#when you're so deep in The Lore of your fictional world

[lady-starkiller]

nyala mitaka, niabi mitaka, dahlia mitaka, dalla mitaka, prince finn of ceryneia of great aetheria, sabel and magnolia, the one aetherian girl who inadvertently calls mitaka a slur you will also Always be famous

dopheld mitaka, nari mirava, cassini parnew, cecylia forstner, sive amaryllis, abraxus kovak...you will Always be famous

[kenananamin]

A Storyteller's Biggest Fan

Summary: Nanami loves listening to you speak. You fill a silence he has never been able to fill himself, so when he sees you getting into the A Court of Thorns and Roses series, he’s ready (and excited) for the rambling to start. fluff, nanami is a very patient man, obv major acotar series spoilers (a/n: i was in the car w/ my bestie for 3 hours after a movie and we talked about a bunch of stuff and that included me rambling about acotar lmao so here's what i think nanami would do in a rambling session)

Nanami's bookshelf was... uniform. He enjoys non-fiction, good biographies and autobiographies, and a whole lot of business themed books. There might be a few poetry, fiction, or self-help books scattered in the mix but the bookshelf as a whole looked the same.

Your bookshelf on the other hand was very very different. You enjoy similar things as Nanami but your bookshelf is packed with fiction, crime and mystery, historical fiction, graphic novels or comics, some horror, and very recently... fantasy. Fantasy was interesting but you never saw yourself digging too deep into any fantasy lore. You never really enjoyed stories where a powerful creature hundreds of years old is yearning to love a small and fragile human... at least until now. You accidentally fell into the world of fantasy when one of your favorite youtubers made a video on a a series you've seen everywhere but never picked up for no particular reason.

But now... your days were filled with the damn series. Nanami had noticed that you had been too quiet and on your phone much more than before. He wondered if he had done something wrong but you quickly shut down that idea and tell him you've been completely enthralled by the ACOTAR series. You had found a fan made audiobook and checked out the e-books through your community library which is why you were on your phone much more than before. You pull out your phone to show Nanami the book and give a small summary on the books. He laughs at what he can obviously tell is contained excitement but tells you that you shouldn't be so secretive or shy with finding a fantasy series you like.

The next day, Nanami stops at the bookstore to buy the series for you. He had to look up the series and check he wasn't missing anything and double checked with the cashier that those five books were the complete series. It was very different than anything Nanami had ever bought but he flipped through a few pages to get a taste of what you were reading.

The next week was filled with acotar content not only for you, but for Nanami as well. He would hear you listening to the fan-made audiobook while you cooked on your nights and would sit across from you as you cooked to listen to a few chapters with you. He liked seeing your eyes widen at the new revelations and your almost inaudible gasps at some trials that the main character was being put through. Nanami would ask a few questions throughout to try to stay in the loop but he'd mostly stay quiet and watch you instead.

It was part of your daily routine to go to the living room couch or your bed after some meals where you would either watch something or grab your own books to read over tea. Nanami grabs his book and looks over to your phone to check if you were on the first or second book. After confirming, he grabs the second book and returns to the living room. He sits on the couch, puts his book on one side and reaches for the mug of tea you're giving him. He gives you your book and extends one arm on the back of the couch so you can lean on him as you read. Reading was a quiet activity but he appreciated every second of silence that would let him listen to your calm breathing and slow sips of tea.

After a while of reading, Nanami puts his book down and takes off his glasses. His eyes were tired and didn't feel like reading anymore. But he didn't want to move, he wanted to stay in that position so he asks for you to read your book aloud. You turn in his arms and ask if he's sure, you knew fantasy wasn't his cup of tea and you didn't want to force him through anything. He nodded and smiled so you turn back around and start reading.

"Oh yeah she's illiterate, that's kind of important. But Rhys teaches her how to read and write, it's kinda hot but ok whatever," Nanami laughs as you interrupt reading the book to give explanations as to why certain things are happening. It's been over an hour since you started reading and Nanami's planning on letting you continue until you stop yourself.

———

Almost a week after Nanami bought the books, you were completely done with the series. You would try to keep your rambling short if Nanami asked about it but you wanted nothing more than to talk about this whole series. After finishing the books, Nanami noticed you would use the quiet reading time to look up theories and read through ungodly amounts of reddit threads.

"Don't you want to talk about it?" Nanami asks.

You turn in his arms, "Talk about what?"

He points to your phone with his head, "About the books. You can tell me about the books and the theories and well — everything."

You lightly laugh, "Well it's interesting and I really really like it but I know this isn't your cup of tea, Ken. I don't want to force you through anything fantasy."

Nanami puts his book down and grabs your phone from your hand to put on the bed. He sits up straight against the headboard and says, "You're not forcing me through anything. I want to listen to you talk about it. Now go, start."

You smile wide, knowing he's genuine in wanting to hear about it.

Oh god, I hope he doesn't regret it, you think before sitting next to him and starting.

———

"And they're mates! He had visions of her even while he was under the mountain and she was on mortal lands! And the visions got clear when she crossed to the spring court!" You fall back on the bed to kick your legs up in the air and continue, "And she always felt him! She didn't know what it was then but she would describe a shadow looking over her and that was him, it was RHYS!"

The more you talk about this series, the more invested Nanami is becoming. He had to put down his mug of tea because he kept shifting all over his side of the bed in anticipation. One thing about you, you can recall a whole story with all important details and tell it to anyone. Considering how important details seem to be in this story, Nanami is happy that you're the one telling this story.

It had been a while since you started your recap. You had snuggled up in bed after lunch and it was now pitch black outside. Nanami didn't mind, he would just pass the mug of tea if he thought your mouth was getting dry and let you continue.

"Tamlin fucking gave up Prythian to Hybern to get Feyre back. Literally sold out every single court and fae and human for Feyre. So now there's a bleeding Cassian and Az on the floor, Tamlin is standing there like it's a regular Tuesday and he didn't betray Prythian, Lucien — well hold on, I like Lucien, that's my boy," Nanami laughs but let's you continue, "but he's there too and the king tells the guards to bring them in. Guess who, GUESS WHO COMES IN?!"

Nanami sits up and tries to actually wonder who, "Amren? Tarquin? The girl from summer? Umm... the weird uncle from the court of nightmares?"

You shake your head as your answer, "No, babe, it— oh my god," You sit up on your knees and ask if he's ready, "babe, it's fucking Nesta and Elain." Nanami's jaw drops and his eyes move wondering if he's missed a detail. "The king fucking brought them to Hybern and he's going to throw them into the cauldron to turn them into FAE. KEN, THEY'RE GOING TO BE MADE INTO FAE, FEYRE'S SISTERS ARE GOING TO BE MADE FAE AGAINST THEIR WILL. AND LUCIEN FINDS OUT ELAIN IS HIS MATE AFTER SHE COMES OUT FROM BEING THROWN INTO THE CAULDRON. AND NESTA IS SO PISSED ABOUT IT ALL SO SHE TAKES SOMETHING FROM THE CAULDRON, SHE'S FAE BUT SHE'S DIFFERENT AND THIS COMES BACK UP LATER. AND CASS AND AZ ARE STILL BLEEDING ON THE FLOOR DURING ALL THIS."

Nanami is running his fingers through his hair, visibly stressed about the state of the Illyrians, the middle sister finding her mate in Lucien and the eldest sister becoming something different. You continue to tell him about the end of the second book and he also ends up on his knees in front of you. If anyone were to walk in, they would see you both kneeling in the middle of the bed, you shouting as you excitedly tell the story and your hands gathered between you, almost as if you were both praying to each other.

"So Rhys winnows his group back to night after Feyre's burst while Tamlin takes Feyre back to spring. But guess what?" You inch even closer to Nanami, "Feyre did not lose her mind in Hybern, she's still Feyre and she ends the book by saying that the high lord of spring has just brought THE HIGH LADY OF NIGHT TO HIS COURT, BABE — KEN, SHE'S A SPY! THE FIRST HIGH LADY OF PRYTHIAN EVER AND SHE'S COME TO WRECK SPRING!"

Nanami mirrors your excitement and stands up with you on the bed as you lightly jump. You're still rambling about Feyre and Rhys's wedding and secret ceremony to make her high lady but Nanami is more focused on the vein slowly popping out on your neck. You're yelling, you're excited, your hair is flopping around while you jump and your hands are moving left, right, up, down, to your face then his chest, you're excited. God, Nanami loves your excitement. He loves the sight and sound of your pure unfiltered excitement.

"So that's the second book, what about the third book?" Nanami holds your forearms as he asks.

You turn to look at the clock and notice it's way too late to start the third book. You know yourself and once you start on the third book, you will want to keep going. You grunt and throw yourself back on the bed. You're face down on the bed and kicking your feet when Nanami kneels back down and strokes the back of your head. You turn your head and say, "The second book is my favorite but god I can talk about the third one for a long time," you sit up to ask, "what if we start the third book tomorrow? I'll start early so I don't keep you for too long or too late like today."

Nanami smiles and lightly runs one finger over your lips, "We can start the third book whenever you want. I don't mind staying up, it's not like we have anything to do tomorrow."

He leans to give you a small peck and pulls away to sits cross-legged on the bed with a pillow on his lap, ready to listen some more. You smile and raise your eyebrows, silently asking if he's sure. He nods and laughs as he motions to continue with his hand.

You sit cross legged in front of him and grab another pillow to pull onto your lap. You take a moment to decide where to start the third book, "So Rhys barely told the inner court about their first ever high lady, and everyone in spring thinks that Rhys went into Feyre's mind and manipulated everything."

Nanami nods and smiles across from you. You begin to ramble on about the third book and there is literally nowhere he would rather be. He mentally makes plans to heat up the leftovers or maybe pop in a pizza in the oven if he hears your stomach growl.

My storyteller. I love my beautiful little storyteller, Nanami thinks as your rambling fills the apartment again.

———

(a/n: honestly y’all i love my bestie so much, i told her everything in that car from acotar to creating this account lmao, i love you girlypop, thank you for letting me ramble about an illiterate character and my favorite bat boy 🥹 also anyone please message me if you’ve read acotar, i want to talk about it and see what others think lol this story might not get any attention and thats fine, i just wanted to express my love for my two favorite things rn (nanami and acotar lol))

OH AND ABOUT THE FAN-MADE AUDIOBOOK— PLEASE check her out, her youtube acct is The Reading Hag Returns and she single-handedly got me obsessed with this series. Here’s the playlist for the first book 🤭 https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2oTNYiJ-4JDcEYd99snnkdjXa2kK9z6i&si=9CQDcNAL6RuXHBAA

[elbiotipo]

So when it comes to distance in a fictional setting, is metric king? I wrote some fantasy post-apoc recently where the protagonist measured it in Oranges and Aevums (the latter being their own name), but more generally speaking is it worth it to hash out bespoke measurement systems for fictional cultures, do you think?

Oranges as a measurement unit sounds so funny, and a measurement based in... yourself makes surprising sense, given all the measurements based on body parts. Why not YOURSELF?

Well, I would think in a real post-apoc world metric would be king indeed, scientific and technologic instruments are in metric even in the US and you could always get a ruler from a school or scales from a grocery store, so eventually you could get back on track to reforming the metric system. It would be interesting, though, if every society during isolation had slightly different measurements for the same units because of faulty equipment (say, ohms or amperes or even grays) and they had to make a congress to clear things up.

Returning to your main question. My perspective here is the same as conlangs. It's very, very fun to have them, but it's not fun to force your audience to read them. When I write something set in a fantasy or science fiction setting, in my head I'm assuming the characters are speaking different languages and I DO explain them and even give examples of them, but the story itself is written, for both the reader's and the writer convenience, in a language we can understand (Spanish in my case, and then it can be translated). Same with units of measurement. I seldom use direct units of measurement like writing "the ship was 110.3 meters long" (in science fiction, it's often a trap as they force you to stay true to them), when more descriptive language can be used...

In any case, you could do, for the kind of immersion I love, say something like "she was 14 oranges* tall, rather small for her age" and do an asterisk like "*A.N. : 1.39 meters tall". This is very fun when used sparingly, because it gives the worldbuilding obessed reader something to play with, you can do the conversion yourself and learn more about the world, without interrupting the story. Some understandably dislike this approach, but I think that if you know what you're doing, you can hide some pretty deep lore behind it. In one of my favorite retro games, The Ur-Quan Masters, there is an alien race called the Slylandro who live in a gas giant. When they tell you their ancient history, they use their own system of measurment based on the rotation of their planet with its own names like Dranhasa and Dranh. The game actually provides you with the rotation time on "Earth" time, so some dedicated fans did the conversion, and found out the dates fit with major events in the game's past. I thought that was an awesome bit.

But I digress again. Does this mean you should not talk about measurements in your story? No, it can do for very fun plots and digressions, as well as make things more realistic and beliveable. A fantasy world sharing all the same measurement units can be as unplausible as everybody speaking "Common". Let's remember that the current metric system is a modern invention which took a long time to be adopted (and some, well one, country, still resists it). Just take a look at the many, many historical systems of measurement:

This was especially prominent in places like the Holy Roman Empire, where every statelet, county, principality, free city, prince-bishopric, duchy, archduchy, etc. may and most often did have different measurements from each other. Just take a look at how measurements varied from each German region, it's crazy. The systems of weight where particularily important. Before the introduction of standarized coinage, coins also varied not only between kingdoms, but between regions, and even towns, and coins made at different times with different alloys had different values. Rather than money in our modern sense, you could think of them as some kind of 'asset' that could vary in value depending on the circumstances. What's more, those values had to be checked by people who knew what they were working with. Silver and gold content could be weighed, ah, but you need good scales and weights, and someone who knows how to work them! And these people could easily rip you off, or you could lose value accidentally if those scales weren't done just right or fiddled with on purpose. In fact, this is where the word 'Mark' comes from.

It wasn't as easy to take say a 100 something bill and get the change in 1 something coins. There is a very interesting subplot in the anime Spice and Wolf where Lawrence, the trader character, has been paid in gold coins, and he has to trade them into lesser denominations. However, he has to be REAL careful so that nobody scams him given all I told you above. Even getting 'gold' coins was a gamble before modern coinage and banking (another long topic). How much of that is REALLY gold and not an alloy with silver or other metal? Who can you trust to tell you how much your coins are worth? Are they compatible between borders or even time, is this version worth as much as the others? Things that characters in fantasy who have just plundered a dragon's hoard almost never think about. Except in Spice and Wolf.

(here is a gif of Holo to break the wall of text)

This all of course, as again you can see in Spice and Wolf, can make trade very tedious and even unstable. This was one of the reasons why the metric system was so quickly adopted in Europe and then elsewhere; consistent units just allow for easier trade. Lots of other things involving measurement can have a major impact on your story. For one, you NEED consistent and accurate measurement to create even the most basic industrial and scientific equipment. You can wing it for a time like alchemists (and even they knew their measurements) but eventually, you need to measure things to understand them. To have working steam engines, steel production, chemical industries and more, you need to know your temperature is. If you want to do electricity, you need measurements for current, resistance and charge. If you're doing engineering, you need to have lenght, weight and volume very, very clear, or people will die. They don't necessarily need to be universal like the metric system (though it has lots of advantages, being coherent between units and decimal so it doesn't jump between different denominations) but they need to be standarized and measurable.

Most of the above, unless you're writing some kind of encyclopedia about a fictional scientific revolution (BASED BASED BASED) will not affect your characters directly. But IT IS worth keeping in mind for what kind of world your characters are living in. The standarization of measurement units always means SOMETHING in the state of your society, the strenght of the state and centralized authority, the state of scientific understanding (one could say that trying to measure the world was perhaps THE scientific revolution, "Man as a measure of all things"), the capability for industry and the standarization of coinage and trade.

Even if you don't have your characters interact directly with those things, they will interact with them. It's also, like I've said in the examples, fun to imagine characters having to learn or deal with different units of measurement, just as it is fun to imagine them learning new languages or cultural quirks. It's something I've done in the past, in my space opera setting, the worlds descended from the United States STILL use the imperial system, much to the frustration of the rest of the metric human sphere. There is also an alien character who has a hard time to learn human measurements, and that makes her melancholic about her past, as they can't intuitively see the now-extinct measurements she does. Again, man as a measure of all things... this does include other thinking beings...

There's more I could talk about here regarding time, but I did a post about that, though I'm not satisfied with it and will probably redo it in some time at the future. In any case, there's lot to talk about why every calendar in science fiction has 365 days and 24 hours.

As always, if you found this interesting and helpful, I would be very thankful if you gave a tip to my ko-fi! And feel free to ask about anything you'd like!

[the-leegend-99]

There's a reason this site sucks and is so profoundly hateable sometimes.

The reason is that since it's the nerd site (beaten out only by Reddit bc its r/topic function allows people to geek out to the max in one specific subject and build forums), where people dedicate essay-length blog posts to contrast (or compound) each other's interpretation of your favorite fictional characters through the most minute lore analysis possible, going "um actually" with all the casualness allowed by such a free reblog feature. And where is it used most of all? Why, to explain away absurdly mediocre or outright bad stuff like the Star Wars Prequels into being "Secretly Good™️" because let's face it, the alienation of living and working into capitalist society has stunted most of us (mostly us Westerners who get to enjoy the full breadth of consumerism) into needing to preserve their childhood security blankets. Of course, sometimes it's not that. Sometimes it's media analysis that wants to have a point and is actually done with more of a grain of salts. But most times, it is that. And sometimes it's cute, most times it doesn't involve the usual BS of manchild fannish behavior as Reddit does (probably bc there's a lot less cishet men).

But then some people here will apply that same mentality and behavior of politics.

And no, you just can't "um actually" your way of rightly being called a genocide and fascism enabler for supporting Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. Applying character arcs and lore to reality is brainrot. Yes, friend, I know that their hands are tied by the system. They made the choice to try and become top dog in it, nobody was expecting them not to comply in its basest crimes against humanity. But then you twist yourselves into hoops trying to rationalize the crumbs they throw at us to keep us content and not threaten their power, or better yet the system of exploitation they profit from, into actual progress. You try to rationalize them into being "Secretly Good™️" when they are the fullest representation of the banality of evil.

Sure, in doing so, you show more argumentative capabilities than Taylor Swift fans, but let's face it, it's not much of a compliment. All those Swifties, Beehives, Lil Nas X or Charli xcx fans who haven't taken their favorite celeb/artist to task for supporting the genocide, they cheer for these genocidal criminals because they've got far less awareness, and superficial diversity appeals to them. I'm not gonna go into who's more starved for crumbs from the master's table between them and you because it's not useful to this dissection. The actual difference is that they've formed a parasocial relationship with the *person*, with the celebrity, while you've formed a parasocial relationship with the *story*.

And you have to hammer the story into making sense, into being good, don't you? Because deep down, you're more aware. Deep down, you know it's wrong, you know that what's happening is wrong, bur you don't want to bring yourself to believe they've been stringing you along, asking you to be an accomplice. You want to explain your way out of letting this realization settle in, because if it does, then you are an accomplice.

Well you are, until you start doing something about it in the real world. Until you join protests, until you join working-class, anti-capitalist, anti-Zionist organizations fighting to overturn this system and build a better one instead.

And sure, that's a big jump, out of the realm of "permissibility", of "respectability", and it's scary. But maturity is having the courage to do the things that scare you the most, because you've analyzed them and realized that they're the ones that bring about the most material good for you and everybody. And everybody can reach that maturity. You, too, can be brave.

[aventurineswife]

!REQUESTS ARE OPEN!

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✓ Rules for Submissions ✓

Things I Will Write:

SFW (Safe for Work): Content that is appropriate for all audiences. This includes family-friendly stories that are safe to read in public spaces or professional environments.

Suggestive: Suggestive content that might hint at romance or more mature themes without crossing the line into explicit territory.

Romantic: Stories centered around romantic relationships, whether slow burn or established etc. This can include traditional love stories, confessions, or moments of intimacy without becoming explicit.

Platonic: Content focusing on deep friendships, non-romantic bonds, and emotional connections between characters and reader.

Yandere: Content where a character is obsessively and protectively in love with someone, willing to go to extreme lengths to ensure their love interest's attention and affection. While intense, this content will be handled carefully and without crossing boundaries into harmful or abusive behavior.

Light Gore: Mildly graphic depictions of violence or injury. This might include blood, bruising, or wounds in the context of a story, but the descriptions will not be overly detailed or explicit.

Things I Won't Write:

Smut/Lemon/Lime: No explicit or graphic sexual content. Any form of writing that delves into explicit sexual themes, whether written for fanfic or original works, is outside my comfort zone.

Fetishes or Anything Extremely Disturbing: I will not write for any fetishistic content or anything that could be considered extremely disturbing, violent, or grotesque. This includes anything that may trigger discomfort or unease in a reader.

Heavy Gore: Overly detailed or graphic depictions of violence or injury will not be written. While light gore (such as cuts or bruises) is acceptable in some contexts, I will avoid writing scenes with excessive violence or graphic injury that may be upsetting.

Non-Consensual Content or Any Form of Abuse: I will not write scenes that depict non-consensual interactions or any form of abusive behavior in a romantic or sexual context. Mentions of abuse may be included if they are necessary to the plot, but I will not describe these events in detail or as focal points.

Underage or Illegal Relationships in Romantic Form: Any romantic content involving underage characters or illegal relationships will not be written, even if the characters are fictional. Platonic relationships between characters and reader of different ages, however, are fine and will be handled respectfully.

Additional Information:

Provide Clear Requests: The more specific and detailed your request, the better! The more context you provide about what you're looking for, the easier it will be for me to craft exactly what you're imagining. Whether it's a particular scenario, character dynamic, or emotional tone, giving clear direction helps me deliver the best result for you.

Respect the Fandoms: When submitting requests, please keep them true to the characters, worlds, and settings they belong to. Creative twists or alternative interpretations are always welcome, but they should remain consistent with the established lore and personalities. Respect for the original material helps maintain the integrity of the story and characters.

OC Requests: You are more than welcome to request content related to my original characters! However, please remember to respect their established backstories, personalities, and relationships. They are created with certain narratives in mind, so requests should stay true to who they are within their own universe.

Be Patient: I appreciate your understanding and patience when waiting for your requests to be fulfilled. While I aim to get to every request as soon as possible, some may take a little more time depending on the complexity of the task. Thank you for your patience!

I mostly write for GN!Reader (Gender Neutral Reader), but if you would like a specific gender, feel free to ask. I'm open to writing for various identities and preferences, as long as they align with the rules above.

Thank you for taking the time to read through these guidelines. I look forward to your submissions/requests and hope we can create some wonderful content together!

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Masterlist

[separatist-apologist]

At this point I just like your posts with just skimming through it because I know your big, mature brain won't let me down with your opinions

And I need people know sjm is NOT a good writer lol. Just because she's famous doesn't mean she's the best one out there. Acotar is a missed opportunity at best. And most people who are hard-core fan of these book thinks these books are perfect and not because sjm keep retconing and changing and forgetting her own goddamn plot so they take everything for what it is. I've seen people criticised Mor and Feyre for leaving some dreamers at CoN and they don't care about them. No babes sjm just forgot about it all fkn together!!!

Okay I have thoughts about this. I'm once again slapping it under a cut just because its long. These are just my thoughts, feel free to disagree

There is nothing wrong, just to be clear, with SJM being a person's favorite writer. I think she is an entertaining writer and I think begrudgingly everyone in this fandom needs to admit that. I think she creates very interesting characters and places that people want to know more about and her writing is very accessible which feels like a burn but I swear isn't.

I don't think she's a bad writer, personally, but I do think she's just not interested in her own details or worlds the way her fans are, and I think this is true across every book series she's written. I think her problem is she writes the way I do- she knows how her stories end, she has a few key scenes in mind, and she figures the rest out as she goes.

This felt pretty evident in TOG, too- you could watch in real-time as her plots changed and she undid things it felt like she'd been building toward. ACOTAR isn't any better in that regard because I GENUINELY do not think she knew what she was doing plotwise when she started the series and it came to her as she went which is why the whole Amarantha things feels so ?????????

Even in TOG, SJM is not interested in the political maneuverings of her characters, the governing process, her political landscape or ANY of the things that a lot of people get frustrated by, to circle to your CoN plot. I think she relies very heavily on "x says they care and I'm telling you they're a good person, so the assumption is they're also a good ruler and we don't need to explore that any further". SJM drops these little pieces of lore like about Mor's cousins or the women of Illyria or whatever and then doesn't do anything with it or even recognize, in my opinion, the conclusions her readers are drawing.

And I think its because to her, she's told you what you need to know. Rhys is a GOOD ruler because the people of Velaris love him AND because she tells us so. Tamlin is a bad ruler because he exacts taxes on his decimated population AND she tells us so. And when people examine those statements, it starts to crumble, in my opinion, which is why I think people get defensive. They don't CARE about the political workings of this world, they just want to read about hot people doing hot people shenanigans.

I do think that going to a SJM book for thoughtful worldbuilding and an interesting magic/political system is a mistake. Having read every series she's ever written, I do not think this is her strong suit and I'm tired of being told I only think so because of internalized misogyny. I think SJM is a good character writer- her characters are compelling, and even anti's typically have a favorite character they wish had been better fleshed out or had been done more with or would be better explored in future books.

This is all over the place- I'm just writing my thoughts as they come to me. Ultimately, I think SJM's books typically don't stand up to heavy scrutiny and that depending on what you're looking for in a book, you're going to come away with different levels of enjoyment. For me, I hadn't read anything fiction in like, six years because I'd been knee deep in academia and it was the first thing I read just for fun and it WAS fun. It IS fun, even now. It's a brain off read. For better or worse, ACOTAR isn't complicated or hard to understand- SJM tells her readers what to think AND feel all the time, so you don't really need to think about any of it.

But when you read other fantasy in her genre, it becomes clear that like...oh. This is just mediocre. In some places it feels like a poor retelling of other stories (TOG has HEAVY LOTR moments, for example) and thoughtless culture stealing that feels offensive in places (CC feels especially bad in this regard given how she's stitched together like, 3-5 different cultures without a good understanding of any of them).

I'm not saying anti's shouldn't still discuss their issues with it. But I will say that if you're looking for a well fleshed out world and a political system that is interesting to read and characters who are consistent and don't bow to the whims of the author and plot, you're probably going to have a hard time with ALL of SJM.

[fearforthestorm]

How is 'no children' misrepresented and what is it actually about? <- genuinely curious and likes people ranting about things like this (and only really knows about the 'hand in unlovable hand' line though maybe that's part of the problem(?))

oh god okay so. how much tmg lore do you want because if we want to get into no children we're gonna get into the alpha couple and they've literally been present in the music since the very first tape ever released under the name the mountain goats over 30 years ago. actually yknow what it's 2am I don't want to mess things up I'll just give you this:

that's the backstory that's what no children is about. the song is so named because (paraphrasing a quote) "if there's one thing I know about this couple it's that the world will be better for it if they never have children". and here's the thing is that no children is a REALLY cathartic song I don't fault people for enjoying it and god knows that it's fun to belt at concerts but it is NOT a love song. it is not a song about a relationship that is in any way good or stable or healthy. it is about a couple that are bad for eachother and for everyone around them and should get divorced but are never going to because filing those papers is a few hundred bucks and you can buy a lot of alcohol with that money. please understand that: they aren't a tragic mutually doomed couple who despite that love each other. they are actively dragging the both of them to their graves because they're too far in to turn around now. they've been drinking for decades like it'll fix their problems and it never will and things only ever get angrier and louder and more destructive and worse so they just keep fucking digging the graves they've been digging since the beginning. first rule of holes is stop digging second rule is that once you do you're still in a hole but they're never even gonna get the first one and they sure as hell aren't ever going to acknowledge that they're in a deep deep hole much less would they try to get out. no children is about wanting the worst for yourself and your better half because it's the only way you can see any of it ending. no children is slinging insults across the living room several drinks deep into the evening at the person you married and realising that you fucking mean it when you say you hope it all goes to shit and takes the both of you down with it.

no children isn't the tragic otp. no children says "I hope I lie and tell everyone you were a good wife" and "I hope when you think of me years down the line you can't find one good thing to say / and I hope that if I found the strength to walk out you'd stay the hell out of my way" and it means every goddamn word when it says them. and I know people like "hand in unloveable hand / and I hope you die / I hope we both die" but they ALWAYS use that quote in a "it doesn't matter if we're unloveable because we're hand in hand" kind of way and that's just completely fucking wrong. if you're going to use no children for your blorbos fucking commit to it, they better be a couple that is genuinely entirely going to bury each other alive for the sheer goddamn fact that they would rather die than try to stop digging.

anyway. go listen to Tallahassee (album) because it is genuinely extremely fucking good and no children probably isn't even in my top three songs from that album.

[dove-tears]

What I love about TBOI is how raw and intimate it truly feels when you look deeper into it, it's an aspect that I feel goes overlooked a lot of the time.

Despite it's dark themes the game also has a certain vibe to it that feels humorous and lighthearted to help balance it out. The lore behind a lot of Edmund's games feel almost.. Therapeutic in a way? If that's the right word? Just being able to experience someone else's personal experiences through their own artistic expression in a way that isn't so jarring or in your face about it just feels comforting and inspiring in a way. Edmund's games just have that unique weirdness to them that just adds to it, makes me feel better being my weird self.

Despite not growing up in a religious household like Isaac, the emotions, thoughts and feelings he experiences are portrayed so specifically and accurately and I resonate with it so, so deeply. Isaac is honestly an amazing portrayal of the dissociation you experience when dealing with dysfunction in your life and the struggle to cope with it. When you play TBOI you're experiencing Isaac's world, a world in his head that is extremely personal and sensitive to him, when you play TBOI you too lose connection with reality to enjoy the game like Isaac does.

I know it's kinda silly, since Isaac is a fictional character n all, but it almost feels like having a reflection of yourself. You wish you could take Isaac away from his home life, and help him through his struggles and pains, hold him in your arms and tell him it'll be okay, because he truly doesn't deserve all that has happened to him, but you slowly begin to realize that you were once Isaac too. You were that young and impressionable mind that couldn't fully grasp or comprehend what was going on around them or why things were the way they were, you just couldn't understand what was wrong or what you were doing wrong, and you grow up to loathe yourself and put yourself down because you still don't understand who you are or why you are the way you are, that you feel like your existence is wrong because you feel so different and disconnected from everyone else around you, that you wish you were never a burden on everyone or were just. Never born to begin with. Even if those thoughts aren't as prominent the older you get, it's still deep rooted in your subconsious.

We're experiencing Isaac's life, something personal and vulnerable to him, and having it feel personal to us too. It feels extremely intimate in a way that I have never felt with any other fictional character. It's like being in touch with your own inner child, and being able to comfort them. Having a lot of the aspects of the game be broad and up to your interpretation just adds to it. Isaac means so much to me it's unreal.

Anyways, I'll put my goofy garbled nonsense to a close lol, just felt like expressing my feelings towards this game. It makes me happy to know other's feel the same way and can appreciate this game for the same reasons. And honestly, if you just enjoy the game because it's fun, just as valid. :)

[tobiasdrake]

The Demon General Burmese Tapir has been slain! Onward, to victory!

Quadruple Shithead at 12 o'clock and closing in fast. Let's fuck him up, Manfred, so we can end this whole thing and go home!

PINWHEELS OF DEATH! I fucked up the Sycophantic Speedster and now I'm here to--

Wait, why does this seem alarmingly familiar? I am at 12 out of 10 on the What The Fuck Scale.

Oh my goddess, we are doing this again.

The fucking Time Shards. They manifest whenever time's being looped. I was waiting for something like this but I wasn't anticipating... this.

That's what Western Hero means!?

It's not a fucking prophecy, it's a goddamn loop. Oh yeah, the great prophets predicted NO THEY FUCKING DID NOT, THEY'RE JUST WATCHING RERUNS.

...

Uh, please disregard my sacrilegious fury. You have done nothing wrong.

I can't believe our whole order is an Avatar chain of postal delivery workers passing the same package along.

What the fuck are we even doing here?

I think... I think I need to lie down and think about my life. Everything I thought I knew about what we were doing was just shot to hell.

I've been moving at a frantic pace from one thing to another and... and for what? I can't do it anymore. I need some time to process and really think about--

FUCK YES I'M THERE LET'S DO IT

You know what, that makes sense yet is somehow tremendously disappointing.

I've built up so much mystique, so much allure surrounding what this even is. But there was never anything there to begin with. It was just a closet. The allure came from the narrative we wove together surrounding the cabinet, moreso than its true contents.

A pretty little fiction in a pretty little bow, tied around a mundane piece of nothing. An apt metaphor for the entire Messenger syst--

Hang on, do you use a glamour photo to get dressed instead of a mirror? Because that's amazing. 10/10 Luana-approved.

So now I'm being inducted into the Cryptic Asshole community? Sure. Whatever. I could use friends, I--

OH I'M YOU NOW AM I

Is that how this works? ...wait, hold up, does that mean your true identity is the Archer who Western Heroed all over my burning village? This is where you've been all this time!?

BYE!?

I have so many questions about--

WELCOME TO ASSCLOWN'S ANAL EMPORIUM. If you give me a moment, I'm sure we have something your size.

Expect to do remarkably little shopping here. There's a bit of it, but for the most part, I'm just going to give you useful geographic background information and stuff. Oh, and I suppose I could read you my favorite passages from the Moon Goddess fab-- I mean, I have some neat stories to share.

Don't get used to freebies; Those only come along when you need a traversal boost for the next leg of your journey. I expect you to pay me in Time Shards for most of your Upgrades. Don't ask what I'm doing with them. You're still too young for that level of cynical disillusionment.

He seems nice. We're going to be best friends.

Wow, from my perspective, you were gone five seconds. For some reason, I anticipated being unmoored from time and space to still progress time at the same pace as, y'know, being moored in time and space. I don't know why I thought that.

Sure, I guess we'll breeze through this loop.

Gonna be totally honest with you, about 80% of the lore you're going to receive from me is probably going to be made up on the spot. I wish I understood even half as much of this world's deep secrets as my predecessor did, he was always so quick with the....

...

Oh, son of a bitch.

I need a moment. I'm having horrifying revelations. The shop is temporarily closed due to existential despair.

[lumine-no-hikari]

Dear Sephiroth: (a letter to a fictional character, because why not) #102

I finished one of the orbs today. The other one still needs work (and yet another layer of epoxy… sigh…), but this one is done:

Huzzah. I wonder what kind of price it might fetch. Or maybe if one of my friends really likes it, I'll just let 'em have it. Why not.

Yesterday, I finished this New Game cycle of Salt and Sanctuary. I stream it on Twitch every now and then because it amuses me.

And it just occurs to me, you might be very confused. "Lumine!" you might exclaim, shocked. "You are normally such a gentle soul! Why do you play this horribly violent and frightening video game?? What would prompt someone like you to cut zombies into bloody chunks with a comically oversized pair of scissors in such a detached, precise, and almost terrifyingly clinical fashion??? Should I be scared????"

...And the answer to that is simple. For every New Game cycle, I am on a rescue mission. And no. No you should not be scared. The game offers me no other way to interact with the zombies, and I'd like to minimize their suffering. I don't hate them.

…I imagine that the above statement has done nothing to assuage your confusion. Indeed, you might be even more confused. So I'll try to explain. Though if you haven't played this and intend to someday, you might not want to continue reading.

The character you play in this game begins on a boat. The story given is that you're supposed to be part of a crew escorting a princess across the sea for a marriage alliance. As you play through the game, it becomes clear that the "princess" is nothing more than a slave in noblewear, and the entire ship and its crew are sacrifices for an entity called The Nameless God. In the middle of the voyage, the ship gets attacked by brigands, and I guess also a giant freaking Kraekan called The Unspeakable Deep. You can win this fight, but it's very difficult, so most novice players lose. Win or lose, you black out. And when you come to, you're on some unknown island.

So then you wander around the island. You probably end up noticing that the island is full of walking corpses. You'll find a few friendly faces amongst all the things that want to kill you, but the fact of the matter is that most of the things skulking around are either monsters, or humans who are now broken, shambling, and invariably hostile shadows of their former selves. The only thing for it, at least until you reach the end, is to disable them from attacking you. And in this world, there is precisely one way to do that. But, just as you respawn when you get felled, so do they.

And then you meet the Scarecrow. Supposedly, the Scarecrow is the voice of the Nameless God that rules the island:

…And for sure, at first glance, all his words certainly sound super duper conceited and evil and scary. And to be sure, this character really used to piss me off at first; the thought went like, "what a pretentious drama king; he's talking all big and like I'm nothing, only to fall down in the end, like every other bloodthirsty wannabe who tries to get a piece of me and ends up instead with my comically oversized scissors stuffed through their skull. How pathetic."

But you know? By now, I have dozens of playthroughs of this game. I have invested literally thousands of hours in this. And after a while - reading the lore in the skill tree, reading the descriptions of monsters, and the descriptions of various items… things started to click, I guess.

One of the things that clicked was this set of lines, which I initially took as threatening:

Such a brave, foolish curiosity. It will struggle then. And it will bleed. And it will fall. And one day, when it finds itself beaten and broken, gasping for air, choking on its own blood and tears… …that will be the day that it kneels. And I will consume it.

My initial response to this was, "why don't you go fuck a cactus? maybe some time with a couple of these might change your attitude:"

...After all, what other people do with consenting succulents in their spare time is no business of mine. It's supposedly a free country or something.

But then… I realized. This entity has been on this Island for probably more years than I know how to count. This entity has seen countless souls succumb to the Island. For him, the part where you kneel and get consumed is nothing more than what seems like an inevitability. He is describing to you the most likely trajectory of things, NOT necessarily the thing that he wants.

And you know? Yes, the entity does call me "foolish", but from his perspective, trying to go toe-to-toe with him is like trying to fight the sun. You CANNOT fight the fucking SUN, so "foolish" seems fair. But he also calls me "brave", and his stance, quite explicitly, is one of curiosity. So if I read these lines clinically, without adding implication, what I see is an entity that is surprised and awed by me and my determination to do the impossible. Also in his favor is the simple fact that so far, this entity is the only one that uses the correct pronouns for me. I will take any pronoun thrown at me, but only because people are not comfortable referring to me as "it".

It's established that this entity, this Nameless God, who supposedly deigns to speak to me through this freaky Scarecrow thing, is trying desperately to become a Candlelit Soul. And, in a misguided effort to become Candlelit, he keeps taking the sacrifices and eventually the souls of the ruling class (corrupt evildoers) back in the "real world" (the island is certainly NOT the "real world"). In his preying upon the greedy and corrupt, characters like mine end up becoming collateral damage. The island is shaped by the memories carried to it by the people who end up there. Or at least, this is how I understand it.

But this part stuck with me:

While they scurry to and fro, I am. While they cherish their petty deities, idols, and false lords, I am. While they fight their trivial wars, live and die for mortal kings and scoundrels, I am. All priests of false gods kneel to Me. All kings of empires great and small kneel to Me. Life kneels to Me. Death kneels to Me.

…And you know. If you read it through a more ordinary, human lens, I can see how this would be interpreted as self-important arrogance. But it's important to remember that this entity is NOT human. So then it becomes important to interpret the words at face value, rather than apply any sort of implication. So from that, I gathered an interpretation that is closer to, "As long as living things continue to act from a place of fear, cruelty, and greed, I must continue to exist. So much life is lived from a place of fear. And so much death is delivered to living things in the name of fear. I am the avatar of fear and despair, therefore, all things done from that place is an act of kneeling to me, whether I like it or not."

…And for sure, this entity must not like it, because if he did, why would he be trying so hard to exit his existence by becoming Candlelit in the first place? As I understood it, this entity came into being as a result of the various cruelties of existence; he does not DEMAND, per se, that mortals make sacrifices to him - they just do, for the sake of their own corrupted agendas. And he's trying, as far as I can tell, to exit being in this role; if he becomes Candlelit, then he gets to escape. We've already established that he is awestruck and curious about me. As the entity that rules this island, if he REALLY wanted me to kneel, he could simply appear and smite me while my level is low, over and over again, every time I reanimate, until I become a mindless husk like the zombies that shamble around - it is established that you lose a little bit of yourself and your sanity every time you die and are reanimated. Instead, he simply watches me, almost shyly, maybe even full of hope, as I grow stronger, and occasionally stopping, almost like a lost puppy, to ask me questions that, by now, just seem very lonely to me. Questions like:

Does it wish to know Me?

…and…

Does it know what I have done?

…Interestingly, if you answer "No" to the first question, he responds as though he is hurt by the rejection. And if he really thought himself above me, he would neither deign to speak to me, nor be hurt and angry that I don't want to know him.

And… here's another thing. I am 10000% certain that this entity's existence must be one of IMMENSE suffering. Whether or not he realizes, HE is the one kneeling, all the damn time. What we see when speaking to him is the man on the cross - broken, bleeding, rotted, and partially eviscerated. This Nameless God claims that the man on the cross is nothing more than a vessel that acts as his voice, but… I can say for certain that that's absolutely not true. The Nameless God would LIKE you to believe that he is the big, scary-looking candelabra'd thing that you fight in the end, but that's just an illusion that crumbles and fades easily as soon as you strike the final blow. It's not him. It's a lie. This image you fight is merely a projection of what he WANTS to be.

No, the Nameless God is waiting for you in the room beyond, broken, bloody, bound to his cross, and likely in unimaginable amounts of pain. And I know that he is the man on the cross because you have the option to become the Nameless God. When you speak to him in the next room, the position of his head makes his silence look almost pleading; I think he is silent because he does not know how to say, "Please help me."

Your options are "Take Helm" or "Do Nothing". If you take the helm, then YOU become the one bound to the cross. You take his place, and presumably, he gets released from the prison that is this Island; he gets to know an end to suffering. He gets to know peace. "Do Nothing", knowing what I know, reads callously to me.

So every time I get to the end, I take the helm - not because I want to rule the Island, but because I want this entity's suffering to end. I want to take his place so that he can move on to the next thing, so that he doesn't have to hurt anymore, so that he might have an opportunity to heal. Choosing to take his place instead of choosing to return to the world of the living is the kindest thing I can do. One of the main themes of this game, repeated over and over, is getting back up and trying again after having been felled, and of the determination to keep learning, growing, and moving forward, even in the face of overwhelming difficulty. And so, I assume that if I take his place, then he, too, can get back up. He can be in a position where he no longer has to kneel to the pain he is in. He can choose something else. He can ascend to being Candlelit.

…I'd do the same for you with even less hesitation. I would take your place on any cross so that you might be free to go. So that you might be free to mourn, to weep, to fall to your knees… and then get back up. To decide to try again, despite the obstacles. To make different choices. To be brave enough to choose kindness, even when things hurt. To ascend into acting from a place of compassion and courage, instead of kneeling to your conditioning and pain.

Sephiroth. You gotta get up off your knees okay? If that's you going around saying weird things and doing mean things (I'm not sure that it is you, but whether it's you or Jenova is not relevant to me; my unconditional positive regard for you remains the same), then if you keep going on like this, it's not going to end well for you. And what's more… you can't claim that you're better and stronger than everyone else, but then act in the same cruel ways as the people you've grown to resent; it's a logical fallacy - surely someone as smart as you can see that, can't you?

Mirroring the same cruelty that was given to you for most of your life doesn't suit you. Being enslaved to the conditioning that leads you to being codependent doesn't suit you. Acting from a place of fear and pain doesn't suit you. Surrendering to the memories you carry doesn't suit you. You're better than this. You're so much better than this. So come on… please reach for the hands extended towards you. Please strive towards the voices of those who love you and believe in you and your fundamental goodness. Please.

I'll write to you again soon. I love you. Stay safe.

Your friend, Lumine

[roleplayfinder]

☢ Fallout and Scribe Maximus enjoyers, ahoy! ☢

★ you: 23+, scribe / aspirant / knight (etc etc) Maximus enthusiast and writer. someone who's communicative and willing to plot, discuss headcanons and endure my memes and stuff even when we're not actively writing. semi-lit to literate, third person and past tense enjoyer. replies possibly every day or even several times a day, but at least a few times a week (unless, y'know, The Life happens of course). someone who's enthusiastic to delve into Maximus and his trauma, his past, his passions and his aspirations, his sexuality and all the good stuff with the encouragement of his future bf!

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

★ me: 32, a trans dude from Europe, a fellow Maximus enthusiast. roleplayer and writer of 17-ish years, semi-lit to literate, minimum two paragraphs a reply (and usually more) and normally at least one reply a day (and usually more) unless something comes up - of which I will communicate to you. I come into this with a m!OC (BOS deserter / human / 32-ish depending on the verse / scrappy motherfucker and a medic) that is so incredibly into supporting Maximus as he struggles through his journey. a man who's morally sort of grey despite doing his best to be good himself and who is BOS Hater Number One. has strong morals (questionable as they may sometimes be) and has a tendency to have a very "I'm right you're wrong" attitude about values close to his heart when it comes to strangers. somewhat slow to trust people (supposedly) yet has a very deep, sentimental side, latches onto people somewhat easily and and cares hard. switch who leans dominant eveb from the bottom, but has no real interest in intimacy unless it comes with intense emotions and is willing to go at Max's pace whether that's in the bedroom or outside of it. I'm honestly looking for, like, 70/30 in regards to ratio of Maximuw VS my character lore, more looking to study Maximus' character and his person and story + growth VS my dude's.

★ yes: slow burn or love at first sight, both are fine by me. multiple AUs, multiple verses, crossovers, ramblings, threads, screaming and crying over fictional men. open to discussing and writing kink, sexuality, romance, trauma, hidden feelings and hard issues, a journey through how tough it is to crave to belong somewhere so bad, in a world where there's so few somewheres left. dark and dead dove topics extremely welcome, with a few exceptions;

★ limits: no non-con, no romanticizing abuse, and... stuff. the world of Fallout is obviously very dark and I have no qualms writing that; my issue is if, for example, sexual abuse is played as a kink or as simple shock value without ever dealing with the ramifications.

does this sound like your cup of tea? great!!! please like this post and I'll contact you, or feel free to check out my blog and hit me up. pls make sure your messages are open for tumblrs you don't follow & feel not afraid to approach me; I will throw my fella's bio, writing samples and other relevant stuff @ you first thing when I message you so you can decide whether you're into it or not and you can ghost me in peace if so be it! (✿◡‿◡)★~

look forward to hearing from you! 🌹

.

[movedto-mastcrmarksman]

Evidence Clint is a nerd

+ knows what the prime directive is (actually makes reference to star trek in the comics two to three times)

+ quotes the ending of blade runner

+ reads western pulp fiction books

+ the homosexual thing he has going on for Two Gun Kid

+ cowboys just cowboys (history dork proof)

+ makes his own trick arrows

+ knows when archery was invented supposedly

+ if you look at his apartment he has so many filled completely bookshelves (at least four of them)

+ world map wall

+ is deep in the dog cops lore

+ look at the things he calls Steve - namely Methuselah (like tell me you know who/what that is off the top of your head unless you're a history dork)

+ studies the avengers archives (history door again)

[screentonescast]

Screen Tones, a Webcomic Podcast

Show Notes

Lore

Release Date: May 25, 2022

Featuring

Kristen Lee (Krispy) She/They https://www.ghostjunksickness.com/

Christina Major (Delphina) - She/Her, www.sombulus.com

Ally Rom Colthoff (Varethane) - She/They http://chirault.sevensmith.net/ http://wychwoodcomic.com/

Claire Niebergall (Clam) - She/Her, www.phantomarine.com

In This Episode:

LORE! We all love it, we all have it. It’s that cool secret sauce that makes sci-fi, fantasy, supernatural, or other speculative fiction so much fun to make theories about. How does this funky world you made up work? How do you keep it all consistent, and make it an interesting part of the story? Today we’re gonna talk about it!

1:50 How do you come up with the lore for your story?

You can find inspiration from different languages, like Krispy gathered a lot of ideas for locations, names, and religions and such from Greek translations.

When coming up with lore, you want to make sure you make sure it all makes sense and matches the tone you're trying to get with your story.

Another form of inspiration is simply mashing up things that you love. Claire mashed up some of her favorites (water, blue, spooky, death) and built her world to include those concepts. Thane loves white hair and pointy ears and funky magic systems so had to develop a world all of those aspects could fit into.

Writing a prequel or flashbacks for your comic can force you to develop the lore of your story. Often this is most beneficial in developing lore that directly impacts the main characters.

Another route to take is to establish the rules of the world that are set in stone. From there, you'll get to discover how your characters relate to that rule and how those rules affect the way society runs. It also helps to demonstrate things so readers can understand what is happening.

Now a lot of the time you want to figure out how all the lore affects things and connect, but it's okay to embrace the Rule of Cool and just go with it because you want it there.

28:10 How do you keep track of the lore that appears in your comic, and make sure it all makes sense?

Krispy has lots of handy dandy notebooks! Make notes of everything and how it intertwines to try to avoid contradicting yourself. Set a few concrete rules that you will always follow. Keep track of questions you get regarding the lore so you can reference them later.

Clam lives on the edge and keeps most of it in her head, occasionally dropping in lore specific pages in between chapters. A lot of comics have their own wikis that make for a useful lore collector. Keep it limited and find a few things you go VERY deep on.

Thane is an archeological dig of lore that keeps building and covering over the old as the new comes to light. Google docs or other cloud based services make for good lore to allow for access from multiple devices so you can make a note when it comes to you. Often what is in the comic becomes the only concrete lore.

Delphie opts for less permanent note options and uses a lot of scrap paper. If a block of text is intimidating, document the lore in a different way, like designing a travel brochure, or graphical poster. Document the canon and leave the rest to be swirled around before it makes it into the comic.

41:50 Can you have too much lore?

This depends on the type of story, the length of the story, and what type of lore. Application of the lore matters. There's no one size fits all.

If you're intimidated by the world building and the amount of lore you have, don't be afraid to tone it back or wait to establish it until its needed in the story.

43:00 Do you have any advice for creators about worldbuilding?

If you're unable to keep something straight, find a way to document it so it can be easy for you to keep up with. Make a glossary if you need to.

Use words that are similar to known words. If you're making up words completely, make sure you define it for your readers, and yourself.

Use your lore to build the story. Start simple and basic and build up to the complicated details.

Leave room for flexibility. Your story will often evolve as you go on and your lore may change with it.

Thanks for Listening!

Have a comment? Question? Concern?

Contact us via Twitter @ScreenTonesCast or email screentonescast@gmail.com

Screen Tones Cast:

Ally Rom Colthoff (Varethane) - She/They http://chirault.sevensmith.net/ http://wychwoodcomic.com/

Christina Major (Delphina) - She/Her, www.sombulus.com

Claire Niebergall (Clam) - She/Her, www.phantomarine.com

Kristen Lee (Krispy) She/They https://www.ghostjunksickness.com/

Megan Davison - She/Her, https://www.webtoons.com/en/search?keyword=megasketch

Miranda Reoch - She/Her, mirandacakes.art 

Phineas Klier - They/Them, http://heirsoftheveil.fervorcraft.de

Rae Baade(Rae) - they/them, https://www.empyreancomic.com 

Renie Jesanis - She/They , www.kateblast.com

[findroleplay]

☢ Fallout and Scribe Maximus enjoyers, ahoy! ☢

★ you: 23+, scribe / aspirant / knight (etc etc) Maximus enthusiast and writer. someone who's communicative and willing to plot, discuss headcanons and endure my memes and stuff even when we're not actively writing. semi-lit to literate, third person and past tense enjoyer. replies possibly every day or even several times a day, but at least a few times a week (unless, y'know, The Life happens of course). someone who's enthusiastic to delve into Maximus and his trauma, his past, his passions and his aspirations, his sexuality and all the good stuff with the encouragement of his future bf!

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

★ me: 32, a trans dude from Europe, a fellow Maximus enthusiast. roleplayer and writer of 17-ish years, semi-lit to literate, minimum two paragraphs a reply (and usually more) and normally at least one reply a day (and usually more) unless something comes up - of which I will communicate to you. I come into this with a m!OC (BOS deserter / human / 32-ish depending on the verse / scrappy motherfucker and a medic) that is so incredibly into supporting Maximus as he struggles through his journey. a man who's morally sort of grey despite doing his best to be good himself and who is BOS Hater Number One. has strong morals (questionable as they may sometimes be) and has a tendency to have a very "I'm right you're wrong" attitude about values close to his heart when it comes to strangers. somewhat slow to trust people (supposedly) yet has a very deep, sentimental side, latches onto people somewhat easily and and cares hard. switch who leans dominant eveb from the bottom, but has no real interest in intimacy unless it comes with intense emotions and is willing to go at Max's pace whether that's in the bedroom or outside of it. I'm honestly looking for, like, 70/30 in regards to ratio of Maximuw VS my character lore, more looking to study Maximus' character and his person and story + growth VS my dude's.

★ yes: slow burn or love at first sight, both are fine by me. multiple AUs, multiple verses, crossovers, ramblings, threads, screaming and crying over fictional men. open to discussing and writing kink, sexuality, romance, trauma, hidden feelings and hard issues, a journey through how tough it is to crave to belong somewhere so bad, in a world where there's so few somewheres left. dark and dead dove topics extremely welcome, with a few exceptions;

★ limits: no non-con, no romanticizing abuse, and... stuff. the world of Fallout is obviously very dark and I have no qualms writing that; my issue is if, for example, sexual abuse is played as a kink or as simple shock value without ever dealing with the ramifications.

does this sound like your cup of tea? great!!! please like this post and I'll contact you, or feel free to check out my blog and hit me up. pls make sure your messages are open for tumblrs you don't follow & feel not afraid to approach me; I will throw my fella's bio, writing samples and other relevant stuff @ you first thing when I message you so you can decide whether you're into it or not and you can ghost me in peace if so be it! (✿◡‿◡)★~

look forward to hearing from you! 🌹

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[gealach-in-a-misty-world]

Love changes you. So do the Outer Gods. Alone in a cottage, Lavinia writes to the woman she loved. Fifteen years ago, middle-aged Lavinia Whateley escaped her hilly Massachusetts town when the townsfolk decided to sacrifice her on Halloween. After almost dying in the woods, she's saved and housed by the stoic and mysterious Asenath Waite, or Azzie. On the coastal outskirts of East Providence, they start to fall in love. However, things change when Azzie, with her secret past and the strange "scars" on the side of her neck, begins to transform into an eldritch creature of the deep.

"To dance fiery and without abandon after you've lost everything". Morgan Dante's Providence Girls is a sapphic horror story that draws heavily from Lovecraftian lore. Brimming with body horror and upsetting imagery, it's a tale of finding comfort and compassion against all odds, of finding solace in companionship. The book starts off with a helpful list of trigger warnings. I don't usually read horror - I'm too much of a scaredy cat - but the plot intrigued me and I told myself it couldn't be that bad. Boy, was I wrong!

Being unfamiliar with Lovecraft, I was wholly unprepared for what was coming, while still being somewhat familiar with the concepts enough that when certain names started dropping, I realized what was going on. Still, I kept reading because the prose is absolutely lovely, filled with stunning turns of phrase; the story is also incredibly compelling. It's set up as an epistolary novel, with an older Lavinia recounting their months together, while Azzie is writing as events unfold, and Lavinia is reading Azzie's words in the present. The format meant that I thought I had the outcome figured out, but I was pleasantly surprised.

For all the unspeakable horror in the story - not just the Lovecraftian horror, but the more mundane horror of domestic abuse - this is such a tender story of resilience and love. It's an ode to healing and overcoming your trauma, and to find body autonomy again.

Providence Girls is a delightful novella, but I wouldn't recommend it if you're squeamish.

✨ 4 stars

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📚📚📚 IF YOU LOVE THIS, YOU MIGHT LIKE:

* The Faerie Hounds of York, by Arden Powell

for: body horror, disturbing imagery

[You can find more of my reviews about queer speculative fiction on my blog MISTY WORLD]

[teeto-peteto]

I’m sorry to keep going on about Ashe being treated unfairly by the community but Mordekaiser can have all these lines about “I will rule the world because evil” and people love him and call him a chad. but Ashe has these lines about leadership, praying to her gods, deep stuff, and people lose their shit “Oh, she talks too much, she’s so annoying” I’m just… I don’t know. I’m tired. It happened when Ahri got her VA update, it happened with Nidalee’s, I’m so tired.

On a more positive note, I imagine that all the alternate costumes are in characters Institute of war closets. Just going through outfits “What do I wear today?”

Pack up for another longpost because this is so right and im so tired of systematic sexism in all aspects of League Of Legends including the community. I dont think i have to mention it but just in case, im referring to the toxic male sector, i know not all men are like this, but 99% of men are like this.

I do not deny that there are male champions whose only personality is being hot, or dumb stupid, that only have 5 voice lines that go all way around like a carousel when playing. BUT. The amount of female characters with same characteristics is overwhelming and disgusting and when Riot tries to ''fix it'' either nobody cares, calls it a feminist agenda or just says blaahh blahh woman talking virgin speech.

Rakan, for example, is a great character. He's a charmer, he's good looking and he knows it, he's prepotent, but also very iconic, he always talks about himself in a way that doesnt bother you, he has a glimpse of 'my past wanst good but right now im handsome and im having fun'. Sarah Fortune in a terrible character, she's a woman with a huge childhood trauma in the seek of the man who provoked it but only talks about seducing, seducing for what?! I know there's a comic that adresses this but let me tell you, i dont like it. She's seducing, she's iconic but only because she has a crazy amount of sexual innuendos and THATS it, she gives you this 'ohh im a easy girl but dont provoke me ;)' that is absolutely ridiculous. Veigar has more personality than her and it HURTS goddamn. I refuse to believe that the people who wrote Sarah in Ruined King are somewhat related to her development in League of Legends i completely and utterly REFUSE. She's a terrible character.

Remember Illaoi? Cause i do, WE do. Rest of people? Men??? Boohoohoo she's a muscular woman... thats anti natura, if she was thinner she would be good looking... what the fuck. Shes just a fucking MEME cause someone for once said 'You know what? Maybe lets not do hourglass body type in this one'.

While showering i thought about Lux and Sylas... Look, Lux got a voice update i think a couple of years ago. Shit is recent, and Sylas was THERE already. Can somebody fucking explain to me why Sylas gets to talk all his shit about his lore, and we only have Lux saying 'oooh rainbow shiny!' ? Its infuriating. I know Lux is this positive vibe champion but... she also had it rough you know....? Cant we have a few of those long-movement lore insight lines? You know? Relationship with Demacia itself? Her brother? Sylas??????? Is this asking for too much. Only thing i percieve of Sylas that i dont agree with is that he's your typical shirtless men again sexualizing champions for no fucking reason but mkay i guess they wanted to give him this reckless type of persona. I still dont like it but eh...

Ashe's situation just presents over and over again the fact that being a fucking woman is TOUGH even when you dont fucking exist and you're just a fictional character because nobody gives a flying FUCK about you unless you get pretty skins. If you get too much pretty skins then its the fault of real women players because 'they only play Lux' and everything its so fucking wrong and trust me, things seem isolated or in different contexts but EVERYTHING is conected. A fucking macro company ruled by men that often marketizes of LGTBQ+ community and feminism for literally 1 month or a week then to do NOTHING and never actually standing up to this people. This makes the people working in the company as designers to make characters that either need to have their sexualities covered up so nobody realizes but leaving up hints here and there for someone to pick up but when someone brings it up then Riot blasts a huge: 'NO' and pretend it never happened. Nobody wants to do new designs or new body types cause everytime they do it people mock the characters and never take them seriously, the amount of racist and mocking comments i have read about K'Sante are ABISMAL, Illaoi is a fucking joke nobody takes seriously, Naafiri is great but Riot has the NEED to put eyeliner on a fucking DOG and to give her earrings so she can be identified as a female dog. This only creates a community of fucking creepy males that think they can step on characters they dont like specially the female ones and when someone brings up the terrible decisions Riot made they blast a 'BUT THERE'S MALE CHARACTERS THAT ARE SHIRTLESS' because they dont care about us they only see themselves. NOBODY gives a shit about Briar and its so unnatural how people put so much attention on her feet and the hips and thighs is just so vomitive. This is a whole cycle where a company full of shit creates a bunch of shitholes that hate women and thats what Riot fests on. I dont even care if im overreacting i know what im seeing and i know what i am. Ashe was forced to marry a man just for political power but nobody cares about that cause Mordekaiser is bulky and he's evil so that instantly makes him interesting enough to call the eyes of fucking creeps. You know what shaped league of legends women the best? The fandom, the niche fandom, not the rule 34 fandom that oversexualizes everything. Writers, fanartists, they made a lot of characters what they are now, but sadly, nobody gives a fuck.

Quoting America Ferrera's speach on the Barbie movie cause i believe is fitting to the female characters of the game too:

'(...) But always stand out and always be grateful. But never forget that the system is rigged. So find a way to acknowledge that but also always be grateful. You have to never get old, never be rude, never show off, never be selfish, never fall down, never fail, never show fear, never get out of line.

It's too hard! It's too contradictory and nobody gives you a medal or says thank you! And it turns out, in fact, that not only are you doing everything wrong, but also everything is your fault.'

Im done. Sorry for long posting. Every day i wake up and i hate being a woman. I think thats what women in League Of Legends lore feel most of the time, if im being honest.

About the happy question :) Yes! And i think Gwen and Elise team up to make the skins... And they have little spider helpers... And champions are like suggesting changes or modifications, it would be so cute! And Lulu can do the chromas changing the colours...