#vespiary

[lizasweetling]

I don't know why I expected more of the vespiary squad to get through: Klaus had the place downright excessively surrounded during the hero in a jar bit, and it's not like they would all just vanish. Even just all going into the city seems unlikely (spatially)

[furlesscoconut-writing-blog]

So, something else just clicked for me.

We don't see any Vespiary squad in Beetleburg.

Now, this has a perfectly reasonable in universe explanation (don't want to spook Beetle walking in the door), and probably an out of universe explanation of "they didn't exist yet".

But.

The in universe problem with bringing them can be solved, if you have a group of other soldiers who can phase in and out of reality at will.

So, until proved otherwise, I will believe that there were some Black Squad people in Beetleburg during the incident.

Does this effect the plot? No, not really (at least, not yet). If any were there, it would probably be the "core team", mentioned recently.

Mentioned. Not appeared.

[trinity-blaze]

RUXALA!!!!!!!

The Vespiary Squad is back!!!

[ostermad-blog]

🌱

Thanks for the ask!

🌱 An unreleased/not-yet-crowdfunding game I’m looking forward to.

My friend Vespiary has a phenomenal Fire Emblem-inspired ttrpg in development called Blazing Brand. She's been working on it for several years, and it fucks. It's based most strongly on FE Three Houses and does a phenomenal job adapting that game into a ttrpg, adding more buildcrafting options, manakete character support, and more while keeping the combat incredibly quick without sacrificing the tactical complexity that makes FE3H combat so satisfying. She's been running a campaign in it (that I've been playing in) for several years, and it's been an absolute blast. I'm stoked for when she gets it publication-ready so y'all can see what I mean.

[ushas42]

Bringing this back because, yeah, it is looking more and more likely to me that Klaus is back on the castle of his own free will and as a prearranged part of the plan. My best guess is that he intends to scuttle the ship on Castle Heterodyne as soon as the time stop is lifted.

So yeah, I think quite a few people are going to have to decide very quickly if their loyalty to the empire means loyalty to Klaus or loyalty to Gil. In that respect, the group chosen to infiltrate the castle are, by sheer coincidence, very aptly chosen.

The Jagers? 100% loyal to the Heterodyne first and foremost. The Vespiary Squad? Would probably be delighted for a chance to wring the Baron's neck after what he did. Martellus? If he's given a diplomatic excuse to slit the Baron's throat so much the better.

Boris? Well, he's loyal to Klaus unto death, but he already suspects that the Baron is a revenant, has put thought into what to do if that were the case, and his definition of "loyal" might well include "putting the Baron down like a dog if that's what he would have wanted in his right mind".

This will be interesting.

I'm not sure I agree with Martellus's assessment here. Yes, I think he's right that this is an attempted attack on Mechanicsburg, but I don't think the Queen of the Dawn is behind it. I think it's much more likely that Patel is acting on standing orders from Klaus himself, regarding what to do if it looks like the timestop is about to be lifted. It being the Queen of the Dawn requires that Patel be either a revenant or loyal to Lu/Zola, neither of which I think are likely. It being Klaus only requires that Patel be more loyal to Klaus than he is to Gil.

Because we haven't really been dwelling on all the conflicting loyalties that are about to pop up once there are two Baron Wulfenbachs running around. I can't imagine that Gil hasn't given it a lot of thought, but what's the plan? How are they going to prevent Vole's predicted "messy, terrible, civil var"? I know Gil doesn't *want* the empire, but as things are he can't safely hand it back over to Klaus. They'd better have a way to yeet his ass back to Skifander or some such or this is only going to get worse.

[luckycharmsand-soymilk]

found this beautiful wasp next today 🖤

[tati-seol]

My OC as a tarot card The Fool

[gabriellesbabrielles]

Bees commission, finished! #bee #honey #honeycomb #honeybee #bumblebee #vespiary #hive #sculpture #sculpey #reliefsculpture #basrelief #handmade #clayart #crafts #craftsposure #craftingislife #makersmovement #gold #artsanity #arts_help #pdxartist #gabriellesbabrielles

[purewhitedevil]

Despite the outsider Frost Virgins roaming around, they aren't aggressive to anyone on sight so it was best not to provoke them like the undead at Shalltear's floors. They were less as some of them are at Cocytus' adobe.

It took them a very long minutes, possibly near an hour on reaching the frozen bug-warrior's home which was an overturned vespiary with pillars which is Snowball Earth. The guarding Frost Virgins confirmed that Albedo carried important guests as they let them pass inside his residence.

As they are now in the wide halls where in-fighting is useful for the frozen insect, he appeared.

"Albedo... why are you here?" Armed aside, he's not here to face her but somehow wanting to know why she's here with the people near her.

Removing her helm, she replied. "I'm only here to take a rest as we came all the way to the First Floor to here. I can't use Gate to bring them to Lord Ainz directly. We won't be staying long."

"Is that so... Leave them to me. I shall take them to our lord through Gate on your behalf." Christopher Olson and the mercenaries agreed to follow him but before that, he did saw Mashu.

"Before i depart, who are you supposed to be?" His eyes focused on Mashu. He means no harm as he is an honorable warrior.

The hostility was palpable — and experience put Mashu on-edge, close enough that she'd come dangerously close to habitually taking up a defensive stance. Doing so would have only given the woman the impression she were more aggressive than the truth be. Thankfully having Albedo before her had kept the Shielder from automatic responses and held back the instinct to manifest Lord Camelot. She was, after all, in their territory — an outsider who, one wrong move made, could make an enemy out of all Nazarick.

She could not afford any hasty actions. Albedo being Lord Ainz's right-hand woman had always played into their favour, allowing for Mashu to spectate what she could of the world with lesser opposition than had her companion been anyone else, much less if she'd wandered alone. That made the encounter with Shelltear a peaceful affair, a mere speedbump along their journey rather than a hurdle outright.

Deeper they descended, and with each new sight, Mashu found herself greater fascinated by the inner workings of the Tomb. Enough that she was capable of sweeping aside the loosest comparison between Gargantua and ORT in their being slumbering beasts before dwelling much on Chaldea's desperate stand against the latter.

Mashu took pause at the snow — both the sight of it was astonishing and the reference to Albedo having a sister. It had been a reminder of just how little she really knew about the woman, despite how much of the world she'd been witness — not unlike her experience with the world into which she was born being primarily through rayshifts rather than direct.

Not to lag and risk the party getting separated from their lead, she was swift to follow, listening for the additional crunches of snowy footfalls behind. "It must be nice to come home after such a long time — and to see your sister again". There was the possibility theirs was a relationship frayed, but she was hesitant to bring up the possibility, lest it feel intrusive and rude.

[lizasweetling]

So it was 1: Vespiary Squad! Seriously though, where have you been???

there's probably tactical advantage to hiding while you got the weasel population up, and you guys are pretty clearly very attached to the weasels and so didn't want to take them into battle indiscriminantly, but also. I don't think it would be an entirely bad thing if Europa developed a few score of feral colonies of these guys.

... I suppose the more information is availiable on the wasp eaters the less time they have before their enemies counter them as a technology. and it would be ecologically irresponsible. but Lucrezia and everyone that works for her would hate that very much.

[koch-michael]

Kassandra, 2017, Lambdaprint, Diasec, from: eternal. . #vespiary #contemporaryart #michaelkoch #kassandra #nature #photography #art #fotografie #eternal #waspsnest #architecture #contemporaryphotography

[teamhawkeye]

legend has it there once was a Fighter for Hire at the top of the Grain Elevator in Holland Valley...he’s all but faded into myth now

[randomencounters]

Random Dungeon Generator

Now you can randomly generate a dungeon for adventuring in, assuming you’re okay with a campaign where you’re equally likely to find a monster pit and a breakfast nook. It’s always bugged me that these forts and lairs and palaces are all called “Dungeons”, but that seems to be the accepted term for “place where you go adventuring”, so here ya go; the plot’s up to you, homeys

(image source)

For each room whose number of exits isn’t clearly dictated, roll d4 for number of obvious exits, roll d6 (1-5 no secret exits, 6 a hidden exit), d20 for location of each (1-6 forward, 7-12 left, 13-18 right, 19 up, 20 down), and d12 for the door (1-4 unlocked, 5-8 normal locked, 9-10 magically locked, 11-12 trap). The room contents will generally be dictated by the room’s description, but the DM can throw stuff in as needed. You can also roll for how many squares wide, long, and tall each room is if that sounds fun.

Throne room

Stairs to next floor up

Stairs to next floor down

Treasure chamber

Monster lair / habitat / pen

Monster breeding chamber

Orrery / observatory

Alchemy laboratory

Weapon storage

Armor storage

Stable / garage / carhole

Magic portal chamber

Divination/summoning chamber

Torture chamber

Dungeon (regular)

Dungeon (sexy)

(Looks in the official Dungeon Master’s Guide for a similar table) Salon? Like a hair salon or a nail salon? Oh I guess they mean like a parlor where you go to have fancy chats. One of those

Shrine to major god

Shrine to minor god

Shrine to owner’s ancestors

Shrine to celebrity

Reliquary

Vestry

Hallway (roll d20 for number of doors)

Library / study

Map room

Gallery of ancestral portraits

Gallery of antique statuary

Gallery of trophies and conquests

Gallery of magical, haunted, and cursed objects

Gallery of some dumb shit that the owner likes to collect, like soda memorabilia or FunkoPops

Gallery of a weird post-modern installation

Crypt for an important figure

Crypt for family/ancestors of the owner

Swimming pool

Well for drinking water

Well where they keep and raise fish for food

Well where they keep and raise aquatic monsters

Trash pit

Lava pit

Spike pit

Acid pit

Ball pit

Conversation pit

Ballroom

Smoking lounge

Meat smoker

Guardroom

Game-room

Concert hall / home theatre

Master bedroom

Unused guest bedroom

Private chamber of a cool teen

Private chamber of a lame teen

Private chamber of a teen that takes martial arts way too seriously

Private chamber of a cool old person

Private chamber of a religious ascetic

Private chamber of the owner’s personal attendant

Servants’ quarters

Servants’ breakroom

Healer’s chamber

Rumpus-room

Aviary / chicken coop

Dairy

Ophidiarium

Apiary / vespiary

Kitchen

Dining room

Breakfast nook

Spice pantry

Liquor cabinet

Walk-in humidor

Saucery, which is apparently an entire room dedicated to sauces that they used to have in medieval castles

Still room / brewery

Wine cellar

Pickle cellar

Cellar full of creepy unfinished taxidermy

Cheese cave

Man cave

Bathroom

Caldarium

Tepidarium

Frigidarium

Calefactory / pisalis

Executive office

Middle management office

Cubicle-farm for low-level bureaucrats

Supply closet

Janitorial closet

Laundry room

Room that looks like it probably used to be an office or a study or something but now it’s just storage for, like, papers and old exercise equipment and junk that they keep meaning to donate to a thrift store. You know the rooms I mean, your parents probably have one

Mailroom

Exercise room

Lecture hall

Grow room for mushrooms

Grow room for poisonous plants

Grow room for unpalatable root vegetables

Grow room for exotic fruits

Grow room for “medicinal” herbs

Suspiciously empty room

[shavynel]

Girl Genius Fave Characters + Hogwarts Houses

Or, "Two characters you thought were in Slytherin, but aren't, and two you thought weren't in Slytherin (but one of whom actually is)"

Since Tarvek's section is Long and I live on AO3 where you know ahead of time who’s getting written up): the faves are {Bang, Tarvek, Violetta, Zoing}. No, there is not a favoriter much less favoritest among them.

Bang: Gryffindor

She's Gryff in that she has one hammer [well, knife] that she applies to all problems. You might think be tempted to think she's Slytherin because she's willing to kill people to get what she wants, but she's not really ends justify the means. She's more stabbing justifies the stabbing. She has one value system, and applies it to everything. Pretty much Gryffindor in a nutshell. You don't conform to my value system? I will make you conform!

Tarvek: Ravenclaw

Tarvek is the hardest to place. The natural inclination is Slytherin. He's our beloved underhanded weasel of ambition. Smells exactly like Slytherin. But there's something a little off. He wants to rule the world, but rather than it being an ends in and of itself, for Tarvek, this appears to be a means.

Ravenclaw, however, fits, and not just from Sparkiness. He studied the socio-political problem, and believes that his solution is the best solution, not just for his own gain. The world can be a better place, not just "better for him," and the way to get there is to rule it all. And I believe he wouldn't necessarily fight for the title if he thought the world was going to be okay (probably in Gil or Agatha's hands. Maybe not Gil).

Let's take a look at the ways we see he isn't just for himself:

He saves Grandma

He saves Colette

He saves Anevka

He saves Lucrezia

He saves Violetta (by sending her to Mechanicsburg)

He drops onto a Fun-Sized Mobile Agony and Death Dispenser

He saves a jager and a Vespiary Squad member from a burning dirigible

He goes up against a Slaver with a wooden sword (and thank goodness Agatha is there)

Okay, so most of these you can argue are still Slytherin. Saving Grandma wins him lots of Family Points, for example. But grabbing Jorgi on top of Ruxala? Recall, his first and primary goal was to save the weasels. (Wait a second... how does he even know to save the little furballs? Bang, a high-ranking Wulfenbach captain didn't know about them until a few hours ago. I guess that's a question for another day.) He's 2 seconds from death the entire time. You could still argue he wants Ruxala for her knowledge, and the jager wins him points with Agatha. But the wooden sword move is exactly the sort of nonsense you expect from Gryffindors.

So Gryffindor!? Motives are a closer match, but the methods are off (which, you'll note, is exactly the opposite problem he has with being a Slytherin). Tarvek's way of dealing with problems is basically everything but straightforward because he knows if he hits a problem head-on, he's going to die. (And maybe this is why his type is too heroic for their own good.) Also, I don't know how you would do a Gryffindor calculation and think, "Yeah, I should save Lucrezia." (You're about to bring up a Wormtail-shaped argument, aren't you? I love me some Peter Pettigrew character analysis so Bring. It. ON!)

Well, Hufflepuffs are do-gooders, too, so why not Hufflepuff? Tarvek does work his butt off, but have you heard him talk about his family? There's a piece to Hufflepuff that believes in the very best of people, and that is very much not Tarvek. Maybe it's that he believes it of everyone but his family. Which is like, anti-Slytherin (arguably therefore Slytherin). Or something.

It's a little unfair that at this point, we only have one house left standing, especially because, surface level, you could easily place every Spark in Ravenclaw, and no one would really say you were wrong. They're all capable of disappearing into their lab, spending hours (if not days) on their chosen project (or whatever happens to pass under their hands), and operate at a level that is untouched by non-Sparks. But just because they're all able to do that, does not mean we should just lump them all in Ravenclaw. (First of all, that'd have to be one sturdy tower.)

For Tarvek, though, it fits. His approach to the socio-political situation doesn't seem to stem from what do I gain from it and how do I end up on top. Instead, he studied and understood the game, thoroughly thought about each and every possibility and the futures they could bring, decided he hated it, that it does no one a benefit, and the only way to get out is to win it, and to do that, he again leaves no means unexamined in crafting his plans. To him, it's chess. And when Agatha walks into the picture, he does a lot of re-calculating. Suddenly the things he had taken for granted as the only way are no longer the only way, and he's willing to adjust his plans to fit the new reality. He’s sort of an experimental Ravenclaw in that way. Come up with the theory, see how it unfolds, and adjust as you go.

The only "outlier" on Ravenclaw is that Tarvek has amazing restraint for a Spark, and doesn't get lost in his passions and interests. But you could also chalk that up to, he's calculated it out, and this really just is the best way. (I mean, well, it is.)

Violetta: Hufflepuff

By far the most straightforward to place. She knows her family is problematic, but then argues that Auntie Margolotta was awfully sweet for not trying very hard to kill her. She spends her first part of Mechanicsburg hating Tarvek for sending her away, but manages to figure out on her own why he sent her. And at the end of the day, she'll save his ass. (It's her job, she says.) And she works insanely hard. Sure, she also complains about it incessantly. (Just let her have cakes and dresses already!)

Zoing: Slytherin

If Tarvek was the hardest to place, Zoing is probably the most surprising. The obvious easy choice here would be another Puff because wholesome, but it just doesn't feel right. No one's going to argue against Zoing being the purest, but Zoing does not think of everyone as equal or even pretend that some people are more equal than others. Zoing's #1 is Gil. He will be loyal forever and always to Gil first. And Zoing has teeeea ambitions. (Who knows what he would've done if Gil said Agatha was there to make tea. And Zoing probably has a running [one-sided] competition with Wooster as to who can be more helpful to Gil.) 

For all his tea ambitions, not everyone gets Zoing!tea. There are people who deserve tea, and people who don't deserve tea. Othar probably isn't ever getting tea (unless Gil explicitly says Othar gets tea). If you dissed Gil or laughed at Zoing's hat, you're probably not getting tea. I'd have words with you for making Zoing spite you, but it'd be possible. 

You might think of loyalty as a Gryffindor trait, but, let's face it, Zoing is not the bravest.

A full Hogwarts

I swear I didn't pick houses or characters so that I could have a full set, but let's not pretend … I am very pleased by this conclusion. Sorting method a little bit derived from @sortinghatchats, but I didn't want understanding their taxonomy to be required reading (it’s fun though!). And shout out to @circumference-pie  without whom this post would have never existed.

[inversetherapy]

symbiosis

In the night, words stir restless within me pour out from every pore crawling along skin like fine bristles, raising bumps flurry of flavors on tongue rolling down cheeks unceasing from eyes iridescent like beetles mindless, purposeful, they march, humming with vim I’m abuzz tip to toe like anthill or vespiary, in a sleepwalker’s haze I try to catch them in pinched fingertips in clumsy desperation I try to pin them down, I need their life blood, their ink to color my days. - SJM

[mythologeekwriter]

Not sure how the logistics of this would work, but AU where Tarvek becomes a member of the vespiary squad