#the blacksmith speaks

[we-are-blacksmith]

I am not dead! Just severely exhausted. These past few years I've been crunching to grind out my prerequisite classes for my radiology program, and by the end of the year, after a rigorous entrance exam, I may well yet be admitted into the program! So while my posting might be severely delayed or spotty, I haven't forgotten this place.

[dragonstailbutch]

so i been thinking about going the way of the Dad™©® and starting a queer trans blacksmithing podcast. itd be about trades with a focus on queer history in them and blacksmithing/forging/metalworking ect.

id hopefully be able to do interviews and talk to other people in the crafting/d.i.y/art community, id want the podcast to be very beginner friendly and encouraging to join communities

any thoughts?

[hello-sweetheart]

Stardew Steddie

A Stardew valley inspired au where Steve, deep in corporate despair, impulsively quits his job to move into a plot of land he inherited from his aunt.

It’s rundown, the cabin on the property is drafty and tiny, he knows nothing about living off the land, but the weight of monotonous corporate life has been removed from his chest.

What feels like the first time in years, he breathes.

Eddie has grown up in the small town for most his life. He feels ‘othered’ as everyone else who has deep rooted connections with the town and community; he stays off to the side never feeling belonging, dreaming of moving to the city.

He plays in a small band that sometimes plays at Benny’s bar with a few friends, a couple from a town over. He lives in the basement of his Uncle’s home occasionally helping him manage his local woodworking business.

And on his free time, he likes hanging around the abandoned farm at the edge of town where it’s quiet, overran by the wildness, and no one can here him take his anger out on the world.

No one told informed him that someone had moved into the vacant land until he’s met faced to face with a peeved yuppie telling him that this is private property.

Who tf is this?

Eddie lives with Wayne, the town carpenter/handyman

Benny runs the Stardrop Saloon

The Ms. Henderson owns the ranch

Ted owns the local grocery store, Karen runs the recreation center (where the fitness club meets)

Chrissy is the teacher/tutor who is from the city as well but settled in Pelican Town to escape her abusive mother. She lives in the sea-side cottage

Jason lives with his grandparents, Evelyn and George, and is studying to be a physical therapist with an athlete’s scholarship

Max lives in a trailer by the river along with her mom who struggles with addiction

Joyce (as Jodi) is single mom who lives next to Nancy and Barb

Robin is an artist who lives in a cabin by the Henderson’s ranch

Hopper is veteran who was held in a Gotoro prison camp and has settled as the local fisherman learning to heal from his trauma.

Luca’s mom is the mayor and his dad is the librarian

Kali is the founder of the Adventurer’s guild, Nancy is a member

Brenner works for Joja corp.

There’s a strange structure hidden in Cindersap Forest and the locals claim that you can often see a glimse a young girl if you travel far enough off the the trail…

[eddiesghxst]

princess!reader and best friend!eddie whos the son of the local blacksmith. you’ve been friends since you were kids because his dad makes most of the armory for the kingdom and whatnot and eddie has always liked you a lot more than just a friend but you’re the princess and he’s just common folk

but he always makes you something pretty on your birthday, a beautiful bracelet or an elegant hairpin and he spends so much time on it, they’re always perfect.

you always sneak eddie in through the many secret tunnels of your castle and you stay up for hours with him, sitting by the fireplace and laughing at the stories he tells you with such animation.

and you’re both slowly but surely falling more in love with each other with each day.

eddie being hesitant when you ask him to be your first time because he doesn’t want to corrupt the princess. but you beg so pretty and eddie loves you and he only wants you to himself anyway

sneaking out to the city to visit eddie and going places with him you should never be seen. and when you do your monthly public appearance in the city you always make your carriage stop by his fathers shop, and you always leave a heavy tip, even if you get nothing. and whenever you walk over to talk to eddie whilst he works you try so hard to not be obvious about your affection towards eddie because your guards are there and word will spread if anyone catches you.

but atp you don’t think you care much, because you love eddie.

uGh and don’t get me started on the angst when you start getting suitors UGHHHH

[elflutter]

i love that you can just wear a bra in fields of mistria. because i will. i will make march look at me in my bra.

[scattered-winter]

nothing will ever get me like a depressed/suicidal character making a conscious decision to Live. or even just Fight for a chance to live. my bread and fucking butter for real

[ominous-feychild]

So one of the other Tapas writers rambled about armor in the medieval world in the Tapas discord server, and I figured I should share it with you all because it's some really good stuff!

So depending on the type of armor, how you'd process it for reuse varies pretty heavily. Mail, for instance, is fairly easy to resize for someone else because you can add or remove links fairly easily. Same goes for repairs. A good thrust can bust through even riveted mail, but the damaged links can be replaced easily enough. Well, I say fairly easily. It's a pain in the ass to work with. But it's still cheaper on the whole than plate armor, and it's far more likely that someone who isn't a member of the nobility can get their hands on it. Plate armor can range from a simple cuirass to a full set. A full set is usually bespoke to the person, so you probably wouldn't try to steal the whole thing. It would take ages to remove it from a corpse, and if they ended up dead whilst wearing it, the stuff probably isn't worth the effort to begin with. A chestplate or helmet that's been stoved in by a warhammer isn't exactly a candidate for the "it'll buff out" treatment. Then there's the fact that the previous owner's family might reasonably expect this expensive and time consuming investment of theirs to be returned with the freshly minted corpse. So, take the good bits that you can get off in a hurry, but stripping the whole set is ill advised. You expect a helmet to go missing, but if someone's taking the time to remove, say, the codpiece, there will be questions. Recycling any sort of armor into weapons is probably not the best of ideas. The steel you'd want to use for armor is different than the steel you'd want to use for swords. Swords, especially around Europe, North Africa, etc, were typically through hardened and made to be flexible. Armor needs to be more rigid, so it would go through a different heat treat process and would need different carbon content. Not that medieval smiths knew what carbon was, exactly, but they had their own ways of grading steel. It can be done, but there are a lot of things that can be done that you wouldn't necessarily want to. I can, if I was so inclined, go to the shooting range in a tactical maid outfit. That doesn't mean it's a good idea. Full plate would be the equivalent to rocking up to battle in an M1 Abrams. Cool as hell, but waaaay to expensive for the average man at arms. Just about everyone would have a helmet of some kind, and there were all kinds of variations on armor that were more affordable to peasants pressed into military service. Gambesons, as you mentioned, were surprisingly effective. They could be augmented in a lot of useful ways, too. If you want a really good reference for historical arms and armor, there's an anime called Maria the Virgin Witch that gets a lot of stuff right. Not only in terms of styles and types, but how it was used and how one might reasonably expect to fight against it.

This all was written by Rusty! He's a great writer and has a whole bunch of novels out if any of you guys want to check it out!

(You guys should totally reblog this to help those who could use this information to see this <3)

[mantisgodsdomain]

Having just read Border Stone, I am sincerely wondering what Team Snakemouth's reaction will be once Mothivia randomly shows up with Hollow.

We originally planned to illustrate this, but we didn't get around to it. This depends on whether or not they show up to potentially important briefings on other team's missions, because the first opportunity that they'll have to see The Hollow Knight is when Team Mothiva turns up to report on that mission, but after that they've got something of a 50/50 of encountering them being dragged around more or less as encountered in Hallownest or encountering them as Ominous Bodyguard Number 2.

As by the time they've returned to Bugaria, they've also achieved what they actually came there to do (assess the state of the fallen kingdom of Hallownest now that the plague has died down), they do have more things to present than just THK, but there's a solid chance that they'll just kind of... leave it to idle in the background, while talking about everything else. Watching. Waiting.

The original plan, of course, was to try and leave it in Hallownest. This, unfortunately, failed around the point when Zasp realized just how poorly it was holding together, along with the fact that they couldn't actually locate anyone with medical training for whatever Hollow was in the area (or anyone speaking a language they shared). Since Hollow was still following them around whenever guided, the plan became "bring it back to Bugaria, get it medical attention, shove it off on whoever we can manage to get it to stick with".

The final step of this plan failed. Mothiva, as someone with a very distinct public image to upkeep, was then stuck with the task of prettying it up enough to fit with the brand rather than risking backlash from either her fans or her managers from having some raggedy-looking maybe-beetle following her around, since her association with Zasp already sort of has her on thin ice with her brand.

There is a "trying to make it look less like it's in the process of actively dying" montage. It involves usage of power tools to clean up the crack on its shell well enough to seal and liberal amounts of beetle shell ointment, and THK is wholly uncertain how to feel about the whole thing. It doesn't do a whole lot for making it look less... horribly intimidating, but it's slightly more marketable in that it don't look like it's going to keel over and die at any second now.

The first reaction is generally going to be "by Venus's name, where the hell did you find that thing?!" regardless of first encounter, though. The industrial sander doesn't change that it's a ridiculously massive maybe-not-even-a-bug with a shell black enough to absorb all light and we don't think Mothiva will be doing an even remotely adequate amount of explanation on "what this thing is" or "how we found it".

[redpapercraness]

the fact that I’m gonna be away from my tablet this weekend and therefore possibly unable to finish the last sonic 3 trailer redraw I have and also the march wips I’ve been working on where he’s using proper blacksmith equipment is homophobic I think

[aceironwood]

She/they Blacksmith real?

[papakhan]

so whos the bad bitch who knocked up papa khan

okay ive had this in my inbox for AGES and I wanted to answer it seriously but I didn't have any art I liked but now I DO so........

This is Mǐn (full name Sūn Mǐn) and he IS the bad bitch who got that warlord pregnant. Though actually, this drawing isn't quite accurate because this is what he looks like in the 2280s but still.

Mǐn is a quick-witted but kind of reckless merchant who worked under the shadow of the NCR during the 2240s and traded goods between the Republic and what was formally known as "Free California" (land in California not controlled by the NCR which by 2281 no longer exists). He met the Khans after the NCR closed a checkpoint due to "raider activity" Mǐn got sick of waiting and broke through himself. He'd heard rumours that the Khan's new leader was willing to trade with caravans not affiliated with the NCR and intended to capitalise on that.

After a rough introduction (some of the Khans wanted to rob him anyway and gave him that scar on his chin) Mǐn got introduced to Papa and Regis (both of whom were enthusiastic about getting some real trade deals) and well. one thing led to another lol

Here's a rough design of one of his caravans,, subject to change.

Anyway Mǐn didn't find out he had a son in the Khans until 2 years later but after the initial shock wore off he found that he loves this kid very much and showers him with gifts and attention whenever he visits. Sūn actually lived with Mǐn for a few years when he was 13 after Papa got worried that being a Khan would put Sūn in danger. Sūn hated the caravan life though and returned to the Khans eventually, though he and Mǐn write letters to each other fairly regularly.

[dragonstailbutch]

hey, apparently people really liked the ask I answered about blacksmithing and also apparently didn't know I am a blacksmith!

Well howdy! I'm a blacksmith and currently trying to make/find a space so I can start making and selling things for people, everything from knives to canes to jewelry and sex safe equipment (cause my wife @dreamyintersexpuppy is a S.W and I know a bunch of S.W's would appreciate havubg more options)

I also have a blog @kingslayers-forge currently up that I haven't posted to in a while, which has links to Facebook and Instagram and the like for when I finally am able to start showcasing things

PLEASE FEEL FREE TO ASK ME STUFF, I LOVE TALKING ABOUT IT, OR IF IM STUMPED AT A QUESTION IT GIVES ME REASONS TO RESEARCH MORE and stuff

[wakaposting]

underappreciated waka thing is how Weird he gets about being told what to do/being taught manners... do you get me... much to think about

[an-oddlyfluffycarpet]

okay SO y'know how in the FIRST first season Nya gets kidnapped by garmadon and kai joins the ninja to save her? What if he didn't go with sensei Wu cause "who TF are you and what do you want with my sister-" and he trys fighting garmadon on his own, nearly getting killed before Nya unlocks her water powers (instead of kai unlocking his fire powers) and escapes on her own, joining the ninja instead of kai, who goes back to their blacksmith business and just continues doing that, but in this au he's a good fucking blacksmith bc he had to be, and also he practiced when nya was off doing cool ninja stuff.

then when Lloyd enters the picture kai also comes back into it, as he found Lloyd in the desert while he was looking for the serpentine, and kai was just on a walk when he find him. Lloyd passes out bc of the heat and Kai's like wtf and brings him back to the shop, sending a letter to Nya cause she mentioned some dumb kid with a cool hoodie causing trouble and Lloyd fits that description pretty well. So after Lloyd wakes up, he gets time to just be a kid cause canon refused to give him that- and when the ninja pop by, Kai's like "yeah kids in the back. He's just reading some of your old textbooks, sis. you guys can come pick em up, except for you wu, you son of a-" and they pick him up, he's the green ninja, blah blah blah, anyhoo!- at the point in the show where Nya unlocks her water powers, instead, it's kai unlocking his fire powers! (Obviously with some changes to the season as a whole for that- cause fire doesn't do shit against ghosts-)

Anyhoo, it pretty much goes like-

"hey guys I'm gonna go see my brother." "oo! Can we come?" "I guess??? I'm going by train though, since he hates it whenever I just fly in on my dragon." "I'm sure it'll be fine if we just drop in near town, nya. No need for a train." (It wasnt. They got scolded for making kai fuck up an important order with their landing.)

But later, Cole, jay, and Zane are 'training' (playing) in the yard in front of the forge, and Kai's working on some stuff, when Lloyd bursts in through the door, hoping to scare someone- kai's shocked, and jumps back, right into the open flame he was working with. He gets up and everyone's staring at him in shock. Kai's like "what?" And they're all like "HOW ARE YOU NOT DEAD-"

So someone runs and gets Nya, and they figure out Kai's the 'master of fire'. He's hesitant to join them at first, since he just found out he has powers and also has no ninja training whatsoever, but Nya finally convinces him, and he becomes part of the team. He already knows how to fight, and spends most of his time either in his cabin, or below deck in the makeshift forge he made. Just because he became a ninja doesn't mean he'd give up the family business!

And instead of Samurai X, there's some idiot in red running around with a sword ♡.

Anyways, y'know how earlier I mentioned how the season would be changed around a bit to fit this au? Yeah, heres most of the changes!!

Morro is still a dick, and he still possess Lloyd! Instead of kai fighting him, it's Nya, as her being Lloyd's big sis is more prominent. Water still is the only way to kill a ghost, but the preeminent is too big and too strong for even a tsunami to truly work. Nya passes out due to exhaustion and kai, who was technically there to deliver a set of armour to a customer, goes into protective big brother mode and sets the preeminent on fire- like, he sets the bits of Stix that she used as armour on fire since it's wooden, and manages to sink her via the pain of burning alive. Instead of the side focus on nya's training to become the water ninja, it's on Kai's struggles to seperate himself from work as a blacksmith, his feelings of never quite being enough compared to the other ninja, his fear of hurting people with his powers instead of helping them, and how he doesn't feel like he truly belongs, because of the bond the other ninja formed throughout the seasons. And unlike with Nya, Kai's not with them on their travels. He's in the blacksmith's shop. He doesn't get to see his little sis save the world, or risk her life day in and day out. He's not apart of their adventures until his fire powers are realized.

[elvain]

begging people to step back and look at how islamophobic the iron man movies really were LMAO

[apollos-boyfriend]

i haven't gotten to flex on this until now but LOOK HOW GOOD MY ROOMMATE IS AT BUILDING!!! he's so cool and awesome and swag :DDDDDDD