#only allowed to give characters 3 items a day and then you basically can’t do anything else for 24 hours

[my-darling-boy]

Special circle of hell for game devs that still subject you to a diabolical grind to earn purchasable extras you’ve already paid for and make you wait significant real time hours to even slightly progress the main story of the game you’ve already paid for and then punish you by corrupting your save file or revoking basic game features if you attempt to try and get around the absurd restrictions in the game you’ve already paid for. You shell out so much money for a game, the least you could do is, oh I don’t know, let me play it

[raeygina-george]

Hii Raey! For the emoji ask game (the one I answered) Can I also give you the whole thing? :D [Only if you have the time tho!]

In that case...the whole thing - ones you you don't wanna answer <3

(Tag me in it btw :3)

📷 What’s set as your phone’s lockscreen?

a picture of a gravestone that says 'drowned in the pussy on it' with 'rip raey' shittily written under it. since i know you're so enamored with this lockscreen that you want to know my homescreen as well, it's the same image but hand drawn by my bestie

🍫 Cheese or chocolate?

chocolate but honestly both!

✨ Do you have any nicknames?

uhhh..... some of my friends call me pookie or raeybae but other than that not really lol

🎵 Last song you listened to?

against the kitchen floor by will wood!

✏️ Have you ever written fanfiction?

yes and i just foudn out fairly recently that someone made a tumblr acc based off of one of my fanfics. that was a wild day

😏 Are you on discord?

yass. username commanderofspicyfire if yall wanna chat!!

 💛 Do you have any piercings?

i have the basic ear piercings. i think it would be fun to have more but ive tried some of like the fake piercings & they don't really look that good on me + they're covered by my hair + you're not allowed to have piercings in when cheering so i'd have to get them all during the off season but there's not really enough Time for the piercings to heal before the season starts again </3

🐰 What do you think says the most about a person?

as gon said, if you want to get to know someone, find out what makes them angry!

🍪 If you were a cookie, what kind would you be?

uhhhh... probably like a caramel chocolate chip cookie.....

🐶 Are you more of a dog person or a cat person?

DOGS I LOVE DOGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1!1111!!!!!!!!!!! i do like cats too but DOGS BIG FLUFFY DOGS PUPPIES HOLY SHIT !!!!!

🎧 Headphones or earbuds?

headpohones yumy

🙃 What’s a weird fact that you know?

i actually dont think that knowing how many calories is in a human tooth is weird but i can't think of anything else off of the top of my head soo. 36. but while fact checking my answer i came across a much weirder fact, which is that the average newborn human baby has 420,000 calories in it. well... blaze it baby......

🦉 Are you a morning person or a night owl?

both but im more of a morning person tbh. ignoring the fact that i can't get out of bed on time to save my life

🧸 Favorite place to nap?

in my bed so cozy and eepy

🏳️‍🌈 Are you a member of the LGBTQIA+ community?

yass

🦋 Describe yourself in three words.

stupid bitch (affectionate)

👖 Jeans or sweatpants?

sweatpants

🥤 What’s your go-to Starbucks order?

i dont really drink starbucks but on the very very rare occasion that i do, caramel frappucino

🧡 A color you can’t stand?

i don't have any of those, but my least favorite color just like by itself is definitely that desaturated yellowy green

☕ Coffee or tea?

tea!!!! i haven't had coffee in a while but it made me feel kinda sick

🌙 How long have you been on tumblr?

since uhh june 2022 i believe? so not that long in the grand scheme of things

🌴 Desert island item?

assuming this is the 'what would you bring if you were stranded on an island' question, i would bring the anime character saiki k for obvious reasons

🐸 Describe your aesthetic.

most of the time i just dress comfy but on the rare occasion that i do dress up it's like. pastel lesbian schoolgirl on the side of goth OR malewife.

🔮 What’s your dream job?

[winry rockbell head in hands image] i dont know

💙 Relationship status?

i mean ignoring the fake polyamorous relationship my besties have suddenly created, single

🤎 What color is your hair?

brown lol

💌 Do you talk to yourself?

nope

💄 Do you wear makeup?

not usually? sometimes i will wear some eyeliner but im kinda eepy

🌸 Best compliment you ever received?

i cant really think of the Best One because a lot of people have given me really really really nice compliments and i appreciate them all lots

💞 @ your favorite blog.

@gxlexii and of course all of my mutuals!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! love yall!!!!

(also, just out of curiosity, does tumblr not give you a notification when someone answers your ask?)

[ingusdoesthings]

General Rules

- Only Cashapp

- Only USD

- No refunds

- Do NOT repost my work without crediting me

- I can provide examples of each item (aside from tarot readings) upon request

- I can provide further explanation on both rules and/or items upon request

Prices

Art:

Pencil Sketch - $1

Lineart headshot- $2

Grayscaled headshot - $3

Colored headshot- $4

Colored + Shaded headshot- $5

Pencil Sketch - $5

Lineart bust- $6

Grayscaled bust- $7

Colored bust- $8

Colored + Shaded bust- $9

Pencil Sketch - $9

Lineart fullbody- $10

Grayscaled fullbody- $11

Colored fullbody- $12

Colored + Shaded fullbody- $13

Rules and Precautions

- I can’t draw animals or anthro but I can attempt certain animal appendages

- I need 2 pose reference photos for every character drawn in case I cannot properly draw one of the poses

- Please give me a reference for every character. If you do not have a reference, I cannot promise I will draw your character accurately based off of simple description but I can try my best

- I have a very busy academic life atm. If I don’t message you within 3 days, feel free to just spam message me

- I’m still very much a beginner artist, especially digitally. I’m willing to admit that my art is not nearly as good as most other people’s on this community but I’ll still try my best

- no nsfw, but I can do suggestive clothing and poses

Tarot Readings

1 card advice - $1

Yes or No - $2

Past, present, future -$3

Past, present, future, advice -$4

Full custom spread - $5

Message from Divinity (experimental) -$6

Rules and Precautions

- I am still a beginner practicitoner, my readings may not be completely actual rate 24/

- Some divinities may not want to speak. I will allow you to pick other readings using the $6 you paid for the divinity reading if the divinity you’re attempting to communicate with does not want to talk

- The path of your life can majorly shift, which is something the card may not predict (especially if it’s very far in the future). Your future is never fully set in stone. The reading may not be 100% accurate, but we’ll try to read it to the best of our abilities.

- By divinity, I DO NOT mean spirit. I am not a spirit medium, I am simply asking gods from your specified pantheon if they have a message for you. I will not contact family members, friends, or any non-divinity.

Custom Themes, Icons, and Wallpapers:

Singles:

Aesthetic icon - $1

Aesthetic banner - $1

Glitter banner - $2

Glitter icon - $2

Simple Wallpaper - $2

Simple Lockscreen -$2

Complex Wallpaper - $3

Complex Lockscreen - $3

App Icons/Widgets - 25 cents each

Bundles:

Glitter Discord Nitro Bundle/Twitter Blue Bundle - $9

- Glitter Icon

- Glitter Banner

- Color codes

- Complex Lockscreen

- Complex Wallpaper

- 5 Icons/widgets

Aesthetic Discord Nitro /Twitter Blue Bundle - $8

- Aesthetic icon

- Aesthetic banner

- Color Codes

- Complex Lockscreen

- Complex Wallpaper

- 5 Icons/widgets

Basic Glitter Discord/Twitter Bundle - $5

- Glitter Icon

- Simple Lockscreen

- Simple Wallpaper

- Banner Color Code

- 3 Icons/widgets

Basic Aesthetic Discord/Twitter Bundle - $4

- aesthetic icon

- Simple Lockscreen

- Simple wallpaper

- Banner color code

- 3 icons/widgets

Additional Info

- I can match all of these in case you want to match with someone

- I’ll likely ask a lot of questions about this one in specific to make sure I get the aesthetics right

Writing/Grammar Check and Adjustment - $7

I adjust your grammar and sentence structure to improve the flow of your sentences to make your passage more readable and engaging.

Custom Poetry - $9

Want to gift your partner, parent, friend, or loved one with a gift? A poem about them and your love for them is perfect!

Custom One-Shots - 1 cent per word

Experience a custom-made mini-fanfic between both of your favorite characters or even between your favorite characters and yourself! (**You can set a word limit!!)

Themed Spotify Playlist - $1 per 2 songs!

Imagine having a playlist for every situation!

How To Commission

Step 1:

Message of on Twitter, TikTok, Insta, or DM me here with what you’d like commissioned

Step 2:

I will ask you questions about the specifics of your commission

Step 3:

I complete your commission and send you a sample as proof of completion

Step 4:

You make your payment and I send over your commission!

[duckprintspress]

Ten Things We Hate About Trad Pub

Often when I say “I’ve started a small press; we publish the works of those who have trouble breaking into traditional publishing!” what people seem to hear is “me and a bunch of sad saps couldn’t sell our books in the Real World so we’ve made our own place with lower standards.” For those with minimal understanding of traditional publishing (trad pub), this reaction is perhaps understandable? But, truly, there are many things to hate about traditional publishing (and, don’t get me wrong - there are things to love about trad pub, too, but that’s not what this list is about) and it’s entirely reasonable for even highly accomplished authors to have no interest in running the gauntlet of genre restrictions, editorial control, hazing, long waits, and more, that make trad pub at best, um, challenging, and at worst, utterly inaccessible to many authors - even excellent ones.

Written in collaboration with @jhoomwrites, with input from @ramblingandpie, here is a list of ten things that we at Duck Prints Press detest about trad pub, why we hate it, and why/how we think things should be different!

(Needless to say, part of why we created Duck Prints Press was to...not do any of these things... so if you’re a writer looking for a publishing home, and you hate these things, too, and want to write with a Press that doesn’t do them...maybe come say hi?)

-

1. Work lengths dictated by genre and/or author experience.

Romance novels can’t be longer than 90,000 words or they won’t sell! New authors shouldn’t try to market a novel longer than 100,000 words!

A good story is a good story is a good story. Longer genre works give authors the chance to explore their themes and develop their plots. How often an author has been published shouldn’t put a cap on the length of their work.

-

2. Editors assert control of story events...except when they don’t.

If you don’t change this plot point, the book won’t market well. Oh, you’re a ten-time bestseller? Write whatever you want, even if it doesn’t make sense we know people will buy it.

Sometimes, a beta or an editor will point out that an aspect of a story doesn’t work - because it’s nonsensical, illogical, Deus ex Machina, etc. - and in those cases it’s of course reasonable for an editor to say, “This doesn’t work and we recommend changing it, for these reasons…” However, when that list of reasons begins and ends with, “...because it won’t sell…” that’s a problem, especially because this is so often applied as a double standard. We’ve all read bestsellers with major plot issues, but those authors get a “bye” because editors don’t want to exert to heavy a hand and risk a proven seller, but with a new, less experienced, or worse-selling author, the gloves come off (even though evidence suggests time and again that publishers’ ability to predict what will sell well is at best low and at worst nonexistent.)

-

3. A billion rejection letters as a required rite of passage (especially when the letters aren't helpful in pinpointing why a work has been rejected or how the author can improve).

Well, my first book was rejected by a hundred Presses before it was accepted! How many rejection letters did you get before you got a bite? What, only one or two? Oh…

How often one succeeds or fails to get published shouldn’t be treated as a form of hazing, and we all know that how often someone gets rejected or accepted has essentially no bearing on how good a writer they are. Plenty of schlock goes out into the world after being accepted on the first or second try...and so does plenty of good stuff! Likewise, plenty of schlock will get rejected 100 times but due to persistence, luck, circumstances, whatever, finally find a home, and plenty of good stuff will also get rejected 100 times before being publishing. Rejections (or lack there of) as a point of pride or as a means of judging others needs to die as a rite of passage among authors.

-

4. Query letters, for so many reasons.

Summarize all your hard work in a single page! Tell us who you’re like as an author and what books your story is like, so we can gauge how well it’ll sell based on two sentences about it! Format it exactly the way we say or we won’t even consider you!

For publishers, agents, and editors who have slush piles as tall as Mount Everest...we get it. There has to be a way to differentiate. We don’t blame you. Every creative writing class, NaNoWriMo pep talk, and college lit department combine to send out hundreds of thousands of people who think all they need to do to become the next Ernest Hemingway is string a sentence together. There has to be some way to sort through that pile...but God, can’t there be a better way than query letters? Especially since even with query letters being used it often takes months or years to hear back, and...

-

5. "Simultaneous submissions prohibited.”

No, we don’t know when we’ll get to your query, but we’ll throw it out instantly if you have the audacity to shop around while you wait for us.

The combination of “no simultaneous submissions” with the query letter bottleneck makes success slow and arduous. It disadvantages everyone who aims to write full-time but doesn’t have another income source (their own, or a parents’, or a spouse’s, or, or or). The result is that entire classes of people are edged out of publishing solely because the process, especially for writers early in their career, moves so glacially that people have to earn a living while they wait, and it’s so hard to, for example, work two jobs and raise a family and also somehow find the time to write. Especially considering that the standard advice for dealing with “no simultaneous submissions” is “just write something else while you wait!” ...the whole system screams privilege.

-

6. Genres are boxes that must be fit into and adhered to.

Your protagonist is 18? Then obviously your book is Young Adult. It doesn’t matter how smutty your book is, erotica books must have sex within the first three chapters, ideally in the first chapter. Sorry, we’re a fantasy publisher, if you have a technological element you don’t belong here…

While some genre boxes have been becoming more like mesh cages of late, with some flow of content allowed in and out, many remain stiff prisons that constrict the kinds of stories people can tell. Even basic cross-genre works often struggle to find a place, and there’s no reason for it beyond “if we can’t pigeon-hole a story, it’s harder to sell.” This edges out many innovative, creative works. It also disadvantages people who aren’t as familiar with genre rules. And don’t get me wrong - this isn’t an argument that, for example, the romance genre would be improved by opening up to stories that don’t have “happily ever afters.” Instead, it’s pointing out - there should also be a home for, say, a space opera with a side romance, an erotica scene, and a happily-for-now ending. Occasionally, works breakthrough, but for the most part stories that don’t conform never see the light of day (or, they do, but only after Point 2 - trad pub editors insist that the elements most “outside” the box be removed or revised).

-

7. The lines between romance and erotica are arbitrary, random, and hetero- and cis-normative.

This modern romance novel won’t sell if it doesn’t have an explicit sex scene, but God forbid you call a penis a penis. Oh, no, this is far too explicit, even though the book only has one mlm sex scene, this is erotica.

The difference between “romance” and “erotica” might not matter so much if not for the stigmas attached to erotica and the huge difference in marketability and audience. The difference between “romance” and “erotica” also might not matter so much if not for the fact that, so often, even incredibly raunchy stories that feature cis straight male/cis straight female sex scenes are shelved as romance, but the moment the sex is between people of the same gender, and/or a trans or genderqueer person is involved, and/or the relationship is polyamorous, and/or the characters involved are literally anything other than a cis straight male pleasuring a cis straight female in a “standard” way (cunnilingus welcome, pegging need not apply)...then the story is erotica. Two identical stories will get assigned different genres based on who the people having sex are, and also based on the “skill” of the author to use ludicrous euphemisms (instead of just...calling body parts what they’re called…), and it’s insane. Non-con can be a “romance” novel, even if it’s graphically described. “50 Shades of Gray” can sell millions of copies, even containing BDSM. But the word “vagina” gets used once...bam, erotica. (Seriously, the only standard that should matter is the Envelope Analogy).

-

8. Authors are expected to do a lot of their own legwork (eg advertising) but then don't reap the benefits.

Okay, so, you’re going to get an advance of $2,500 on this, your first novel, and a royalty rate of 5% if and only if your advance sells out...so you’d better get out there and market! Wait, what do you mean you don’t have a following? Guess you’re never selling out your advance…

Trad pub can generally be relied on to do some marketing - so this item is perhaps better seen as an indictment of more mid-sized Presses - but, basically, if an author has to do the majority of the work themselves, then why aren’t they getting paid more? What’s the actual benefit to going the large press/trad pub route if it’s not going to get the book into more hands? It’s especially strange that this continues to be a major issue when self-publishing (which also requires doing one’s own marketing) garners 60%+ royalty rates. Yes, the author doesn’t get an advance, and they don’t get the cache of ~well I was published by…~, but considering some Presses require parts of advances to get paid back if the initial run doesn’t sell out, and cache doesn’t put food on the table...pay models have really, really got to change.

-

9. Fanfiction writing doesn't count as writing experience

Hey there Basic White Dude, we see you’ve graduated summa cum laude from A Big Fancy Expensive School. Of course we’ll set you up to publish your first novel you haven’t actually quite finished writing yet. Oh, Fanperson, you’ve written 15 novels for your favorite fandom in the last 4 years? Get to the back of the line!

Do I really need to explain this? The only way to get better at writing is to write. Placing fanfiction on official trad pub “do not interact” lists is idiotic, especially considering many of the other items on this list. (They know how to engage readers! They have existing followings! They understand genre and tropes!) Being a fanfiction writer should absolutely be a marketable “I am a writer” skill. Nuff said. (To be clear, I’m not saying publishers should publish fanfiction, I’m saying that being a fanfiction writer is relevant and important experience that should be given weight when considering an author’s qualifications, similar to, say, publishing in a university’s quarterly.)

-

10. Tagging conventions (read: lack thereof).

Oh, did I trigger you? Hahahaha. Good luck with that.

We rate movies so that people can avoid content they don’t like. Same with TV shows and video games. Increasingly, those ratings aren’t just “R - adult audiences,” either; they contain information about the nature of the story elements that have led to the rating (“blood and gore,” “alcohol reference,” “cartoon violence,” “drug reference,” “sexual violence,” “use of tobacco,” and many, many more). So why is it that I can read a book and, without warning, be surprised by incest, rape, graphic violence, explicit language, glorification of drug and alcohol use, and so so much more? That it’s left to readers to look up spoilers to ensure that they’re not exposed to content that could be upsetting or inappropriate for their children or, or, or, is insane. So often, too, authors cling to “but we don’t want to give away our story,” as if video game makes and other media makers do want to give away their stories. This shouldn’t be about author egos or ~originality~ (as if that’s even a thing)...it should be about helping readers make informed purchasing decisions. It’s way, way past time that major market books include content warnings.

Thank you for joining us, this has been our extended rant about how frustrated we are with traditional publishing. Helpful? No. Cathartic? Most definitely yes. 🤣

*

Have a question about writing? Drop us an ask!

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[pies-writes-and-more]

Haikyuu boys and wearing their clothes

Characters: Asahi Azumane, Kageyama Tobio, Sugawara Koushi, Tsukishima Kei, Bokuto Kotaro, Ushijima Wakatoshi, all with a gender-neutral reader :) (let me know if I missed a pronoun change or made something too femme! I very much so did not proof read this lol)

Warnings: Probably some swearing

A/N: This might be an overdone topic but I love it so much soooooo no regrets :) Let me know if you’d like more!

Asahi literally carries a picture of you in his phone case because he loves you in his clothes so much. He also has a pic of you wearing his hoodie as his wallpaper, and another printed pic of you framed in his room. I don’t care what size you are, his sweaters still manage to feel gigantic on you. It is like a hug FOREVER. 

He literally could not care less that his closet is slowly growing smaller because it means that he gets to see you in his clothes. Eventually, you’ll carry them all back to him in a bag so that he can make them smell like him again. But this is his favourite part, because now his favourite items smell like you. 

Daydreaming in class? Thinking of you wearing the sweater he has on. 

Gets smacked by a volleyball during practice? It’s cause the smell of you is still on his jersey. 

This man trips over his own two feet cause he’s trying to find you in the halls and you wave at him wearing his volleyball jacket ”So that’s where that went. I thought I forgot it somewhere...”

The two of you would trade sweaters before he went on any overnight trips and you’d send him snapchats of you cuddling with the sweater over a pillow or just you snuggled in bed with it on. He’d screenshot all of them, regardless of if you thought you looked good. 

He has an album of you. He will never delete them because they’re all precious.

His teammates have accidentally caught him looking through it before a game because it really de-stressed him if you weren’t able to attend the game in person (though you made it to most of them). Tanaka would burst into tears over not being able to have a significant other with cute photos of and would make Asahi promise to always treat you right. And Asahi would just stare at your photos with his cute little smile and obviously promise because his least favourite thing in the world is seeing you sad.

(Look at how cute he is omg)

Kageyama is confused when you ask to wear his sweater. You probably did it at a time that made some sort of sense. Like it was late at night and you were studying in the gym while Hinata and him were practicing. 

The cool breeze into the gym made you shiver a little and you noticed that his sweater was just sitting there on the ground so when he came over to grab some water you just looked up at him with your signature puppy eyes. “Can I wear it?”

“Why?”

“Oi, stupid head. They’re probably cold!” 

It would probably annoy him so much that Hinata figured it out before him. He’d kneel down and help you put it on, pulling it over your head and giving you a little smile cause you looked so damn cute in his sweater. 

But now that you’ve started wearing his things, he’s still very confused as to why you ask for them. “Should we go shopping?” He’d ask you randomly on a weekend when there was no volleyball practice. And you’d just stare at him because why would Kageyama want to stand somewhere that wasn’t a gym. “Aren’t you running out of clothes to wear or something?”

It would take a while and some conversations before you realized he was asking cause you had like 3 hoodies, a t-shirt, and some track pants in your room that were very much so his. “I just like having a piece of you with me,” you’d explain. He would have to think it over but he was very happy with this idea.

There’s only one shirt you’re not allowed to take and it’s this cute little graphic tee you got him for his birthday that has a nice drawing of a milk carton on it. He loves it. He will kill anyone that laughs at it. And no, you cannot wear it because if you’re wearing, what is he supposed to wear.

Sugawara and you regularly switch clothes because this man gives no fucks for your gender roles thank you very much. He shows up to practice one day wearing a dark pinkish basic, or some floral print shirt that you had in your closet and the boys are like “um Suga what are you wearing?”

And he’s probably just like “it’s call fashion, look it up.” (Like Suga sweetie, it’s just a shirt lol)

If you own any tighter pants like yoga pants or leggings? Suga has worn them because his legs and ass look great in them and he will strut around fully confident with that knowledge.

Honestly, he probably steals your sweaters more than you realize. You guys are baking at his house one day and you’ve made a mESS of your clothes and he’s just like oh it’s okay I’ll get you some new clothes.

And you’re expecting this cute little pj set that he has that might fit you or some comfy clothes that he’s lending you. No. He legitimately has some of your clothes and gives them to you and you’re just like.... “Suga I’ve been looking for this shirt for weeks. I even asked you about it.”

And he is suddenly deaf, little shithead.

He likes you in any clothes but they have to be his comfy clothes or he will set that shit on fire. Ennoshita once offered you his gloves because it was fricken cold out and you forgot yours at home and Suga literally threw him across the road and was like “hello angel I have gloves for you”.

You’re just like “um... Ennoshita are you okay?” Boy probably has a concussion and Suga’s just like “who’s Ennoshita?”

Tsukishima will kill you if he finds you raiding his closet. Like if he walks into his room when you two are supposed to be studying and you’re just casually picking out a sweater, he will throw you on the bed and tickle you until you call for mercy.

Will he offer his clothes to you if you’re in need of something? Most of the time, yes. But you have to ask. No stealing allowed in this household.

Except one night you stayed over and totally forgot a night shirt. Tsukishima is already like half asleep because he woke up way too early for practice that morning, so you just sneak into his drawers and pull out the first shirt you can. You can’t even see what it has on it cause it’s fucking dark. Then you crawl into bed with him, figuring you’ll accept your punishment for stealing tomorrow.

And when he wakes up, you best believe he was annoyed. First off, who plans to stay over and doesn’t bring a shirt? Stupid, can’t you remember anything? But then he realizes, you grabbed this cute little dino graphic shirt and his face is RED. Pasty boi so bright, he might as well be Hinata’s hair. And he’s desperately trying to get out of the bed and run to the bathroom before you wake up because holy fuck you’re PRECIOUS?

But all of his squirming just wakes you up and you see him all flustered, and just assume he’s mad and you’re like I’m so sorry I just didn’t have anything else and was stupid and forgot. And he just hits you (lovingly) on the head, mutters some sort of insult, and moves on.

From then on, that is your designated shirt. It’s a comfort item almost. He’ll only really wear it when he has to be away from town overnight, in which case he’ll wear it as a reminder of you (he won’t admit to it but you tried to take the shirt as a keepsake for while he was gone and he only had a heart attack. Tsukishima Kei does not believe in lucky charms. But he has yet to lose a game when he wears that shirt the night before).

Bokuto has been WAITING for you to wear something of his, but you haven’t yet. And it’s been stressful. He keeps trying to find a good excuse to see you in his clothes but you’re always too well-prepared.

“It’s kinda chilly out, Y/N, want my sweater??”

“I brought one, don’t worry!”

-.- *cue owl boi pouts*

And he doesn’t want you to wear something of his just because he asked. He wants to you want to wear his things. So he just waits. And pouts. And waits some more.

The day finally came when he was least expecting it. The gym that his game was in was freezing and you couldn’t imagine why. Most of the gyms they had played before in were pretty standard temperature but you were going to die if you stayed in the clothes you came in.

You had snuck onto the court while the boys were stretching, Akaashi smacking Bokuto in the head and interrupting his hype session to help him notice you.

“You wouldn’t happen to have a sweater with you, would you? It’s freezing!”

His eyes would widen. The day has finally arrived. He would finally get to see you in his clothes!!!!

But of course he has no sweater because he had not planned on needing one. Cue more sulking. Of course Akaashi comes over and offers his sweater and Bokuto almost bites his hand off.

“Well offer her your jacket then, idiot.” Akaashi just needs this man to hold off pouting till later. 

Bokuto’s jacket just looked so perfect on you and it was a nice way to keep warm. You cheered him on during the games and after some jaw-dropping move of his, he would turn to your direction and send you a kiss. Embarrassing? A little. But he was such a cutie, how could you deny his air kiss?

Wearing his clothes became more common after that and he will literally bring you his whole closet so you can pick your favourites.

Ushijima didn’t even wait for you to ask to give you his clothes. He probably folded up his hoodie or jacket for you before a game and placed it awkwardly on your lap or in your arms and you’re just like um... do you want me to put this away for you or?

“Would you wear it for me?” How can you say no??? His cheeks are just slightly going red and he’s avoiding your eyes a bit so of course you have to wear it.

Ushijima thinks you look so nice in his clothes and he really likes how happy you look when he asks you to wear something, so he keeps doing it. That and he knows that sometimes people ask you out during his matches and he likes knowing that they’ll recognize his school colours or his jersey number and at that moment, he will send a calculated glare in their direction. And they will run for the hills, never to bother you again :)

I feel like he’s accidentally shrunk his clothes in the wash before and he just keeps them in a small pile in his room so that you can wear them when you come over. He also buys you proper house slippers that you can wear around his home because he wants you to be as comfy as possible.

Sometimes when you guys are just standing around waiting for a game to start, or if you’re all done eating lunch, he’ll unzip his track jacket and open it up so you can stand there and hug him, and he’ll hug you back with his hands in the pockets so it’s like you’re in the jacket with him (Tendo has definitely zipped it up before and trapped you guys in an awkward hug like stance and he will continue to do this because he thinks it’s hilarious. Has definitely snapped pictures of it and sent it to Ushijima. Ushijima saved it because it was kinda cute).

[shima-draws]

Me, clapping my hands: SUPPORT COURSE IZUKU! SUPPORT COURSE IZUKU!! ...WITH A PROSTHETIC!!

I’m sure people have had this idea before but I wanted to put my own spin on it!! And now for the info:

-Izuku's been fascinated with heroes since a young age. However, after finding out he was quirkless, he refused to give up, and switched gears to start investing in the support field. He figured if he couldn't be a pro hero he could at least do his best to help them and be a hero in his own way.

-Izuku's an absolute GENIUS when it comes to inventing--he's on par with Hatsume. However, Hatsume focuses more on support items that break convention and are very innovative and unique. Izuku's focus is more on items that actually help heroes on the field and support their bodies, and items that also allow them to use their quirks to their full extent while still being able to control them properly. (Basically, Izuku's gadgets act as a control stick for heroes that go all out i.e. Toshi.) He also makes a lot of gadgets that support disabled heroes, because--

-Izuku has a prosthetic arm! It's his right one. This was the result of a villain attack that he got involved in after meeting All Might. Toshi blames himself for what happened to Izuku because he couldn't get there in time. He and Izuku are very close--Izuku knows the secret behind Toshi's appearance and he knows about One For All. Mirio is the one to inherit OFA in this AU--so Izuku's very close to him as well! Izuku makes support items for both Toshi and Mirio, to support their quirks. Izuku's gadgets have saved Toshi in a pinch a hundred times over, and are designed to support him when he needs that extra push when he's already reached his limit.

There is more ahead~

-After Izuku lost his arm in the villain accident, Bakugou does a total 180 and starts treating him better. From the start their relationship was less strained than in canon bc Izuku went into doing stuff for support early on, and Bakugou didn't see this as much as a threat compared to if Izuku still wanted to be a pro hero despite being quirkless. Nowadays Bakugou is VERY protective of Izuku--and both of them have reached a point where they're genuine friends. Izuku teases Bakugou a lot and easily snarks back at him when he's being a little shit. Bakugou won't ever admit it openly but Izuku is his best friend :') He cares about him  a lot. He used to defend Izuku constantly back in middle school after the accident, but Izuku soon learned to stand up for himself.

-Going off of that, Bakugou taught Izuku how to fight physically, and they try to spar once or twice a week if they can! It's good practice. Izuku was awful at it at first especially since his sense of balance was off due to the weight of the prosthetic, but Bakugou's a good teacher despite all his shouting lmao. Now Izuku can easily hand his ass to him if he gets into it enough. He can handle himself in a fight pretty brilliantly, even against villains, and Class 1-A quickly learns not to underestimate him.

-Bakugou refuses to get support items from anybody else but Izuku. He bitches at Izuku a lot but Izuku always takes his advice--Bakugou usually offers good tips and pointers on how to improve his gauntlets! Baku always says that while Izuku fucks up all the time (false), he at least trusts him enough to get the job done, while he scorns the rest of the support course fnjdsdd

-Since Izuku isn't in Class 1-A in this AU--guess who is? Yeah, it's Shinsou! Besides Baku Shinsou is probably Izuku's other closest friend, along with Hatsume! Shinsou's got a crush on Izuku and probably knows it won't be reciprocated, but he's fine with that. If Shinsou isn't in class he's most likely hanging out in the development studio with Izuku and Hatsume. The three of them are kinda like a mini Big Three haha, they've got a reputation around UA

-Do not put Izuku and Hatsume in the same room together or they'll bounce insane ideas off of each other and create outrageous things. They get each other super fired up LMAO and go to each other for advice when they need it!

-Izuku has the biggest, most obvious and absolutely endearing crush on one (1) Shouto Todoroki. Bakugou teases him about it CONSTANTLY. The reason for this is because they actually met back in middle school, before Izuku lost his arm--and Todoroki just made a really memorable impression on him bc he was the first person to ever treat him really kindly (they bumped into each other on accident because Izuku was getting chased by bullies, Izuku scraped up his hands, Todoroki chased off the bullies and then iced his injuries, and then they had a really deep conversation about heroes and encouraged each other). Todoroki kinda becomes Izuku's first love in that sense;; ofc it's nothing super serious but Izuku definitely feels all floaty and happy about it afterward. When Izuku gets into UA and notices that Todoroki's in the hero course he almost has a stroke because 1. Izuku gave him encouragement to get into UA waaaay back then and he's shocked Todoroki actually took his advice, 2. He finds out that Todoroki is in fact Todoroki bc they never gave each other their names, so Izuku's Shook his "first love" is actually the son of Endeavor, and 3. Todoroki's grown. He was pretty back in middle school but now. He's hot. HE'S HOT OH NO. After that Izuku keeps noticing him and hears rumors that Todoroki is an ice cold prince type character that has no real feelings. Izuku's like "Someone who takes the time out of their day to save you, heal your hands, and encourage you on your path to be a hero can't be that type of person" so Izuku just KNOWS Todo's actually a very kind boy. Izuku keeps watching him and gets super smitten after the Sports Festival ;) But he's like "He's practically famous, he'd never notice somebody like me, he probably doesn’t even remember me from middle school, haha" (so it's a bit like a celebrity crush). Shinsou and Hatsume bug him about his crush just to see him get flustered and it's very cute lol

-The second time Izuku and Todoroki meet is a goddamn mess and technically counts as their first because Todoroki has a shit memory and can't connect Izuku's face to the boy he met in middle school (also that boy definitely had two flesh arms and Izuku only has one). Todoroki walks in right as one of Izuku's gadgets explodes, absolutely showering him in dust and soot. Izuku freaks out and apologizes a lot while he helps him clean up (while Hatsume is teasing in the background). Note that Izuku's only wearing like a tanktop and sweats, and his hair is all messy and swept back especially since he's wearing his trademark goggles, he's covered in sweat and dirt, he has a really cool looking prosthetic (and Todoroki didn't realize he'd have a thing for that but apparently he does), and Izuku's really fucking toned so Todoroki has a big ol Gay Crisis right there in the development studio. Izuku is INCREDIBLY attractive and Todoroki doesn't know what to do with that info. After Izuku cleans up and manages to get an order for a support item out of Todo, Todo leaves and immediately texts Momo saying, "Yaoyorozu, I think I just had my gay awakening" and on the other side of campus, Momo chokes on her drink. Meanwhile back in the studio Izuku is SCREAMING like "Oh my GOD did that really just happen--did Shouto Todoroki walk in, get blasted by one of my inventions going haywire, let me clean him up and TOUCH HIS CHEST, HATSUME, I GOT TO FEEL HIM UP, and THEN HE ASKED ME TO TAKE AN ORDER, I'M GOING INTO CARDIAC ARREST. TELL MY MOTHER AND TOSHI I LOVED THEM AND TELL TODOROKI I'M SORRY FOR GETTING HIS PERFECT BEAUTIFUL HAIR DIRTY" and she's just laughing her ass off LMAOOOO

-It isn't until their third meeting that Izuku realizes Todoroki doesn't seem to remember him at ALL. And it stings, a lot (but he kinda figured this would happen esp since Todo didn’t recognize him the last time they talked), but he's still happy for the chance to know him now, and get to design support items for him!! Meanwhile Todo's like. Starting to catch on that maybe he DOES know Izuku after all? He isn't sure? But he's definitely falling for him. 

I’ve got more headcanons and stuff but yeah this is all the basics!!! I got so excited to flesh this AU out and make designs fnasjkbdnasds it’s definitely gonna be a fun one to play around with!

I want to either call this the Support Course Hero AU or maybe just Support Hero AU would work--what do you guys think?

[2-dsimp]

SURVIVAL KIT EVENT (heads up my explanation is a bit long) I sent this earlier but idk if you saw it. Lately Tumblr has been yetting my asks into the void for some reason.

1. Karate Club Leader - Childe.

We know he has the obsessive trait. He needs to see senpai regularly which isn’t going to be too hard since we are in a club with him. Basically he seems like he isn't going to cause much trouble for us as long as he gets some attention . Not to mention he is physically strong so he is a free bodyguard. Don’t think many yandere’s are going to act up when they counter Childe with Senpai otherwise they are probably going to get knocked out hard. “You shouldn’t have touched my Senpai, now look at you…Hanging on to your last breath haha! How pathetic” (quoted from his headcanons) Childe’s club I’m sure gives the skillset strength which will be useful when we have unexpected encounters where we can’t use stealth to get away.

2. Stealth and Strength

Getting out of situations before they can even begin, escaping them or grabbing important items makes stealth a flexible trait that can be used in many situations. For some reason I have the idea that strength can be OP at a high enough level because the yandere will struggle to physically do anything to you. Not to maintain some would be imitated and act more tamed not to offend senpai out of fear or respect which gives the players more control. Unless the yandere has more strength or is able to outwit the players to me it feels like a get out of jail card at higher degrees.

3. Ayato, Kazuha, Albedo and Lumine

Since this is the first day and things are going to get harder as days progress. I think it’s important to try to figure out the character traits we don’t currently know yet because it’s the best time to do so. Especially the ones that give off red flags because one way or another we are going to encounter them and I say best to do it now with no debuffs, assignments, debts etc. As for Lumine, well we still have her phone so I think she owes us a favor if we can give it to her.

4. Ayato (Yes I know I put him in q3)

Being on a date and having a character's affection at a high level doesn’t mean you know the character traits so thats why I put him in q3 3. As for my reasons to have him in question 4... “Secret admirers are difficult to find and are known to be the most dangerous wild cards! They may be your saving grace or potential ticket to death row, it all depends on how you impact them.” So far he is the only one that we have currently discovered that has that. The fact that the game is straight up warns us players about him being the death of us or being super helpful shows alot about Ayato’s potential so I want to be on his good side. Unlike some yanderes, most likely he isn’t going to be bragging about the kiss or date unless someone brings it up. Based on his personality in Genshin he isn’t the type to draw unwanted attention but rather dance in the shadows and be cunning like a puppeteer. He is a smooth talker due to being the Yashiro commissioners dealing with politics so he isn’t going to do anything reckless outwrite but instead plan carefully and manipulate situations to suit his interests. He has spies that relay information back to him so it makes me wonder if he has any dirt/ useful information on other characters. This would be helpful as it allows us to make better decisions and survive. Idk if the Shuumatsuban in this au are able to assassinate anyone Ayato chooses but that too could play to our own advantage if that is the case.

I haven’t had the chance to get to it yet but I’m so glad I did now! (>^ω^<)

@xadiac

[tl-notes]

Kobayashi’s Maid Dragon S2 Episode 9 Notes

...設立から大分地盤が固まってきており、少しずつだが、業態は改善されている。

One thing to note here is that Kobayashi(‘s narration) isn’t saying the company has already made solid improvements, it’s that the company has finally established itself somewhat (as it was only founded relatively recently, and typically new companies are especially busy while trying to get off the ground) and now is starting to make improvements.

Similarly in the second sentence, it’s not “was” slow going, it’s “is still” slow going, and the working conditions “are” improving, not “have improved.”

This is がんば ganba, short of course for がんばって ganbatte, which I’m sure most of you are familiar with: the (in)famous “do your best.”

I only mention it because I like this shortened version of it. Ganba!

This is a fun little idiom(?)/saying: 鼻で笑う hana de warau (conjugated as hana de warawareta), lit. to laugh using the nose. It’s used to describe laughing at someone you’re looking down on for whatever reason (not necessarily in a super serious way, could just be a friend being dumb etc.; in this case it’s Elma’s being naive).

Typically it refers to like a “heh-but-through-the-nose” kind of “laugh,” but as you can see in this scene (where clearly Kobayashi is laughing with the mouth, even starting with “pff” lips) it works idiomatically even if the laughing isn’t only through the nose.

You may have heard that Japan is/was a “lifetime employment” country, where typically people would get hired right out of school and stay at that company until retirement. While that’s much less true today than it was even a couple of decades ago (and has become kind of controversial in ways), it’s still much more common of a practice than in say the US.

One result of this is that there’s a much bigger distinction placed between hiring people in spring as part of the annual graduation rush (the Japanese school year ends in March), and mid-career hiring. Typically you can’t participate in the fresh grad hiring if you aren’t one, even if you’re new to the field in question. 

For larger employers (i.e. 5k+ employees), roughly two-thirds of all hirings come from fresh grads, and only small employers (<300 employees) hire more mid-careerists than people directly out of school.

Of course, this split tends to apply mostly to “standard” full time jobs, not so much part time, and is not necessarily a thing in every industry/at every company.

Just as a minor point of clarity, this “organized text” in Elma’s document refers to the phrase まとめられた文章 matomerareta bunshou. In a literal sense, matomerareta can mean organized/consolidated etc., and bunshou text/passages, but meaning-wise it’s more like “writing that gets its point across clearly/cleanly.” 

This is a pretty big compliment and a very useful skill to have in organizations like this, as writing such that people can quickly and easily understand exactly what you’re trying to say often saves a ton of time and frustration.

我々はエルマの気迫に押されるがままにその書類を読み始めた。

Another minor point, but where the English could imply that they were overwhelmed by Elma’s intensity through the act of reading her report, the Japanese implies more that they started reading it because of how intense Elma was being. 

It doesn’t really make much of a difference either way, but it stuck out a little for me. 

To justify mentioning it, I guess I’ll explain the grammar point Kobayashi uses: されるがままに sareru ga mama ni. Sareru is a generic verb/verb conjugation for having something done to you (technically here it’s 押される, to be “pushed/pressed/pressured”), and mama refers to a state, condition, or “way” (like “do it this way”).

Put together, the whole phrase is used to indicate “you” do/did something that someone else wants you to, without (meaningful) opposition. (Something similar in raw meaning but with a very different connotation would be “going with the flow.”)

If a friend says “hey let’s go do something,” and next thing you know you’re out bowling despite preferring to stay at home, this is you.

You can stick the mama ni to various other things as well to come up with a similar idea, but without the sareru the nuance may end up different. 

The word for clairvoyance here is 千里眼 senrigan, lit. “eye(s) [that can see] a thousand li”, li being a Chinese unit of measurement for length (shorter than a mile, but for general purposes “eyes that see a thousand miles” is basically the gist).

Despite the perhaps physical-sounding nature of the term, it does actually describe the same power as “clairvoyance” in English: being able to perceive things outside your actual range of vision, including potentially into people’s hearts and minds etc.

Hence why it’s a thousand screen display, when she updates it with tech knowledge:

“Tainted by work” here is 職業病 shokugyou-byou, lit. an occupational disease. The “proper” definition is a disease one gets from working in a particular job, such as black lung for coal miners or even posture-related health issues for desk workers. 

Additionally, it’s used colloquially to refer to noticeable habits or quirks that people in a certain profession pick up, like a baker always waking up super early or a programmer using programming lingo out of context in normal conversation. The latter being especially noticeable in Japanese, as a lot of such terms are English in origin.

“Shocking” here is a fun word: ドン引き don-biki. “Don” here is added just for emphasis; the main meaning revolves around 引き hiki/biki, from the verb 引く hiku, meaning to pull. 

The idea is that someone does/says something that you recoil from. Maybe it’s gross (“I only shower once a week”), maybe it’s mean (“They didn’t smile enough so I didn’t leave a tip.”), maybe it’s creepy (“I sent like 30 texts yesterday but still no reply.”), just anything that has you feeling like you might want to create some distance because... phew. 

It’s kind of similar to the current use of “cringe” as an adjective/noun, though with less of an internet-slang feel* to it, and generally used more as something the speaker is doing rather than describing whatever/whoever is being cringe. 

(*I think it started being used popularly in this way in the early-to-mid 90s, with the “don”biki variant specifically popping up around 2005.)

A “Premium Friday” is the last Friday of the month, where you get to leave work at 3 pm. It is largely theoretical. 

The idea was created by the Japanese government as a way to reduce working hours and encourage domestic spending (boost demand), but it has not been implemented by all that many employers, and especially not many smaller employers. There isn’t, after all, any mandate or government-provided incentive for doing so.

Evidence from the places that did implement it suggests it is actually good for the economy, but good luck convincing bosses to give extra paid time off.

“Last Friday of the month” was chosen because most people get paid on the 25th each month (Japan tends to pay monthly instead of every two weeks), so it would usually be right after payday, when people are more willing to get spendy.

Kobayashi saying eight hours here reminded me of a “fun” fact: the typical Japanese work day is eight hours plus a one hour break. Plus a one hour break, not with. So a typical work day is actually nine hours. Most commonly 8 to 5 or 9 to 6. Not many “nine-to-fives” here.

The characters for Joui are 上井, which usually read as Kamii or Uwai. It’s “Joui” because that means, when written as 上位, “superior.” As in “a superior life-form.” Like a dragon, say.

でも、ゆっくりやる事業改善案を見せてもらえたじゃない？

This one is actually kind of a critical mistake. In the English it sounds like she’s talking about the improvement proposal that Elma made and that the boss looked at. In the Japanese though, she’s talking about a different plan, one the boss showed them*, that is similar in idea but is going to take longer to be fully implemented**. So we’re being told that while Elma didn’t get what she wanted as fast as she wanted it, it is still basically going through at a slower pace.

*In ”見せてもらえた misete moraeta,” the misete vs mite means they were the ones who got shown something, rather than the ones who got someone to look at their stuff. 

**Which you can tell from the ゆっくりやる yukkuri yaru, where yaru is basically “do” and yukkuri means (in this case) at an unhurried pace.

(Re previous note: Hence why she says “immediately” here.)

“Black (ブラック)” and “white (ホワイト)” in the context of Japanese employers refers to how well employees are treated: a company with good benefits/pay, reasonable levels of overtime, and feels safe to work at is “white,” while a company that has excessive overtime, often pays poorly, breaks labor laws, and allows harassment to fester is “black.” 

While “white company” was created simply in contrast to the term “black company,” the latter finds its origins in front businesses for organized crime, which were called “black” in the sense of “illegal” (similar to “black market” or something being in a “grey area”). Given the international reputation of Japanese work life, you can imagine that “black company” as a term sees much more use.

There’s been some discussion about maybe replacing it due to the racial implications (especially since it uses the English word “black”), but while typically English translations drop the color for that reason (e.g. ブラック企業大賞, an “award” given to Japan’s worst employer each year, is officially “Most Evil Corporation of the Year Award” in English), it hasn’t really penetrated to the mainstream at this point.

The rice there is in a 飯盒 hangou, a metal container that looks… like that, and is the stereotypical item of choice for cooking rice while camping. It has its origins in the mess kits used by the military, but these days they’re primarily marketed as portable rice cookers for camping use. 

You can get round ones too, but the bean shape is very popular.

“Settings” here is 設定 settei, lit. exactly that, “setting(s).” E.g. if you open a computer program and look at the settings menu, it’ll be settei in the Japanese language settings (settei). 

I bring it up here because there’s a bit of a difference in how it gets used colloquially like this. In English, the “setting” for a story typically refers to where and when it’s set. In Japanese, “setting” in that sense is usually 舞台 butai. But settei is still used when talking about fiction, just in a different, more expansive way.

Often in these cases settei is used to refer to the various conceits that provide the context in which the story takes place. In this show, for example, one such “setting” is that dragons are real: another is that magic exists. It comes up especially often in fantasy/sci-fi type stuff where there are major distinctions between that universe and the real world—not that stories in a real-world setting don’t have settei of their own, but they often are lumped into descriptions of the plot in that case (”a dragon comes to live with an office worker in her apartment”).

It also refers to the “settings” of characters, like name or age, and things like “they run a bakery that’s going out of business and are trying to save it.” Basically all the details you’d have in a character profile.

It also gets used in conversation to refer to pretend things or (basically) lies: like here, where Saikawa thinks Shouta is playing pretend with his ley-lines talk, or e.g. if someone is trying to tell you some outlandish story (“my uncle works at Nintendo…” or someone asking for love life advice for “their friend”) and you’re just like “Okay so that’s the settei here, I see.”

Not really a big deal, but Elma’s line here in Japanese implies she won’t let Tohru call her that anymore (see her もう mou). Tohru’s response is also more of a “I haven’t been?”, since of course she wasn’t aware of Elma’s-mental-image-Tohru tormenting Elma in the previous scene:

The word for “full of” in the title here is ざんまい zanmai (a suffix form of 三昧 sanmai), usually meaning that there’s a whole lot of [whatever] to immerse oneself in. I mostly bring it up because there’s a famous restaurant chain called Sushi Zanmai that specializes in, obviously, sushi.

And you know, Elma is a water dragon that looks kinda like an eel… I’m just sayin’…

Not really a translation note, but wild that Elma didn’t even touch her parfait. (Not so wild that Fafnir finished his so quickly.) Serious business ahead...

“Genuinely” here is 素直に sunao ni, where the “ni” is used like “-ly” to make sunao work as an adverb. Sunao itself is an interesting word that falls into that category of “simple concept that is often hellish to translate.”

For some context, the first character, 素, is also used in the word 素顔 sugao, which is a face without makeup and 素材 sozai, basically raw ingredients/materials. The second, 直, is used in words like 直線 chokusen, a straight line, or 正直 shoujiki, honest.

Put them together, and you’ve got a word with connotations of directness and being unadorned. The original definition of the word tends toward “simple, natural” in the sense of e.g. life growing up on a rural farm. 

The more common use for it these days is to describe people and their actions. Positively, it can mean something similar to a person being happy to help, or kind of like the opposite of conniving; open, frank, genuine. Less positively, it can mean someone is too trusting and easy to trick into doing things OR someone who is “too honest” and says hurtful things. 

(If it helps: tsundere characters are often described as explicitly not sunao.)

In this case, the idea is that Tohru accepted the invitation easily as-is, without putting any conditions on it, or doing any “ugh, what a pain, do I have to, jeez” rigamarole—she just accepted. Another way you could put it in this case might be “It’s even more unusual for Tohru to accept an invitation like this without a fuss.”

Just to point out the hand on head thing again.

Also just to point out that this is another example of otsukare, as a reminder of how ubiquitous that word is.

And it makes a good place to end on: thanks for reading!

[sportyclown]

how sawamura, miyuki, yuki, and kuramochi text (friends + s/os)

will most likely do a part 2 with more boys at a later date! these got freakishly long because i am, at my core, a very mad. also might revisit as i get re-familiar with the characters, i just had this idea floating around in my head. also the way these got pro

sawamura eijun

no matter who he texts, it’s always extremely extra. not only does he always give more information than you asked for – ex. if you text him wya? he will give you a play by play of his entire route or something

 he also uses tons of emoticons. and yes I do mean emoticons, baby boy has a flip phone. ifhe does eventually get a smart phone, then this boy overuses tf out of emojis. he’s the sort of person that sees someone use a combination of emojis he likes and then tries to copy them, but uses it completely incorrectly, but its v cute.

if you send him a meme, he will respond with an unnecessary amount of hahas. 

when he’s texting his lil bae, they’re always on his mind so he ofc texts them every thought that comes to his mind! when he sees something that reminds him of you, he won’t hesitate to share it with you. 

if you have been together for a long time, then we will definitely text you words of affirmation and be very honest/blunt about how he feels about you. he’s also always sure to ask you about your day - and he seriously cares. but i still i feel like with a s/o he would prefer facetime to texting just because he likes to see you :)

overall, a very adorable texter and his enthusiasm is just as contagious when texting as it is in person. he’s kind of clueless so he doesn’t pick up on subtext. so be blunt, just like he will be with you~

kuromochi youichi

my bias might be showing here, but I feel like he is one of the most well-adjusted boys in terms of being ready for a serious relationship tbh (at least post-high school). i mean we all saw that he regularly corresponded with wakana wish that were me lmao

i think he would most often use proper capitalization, but not to the point where he uses a period after every text

would send his friends news articles about his favorite fighting games where u like gaming or not

a meme fiend in general. the sort of person who uses reaction images of people he knows. (if you’re dating, he would still have a stash of funny pics/screenshots of you on ft, but he’d ofc only use them with you <3). his convos with his friends are rarely serious

 i don’t think he’d be the type to text haha out loud, but he does use LOL on occasion. with close friends/his lil bae he might send a voice memo of him laughing hysterically if you send him something REALLY funny. ugh my annoying king <3

unlike eijun he’s the king of being perceptive / picking up subtext. 

similarly, i do think he’s pretty reliable, but for friends i feel like he might make a lil bit of a stink lmao. like lets say a friend wants him to pick something up for them, he might play like he won’t do it then miraculously shows up with the requested item. its giving tsundere vibes on the low.

with his partner: i feel like he would use emojis when he’s trying to be ~cute~. i think with a established partner he’d be pretty flirty still but he’s v much whipped for his partner so its way more mushy than it would be early in the relationship.

yes your name has hearts/stars in his phone. mans is a SAP for you

his love language is more quality time imo, so I think he values time spent with you over texting time. so a lot of your texts might be asking you to come over to hang out / get a meal or vice versa

like eijun he wants to hear about YOU, and is very supportive and good at advice when he wants to be. he can be goofy but this is how he shows you he cares/sees you as more than a friend

he’s a blushy/shy boy with his s/o esp early in the relationship, so he might be hesitant or nervous to say “i love you” or anything like that outright, but you know anyway, which just makes the times when he does outright say it that much sweeter.

miyuki kazuya

i mean it goes without saying that this man is snarky. he’s not a meme king himself but he enjoys when people send them to him and will usually play off the meme to make his own jokes.

i feel like he also likes deep-fried memes or the very abstract, post-modern memes. miyuki is good at making other people laugh, but he has a generally very-off brand humor and the things that make him cackle hardest are either at someone else’s expense (very similar to kuramochi, so they bond a lot over that) or just indiscernible without access to a huge layer of context/background

saves the reaction photos kuramochi sends him, but doesn’t usually use them. but seeing an ugly pic of eijun yelling never fails to make him grin LMAO

i think he also texts A LOT about baseball, even more so than these other baseball dummies. texts his teammates a lot of articles he reads or clips from games/cool plays. this is mostly about texts, but in terms of social media I think miyuki uses twitter/instagram the most especially for baseball related reasons, while kuramochi uses snapchat the most. 

he probably texts a lot about baseball as well, both seriously and playfully

i can see him using hahas and LOLs in equal measure, but he would also utilize the haha reaction if he had an iphone. this boy does value his wit so he would definitely have commentary about any memes or jokes he’s sent

you won’t win a joke war against him, he will definitely one-up whatever you send him with either a one-liner or another joke. how tf does he do it?

definitely ignores people/conversations if he really wants to - but ofc he never does that to his BAE

if miyuki give you a dry one-line response...he’s not interested at all or he’s feeling frustrated about something else. but when he’s really happy? he will text his friends all the time and spam them! i see him as someone who enjoys texting when he has the attention span/state of mind for it. and when he’s texting his s/o his texting gets even more ~flavorful~

wit his lil bae: i don’t think miyuki would switch it up much w his s/o. is probably even more teasing with you over text than he is with his friends, which is saying something.

like talking with you just by nature of you being his partner. prob prefers texts to facetime because text kinda allows for maximum snark

he LIVES for you guys’ witty back and forth 

if he’s traveling for work or something, will definitely relish in you guys binge texting a tv show or something but just making funny commentary (or he’ll just send you funny commentary to get a reaction)

 he can dish it and he’s also not a super sensitive guy so he can take it tenfold from you as well. nothing y’all wouldn’t be used to when talking in person!

sometimes when texting him you’ll want to beat his a*s because he can be so cheeky but its endearing in a way. he definitely adds emojis to the end of his more annoying messages to give it that loveable vibe (and it works ofc, we love u miyuki)

he’s kinda clingy on the low so i think he’d prefer a partner that’s more open with their affection via text than he is. he would live for your random ilys or whatver throughout the day. also would not mind at all if you updated him on your actions throughout the day or sent him snaps - might not be able to respond to everything, but will react and appreciate it. very likely to make jokes about whatever you’re doing.

would also apologize over text. he’s not always used to apologizing can be awkward about it, so text makes it easier for him.

he would use emojis w you in a joking/ironic way. would absolute use those dumb but genius emoji combinations

yuki tetsuya

i’m literally cracking up thinking about texting him. he is one of my ultimate baes but im sorry i just know he texts dry asf. but its part of his charm!

has a flip phone. either never upgrades or gets the chunkiest most basic android if he is forced to

the thing is this man thinks that he is infusing all his texts with, like, tajin level seasoning, when in reality its pepper

uses punctuation. always. exclamation marks are used sparingly to express excitement.

but i can’t get the image out of my head of an upset tetsuya texting you a simple angry emoji (or the angry emoticon >:( LOL) if he’s reeeeeeally mad. but its v cute i can’t take him seriously. i just want to give him a hug <3

 but you know what he is so PASSIONATE about whatever he’s talking about that his passion bleeds into his text through sheer quantity of words and depth of thought. ultimately, all his conversations end up being extremely flavorful in terms of content. he is surprisingly good at having deep conversations over text.

he’s better at holding conversations with more extroverted personalities, truthfully.

he’s another one who sends random things to people when he thinks about them. miyuki of course gets so many texts/thoughts about shogi. if you get a random haiku, poem, or quote from testu, that means you’re blessed enough to be in his inner circle! he definitely thought of you when he read it and and wants you to respond!

with bae: he doesn’t really change up his texting style tbh, but he has a stronger outward reaction to what YOU text in response.

definitely the type to smile almost imperceptibly at his phone as he texts you, even if you send him something like “hey i’m at the store, want anything?”

he’s not great as verbal affection early in the relationship, so you’ll have to discern his love/affection. however baby boy is NOT afraid to just straight up say he loves you, he does it all the time and early.

he’s KNOWN for being reliable and responsible, so he will be at your beck and call when he’s able to for anything you need, but his heart is also warmed by the thought of you reciprocating that care. if your texts show him you’re thinking of him just like he does too. he’s very gentle and sweet, and checks up on you when he’s able to see if you need anything at all.

he might be reliable, but that doesn’t mean that he’s the quickest guy to respond to texts. he’s a busy guy, and he doesn’t think about his phone all the time, but he will always get back to you (bae does not play when it comes to completing things).

if they came up with a shogi game for gamepidgeon and tetsu had an iphone, your phone probably would be spammed with requests for games lol.

this is my first time doing headcanons like this so please let me know what you think or give me tips on how to improve! I really enjoying thinking about it so I hope to do more in the future <3

[grailfinders]

Fate and Phantasms #184

Oh shit we’re a day late. Sorry. Now that Summer’s over, Fate and Phantasms is heading out to Shimousa, starting with the Archer of Inferno! You know the deal by this point; true name spoilers and build breakdown below the cut, character sheet over here, but still expect a little bit of spoilage because you can’t spread out a character over 20 levels and not spoil a bit about them.

Next up: I thought the ghost of an occultist driving a car made by a talking lion would be the most convoluted character design for a while. I was wrong.

Tomoe Gozen is a Battle Master Fighter to talk with her fists and throw people around as well as a Hunter Ranger to get her fiery arrows and to specialize in fighting massive crowds.

Race and Background

Tomoe is kind of halfway between an oni and a human, never quite at home in either world. Thankfully that’s exactly what Tieflings are as well, so getting her race is pretty easy. As a Mephistopheles Tiefling she gets +1 Dexterity and +2 Wisdom, Darkvision for night raids, Hellish Resistance to fire damage (it would be awkward if you died to your own inferno), and the Legacy of Cania. This gives you the Mage Hand cantrip immediately, with one casting of Burning Hands and Flame Blade with your Charisma per long rest at third and fifth level respectively.

As the wife of a Lord, you’re the definition of a Noble, giving you proficiency with History and Persuasion. People just like you, y’know?

Ability Scores

Step one; Dexterity. You’re an archer, this shouldn’t come as a surprise that this is pretty high. (I mean I say that, but there’s ton of archers that don’t use bows, so...) Anyways, second is Strength. You throw people around like sacks of potatoes, so you gotta be pretty good at lifting them. Go with Wisdom as your third highest ability. Large scale battles are hectic, you’ve got to have a sharp eye to do your best work in them.  Your Constitution isn’t half bad, oni tend to be able to take a beating. Your Intelligence isn’t that high purely because we need other stuff more, so we’re dumping Charisma. You’re a bit awkward no matter which side of the family you’re talking to.

Class Levels

Ranger 1: Starting off as a ranger gives you plenty of goodies, including plenty of proficiencies, like Strength and Dexterity saves, plus three skills; Insight and Perception to read your enemies and Athletics to make it easier to haul them around. First level rangers also become Deft Explorers, which makes you Canny with athletics. That doubles your proficiency bonus for extra oni strength when you push and pull objects. You can also set a Favored Foe as a bonus action, dealing an extra d4 of damage once per turn after hitting them with an attack. You can do this proficiency times per long rest, and the damage grows as you level up.

Ranger 2: At second level, you gain the Archery fighting style for an extra +2 to your ranged attack rolls. The archer class is really made up of archers, huh? You also learn how to cast Spells using your Wisdom to cast them. Theoretically. You don’t actually have any spells that bother with that. At first level you can use Longstrider to move around the battlefield easier and Absorb Elements to add a little bit of fire to your arrows immediately. That helps less than the other elements since you’re already resistant to fire damage, but we suffer for our art here. Well, you do.

Ranger 3: Making it all the way to third level without burning out grants you entrance to a shiny new conclave, and the Hunter conclave turns you into a Horde Breaker when you take the subclass, specializing you towards dealing with large groups. Once per turn you can make an extra attack, as long as your second target is within 5′ of the first. You also gain Primal Awareness, letting you Speak with Animals. I don’t think anything in canon says you can do this, but your event is one of the only times we hear the servant animals talk, so I’m counting it. You also learn how to cast Zephyr Strike, speeding yourself up and possibly dealing extra damage at the same time. Controlling your spacing is vital when it comes to dealing with tons of enemies.

Ranger 4: Use your first Ability Score Improvement to bump up your Strength for stronger punches. They’ll get even stronger in a second, don’t worry.

Fighter 1: Bounce over to fighter for the Unarmed Fighting fighting style. Now your punches deal 1d6 damage (or 1d8 if you have both free) and you can deal damage to grappled creatures at the start of your turn. You also get a Second Wind, which will heal you as a bonus action.

Ranger 5: We’re done multiclassing for a while, since heading back over to ranger will net you an Extra Attack each action. Now you’ve got two attacks against one target, or three if you can use horde breaker. You also learn second level spells, like Beast Sense and Enhance Ability. I don’t think you’re strong enough yet, so that latter spell will give you advantage on strength checks for the duration. (Or a target creature advantage on any one kind of checks, that’s just the most in-character option.)

Ranger 6: At sixth level Favored Foe grows to a d6, and you also become Roving, which increases your speed and lets you climb and swim without slowing down.

Ranger 7: Seventh level rangers will find it a lot easier to Escape the Horde, forcing disadvantage on all opportunity attacks against you. Right now you’ve still got to keep your distance from your enemies to use your bow and arrow, so this will help. You can also cast Aid to increase your maximum HP along with that of a couple of friends for something that will really excitate your whole lineage.

Fighter 2: Bouncing back to fighter gets you an Action Surge for two actions per turn once per short rest. Now you get up to five attacks in a turn thanks to Horde Breaker and your extra attack.

Fighter 3: If we keep on trucking we’ll hit third level, which is where things get really spicy. As a Battle Master, you get four Combat Superiority d8s per short rest, and you can add one per attack to attack you make, dealing extra damage and adding effects to the blow. Technically. Only one of your maneuvers actually deals with attacks, but that’s Pushing Attack, which will do a lot of work for you. When you hit a creature you deal extra damage, and if they’re smaller than Huge and fail a strength save, they get pushed 15 feet away. Your other maneuvers are Evasive Footwork, adding the d8 to your AC while you move to make fighting you even harder, and Tactical Assessment, adding the die to an Investigation, History, or Insight check. We might not have been able to make you smart, but this should cover whatever tactics you need. You’re also a Student of War, giving you proficiency in any one artisan’s tools. Pick your fave, you’re not exactly Hokusai.

Fighter 4: Our last level in fighter grabs the Crusher feat for +1 Strength and once per turn you can push someone an extra 5 feet as long as they’re large or smaller. Also, critical bludgeoning hits give all attacks against their target advantage until you start your next turn. Now you can fling someone 20′ away, and while that technically doesn’t let you throw them in the air I’d allow it. Honestly, if someone’s moving that far away their feet have got to be leaving the ground at some point.

Ranger 8: Going back to Ranger for good now gets another ASI right away, and Gunner is a weird feat to pick, but hear me out. It’s basically the crossbow expert feat, but it trades that bonus action attack for a +1 to Dexterity, which is way more useful since you don’t use a hand crossbow. You also get proficiency with and can ignore loading on firearms, but most D&D games don’t have those anyway, so it’s fine to be a bit out of character. The real good reason we’re here is to ignore disadvantage on your ranged attacks if people are near you. Archery and brawling don’t normally go together, now they do. You also get Land’s Stride so you can move through difficult terrain easier and have advantage on saves against magical terrain. You leave a lot of corpses around in Shimousa, but this’ll help you keep your footing in that demiplane of skulls you do your boss fight in.

Ranger 9: Ninth level rangers get third level spells, like your Primal Awareness spell Speak with Plants. That might sound totally out of character, but it turns out there’s a legit reason for it: Hey look over there, it’s Flame Arrows! Finally, you can dip 12 arrows into fiery goodness, and each one deals an extra 1d6 fire damage on a hit. You’ve got up to an hour to use all of them, but it also takes concentration so don’t get too attached.

Ranger 10: Tenth level rangers are Tireless, letting you heal yourself with temporary HP as an action Proficiency times per day, and you heal exhaustion on short rests. Some people call that inhuman, I call it efficient. Gilgamesh wishes he had what you do. You can also use Nature’s Veil to turn invisible for a round as a bonus action Proficiency times per long rest. Think of it like a smoke bomb. Or a wildfire bomb. Just set things on fire, hide in the fire, done.

Ranger 11: At eleventh level, hunters can let out a Volley of ranged attacks, letting you attack every creature within a 10′ radius of a point you can see. Technically, this means you can pump out up to 50 attacks per round thanks to Action Surge, assuming a lot of creatures are dumb enough to clump up next to each other. 51, sorry, Horde breaker’s still there. To make getting into position easier you also learn the UA spell Flame Stride, negating opportunity attacks, bumping your speed up by 20 feet, and dealing fire damage to nearby creatures when you run by them. It also explicitly sets items on fire, so now we know how you caused so much damage in Shimousa.

Ranger 12: Use this ASI to round up your Strength and Dexterity for stronger punches, tougher punch saves, better arrows, and a higher AC. A banner level for you.

Ranger 13: Your new fourth level spell from Primal Awareness, Locate Creature is way easier to justify than the last one. You just know where the enemy general is located, even in the thick of battle. We’re basically building a Dynasty Warriors character at this point, aren’t we? You also get Freedom of Movement, just in case you need to speed around the battlefield without setting stuff on fire. I know, it’s boring without the fire. You just have to make due for two more levels.

Ranger 14: Your Favored Foe grows again, and you can Vanish as a bonus action, hiding yourself without any way to track you, bar magic.

Ranger 15: Your final spell of the build will turn you into a mighty inferno that can burn down all of Shimousa! Well, not really, but if you Summon Elemental then Vanish away, it’s almost like you turned into a fire elemental, right? You can also Stand Against the Tide, using your reaction to redirect a missed melee attack at another creature. It’s really hard to hit you when you run away, so I suggest fishing for attacks of opportunity for extra damage.

Ranger 16: Use your final ASI to grab the Tough feat for an extra 40 HP. Onis, man. They’re hard to kill.

Pros:

You specialize in dealing with large groups of enemies, with plenty of ways to move through them and attack over large areas at once.

Working with your bow and fists means you’re never in a bad position in a fight. Hah hah, you ambushed the archer, I guess you’re just getting your skulls bashed in instead.

Your range and speed, combined with your punches’ pushing power, means you are great at choosing your fights. For the most part you can determine where and when you fight an enemy, giving you a pretty solid advantage. As long as your DM doesn’t make all the fights take place in a vacant plain somewhere.

Cons:

Your charisma is pretty dismal, so even if you have a plan in mind good luck getting people to follow it.

You’re also pretty unfocused, and I mean that in every sense of the word. You’d be a lot more consistent with damage if you only focused on punching or arrows, and since you’re specialized for bunches of weak enemies single bosses can be tricky.

Most of your magic damage is Fire, which is easy to resist. If you’re up against a demon or devil, you might just have a bad time.

[joonie-beanie]

The OM! Characters as Retail Workers/Positions from my old job

Full disclosure: I’ve only had 1 retail job, and it was at a Homegoods. I worked there for 3+ years during college. Because I’ve only had this one experience, my below hc’s for the boys may be a little...specific to my previous job, and not universal traits that come with all retail jobs. 

Also I’m not including Luke because thattttt is child labor.

This is probably a very self-indulgent headcannon. Oh well.

Lucifer: 

(One of) the store managers. Specifically the assistant manager.

Nice to customers to their face, but will fantasize about stabbing them once they leave. 

Asmo once walked past the manager’s office and witnessed Lucifer professionally apologizing to a bitching customer over the phone, only to slam the receiver down moments later, sighing and mumbling “what an idiot.”

Very watchful of his staff. Do not slack off while he’s working....unless he likes you. In which case, he will take a moment to chat with you and give himself a much needed break. 

If he doesn’t like you, well...make yourself busy, or else you’ll get a stern talking to, and likely written up. Lucifer already has too much work to get done--he doesn’t want to babysit his staff.

Quietly schedules the people he likes to work during his shifts whenever he can, since he knows he can trust them to do their work. Not to mention, he enjoys their company a lot.

His favorite crew to have is Beel, Asmo, and Satan (and MC). Their schedules, of course, don’t always line up, but when they do he seriously thinks that he has the dream team.

Mammon: 

Cannot be trusted to actually organize the store, so he gets stuck at the registers.

However, the managers quickly realize that he's shit at anything front-end related aside from counting money (the man likes his money), and that he's prone to pulling out his phone when no one is around, so Lucifer forces him to work the floor. 

They start trying to give him more backroom shifts (because if he's not doing his work, they'll be able to tell easier).

HOWEVER--because Mammon is such a money lover, he’s very aware of every piece of expensive merchandise in the store. So if a customer attempts to switch tags, or peels the price tag off hoping to pull a quick one on the cashier, his coworkers always call him up so he can take a look.

Seriously, the amount of people that try to buy the $100+ gem rocks for $9.99 is crazy.

He feels very proud of himself whenever he manages to stop a customer from getting away with it.

He’s not the best worker in general, but the mangers would be lying if the said they didn’t appreciate his knack for remembering the expensive items.

Levi: 

Cash office.

Prefers to sit in the locked office by himself, listening to music on his phone as he runs checks the register balances from the previous day.

If he's not doing cash office, he's probably out gathering carts, or compacting boxes in the back.

Whatever keeps him away from the bulk of customers.

Whenever the managers need him to go help out on the floor, he gets permission to not wear his apron.

He seriously does not want anyone to talk to him. He just wants to work in peace.

Of course, if he’s seen organizing, or stocking shelves, customers tend to assume he’s an employee anyway--even without the apron.

Levi legitimately jumps anytime someone calls out to him and asks if he works there, and if he can help them. 

Oh, and he always brings his Switch to work and plays games on his lunch break. Do not talk to him if he’s playing his game--he will get mad at you.

Satan: 

Flow & mark-downs.

He's basically an all-rounder, but is superior to the others in putting out new merchandise (flow). He knows where things go, and how they should be organized. 

Secretly gets annoyed when customers ask him for help when he's in the zone, but is very good at faking a smile.

Will do what’s asked of him without any lip in return.

However, rude customers should beware of him, because his anger tends to flip on like a switch. If a customer is badmouthing him, or one of his coworkers--he has no issue telling them they’re a fool, and that they should just leave instead of causing issues.

He gets in trouble with management for doing this, but honestly has no regrets.

Definitely has regular customers that he is enemies with.

Gets left in charge of the store if the managers ever need to step away for their lunch break, or otherwise.

Asmo: 

Lead cashier. 

Super charming, great customer service voice. 

Always gives a good impression on the phone, and manages to make peppy announcements. 

If there’s ever a fundraiser going on, and the cashiers are supposed to ask for donations, Asmo is guaranteed to rake in the most.

He is very good at calming a customer if they're upset--apologizing and and being so sweet and polite that it’s nearly impossible to stay mad.

However, if they're rude to him, or his apologies go on deaf ears, he has no problem politely telling them to fuck off.

If he’s not at the registers, he’s probably off in the bath section--smelling soap--or the candle section--sniffing literally every candle in existence.

He’ll also be sure to get a whiff of whatever candle/soap a customer has brought to the register to purchase.

Runs off to visit other stores in the mall/strip when he’s on his break. (Aka. he spends way too much of his paycheck shopping).

Beel: 

Back room - heavy lifter. 

Dude spends most of the day in the stock room emptying the truck and building furniture.

Seriously can move big things with very little effort. He once carried an entire couch out onto the sales floor buy himself. 

While other coworkers may need to use carts or flatbeds to move larger items, Beel can legit just throw them over his shoulder and continue on his way like he’s not carrying anything at all.

He looks intimidating but is actually super friendly.

Will always work extra hours if you ask him to. Will also come in for extra shifts if you ask him to.

He always feels so guilty if he can’t accept, or needs to call off.

The type of coworker that goes out to buy snacks on his break, and ends up buy snacks for the rest of the staff. He just leaves them on the break room table with a note that says “Eat up :)”

Belphie: 

Closer - Sales Floor. 

The managers tried to work him on morning or midday shifts, but he was continuously too groggy, and ended up knocking things over on accident.

Hes more energetic at night, so they put him on the sales floor (since he’s honestly...not the best at the register. Don’t get me wrong, he can work the register as well as anyone else, but...he just...doesn’t sound friendly. (Lucifer: “Belphie...at least try to sound like you’re not working here against your will when talking to the customers. You applied for this job.”))

He honestly doesn't mind organizing merchandise, but gets annoyed if he ends up doing the bulk of the work. (Whether it’s because they’re short staffed, or because his coworkers are slacking).

Has no problem telling customers to gtfo when it’s closing time.

If people are still in the store 5 minutes after closing, he’ll follow them around until they finally take the hint and leave.

Always stops for fast food on his way home after work because making himself a meal sounds like too much effort.

Diavolo:

Store Manager.

Is very kind to all of his employees, but will also have hard conversations with them if there’s an issue regarding their performance that needs to be addressed.

However, he always does his best to maintain good relationships with everyone he works with.

Will buy lunch for the staff on busy weekends, even if he has to pay for the food himself. He wants to let his employees know that they’re appreciated, and while he’s the type to give verbal affirmation of a job well done, a luncheon doesn’t hurt either.

Even if customers are bitchy, he never raises his voice, or yells. He handles complaints like a champ.

If the customer physically or verbally abuses one of his workers, however...he will threaten to call the police. Do not fuck with his work children.

If his employees ever find him sighing, or looking like he’s stressed, then they know he’s definitely having a rough day. Please work hard, and help him out, and he’ll very much appreciate it. 

Barbatos:

The 4th key. (Basically a manager)

Some workers are scared of him because he always seems to be in a good mood--even if the store is packed, and things get overwhelming.

A very by-the-book type. While Lucifer and Diavolo may allow for some things to get overlooked, or for there to be a lapse in proper procedure, Barbatos is not like that. Rules are rules, and they shall be followed.

Honestly is a very nice guy, but working a closing shift with him can be the worst. Especially if Diavolo is the opening manager the next day. 

He will keep his staff there after closing as long as he needs to for the store to be in an acceptable condition. (The worst part is that Diavolo honestly is so easy going that if Barbatos had just opted to say “we were very busy and didn’t have the time to get everything done”, Diavolo wouldn’t blame him. Shit gets crazy).

Alas, Barbatos wants to please Diavolo and takes his role very seriously.

At least he brings in homemade baked goods for the staff sometimes. (His good cooking usually makes up for all the times he has kept them late).

Solomon:

Another all rounder. Usually get scheduled on midday shifts to bridge the gap between the openers, and closers. 

Is very good at keeping up his “customer service” facade. 

However, once there are no customers around his smile will fall, and he’ll mumble complaints under his breath. 

“Why does one couple need 15 candles?” “Lady, I don’t care about your chihuahua’s sleeping habits--just buy the pet bed already.”

Will always tease his coworkers if he gets along with them. Bickering with Solomon can become a very entertaining past time if he likes you.

Whenever new crystals, or rocks come in, usually he’ll spend a while inspecting them. Apparently he can tell which ones are real, or fake. (And he always ends up buying the real ones).

He’s the type of coworker that will sneak up behind you and scare you when you’re not paying attention. Just because he can. (Fight him, he loves it).

Simeon: 

One of the sweetest staff members, but he’s prone to getting flustered and making mistakes.

If he’s on registers, he’s so busy trying to start a conversation with the customer that he’ll short them on their change. 

Luckily, the customer is either patient in waiting for the manager to come up and open the register, or doesn’t care about the 22 cents Simeon forgot to give them.

He loves reorganizing the towel section of the store the most. Getting to stand there and refold towels almost feels like meditation to him.

Always goes out of his way to ask the customer if he can help them with anything, or if they’re finding everything alright.

Is prone to accidentally cutting himself when something sharp breaks. (It has literally gotten to the point where if a ceramic plate or something glass breaks, the managers have instructed Simeon to call someone else to clean it up, rather than doing it himself.)

Honestly, in the end, he’s a fabulous worker tho.

[shijiujun]

Hope everyone is partying (by yourself, spiritually, or with people, all are totally fine) well into the Christmas weekend! I am back with even more recs (I’ll prolly give it a rest at the 10th one sorry for the spam guys)! This one I just finished a few days ago, because CHINA BOOKSTORE PUBLISHED THIS ON CHRISTMAS WITH MANY GOODIES!! And I was like oh cute long-hair dude, let me read this.

Anyway this is a fengshui + supernatural + body-switching type of novel, with a heavy focus on fengshui! I don’t know if everyone knows what fengshui is (I will prolly do a list for Chinese New Year) and I am no expert, but it’s basically like Chinese geomancy where you can calculate a person’s fate, wealth, marriage suitability etc. with things in an individual’s environment. 

So a lot of Chinese people, for example businessmen when they have new offices or when couples renovate their homes, they may get a feng shui master to arrange furniture and add crystals or talismans or whatever to increase wealth/prosperity/happiness or harmonize bad energy etc., just an example. When you want to check the compatibility of yourself and your SO, some people do go to the fengshui master and calculate their 八字 (day, hour, time they were born + other things) to see when is an auspicious day to marry etc. 

My ex-editor really believes in feng shui masters because hers really predicted a year that her husband got into hugeee trouble like almost to the day itself apparently. And she always wear an accessory with a snake on it because the master said

Written by the same author (Xi Zi Xu) who wrote Kaleidoscope of Death!

- Part of Min’s ‘Why You Should Read’ Series -

Summary:

This book is set in the normal, regular, law-abiding modern city world where fengshui is heavily believed in, and skilled masters can see spirits, bad energies. Where dogs can be reincarnated as humans, and there are demonic pets that humans can keep, and paper dolls can come to life basically.

Zhou Jia Yu is a government office worker who dies in a car accident one day, and wakes up in the body of another Zhou Jia Yu - a handsome man whose name is the same as his. He’s brought back by this spirit bird in his head called Ji Ba (pun not intended), who says that Zhou Jia Yu is fated to save Lin Zhu Shui, the young, blind fengshui master who has caught him.

Unfortunately, this second Zhou Jia Yu is a con-artist who has cheated the money of several families via fraudulent fengshui schemes, and his scams have led to the death of several children in the process. Legendary fengshui master Lin Zhu Shui and his disciples have caught/imprisoned this Zhou Jia Yu, not knowing that original conman Zhou Jia Yu has died (and therefore his soul is gone), leaving good citizen Zhou Jia Yu in the body of a conman.

Lin Zhu Shui intends to kill conman Zhou Jia Yu (not really kill, kill but probably will do something to his soul, considering there are laws against murder you know) when good citizen Zhou Jia Yu wakes up in this body, but because he has come back from the dead, his body and soul is considered an extremely yin (cold) body, which allows him to attract more bad spirits and energy, giving him an extraordinary, gifted ability to excel in the fengshui line. Of course, being the master that he is, Lin Zhu Shui also realizes that this Zhou Jia Yu (and his soul, in particular) is not the one he caught, and as he has an extremely yang (hot) body, the both of them are compatible with each other. Lin Zhuo Shui realizes that he can train Zho Jia Yu and then takes him on as his disciple.

Cue Zhou Jia Yu being tossed into a dangerous fengshui competition as he figures out just what Ji Ba wants him to do about Lin Zhu Shui. In the meanwhile, he falls in love with amazingly handsome, cool and aloof Lin Zhu Shui (who threatens to murder him if he doesn’t come out first in the competition), who keeps him warm when he gets unbearably cold due to his body condition. They also have to deal with an evil person working behind the scenes, and how Zhou Jia Yu eventually returns back into his own body at the end.

Read:

Novel (Online) | Novel (Print) - Dec 2020 Print | Novel Translations 

Characters:

1. 周嘉鱼 Zhou Jia Yu (third from right) - A really cute government office worker whose soul was pulled into a conman’s body, who has the same name as he, when he got into a car accident. Has an extremely yin (cold) body which attracts spirits (good and bad), and allows him to see, smell or hear them more clearly than everyone else except for Lin Zhu Shui. He cooks extremely well too and is considered a treasure in the household by Lin Zhu Shui’s other disciples because none of them can cook for shit. They don’t initially know that this Zhou Jia Yu is not conman Zhou Jia Yu, although they suspect it, and once they fall in love with his cooking no one doubts him anymore HAHAHA.

He gets a feng shui tattoo personally done by Lin Zhu Shui who already knows that his soul was switched, a tattoo which is supposed to help him in feng shui matters. Gets a paper doll son halfway through the story, who he calls Xiao Zhi (little paper), which calls him Dad (and calls Lin Zhu Shui Big Dad - da baba) ;-; It’s the cutest shit ever.

There’s a mystical creature in the back of his head that speaks to him and helps him out on certain feng shui things, and helps him to explain what he’s seeing, but aside from telling Jia Yu that he’s supposed to save Lin Zhu Shui, the mystical bird thing is unable to tell him anything else. Within a few weeks of him waking up in this body, he’s sent by Lin Zhu Shui on an international feng shui competition without having any sort of basic knowledge, only innate talent, much to his panic XD As Lin Zhu Shui continues to protect him, teach him and tease/smile at him, Jia Yu, who is certified gay af, falls totally in love with the seemingly aloof and strict feng shui master.

They probably would have continued like this if not for Jia Yu’s body deteriorating because his body is technically not his and not compatible with his soul, and Lin Zhu Shui tries to find a way to save him, after seeing the future where Jia Yu’s body is rotting as he dies slowly over months and begging Lin Zhu Shui to kill him and let him die.

2. 林逐水 Lin Zhu Shui (third from left, right next to Jia Yu) - Long-haired, wears changshan perpetually and is blind, but can see more clearly than most people. He knows where everyone’s positions are exactly, and can see spirits etc. very well despite being blind. Considered a genius of the feng shui world and is the patriarch of one of the big feng shui families in the world - the Lin family. He’s a master at drawing talismans, carving crystals/gems and feng shui tattooing.

He’s so well-known that everyone wants to be his disciple, everyone wants to get a talisman/crystal/tattoo from him, everyone wants him to come and look at their houses, but he can’t be bothered with most people. He’s also super handsome? So a lot of girls (and guys) are always drooling over him.

He has an extremely yang (hot) body, which is supposed to naturally help to repel spirits and what not, but because of this he suffers a lot in the summer. His body condition is very rare and when he was younger, others said he would not live past 18 years old, and his parents gave up their lives to change his fate so he would survive. The feng shui master also predicted that Lin Zhu Shui would experience another calamity when he was 30 (thereabout), and that year, thankfully he has Jia Yu as his entire house caught on fire in the summer while he was in it (and cooling talismans and the house item placements meant to keep the house entirely cool in the summer were no longer working). Jia Yu helped him to cool down with his incredibly yin body.

Knows right off the bat that this is a different Jia Yu, and starts teaching him as one of his disciples. Can only eat the food hat Jia Yu cooks because his yin qualities transfer to the food he cooks as well, and Lin Zhu Shui usually cannot eat anything else that’s cooked outside. Gives Jia Yu a carved jade pendant he made himself that’s apparently worth thousands of dollars to keep him safe, and is a dumbass when it comes to confessing to Jia Yu hahahaha (although he’s successful at the end!)

3. 沈一穷 Shen Yi Qiong (second from right, dark skin tone) - Lin Zhu Shui’s youngest disciple and also Jia Yu’s best friend, technically. Brash but smart, and is always thirsting openly after his shifu Lin Zhu Shui, it’s hilarious! He’s a little jealous in the beginning because his shifu is showering Jia Yu with so much attention when he’s only been around for a week etc., but quickly gets used to it and supports Jia Yu. Jia Yu always makes fun of his tanned skin, then makes fun of his singlehood HAHA, while Shen Yi Qiong provides emotional support to Jia Yu, and by emotional support I mean when Jia Yu asks him what will happen to him if he loses the feng shui competition, Shen Yi Qiong pats him on the shoulder and asks him to choose a vase/pot pattern (like a ceramic pot where you put cremated ashes) = shifu will kill him if he loses the competition, so gets Jia Yu to choose a pot he likes so Shen Yi Qiong can help him put his ashes in HAHAHAHA. He is the last one to find a significant other, but the one he finds is like a legendary mystical creature who half deceives him into promising to marry him and then keeps chasing after Shen Yi Qiong so he can marry him XD

4. 林珏 Lin Jue (first from left) - Lin Zhu Shui’s cousin but technically his older sister because she brought him up after his parents died. Spends most of the novel being sad about her past lover who died because of an illness, and is wooed a few years later by a legendary golden dragon.

5. 小纸 Xiao Zhi (that little cute white thing on top of Jia Yu’s head) - A paper doll who’s given to Jia Yu after he helps out at the paper doll village/tribe, and grows up with Jia Yu and Lin Zhu Shui taking care of him. Is the cutest little shit ever, can speak, and calls Jia Yu ‘baba’ and Lin Zhu Shui ‘da baba’ i.e. dad and big dad. Very strong, and can protect Jia Yu very well.

Other Things I Like in the Novel:

Jia Yu basically goes to the feng shui competition and destroys everyone else because he’s just gifted in this aspect - When he wakes up, and in the days leading up to the competition, he doesn’t have a cellphone (Lin Zhu Shui and his disciples live in a remote part of town, a traditional-type house, one with nature) and after he wins the competition, other people want his phone number to contact him and he’s too embarrassed to say that he’s basically too poor to have a phone after rising from the dead, so he bluffs everyone and says “My shifu says that handphone signals and radiation will interfere with advanced feng shui readings so I don’t have one” and LITERALLY half of the feng shui training population gets rid of their phones on that day, gullible af

Everytime Jia Yu runs cold, he has to drink some of Lin Zhu Shui’s blood mixed with water/milk, and the man’s yang blood warms him up immediately

Jia Yu has to deal with four of Lin Zhu Shui’s disciples, all who are really suspicious of him because they think he’s the conman, and Jia Yu doesn’t realize they already know it’s not him until they defend him in front of other people, and he’s so touched

Shen Yi Qiong gets his marriage fortune told during one of the cases by accident. He asks when he’ll get married, and the thing replies “Seven Three” AND HE’S SO DEPRESSED BECAUSE he thinks that it means he’ll only get married when he’s 73. It’s a source of jokes between him, his other shixiongs and Jia Yu, but then towards the end he realizes what it means - His supposed match, a legendary mystical male weasel who’s 73 years old XD

Jia Yu keeps thirsting after Lin Zhu Shui, fully aware that he’s very gay himself, and he’s confessed to while he’s stuck in the haze of a high fever, so he thinks it’s a dream. Lin Zhu Shui doesn’t realize he forgot/thinks it’s a dream and is pissed that he’s rejected HAHAHA and then Lin Jue reminds him to not be a dumbass and confess properly, and so he does so again in an empty amusement park, after summoning evil spirits so they can fly in the air and make a heart shape just for Jia Yu while they’re on the ferris wheel XDDDD

[sirspud]

So, for reasons beyond my own comprehension, I have recently endeavored to recreate the characters of DuckTales (2017) into Pathfinder characters and run them through one of those pre-built adventures. And I mean that quite literally, resolving skill tests with dice rolls, writing up their character sheets, mapping out their positions on a virtual battlemap. I am effectively playing D&D by myself, with characters I don't own, to the cathartic benefit of absolutely bloody nobody, not even myself.

I don't know how to write segways, so I just wrote down the character info for Dewey and Huey below. I'll write Louie and Webby in a separate post.

Also, if you want to read these guys going through an adventure, see this post.

Dewey, the Explorer

Age: 17; Height and Weight: 5' 9", 160 lbs.

Race: Duck; Class and Level: Fighter 1 (0 xp)

Str 15, Dex 15, Con 13, Int 10, Wis 9, Cha 14

Alignment: Chaotic Good; Deity: None.

Dewey is a fighter, specialising in attacking with two weapons at once, for the sole reason of "it looks cool". But this is merely the start of this young duck's career. By the end of it, he would've multiclassed into all kinds of classes. A couple of levels in rogue, a few in bard, and pretty soon this young duck will a smorgasbord of different classes.

It started when Dewey uncovered an old longsword in Uncle Donald's attic. Rather than asking, "what is this weapon doing in a fisherman's attic?", Dewey instead asked, "how can I practice with this without Donald noticing?" So, he snuck out one night to test his might, finding the large, rusted blade to his liking.

Donald does eventually find out, taking the sword and forcing the young boy to promise him up and down not to play with swords ever again. When Dewey inevitably does - multiple times - Donald gives up and decides to teach Dewey the basics himself, deciding that if he's going to insist on playing with swords, he's at least going to learn how to avoid accidentally killing himself.

Class Features: As a fighter, Dewey gains a bonus combat feat at 1st level. Obviously, he chooses Two-Weapon Fighting, so that he can actually fight with two weapons without incurring massive penalties.

Feats and Skills: For his 1st-level feat, Dewey takes the Skill Focus feat to gain a +3 bonus on Acrobatics checks. As a duck (i.e., human), he also gains an additional bonus feat at 1st level. He chooses Weapon Focus to gain a +1 bonus on attacks with his longsword, reflecting his training with Uncle Donald.

Dewey doesn't have many skills, gaining a mere 2 skill ranks from his class and 1 extra rank from his race. He puts them into Acrobatics, Climb and Swim, giving him the following skills:

Acrobatics +6, Climb +6, Swim +6.

Equipment: Dewey's main equipment includes his longsword and shortsword combo, which he uses to... well, not a horrible effect. He has a suit of scale mail, giving him an AC of 17, as well as a sling and ten sling bullets. He has a backpack containing a bedroll, a days' worth of rations and 50 feet of light, but strong silk rope. He also has a kit full of climber's gear - a notably expensive investment that left him with a measly 2 silver coins to his name.

Huey, the Analyst

Age: 17; Height and Weight: 5' 10", 180 lbs.

Race: Duck; Class and Level: Cleric of Athena 1 (0 xp)

Str 12, Dex 11, Con 12, Int 14, Wis 16, Cha 10

Alignment: Lawful Good; Deity: Athena.

Now, I know what you're thinking. "What? Huey can't be a cleric! He's a Junior Woodchuck! If that's not druid material, I don't know what is!" And yeah, if I was using D&D 5th edition rules, that would be case. However, in Pathfinder, druids have to be Neutral, either along the Good/Evil axis or Law/Chaos axis. And Huey is a Lawful Good character if I've ever seen one. So, he's a cleric.

Not to say that Huey didn't try to become a druid. He met with an elder druid early in life and tried to learn the ways of the Old Faith. And though a few routine trials proved that he wasn't cut out for a druid's life, the old man was perceptive enough to notice a talent for divine magic in him regardless, and directed him towards the Cult of Athena - goddess of wisdom, tactics and community.

Now, Huey has become an adept cleric, wielding divine power and a mean-looking mace with caution and discretion. He wouldn't call himself a "true" follower of Athena, though. There are aspects of the faith that he doesn't quite agree with - namely all that nasty business with war. Thankfully, this is something that actually puts him in Athena's good books - only the horrifically unwise rally behind a cause they don't fully understand.

Class Features: As a cleric, Huey can channel positive energy 3 times per day to either heal his friends or harm undead monstrosities. Choosing the domains of Community and Knowledge, he also gains the ability to heal creatures of fatigue and worry, and to glean tactical insight into a monster's weaknesses with but a touch. He can prepare and cast divine spells, choosing from any spell on the cleric's spell list. His favourite spells include the following:

0-level spells (3 slots) - detect magic, guidance, light, read magic, resistance, stabilise.

1st-level spells (2 slots, plus 1 domain slot) - bless (D), comprehend languages (D), cure light wounds, detect evil, divine favour, protection from evil, sanctuary.

Feats and Skills: Huey's 1st-level feat is Extra Channel, allowing him to channel positive energy an additional 2 times per day. His ancestry also gives him a bonus feat in the form of Self-Sufficient, which grants him a +2 bonus on Heal and Survival checks to reflect his initial training with the druids.

As a cleric, Huey has 2 skill ranks, plus an extra 2 ranks from high Intelligence, and 1 extra rank from his race. He puts 1 rank each into Heal and Survival. He puts a rank into Spellcraft, to help him identify spells and magic items, and a rank into History, having learned much in his training under Athena. He puts his final skill rank into Craft (cloth), having been taught how to sew by Donald, and his final skills look like this:

Craft (cloth) +6, Heal +9, Knowledge (history) +6, Spellcraft +6, Survival +6.

Equipment: For his defensive gear, Huey purchases a suit of studded leather armour and a light wooden shield, providing a decent AC of 14 without hampering movement too much. He has a shortspear, favoured weapon of Athena, and a heavy mace, favoured weapon of most clerics. In his backpack, there's a bedroll, a days' worth of rations, a torch, and two flasks of holy water. He has 45 gold, 3 silver, and 9 copper coins.

[jazinerambles]

Persona 2 Innocent Sin Review

I wanted to have some time in between playing the game and writing my thoughts for Persona 2 Innocent Sin. I will be referencing it and other Persona games so there may be some light spoilers for games 2-5. 

I played the psp version of the game on a Playstation TV. I beat the game at 76 hours on the dot. I have not completed most of the theater missions, but I have completed the main story of the game and did do a few sidequests.

My review will be organized in several sections-gameplay, story, music, characters, LGBTQ representation, extra content, wishlist and recommendation.

Gameplay:

Persona 2 Innocent Sin was released in 1999. Therefore plays as a game from 1999. The PSP rerelease updated menus, changed the difficulty, and added all out attack art similar to P3-P5 for the fusion spells. I love the all out attack animation and although the menus got a little cumbersome, it didn’t really impact gameplay for me. 

The biggest complaint about Persona 2 IS is how easy and repetitive it is and the high encounter rate. The battles for the most part are easy and if you set up all your attacks in the first round, you can basically use autoplay until an emergency occurs or you encounter an enemy in which you must change it up. 

I never saw the gameplay as repetitive as others do and I feel those who do only just battle and that’s it. I was constantly trying to get all the fusion spells, max up my personas to trade them for items, try different combinations for the demon negotiations and spread demon rumors to get items, spells, and cards (you need cards to summon new personas in the velvet room.) Demon negotiations also allow you a better look into each of the characters’ personalities and relationships. Events in the game will change how the characters react in these negotiations so it is always nice to go back to them throughout the course of the game. 

The demons you encounter have emotions. I believe they are intrigued, happy, angry and fearsome. Make them happy and they will offer a pact with you and give you free stuff and willing to spread rumors for you. Make them angry they will fight you. Make them fear you they will run away. Make them intrigued and you get the cards needed to summon personas and even more if you already have a pact with them. 

I wanted to return to the big complaint though, the high encounter rate. This was something that I felt hot and cold about. Most of the time this didn’t bother me, because I needed to level up my personas anyway. But when I needed to backtrack and explore further, it did get a little bothersome. 

You can use estoma to avoid enemies weaker than you. It is not a passive skill, so once you have a persona that has it, you have to cast it every time it wears off. At the Mu casino, you can also purchase a disguise kit that does the same thing, but it effects last about the same amount of time and it is ridiculously expensive. Just use estoma. 

As briefly mentioned above, unlike Persona 5 in which you can just catch Personas, in P2IS there are only two ways to get them. You get cards from demon negations, take those cards to the velvet room and then trade them in for a Persona. But you have to enough cards to summon it and the persona has to be 5 cards within your character level. 

You can also talk to the demon painter, for him to make you cards for the specific arcana you want by using blank cards. These are also given through demon negotiations that you have a pact with. 

In P2, ALL your characters are capable of changing out Personas, but their compatibility with different personas varies with their Arcana. 

The other way to get personas is through the story. There are certain actions that you must take to get the prime personas and then the final personas. These personas are character specific and you can’t give them to other characters. 

I wanted to talk about three more things before I move on to the story: rumormongers, fusion spells, and dungeons. 

Persona 2IS is based around rumors. Just like P3 is for the dark hour, P4 the midnight channel, P5 around palaces and so on...

To get certain items and progress the story, you MUST gather and spread rumors. There are five characters throughout the game called rumormongers. They will give you information in exchange for receiving information. You then share this information to the detective agency, pay a fee for them to spread them for you, and there you go. rumor spread. As mentioned earlier, there are also demon specific rumors. 

Fusion spells were something I really enjoyed in this game. Although hearing “Are you ready? Here goes” and “Let’s go everybody” will be stuck in my head for the rest of eternity...

Basically, to create a fusion spell, members in your party require a requisite spell and then that party member is placed in a specific order when taking turns. Once that spell is unlocked, it will let you know if you have the requisite spells and you no longer have to adjust the order of party members. Some of the spells you need to unlock fusion spells are persona specific. The fusion spells are elemental. 

I will not go into weaknesses of elemental spells, I am just going to say that you aren’t “down”’ed like you are in 3-5. 

Finally, my first real pet peeve with this game-the dungeons.

Oh boy. Air raid, AeroSpace and one of the four Zodiac dungeons (I am pretty sure its Eikichi’s) gets ALL my hate. There are cheap gimmicks that make the game artificially hard but only for these dungeons and more so, frustrating. 

But I am not going to go into detail why, and the other dungeons are not bad at all. But play the game and experience these dungeons for yourself. That is all I am going to say about that.

Story:

This section will be nowhere was long as gameplay. The story did not go where I thought it would, but that’s a good thing. I would go in completely blind if you can. The ending definitely surprised me a bit. I think it has one of the best stories of the persona games.

It does not follow a calendar like the later Persona games and time just blends together. By the end of the game, you won't know if a day, week or month passed from the beginning to the end.

Music:

The music is actually really good. It is the reason why I played the game in the first place. Just don’t look at the soundtracks names. Spotify has it available if you live in the US. You are better off listening to the soundtrack because I promise you that most dungeons songs will be cut off due to the frequency of battles. 

Some of my favorite songs are Smile Hirasaka, Unbreakable Tie, Kurosu’s theme, Joker and the Taurus dungeon’s theme.

Characters:

Despite Persona 2 not having social links, I feel like I know these characters better than some of the persona games that do have social links. It is also the only Persona game that I can say without any hesitation that I like the entire main cast. 

I truly love them all, but my favorite would probably be Yukino or Maya. 

Unlike other Personas, the dynamics for Persona 2 IS are different, because not all of your party members are high school students. The adult characters have adult problems, the high school students have high school problems, and all of them have deep psychological problems and abandonment issues that will take years of intense therapy (or Philemeon) to forget.

One of the biggest themes of Persona 2 is confronting your past and learning from the mistakes of your childhood. And the characters do! And by the end of the game you are so proud of how far they have come. And then things happen...

LGBTQ representation

Let me say that I started P2IS off on the wrong foot, but I am still absolutely justified at being upset by it. One of the very first interactions you can have with a NPC is through a very uncomfortable exchange between you, Eikichi and a transman that is pretty transphobic. And to add the icing on the cake, Atlus refers to him as a “weird woman.” 

I was literally going to just stop playing the game like an hour in because of that, but I decided to continue.

What I discovered was a game that has highs and lows when it comes to LGBTQ representation. 

You can play as a bi character who can confess his feelings to men and women. *Stares hard at Persona 4 and Persona 5*

You have a gay character that has an interesting story, character development, is unabashedly gay and isn’t a walking stereotype. Nor is his entire arc centered around gay panic. 

From what I understand the dialogue from the NPC does get better, but I am not holding my breath. 

And the one sapphic kiss scene we get in a Persona game is a kiss of manipulation and not love. So that is a little sad. 

But overall, P2IS does try to make an effort. And it definitely makes a better effort than its successor released almost 2 decades later.

Extra content:

Again, Persona 2 doesn’t have social links or a calendar. Please don’t approach it like the other games where you have to fill up your time between dungeons. It is not a necessity, but there are things you can do. 

Mu is a casino that you can visit that allows you to play mini games to gain coins that you can use to get weapons, rare items, and even unlock personas. I spent a little too much time at Mu....

You can also talk to NPCs to do side missions. Be careful though. You have to do the side missions in a given amount of time or you may not get rewarded for it. Also P2IS is very much like Final Fantasy 9 where it is much better to go to a place sooner than later, because there may not be a later...

You also have the factory which is an optional dungeon that opens up more and more as you progress through the game. 

There is the theater which is a PSP exclusive which has side missions unrelated to the main story that you can play. They are okay.

Wishlist

I hear so many people wanting a remake of P2IS so the game can be more accessible. I am very torn about this. Besides the difficulty and maaybe tweaking the encounter rate a bit, I wouldn’t change a thing. However, I also know that I couldn’t enjoy Shadow of Colossus until the controls were updated. Like I tried and then just gave up. 

I honestly don’t want a remake. I don’t trust the Atlus of today with this game.

I do want it to be acknowledged and more accessible though. 

But if I had to make a wish list, this is what it would be. Again, this would be a “it would be nice list.”

Make the battles harder.

Update cut scenes? I really like the art for the cut scenes already, but would like some more. Maybe keep the drawings but update the CG?

Social side quests. I do not want social links in Persona 2. However, side quests that allow you to learn more about your character like a social link would, would be something I would be very interested in. 

Make the portraits consistent. The art from the original game and the new art put in the PSP game (I am talking about you climax lady) clash so much. Pick one style and stick to it.

I want to fight Ms. Ideal. Let me do it for reasons. Give me a chance to battle her.

I want the option to switch out characters. I love both Jun and Yukki, but I want to be able to play with both. 

Let me skip the animation when I create a new Persona. 

*EDIT*  I can’t believe I forgot this and feel awful I did, but I do think they should keep the trans NPC, but change the dialogue and the the name. It isn’t the NPC that is the problem but the dialogue and actions. Otherwise, I think it would be ok. 

I think that’s it.

Recommendation:

So should you play Persona 2 IS? Short answer, yes. Long answer is that it is complicated. In a few months the game will no longer be accessible for psp consoles. The physical version of the game is ridiculously expensive. You will have to accept the fact this game is on psp and its sequel’s psp version never came to English speaking markets.

You may not like the graphics, gameplay, or that it doesn’t feel like the later persona games. And as much as I love this game, that is alright. You do you. But I truly do think you are missing out on a great game. So if you have the opportunity to do so, yeah absolutely give it a shot. 

[annatao]

[ -  Bad English - ] This was a necessary update, because in the comic book, that's exactly what she looks like+ it must conform to the canon. I also updated the information about her.

Cona Dei Basic information

Class: Alchemist Type: Protection Health: 135/in uber – 245 Speed: 110% Team: RED Weapon To kill effectively, the Alchemist must increase his damage with his potions. The main thing: the Scorpion submachine gun is an experimental weapon that was developed by the “MannCo” corporation intended as an upgrade for the standard class. However, it was stolen by a certain thief who had all the necessary access. Later, this weapon underwent a change, and then went to the Alchemist. Ammo is coated with acidic composition. - 20% damage + causes bleeding from burning acid Burning sensation: 4/sec x 5sec Secondary weapon: a one-handed crossbow that fires poison bolts. *If hit in the head-crit * damage 25-60. Depending on the distance Close Combat: Hopesh is a cold weapon that was once given by Henrik as a decoration. Now she uses it in battle. 4 slot: potion set. In total, Kona can carry one potion of 3 types with her. For example, a regeneration potion (for yourself), a poison that causes bleeding, an acid bomb. * In the game, the mechanics worked like this: holding down the 4 button and scrolling the wheel, you select 1 of 3 potions that the player selected in advance in the menu. After use, they would recover for about 30 seconds. The distributor has about 20 seconds (She would take resources from there) Special opportunity: Margo the rat – if you sneak up on the victim from spita, the Alchemist will release his pet and it will get under the enemy's clothes and start biting, thereby causing bleeding for 6 seconds. Alchemy Kit There are 3 categories in total: *For yourself *For your team *Halloween

For myself: *Fire Resistance Potion-Reduces fire damage by 50% for 5 seconds *Potion of the feather-gives the effect of a smooth fall, thus it saves itself from damage. The effect passes as soon as the Kona touches the ground. *Regeneration Potion-the effect lasts for 5 seconds and restores 5 health points each. For the attack and for your team: Potion of power-Gives mini-crit. Apply an effect can, as well as himself, and on any player from his team, but only one. The effect lasts for 5 seconds. Freeze Potion-slows the victim down, and the victim takes a small amount of damage for 6 seconds. You can get rid of the effect if the friendly Pyro warms up with his flamethrower. Poison Potion-a small dark cloud is created when thrown. Causes poisoning within 5 seconds, removing 4 health points each. Bacon's Potion-removes negative effects from the team A bandage-An alchemist can give a bandage to a teammate who is bleeding. If this effect is not present, the item will not work. It does not regenerate and does not heal, only removes this effect. Acid bomb "surprise" - is a throwing glass projectile with acid. When it hits the ground, it releases an acid cloud. * Works on both enemies and allies. *When igniting such a cloud, it deals additional damage to everyone who was in it * Only an Alchemist or a first-aid kit at the base can cure this "poison". * Does not work on the Alchemist himself, as the cloth that hides her face is soaked with the antidote and does not work on the Arsonist, as well as on those who are in the uber. Halloween ones. On maps where the Alchemist acts as a boss, these potions are available to mercenaries ONLY in the alchemy machine (there are 3 of them for the entire map) : 1. Explosive potion "Griffin's Feather". It is enough to throw a potion at your feet and it allows the player to jump high and smoothly descend without any damage. Valid for 20 seconds. It works by the type of parachute. 2. Death Potion-turns the player into a zombie (cosmetic effect) 3. Potion "???» - an unknown potion that, once applied, turns the player into toads, deer, elephants, jackals, panthers, chipmunks, bats, cats, and otters (cosmetic random effect.) 4. Reduction Potion-turns players into toddlers that squeak like chipmunks. It also gives you the ability to fly, but you can't use weapons. Exc: Taunts, Machine Gunner's food. 5. Potion of Fear-Scare the shit out of your enemies! But be careful, because it works not only on the enemies, but also on you, too. It can be repelled with compressed air. 6. Potion "blood of the Vampire" - causes a thirst for blood in the owner and if he does not "drink" it from enemies, he will slowly lose health. This poison works for 30 seconds. 7. Potion "Magic for weaklings!" - prohibits the player from picking up and using spells. A potion for those who want to play the classics on this map. 8. Potion of Regenerations – is there no Medic in the vicinity or does he not hear you? Were you injured or had your arm torn off? No question, use this tool and your problems will be solved quickly! Valid for 7 seconds. 9. There is also a new spell during the boss battle (Marasmus, Cona Dei) - challenge Margot. Summons a mutant rat that walks on its hind legs, wears skin clothing, and uses a heavy wooden hammer as a weapon. Health – 460 units. * Rarely when using this spell, during a battle, Kona may resent that Margot " betrayed her» Biography Age: 27 Origin: Greece Bad habits: no Motto: "You need to start all over again" Appearance: Dark brown hair, brown eyes. Normal build. From clothing she has a T-shirt, over which she wears a bulletproof vest with straps for securing weapons. Dark skinny trousers,army boots. On the belt there are two pouches, and there is on the leg. Description Little is known about her past. She doesn't really tell outsiders about it, rather evasively and reluctantly, missing a lot of details. She keeps silent about how she got into the ranks of the mercenaries, because she doesn't really want to talk about it. However, her current goal is to start all over again. Many people will think that she has a secretive character, but in addition to such a trait, you can notice calmness, and an Alchemist can easily be caught off guard when a girl is passionate about something. If you make her angry, the girl will think of a very good plan of revenge, and as for the consequences for her victim, she will not care much. Good and bad qualities: a good friend, not against putting his shoulder to "tears", lack of sleep often cause her indifference to the environment, with which she began to struggle, before she could score a bolt on it. She is careful in her work, but when it comes to working with a Medic, she puts more effort into it. Attitude to other mercenaries Scout-friend (the best option for a direct attack, like " hit and cover») Soldier-dislikes, often comes into conflict with him. This is mostly due to misunderstandings, or the Soldier starts them himself. Arsonist – best friend (fire-acid duo-effective, especially ambush attack on the very crowd of opponents) Demoman- friendly. Do you have someone to borrow gunpowder for experiments Machine gunner – at first she was afraid of him, but over time she became more friendly to him Engineer-work colleague Medic - Teacher-Student relationship Sniper-neither friend nor foe Spy-neutrality Ada Gilbert-passive-positive. Sometimes Miss Gilbert's obsession annoys her Jeanne-neutral Evidence * The last name " Dei "is taken from the song "Green day" and supplemented, since she does not have her own. * The Alchemist keeps a pet-a lab rat named Margo. *Her first mercenary friend was an Pyro. * The girl participates in a joint project with a Medic and an Engineer, building the first prototype of a helmet for viewing dreams, which also records them. *Because of her 8 years of solitude, it is difficult for her to communicate with the rest of the classes outside of combat. *The Alchemist has a thick notebook where she draws different happy moments from life. *The Alchemist has no education, but she was taught all the standards and everything else by her so-called brother. * In non-combat, he wears light but closed clothing, and prefers to wear an arafatka over his face. * The alchemist almost never takes off his gloves.

[americangirlstar]

american girl contemporary dolls’ animal crossing islands

bc apparently covid is now canon to the agverse you know they all got new horizons

lindsey bergman: the first contemporary doll also has THE most chaotic island. she does what she wants and nobody can stop her. she only accepts the villagers with the wildest designs, made everyone’s catchphrase either uwu speak or smth like “gay rights,” only wears the most hideous outfit combinations, and buys everything from redd no matter how fake it is. one room of her house is filled with haunted artwork, another has nothing but snapping turtles. she’s figured out how to make memes into clothing patterns and now every pathway on her island is the pogchamp face. best friends with flick. honestly she’s an icon 

kailey hopkins: spends 90% of her time swimming or fishing. only 90% because she actually takes her role as island rep seriously and she has worked very hard to get it to five-star. she does abuse her power to make a million rivers and turn her island into basically a waterpark, but that just makes it cooler. died of joy when swimming was enabled and now has two of everything you can collect in the ocean decorating her house, every room of which resembles a beach house. also collects seashells and has very pretty shell arches decorating doorways

marisol luna: she went into the game with a list of who she will and will not allow on her island and is ruthless in kicking out villagers in order to get who she wants to move in. absolute QUEEN at catching tarantulas/scorpions, goes hunting for them on islands with the insane amount of nook miles she collects by doing random quests. loves collecting emotions for her character to do and then making funny videos out it. filled out the fossils in her museum FAST and now just digs up fossils to decorate the lawn with. each room of her house is a different dance studio. 

jess mcconnell: QUEEN of fishing and bug-catching but can’t dive for SHIT. she has about three of every fossil because she can’t stand the idea of selling them. is obsessed with gathering every possible DIY recipe even if she doesn’t plan on making anything with them, she just thinks they’re neat. has a shrine on her island for redd and celeste in attempts to get them to come more often. she’s been on her island religiously every day since she got the game, it’s a little scary. thinks murder should be legal on her island 

nicki fleming: cannot chose a mean dialogue option to save her life. she can barely stand to kick out villagers she dislikes either, only does it if they ask to leave and then prays to the nintendo gods that bunnie will come visit the island. the main room of her house is reflective of her actual room, the rest of it is absolutely gorgeously decorated, stuff made to look like meadows or snowy mountains. winter is her favorite, she makes a snowboy every day no matter how many times she crashes the snowballs. LIVES for cj and flick because she always hated the idea of her fish/bugs dying for a competition. saves all her new stuff for the museum for nighttime because she feels bad waking up blathers 

mia st clair: wants to hack the game so that it’s winter all the time. soon as the winter DIYs dropped she redecorated her entire island and house to be as icy as possible. she’s basically queen elsa at this point. she’s horrible at catching items so her museum is mostly fossils, but even then sometimes she sells fossils before identifying them if she’s short on bells. she visits sable every day in hopes of making her feel happy. she has pretty much every possible clothing wand so that she can carry around one to match each outfit. one time her brothers went on to try and fuck with her island and we don’t speak of what happened following that. fear her 

chrissa maxwell: shares an island with gwen and sonali. she’s the one in charge so she’s working very hard to make it a 5-star island so isabelle will stop bugging her about it. also very into DIY and likes to decorate the island with things she’s built. favorite seasonal event was the wedding anniversary one, she can’t get enough of redesigning and taking photos of those funky lil alpacas. plus, she got a lot of neat stuff out of it. goes to the able sisters every day to see what kinds of new outfits they have, and yet somehow cannot make a good fashion decision to save her life. obsessed with swimming and now leaves all other museum donations to her girlfriends so she can spend all her free time looking for crabs 

gwen thompson: somehow absolutely brutal. will send clashing-colored toilets in the mail to villagers she doesn’t like to fuck with their home design and hit them with butterfly nets. she’s tried to hit them with axes as well. shakes trees constantly in an effort to catch wasps and has not gotten stung once because she’s that quick with a net. her favorite character is celeste and chrissa and sonali have barely any star stuff because whenever celeste is on gwen is hogging the switch. changes her characters’ hairstyle, like, every five minutes. when she sends her friends gifts the letters will say something like “fuck u, love u <3″ it’s so wildly different than how she normally acts in public that it’s a little scary 

sonali matthews: even worse than gwen. has tried to murder villagers she dislikes before. sometimes fucks with parts of the island just to see how people react. would sell her soul to redd just to piss off tom nook. the only thing she takes seriously is gardening, she has a fenced-off area where she breeds flowers and woe befall anyone who messes it up. her house is a hoarder’s nightmare and chrissa and gwen have been begging her to let them redesign it but she refuses. screenshots the worst parts of their island and posts them on twitter with the dreamcode so people can see the graveyard she made to intimidate rodney 

lanie holland: still lives in a tent because she thinks it’s cool, refuses to pay up to nook so she doesn’t have to get a house. somehow has the cutest outfits of everyone. her island design is to die for, half the island is full of flowers arranged in rainbow-order and the other half looks like a faerie forest. has filled out her museum’s bug collection and has half the fossils but keeps forgetting to go fishing. her little sister emily joined her island and keeps trying to get lanie to upgrade to a house or expand other stores but lanie refuses, it’ll mess with the aesthetic. emily basically has a huge mansion in the corner of the island while everything else is practically a glorified campsite. leif is lanie’s favorite and she only collects bells in order to buy things from him 

kanani akina: the most beautiful island design you’ve ever seen. she also takes the best screencaps and posts them just so her friends know what she’s up to but becomes internet famous for how gorgeous everything is. the best designs, very diverse plants, all the houses are arranged in an aesthetically pleasing way. kanani’s house is on the beach so she can easily swim, fish and collect shells, but the inside is the best part. five of the six rooms are just as beautiful as you’d expect, with soft pastel aesthetics and quiet music playing. then her basement is referred to as the “special room” which holds nothing but several candles in a summoning circle and a single tarantula figure in the center. there’s a skeleton in the corner. whenever anyone asks about it she pretends she doesn’t know what they’re talking about. it’s the funniest thing 

mckenna brooks: disastrous. horrible at paying nook back and keeps getting angry letters from the happy home academy. her goal is to find any loopholes in the game and exploit them, no matter that the game is super simple and thus “cheats” aren’t very useful. she found out about island star ratings and now is trying in vain to get a five-star but she can’t get above a three. has been stung by wasps about a million times while shaking trees to try and find loose bells. one time she shook a tree and a toilet fell out and it now has a dedicated podium on her island, and whenever anyone asks she simply tells them that the toilet is the god of the island. hasn’t been able to keep a villager for longer than a few weeks, and also somehow got raymond on accident. still having the time of her life

saige copeland: spends far too much time designing customs and far too little removing weeds. wants to have flowers in rainbow order like lanie but keeps accidentally picking them. has absolutely no rush to do anything, lived in a tent for like three months because she forgot she could pay off loans. only accepts peppy or normal villagers so her island is pretty much all-girl and she refers to it as the amazon island; this is, however, because somehow no horses have shown up on her island yet even though she very much wants them to. likes to dream and go to random islands to get inspiration. she has a room in her house full of rainbow eels because she thinks they’re pretty 

isabelle palmer: will not stop buying things from the able sisters. she visits every day, pretty much buys one of everything, and then mixes and matches costumes instead of fixing her island. lives for the days when label visits because she takes her requests very seriously and comes back in outfits that slay™. almost exclusively gives clothing gifts to her villagers so that they have a better fashion sense. has a lot of flowers but can’t figure out how to get them to mix. the bug section of her museum has butterflies and nothing else simply because she only thinks to try and catch butterflies. hits rocks every day to try and find the daily Money Rock™. keeps trying to get raymond but her sister won’t let her pay anyone actual money for him 

grace thomas: when she visits the nook store she will solely speak to tommy. constantly checking the wiki to find out which DIYs sell well, and thus only collects shells in order to make shell arches to turn around and sell back. insanely good with bells and with figuring out how to make her island palatable, got a five-star fast. the main room of her house is decorated like a restaurant, with two different kitchen rooms and the upstairs decorated to look very french. she made everyone’s catchphrases french, too. is the only person in the world upset you can no longer eat the fish. goes swimming every day just so she can find a scallop and talk to pascal, she thinks he’s cool 

lea clark: there are a lot of plants here. just. far too many plants. of every color too! she’s very proud of it. she has a short attention span though so there’s like fifty different unfinished projects. she is best friends with like three villagers and forgets the names of the rest, but one time she accidentally hit a villager with a butterfly net and cried for an hour. only ever dresses in summer clothes and is awful at saving money so she only has like eight bells at a time. seasonal events are her absolute jam though, she can’t get enough of them. would die for leif. almost got blocked by the animal crossing twitter for constantly begging them to give her the froggy chair (thanks @lesbianleaclark!) 

gabriela mcbride: her island is more important than her social life. she is very serious about making it a functioning island, and is obsessed mainly with filling out her museum. every time she catches a sea bass instead of something new she lets out a series of swears not appropriate for a child audience. she is best friends with all of her villagers and cries whenever one of them thinks about leaving. her favorite kk slider song changes by day and she’ll switch the music around everywhere whenever she feels like it. visits other islands in order to gather materials to sell in order to make her house bigger; she’s got a dance room, a poetry corner, a student council room, and the main room looks like the liberty arts center. whenever anyone (who’s not redd) visits her island she cries and tries to figure out how to give them things for free because she loves them so much. whenever redd comes by without genuine art she tries to hack into the game in order to skin him alive

tenney grant: obsessed with getting every kk slider song. every time he shows up to the island she pulls up the list of available songs and picks one she doesn’t have yet to request. she wants to get a different song playing in every area of the island and every room of every house. shares an island with logan, jaya and holliday but she’s in charge, which sucks because holliday is way better at doing island management. she’ll text holliday with what isabelle wants her to do and then go DIY a guitar. she set up a stage area near the beach so they can give concerts for the villagers and honestly it looks gorgeous. she named her island “nashville” but makes no attempt to actually make it look like tennessee. she released her dream code on her twitter and because she’s technically a celebrity people keep coming by and asking her why everything on the island looks good except logan’s house and she’s like “ask logan idk” 

logan everett: speaking of which, yeah, logan’s house is a disaster. he cares naught for decorating his place and fills it with random things he thinks are “cool.” likes to run through flowers until they explode. the best diver on the island, though, and is responsible for that area of the museum, while tenney gets fishing, jaya gets bugs, and holliday gets fossils. they all work together to buy everything from redd whether it’s real or not because they think the art is pretty, they find out whether or not it’s real after taking it to blathers. he will place random toilets in the middle of the island and wait for someone else to find it, they have no idea he’s the one doing it and it’s driving them crazy. it’s also the funniest thing he’s ever done and he’s very proud of it. whenever kk shows up he requests a song tenney doesn’t have yet and leaves it outside her door. she didn’t ask him to do this he’s just like that 

z yang: the god of all things video games. she’s a streamer now and while she mostly streams mario, zelda or sonic games, on holidays she’ll stream her island and take suggestions for what she should do to it. due to this, her island can be a mess at times, but she somehow keeps getting good ratings. every time there’s an update she loads up a report of what’s new so she can be one of the first to try it out. she named her island something like “zworld” and refuses to change it. every room of her house is a different movie set, and she put cameras everywhere on the island “so the villagers don’t get any ideas.” somehow keeps getting rare villagers on the first try and won’t let them leave 

luciana vega: would die for celeste. her island is incredibly space-themed and well cared-for, because this game soothes her anxiety so she’s on it 24/7. her town flag is an incredibly accurate constellation. she fills out her museum specifically cause it’s run by celeste’s brother and she’d do anything for that owl; her parents got her a celeste plush for her birthday and now she won’t let go of it. she schedules her life around animal crossing updates. her favorite thing to do is go swimming at night and just look at the animation on the waves under the stars. also wisp’s best friend. won’t accept a villager unless they look like they could potentially be an alien, which means she has the coolest villager collection of everyone 

blaire wilson: due to her family’s experience running an inn she knows exactly how to run a village. her island’s almost boring in how well it’s designed and run, but she always has something extra to keep interest, like an island in the middle that’s filled with exotic flowers. went to the wedding picture event every day in order to get every piece of furniture she could and now has a “wedding area” of her island that nobody uses but is great for photos. isabelle is her favorite character and she will do anything for her. somehow able to make the funniest animal crossing memes in the world. once caught a coelacanth without expecting it and screamed and dropped her switch 

joss kendrick: the BEST fisher. has never lost a fish once, nobody knows how she does it. best friends with cj and takes his seasports challenges way too seriously. wishes they were able to surf but swimming is good, too, though sometimes she’ll spend upwards of ten minutes chasing a particularly stubborn crab. she is incredibly patient at terraforming and uses this skill for evil, as every time her cheer squad comes to visit her island she has completely changed it around and then has them all play hide-and-seek. nobody knows how to find anything. the only consistent thing is that the beach will be the coolest-looking beach in the whole game. she named her island “lesbos” and accepts villagers that “pass the gay vibe check.” nobody is sure what the gay vibe check is 

kira bailey: is horrible at saving bells or getting a good rating on her island but she doesn’t care because her main focus is DIYing her own decor to make her island look like her aunts’ conservatory. as such, will only accept animals that could potentially live there, such as koalas or kangaroos. she’s bad at figuring out where to put houses and buildings so her island’s a mess to navigate, however she knows the routes like the back of her hand and gets confused when people ask her how the hell she finds anything. for some reason absolutely terrified of wisp and refuses to wander her island at night in case they show up