#obviously there are examples in the games writing of nuance and stuff but not nearly as much as id like

[zaeedsflipflops]

i have very little experience with dnd lore and so when shadowheart said she worshipped shar and, judging by dialogue options and stuff, clearly shar had a bad rep, i was kinda interested. bc i was like oh ok so maybe shar is seen as evil bc she is the goddess of darkness and loss, things that are scary and often unwanted. but shadowheart meanwhile was explaining the misunderstood good of shar and sharran belief. and then selûne being the goddess of light, i was like ok that makes sense people would assume that was entirely a good thing. and considering they are sisters, i thought the conflict between them might have layers beyond good vs evil.

anyway, eventually finding out that no, shar IS just bad and selûne is fully good was pretty disappointing and boring imo? it's not like i wanted it to turn out shar was good and selûne was bad or anything. but even if shar was portrayed a ruthless god who still genuinely had the positives shadowheart spoke of, while selûne was overall decent but there were negatives to her and selûnite beliefs would've been more interesting.

idk it's just kind of boring. turns out the most obvious interpretation is correct and there is no nuance. as always, dark=bad, light=good. shadowheart's hair isnt black anymore bc she is following the Good Light god now. it's just boring to me.

[alittlebitofloveliness]

you should absolutely write the genderbent outsiders fic, it would be so interesting to see how many things get changed. often people genderbend one person and just turn them into someone everyone's attracted to rather than looking at character, or they do change everyone but it's still all surface level changes but from what i've seen you seem like you'd do something really interesting with it

(no pressure obviously but it's a really cool idea especially with the attitudes of the outsiders (how would the scene where they meet cherry and marcia play out for example?))

HI! Ok so I do love this idea but I dont have time to wrote a full fic with the nuance it deserves but I did write out two little scenes for it so I'll post them here! One is lifted almost directly from the book its just the genderben take on it :)

“Speaking of movies,” Dalia flicked away her cigarette butt, “I’m thinking of walkin’ over to the nightly double tomorrow night. Might find someone to fool around with. Anyone wanna come?”

Stella shook her head. “The boys are takin’ me and Soda to the game.”

She didn’t need to look at me the way she did then. I wasn’t gonna try and stick around or nothing. I liked Soda’s boy, James, well enough and sometimes they’d offer me and Dar to go with them when they went to do stuff, but I wasn’t gonna try and third wheel. I’d never admit it, because Soda really likes Stella a lot, but sometimes I hate her. She doesn’t need to be half so possessive as she is over everything all the time- and Soda is my sister.

Darlene sighed, just like I knew she would. Darlene never had time to do anything with us anymore. “I have a date tomorrow night.”

She sounded less than enthused at the prospect, and Soda and I shared a look. Ever since mom and dad died, Darlene had spent nearly every night she wasn’t working going on various dates, with each guy seemingly worse than the last- and much as she tried to hide it, it wasn’t hard for Soda and me to guess why. It kind of killed me that my once vivacious sister, who’d always been so fiercely independent, was throwing herself at every mediocre guy who looked her way trying to find someone to provide for her, for us. On her own, Darlene would never consider marriage, at twenty no less, but now she had Soda to support for another year and me for another four and we all knew her two jobs were barely covering bills already. Sometimes the guilt of it, what Dar had already given up and what she was further prepared to lose made me so guilty and sad I couldn’t stand it. I knew Soda felt the same way.

Dalia just rolled her eyes. She only went on dates when it suited her, and only to cause trouble. She didn’t get Dar’s obsession with finding a good man- or if she did, she clearly didn’t respect it. 

“What about the rest of y’all? Two-bit? Jennygirl? You an’ Pony wanna come?”

“Me’n Jenny’ll come,” I knew Jenny wouldn’t open her mouth unless she was forced to, “Okay Dar?”

***************

“You make sure she gets her ass straight home, Soda,” Darlene says, “I mean it.”

I roll my eyes and she fixes me with an icy glare.

“Don’t get huffy with me, Ponygirl. You’re lucky you ain’t grounded. You know better than to be goin’ to the movie house alone.”

“But-”

“No buts,” she fixes me with a stern glare. If it weren't for how cold her eyes are she could be real pretty with her tumble of smoky curls and delicate nose. Now though, she just looks mean, like Tamina Shepard or one of the other girls who date the gang leaders round town, “you ain’t a boy Pony, you gotta quit goin’ around actin’ like one.”

[romancemoving]

ok first of all: vi is such a good oc. you really give him such a unique, vivid voice. he's multi-faceted, he has many layers and nuances about him that are so wonderful to see and read. i have to admit that i've peeked at your other writing and it's so fucking good.

i love the way you seem to capture everything about him in a reply. you know who he is, it's confident, it's a portrayal that you should 100% be proud of. vi has such a deep characterization and rich backstory. i love knowing more about him as time passes. it's such a pleasure to read headcanons and unique thoughts re: his personality.

there are no ocs like vi. he's one of a kind, he has an amazing personality that you've weaved from the ground up. i just clenches fist love vi so much. also? you're so good at dialogue. you know exactly what to say in your replies that gives me everything to work with. i love our stuff, i love how awkward and pretty and lovely it is. i love this space babe.

goddamn, rae! let me just say one last thing: vi is a perfect example of what an oc should be. well-rounded and built from scratch and like no other. i'm proud to know you and know vi.

✨ @debtwon. meme. still accepting!

im sorry i am answering this very very laté but i had to have a moment cuz this is so nice....... but now im here and im typing a response and it may be inadequate i have an incredibly awful time conveying my feelings its an uphill climb but ya kno what 

wateva we keep climbin babey, i got my hikin boots on for this ‘un

sang-woo has so much to find out about him lgfdjglfd. virote’s had his hands and aspirations in so many things and hes been through so much and some of it nearly killed him but we survived!! and hes here and hes strong about it!! and he struggles but he is impossibly strong-willed and his resolve cannot be knocked down by a stiff breeze...

and i guess that comes from the fact that i draw those emotional beats from the people around me in real life and the experiences ive had with them. and myself except i think virote and i are a bit too different for the inspiration to be seen on a surface point. its important for me to write someone so painfully human. so painfully open and strong, but still having a hard time keeping head above water. he has so much but he’s also suffered immensely he can’t even put it into words anymore.

he’ll still clock someone in the face tho ljJKLGFJDSGJFKD. there’s a side of him that’s a little rabid but as long as its not provoked its fine. he won’t blow up a building................. 

i love him too tbh and i think i’ve excelled above and beyond with him! ive had this muse for like 5 years now. he started out as an oc for final fantasy x... an rpg, a video game... an npc for that world. and now he’s just like

some guy lol..... doing excellent things. sometimes he does questionable things but he is some guy!!!

-_- omg our threads give me sensations....... sang-woo and vi r so awkward lol. but they obviously dig each other a lot........... its sweet

here’s to them being slightly less unstable around each other. luv from me n vi.... xoxo

[mantis-lizbian]

An aggressive reading of Warcraft

So I fell in love with the world of Warcraft thanks to Warcraft III. And perhaps one of the biggest parts of why I loved it so much was because, even then, it was a world. Arthas, and Jaina, and Thrall, and Tyrande were cool and all, sure, but I didn’t really connect to Warcraft through them. It wasn’t thanks to them that I won my battles. I connected to Warcraft through its people They may not have had names, but I still had fondness for my huntresses, and mortar teams, and grunts. No, not individually, that would just be insane. But collectively. As a group. These were Warcraft to me, not Illidan, or the Lich King, or Sylvanas. They were a part of it, and they certainly add to it, and I had affection for them, but largely as a part of this fantastical world, not in and of themselves. It’s because of how they relate to this world that I love them, not so much because of who they are in and of themselves.

When WoW came out, it was wonderful, because I got to step into this world myself, and become a part of it. I got to be one of those knights or raiders or mages or druids. I may have done great things, but never on my own. I was one of dozens fighting back the Redridge Gnolls. I was one of five who freed Silverpine from Arugal’s influence. I was one of forty who defeated Ragnaros. Intentional or not, the structure of the Warcraft games have always emphasized community effort and spat in the face of Great Man History. And on top of that, Azeroth’s Great Men constantly end up becoming its villains, reinforcing that message. Arthas wants to be the One to save Lordaeron and ends up destroying it. Illidan wants be the One to defeat the Legion, but becomes corrupted by it. Any time he actually manages to fight for good, it is when he relies on allies. Kael’thas wants to be the One to lead the high elves to salvation, but nearly turns them into ravenous slaves of the Legion. Garrosh wants to be the One to lead the Horde to glory, but leads to its implosion.

Great Men don’t exist in Azeroth.

Now, let me take a step back and explain that this is what we, in the literary criticism business, call an “aggressive reading”. I will bet money on the fact that no one at Blizzard intentionally set out to make this the theme of the Warcraft series. In fact, if may be permitted a touch of wild speculation, I suspect Metzen himself is likely to believe in Great Man Theory. Apologies if I’m mistaken on that, Chris. But authorial intent does not matter here. All that matters is what the text, itself, says.

Of course, some of you may already be trying to think of some counter-examples. Perhaps Thrall springs to mind. Fair enough, Thrall was a great man (orc). He led the orcs to the safety of Kalimdor, and founded Durotar, but the thing is that, first off, Thrall never really had much ambition. Founding Durotar is probably the most ambitious he gets, but that’s also just kind of the natural next step. I mean, what was he supposed to do? People can do great things, but great things are never done alone. In founding Durotar, Thrall has the help of the tauren, trolls, and even Jaina. Not to mention that it’s really the people who found the nation, and really Thrall just gets credit because they looked to him as their leader. It’s much easier to credit a single person for doing something than it is thousands. Still, it’s more accurate to say “the orcs founded Durotar” than to say “Thrall founded Durotar”. Now, I’d also like to point to the one time when Thrall actually does get closest to being the One person to do something: Cataclysm. But in doing so, I’d also like to point to the community’s feelings about this at the time. Thrall was not a popular character while he was hogging the limelight and getting all the credit.

You may also be tempted to point to your player character. They do a bunch of great stuff. But… most of what you do is quests and instances. Instances are, obviously, inherently a team effort. No one person gets any more credit than anyone else for slaying VanCleef or Yogg-Saron. Even canonically, every instance boss is credited as having been slain by “a group of adventurers”. And as for quests, the majority of quests are things that many people could canonically do concurrently without a need for further explanation, like clearing troggs out of a mine, or gathering materials for a team of engineers. Those quests which are an exception typically get credited canonically as having been performed by a group, like with dungeons, even if they aren’t actually group quests (though, notably, many once were before Cataclysm). Even in the more modern successors to these quests, the completion of the quest is usually thanks to the quest giver just as much as to the player. Even if they aren’t participating in the activity themselves, the quest giver tells you what needs to be done, how to do it, and sometimes gives you the tools needed to get it done. Without the quest giver, your character wouldn’t be able to complete the quest any more than the quest giver could without you (ignoring the restrictions and side effects of this being a game, of course; we’re talking in-universe).

Even when the player character gets more singular attention like in WoD and Legion, the Garrison and Class Hall have many people going about working on things that are needed to keep things running, even if they’re less exciting than adventures. You may be a catalyst, but you aren’t the sole driving force behind anything.

But then comes BfA. And suddenly… Great Man History everywhere! Sylvanas wants to execute a nonsensical attack on Teldrassil. So of course no one questions her, because Great Man History. It’s not like we’ve ever had other leaders push back against decisions they disagree with. Rank-and-file soldiers showing doubt? That’s not a thing that happens! In Northrend. During the Third War. Perhaps in a mission named after that very act. Sylvanas is the Warchief, so of course everyone’s going to follow her blindly. Even if the last Warchief had a completely different outlook. And the one before that was overthrown for pretty much doing this exact same thing. Even though he was more widely trusted by the members of the Horde than the current one.

I mean, I could also talk about how what is probably Blizzard’s most nuanced character ever (which admittedly isn’t a terribly high bar…) is getting every scrap of that nuance just thrown out the window, but plenty have people have already said so much on that topic… What really frustrates me - and what’s risking me losing all interest from here on out, not just until things blow over - is that… it’s the themes of the entire world. Not just the planet, but the setting. That are at risk, here. And that’s not something that’s as easy to recover from.

At the very least, ever since Warcraft III, contrary to its name, the Warcraft series has been almost anvilicious with its themes of cooperation and reconciliation. Archimonde could only be defeated because the orcs, humans, and night elves set aside their differences and worked together. The Horde and Alliance worked together against the qiraji as the Might of Kalimdor. The Scryers and Aldor unite as the Shattered Sun Offensive against Kael’thas. The Ashen Verdict. The Avengers of Hyjal and the Earthen Ring. The Siege of Orgrimmar. In addition to the customary-at-this-point Horde/Alliance… alliance, even Garrosh and Yrel fought side by side against Archimonde. And everyone hops on the Vindicaar together to take the fight to Argus.

So after all this, when the world itself has been smacking the Horde’s and Alliance’s heads together like unruly school children, why in fel should I be expected to take such a nonsensical status quo reset lying down? What am I supposed to make of the fact that Vol’jin, the Horde’s Warchief most dedicated to peace, second only to Thrall, chose Sylvanas? Stepping outside the narrative, why should I be content when we’ve been here before and the story offers literally nothing new? Why should I continue to have faith that engaging writing will be on its way when every actually interesting plot hook got unceremoniously dropped in favour of such a ridiculous war?

I ask because I love Warcraft. I truly, deeply love it. You don’t put this much thought and critical analysis into something you don’t love to perhaps a slightly unreasonable degree. And I don’t want to lose it.