#that have little to no basis in canon

[lucabyte]

I don't use it to eavesdrop, if that's what you're asking.

[tls12lessthan3]

probability sparks everywhere the first time yoo joonghyuk tells kim dokja he loves him because kim dokja can't believe it. yoo joonghyuk repeating it over and over again, ignoring the burns from the sparks because he's never been the type to conform to probability anyway (and whos fault is that in the first place). the sparks lessening each time as kim dokja starts to believe him more and more, until eventually yoo joonghyuk can hold him and say it without either getting burned. can anyone hear me

[serpentface]

Do psychotropic drugs and/or ritual play a role in any of the blightseed cultures? A pretty broad question, lol

Yeah that’s a very broad question, the answer is about as much as it tends to play roles in real history. Alcohol is pretty ubiquitous (outside of cultures that abstain from intoxicants) and used for a variety of purposes, opioids are commonly used in some parts for pain relief or recreational purposes, stimulants (usually in mild, natural forms) are used to provide extra energy, and hallucinogens are most commonly used as part of a larger religious framework (rather than for recreational purposes). Any more elaborate answer kinda has to be case by case in a certain culture or part of the setting.

I'll just take this as an opportunity to talk about the one established sect that pretty much REVOLVES around psychoactive use. This is the Scholarly Order of the Root, which is a sort of mystery religion + elite community of scholars who currently occupy the Ur-Tree and its forest in the far southern Lowlands (southeast of Imperial Wardin, on the same land mass).

The Ur-Tree is the obligatory Huge Fucking Fantasy Tree (and its surrounding forest). It’s a mass of vegetation about a mile tall and almost as old as Plant Life Itself, its upper branches are primeval plants, which become more modern the nearer they get to the ground (and each 'level' holds tiny ecosystems, some containing descendants of LONG-extinct arthropods/other small animals). Its lowest branches and the surrounding forest are contemporary plant life, and all is connected and protected by an incomparably MASSIVE fungal mycelium network (which is itself a living god).

A lot of the Scholars' more secretive practices revolve around experimentation with substance use with the goal of expanding the Mind and transcending the body to fully connect to the Dreamlands, and they have a supply chain of traders and mercenaries called Rootrunners who traffic substances into the Lowlands. Most of their psychoactive use is in a very intentional capacity and not just like, for fun, but a LOT of them are just straight up addicted to cocaine (in the form of alchemically refined bruljenum, which is used for practical purposes of its stimulant effect during long hours of work).

All known psychoactives are desirable for experimentation (particularly hallucinogens), with each having properties that either allow expansion of the Mind, transcendence of the body, or outright divine communion. Their effects are logged in great detail and interpreted to form the basis of the Scholars' understanding of the natural world and reality itself.

The most important substance is Ur-Root, which is root matter from subterranean levels of the Ur-Tree that have both their own intrinsic psychoactive substances and a very, very high concentration of living god mycelium. The tree root contains DMT and the mycelium has its own wholly unique effects (being an actual living god). They alchemically refine it into a purer, more potent form, and use it to expand beyond the body and directly commune with the Giants, a group of entities they have identified as the only true gods.

An Ur-Root trip starts off with minor visual distortion, which turns into shifting fractals that slowly obscure the vision. Eventually the senses are entirely taken over by a 'tunnel' of rapidly shifting fractals and geometries. In a complete trip, the experiencer gets a sense that they have been pushed through a membrane and entered another realm, finding themselves in a distinct experiential Space.

At this point they may encounter entities which communicate to them in a language impossible to describe but wholly understood. These beings are understood to be the Giants, or at least aspects of the Giants that mortals are capable of comprehending (they often take familiar tutelary forms of the Mantis or the Snake, or appear resembling the same type of sophont that the experiencer is, all composed of ever-shifting geometries). The experiencer often feels a sense of unconditional and endless love from these beings, though the Giants may be more hostile and may appear in the form of the Trickster (usually a cultural figure regarded as malicious, be it an animal or otherwise) in a bad trip.

(^Up until this point, this has mostly just been a DMT 'breakthrough' experience ft. 'machine elves' and the like).

They are then removed from this space and returned to something that feels like the real world, but is nearly unrecognizable. They have a sense of rapidly moving through time, and will usually see 'the spires' towards the beginning, which just so happen to look like this:

(source + some context via Implication- the spires are exactly what this art is depicting)

The experiencer continues to move across an unfathomable amount of time, occasionally 'seeing' other such flashes of unfamiliar landscapes and creatures, and yet also being devoid of all their senses, the 'seeing' is pure, unfiltered experience. There is a sense of interconnectedness with all life, and that one has become the forest (or even Life) itself. The sense of time is wildly distorted, the trip lasts only about 5 minutes but feels like an eternity and is understood as literal hundreds of millions of years.

The experiencer has usually lost any remaining sense of Self and individual consciousness during this phase (in which case this time distortion is usually a neutral or even peaceful experience), but some retain a fraction of their identity, and find themselves trapped and conscious while experiencing what feels like eternity (which can be LIFE-CHANGINGLY distressing, even after the fact).

(^This latter part of the trip is the effects of the Ur-Tree fungus).

The trip ends with a sense of rushing through the ground and back up into one's body, at which point they will abruptly return to their senses and consciousness. The details are then immediately retrieved via interview and recorded in immense detail. The whole experience is understood as having been full comprehension of the Dreamlands, communion with the Giants, and then a tour through the act of creation.

This is done as part of the initiatory practice into the inner mystery-religion of the scholars, and as needed for study by high scholar-priests. It is not taken lightly, both as it is absolute communion with the gods and reality, and in that it can be a very, very difficult experience. People who have gone through this often walk away with a permanently shifted perspective, often in a positive and/or comforting way- a sense of interconnectedness with all life, a peace with the concept of death, seeing less of a point in individual ego and the concept of Self, and comfort in the sense of divine love they (may have) experienced. This heavily influences the philosophy of the Scholars and has had effects by proxy in the religious worldviews of the region.

Details of this experience are closely guarded, and initiates are given absolutely no prior knowledge and expectations for their trip. This is seen as a necessity- their naivety will allow for a true, unfiltered experience, and can be used to gauge whether they should or should not be accepted. Those that have a distinctly bad trip upon initiation may be assumed to have been 'rejected' by the giants and thus denied full priesthood, though this largely depends on How they interpret their distressing trip- those who identify this as a test and harsh lesson in a journey to enlightenment may be accepted (as this is how fully initiated scholar-priests interpret and handle their bad trips).

This inner priesthood is only a small fraction of the Scholarly Order, and its greater function is as a hub of education and repository of knowledge, and Scholar-trained doctors can provide some of the best medical care available in the setting ('best medical care in this setting' only means so much but it's pretty solid, relatively speaking). Only a chosen few Scholars ever get to commune with the Ur-Root, and most of the divine secrets revealed in the process are kept hidden (though they indirectly influence the politics and worldview of the entire order).

[mari-lair]

I keep imagining Teru got scars and that's why he always wears long sleeves and pants but I think it would be more fucked up if he is incapable of having scars because he heals up so unnaturally fast.

Imagine being stabbed and one month later there isn't a hint of damage cause your clan genetics is insane and your body was built to fight deadly monsters your whole life, so you can stay alive even if you get stabbed again and again without relevant resting breaks.

[stuck-in-the-ghost-zone]

choosing violence 10 + 16 + 22 !!!! >:333

ok u didnt specify a fandom but im just gonna do this for pd because its front and center in my mind !!!!!! oh boy i cant wait to be crucified for my opinions

10. worst part of fanon

this is a problem with every jrwi campaign and also like. most . other fandoms to be real. but it seems like my favorite characters are always the ones that get the worst of the mischaracterization beam -_- i cant tell you HOW MANY fics ive opened bc the premise sounds cool only to IMMEDIATELY close it due to "he would not fucking say that" this isnt pd but if i have to read one more fic that infantilizes gillion for not understanding Land Things im going to blow up. hes stupid sometimes yeah! but hes not ignorant and hes not a baby hes like. literally the oldest one on the crew even if its only by a year or two. head in hands

16. you can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

ok im gonna get burnt at the stake for this one but i personally dont really see the appeal of tfem ashe... like i see the appeal yeah of course i do i just dont get why people are so like... weirdly forceful and passive aggressive about it? also this is totally a personal thing no hate to anyone that does this but its kind of a peeve of mine when ppl write analysis posts ans use their headcanon pronouns like.... if u are going to talk about and analyze canon then talk about canon !!!! i cant tell u how many good ashe posts ive skipped over bc im like. we are talking about different characters here .. respect to ashe tfemers and everything but its not for me

22. your favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores

THERE IS A DISTURBING LACK OF CLARENCE ALBERT FAN CONTENT. WHY ARE PEOPLE NOT MORE INSNAE ABOUT CLARENCE ALBERT. HELLO???? am i the only person that feels this way . can anyone hear me its so fucking dark in here. every day i just want to read a fic about clarence albert and i am met with this

and neither of them are . interesting to me. hell on earth. bizly PLEASE give me more clarence lore in season 3 im fucking starving.

[lesbianralzarek]

sometimes the ships i hate arent even that bad, but just so far removed from canon that 90% of dogshit takes in the fandom are made by those shippers, so i develop a rage response to a ship thats just so whatever

[lunarharp]

lazy scribbling of my baldur's gate 3 characters

[beeapocalypse]

strikes the i can imagine anything pose. trans woman dallas

[lanternlightss]

god with this art im realizing this will be the first time i show my silly ghost bard design

[umbralundertaker]

first off, yeah the word soul is nebulous, and in my case I'm using soul in the sense of free will and personhood. little stuff like jack/slick being a pianist despite that not equating to much in the big picture. second, part of my idea has the prerequisite thought of how sburb isn't that obsessed with creating universes, nor is it malicious and a control freak. because if it was, not even the players (who are still made by the game) would have free will. itd be like a factory line; no errors.

Thats very true. To me, sburb is like an animal; it evolves over time in order to get better at what it does, but it is not conscious of what it does in any sense of the word. It is an evolving program whose purpose is to kill and make new universes, but it has no agenda deeper than that- neither kind nor unkind.

The players have free will because they are 'outside of' sburb and carapaces/consorts don't have free will because they are 'inside of' sburb. It's like... pardon the analogy, but it's like how an animal cant reproduce by itself, it doesnt have the sperm or egg needed to create something new. It can create clones of itself (carapaces/consorts), but it needs another animal to copulate with (that being players) for it to actually reproduce. Carapaces and consorts don't have souls because sburb cannot make them. Does that make sense? Sburb needs players.

[sodafrog13]

the more ppl i can rope into my identical twins swans/trans alex agenda the better

[sanchoyo]

one day . i will snap and write my entire tmm alien world worldbuilding ideas in one post. and then. u will all Know

[b-rainlet]

Helaegon can't ever truly be the codependent fuck ups I want them to be as long as Aemond exists, I can't elaborate further.

[lesboygamzee]

wgats yuor feelings on trans girl rose

extremely good i understand so bad

[witsserviceablesubstitute]

Tumblr is the queering the text website and queer interpretation of media is expected here (and honestly a nice reprieve from the hostile homophobia getting bolder in the mainstream). However, I've been seeing a common knee-jerk reaction circulating and wanted to offer a rebuttal:

The Crisis of Male Friendship

[stuck-in-the-ghost-zone]

HIII THABK U FOR THE TRIVIA AND ASHE SONG before i take forever 2 answer those or forget here is a blank ticket to please please talk about prime defenders and their AWFUL emotional literacy and processing skills i would literally love to read that essay so much ive also been thinking about it incessantly. big eyes staring up at u.png. ok ok peace out GOODNIGHT !!!! <33

i lied actually im not going to bed im judt thinking about this ans listening to St. John on a loop now. hello catkiss.gif i forgot how youve filled me with so much joy. that cat is so fuckign cute

anyway. hi :) prime defenders huh. this is gonna be less of an essay and more of a sleepy ramble but ohhh i have so many thoughts. they all process things so differently and none of them are good at it they all need therapy so bad. ms.g where is the hero therapy why didnt you build that into w.a.t.c.h ma'am

vyncent is probably the best at actually processing things out of all of them, he just internalizes everything to the point where he wont talk about it unless hes pushed past the breaking point. vyncent is actually very.. emotionally intelligent? i want to say mature but that feels like im singling him out because hes the oldest. i just feel like because he grew up on Fauna and had to be in basically survival mode in a world full of monsters trying to kill you.. that makes a person grow up quicker than they should. i think vyncent had a good childhood and for the most part his parents took good care of him but just.. living in that world doesnt seem like it leaves room for a whole lot of expressing emotions. vyncent is good at quick analysis of a situation, but unless a problem directly interferes with the current goal he doesnt externalize it to everyone else. but bottling up his feelings and emotions just builds up pressure over time until something like the lich makes him blow up and let it all out at once, usually in a dramatic monologue format bc condi is really good at those god damn it. also they played off the fact that vyncent said all of that to the lich and then missed his attack as a funny thing but i like to think of it as. he got too overwhelmed w his emotions and lashed out too soon it made his fighting messy. vyncent is so angry and honestly after what hes been through he deserves to be !!!!

william wisp. my boy. god hes just like me fr so much so that it physically hurts sometimes. anyway. i always think back to the scene where theyre all in the cabin talking about themselves/sharing backstories and william keeps desperately trying not to talk about himself. the fact that hes so ashamed of his powers he hides wisp form every time. two of his powers are LITERALLY a) turning invisible and b) turning intangible, usually as an excuse to leave whatever situation hes in ("accidentally" falling through the floor at opportune moments in season 1) . theres. a thing that happens at the end of episode 13/beginning of epidode 14 that youre really close to and i wont spoil yet but god it has to do with this so extremely much please come back to my inbox when you get there. youll know what it is trust me. um. yeah. so anyway. i think a lot of this comes from a place of. he doesnt want anyone to be scared of him. williams not stupid hes incredibly smart and insightful he knows his powers are objectively SCARY. hes scared of himself constantly, he doesnt want anyone else to feel that way about him, so he shifts focus whenever those aspects of himself are brought up because if someone were to think about it for any amount of time theyd realize the truth that hes scary and dangerous to be around (<< william logic. hey remember how one of the reasons he originally left deadwood was because the monsters there were attracted to the wisps and therefore Him so he left to keep his friends/family out of danger)

i think a lot about williams death and the immediate aftermath, i dont know how much you actually know and how much of this comes later but . how does he go home after waking up from that. his parents know about his powers, so they MUST know what happened. what do you think he told them when he god home muddy and dirty and broken and probably bloody after being missing for. god knows how long. how does he look his mother in the eyes and tell her her little boy is dead. but hes also not because hes standing right in front of her. how the fuck do you think he felt the first time he went into wisp form and saw his body laying there !!! of course he wouldnt want to talk about that!!!! youre gonna have to pry william wisps emotions from his cold dead hands !!!!!!!

dakota's response to the ashe situation was to run away in the woods and do nothing but train for 10 months. he didnt think about it for 10 months. i dont even have a whole lot to say about dakota other than like. stunned silence whenever his inability to process trauma is brought up because grizzly does such an incredible job at being like "you ask dakota how hes doing and his face is just blank" << paraphrased actual quote from an episode i cannot remember which one. either 11 or 12 ?

also because im thinking about him im including ashe in this. we didnt get to see a whole lot of his canon reactions to extreme emotional situations so a lot of this is just coming from My Mind but ashe seems like hed be the type to repress a lot of his emotions too. being alone in your house/in your room for extended periods of time will do that to a guy. i think he feels a lot of things and will probably very openly cry/scream/get angry when hes alone but as soon as he knows another person is there he can immediately flip the switch to turn it all off like nothing happened. very much a deadpan "im fine." if someone asks how hes doing, even if hes got like. the remainder of tear tracks down his face. cannot physically express his emotions in the presence of someone else