#splint armor is absolute hell do not try to draw it

[gamma-rae]

Maz upgraded her armor to splint armor and i had to draw it because i'm a moron who loves to suffer

[fruitcoops]

I absolutely love your fics!!! Thank you for sharing your talent with the world. If you're interested, do you think you could write a fic where Finn gets injured in a game against Tampa? O'Hara brothers ftw ♥️♥️♥️

Ohohohoho yes. It's 'missing your big brother so you write siblings' hours, and all of you are trapped in here with me. Combined with prompts for cubs hurt comfort/ poly love (@hi-im-phoenix) and distraction hurt/ comfort for AJ. Sorry about your manager <3 SW credit goes to @lumosinlove!

TW for bone inJuries

The crowd was roaring. Finn couldn’t catch his breath. His arm was on fire.

Something like a sob broke free in his chest, but he could do little more than hiccup in pain and fear from his place laying flat on his back atop the unforgiving ice. He couldn’t move his fingers. His elbow throbbed. Everything in between just hurt.

“—fuck is wrong with you?” an angry voice shouted, followed by a flash of blue and white shoving at the man whose late hit had left him suspended in shock. Finn didn’t know if it had been on purpose, but he didn’t really care anymore as a tear tracked down to his ear. He couldn’t pull his eyes away from the bright lights overhead.

A hand cradled one side of his jaw, warm and clammy on his cold skin. “Talk to me, mon amour, what’s wrong?”

“Lo,” he croaked, swallowing hard. “I’m okay. ‘m okay, promise. I’m okay.”

“Out of my way!” The blue and white blob pushed closer before kneeling next to him. A helmet hit the ice, followed by a glove; heavy hands settled on his shoulders, and the one on his face disappeared. “Finn? Finn, look at me.”

Finn’s chest hitched once, twice, hard. His head was pounding, and everything hurt. He may have been able to reassure Logan, but he had never been able to hide from his brother. “Alex.”

“Hey, buddy,” he soothed as Finn finally regained enough breath to gasp around his tears. “No, no, shhh. You’re gonna be just fine, yeah? Can you tell me what happened?”

“Hurts,” he choked out, squeezing his eyes shut. The pain had reached his shoulder and every movement was agony. “It hurts, it hurts—Alex, it hurts.”

“What hurts?”

He could hear people calling for medics. His friends, his family. But Alex stayed right there next to him, holding his good hand and brushing his tears away. “My arm,” Finn said, feeling as pathetic as he ever had. “Alex, it hurts so bad.”

“Can you wiggle your fingers for me?” Finn sobbed again as he shook his head and saw the encouraging smile slide of Alex’s face. “That’s alright, buddy, just take some deep breaths.”

“I don’t wanna be out,” Finn blubbered. “I gotta play.”

Alex gave his hand a light squeeze. “It’s not that bad, Fish. Deep breaths.”

He managed a handful—and admittedly felt a little better—but the alarms in his head were still blaring when Remus arrived with the medic, all but carrying him across the ice to get to Finn. He had a smudge of a bruise beneath his eye, but the worry creasing his brow overtook anything else. “I’m good, Loops,” Finn panted as the medic sat next to him. “Totally cool.”

“28, I’m going to need you to make some room,” the medic ordered. Fear spiked in Finn’s heart when he met Alex’s gaze, but he found only determination looking back.

“I’m not leaving,” Alex said simply.

The medic glanced down. “Can you stand?”

“I think so?” Finn said hesitantly, trying to get cool air back into his lungs. “It’s—I think I broke my arm. Everything else is okay.”

“What’s your pain level?”

“Eight. And a half,” he added. Alex frowned.

“Let’s get you off this ice, yeah?” The medic patted him gently on the shoulder. “O’Hara, can you get him up?”

“Keep that one close,” Alex murmured, sliding his arm under Finn’s shoulders. He clenched his teeth around a cry of pain as his bad arm was jostled, but Alex was strong and steady, and within a few seconds he was on his feet. “Easy does it, bud. I’ve got you.”

“Fucking shit,” Finn wheezed as he tried to close his hand. The fear and adrenaline had faded, but involuntary tears sprang to his eyes anyway. Alex held him upright without faltering despite his wobbly legs; they made it to the bench in a blur of movement that made Finn dizzy.

“We can take him from here,” the medic said to Alex.

“I’ll be fine,” Finn said, cutting him off just as he opened his mouth. “Go play. Your boys need you.”

Alex pressed his lips together in obvious frustration, but tapped their helmets together and skated back to his own bench. Finn let out a shaky breath and closed his eyes for a moment. “O’Hara?”

“I’m good,” he assured the medic.

“If you feel like you need to throw up, let me know.”

“No. No, I’m good. Just hurts.”

He caught a glimpse of the clock as they headed down the tunnel—ten minutes left in the period. Finn steeled himself for a long stretch of being alone in a medical room and tried to focus on something over than the unbearable heat and throbbing in his arm.

--------------

Leo traced the edge of the splint with a deep-set frown, but said nothing. His other thumb ran in gentle lines up and down Finn’s waist, kept there by Logan’s side pressing close. “You’re sure you’re alright?” Logan asked softly as he placed a kiss on the corner of Finn’s mouth.

“I promise.” They had barely traded ten words—both had shown up the second the game ended, stripping off their pads and skates in the entrance to the medical room before sandwiching Finn between them. Leo had been unusually quiet. They had won the game; from what Finn saw on the television in the corner of the room, Alex had reamed out the guy that hit Finn with a vengeance. Tampa had been disjointed, and the Lions swept in as a cohesive pack, out for blood.

“I was worried about you,” Leo said at last, resting his temple on Finn’s shoulder. He sighed, then shifted impossibly closer. “Couldn’t get through the crowd.”

“I thought Talker and Loops were gonna kill that guy after he hit you,” Logan said with a shake of his head. “Looks like Alex did it for him.”

“What, you didn’t get into your shining armor for me?” Finn teased, nuzzling his nose against Logan’s cheek to draw even a slight smile from him.

“Maybe next time.”

“No,” Leo mumbled, linking his fingers with Finn’s purple ones and lifting them to his lips for a brief kiss. It was a clean break, but would still take weeks to heal. Big blue eyes landed on him, melting his heart like they always did. “No ‘next times’, okay?”

“Aw, Knutty,” Finn said, barely above a whisper. He wrapped one arm around each of them and held them tight, soaking in the feeling of having both crushed against him. “I’m sorry I worried you.”

Logan tucked his face into Finn’s neck. “Nothing to be sorry for, mon rouge. We’re just glad you’re alright.”

“Sorry to interrupt,” a voice said from the door. Alex shifted his weight back and forth, twisting his baseball cap in his hands like he always did when he was nervous. Finn didn’t hesitate before extracting himself from the cuddle pile and crossing the room; Alex met him halfway and engulfed him in a hug. A shudder ran through him under Finn’s palms. “Jesus, Finn, you scared the hell out of me.”

“Sorry,” Finn mumbled into his hoodie, letting himself be cocooned by distilled safety. Even out of his skates, Alex had a good two inches on him, and he had always been the broader of the two—Finn suddenly felt about six years old, as if he had just skinned his knee on the sidewalk.

“What’s the diagnosis?”

“Closed break, clean fracture. I’ll be out for a month or two.” He stepped back and swiped a hand under his nose, then tilted his head toward Leo and Logan with a wry smile. “But I’ve got these two to look after me.”

Alex scanned his face for a moment; his mouth dipped on one side. “I called mom and dad, told ‘em you’re okay. You should tell them yourself, though. They were freaking out.”

“I will,” Finn promised.

The worry creasing his brow didn’t diminish as he wrapped Finn in his arms again, holding him tight. “Keep me updated, yeah? If I don’t hear from you, I’ll get the captain on your ass, and he won’t be as nice about it as I will.”

“Deal.”

“Knutty, Lo, drive safe. If he tries to pull some stupid shit, I’m counting on your survival skills to stop it.”

“Survival skills?” Leo half-laughed.

Alex pulled away and raised his eyebrows. “They don’t call me Hurricane O’Hara for nothing.”

His eyes flickered back to Finn, who was horrified to see slight redness around the rims despite the teasing in his voice. “Alex,” he said softly. “I’m okay, I swear.”

“I know.” His voice was gruff, but it poorly hid a sniffle as he bumped their foreheads together. “But I’m your brother. It’s my job to worry about you. I hate that one of my guys was at fault here.”

Finn tried for a smile, socking him on the arm. “Six weeks, and I’ll be good as new.”

“I’ll hold you to that.” With a final survey of his face and a kiss to the top of his head, Alex headed back out into the hall with his shoulders up near his ears. Finn sighed; he hated it when Alex was upset, and even more when there was nothing he could do to fix it except wait. He didn’t know what he’d do if one of his teammates broke his brother.

“Fish?” Leo was smiling when he turned around. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

“What kind?”

“The kind where I pull out all the sob story pity points on Cap’s soft heart and get us babysitting privileges for his incredibly fluffy dog after three months of constant begging.”

Finn’s eyes widened. “You’re kidding.”

“Make sure you look extra sad when we leave,” Logan advised. “We can’t lose this opportunity because you were too perky about a broken arm.”

“Quick, someone make me cry.”

Leo’s grin turned to horror. “What?”

“No!” Logan said at the same time.

“You guys are killing me here,” Finn groaned. “Just, like, hit me in the arm or something.”

“No!” they shouted in unison.

“You said I need to look sad!”

“I meant pout and sigh!” Logan pulled him over by the hem of his shirt in clear distress. “You’ve already cried too much tonight. No more.”

“Alright,” Finn agreed, already wracking his brain for any smidgen of drama skills he might have acquired over the years. Younger siblings were always the best actors, of course—he had given some Oscar-worthy performances to his mom when Alex got on his nerves as a kid—but Sirius was tough to fool. Maybe if he stayed quiet and didn’t risk opening his mouth they would get away with it.

Leo let out a slow exhale against his chest and snuggled closer before standing. “Come on, darlin,” he said with a kiss to Finn’s forehead. “Let’s get you settled. We’ll take a shower, have some dinner, and then we can put a movie on.”

“Mighty Ducks?” Finn asked hopefully.

Logan rolled his eyes. “Of course.”

[lifeblossom-remaking]

how to effectively Maxwell DPS in the forge: a (rambling) guide

heyo, im seeing lots of guides going up now that the forge is live and no longer in beta and i figure nows a good time for me to explain how ive won as this terrible, terrible frail old man and how he can actually be one of the strongest players on the team!

a few overall tips:

- communicating openly and loudly with the team is vital. youre going to be pretty weak at first and your biggest benefit to the group will be reducing the number of enemies coming to them, especially in rounds that can be overwhelming like the ones with pit pigs and crocommanders

-similarly, youre going to need a team comp thatll work with you. for maximum damage maxwell is going to want both the infernal staff *and* the tome of beckoning (as well as the tome of petrification when the situation calls for it). dont use a maxwell in a game with a wickerbottom, because imho theres really only room for one magic dps per game (though he does great with willow as a teammate, given willow can take fire physical dps with the molten darts)

-its going to seem stupid but youre going to want heavy armor once your tank(s) is/are outfitted and there happen to be extras. trust me.

now, starting out: maxwell is frail as shit. he has 75 max hp. with his starting armor, he dies in three hits to the snortoises, and if he gets hit from max hp by the scorpeon acid, he will get knocked down to 10 hp once the acid leaves your system. you absolutely do NOT want to get hit. dont even bother trying to hit enemies with your book unless youre absolutely confident in your ability to get away from their retaliation and are doing it to keep them grouped up for petrification purposes.

this guide’s going to explain how to be a king of multitasking via both tomes and the infernal staff. given maxwell has the shadow clone special ability, which does about 150 damage when it procs, AND can summon the magma golem to do consistent damage on top of his infernal staff usage, he is very, very good at taking down bosses and keeping their attention if need be!

besides that: though i focus on how wonderful and sexy the infernal staff and tome of beckoning are, the tome of petrification is HUGELY useful. be sure you keep an eye on your cleric. if theyre surrounded and trying and failing to cast, you can easily swoop in on the distracted enemies and freeze them in their tracks so your healer can revive or cast life blossom.

however, that means getting past the first few rounds. the pit pig and crocommander rounds are hell on earth as a maxwell. in the beta, he was able to consistently petrify enemies if he got the crystal tiara due to the recharge being just fast enough - however, it got rebalanced in the new update, either slowing down the cooldown or shortening the time enemies stay petrified. its better to let the healer take the crystal tiara (unless they insist). stay out of the thick of things, or just run around and try not to get hit if youre being pursued because the pit pigs are fast enough to get to you before you can petrify them.

your time to shine will come when your healer gets a life blossom spell up. once all the enemies are grouped up - this is where communication is vital, because this is where i see the most mistakes - let your physical dps units get their anvil strikes/pyre poker attacks off, and THEN petrify the enemies while theyre stunned. this will let them pick off the severely damaged enemies at their leisure. dont be afraid to be assertive in text or voice chat! remind the others to take turns getting those attacks off as the healing goes down, and keep track of how many are left to go. the worst feeling is getting a petrify up as soon as someone else undoes all that with an anvil strike.

when its time for the crocommanders, the best you can do is petrify one of the two groups as soon as they spawn in, then continue to stay out of the thick of things. the best ive found to petrify a group without getting completely mauled or them running out of the circle is actually going after a group of enemies that the tank has busy - and of course, communicate as always. thisll make it easier for them to either clean up the pit pigs or pick off the crocommanders if you make your intentions clear so they can stop attacking the petrified enemies.

the snortoises are the next round that youll only be able to petrify in. let your kite take the top or bottom group of two - youre going to want the group of three that spawns to the bottom-right. its not hard to keep them petrified, given how slow they are and how little you have to worry about dodging them, even if its tempting to sometimes whack one as it starts to wander off. youll probably get spiked in retaliation - keep in mind you can only survive three of those hits. just make sure you keep communicating and dont let anyone else, not even your kite, (well, okay, your kite can, but its very annoying), get those three away from you or unpetrified.

after the snortoise round is when the infernal staff drops. the scorpeons are much more dangerous than the snortoises, but youll be able to actually hold your own for once. just keep your distance and be sure to consistently attack one - and keep an eye on your healer as always, in case theyre having difficulty with aggro, so you can switch back to your petrification tome and freeze the scorpeons. i find it easiest to keep the two weapons, whenever i switch, in the middle, so that i can always see where they are.

you dont need to worry as much about petrifying as enemies wake up; now you can join the physical dps team. try to remember about how long life blossom lasts; the meteor spell takes a long, long time to cast, and youd want to get it to land about when the flowers are fading away. its helpful in that it can stun enemies for a short time, too, in case anybody needs to get out. if youre going to cast it on a group of moving enemies, it follows the same rules as petrify, just takes longer to cast; try to predict where theyll be moving a few seconds ahead, especially if theyre chasing a teammate.

this really should go unsaid, but do everything you can to not get hit by the acid. stick with your healer if youre hit, because youre almost guaranteed to go down unless youre able to avoid any more hits afterward.

the tome of beckoning should drop towards the middle to end of this round. it summons a magma golem that does about the same damage as you do with the infernal staff, and as consistently, but it goes down rather easily and will eventually leave by itself. however, by combining that AND the infernal staff AND the shadow clones (those dont apply to the golem, obviously; only the staff attacks), you can get an absolutely bonkers amount of damage off.

hopefully, you only have one tank. having more spaces open for dps will get you through the fight laster. if you only have one tank, you can get the second chiselled marble armor when it drops. if you have two, you can get the stone splint armor. either way, youre going to need those during or after the scorpeon round, otherwise (im relatively certain) the boarilla can literally one hit kill you. and things will go awry sometimes. its going to want to punch that frail old man. thats just how the forge goes.

this shouldnt have to be said, but once it drops from the first boarilla, youre going to want that tiara that ups your cooldown speed and your magic damage. now you can be even more deadly.

for obvious reasons, when it comes to the two boarilla round, youll be better against one boarilla than against the reinforcements that come up. just keep versatile. youll want to petrify the mooks while keeping dps up on the boarilla if possible, and its a stressful job, but its absolutely useful and possible and will keep a lot of heat off the team. now that youll have better armor, youll be much more survivable against the hordes, too, and have to worry just a little less.

(by the way; the magma golems ai isnt too bad. it wont attack petrified or sleeping enemies, making it automatically a better teammate than half of the randoms youll find)

if you have the marble armor, youll actually be able to take a couple punches from the boarilla. dont be afraid to try to draw aggro off of your healer or wilson (or if they were feeling particularly punchy, your wilson IS your healer). and as a dps, youll be the bottom priority for rezzing (which should be wilson>kite>tanks>dps). but not to worry. just do what you need to keep the group alive, even if you have to get smushed sometimes. dont forget, the golem can serve as a distraction, too, and can keep it locked into defensive mode.

the same general rules apply to the boarrior, when it shows up; you can tank a bit better than you think (but still not very well! youre a twig in a whole bunch of bubble wrap) if you need to get aggro off your healer. now, heres where things can get really juicy: does your healer have a hard time getting the big man into the life blossom circle so he can sleep? this is where you can swoop in. remember that tome of petrification you forgot about once all the mooks got cleared out?

yup.

you can set up a combo (as long as youre communicating! no matter what i say here communication is the number one key to winning) where you petrify the big boy (which will only last a few scant seconds, so work fast) and then your healer puts a circle right on him so he cant escape.

aside from that, tactics are widely the same. dont be scared to petrify pigs, etcetera, etcetera. keep your kite and your healer safe. you can do it!

good luck! message me or reply if you have tips i should add!