#others I'm sure will find their way in

[canisalbus]

gothic lolita machete came to me in a dream

.

[clfixationstation]

idk if this is a hot take but I don't think Armin is friendly. I think people find him generally off-putting. Like, people think he looks sweet, but also find him strange; for the topics that interest him, the way he didn't stray far from Eren (& Mikasa) socially, and his general demeanor.

I think that as Armin established himself more as he grew up, he developed better interpersonal skills that compliment his rhetorical prowess. I think he's the type of person who sees value in life and in minimizing harm. He offers kindness to his friends and understanding to all. But I don't see him as particularly "friendly"

[uncanny-tranny]

The thing that gets me about history and humanity is that you never know what is immortalized, and the things that will be immortalized are things you would never think.

I saw a person sharing a new tattoo, and it was one of Onfim's drawings. A boy who lived so long ago he is barely a blip now, but his drawings meant so much to people that somebody is now permanently marked in their skin with one of those drawings. Do you ever look at the things you make and just sit there and wonder if this is the thing that future people look at? Do you ever look at your art, your writing, your schoolwork, or anything that is yours and just wonder who will find it, who will fall in love with a piece of your humanity and become overwhelmed with emotion over? It's not unlikely. It's not totally unlikely that somebody will find a piece of you in the distant future and devoid of any other context of who you were will still love you because you were here. You were here, and you are still here, even hundreds or thousands of years later. Treat yourself with the same love that so many have for dear Onfim.

[nakaremfarlei]

Was just thinking about the amount of animals Obi-Wan interacts with compared to literally everyone else and in the Clone Wars episode where Kamino gets attacked he literally gets saved twice by the same ray-like animal and just...

The growth from judging Qui-Gon for the 'pathetic lifeforms' he picks up to whatever he has going on during the Clone Wars era. He must have gotten that from Qui-Gon though, right?

And because it's my brain and it's rotting with all the star wars stuff I am consuming I was thinking of Obi-Wan saving all these creatures and the 212th having to deal with that. Surely they made one of the rooms pet proof in case one of them needs a new home. There also have to be clones who love that because of course Obi-Wan can't really take care of rescues on top of all his duties.

After the first few times this happens Cody learns to order animal food and other necessities. And if the Republic doesn't fulfill these requests or asks too many questions he'll just have to make sure to organize them on planet during the campaigns.

[lolomidi]

Personally I don't want Alastor's power to be (at least solely) a result of his deal. It feels like a pretty obvious and almost cheap twist.

I think it would much more unexpected and crueler if he truly was a talented up-and-comer who made a name for himself, who was so close to attaining freedom and control over his life as an Overlord of Hell, only to be brought under someone's boot anyway due to circumstances outside of his control. Of course he'd be all about "taking control of his fate" after that.

[mourn-and-watch]

i would really like to see people appreciate beau's growth and character arc more without trying to convince newcomers that "she'll get better eventually just you wait" implying she was such an unbearable character you have to make yourself sit through her scenes. i assure you, she wasn't

[corallapis]

No, never. Missy! I will never stand with Doctor!

[thebramblewood]

I thought it might be fun to do a little behind the scenes for the last story post! You guys might be surprised how little actual editing was involved. I mainly just crop, add brightness and saturation, clean up any small bits of clipping or weirdness that bother me, and then add captions! Do you want to know what actually took me the longest?

This hair had some problem areas that showed up in live mode but not CAS. It's such a tiny thing, but it annoyed me, so I had to touch it up in nearly every screenshot. Luckily, the darkness of her hair means I didn't have to do a perfect job.

The effects were all done in-game. Lilith has the alluring visage vampire perk, which creates the red haze and mind control spiral. Unfortunately, Helena crossed her path too closely, and rather than set the shot up again I used the clone brush in Photoshop to edit out the effects around her head (vampires who can successfully do mind control on other vampires are exceedingly rare). By the way, I later figured out a quick and dirty method for dispelling unwanted visual effects on a Sim is to remove buffs in MCCC.

As I've mentioned, I had to shoot the attack scene twice. The first attempt was too dark, the location wasn't very visually interesting, I was in an area of San My where I had less camera control, and I used the Effects Player, which ended up being less eye-catching (hey, sometimes vanilla is the best option!). They would have worked to get the point across, but I think you can really see how I learned and improved upon my vision!

These comparison shots are all uncropped and unedited, by the way. Reshade/Relight truly does the heavy lifting. I've also gotten better at finding an angle I like and sticking with it, even if that's only because I don't want to adjust Relight all over again, lol! Speaking of angles, that last shot was done using the Dutch angle trick I learned in this tutorial by @surely-sims! First-person camera is actually super useful for storytelling. If you don't already know about this head-turning trick, it'll change your life. It comes in clutch for changing the eye line of a posed Sim since I'm not always great at getting that right in Blender.

Anyway, I don't know if anyone will find this super helpful or interesting, but I'm always open to questions about taking and editing screenshots, even though I feel like most of what I know has just been absorbed through osmosis and trial and error!

[pigeonstab]

(One more silly werewolf doodle before I go to bed)

Poor Dust didn't stand a chance, how long do you think it took Horror to learn his strength and stop destroying everything in the vampire house? lol

(Also in case you're going to bed around now too goodniiiight!!)

(Unless you see this in the morning in which case good moooorning!!)

WAAAAAA cutiesss, Horror just fucking clocked him holy shit T T, this is so cool thank u sm!!

I think.. College au Horror is very controlled. He knows his strength, maybe there was a small adjusting period when he started living with vamps instead of a pack of wolves similar in strength.

He's very teasing though, so probably lots of 'oh no gravity is increasing on me' bullshit lol.

[canisalbus]

You mentioned before that the people who would have access to Machete's bedchamber would likely already know about Vasco. How did that come up in your mind? Did they get caught in the act or was the subject broached with enough trust? How did those people handle it? Sorry if this is a bit vague but I thought about it today and I'm very interested. :)

I think it just has to be the case, I can't imagine how they could manage to hide the fact Vasco is bunking with him from everyone, for years and years. Machete doesn't live alone, he has staff and servants who do his housekeeping and run his errands. Even if Vasco didn't stay there for any extended periods of time and snuck out the back door to avoid attention, I'm assuming at least the people who do his laundry and change his sheets would eventually detect that some sort of funny business had happened. But the number of people who are in on it is still very very small and tightly controlled. His assistant Vittorio definitely knows and helps to manage this situation, so does his personal doctor, and on top of that maybe a handful of most trusted high-ranking emplyees, which he has vetted extremely carefully and pays handsomely for their discreetness and prudence.

[moongothic]

You know. If Crocodad Real. How would Luffy even react if he found out. Like really, how the fuck would he feel about it.

'Cause like how I went over in this post (briefly at the end), we don't even know how Luffy feels about Crocodile as he is right now, so can you imagine how that bombshell would impact things

Like my running theory is that Luffy still hates Crocodile but maybe not quite as much as pre-Impel Down since he kiiinda owes him etc

And Luffy does not seem to give a shit about blood connections, at least not that much. Like don't get me wrong, Luffy's family are the people who were there for him when he was a child, those are the people he cares about and his bio-parents don't really matter. But also, honestly, I think the reason Luffy doesn't give a shit about who his parents are is because he doesn't know them. Luffy cares about people who he knows and likes, and while he doesn't give a shit about Dragon right now, it's arguably because he simply just doesn't know him. If the two actually get to meet and know each other, like if Luffy takes a liking Dragon, he'll probably accept Dragon as his dad and as his family. But on his own terms. It's up to Luffy to decide

And that's why like. How would Luffy react to finding out he has another dad and that one is fucking Crocodile. Because he already hates the man. It would not be happy news for him I'm sure

The other thing is that normally Luffy does not give a flying fuck about people's sad backstories. He didn't care to hear what happened to Nami and her village for example, because what really mattered was that there was a person he cared about who was deeply hurt and in danger and he wanted to help said person. And that's where I'm so torn. Because on one hand, it would be perfectly on-brand for Luffy to not give a shit of Crocodile had a sob story to tell. But also, I could imagine Luffy being so fucking confused over the news that he'd want to hear the truth of like, who what where how why, in detail. So that, you know, he could make his own decision and figure out if he wants to considder Crocodile is other dad or disown him.

Like, both feel like things Luffy would do

So really, would the real deciding factor might be just... the circumstances where Luffy finds out???

God knows, I can not imagine Crocodile himself telling Luffy anything ever. The kid already hates him, he knows it, so he'd probably think it'd be for the best if Luffy never found out

So how else could Luffy find out then?

As far as we know, the only other person who could confirm it would be Dragon himself, and considdering how he probably feels about his ex (see: Alabasta Coup Attempt), I can't imagine him wanting to talk about Crocodile to Luffy in lenght or in a positive light. Like I can't imagine Dragon wanting to tell Luffy at all is the point, not unless he wanted to like apologize to Luffy because it is arguably his fault Luffy and Crocodile fought in Alabasta to near-death to begin with. (Sidenote since we don't know how the break-up happened to begin with, it's totally possible Crocodile could've asked Dragon to never let their kid find out what happened to his "mom")

And now, this is where I'm gonna go completely off the rails, but. As I was wondering if there was any other way Luffy could find out...

S-Croc is made with Crocodile's DNA.

(And actually before I even go into S-Croc, super quick sidenote: If Kuma can extract memories out of people and allow other people to literally see them... Like I can't tell if Kuma's memories got absorbed by Bonney when she looked into them or if Kuma's Memory Bubble is still on Egghead, but if viewing the memories isn't the same as having them inserted into a vessel permanently... Like if Kuma isn't turbo-dead, could there be a scenario where we have Kuma (or S-Bear) yeet out Croc's memories and have Luffy just look into them? Because god knows Crocodile might just refuse to speak about it and that could be the only way to get The Whole Truth if Dragon doesn't want to talk about it either?) (Of course, Crocodile would understand just How Persistent Luffy is so if Luffy just kept on annoying him about it, Crocodile could maybe give up eventually because he knows he can't get Luffy to piss off until he spills the beans)

So currently the Strawhat's plan is for them to go and escort the Vegapunks to Elbaf (if nothing goes funny after the flashback is over, which remains to be seen)

2. There is the mystery of what sex S-Croc is going to be, because there is a possibility that if Crocodile is trans then his Seraphim could be pre-T (though this entirely depends on whether or not Ivankov's HRT changes even the DNA of person. Since it's MAGIC HRT I would prefer it to, not gonna lie, and I would not appreciate any "you may look different but your DNA will tell the truth!" rhetoric in the story but I may be asking too much from Oda)

3. And there's also the mystery of what Devil Fruit ability S-Croc might have, since all the Seraphim have been given Fruit powers, and we know Vegapunk can't replicate Crocodile's Sand Logia.

All things considdered, I think the actual, most likely known ability S-Croc might end up with would be like, Mr 3's wax powers (hilariously), mainly because I could imagine it being flexible enough to work in Crocodile's fighting style, so it'd be the easiest for S-Croc to adapt to (like if you can make anything from wax, then why not sharp blades to fling at people) (Also we know Vegapunk would have access to this power since Mr 3 was in Impel Down, when they also got Daz' powers)

But also I had joked before how it'd be funny if S-Croc was a Crocodile Zoan for no reason. Like it'd be fitting since Crocodile was already the Only Logia of the OG Shichibukai, so making his Seraphim the Only Zoan would be funny as hell (if it's even possible, which we can't say if it will/won't be). Additionally, making him a Crocodile Zoan would be hysterically on-the-nose.

(Sidenote: If there was a crocodile Zoan Fruit, what sub-category do you think it'd fall into? Like would it be Ryu Ryu like all the dinosaur-themed Zoans are, or maybe even a different model of Uo Uo (same as Kaidou)? Since "wani" could be considdered a different type of serpent-dragon, and if Vegapunk was researching how to recreate Kaidou's fruit, it's plausible he might've accidentally recreated some other related-fruit in the process or afterwards?? (Also since Kaidou's Uo Uo is a specific model (Seiryu) it would make sense if there was another Uo Uo model Fruit, and this could be an excelent opportunity to use it))

The thing about Zoans though is that, as it's been brought up once or twice before, Zoan fruits can kind of have a "mind of their own" and influence the user in unexpected ways.

And as all we Crocodad Truthers know.

Crocodiles are protective of their babies.

ALSO: The Seraphim do have enough personal will-power that they may (slightly) disobey orders they've been given. Case-and-point, S-Snake undoing the Petrification on the Strawhats after Luffy asked her to, since S-Snake is fond of Luffy just like Hancock is

Sidenote, it was kind of made a point how Vegapunk considdered his artificial replica of Kaidou's dragon fruit a compete failure simply because instead of a blue dragon, the user would turn into a pink one instead. So if Vegapunk tried to make a Seraphim of Crocodile, knowing full-well he couldn't even give the Seraphim the same ability as the OG, and then the Seraphim turns out the wrong sex for no reason?? I could see him being confused as hell and considder S-Croc "a failed Seraphim"

So really, all we'd really need to happen would be for the Strawhats to somehow encounter the remaining three Seraphim while escorting the Vegapunks to Elbaf. Mind you, IDK how that could even happen since as far as we know they've been deployed the Emptee Bluffs

And then just have S-Croc either disobey orders to hunt Luffy or even even have him be protective of Luffy (following that Zoan Instinct, one even he can't explain, it's just Instinct). Have Sanji be like "hey why the fuck is this one a girl, isn't it supposed to be Crocodile", followed by Vegapunk explaining this Seraphim was a failure for reasons even he can't understand

Then have Jinbei remember the conversation Crocodile and Ivankov had at Impel Down (suspicious considdering Ivankov's abilities and this "failed Seraphim"), and maybe if Crocodile had any involvement with the Revolutionaries and Robin was suspicious of him she could even bring that up

Along with any other minor details that may be bothering the crew about the whole deal

And so if the Strawhats and Vegapunk just put all their braincells together and rubbed them real hard, they could maybe come to a hypothesis as to why S-Croc is a "failure" and protective of Luffy, and maybe even a potential explanation as to why The Real Crocodile was protective of Luffy in Marineford for no fucking reason

And maybe, just maybe, Vegapunk could confirm that suspicion with a DNA test. All he needs to do is check Luffy's and compare it to Crocodile's.

Not sure Luffy would want to do the DNA test, like knowing Luffy he might prefer to just ask Crocodile in person if they ever ran to each other again

But boy, if he somehow did agree to a DNA test, and there was a match... oh boy

But again. This entire scenario is BEYOND off-the-rails. Technically plausible! But honestly if Luffy is ever gonna find out (assuming Crocodad Real) then it's gonna be from Dragon

I just wanted to get the theoretical scenario out of my system okay, I had to get the brainworms out of my brain

[pushing500]

So i was looking into the canon romworld lore and, learning that spaceships cant do any warp speed travel bc they never developed it immediately had me thinking of mechi and his sister :(. Like, i'm just imagining the angst of mechi going home with kwahu, thinking its only been like 10 years and its actually been 100 or something bc cryosleep.... could definately be a reason why the two would go for the ideology or anomoly ending

Yeah, it would make for a very heartbreaking story if Yamka wasn't every bit as stubborn and reckless as her brother. She followed him all the way to the Rim and dragged their parents along as well. They're on the planet somewhere, but as Mechi and Kwahu aren't particularly inclined to build hotels for interaction with other factions, it may take us a long time to encounter them (if we ever do).

I'm sure Mechi imagines that their reunion will begin with a long-awaited hug, but Yamka is absolutely going to punch him first. She was not happy that he decided to go galavanting about the galaxy without her, and she'll probably be torn between yelling and crying when (if) they do meet again. Mechi will be suitably chastened, I'm sure. Maybe Kwahu, too, even though he technically never did anything wrong.

[asgardian--angels]

I feel like this is a good time to remind my followers of the full-circleness of it all; the 2001 Queen of the Damned film with rockstar Lestat featured songs composed by Jonathan Davis of Korn, my absolute favorite singer throughout my teenage years (and to this day, lbr). Before getting into IWTV I enjoyed those songs on their own, having no real idea of what they were supposed to be about. Now, we're getting actual rockstar Lestat, and looking back relistening to those nu metal rockstar Lestat songs, knowing that the singer that's been absolutely formative for me is singing from the pov of Lestat (and Akasha), a character that's become such a big part of my life as well.

it's just yet another way everything is connected and the world's smaller than you think.

Anyway if you haven't heard his original compositions for QOTD that he himself sings on the soundtrack, they're really, really good- System, Forsaken, Careless, Redeemer, Slept So Long, Not Meant For Me... give 'em a listen! He's done all of them live many years later too, and there's great recordings of those.

(the live version of Careless is truly extraordinary imo...)

[everytangbo]

“During today's spar I tried to keep things interesting, I told him I would be tasting the poison of a foreign stinging bush. Told him about the prolonged pain inflicted by it ‘a guy wiped his ass with it and jumped off a cliff because he couldn't handle the pain anymore’. But not to worry! since he was so confident that I wouldn't be able to hit him. I gave him a scratch! Oops.

He wasn’t worried until his leg started tickling. He was so freaked out about it. He almost cut off his leg! Was that overbreadth? Can’t hold my laugh– That’s just peppercorn, silly! He beat the shit out of me. Still worth it, tho. It's been a while. He’s still mad, but it's because I haven’t stopped laughing since this morning. I’m telling his Senior Brother about it, I know he’ll find it funny.��

[greenerteacups]

Hi! I am an ardent fan of your writing, and I hope to be as sorted and planned as you some day in my own writing journey.

My question is: you have a keen eye when it comes to planning character personality, dynamics, and such. I've also been wading through your ask replies, and your insights into how you write people and how you make them play off of each other is so wonderful to read. If it's not too personal a q, how did you learn how to write like this? Did you go to school for writing, does it come from years of observing people, do you have reading list recs for "how to write real people and real interactions"?

Thanks! This is a really flattering question. I'll try to answer it honestly, because I wish someone had been brutally honest about this with me when I was a young writer.

I didn't go to school for writing. I started doing it when I was about nine years old. It sucked very badly. I kept writing throughout high school, and it still mostly sucked, but some of it was occasionally interesting. ("Interesting" here does not mean "good," by the way.) I took a break in college, and then came back. I've been writing ever since. Sometimes, I feel good about it. A lot of the time, I don't!

I hate giving this advice, because I remember how it feels to get it, and it's the most uninspiring, boring-ass, dog shit advice you can get, but it's also the only advice that is 100% unequivocally true: you have to write, and specifically, you have to write things that suck.

I do not mean that you should make things that suck on purpose. I mean that you have to sit down and try your absolute hardest to make something good. You have to put in the hours, the elbow grease, the blood, sweat, and tears, and then you have to read it over and accept that it just totally sucks. There is no way around this, and you should be wary of people who tell you there is. There is no trick, no rule, no book you can buy or article you can read, that will make your writing not suck. The best someone else can do is tell you what good writing looks like, and chances are, you knew that anyway — after all, you love to read. You wouldn't be trying to do this if you didn't. And anyone who says they can teach you to write so good it doesn't suck at first is either lying to you, or they have forgotten how they learned to write in the first place.

So the trick is to sit there in the miserable doldrums of Suck, write a ton, and learn to like it. Because this is the phase of your path as an artist when you find what it is you love about writing, and it cannot be the chance to make "good writing." This will be the thing that bears you through and compels you to keep going when your writing is shit, i.e., the very thing that makes you a writer in the first place. So find that, and you've got a good start.

Some people know this, but assume that perseverance as a writer is about trying to get to the point where you don't suck anymore. This is not true, and it is an actively dangerous lie to tell young writers. You are not aiming to feel like your writing doesn't suck. You are aiming to write. You are aiming to have written. Everything else is dust and rust. And of course, you'll find things you like about your pieces, you'll find things you're proud of, you'll learn to love the things you've made. But that little itch of self-criticism, in the back of your brain — the one that cringes when you read a clunky line, or thinks of a better character beat right after it's far too late to change — that's never going away. That's the Writer part of you. Read Kafka, read Dickens, read Tolstoy, you will find diary entries where they lament how absolutely fucking atrocious their writing was, and how angry they are that they can't do better. A good writer hates their sentences because they can always imagine better ones. And the ability to imagine a better sentence is what's going to make you pick up the pen again tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that.

Which is what I mean, and probably what all those other annoying, preachy advice-givers mean, when we say: a good writer is just someone who writes every day. It's that easy, and that hard.

[antiyourwokehomophobia2]

I wonder what it is about breaking up with someone and starting new that I find so upsetting. I realize that people also find break ups heartbreaking, but I know I take it to an extreme. I've never liked the idea of having different partners throughout my life. The idea of having an ex has always been something I hated. The type of breakup didn't matter to me. That is to say whether we ended on good or bad terms didn't make the idea of ending a relationship better to me. I'm not trying to be pretentious about it, I'm just being fr about a sentiment I've held for as long as I can remember. I've never been the type of person who enjoyed the idea of hook ups or casual dating. For better or worse, I've always held the belief that romantic relationships should be all in and serious from the beginning.

I think this feeling is definitely exacerbated by the fact that I've been passed up for another person before so I know what it's like to have someone "move on" from you, and it genuinely sucks like all fucking hell lmao. So the idea of "moving on" and being with someone else has been incredibly tarnished for me.