#rat grinders discourse makes me go wild

[neurotic-sinkhole]

A Crown of Candy is my favorite setting and season Dimension 20 has done so far. The way Calorum was meticulously crafted in both lore and actual mechanics demonstrates complete mastery of GMing. Political intruige is such a fun yet unsettling type of campaign, and in one of my own campaigns I've GM'd, I looked towards the world building Brennan and the Intrepid Heros did in the world as an inspiration.

With that being said, there were parts I wasn't a big fan of.

I only discovered D20 about a year and a half ago, so I wasn't around when A Crown of Candy was coming out. I have no idea what the discourse surrounding the season looked like at the time. But seeing the current Rat Grinders discourse, I can put together the peices of how bad fans at that time could have been.

Now, with ACOC, my personal gripes with the season aren't little scenes I disagree with. I've rewatched the season many, many times- and every. single. time For Candia Pt 1 (second to last episode) makes me genuinely upset. I'm a Survivor fan. I've hatewatched many hours of TV but preservered simply for the sake of completion for a lotta content. But that episode, the decisions made by some of the cast in regaurd to their character's alleginces makes me so angry.

From what I gather, there was a shit ton of hate to Emily based from her portrayal (and i guess just existance?) as Sacharina. While I don't think Sacharina was a perfect character, the choices Emily made as Sacharina were nowhere near as upsetting to me as Murph's as Theo.

((This is spoilers if ya haven't watched yet))

In For Candia Pt 1, there's the whole conversarion between the Momma Poppa lonely twin inner House Rocks family about how Amathar isn't an adulterer. They talk about how he's actually legally King! And they make the decision to tell nobody, not even Theo, because it isn't the time. Because well, there is literally war going on, and also because they're nervous about it weaseling rebellion in the troops and companions they so desperately need to work together- if but just for a few more hours.

Then the swifty thing happens, Sacharina tells Theo, and the exact thing Ruby DIRECTLY MENTIONS being nervous about happens. Theo can't keep the secret and tells people.

Now, I know that within the cannon Theo wouldn't know Ruby said that. Him knowing that is straight up metagaming lol. But what Theo does know, and hears directly from Sacharina's lips, is that SWIFTY found this out. Swifty, the "advisor" to his queen who is a known shit starter and murderer. Theo only checks if the queen is telling the truth- not Swifty, and doesn't think to double check this info.

Theo says he's known Ruby since she's been alive. He's known Amathar for decades. But he'll take the word of a rampaging violent maurader such as Swifty, who he's only known for a series of weeks.

Everybody- the cast, the other characters in game, MURPH HIMSELF- has waxed poetic about the importance of honor to Theo. Yet he forgets it so easily at times that he needs it most and it drives me WILD.

This is probably my biggest complaint with ACOC. And I know this issue does not come from some weird sense of "morality" or just straight up sexism/racism/queerphobic tendancies like a lot of the issues d20 fans come up with. It's a genuine critiqe of a character not based off of their behavior but choices made. It's criticism that garners conversation. I bet there are people who will think I'm wrong, and that's fine! I think you're wrong then too, and that's it. I don't think you're immoral or a bad person for not having a different viewpoint than me. It's interesting in a way that stirs myself and others to delve further into the season I love so much.

Because that's what fandom discourse should look like. That is what disagreements within online spaces should look like. Especially when the events being dissected are about little food people in the dice game.

[i-said-blimey]

I get that people love the rat grinders

and want to see them redeemed because they were being misled by their teachers

And maybe I would have been on that side if it hadn't been for KLCK. If it wasn't the slashing her own AP member's throat, it would the complaining about Riz having a hard life as if that somehow gave him advantage. If it wasn't the endangering students at the party, it would be the trying to bring about the apocalypse. I have as much sympathy for her as I have for Penelope, Biz and Dayne in freshman year.

In conclusion:

I don't really care much about the rest of TRG. Except maybe hating Ivy for being a fantasy racist. I even thought Oisin and Adaine would be cute together before it turned out there was nothing there at all. Ruben is insufferable but what teen boy isn't. I just don't think that him being a teenager makes him a wooby whose actions need to be ignored or justified.

I'm not saying it's bad to care about TRG or whatever. i just don't get why people are acting like TBK are awful for killing TRG when TRG have been making their lives miserable. And are also actively trying to bring about the apocalypse. Or worse that BLeeM and IH are horrible for not shifting the story from mystery solving to focusing on redeeming TRG

[kindlespark]

sam i didnt even watch fhjy but can you tell me more of ur thoughts abt kipperlilly? any thoughts even stream of consciousness, she seems so teenager rage gone wrong im so fascinated by her

HJBFESJBFEKSFS THIS IS SO FUNNY OFC ok this is going to be a range of thoughts about the reactions i've seen from both ends of the rat grinder Discourse™

i think it's fine to be like, yeah, what kipperlilly's anger stems from is like deeply unsympathetic and comes from a very privileged status. i think being like "no that's normal for a teen girl" is silly. she is very much not normal she's a little upper-middle class brat and i love her. i love that she's so deeply distasteful and unappealing to people LOL. hate when female characters have to be smoothed down to be liked! like we don't have to downplay her negative traits when people are obsessed with male serial killers all the time etc etc

BUT i also think people forget that like... the bad kids were reading private thoughts she shared with her therapist (which is a massive invasion of privacy)! like of course it was fucked up. that's why she was going to a therapist lmao!!! it stresses me out that people are this vitriolic about a teen character who is pretty explicitly mentally ill and trying to get better about it but is being manipulated by a deity of rage and possibly her adult vice principal like. you don't have to LIKE her but calling for her to be violently murdered is wild to me. the bad kids had never even HEARD of her before this season and you can metagame about brennan not having invented her character yet all you want but in canon u gotta assume she was successfully keeping that rage down until she got got and is now being actively corrupted by a powerful rage deity lmaoooo

and like! she got her narrative punishment!! the monkey's paw curled and she lost her best friend she's got her traumatic backstory now!!! she's already suffering and at her lowest i don't need her to die (again!)

i think brennan is past the point of making teen characters irredeemable so i can only hope that the cast follows through on that bc i feel like redemption and healing from trauma is one of the strongest themes in fantasy high like i bawled my eyes out in every aelwyn and adaine scene. which is why it's really funny to me that siobhan is kipperlilly's biggest hater because i feel like she's a great mirror to adaine's spite and aelwyn's redemption..... like siobhan's characters are all very appealing to me because of their rage. god im hoping and praying they don't kill the rat grinders in the finale god bless

oh final petty thing i think saying kipperlilly's name wrong was only funny the first 200 times <3 love u all mwa