, angst w/ comfort, part ii INARTICULATE

sum. With the stress and frustration from losing to mr. Blue Lock, from the humility of being called a clown of his story, and bottling up his emotions into a tiny bottle since the start of his career, he finally let it burst behind the doors of your shared bedroom, in which he thought you were gone.

char. Micheal Kaiser

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯ ☔︎⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

A nervous figure sat on the couch, accompanied by slow jazz playing in the background with a calming rain lending comfort to the anxious and paranoid figure, who did anything to distract herself from the pang in her chest, the rising pace of her heartbeat. You who scrolled through any media your eyes can take, you who ignored your jittery legs, who tried to ignore the thoughts clouding your mind were now growing exponentially anxious.

The clicking clock neither help in your comfort, only making you more nervous – nothing had helped in your case, drinking, taking long breaths in&out, working, writing, none helped your beating heart, the absence of your teasing and loving boyfriend worsened it. Oh where could your prince be at such a time like this?

He hasn't texted or called you of his whereabouts since his game, which resulted in a loss for bastard munchen, ended. Finally having enough of it, you opened your phone once again, instead of scrolling mindlessly, you opened the phone call app, searching through the many saved contacts of loved ones and friends and clicking on the one you were after, probably, the most trusted friend of your boyfriend, Alexis Ness.

Within a few seconds he picked up, your tone was shaky as you spoke, trying to calm it and speak normally. You knew what Kaiser does to himself when a defeat was upon him, and now the passing hours of his absence, you don't know if he ended up drunk at a bar, or beating himself up at some alleyway "hi, ness?" "Ah y/n, why must you've called so late at night? It's nearly 10:30 pm." "I- uh apologise if I had uh awakened you from y-your sleep but have you seen kaiser anywhere? His whereabouts, is he training late or is he at your or your teammate's house?" Before you bombard his ear with your ongoing rambling of his friend's whereabouts, he asked a question you most dreaded. "Wait, he's not at your house? He told me he would be going to your house as soon as our match ended." "A-ah.. no, well I better get going now, sleep well ness. Don't overwork yourself too much Kay?" "h-hey wai-" you cut the phone without a second thought, leaving it on the coffee table. Taking your car keys you made your way to the locked front door but coming to an abrupt stop as you heard keys rattling and the door's lock unlocking. With the only person who has the keys to the shared penthouse was Kaiser, your thoughts ran berserk, 'oh dear, has someone murdered Kaiser and stolen his keys?', you thought. Positioning your keys in such a way it can injure a person. Stepping back as the door opened revealed a drenched in rain, drunk and cheek stained with defeated tears man, it was him who stood before you, the narcissistic, princely, asshole and bastard munchen's greatest, Micheal Kaiser, who now stood as a broken man.

Your keys fell to the ground, rushing to his side having no care of his drenched clothes staining yours and locking the door behind you. "Oh darling, what have you done to yourself.." your caring and comforting voice filled his ears, a small faint smile forming at the hearing of it. "Will you have the comfort of knowing the doings of mine?" You scrunch your nose at the smell of alcohol reeking from his mouth, sitting him down on the couch leaving behind the trail of water you have to clean up, you left to retrieve water for him but stopped at the feeling of a tug at your shirt. You looked back, Kaiser raising his head to face you, new crystal tears "don't leave me here all alone." His mouth quivering, it broke you, so, so bad. You failed to lend him the comfort he needed, you failed to notice how much he needed you. Leaving him to fulfil your own duties and work, rubbing off his needy behaviour, unable to see the chagrined face behind his smiling and whiny voice. The past three weeks were tiring and ridden you both of life, sleeping through even when Kaiser woke up from reoccurring nightmares, unable to brave through no matter how often it happens. "Alright, I won't go, I won't go. I will be beside you, every moment of it, I will never leave you, even after death" you reassured calmly, moments away from crying with him. He pulled you into a tight hug, sobbing quietly, choking on his tears every now and then, barely able to speak of his emotions through speech. You silently patted his head, combing his hair with your fingers. You didn't even care about the wet spots on your shirt, some with spit and some with tears. He needed this, never had he had this comfort in his life. "I'm s-sorry-" "for what?" You spoke gently, he looked at you with wide teary eyes. "Micheal, you are an amazing boyfriend, everything I could ask for. Everyone has their moments of failure and such, those are unable to face it, fall, week. And those are, rise, strong and you are one of the strongest man I have ever met, physically and emotionally. You faced everything alone, I want to accompany you, in your struggles and mote. Will l you let me face your struggles together like you do with me?" "God, why do you love such an asshole like me, you should just leave like they said.." he spoke despondently, wiping away his tears aggressively "who told you you were an asshole? I don't care what they say, I don't care what the media says, I don't care what anyone says, I will never leave you, no matter. You are worth everything in this world, the things you do for me are thoughtful and always held with good intention, everytime you buy me a gift, it has a meaning behind it, and I wish I had the money to buy you something back, fuck if I was rich I would give you the entire world if I could." He hid his face in the crook of your neck, wrapping his arms around you, more gently and less tightly. His brows furrowed, the thoughts, the nightmare in his mind were leaving the more you spoke. Other than ness, no one had ever thought of him so lovingly this much. A smile was slowly plastered to his face, it stayed hidden.

"I.. I love you so much.. Thank you for staying beside me.., even when I'm being hard sometimes, you still deal with me. Thank you for bringing me comfort, mein singvogel. I never felt so.. happy. Thank you" he spoke quietly, he felt small but secure. Your soft voice spoke yet again "there's no need to thank me, kai, now let's get you cleaned up shall we?" "Will you join?" He spoke slyly, revealing his tiny sly smile, you chuckled joyfully "even after all this, you managed to be such a sly lil shit, that's what I love the most about you" without a second, you cupped his face kissing him fervently. His wife eyes now glued shut, pushing you, hugging you into a kiss. You both broke apart, "stop looking at my lips and look at my eyes you bastard" you giggled "just let me have this moment princess" you huffed out a falsely annoyed 'fine', softly pinching his cheeks "ow, stop thattt your hurting mee" he whined, it was moments like this you cherished most, it felt most lively, most wholesome and most loving. "C'mon now, let's get you to bath" "only if you join" he retorted back "alright fine, now c'mon, get going" with ecstasy, he followed, like a lost but happy puppy, thinking of a stranger as it's new mother.

𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑛𝑠𝑙𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 —

mein singvogel - my songbird

copyright © @vvluvmai

Fufufu I finished this within the day, kaiser is such a silly man sometimes

Tags: @kaiserkisser

[kit-williams]

I'm finally playing a Black Crusade Game

SO yesterday we finally started a Black Crusade game from our forever DM! Whom hates Black Crusade... but he was feeling 40k.

So the game is Me, my husband, and our other mutual friend who in the game is named Mec. Mec isn't a fan of 40k rpgs we (me, my husband, and our friend) all got introduced to warhammer via Warhammer Fantasy 2e (so we're all biased)

But this is the game i was going to be a space marine but no this isnt the Dog Centaur night lord this is Khornite Blood Angel! Angelos! errr Angela.

See Mec wanted a few concessions since we're going to be dealing with a lot of space marines that why can't there be female space marines so I was given the option to swap Angelos to Angela which I did (Hubby has filled my DMs with Mommy Angela) (also cuz he is a DM who will genderlock stuff but he will also allow you to do very interesting stuff with gender like allowing my one Fantasy character to be genderfluid but it also made sense due to how Fantasy Norsca works and because of how actual viking society worked) [reeling in the tangent!]

SO I'm a Khornite Berserker [Tome of Blood Starting Class] Fallen Blood Angel named Angela

I made a great first impression in the chaos city we landed in and thus scaring away the "welcoming committee" by watching one man get shot and then going over to the dying man and ripping out his throat and drinking his blood.

I got bullied by an Ancient Night Lord (which I failed the test to id him as being either a Night Lord or Alpha Legion ((Which to be fair is a safe guess))) who basically outed me as a Blood Angel and told everyone to be aware of me (aka I have the Betrayer Talent) did the whole "You keep my father's name out of your dirty mouth" but otherwise was hissy at him I'm around 200 years old I am a baby to that man I wasn't going to fight an established Night Lord.

But after getting bullied everyone in the Eye of Terror(?) got a vision that on this planet was the keys to the next crusade which will happen in the next century. So everything exploded into violence!

So at the moment we are gathering troops right now we've got some gangers and mutants but I am the Warband's only Space Marine which we will have to fix as well as getting us a ship too

We're going to play again tonight because we had a lot of fun and our DM wants to get us off planet.

ALSO

We've been playing Warhammer Fantasy 4e which has this cool Advantage mechanic which for normal Cubical 7 games if you do a successful parry no matter the degrees of success you just avoid it completely... this leads to Black Crusade and Dark Heresy and I think also Rogue Trader combat to fucking DRAG ON. We introduced the advantage system which means that if you attack me with only 1 degree of success but I parry with 1 or more degrees higher THEN I avoid the attack. But if your attack has more degrees of success than my parry then in fantasy I'm allowed to reduce the damage. But we're just using advantage to speed up the combat and it worked.

Anyway I'll give you an update on the Harbingers of the Apocalypse on our quest to be amazing.

As long as there are no Iron Warriors thrown my way I should be fine

[thydungeongal]

for the tarot ask game -

The Emperor — Do you have a process you follow with your design work? OR How important is mechanical complexity to you?

The Star — Talk about a game you’re working on and what excites you about it.

You can actually get a glimpse of my process in this post I made recently outlining how I'm currently approaching design:

Basically, I first got a huge stew of ingredients together and then threw them in and then started thinking about the game in terms of what types of scenes I want it to produce, what I want the characters to be like, and what type of progress the game will generally follow. I've also been helped in this process by my friend @ashweather who's been extremely helpful in forcing me to think how the various ingredients I've chosen interlock and intersect! For an example, she forced me to think about how the idea of Keys from The Shadow of Yesterday could intersect with Lifepaths and, folks, we're cooking. Also, yeah, this has very much turned into a collaboration between me and ash, and I'm really thankful for all the ideas and insights she's provided.

And that also, in part, answers the second question. I'm really excited about this project of ours, this untitled dark fantasy role-playing game. Heavily inspired by Berserk, Dark Souls, and Darkest Dungeon, the core gameplay is largely going to follow adventurers in a dark fantasy world where something has happened which has made the world Fucked Up and the simple act of traveling between cities and in the wilderness has become dangerous. We are leaning very heavily on Keys as a core mechanic to help create powerfully driven characters to make for largely character driven play in a sandbox/powderkeg style setting.

And yeah, part of what excited me about it is getting to think about systems and how they interact, but I'm also extremely excited about seeing how I can pull off my design goal of making GM prep actually gamified and enjoyable, but also I'm just excited about this stew of ingredients that is equal parts trad and indie.

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 1/30/2024

a good 60% of my brain is screaming in unemployment terror at all times so these will be somewhat abbreviated until that situation resolves itself

listening

sleeping on the ceiling by friday pilots club. this is a song by a five-piece alt-rock band from chicago that could EASILY open for mid-aughts fall out boy. i would like to think it is from the point of view of a freshly-turned vampire. listen this slot isn't about the best song i heard this week it's about the one that got stuck in my head the most

Hey, I swear I'm okay Honey, I been sleepin' on the ceiling all day Yes way, like hey I swear I feel great Looky, looky, love the feeling of being okay Yes way

spotify.

reading

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and the Amulet of Power by Mike Resnick. it was in a dollar book bin and i got it as a joke gift for a friend. mike resnick is a remarkably prolific writer who's done a lot of tie-ins. i don't have anything particularly notable to say about his star wars books but they are a sort of minimum viable product? they feel star warsy and don't annoy me on every page.

this book was published in 2003 and treats the people of the Nile delta and their beliefs with all the delicacy you might expect from a 2003 video game tie in novel. i do think the twist is being telegraphed way too hard. perhaps i should say instead of sending a telegram mr resnick has simply set the telegraph office ablaze as a signal fire. the titular triangle-pointed woman herself ms croft is VERY insistent she's just as good as the boys. this is pretty on par for my experience of 2003 empowering womens' feminism AND my experience in a male-dominated field so i can't really ding it too hard? aside from the racism, in the notably racism-free fields of archaeology and video games and archaeology video games, this book is aging a little strangely overall. i do not know if i will finish it before i mail it out to my friend, but despite its sins it is a very fast read.

watching

watched the four dungeon meshi episodes. it's cute! ProzD was an unexpected delight! it made me want to make something fancy for dinner but alas i still have to go food shopping!

some posts on my dash were talking about how the episode with the mollusks inside the living armor really got them hooked and i have to agree. i also saw the full potential of the show's speculative biology unspooling before me. i don't know if i currently have the brainwidth for the manga but it is going on my reading list for after i finish berserk. which is kind of like saying i'm going to watch chopped after i finish up hannibal

playing

forgot i had an original gen switch, given to me through a complex series in a complex series of friend barters back in uhhhh late '21? early '22? i got through 3/4 of the divine beasts the first time around and then could not crack the camel. it was well past time to create a new switch profile so i could start a new game without losing the old one.

omg twinnsssssssss

i did forget how goddamn big the map is. i have just now unlocked the camera and the memory quests, i have not really. done much more than basic tutorial and beginning of game stuff.

making

anxiously junebugging between a whole bunch of shit. finally figured out the correct charger/extension cord setup for my bedroom. replaced all the fluorescent lightbulbs and took them to be recycled. fixed the hall door enough so it latches closed and an irritated cat can't claw it open. tidied up the balcony and patio and repotted the surviving houseplants.

in textile news, started this cross stitch. this is a Bless This Wretched Hive of Scum and Villainy Star Wars themed sampler, i have made two as gifts and had to throw out a mostly-completed one i made for me bc of the moths. but i now know exactly where this will go in this apartment and i already have the frame and i bought all the floss pre-being fired, so might as well? the real bitch of the situation here is backstitching the buildings. it's so start and stop. it's so much tan. i talked about this on the weekly siblingchat facetime and now my brother has requested one lmao. that's his christmas gift settled. i suppose.

i had somehow forgotten how loadbearing textile crimes are for me. i haven't done much of anything since the moth debacle, and that was almost two years ago. last night i found some suspicious holes in a camisole and i'm really really hoping it's just cat claws and not moths or carpet beetles or any other fun things that eat clothes.

[13eyond13]

Hello, can I ask from this ask game :

https://www.tumblr.com/threecheersforinking/677824836625694720/anime-ask-game?source=share

For anime/manga : Death Note and Berserk.

Thanks 🌻

Hi! Sure thing:

DEATH NOTE:

Favorite Character: L was basically a "love at first sight" situation for me and the main reason I ever checked out the anime (I just really loved eccentric loner sad boys at the time and he just looked exactly up my alley at a glance, hahaha). And he has stayed extremely dear to me and my favourite cartoon guy ever basically since! I actually think Light is a bit more of a complicated/interesting character than L is to think about in-depth, and has become also kind of my favourite one in the series in a different way over time, but L is def the one that I was really obsessed with from the start.

Favorite Arc/Episode/Scene: I love everything up until the Yotsuba arc the most I think, I just find it so much fun in the beginning of the story when everything is so well-written and so exciting and tense and fast-paced. The university arc stuff MIGHT be the part that I just find the most fun and funny in the way that Death Note is known to be, with all the detailed little mind games and bitch moves and shocking reveals every other page, ahahah. I remember laughing out loud so many times during that section of the story just due to how ridiculous it gets and how often everyone is pulling the rug out from under each other nearly constantly.

And my favourite scene is probably the "first ever friend" scene in the manga. I WILL NEVER STOP THINKING ABOUT IT it's just so funny and mysterious and intriguing and layered to me

Character I Think is Underrated: Mikami is fairly underrated, but at the same time I myself am not the best at intuitively understanding him or creating content about him either...

Character I Think is Overrated: Matt (sorry I actually like him in the manga, but I just don't think he's that interesting really)

Favorite Ship/Pairing: Lawlight! I never needed much convincing about this.... I went straight from watching the anime to going "omg they should have kissed..."

Something I Love About the Show/Movie: The anime's audio elements are just so iconic and so good a lot of the time! It makes some of the manga scenes SO MUCH better just with stuff like the gregorian chanting while Light's writing the names. And no lie, it's really easy to follow as a story without even seeing what's happening onscreen, too. I used to listen to the English dub while drawing or doing my work sometimes and it felt almost exactly like an audio play.

-

BERSERK:

Favorite Character: Guts is by far my favourite! Which was a total surprise to me, because I thought he was going to be a pretty boring macho action hero cardboard cutout type guy going in. I got very attached to him while reading the manga after a few volumes, and now he's one of my all-time faves...

Favorite Arc/Episode/Scene: I'm going to be very basic and say The Golden Age, but IT'S JUST REALLY GOOD OKAY. It's better than good, it's the reason the series went from just "ok this is pretty interesting" to "OMG WTF THIS IS SO GOOD I'M SO INVESTED NOW"

And my favourite scene?? Hmm.... extremely hard question, but I feel like the sword fights between Guts and Griffith are definitely some of the peak moments. Their first one is iconic in so many ways, but the second one in the snow really got me in the feels and made my stomach drop and my heart beat a bit faster as well!

Character I Think is Underrated: I feel like Casca is just kinda hard to talk about with other fans. She's my second favourite character in the series, but I feel like it's just really difficult to discuss her without it just getting either depressing or into too sensitive territory or something? I love her dearly in the manga, but the fandom space here seems only much fun to talk about Guts and Griffith in for me

Character I Think is Overrated: I am not THAT well-versed in who is overrated or underrated in this fandom, but I feel like mostly almost all the characters aside from maybe Griffith and Guts are a bit underrated and under-explored in fan stuff that I've seen? That might be entirely on me and the fact that I'm mostly looking at griffguts stuff, though...

Favorite Ship/Pairing: griffguts drives so much of the angst and the drama and I think is basically canon to me at this point... I don't think it's hard to interpret Griffith as in love with Guts, but I also think Guts is in love with Griffith too in just a more furtive sort of way

Something I Love About the Show/Movie:

I only partially watched the 1997 anime so far, and the Guts theme song in it is so good! My god that's still such a good fitting song for him and his personality somehow. And I'd never actually heard it before I read the series either!

[linuxgamenews]

Get Ready for ANTONBLAST: The Most Anticipated Game of 2024

ANTONBLAST fast-paced explosive action platformer game is due to release soon on Linux and Windows PC. Thanks to the awesome team at Summitsphere for their creativity and talent. Due to make its way onto Steam. ANTONBLAST fast-paced, explosive action platformer, just won the “Most Anticipated Game 2024” award at the GameMaker Awards. Which is all about destruction, comes from Summitsphere and Joystick Ventures. Get ready to play via Steam on Tuesday, Nov. 12th. Can’t wait? You can try out The Dynamite fast-paced Demo, which is available now, ANTONBLAST is also playable on Linux via Proton. Summitsphere’s Fearless Leader, Tony Grayson, shared his excitement about the win. “I’ve been using GameMaker since 2007, back when I started making games with version 6.1. Working with this engine let me chase my dreams, and it’s where I met my best friends, who I’d eventually create Summitsphere with. GameMaker changed my life, no exaggeration." He added, “Winning this award is a huge honor for our team and feels surreal to me, having used GameMaker for 17 years. On behalf of everyone at Summitsphere: Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

ANTONBLAST fast-paced platformer - Intro Cinematic Preview

Showing off the full power of GameMaker with its destructible environments and smooth gameplay. While offering an urban graffiti-inspired animations. The trailer above, entirely made in-engine, shows exactly what you can expect from this title. The title now joins the ranks of other indie hits like Heartbound, LUNARK, and Berserk Boy, which also won the “Most Anticipated” award. Summitsphere’s win comes with a trophy, some sweet promotion support from GameMaker, and a 12-Month GameMaker Enterprise License. In ANTONBLAST, you’ll jump into fast-paced action, playing as Dynamite Anton or his wild coworker Annie. While smashing through strange worlds with a Mighty F’n Hammer. Your mission? Set detonators, find Anton’s spirit, and escape before time runs out. So expect big boss fights, a ton of destruction, and a lot of style. Want to blast through levels as fast as you can? Go for it. Prefer to take your time and explore? That works too! ANTONBLAST fast-paced explosive action platformer is due to explode onto Linux and Windows PC via Steam on Nov. 12, 2024. The Dynamite Demo is ready to play now, so get in on the action early!

[edward-cabrini]

My Sources of Inspiration

With my recent Character Focus posts, I've taken a bit of a deep dive into my core cast of characters and lightly touched on their various sources of inspiration. I think it's time we take a harder look at my sources of inspiration. In terms of media/Texts we have: Berserk, Dark Souls 2, Dragon Age: Origins, Kingdom Come Deliverance, Blasphemous, Mount & Blade: Warband, Archaon Books, various Irish folk tales & myths (Cú Chulainn & Fomorians in particular). One of these is not like the others... Mount & Blade doesn't really have a story, it's a sandbox where you invent your story as you play. With a 190hrs in it. I've yet to ever conquer caldaria as a lone mercenary warband. My last run came closest though. I dedicated my self to being an effective leader, I recruited the best companions, I worked for King Ragnar with the hopes of marrying into royalty to increase my legitimacy. Five years I worked under Ragnar amassing Fiefdoms and wealth as we wiped out the Swadians and pressed into the Kingdom of Rhodoks. Yet when the time came to leave Ragnar's service I was caught out by a Swadian war band, I lost everything... My companions fucked off to the four fucking winds and after a solid 60hrs I gave up I enabled cheats made my self damn near un killable with the strength to solo armies. I razed everything until I recovered my fiefdoms and then I disabled cheats and carried on as normal. However the damage was already done, that run was stained, marred by my weakness. Any way I deleted the save uninstalled the game and did a quick run of Dark souls 2 to cheer myself up. But it got me thinking... That was a grand adventure, and right up until the total collapse of my plans I was very happy. This was the first spark of inspiration for "The Curse of Want". If I remember rightly, I'd read the Archaon books for the third time maybe a year before this point. Archaon's fall is surprisingly the inspiration behind Lorcan's heroism and rise through the ranks. Ernin is almost, but definitely not, the same role as Giselle from the Archaon series. I think it wasn't until after I read all of the Berserk series (that was out at the time) that I resolved to start writing something. Not the "Curse of Want" just yet... Mostly I poured a needless amount of effort into a series of D&D characters. A lot of human fighter combat masters. Fight me, I just love the mechanics and being human.

It was actually one of my best mates and DM that introduced to Fomorians. I knew various Irish tales but not a lot about their history or that they were written in various cycles. The research rabbit hole went very deep very fast. By the time I finished reading up on the shit that Cromwell and the Church did to Ireland, Irish culture, and the Irish people. I was resolved to write "The Curse of Want" my own mythos inspired by the Fomorians of legend and the Church's rewriting of Irish myths. Book 1's plot isn't all that different from events wise the golden age arc of Berserk. Child soldiers led by a pretty charismatic child soldier go from battle to battle achieving ever increasingly impressive victories. Until they go to capture the last fortress. However, consider what that would look like from the perspective of the enemy. A near unstoppable force of humanoid devils tearing across the countryside, ripping and hacking apart your friends as they advance toward your families. Here at last we come to the Dragon Age: Origins & Kingdom Come Deliverance Inspiration. Though to write more about why these particular narratives inspired me would I think lead to some pretty major spoilers. So you'll just have to guess what inspired what and who in my works. The last thing to touch on is Blasphemous, the church and all it's evil and good are present through out the game. I think I'll leave you with this thought I had as I squared up to fight Escribar: The unknowable will of The Miracle, made manifest by the belief of the citizenry. It's divinity enforced by the church and it's preachers; spreading the word of it's miracles and punishing heresy violently and publicly. Time to kill it.

[randomnameless]

I feel like FEH's nature as a gacha game ocasionally causes IS to have to twist certain characters around so they can better sell them to FEH's audience, like the Fallen Corrins; they're taken from the end of Chapter 5 of Fates, a chapter where they're stuck in their dragon form, have practically devolved into a feral animal who attacks anyone they see, and whose maximum speech capacity is to grunt and roar in pain/exertion/anger.

Since a character that's completely incapable of speaking would be less desirable for the average player than someone with actual voice lines and confessions, they wrote themselves into a corner and had to invent a weird version of Chapter 5!Corrin where they've already gone on their rampage and returned to normal after Azura calmed them down, but for some reason are stuck being forced to unwittingly use their draconic powers in exchange for severe pain and an urge to give in to that side of themselves again; none of that tracks with what actually happens in chapter 5, where they show no signs of struggling to control themselves after regaining consciouness, especially not to the extent the Fallen ones do, and are very quickly given a dragonstone by Azura to make sure they can't go berserk again and can control their dragon powers properly.

The Fallen Corrins explicitly say that their friends and family helped them regain control of themselves and that they're ashamed for hurting Azura, so unless these Corrins both hail from a world where their dragon blood is inexplicably significantly more powerful and possessive than it ever was in Fates proper AND were summoned into Askr during the ridiculously short time-frame between being told that they went berserk and being given the dragonstone to stop that from happening again, the entire concept is broken from the start; all because IS couldn't just market a mute angry dragon to their playerbase in their gacha game.

It's the same reason they did what they did with Fallen Linus; sure, a mindless mute zombie isn't the most interesting of characters, but there was no need to include that version of the character into FEH if IS already knew they wouldn't sell well without heavy changes to the source material in order to make them more marketable.

Hmm

I still note they made mute!Soren an unit lol

More seriously, as a rule of thumb, I'd prefer if FEH kept characterisations the character had in their original games even if, as you said, some alts definitely need to be... modified.

You mentionned the Fallen Corns, but in general, a lot of Fallen Heroes fall under that banner, Fallen Julia exists for the last half of the last chapter in FE4, Fallen Ike is an AU, Grima(sses) were created from scotch and glue, Fallen!Bilthis apparently cares about her kid (obviously an AU lol), etc etc...

I still am completely baffled at what they did with Fallen!Vigarde like sure, he was given lines from his zombie self in FE8, but the part where he goes "my power is to great for this vessel" or something is completely bonkers, Fomortiis only possesses one dude from that family, and that dude is Lyon. Remove Fomor-Lyon moving zombie!Vigarde's strings, and Vigarde is barely something more, uh, "sentient" than Monica (yes, the one from FE8 if you're wondering).

I ranted enough about how I fucking hated the FB between Lyon and his possessed self - maybe to sell Lyon as something more than a mere tool played and sacrificed by Fomortiis who preyed on his ambitions - and if that was supposed to sell me more on Lyon, then good job devs, FEH's Lyon is, imo, not FE8!Lyon thus not the character I care about.

Granted, I rant and rant and rant, but I'm also someone who's overjoyed when, saaay, FEH pisses on the source material when the source material sucks, like Julia has more characterisation in her base intro than in her entire game(s) because the devs see her as something else than a falchion with legs, and I've already ranted about Fodlan, but in general, IS seems to want to "correct" some stuff that came out wrong in earlier games (or piss on certain lolcalisations).

And it's always kind of difficult, with seasonal units, to come up with lines, like take Deghinsea for instance, all of his lines in the games are, hm, very serious and not light at all. And yet, he has a cute Halloween alt that would feel in-character, so to say, with the giant bald lizard we kill at the end of FE10.

But when it comes to creating a new unit from scratch (Altina? Ullr?) sometimes things work because the new thing created from scratch feels coherent with the world they're supposed to come from, and sometimes it's way more, uh, muddy (Elimine?). And you can bet I'll be overjoyed if mythic!Willy is released, or mythic!Indech/Macuil, even if it means the devs will have to invent a lot of things to make those characters feel like characters and not... pixels with new skills (but then they didn't care about that when they made Nerthuz...).

In the end, I think it's still the old discussion when talking about a fanwork, is something OOC or IC ?

And even if Heroes was developped by IS too, like the base games, sometimes the OOC comes out too clearly. Sometimes, everything works because the fanwork that is heroes works. It all depends on the twist IS uses to, as you said, sell characters.

I just hope that potential remakes won't use FEH as a base (with the twist they brought to characters) but use the... game being remade as a base, even if it clashes with the FEH characterisation.

Like, I'd hate it if a Sacred Stones remake characterises Eirika only as the naive princess depicted in the FE13 DLC or the "I want to be like my brother" brave alt, while removing the "Enough. Hold your tongue." part of her character.

[eggman91]

random dnd worldbuliding stuff I quess of the world of edo

ok so I play dnd with my friends for years now and over that time we bulid up our world with random stuff also some wargames play a part and existing stuff but yeah here 5 random things that I got written down in my world book warning I may ramble

5 cult of hastut (made by my brother he play couple of clerics and paladins of this faith)

while the follower of hastut covered in scars and blood rushing into battle like gore mad berserkers, they are the quite opposite of what you think they would be.

They are followers of god of justice, the god of fairness of sacrifice. No one know where the worship began but the legend said it hastut was a mortal man his village had committed some great crime and so the gods punish them But he hastut step up to take all the punishment for his people all all know torture and pain hastut was still standing all his skin gone his eyes burned suffer pain greatly then any other and so he ascended to the pantheon or not .became his own god

his followers ranges form the scars of the free who fight the southern slavers city states of gash freeing the slaves there to the order of broken hand giving shelter and food to the poor in the herzland “a odd sort ain’t a mad and flaying their own skin i don’t how they still live by they they kill slavers so cool by me “ gallo a member of the one anti-slavers groups in gash hilllands

4 cor’Quessir ath swi “‘’king of swing” (made by me as a dm and warlock

A Fae being of sorts a one focus on music partying and having a good time his worship and followers bought many strange things to edo such as jazz swing and other stuff other fashion trend like top hats

(but that a myth the first top hats was made by the Halfling of erdia and it was common for those wearing top hats to be attack by religious fanatics or anti-fae people but that practice stop after marley one of the major naval power government officials and lords start to wear them so that became uncivilized thing)

not hav seen this king of swing himself in ages but his court is still playing the Savoy in his realm the band still popping there was one time a bunch of city goblins who was influenced by the fae king they along with the local ratmen form a family of sorts a criminal family in the city of sunhaven which spread to other cities

3 Olaf murinson (this mostly happen in games of one page rules and this happen the most recently and don’t underestimate dwarf miners they got bombs)

in the fourth age like that of the elves the dwarves was falling many holds and fortress was lost to greenskins the underdark or the underearth was losing to drow and other creatures of the dark and infighting and clan wars was numerous and mirrormere stars was fading the oldest mountain hold the twin peaks was still ruled by a dragon

(fun fact, one of the games actually involve that dragon muratasxa and my player actually help her)

it was not looking good for the dwarves of all kin but in the hold of kelgathgard a thane rose after a battle with the men of the herzland and this thane Olaf murinson of clan blackshovel rose though many things the battle of kegath hold (Pepsi hold) the battle of the ruined house (there was a magic gem of the old elven Phoenix empire and he was able to get it) he united the northern leagues and clans into a new high kingdom which spead to the new holds like the south an across the sea ( fun fact dwarves try to build a navy to fight the eleven one in the secondth age the great stone fleet was quickly erased form the history stones)

reforging the old dwarven kingdom even with the slag or petty dwarves form the Kodar mountains trying heal the rift he basically dwarven, Charlemagne and Aurelian and ( my players did join in those efforts when we played an All dwarf party as a one off but that was happening on a different continent then we normally played) but before Olaf could reclaim the twin peaks he was slayed in battle by undead but his kingdom did not collapse a council of leagues thane and petty kings try to hold it together who knows but the kodar dwarves already left who knows if the kingdom of rock and stone fall again or will it hold?

2 elves yay😕 most like elven falls

Ok so elves start as the first race made by the earthmother or light goddess or elune or whatever they was the first to fight teh shadows of old myth and drove them back to there plane of darkness and these elves was the most of unearthly tall and black eyes but after a time there children became tire to the world and embraced more civilizations naming nature elune or whatever which confused there older kin (like why pray to this earthmother there. Perfectly good tree over there and etc)

these elves would raise as the high elves or ella’quor and rivaling with the dwarves and the left over giants and dragons (which they got there magic form the dragons)but then boom first demon invasion that never destroy them but boom Elrond came and destroyed them destroying the portal gate, whatever that was bringing them into the world( those demons who was left later interbreed and became Teifling and etc)forming his Phoenix empire that would last 300 years

then like the eldar decadence, hedonism, self-righteous end that was the Phoenix empire at it end wizard kings rule and princes fought each other over petty things cults of dark gods like lolth or kahine rose and well then the human migrations happen coming from the north with there serpent ships so like rome they panic there armies was overglorify spearelves and well they turn to magic to stop them…oh shit they got magic too like runes and thennic magic

(thenns was a large cultural group of the humans migrations, mostly settling in the western continent many was with the East there magic a mix of tomb necromancy and runes and minor magics and since there was more shamans then there was wizard kings and minor elven sorcerers well quantity over quality )so they turn to blood Mages and there flesh crafted starting off from the basic gremlin and ogre throw in some capture humans the greenskins was born orcs and goblins of many different breeds along with anthros(breath in wulfen tirgans marleians foxvisn and etc etc )and minor stuff like centaurs they sent them to go fight the human well just like rome that backfired hopefully the oven empire fell apart many fled but many more was slaughtered The Elven groups that survived were divided into two groups, light and dark, which was extremely bias light made up of remained high elves wood elves and snow elves dark made of drow and many many different dark elves groups (also sea elves but those freaks are just jumped up, ancient pirates)

1 infernal and the abyss

What is hell? Where the souls of the Damned are sent? Infernal id just normal dnd hell princess and all etc throw in some seven deadly sins and chaos gods but

The deeper you go, you arrive to the abyss with no demon of a infernal dared to go for they are just the imps compared to what down there true hell laid there abandon all hope who enters there.

any questions?

[wizard-finix]

❤️ 💥 👻 🎁 :D

YOOO THANKS FOR THE ASK :D

❤️ What is your favorite line that you’ve written in a fic?

Hmmm it's hard to settle on a single line, but I think it's a tie between this one, from Stygian Ringlet (my p3/p5 fic):

Ryoji remembered that awful night on the Moonlight Bridge, when his world fell apart. The night he remembered everything and instantly wished he hadn’t.

and this one, from a Runescape fic chapter I haven't posted yet:

“You know, I was planning on a nice evening playing cards with the rest of the crew,” Jaida said, still catching his breath. “But no, here I am, stuck in the temple in the middle of the night with you and the Scourge of Wushanko herself, with the only way out being blocked by an army of cultists, mercenaries, and giant crabs.”

💥 What is one canon thing that you wish you could change?

Ryuji's treatment in P5. I normally don't mind a character being comic relief, he does have some hilarious moments. The problem is that he had the potential to be a really good underdog-type character and have interesting character interactions with the others, but Atlus really did him dirty and squandered his character development by having the entire cast degrade him for the rest of the game. It worked for Yosuke in P4 because he tends to make those kinds of jabs at his friends and often brings it on himself, but it's a lot more one-sided with Ryuji. These people are supposed to be FRIENDS, guys. (I don't even need to say anything about the end of Shido's palace jfc)

(also Kawakami's social link and benefits are uncomfortable as hell so I never used them)

👻 What is your wildest headcanon?

OH, THIS ONE. I DEFINITELY HAVE ONE FOR THIS QUESTION. My wildest headcanon:

Shinjiro's persona has a latent berserk ability somewhat similar to Akechi's, and absolutely no one realizes this, not even Shinjiro himself.

I will explain this one, so hear me out.

In P3, the only ones in the game with personas that go berserk and try to kill their own users are the artificial persona users, who are the results of human experimentation. Shinji is a natural persona user unlike Strega, and he is (reasonably) mentally sound, which rules out that possibility.

Shinjiro's persona went berserk the night of the accident that killed Ken's mother. He definitely was not on Persona suppressants at the time, because this event was the reason he started taking them in the first place, so it wasn't because of the suppressants either. It had to be a preexisting issue (one that the suppressants actively made worse).

It's a LATENT ability. The first time it happened was the night of the accident, as mentioned before. Normally someone's persona discovering a new ability would be great, right? Well, in this case not so much, since it kind of manifested at the worst possible time and killed someone. And because of that crushing guilt, Shinjiro made no effort to train or understand this ability, instead seeing it as something deeply wrong with himself and trying to suppress it entirely with drugs. So he wouldn't really know if it was actually one of Castor's abilities or not.

Akechi's persona also has the ability to make its user go berserk (except Call of Chaos can also be used on shadows). Castor also pretty much went berserk and while Shinjiro himself didn't, there's no telling whether or not it was having that same effect on him and Shinji was trying to fight against its effects, causing him a hell of a lot of pain. Akechi, fueled by rage and spite, fully embraced this ability and used it on himself and enemy shadows; Shinjiro on the other hand actively suppressed his persona because of he doesn't want to hurt anyone else.

tl;dr I just think "latent berserk ability gone wrong" is an explanation that makes sense guys, cause when you think about it we don't actually know what was wrong with his persona in the first place

🎁 Have a piece of a WIP you want to share?

Oooh don't mind if I do (this is a deleted scene for Stygian Ringlet that I had to scrap because it didn't fit, so it's not actually spoilers lmaoo):

One ring. Two rings. Each one seemed to drag on for an eternity, only making him even more nervous. 

After a third, agonizingly long ring, the other end picked up. A moment, and then a voice Minato hadn’t heard in far too long answered. 

“Hello?” said Akihiko.

Minato immediately slammed the phone down on the counter. 

Fuck. He couldn’t do this. What was he thinking?!

Minato, I would suggest you answer the phone. You’re being kind of rude, Ryoji gently chided him.

Minato eyed the phone warily before picking it up, slowly putting it back to his ear as if it might electrocute him. 

(Well, it was Akihiko on the other end. Maybe it could.)

“Hello?" said Akihiko, sounding vaguely annoyed. "If this is a prank call, I’m hanging up.”

Minato swallowed nervously. Now or never. 

“...Uh,” he said lamely. “...Hey, senpai.” 

The silence that followed felt like the longest in his entire life.

[heredis-sanguinis]

|| ✨ I'm terrible with words, and I have zero idea where to begin!

You are one of my dearest friends here and one of my most cherished RP partners.

I absolutely love your portrayal of our favorite Bloody Diva™. You keep him extremely close to his canon portrait and lore, at the same time you don't shy away from expanding it, and everything you create to expand his story makes so much sense! 100% Riot should ask for your opinion on what to do next with this Tremere Hemomancer! You respect his complexity and it shows when he is both being an annoying asshole to LB, when he is about to go berserk with anger, or when he is serious or confused. All of those moments are so real and so legit!

I adore talking to you about literally anything and everything, and I appreciate all your feedback and help sorting the ideas out. I'm extremely thankful for it.

I'm so happy that our two idiots clicked, and that despite every stupid decision they made through the centuries, all the pain they caused one another, they still somehow care for one another.

I hope we can still play other games together one day! We need a good co-op to start laughing while I inevitably die thousands of times XD (because that's what I do. I'm always the first one to die in any game I play!)

Send ✨ if you like my writing and feel free to tell me why !! the rpc is in serious need of some positivity.

// -screams into the void- I fell asleep after work and woke up to this and I'm sobbing now!

You've become a good friend on here to quickly and I simply adore chatting with you. It is one of the biggest highlights I have on my days! <3

I'd love to play games with you when we find something we both have and enjoy. I'll contest you for the one who dies first and ends up laughing on the floor, because I too am one who usually botches things up and ends up dying!

I appreciate and love your messages, from the 'Good morning Cella/ to things you find that apply to our muses and the random chats with hilarious things you find.

Thank you for being so nice to me and I can't imagine how it would have been, had we not started to talk.

[meltykarasu]

Failures In Worldbuilding

Rather than my usual post I’d like to celebrate a little; I run a little tabletop group online and we recently completed our third campaign with myself as DM/GM — this one taking place in the Star Wars universe and acting as a strange mix of The Mandalorian-inspired bounty hunting coupled with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead-ing through the background of the Star Wars films (a device I liberally cribbed from the very funny Tag and Bink comics they did in the early-to-mid-2000’s). We grappled with friends and foes and the esoteric systems of West End Games’s d6 system and the honestly janky Roll20 sheet I had to edit myself after a style update busted the fanmade one we were using.

Starting in a couple weeks, we’re going to be playing Dungeons & Dragons again in a setting I’ve been building for some time. I’m not going to discuss it a ton because, well, some of my players do follow this blog, and I’d rather not tip my hand before the first session. I’d rather talk about my earlier settings right now. 

The second campaign I did was a contemporary setting inspired heavily by Sailor Moon and Persona 4 and etc, etc. Admittedly, I think that Dungeons and Dragons was a poor choice for this and if I had to do it again I would find something more rules-lite, like FATE Accelerated. I think that the plot setup, however, made me really flex my muscles in world and especially character building, because the PCs were stuck in the same town for the entire thing and ran into the same characters repeatedly, including one of my favorite villains: a talking skeleton named Commandant Bones, who once introduced himself by declaring, “Prepare for trouble! And make it single! Because it’s just me.”

I think that my first campaign, though, is what I want to talk about, because a lot of my ambitions for it and the failures to meet them are part of what led me back to D&D after spending fourteen or so months immersed in Star Wars. (The other part, by the way, was Berserk, The Witcher, and D&D: Honor Among Thieves getting me back into fantasy as a genre.)

Long story short, I had neat worldbuilding ideas going into the first campaign and I want to talk about how a couple of them failed to manifest properly. None of these are going into my new setting as a result of the differing focus/foundational worldbuilding, so if you ARE one of my players, feel free to read this through.

Idea One: Couriers

Do you know what Death Stranding and Fallout: New Vegas have in common? No, it’s not the inexplicable celebrity cameos, although we can all love Matthew Perry saying “What in the goddamn?” No, it’s couriers. In both you play as couriers thrust into something greater after a delivery gone wrong, which is an idea I really liked as a plot setup. 

So I had this idea that the couriers were the adventurers of the setting, and that the players were couriers, and there were these isolated settlements they were meant to travel to, but I think that I jumped the gun too soon on giving the players a vehicle. They never really got to experience trekking through the wilds of the very imaginatively named Home Continent (I also have an issue with naming things, but we don’t need to get into that right now.)

I also never gave them the option to have another courier job beyond the initial plot one. I think this would have allowed them to grow a cash base and run a business (very Acquisitions Incorporated, whose book does have rules on business forming that I would use if I were to run this style of game). I think it would have been better for that. Players like having ownership over A Thing they they get to fill out and make stronger.

Third, and maybe most importantly, they never encountered another courier. I think that this, too, would have helped make this job feel more important. During this latest Star Wars campaign, I had them run into other bounty hunters — big names like Boba Fett and Bossk, along with original small names like Wolfram Aphra and Molly Ringworld. They had professional, preexisting notions and relationships with these characters, which makes the profession feel alive — important if you want to convey that this is an important job that more than just your PCs do.

Idea Two: Barter

I also had the idea that things were primarily barter-based: you did not get paid in coins, but in things: items or favors. This immediately fell out of the worldbuilding a couple sessions in when I realized that I had not told the players and the wizard attempted to pay for an inn room with gold pieces. Yikes! 

Basically: reinforce these fundamental ideas if they do not mesh with what is established in materials like rulebooks, etc. This should be a bullet point on your lore doc or something you state in session zero.

Idea Three: The Silos

I’m going to admit that I’ve never seen the show, but I read the premise of Turn A Gundam and knew I wanted it to be part of this campaign: the idea that fantastical advanced technology had been buried, and the world turned ever on until someone discovered it and caused an arms race of unearthing progressively more destructive technology. 

I just don’t think I communicated this enough! I had all these grand story ideas but I think that they weren’t well-exposited or depicted. We didn’t even go to an excavation site! How foolish of me!

Going Forward

James Cameron and Stan Winston, on the DVD commentary for Aliens, discussed how everything that they’d done for that film had, in effect, become R&D for The Abyss and Terminator 2 — everything you do is research and development for your next project. I think that this is an important mentality to have in the creation of art. 

After I had what I perceived as a failure of a campaign, where it felt like maybe a third of my ideas for the setting and plot went anywhere, I sat down and I experimented. I set an entire campaign in and around a single town. I think this worked well because there were locations there that kept getting revisited — the school, the local shrine, the main characters’ houses, their usual haunts. They formed a more effective bond with the setting and NPCs because they couldn’t gallivant around the world on an airship. 

On the opposite end, I let my players roam relatively free in our Star Wars campaign. They had open choices on where to take the story, what they wanted to do each week (generally from a short list of adventures). Revisiting the bar after a hard job or dropping by the Merchant after a firefight to restock or taking the ship in for repairs and upgrades meant more when it was a choice the players made.

I still had things go wrong (which, hopefully, my players did not notice too much) but I think that my skills are much more sharpened for another crack at this. I’ll let you know how it goes. 

[kwaggysshardmindemporium]

Feel like rambling about the DnD character I just made for a campaign my friend is tossing together.

So, I started with a simple goal. I wanna be a heal-centric Cleric. Be the real classic image of what a Cleric does in people's minds, even if that doesn't really line up with how it plays anymore.

What species? I always try to play something I haven't played, so I settle on Harengon. (Rabbit-man!) Even though this technically doesn't exist in Wildemount, which is the setting we're using, my DM and I agree that a fun animal man is not particularly weird and just because it's not in the sourcebook doesn't mean it can't be around.

So I'm an MtG guy, and realize this character can use a fun new card as the portrait.

And since the other players don't do MtG or aren't current on releases, I steal the name too.

So now we have Preston, rabbit-man Cleric of... something?

Go with Peace Cleric for subclass. Just good vibes time with the fun bunny.

Background time! Feylost seems fun and my DM is on board. Another player also wants to do that exact background, which actually gels nicely because we're supposed to already have some connections as a party.

I've put very little thought into backstory outside of broad strokes, and Wildemount has AMAZING backstory generation roll tables. Seriously these are great I love them, and DM wants us to at least roll one rival and ally, but we can roll per book's instructions on everything we'd like in addition.

Start with where I'm from: oh, a completely different part of the continent than where the game is. Not super weird especially for thos background. That's fine.

Family? 2 parents (also shoutout to the book for having 3+ parents as an option on that table explicitly saying they might be poly, non-monogamous, or just divorced and remarried and these are all valid and normal, feel very seen by that), 5 siblings. Jokes about rabbit birth rates flew around the Discord immediately.

1 significant family relation. I have a family member who caused something horrible to happen to me and they feel indebted to me about it. Gain an ally. Okay, I DM my DM saying I figure that's how little Preston ended up in the Fae. Roll for stat block this person uses... Berserker? Weird. Quirky.

Alright, time to roll for the other ally since DM said 1+ however many your relationship rolls generate for both allies and rivals. I apparently gave a significant sum of money to a beggar, who used that to turn their life around. Awww, that's sweet. Really on brand for the vibe I want here.

Okay, roll for what stat block THEY use... assassin? Okay so this beggar I guess used the gift as seed money to pursue their dreams of contract killing! Sure! Fine! We're definitely not going off the fucking rails here! Nope!

Qlso, this stat block says to roll on the "fateful moments" table because that's a rather dramatic person to interact with. So I roll on that and...

A demon lord visited me in a dream and spooked me real bad? And I woke up knowing how to ritual cast Find Familiar, but MUST summon a Quasit. (I named it Gullet!) I'm... I'm still a Cleric, right? Oh, ALSO ROLL ON THE INDEFINITE MADNESS TABLE.

So roll that. "I've discovered I really enjoy killing people." Wait, no, I misread that. Oh thank god. "I can't take anything seriously. The more serious it should be, the funnier it is." Feeling a little hurt that my personality is apparently listed as a type of madness in the DnD DMG, but I mean like I grudgingly admit this probably isn't a good way to be so fair.

So apparently my PEACE CLERIC helped their new friend start their dream of an assassination business, and this caught the attention of a DEMON LORD who wanted to give me a little buddy to chill with.

Still haven't rolled on the rival table at this point.

So do that, my rival is an ex-lover whose heart I broke. So I guess the rabbit fucks now. Stat block? Guard. So I was dating a cop or something, apparently. Feels like that's probably WHY my Chaotic Good ass dumped them. I remark that this seems REALLY boring compared to the rest, my DM says I can reroll it but honestly it's too funny to me.

So now it's time for some ancillary silliness. Favorite food based on region you're from? Dumplings apparently. Whimsical!

Mysterious secret? I've had dreams where townsfolk see me, scream "Scourger!" and then burst into flames. Seems probably like that's an after-effect of my DEMON LORD PAL, just logically. But also Preston maybe look into some dreamless sleep remedies for these nightmares, bud.

Prophecy? "I will meet my birth parents, and something about this will drastically change how I see the world." Seems appropriate for a child stolen by the Fae, actually.

So that's Preston. My new DnD character who is having a completely normal time and is just fine thanks for asking.