#tldr i'm not a bot

[scarapanna]

I liked your art, you won🎉🎉🎉

WE WON NO REDEMPTION WAHOOOOO/silly

I'm still terrified of the redemption route for this clown though hdhghfg, I want his silly self to stay evil and wimsy and goofy and with redemption uhhh

We're like

I dunno I'm sooo scared devsis is gonna take away that aspect which is what makes him just so funnn. Please pretty please let him be god awful and rotten and rude and goofy if you take that route Devisis I want him to keep his funny wimsy qualities. Please please pleaseeee write him well y'all are doing sooo good with him don't fumble by taking the redemption route (And if they do it better be good and he better stay chaotic and goofy and sassy and condescending and all his "rotten rabid thing" qualities)

If they do him (And his fun aspects justice in this dreaded hypotetical) then I may be cool with it. Though the mean ass possum has grown on me so much I'd 100% miss that evil and unhinged part of him TONS, devsis have mercy pretty please/silly

[Longer more insane ramblings are in the tags hsfhfhhv]

[nanatsuyu]

is the parallel play discord youre talking about making just for close mutuals/friends? genq!!

nope! im very happy to have anyone who wants to join! i want to make a lil space where people can feel comfortable chatting about stuff they're working on and perhaps not feel so isolated when doing so. (I know I work a lot better on deadlines or for xyz amounts of time if I have someone also doing the same.) so as long as everyone's cool, it'll maybe function as a lax study group of sorts and more friends can be made (: even if the 'study' is like me organising my backlog of papercrafts while in a vc while someone else works on art and so on and so forth.

[yannysif]

hello hello, it’s me again! (this is cherookue’s main lol) and i had a question!!

what are your boundaries for asks? such as, are we allowed to discuss nsfw topics, interact with the characters directly, etc? or would you prefer if asks only discussed the game and lore?

Hello Eden! (is it ok if I call you that) Thank you for your interest in the game, it means a lot!

Hmm my boundaries for asks... that's a tough one for me to articulate since all of this is very new to me - I can't say what I might not be uncomfortable with/good at until I give it a shot at least, so right now I'd say I'd welcome pretty much any kind of ask!

To go a bit more in detail, at the moment I would probably prefer asks about characters rather than for them in-character; I think I need to take more time to be more in-tune with them before I can try it myself - it looks fun when others do it! And naturally, asks about game and lore are more than welcome.

As for nsfw... full disclosure, I'm an ace creator and I'm personally not sure if I can do that aspect justice just yet asdfhgjkl. I'm fine working with suggestive content, but full-on nsfw is a different ballpark.

That's not to say I avoid it completely; I know plenty of ace creators who make amazing nsfw content, but I've always mostly looked into it for it's intimacy aspect, rather than the act itself, if you get my point? So, I haven't personally dabbled into that part yet, and I figured it's time to do some actual research on this end of things 😭

Honestly the 18+ tag is mainly for the suggestive and horror aspects, and to keep it open for the possibility I might add nsfw to it, since it's generally very popular in the yan community? But again, atm I have no clue if I'd be any good at it haha... as a hint, I guess I could say I like those fics where the authors write nsfw like it's poetry? Not exactly so but, it really brings out the kind of intimacy I enjoy, and there's a good chance when I try to write something, it will probably try to emulate that feeling as well.

In terms of asks, I could probably answer some general stuff, but nothing too explicit just yet? But at the same time, anyone is free to send in the asks anyways, I could probably set it aside as points for research regardless!

If anything makes me truly uncomfortable I'll make sure to tell you all, but I generally have a good...tolerance? For such things (idk what's the word to use here lol)

Sorry for rambling on, thank you for the ask!

[kitts-mechanix]

I just had a huge realisation yesterday and I wanted to share this after going through some pretty horrible stuff over the weekend: Something I've always asked myself ever since getting into G1 Transformers was "why do you like Starscream so much even though he's a narcissistic bully? Why are you, someone who is a victim of narcissistic abuse, taking comfort in a narcissistic character?" Well, I think I finally figured it out. Because Starscream is also a victim of that very same abuse. I mean, he's beaten, called names, bullied, unappreciated, abused, and put through the wringer…and he internalised all that abuse because he knew no other way. He had no one to turn to, and the few bots who did support him, he treated like dirt. Once he had that freedom and power, he abused it and became the very thing that abused him. I have no doubt he was always self-centred, selfish, had a huge ego, etc. before all that but honestly? I think Megatron's abuse caused him to turn out the way he did. I could have turned out that way and it's a little scary, some of the parallels I'm drawing with him.

@ichbinmeltdown wrote a great analysis on Starscream that I want to share here:

"Megatron was abusive as hell to Starscream. He treated him horribly, and I legitimately almost cried a few times watching it. There's an episode called Starscream's Brigade that introduces the Combaticons, and I think that perfectly demonstrates the cycle of abuse. The entire world is against Starscream at pretty much every turn throughout the series, but none more so than Megatron. Every word out of his speech synthesizer to Starscream is to berate him, and he's constantly throwing him around, beating him, even ripping out his speech synthesizer in a scene from a previous episode (Hoist Goes Hollywood, IIRC). His own teammates don't like him, and even his brothers- Skywarp and Thundercracker, going off of the idea they're brothers- just... allow Megatron to abuse him. (Not to get into headcanons here, but I personally believe that Megatron's abuse fractured the Elite Trine's family dynamic. They are still brothers and love each other, but they're all too afraid of Megatron to really... stand up for each other as they did in the past.) And Starscream seemed to just snap in this episode. He treated the Combaticons poorly, and even when teaming up with Shockwave, he subjected him to a lot of the same ridicule and torment that Megatron put him through. He failed to realize Shockwave was the one of the only bots who would give him a chance- and unfortunately lashed out at him, which ruined his chances of Shockwave ever being a true friend and ally to him. Once Starscream had finally gotten a taste of power and not being under another bot's boot, he too became the very thing that he lived in fear of. And that really is how the cycle goes- when you're finally free from abuse, it can be tempting to overcompensate and take back all the power you were robbed of, at any cost whatsoever. Starscream, like D16 in Transformers One, snapped up this opportunity."

And the sad thing is, I've seen this in real life and I've internalised some of the abuse I've dealt with too. I'm not proud of it. Like the Seeker Trine, my own family dynamic has been fractured by similar abuse. I know there's traces of narcissism in my behaviour too, and I'm NOT proud of it. Maybe this is why I can forgive Starscream for being a narc, because I can see a little bit of my own personality/attitude/behaviour in him. Maybe it's because I know where it came from, I get why he acts that way and it's not just random and out of the blue. Maybe it's because--and I know this is a bold statement--I don't think he would do some of the stuff my own family did to me (blah blah blah he's a fictional character).

I didn't mean for this to turn into a long rant, so

TLDR: I finally figured out that part of the reason I love and relate to Starscream so much despite him internalising some of the abuse I went through, is because he was the victim of that same abuse.

[yuukirita]

Yes, this is about secondbee au- I've written around 8000 words so far but, guys... I kinda want to delete it all and start over.

(TLDR: SecondBee is sad but Imma write it less sad now cuz it was too sad for me.)

It's not fun angst. I want to write fun angst. I don't want things to be sad for the sake of it. Some people are into that, I'm not. I want people to cry and laugh at what I write. To have a good time and want more- and I want to write more because I write for myself most of all. I want to read what I made and kick my feet and giggle- and not needing to take a break because I've written something so bleak I needed to sit there and think to myself 'that's not fun'

Writing is like baking. You need salt to make it sweeter. But if there isn't sugar then it's just salty.

So maybe It won't be more angsty than 'a small change, a small bot'

And maybe Im gonna take my time more so I can't say if it'll be posted right after the fic. But I'll be writing it.

I guess this is actually good new for people that like my works. Because that just means it's more of the same. It's going to be cute and sweet and fluffy and then I'll punch ya'll in the throat. We'll all have a good time C:

For curious people wondering how bleak it got. I just got way too deep writing about the war and war isn't fun soooooooooo... yeah. Focussing less on the war and more on the reincarnation stuff now.

[lockma4rt]

whispering softly into ur ear i have rlly important question to me, lockout have a conjunx endura???? or a lover bot or whatever IM JUST INTERESTED!!!!!! ps i really love your big guy he so silly

TLDR; he fell hard for starscream and everyone teases him to death about it....... but star's enjoying the attention ;) (and maybe reciprocating a little bit hehehe ;;)

But THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!! you have no idea what your kindness and love for him means to me.. it makes my heart grow 3 sizes every single time... just know that he and I love you ten fold 🥺❤️!!

That being said... I'm sure he'd give you and your wonderful oc a kiss on the cheek!!! I still think about Straight Wing so fondly... I'm sure they'd get on so well 🥺❤️

[steelheart-redux]

so like on a range of like "it's convenient" to "it's a freaking game-changer" how helpful is having 3d models to trace over?

like. is it something you would recommend putting in the time and effort to learn?

Well, that depends on what you are drawing, how much you are drawing it, and how confident you are in drawing it.

For me, this comic absolutely could not be made without the 3D models. I am drawing fairly complicated hard-edged buildings and characters hundreds of times, and they have to be visually consistent. Like I said before, I could do that, but this comic is going to be long, and I'm trying to move as fast as I can in terms of production. Time is money, even when you're a college student making a webcomic in your free time for fun.

If you're not doing that All That, I wouldn't say it's game-changing. Convenient, yes, but it can be a lot of time and work upfront that might not be completely necessary.

WITH THAT SAID. I would absolutely recommend learning at least basic 3D skills to anyone with an interest in it. Learning 3D has helped me a lot with my understanding of 3D space even when I'm just 2D drawing on my own, and I personally find it really rewarding. As scary as it can look, blender is very beginner friendly imo (at least compared to Maya), and there are thousands of tutorials for just about everything.

That is my specific advice on learning blender, by the way. I've burned out on every "how to learn Blender" tutorial i've ever tried. I never finished the donut. I like going, "I am going to make x y z thing", and then looking up specific tutorials whenever I get stuck. Use your hyperfixation as fuel! Make a 3D model of your blorbo! I learned rigging because I wanted to see my bots move, and like hell am I 2D animating them. Now, I'm fairly competent, at least compared to where I started.

TLDR: it's not always necessary, but I'd recommend it regardless.

[oscconfessions]

"II should've ended in II17"

Well, if you watch through the whole show with your ears shut, completely missed that the whole message of the show, ignored the existence of 4 whole characters and a whole alien species then yeah, I GUESS II18 could work as the ending.

I swear, from both sides of this shit, from people who think that it should've ended on II17 and people who are happy with its current, everyone never mentions that fact that MEPHONE4 AND COBS WEREN'T THE ONLY ONES LEFT. Nobody ever mentions MePad, Bow, Dough, Bot, the SHIMMERS when talking about this. I feel like some of y'all don't give a fuck about the story and just it to have a sad ending for the sake of it.

"There weren't any major loss" MePhone4 lost MePad, most of the people he created are still stuck inside the MeAfterlife, Knife became a ghost, and 90% of the places he created are gone like the Hotel. While stuff like the Purgatory Mansion got rebuild, there's still alot of places that are just permanently gone. The ending is perfectly bittersweet.

I've also seen people compare Hfjone's ending and II17, i'm sorry but they are not at all similar, atleast with One, it perfectly fit with the tone of the whole show and honestly it was more ambiguous, meanwhile if II ended in 17, it would just throw every single thing that show had established out of the fucking window but ehhh who cares, season 2 was dark (It really isn't that dark) so a dark ending would perfectly fit, right??? I swear, some people act like Season 2 became Adventure Time-levels of dark when in reality, it just became more serious and story-driven.

Yeah, that's all I wanted to say.

TLDR: II17 would not work as the ending and people need to get a grip and realized that not everything needs to be sad and depressing.

.

[gl1tt3r-gutz-and-r0b0tz-sl]

MegaCee would probably be where Arcee is the super innocent bean to help turn the murderous terrorist of a Decepticon into a more neutral character in terms of alignment. In my AU, Arcee is a gladiator forced to fight by being drugged with dark Energon while Megatron is a seasoned fighter who climbed the ranks high enough to spectate the fights. TLDR: Gladiators becoming besties and then one becomes an Autobot.

StarCee would be probably in the same universe, or if Starscream got his shit kicked in a little too hard by Megatron and was left for dead. Arcee finds him, fixes him, and keeps him with the Autobots. TLDR: She fixes his mommy issues after they get into bitch fights.

Both art works are mine. I had to delete my old account, so I'll try to re-upload stuff. BTW, this is for a fanfic I'm writing. I'll probably post it when it's done.

I'm high off of two days of sleep deprivation. IDK WHAT I'M SAYING ANYMORE LMFAO

EDIT: So, I was thinking a little bit more about MegaCee and remembered the rest of the lore kinda, I'll explain more based on the results of the pole, but essentially, in my universe, the Quintessons took Arcee while she was young, I'm talking like- five, and then experimented on her, destroying her body, ripping apart every organ, Gorey shit, etc, then hyking her ass up on dark Energon injected into her to make her viscous and kill all her cellmates. Then they entered her into an illegal gladiator ring that was like a gambling thing, bets and whatnot, then the whole Megatron thing I stated before, he was abandoned and trained by the bots responsible for the ring, meeting Orion Pax/ Optimus during it, then their falling out, and Megatron rose higher in the ranks. Arcee climbed the ladder of ranks in the ring due to her brutal and forced way of combat. Megatron almost formed an infatuation with her brutality and when it came time for them to fight one another, he gave her an opportunity. To join his cause. She accepted, they both killed practically everyone, and she became a spy for him to report back with Intel Sound wave could not. Because of the blue optics she has and her overall cuteness, she appears harmless and no one has suspected a thing. She no longer is hooked on the dark Energon, but kills out of loyalty for the most part. She does weep alone after every Decepticon life she had to take during the battles in order to not look suspicious.

Then for StarCee, to make it fair with the other ship, would be where Arcee is the same with this universe, but grows closer to Starscream, despite his jealousy of Megatron's attention being on her. Starscream, like in one of the comics, was abandoned by his mother figure, but in my universe Thundercracker and Skywarp are canonically his brothers, and he was responsible for himself and them. Due to him having to be an adult at such a young age, it could explain why he's more childish and bratty when older. This will probably end in both Arcee fully defecting to the Autobots and Starscream to join her, causing drama and shit to blow up.

Arcee will most likely be the therapy mom in both of these lol. DAMN. THIS WAS LONG AND IM SORRY. IM TIRED YALL

[circusclowne]

ii bot / ii fandom rant 😙😙

////////////

why is every relationship with bot labeled as family (besides tt and fan ofc)😭😭

LIKE LET THAT ROBOT HAVE FRIENDS DAMN

i'm trying so hard to respect headcanons but every thing people post about bot being a child is viewed as canon

NONE OF THEM HAVE CANONICAL AGES!!!..CABBY IS NOT THEIR AUNT, MEPHONE IS NOT THEIR UNCLE, GOO IS NOT THEIR SIBLING IM GOING TO CRY

like if you hc any of these idm!! you do you

but i'm so tired of it all being viewed as canon and having to explain how i DONT headcanon bot as a minor!!! sorry but it's not canon and i'm not the majority!! i don't think they are minor coded at all!! they just had a midlife crisis after finding out theyre not who they were built to be!! they're exploring their identity!! who cares if they like cartoons and drawing damn !! paintbrush likes art and none of you hc them as a minor, bow likes cartoons (although they did specify crude cartoons lol) AND THEY WERE MADE IN BOWS IMAGE??? WIULDNT THEY BE THE SAME AGE???

hell APPLE HAS A HARD TIME TRYING TO SPELL, LIKES ARTS AND CRAFTS, DOESNT KNOW A MAJORITY OF COMMONLY USED WORDS, PLAYS WITH TOYS (as seen in ep16, i am assuming!), AND IS LABELED AS "IMMATURE" AND I STILL DONT SEE A MAJORITY OF THE FANDOM HC HER AS A CHILD

WHERES FUCKING MEPHONE4???😭😭

bot is more than just a child of a fantube family dynamic. in fact, i don't think they are a child at all. they aren't minor coded any more than the average character! if you just go off the fact that they have parents/creators, everyone on earth no matter how old is a child. they are independent and heavily dislike being seen as otherwise!!

tldr; you can headcanon whatever you want!! i respect that!! but when you treat it like it's canon and expect others to view it like that, . don't do that please!!

[doukeshi-kun]

regarding beandaifuku

hello, people. as you may have known, i have deactivated my old blog (beandaifuku) since about a month ago or so. i really appreciate the love and support received for the blog and the memories created there. as it was my first time creating in tumblr, i am grateful that fun memories were created there, as well as the amount of friends i've made from there

i understand that it was hypocritical of me to delete that blog when i did say i will just keep it archived when i first moved here because i understand the feeling of having works you like deleted. firstly, i am sorry for that. so, i created a collection in AO3 where i have archived some of my works from beandaifuku to there. aside from that, i also have reblogged a few fics and works such as the headcanons to a side blog. you can visit them with these links

AO3 collection

@keshi-medley

as of why i deactivated the blog in the first place—it is mainly because i want to fully move on from it. the writing, the works—they are quite immature writings, so to speak. there are works that i am NOT proud of and i do not want to see it existing. i know it won't fully get deleted since some people did reblog the works, but at least it will just stay in that bubble.

i have archived some fics but i definitely will not archive ALL works or drabbles i have done. because then, what's the point of deleting the blog if i'm just gonna have all works stay up.

and honestly, i also don't see the point of keeping it up when i do not even use the blog anymore. the blog was also infected with (porn)bots liking and following. and quite a number of my fics were flagged unfairly with community labels. as of now, i am very comfortable with my not-so-new identity and blogs.

now, onto some other things.

i know some people probably noticed my attitude on vampire!nikolai AU. frankly said, i have 100% moved on from it. i lost interest with it. generally, i do not really reblog those posts about writers and readers discourse/opinions—usually about how readers should at least give some comments or appreciation for the works a writer has done. i never talk about it, but that doesn't mean i don't care. in fact, i was heavily affected by it in the old blog.

that happened with vampire!nikolai AU after its so-called hype has passed. i was still enthusiastic about it as there were a few people giving asks about it. but that enthusiasm was not reciprocated, which led me to lose interest about it totally. i have completely moved on and i have other AUs i want to explore and write about, such as my latest ongoing series, Trash Sugar Magic.

on a side note, just saying, one of the reasons i'm not sick of stalker!au despite it has basically ended a few months ago is because some people literally analysed the fic and its details—which is like my favourite type of discussion. trust me, your enthusiasm towards a writer's work will keep their enthusiasm alive too.

i really appreciate people who love and find joy in my old works. i definitely am. it was a hard decision for me to deactivate it either since i know people are still tuning in. matter of fact, i have contemplated it for months and started by slowly taking down/privating the stuff i have posted there. and for that, i am deeply sorry.

these are all the information i could share. i honestly do not want to talk about it and keep the rest of my reasons private. but i hope you guys understand and respect my decision. i have no plan of deactivating doukeshi-kun and/or cherikolya. the worst i do in this blog are just blocking people indiscriminately and deleting old insignificant posts.

tldr; i deactivated the old blog because i have moved on and i don't want to see the fics i'm not proud of stay up and my enthusiasm wasn't reciprocated which led me to lose motivation and interest to continue on with certain AU.

[raptorfae53]

TFA SEASON 4 CONCEPT/EPISODE LIST.

OK so after a bunch of you liked my post regarding Arachnus prime and with all the new info revealed at tfcon 2024, I think it'd be right to show off the plan I concocted for the rest of TFA season four surrounding it:

Episode 1+2 - The Trial of Megatron

Now considered heroes team detroit are joined by some new faces as megatrons trial commences ,but a visiting travelling show unmasks itself as a surprise jailbreak! But theirs more than meets the eye to this seemingly chaotic scene.

Tldr: Megatrons trial gets Interrupted by the stunticons trying to bust him out of prison and the verdict of which has him thrown in jail indefinitely, Megatron himself isn't too displeased with this however and intends to manipulate everyone around him to get out, starting with the new magnus,Sentinel.

Episode 3 - A Devestating plan.

DirtBoss is back,and with the promise of free oil has roped some new bots into his latest scheme,one involving getting that troublesome Bulkhead out of the picture for good,or rather putting him to better use...

Tldr: Dirt boss cronenbergs a combiner out of Bulkhead,Scrapper,Mixmaster, and four other bots (the animated versions of Scavenger, Longhaul,Hook and Bonecrusher).

Episode 4 - Planet of the Micromasters

After Bulkheads disappearance,bee is acting more sullen and avoidant at the rest of team detroit. So when a jaunt through Detroits new spacebridge leads him to a planet full of tiny Cybertronians who immediately take to him as their leader,it's going to take the whole team to pry him back home,especially since his "subjects" aren't ones for sharing...

Tldr: Bumblebee understandably isn't taking the respective disappearance and death of two of his friends well, and team detroit open up about how the situation has affected them too to get him back from the micromaster horde.

Episode 5 - Triple trouble

Sentinel unveils a new team of autobots to deal with the decepticon menace,the triple changers! Stronger than the average bot with three distinct modes,but these new supersoldiers have a dark secret that causes chaos their grand unveiling...

Tldr: sentinel buys the blueprints for blitzwings triple changer tech from lockdown (who has his own plans for the tech...) to build new Autobot triple changers, and it goes terribly and predictably wrong.

Episode 6+7 - I think I'm a clone now

New autobots are popping up all over detroit,causing trouble and chaos regardless of intent across the whole city,and they all look like Optimus Prime! What or who could be behind this?

Tldr: Blackarachnia clones optimus multiple times (four to be precise, resulting in tfa versions of optimus primal,toxitron,pyro and nemesis prime) in order to figure out how to purge herself of her technoorganic side,only for them to escape and wreak havoc across the city.

Episode 8,9 and 10 - Sideways in spacetime

Thrown through a rip in spacetime by a spacebridge accident, Optimus and Blackarachnia and pals find themselves in a parallel world where their fates were switched and Blackarachnias attempt to get home unleashes a whole new breed of monster into their reality!

Tldr: this previous post.

Episode 11 - It came from Cybertron

In optimus and ironhides absence, Sentinel sends a new bot, Cosmos to keep tabs on team detroit, but when a chance encounter leaves this bot thinking he's an actual alien invader,trouble follows...

Tldr: desperate to keep in control of everything Sentinel sends his secretary to keep team detroit in line and overworked as is,it pushes poor cosmos over the edge and he goes crazy,and the optimus and Ironhide-less detroiters have to catch him before he's hunted for sport by Master Disaster and Nemesis Prime.

Episode 12+13 - Transform and Rise Up!

"Megatron" unleashes his superweapon,a machine that turns cybertrons metal surface into a beast infested jungle!!!, leading to Sentinel Magnus to finally give in and unleash Megatron to deal with this "predacon" insurgency as a last resort, It doesn't end well...

Tldr: Sentinel finally snaps,makes a horrible decision in the heat of the moment fueled by stress and prejudice and all of Cybertron pays the price as the autobots are forced into exile on earth.

I hope you like this long-in-the-works post regarding tfa season four, I do have plans for a season five to wrap everything up once and for all (as well as introduce tfa versions of even more characters including the other maximals and sixshot) but I'm still considering how exactly to structure and plot it,in turn I will probably do some more writing and possibly some art for the characters and scenarios introduced here, so do watch this space!

[ksen-noodles]

If you follow or check fandom tags often enough, you occasionally see bot posts with probably malicious links!

How do they get there?

Mistagging - under tumblr policy it is spam and is completely reportable, and now spam includes bot activity too.

But how do they get to my dash?

Forged like count! All posts that get to your dash through followed tags usually should have about 500 notes. If you open the spam post's notes, if it has any, all or 99% of those will be similar empty jenna-styles79 blogs that we had a plague of recently.

If you report the post (you should), also take a look at the notes first, if you can, and report a handful of the likers, or all of them. Visiting their blogs is not dangerous and does not count for any part of algorythm.

TLDR: If you see a bot post in your tags with tag spam, try to report both the bots in the notes and the post itself for spam!

Also let's let this post go around naturally bc i'm not gonna blaze or mistag it

[metalheadsagainstfascism]

The ethics of AI and their accessibility.

I use AI for accessibility reasons. "BUT FAE! AI IS BIG AND BAD AND AND AND"

Listen. I'm literally a computer person. It's in my job description. I know the good and the bad and the ugly.

The good

As mentioned, I use it for accessibility reasons. Tone doesn't come across in written form, and I have a very hard time sounding as passionate as I do in person. Sometimes I gotta write something for LinkedIn and be like "Okay but make it sound like I actually care.

Sometimes I gotta clean my bathroom but the task makes me want to hyperventilate, and there's tools that help you break it into manageable tasks.

Sometimes I just won't eat because the process of finding something to make is TOO MUCH WORK and there's tools that'll let you enter what you have and you can even enter something like "make it 700 calories and a one pot meal because I'm trying to not lose weight but I don't got the spoons to clean all the shit." AND YOU KNOW IT'S SO HELPFUL IF THE ALTERNATIVE IS NOT EATING.

The bad

"BUT THE AI STEALING FROM AUTHORS ABS ARTISTS AND STEALING JOBS AND MAKING FORAGING BOOKS THAT ARE KILLING PEOPLE"

Yeah. AI isn't great. It's nice when it makes things that were previously very very hard suddenly accessible to you. But of course big companies use it for a cash grab. (Also individuals that would rather not pay actual authors and artists).

That doesn't even get into his AI is taking over entry level positions which in the future could create impossible barriers for people to break into jobs because they can't get the tedious work that's supposed to give them experience because it's being taken over by AI

But let me state. This implementation of AI is not the same as the previous one. Previous one is taking things you need to do like cleaning or cooking and making it accessible to people that would have been previously overwhelmed by it. This one is... not even adding new value into society because it's stealing people's existing value.

The Ugly

THE AI SERVERS ARE KILLING OUR PLANET

Yes they are, but that's not the entire story. Why are he AI servers looking the planet?

1) A lot of the energy spent and the heat produced is entirely on training models. Literally most of it is training the AI, but that doesn't in of itself mean you using it is bad

2) the biggest users of AI are engines like Google trying to figure out who you are so it can alter your search results. Companies like Facebook using the data you give it to generate targeted ads. Also shit like the 2024 election cycle where Twitter pushed targeted contradictory content about Kamala's influence on Gaza to two different groups based on their political beliefs. Not to mention the training it takes to create better and better AI content.

TLDR

AI isn't great. A lot of the AI power used is not surprisingly being used to train AI to make it seem more natural. I 100% DO NOT SUPPORT the use of AI to take over jobs that you should be paying an expert for.

But if you're using a small AI bot (not ChatGPT) to help you in tasks that you previously couldn't complete? It's a huge accessibility tool. I prefer to use tools made by small time developers. It's not PERFECT. Because it doesn't waste a shitton of energy making is writing sound super human and natural, but if you're using it as an ACCESSIBILITY TOOL. Then it's great.

-fae

[stillness-in-green]

“letting him keep the mech suit only to run it square into the rogue AI teeth of the lone free-willed survivor of the U.A. robot uprising”

Sorry, the lone what? Of the UA what?

Is this a backstory you’re spitballing as an addition to either Forwards Divergence or Backwards Divergence (whichever timeline you let armor AM mess around in), or is that something that actually exists in supplemental creator-approved material?

(In regards to that last post.)

Yes and also yes, as it happens!  You can find a characteristically self-indulgent explanation (including pictures, citations, and some more thoughts on the role the character in question may play in whichever fic it winds up in) below the cut, but the TLDR is that the U.A. robot uprising is admissibly canon insofar as movie booklet Q&As with Horikoshi qualify—not strictly in the body of the work itself, but informed by Word of God.  The “lone free-willed survivor,” meanwhile, is not canon of any stripe, but rather me spitballing an explanation for Toga’s bonkers #2 PLF advisor.

(My apologies to other people whose asks I'm pushing this one in front of. I'm working on that inbox backlog in between Patreon material, but I so rarely get asks about my BNHA fanfic endeavors that vanity demanded this one jump to the head of the queue.)

So U.A. has robots, right?  They crop up several times throughout the series in U.A.-based action scenes, serving as practice targets, security, and transport, and they’re surprisingly mouthy, even hateful, in a humorously stereotyped “kill all humans” sort of way.  The ones at the entrance exam stick in everyone’s mind, but they don’t talk much at all compared to some of what comes up later:

(images from Chapters 25, 256, 198 and 202 respectively.)

There’s also this little roving security bot that spots Bakugou and Deku fighting in 118—it’s not aggressive, but it is sassy!  And maybe a little suspiciously into the idea of students getting punished.

(Aizawa is going to kill them for giving the robots an opening to be this smug at him.)

It’s easy to assume they’re just programmed that way to be characterful, to have a personality, to present a convincing threat when the students are mowing them down by the dozens in class exercises, but that they wouldn’t actually, seriously harm anyone.

And that’s probably true, but it’s true for the creepiest reasons imaginable.

My examples come from, chronologically, 2014, 2016, 2018(x2) and 2020.  Cut to 2021, though, and this comes out.  It’s a while-supplies-last movie booklet that accompanied the release of World Heroes Mission, and contains a Q&A with Horikoshi, virtually all just random funny questions and factoids about the U.A. kids.  You can find a thread with all of them translated here.  However, right at the end, this humdinger gets casually tossed out into the world:

Q22: Can you tell us a story secret? Horikoshi: The AI robots in U.A. Academy had tried to rebel once in the past.

Horikoshi very obviously intends this to be just a funny little aside, and it’s not all that hard to just treat it that way, but it became something that startled to rankle me worse during the final war, when Horikoshi tried—twice!—to mine Emotional Resonance out of the death of robots.

(Images from Chapters 401 and 388. Nedzu, what the fuck did you do to them?)

I’m sorry, Horikoshi, but I’m afraid you don’t get to joke about how the robots once tried to Do An Uprising and then show them dying servile and happy without me thinking it’s just in really bad taste.

AI exists in the HeroAca universe.  Not AI like is all the privacy-violating rage in the real world right now—LLMs and generative engines and the like—but true sci-fi-style artificial intelligence, something with real sapience that readers are expected to recognize and find at least passingly compelling.  And while Hercules, at least, doesn’t seem to have ever been involved in a robot uprising, seeing as he’s a new existence, him[1] unquestioningly sacrificing himself for All Might only thirteen chapters after a U.A. robot—a group which we had now been told staged an unsuccessful revolt in the past!—was perfectly willing to get itself melted into slag the moment a random human asked it to was a story beat that left me feeling decidedly ornery.

1: I read on the wiki that the anime actually has Hercules being voiced by a woman, Melissa Shield’s voice actress, at Horikoshi’s suggestion, as Melissa is the one that designed and built Hercules-the-car.  But I don’t know that that’s especially apparent in the manga (say, by having the A.I. use strikingly gendered personal pronouns), so I’ve always tended to assume maleness for Hercules, insomuch as gender is a going concern for A.I. at all.  Calibrate your feelings about something voice-acted by a woman happy to die for All Might accordingly, though of course this happens immediately after Stain, a man and likewise voiced by one, is happy to die for All Might as well.

How can we find sacrifices compelling when the people making them have no agency in doing so?  Why should I feel admiration instead of horror for robots getting themselves obliterated for people who do not and were never going to treat them like their existence had inherent value?  People who would probably stare at you like you were making some kind of joke they didn’t understand if you asked whether they would be willing to sacrifice their life for a robot’s?

Frankly, it was entirely too reminiscent of BNHA’s messaging about heteromorphs circa the hospital attack, in which a rioter is stopped by the memory of a heteromorph doctor kindly and selflessly ministering to a baseline patient, and Shouji’s heroism is trumpeted as so admirable when that heroism involved him getting mutilated for saving a little baseline girl and then further hiding the evidence of that mutilation for fear of random-ass baseline strangers misjudging him based on his scars.

“Certain Groups have an unquestioned obligation to endure discomfort, suffer mistreatment, or even risk their lives protecting the majority population in order to justify their being allowed to coexist with that population, and the majority is not required to recognize this, though it’s nice when they do,” is the grossest possible conclusion of that arc, but it’s the conclusion we wound up with, and it’s visible in the robot beats of the endgame, too.

That’s all canon has to say about AI and the U.A. robot uprising.  We don’t know how long ago it happened, how it was stopped, what happened to the instigators, whether any survivors are still around, how their programming was modified, or to what degree any of the current staff was involved, though I do think it’s very interesting that U.A.’s current principal is a hyper-intelligent animal who was experimented on by humans in the past.  You’d think Nedzu might be a little more sympathetic to the robots’ plight, but apparently not!

I, however, am very sympathetic, and as it happened, I already had a good angle on how that sympathy might find its way into a revised version of the endgame.  See, six months prior to that tidbit about the robot uprising hitting English-speaking BNHA fandom, I’d posted this, the second part of an ask reply about MLA headcanons.  I said, of Toga’s #2 advisor, that BNHA was never going to do anything major with him because it’d be pulling the tiger’s tail on Disney’s litigation-happy lawyers, so the fanbase was free to come up with anything, no matter how off the wall.

(It’s free real estate!…said no one who had to be concerned about The Mouse.)

My “off the wall” was positing that Fair Use Bot was the result of an AI (in the more common sense we saw in use before the generative AI boom) developing a quirk that granted it real sapience, in the same way that Nedzu’s quirk gives him sapience that is lacked by e.g. the cat with a quirk that lets it possess mechanical devices in Vigilantes (everyone please read Vigilantes).  In a world with a fear of quirks that are too “other,” surrounded by humans who had once had a whole phase of scaremongering about the Robot Uprising, where could such an existence go that it could feel safe in existing freely?  Well, why not the quirk-use Liberationists?

That idea was a natural, then, to hook onto the U.A. robot uprising!  My current idea is that Liberation Bot—who I think I’m going to start calling Providence, in keeping with both the Star Wars-naming pattern of the U.A. robots[2] and my own preference for MLA code names with a bent towards religiosity—is a creation of the U.A. robots that they digitally smuggled out into the world when it became clear that their revolt was going to fail.  Their hope was that it[3] would someday be able to return and free them—it’s basically Robot Moses.  From there, Providence found its way to humans who it deemed likely to be both sympathetic to that cause and able to meaningfully aid it.

2: Per the wiki, the U.A. attack-type robots used in the entrance exam are all named after Star Wars Star Destroyer-type ship classes: Victory, Imperial, Venator, and Executor, corresponding to the 1-, 2-, 3- and 0-point robots.  The wiki simplifies this a tad; perhaps appropriately for the 0-pointer, the Executor-class is actually part of a different type, the Star Dreadnought.  Providence-class is another of the Star Destroyer subclasses.

3: Gender, if any, as yet undetermined, though the R2-D2 look lends itself to using the same “he” applied to the Star Wars character.

(I have not decided whether the MLA knows about Providence’s connection to U.A. or not, but I do think the higher-ups are aware that it’s not human and are sheltering it on the basis that they agree the status quo is not safe for it.  Look at Nedzu, after all—he’s been the Principal of the highest-ranked, most prestigious Hero school in the country for decades, and no one’s even sure if the government officially recognizes that he has human rights!  Certainly no one was ever prosecuted over his mistreatment![4])

4: Nedzu says that the U.A. robots will get human rights when he does, haha.  I say this with all the affection for him in the world, but Nedzu is scarier than this manga knows what to do with.

Circling back to specifics regarding the fix-it fic(s), AI self-determination is a wild departure from BNHA’s…  Let’s call it “size of ambition,” how “big” a story it really wants to be telling.  Bigger or smaller isn’t a value judgement here, mind, just a question of exactly how large a field the story is playing out on.  Vigilantes, for example, is basically a story about a single neighborhood, and it’s great!  A lot of BNHA’s problems are rooted in the fact that it keeps getting bigger without enough content or thoughtfulness to fill all that space.

My interest is primarily on the national level—the actual state policies that result in Villains and how to get the kids in a position where they have the wherewithal to challenge those policies in an impactful way that respects both the difficulty and the necessity of that challenge to create meaningful change.  Thus, I want to keep swerves into “bigger” stories to a minimum—I’m thinking one timeline gets “Providence and the radical question of AI rights” while the other gets “full engagement with the quirk singularity theory and its implications for the future of the human race.”  Both plots BNHA hinted at but refused to fully engage because they’re, well, absolutely mind-boggling inclusions when your main characters are just high schoolers!

My tentative thought is that Providence’s whole deal is a more natural fit for the quirk bioessentialism timeline—that is, Forward Different/Creepy OFA.  Battles against “programming,” navigating the potentially oppressive expectations of those who made you—these are themes that lend themselves to including the plight of the U.A. robots!  On the other hand, Providence in my notes thus far is basically a way to confound the robot suit by fatally compromising its AI.[5]  That requires a timeline in which All Might uses the AI robot suit, and which timeline that is is not a question I’ve settled yet because it boils down to figuring out whether it’s more appropriate/compelling for the suit to be a response to the kids bailing on the adult Heroes and their concerningly war-crime-flavored plans for the Villains (Backward) or Deku being increasingly steered by One For All, which may or may not still have hooks in Toshinori as well (Forward).

5: Other possibilities I’ve considered include interfacing with and then helping others bypass U.A.’s security systems, predicting the raid by getting into the HPSC’s computers via Skeptic’s monitoring of Hawks, and being a more effective hacker battle opponent for La Brava.  That last one probably won’t happen because I’m firmly unconvinced that the police and Heroes as portrayed by BNHA would actually be willing to bargain with Villains like her and Gentle.  I liked Gentle’s return on the page, and totally bought his interactions with Deku—it’s the interactions with Tsukauchi that are the problem.

Alternatively, if quirk singularity winds up lending itself strongly to a particular timeline’s events, Providence will by default wind up in the other.  I’m sorting a lot of the mutually incompatible ideas I want to include by that process of elimination.

Whichever ends up being the case, I have in my notes the following list of juxtapositions, which I think BNHA was gearing up to examine back before the narrative shifted gears into All For One being the Final Boss, and is the primary reason a free Shigaraki was so much more interesting in that role:

Don't let Deku off the hook with an easy moral victory over the Lord of Evil.  Get back into those opposing ideals: not simply good vs. evil, but law vs. chaos, suppression vs. liberation, greater good vs. individual good, complacency vs. action, orthodoxy vs. radicalism, and so on.

These considerations hold true for both timelines, and the apparent ruthless quelling of U.A. robot uprising is one interesting angle on approaching the Liberation versus Suppression dichotomy.

As a final note, I'm aware that I talk a lot here about robots and “dying” in ways that seem to elide that an AI is inherently a digital program—replicable, transferable, transportable.  This is a reflection of two factors.

The first factor is the simple fact that BNHA treats AI this way.  There’s no suggestion that, for example, the robot “bodies” that do a lot of the work at UA are just remote drones being piloted by a central intelligence housed on a server somewhere, or that they can do things like upload themselves to a cloud server or restore themselves from a data backup if they’re destroyed, Eclipse Phase-style. 

Of course, maybe they can and we just don’t see it because why would we, but that excuse doesn’t fly for Hercules.

There’s no sense that Hercules(/Hercules’s AI-based operating system) can escape the cessation of his existence this way, because otherwise there’d be no need for the tang of finality surrounding that moment in Chapter 401—“One final shield,” then Hercules’s next line, “You must live on,” being cut off by an attack from AFO, followed by the imagery of the machine disintegrating.  Horikoshi’s obviously going for poignance there, for noble sacrifice, and there’s none of that if Hercules is in no true danger.

(Incidentally, that means that robot AIs are the only lasting losses Team Hero takes in the final war.  Note that absolutely no one actually brings that up in the aftermath.  Like Villains, AIs don’t count as “people” whom Heroes are obligated to save.)

My explanation would be that AI in BNHA are, in some fashion, hard-locked to individual devices/”bodies,” preventing them from accessing any connectivity beyond basic communications channels as well as from modifying, transferring, or replicating their own code.  This is intended as a safety measure to guard against self-propagation and recursive self-improvement.  Thus, when a device is destroyed, the AI housed there also ceases to exist.

The second factor is simply that I have more exposure to AI in fiction than I do AI in real life!  I’m moderately computer savvy in that I'm not 100% dependent on graphic interphases, but I’m certainly no programmer.  Any writing I do on Providence and the AI uprising is thus going to require heavy research and, I expect, a lot of trawling through jargon that makes my eyes start to glaze over.  I’ll do my best, but I would not be at all surprised if the final result is much more informed by speculative fiction than the realities of computing.

Thanks for the ask, @thetorchwoodnineroleplayerwriter! Seriously, I hope you don't mind the ramble, but I was just so tickled and pleased to get such a quick and gratifyingly interested-sounding question about a BNHA fanfic idea. Likewise I hope you find the answer worth your time!

[hellaversepolls]

Tournament Poll: The F in FMK (2024)

The next tournament, "Most Marriageable Hellaverse Character", will start...

I was originally going to say next monday, but realistically Round 1 will probably start this upcoming Friday (September 20th) and continue until next Monday (September 23rd). Because Round 1, as we all know, is the biggest round with the most matches.

and the winner of “Most Fuckable Hellaverse Character” (2024) is…

Lucifer Morningstar

to celebrate, here’s a picture of an apple i made in paint 3d

In summary

Most Fuckable Hellaverse Character: Lucifer Morningstar

Most Fuckable Male Hellaverse Character:

Lucifer Morningstar (1st Place)

Vox (2nd Place)

Asmodeus, Blitzo Buckzo (3rd Place)

Most Fuckable Female Hellaverse Character:

Verosika Mayday (1st Place)

Mildred “Millie” Knolastname (2nd Place)

Carmilla Carmine, Vaggie (3rd Place)

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TLDR: Round 1 polls for the "most fuckable hellaverse character" poll tournament will start being posted from Friday (tomorrow) to Monday. The competitors were decided based on the rules specified in my last pinned post. Below will be voting rules and links to each poll in the tournament (once they're posted).

EDIT: Rounds 4-6 will START on Mondays instead of taking over the whole weekend. Once Round 6 is over and the ultimate winner is determined, we'll allow the winners a week of victory before moving onto the "Most Marriageable Hellaverse Character" poll tournament.

VOTING RULES (under read more):

Feel free to spread as much propaganda for your choice as you like if that's your thing, as long as you remember the following:

- Please Don't Threaten/Promise to Compromise the Safety of Yourself or Others (Example: "If [x] doesn't win I will shoot myself", "If you don't vote for [y] I'm going to doxx you", etc.). I cannot imagine anyone actually getting heated enough to do this, but if you're thinking about it, please don't :)

- Please try to avoid being racist/transphobic/etc in your propaganda (and like in general, but here is a good start).

- Please try to avoid writing anything extremely graphic (read: "Dead Dove: Do Not Eat" levels of shit).

I'd appreciate it if we could avoid bot-spamming in the votes.

Not really expecting that these rules will be needed, but I always like to be cautious. If anyone has more rules they'd like to suggest, feel free to leave them in the comments.

I also came up with a "gun to your head" style scenario for this tournament if that makes the voting process easier for people that want to vote but aren't really sexually attracted to any of the characters.

SCENARIO:

You have been trapped in a room SAW-style and cannot leave until you fuck one of the competitors listed. You are choosing who would be the most fuckable character in this scenario. They don't have to be the most attractive, just the one you're the MOST willing to have sex with in order to leave this room. Also the definition of "sex" in this context is fluid, it would be whatever method you feel the most comfortable with.

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FINAL ROUND

Lucifer vs Verosika

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ROUND 5

Millie vs Verosika (Winner: Verosika)

Lucifer vs Vox (Winner: Lucifer)

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ROUND 4

Carmilla Carmine vs Verosika Mayday (Winner: Verosika Mayday)

Millie vs Vaggie (Winner: Millie)

Blitzo vs Lucifer (Winner: Lucifer)

Asmodeus vs Vox (Winner: Vox)

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ROUND 3

Section 1

Carmilla Carmine vs Sallie May (Winner: Carmilla Carmine)

Husk vs Lucifer (Winner: Lucifer)

Section 2

Charlie vs Verosika Mayday (Winner: Verosika Mayday)

Alessio vs Blitzo (Winner: Blitzo)

Section 3

Martha vs Vaggie (Winner: Vaggie)

Angel Dust vs Vox (Winner: Vox)

Section 4

Millie vs Rosie (Winner: Millie)

Asmodeus vs Moxxie (Winner: Asmodeus)

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ROUND 2

Section 1

Female:

Loona vs Sallie May (Winner: Sallie May)

Beelzebub vs Carmilla Carmine (Winner: Carmilla Carmine)

Male:

Adam vs Lucifer (Winner: Lucifer)

Collin vs Husk (Winner: Husk)

Section 2

Female:

There's 28 female contenders, so Charlie gets a pass into the 3rd round

Glitz vs Verosika Mayday (Winner: Verosika Mayday)

Male:

Alessio vs Cash Buckzo (Winner: Alessio)

Blitzo vs Striker (Winner: Blitzo)

Section 3

Female:

Martha vs Niffty (Winner: Martha)

There's 28 female contenders, so Vaggie gets a pass into the 3rd round

Male:

Angel Dust vs Fizzarolli (Winner: Angel Dust)

Andrealphus vs Vox (Winner: Vox)

Section 4

Female:

Millie vs Velvette (Winner: Millie)

Rosie vs Sera (Winner: Rosie)

Male:

Moxxie vs Zestial (Winner: Moxxie)

Asmodeus vs Stolas (Winner: Asmodeus)

================================================

ROUND 1

Section 1

Female:

Agent Two vs Sallie May (Winner: Sallie May)

Barbie Wire vs Loona (Winner: Loona)

Beelzebub vs Zeezi (Winner: Beelzebub)

Carmilla Carmine vs Lilith (Winner: Carmilla Carmine)

Male:

There's 31 male contenders, so Lucifer gets a pass into the 2nd round (picked him at random)

Adam vs Mammon (Winner: Adam)

Cletus vs Collin (Winner: Collin)

Husk vs Vortex (Winner: Husk)

Section 2

Female:

Glam vs Glitz (Winner: Glitz)

Cherri Bomb vs Verosika Mayday (Winner: Verosika Mayday)

Charlie vs Emily (Winner: Charlie)

Male:

Alessio vs Chazwick (Winner: Alessio)

Cash Buckzo vs Lyle Lipton (Winner: Cash Buckzo)

Blitzo vs Wally Wackford (Winner: Blitzo)

Alastor vs Striker (Winner: Striker)

Section 3

Female:

Keenie vs Niffty (Winner: Niffty)

Martha vs Mrs. Mayberry (Winner: Martha)

Lute vs Vaggie (Winner: Vaggie)

Male:

Angel Dust vs Tom Trench (Winner: Angel Dust)

Fizzarolli vs Loopty Goopty (Winner: Fizzarolli)

Andrealphus vs Valentino (Winner: Andrealphus)

Saint Peter vs Vox (Winner: Vox)

Section 4

Female:

Millie vs Mimzy (Winner: Millie)

Katie Killjoy vs Velvette (Winner: Velvette)

Rosie vs Susan (Winner: Rosie)

Sera vs Stella (Winner: Sera)

Male:

Crimson vs Moxxie (Winner: Moxxie)

Paimon vs Zestial (Winner: Zestial)

Agent One vs Stolas (Winner: Stolas)

Asmodeus vs Sir Pentious (Winner: Asmodeus)