#yes you can play d&d that way but it's not designed for it

[ineskew]

played a session of d&d the other day that reminded me how much 5e isn't designed for investigation and diplomacy. it's a combat game; actual roleplay is barely supported by the rules

we spent half the session going in circles trying to convince someone to do something without knowing anything about him, and even with insight & persuasion checks to help it still took us 2+ hours to get to the heart of things. we wanted more information but couldn't figure out how to ask the right questions in character; the dm wanted to tell us but didn't know how to get us there without breaking the fourth wall. we only made a handful of rolls, and most of the session was just unstructured talking (not a bad thing, but further evidence that d&d isn't really designed for this)

i would have killed for a pbta-style "discern realities"/"read a person"/"assess the situation"/"investigate a mystery" roll to give the conversation more structure. instead of making me roll a general insight check and parceling out information my character could realistically intuit, give me the chance to ask questions directly. with the right gm, "what here is not what it appears to be?" or "how could i get your character to ___?" would have cracked that negotiation open without giving the whole game away. instead we just... kept going in circles

[sysig]

A hero is only as good as his weapons, so make ‘em count (Patreon)

[aromanticasterisms]

coppelia and coppelius...............

[anim-ttrpgs]

Help Save the World of TTRPGs and Their Creators.

Okay I’m being a little dramatic, but at the same time I’m pretty serious. This is a call to action, and the livelihoods of myself and lots of other people, many of them (like myself) disabled, are depending on it. This is a post about why, what you can do about it, and (perhaps least often answered) how.

This post is actually an accompaniment to another discussion by someone else. If you don’t want to listen to a 90-minute in-depth discussion of much of what I’m about to tell you, you can just keep reading. Otherwise, click here or here and listen to this either before or after you read this post. (They’re the same thing, just different sources.)

If you have ever made or reblogged posts urging people to switch from Google Chrome to Firefox, you should be willing to at least give a try to other TTRPGs besides D&D5e for much the same principle reasons. I’m not telling you you have to hate D&D5e, and I’m not telling you you have to quit D&D5e, I’m just asking you to try some other games. If you don’t like them, and you really want to go back to D&D5e, then go back to D&D5e. But how can you really know you won’t like other games if you have literally never tried them? This post is a post about why and how to try them. If you’re thinking right now that you don’t want to try them, I urge you to look below to see if any of your reasons for not wanting to try them are covered there. Because the monopoly that WotC’s D&D5e has on TTRPGs as a whole is bad for me as a game designer, and it’s bad for you as a game player. It’s even bad for you if you like D&D5e. A fuller discussion of the why and how this is the case can be found in the links above, but it isn’t fully necessary for understanding this post, it’ll just give you a better perspective on it.

If you’re a D&D5e player, I’m sure at some point or another, you’ve been told “play a different game”, and it must get frustrating without the context of why and how. This post is here to give you the why and how.

[The following paragraph has been edited because the original wording made it sound like we think all weird TTRPGs suck.]

Before that though, one more thing to get out of the way. I'm going to level with you. There’s a lot of weird games out there.

You are gonna see a lot of weird TTRPGs when you take the plunge. Many of them try to completely reinvent what a TTRPG even is, and some fail spectacularly, others really do even up doing something very interesting even if they don't end up being what a core TTRPG player wants. But not every indie RPG is a Bladefish, lots and lots of them are more 'traditional' and will feel very familiar to you, I promise. (And you might even find that you like the weird experimental bladefish type ones, these are usually ideal for one-session plays when your usual group can't play your usual game for any reason.)

You're also going to probably see a lot of very bad games, and man have I got some stories of very bad games, but for now I'm just saying to make sure you read the reviews, or go through curators (several of which will be listed below), before you buy.

Now that that is out of the way, I’m going to go down a list of concerns you may have for why not, and then explain the how.

“I don’t want to learn a whole new set of rules after I already spent so much time learning D&D5e.”

Learning a new set of rules is not going to be as hard as you think. Most other TTRPGs aren’t like that. D&D5e is far on the high end of the scale for TTRPGs being hard and time-consuming to learn and play. If you’ve only played D&D5e, it might trick you into thinking that learning any TTRPG is an overwhelmingly time-consuming task, but this is really mostly a D&D5e problem, not a TTRPG problem as a whole.

“D&D5e has all of these extra online tools to help you play it.”

So what? People have been playing TTRPGs without the help of computers for 50 years. To play a well-designed TTRPG you won’t need a computer. Yes, even if you're bad at math. There are some TTRPGs out there that barely even use math.

“I’m too invested in the narrative and characters of my group’s current ongoing D&D5e campaign to switch to something else.”

There are other games, with better design made by better people for less money, that are the same kind of game as D&D5e, that your current characters, lore, and plot will fit right into and do it better. And no, it's not just Pathfinder, there's others.

“I can’t afford to play another TTRPG.”

You probably can. If you’ve only played D&D5e, you might have been made to think that TTRPGs are a very expensive hobby. They aren’t. D&D5e is actually uniquely expensive, costing more than 3x more than the next most expensive TTRPG I can think of right now. Even on the more expensive end, other TTRPG books will cost you no more than $60, most will cost you less than $20, and a whole lot of them are just free. If you somehow still can’t afford another TTRPG, come to the A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book club mentioned below, nominate the game, and if it wins the vote we will straight up buy it for you.

(By the way, if you had any of the above concerns about trying other games besides D&D5e, that really makes it sound like you are in a textbook abusive relationship with D&D5e. This is how abusers control their partners, and how empires control their citizens, by teaching you to think that nothing could ever get any better, and even though they treat you bad, the Other will treat you even worse.)

“If I don’t play D&D5e, which TTRPG should I play?”

That’s a pretty limited question to be asking, because there will be no one TTRPG for everything. And no, D&D5e is not the one TTRPG for everything, Hasbro’s marketing team is just lying to you. (Pathfinder and PbtA are not the one system for everything either!) Do you only play one video game or only watch one movie or only read one book? When you finish watching an action movie like Mad Max, and then you want to watch a horror movie, do you just rewind Mad Max and watch it over again but this time you act scared the whole time? No, you watch a different movie. I’m asking you to give the artistic medium of TTRPGs the same respect you would give movies.

“I want to play something besides D&D5e, but my friends won’t play anything else!”

I have several answers to this.

Try showing them this post.

If that doesn’t work: Make them. Put your foot down. This works especially well if you are the DM. Tell them you won’t run another session of D&D5e until they agree to give what you want to do at least one try instead of always doing only what they want to do. This is, like, playing 101. We learned this in kindergarten. If your friend really wants to play something else, you should give their game a try, or you’re not really being a very good friend.

If that doesn’t work, find another group. This doesn’t even mean that you have to leave your existing group. A good place to start would be the A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book Club which will be mentioned and linked below. You can also go to the subreddit of any game you’re interested in and probably meet people there who have the same problem you do and want to put together a group to play something other than D&D5e. You might get along great with these people, you might not, but you won’t know until you try. Just make sure to have a robust “session zero” so everyone is on the same page. This is a good practice for any group but it is especially important for a group made of players you’ve just met.

“I only watch actual plays.”

Then watch actual plays of games that aren’t D&D5e. These podcasts struggle for the same reasons that indie RPGs struggle, because of the brand recognition and brand loyalty D&D5e has, despite their merit. I don’t watch actual plays, or else I would be able to list more of them. So, anyone who does watch actual plays, please help me out by commenting on this post with some non-D&D5e actual plays you like. And please do me a favor and don’t list actual plays that only play one non-D&D5e system, list ones that go through a variety of systems. The first one I can think of is Tiny Table.

“I can just homebrew away all the problems with D&D5e.”

Even though I want to, I’m not going to try and argue that you can’t actually homebrew away all the problems with D&D5e. Instead, I’m going to ask you why you’re buying two $50 rulebooks just to throw away half the pages. In most other good RPGs, you don’t need to change the rules to make them fun, they’re fun right out the box.

“But homebrewing D&D5e into any kind of game is fun! You can homebrew anything out of D&D5e!”

Firstly, I promise that this is not unique to D&D5e. Secondly, then you would probably have more fun homebrewing a system that gives you a better starting point for reaching your goal. Also, what if I told you that there are entire RPG systems out there that are made just for this? There are RPG systems that were designed for the purpose of being a toolbox and set of materials for you to work with to make exactly the game you want to make. Some examples are GURPS, Savage Worlds, Basic RolePlaying, Caltrop Core, and (as much as I loathe it) PbtA.

“I’m not supporting WotC’s monopoly because I pirate all the D&D5e books.”

Then you’re still not supporting the smaller developers that this monopoly is crushing, either.

Now, here’s the how. Because I promise you, there’s not just one, but probably a dozen other RPGs out there that will scratch your exact itch.

Here’s how to find them. This won’t be a comprehensive list because I’ve already been typing this for like 3 hours already. Those reading this, please go ahead and comment more to help fill out the list.

First, I’m gonna plug one of my own major projects, because it’s my post. The A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book Club. It’s a discord server that treats playing TTRPGs like a book club, with the goal of introducing members to a wide variety of games other than D&D5e. RPGs are nominated by members, then we hold a vote to decide what to read and play for a short campaign, then we repeat. There is no financial, time, or schedule investment required to join this book club, I promise it is very schedule-friendly, because we assign people to different groups based of schedule compatibility. You don’t have to play each campaign, or any campaign, you can just read along and participate in discussion that way. And if you can’t afford to buy the rulebook we’re going to be reading, we will make sure you get a PDF of it for free. That is how committed we are to getting non-D&D5e RPGs into people’s hands. Here is an invite link.

Next, there are quite a few tumblr blogs you can follow to get recommendations shown to you frequently.

@indierpgnewsletter

@indie-ttrpg-of-the-day

@theresattrpgforthat

@haveyouplayedthisttrpg

@indiepressrevolution

Plenty of podcasts, journalists, and youtubers out there do in-depth discussions of different systems regularly, a couple I can think of off the top of my head are:

Storyteller Conclave (I’m actually going to be interviewed live on this show on April 10th!)

Seth Skorkowsky

Questing Beast

The Gaming Table

Rascal News

Lastly, you can just go looking. Browse r/rpg, drivethrurpg.com, indie press revolution, and itch.io.

Now, if you really want to support me and my team specifically Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy, our debut TTRPG, is going to launch on Kickstarter on April 10th and we need all the help we can get. Set a reminder from the Kickstarter page through this link.

If you’re interested in a more updated and improved version of Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy than the free demo you got from our website, there’s plenty of ways to get one!

Subscribe to our Patreon where we frequently roll our new updates for the prerelease version!

Donate to our ko-fi and send us an email with proof that you did, and we’ll email you back with the full Eureka prerelease package with the most updated version at the time of responding! (The email address can be found if you scroll down to the bottom of our website.)

We also have merchanise.

[genderlessghoul]

I've been wanting to do this post for a while now so here is EVERYTHING I CAN TELL YOU ABOUT THE GHOULS' IMPERA COSTUMES.

Buckle up because I have a LOT to say about those, this is gonna be a very long one.

The costumes were designed by B Åkerlund, a Swedish costume designer who's worked with Ghost since at least Meliora (that's as far back as I was willing to scroll on her Instagram page lol). B Åkerlund has also worked for many other musical artists such as Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Madonna, the Rolling Stones, Ozzy Osborne, Blink 182 and Hollywood Undead (information from her own website)

The masks were made by Bob Basset, a visual artists who works a lot with leather. I find his work fascinating, you can look him up on Instagram (nsfw warning, there's a few naked ladies).

Fun fact! The horns are real cow horns. That's the reason some of them have gold tips, to hide the imperfections that come with working with actual horns.

He does have a shop where he sells his items, there's a mask there very similar to the Impera ones. You can also buy Papa's batwings if you happen to have 2500$ lying around!

The jackets are made on the same model as one of Papa's. The back is decorated with a spine-like design made from leather and cording. It's adorned with a few of our classic Impera buttons. Some of the hems were left raw and some deliberate weathering was done to make it look old and worn.

Fun fact! The shoulder pieces are not sewn into the garment, I would assume for easier cleaning. I don't know if they're held by strong magnets or snap buttons.

The vest (my beloved 😩) is made from flocked velvet in a paisley pattern, the front hems embellished with satin piping. It closes in the front with custom metal clasps that are riveted into the garment. The D parts are attached with what seems to me like wide elastic, which would lessen the pression on the clasps when moving around a lot. The back is made from two different types of fabric, I'd have to touch it to be able to tell you what they are. I assume the panels closer to the sides have some mild stretch to them. The top of the shoulders are decorated with Impera grucifix patches.

The shirts were not custom made for the ghouls, altho they were altered. The original shirt in the vintage painter linen shirt from Punk Rave and it is still being sold. Some of the cuffs were altered, removing the ruffles for some of the ghouls, but not all. They were removed for Dew, Mountain and Phantom, Aether's didn't have them either. As far as I can tell, all the ghoulettes still have them.

An unfinished piece of linen serves as an ascot, that piece is decorated with a metal devil skull. The colour of the skull doesn't appear to be consistent between each ghoul, Dew's looks gold almost bronze while Phantom's is a silver-like colour.

Another modification is the buttons, a small portion of them were removed in favor of our Impera buttons. Some of the ghouls have more buttons replaced than others, which is still a mystery to me.

The pants are called Jodhpurs, they were invented in the 1800s as horse riding pants. The wide part at the hips and thighs allowing for better movement. The ones the ghouls wear don't reach all the way to their ankles, they stop a bit past the calf muscle, hidden by the boots. (Yes, the ghouls are effectively wearing capri pants)

The boots are motorcycle riding boots, decorated by a grucifix. Like the shirt, they can still be bought online through the All American Boots website, altho the price tag is... Headache inducing to say the least.

The cape is a piece of costume that was only briefly worn on stage by the ghouls, Aurora being the only one who still wears one. I would assume it gets in the way of playing very easily. The cape itself is made of two fabrics, a light blue satin and a dark grey suede. The two pieces are not sewn together at the bottom, they move freely from each other. The cape is attached on the left shoulder with a harness piece that has one strap across the chest, decorated with a metal buckle, and one under the armpit.

Aight that's it for me, have a nice day byyyyye!!

[markrosewater]

You often say something akin to "If you don't like something Magic has done, don't build a deck with it", but that ignores the actual problem. If I don't like something in the game, I don't want to PLAY against it either. I can't control what other people play but if the things I detest keep getting made, and at a higher and higher power level, the idea of just not putting them in my own personal deck doesn't solve anything. This is doubly true with things that are competitive or exclusively with strangers, ie Arena or FNM.

Let’s me try to approach this from a slightly different vantage point. One of the core things about Magic is that it constantly reinvents itself. Much like how we design the game, it iteratively adapts.

That means we try something and then the audience, the collective whole of all the players, gives us feedback. Note, for the rest of this answer, I’m going to use the word “players”, but I’m using that word to mean the totality of everyone playing. If it’s something players like, we make more of it. If it’s something players dislike, we make less of it. If players despise it, we don’t do it again.

My example for the last point was ante. For those unfamiliar, ante made you play an extra card exiled from the game which the winner permanently took from the other player if they won. The game started with ante as a core part of the rules. Originally, it was the default. You had to opt out of it.

Players hated it. Hated, hated, hated it. I remember, whenever you would meet a stranger, you had to start by saying “no ante”. It didn’t take long for the game to reject ante. Eventually, we even banned all the ante cards in every tournament format.

Part of the social contract of playing Magic is agreeing to experience what the players want in the game. Yes, you can build your deck however you wish, but other people get to do the same.

This means if something exist in any volume, it exists because the players want it to exist. If the players didn’t want it, like ante, the will of the players would force it from the game.

A common note I get on Blogatog is “I don’t like thing X. Can we please remove thing X from Magic? Thank you.”

My answer is always some form of this: The players (again the totality of the players) have said that this is something they want in the game. It’s now part of the game because people want it to be.

This means being part of Magic means to signing up to anything the players have said they wanted. I keep focusing on how you can control what you play with, but yes, part of being in the Magic ecosystem is the agreement that each player gets to play with the parts of the game they enjoy most.

So, let’s talk Universes Beyond. The reason we tried it in the first place was because we had data that made us think players would like it. That’s what R&D does. We extrapolate based on player feedback and try new things.

The players will embrace or reject it. If they embrace it, we’ll make more. If they reject it, we make less of it. If they reject strongly, we might never make it again. Look at March of the Machine Aftermath. The players hated it, and we excised it from our future plans (surprisingly quickly, by the way).

Why are we making more Universes Beyond? Because the players are saying loudly that they want it to be part of the game. The best selling Secret Lairs of all time are Universes Beyond. The best selling Commander decks of all time are Universes Beyond. The best selling large booster release of all time is Universes Beyond. It’s not “sets” because we’ve only ever released one.

It’s not just sales. We do market research. Market research also strongly says players want Universes Beyond. Note, each individual player wants specific ones, but the collective data is they want it.

We also look at data about what creates the biggest online discussions. Universes Beyond rules supreme there as well.

I could go on and on. There are many metrics we look at to reflect the will of the people, and Universes Beyond is crushing it in (almost) every metric.

My point is Universes Beyond follows the pattern of every new thing we’ve tried. We try it in small samples and then increase its usage as the players show acceptance.

Why do you have to play against it? Because, by being a Magic player, you accept the will of the people. You accept that part of being a member of the community is allowing the community, as a whole, to dictate what the game is.

It doesn’t want ante, but it definitely wants Universes Beyond.

That’s why you have to play against it.

[dailyadventureprompts]

Monsters Reimagined: Bandits

As a game of heroic fantasy that centers so primarily on combat, D&D  is more often than not a game about righteous violence, which is why I spend so much time thinking about the targets of that violence. Every piece of media made by humans is a thing created from conscious or unconscious design, it’s saying something whether or not its creators intended it to do so. 

Tolkien made his characters peaceloving and pastoral, and coded his embodiment of evil as powerhungry, warlike, and industrial. When d&d directly cribbed from Tolkien's work it purposely changed those enemies to be primitive tribespeople who were resentful of the riches the “civilized” races possessed. Was this intentional? None can say, but as a text d&d says something decidedly different than Tolkien. 

That's why today I want to talk about bandits, the historical concept of being an “outlaw”, and how media uses crime to “un-person” certain classes of people in order to give heroes a target to beat up. 

Tldr: despite presenting bandits as a generic threat, most d&d scenarios never go into detail about what causes bandits to exist, merely presuming the existence of outlaws up to no good that the heroes should feel no qualms about slaughtering. If your story is going to stand up to the scrutiny of your players however, you need to be aware of WHY these individuals have been driven to banditry, rather than defaulting to “they broke the law so they deserve what’s coming to them.”

I got to thinking about writing this post when playing a modded version of fallout 4, an npc offhndedly mentioned to me that raiders (the postapoc bandit rebrand) were too lazy to do any farming and it was good that I’d offed them by the dozens so that they wouldn’t make trouble for those that did. 

That gave me pause, fallout takes place in an irradiated wasteland where folks struggle to survive but this mod was specifically about rebuilding infrastructure like farms and ensuring people had enough to get by. Lack of resources to go around was a specific justification for why raiders existed in the first place, but as the setting became more arable the mod-author had to create an excuse why the bandit’s didn’t give up their violent ways and start a nice little coop, settling on them being inherently lazy , dumb, and psychopathic.   

This is exactly how d&d has historically painted most of its “monstrous humanoid” enemies. Because the game is ostensibly about combat the authors need to give you reasons why a peaceful solution is impossible, why the orcs, goblins, gnolls (and yes, bandits), can’t just integrate with the local town or find a nice stretch of wilderness to build their own settlement on and manage in accordance with their needs. They go so far in this justification that they end up (accidently or not) recreating a lot of IRL arguments for persecution and genocide.

Bandits are interesting because much like cultists, it’s a descriptor that’s used to unperson groups of characters who would traditionally be inside the “not ontologically evil” bubble that’s applied to d&d’s protagonists.   Break the law or worship the wrong god says d&d and you’re just as worth killing as the mindless minions of darkness, your only purpose to serve as a target of the protagonist’s righteous violence.  

The way we get around this self-justification pitfall and get back to our cool fantasy action game is to relentlessly question authority, not only inside the game but the authors too. We have to interrogate anyone who'd show us evil and direct our outrage a certain way because if we don't we end up with crusades, pogroms, and Qanon.

With that ethical pill out of the way, I thought I’d dive into a listing of different historical groups that we might call “Bandits” at one time or another and what worldbuilding conceits their existence necessitates. 

Brigands: By and large the most common sort of “bandit” you’re going to see are former soldiers left over from wars, often with a social gap between them and the people they’re raiding that prevents reintegration ( IE: They’re from a foreign land and can’t speak the local tongue, their side lost and now they’re considered outlaws, they’re mercenaries who have been stiffed on their contract).  Justifying why brigands are out brigading is as easy as asking yourself “What were the most recent conflicts in this region and who was fighting them?”. There’s also something to say about how a life of trauma and violence can be hard to leave even after the battle is over, which is why you historically tend to see lots of gangs and paramilitary groups pop up in the wake of conflict. 

Raiders:  fundamentally the thing that has caused cultures to raid eachother since the dawn of time is sacristy. When the threat of starvation looms it’s far easier to justify potentially throwing your life away if it means securing enough food to last you and those close to you through the next year/season/day. Raider cultures develop in biomes that don’t support steady agriculture, or in times where famine, war, climate change, or disease make the harvests unreliable. They tend to target neighboring cultures that DO have reliable harvests which is why you frequently see raiders emerging from “the barbaric frontier” to raid “civilization” that just so happens to occupy the space of a reliably fertile river valley. When thinking about including raiders in your story, consider what environmental forces have caused this most recent and previous raids, as well as consider how frequent raiding has shaped the targeted society. Frequent attacks by raiders is how we get walled palaces and warrior classes after all, so this shit is important. 

Slavers: Just like raiding, most cultures have engaged in slavery at one point or another, which is a matter I get into here. While raiders taking captives is not uncommon, actively attacking people for slaves is something that starts occurring once you have a built up slave market, necessitating the existence of at least one or more hierarchical societies that need more disposable workers than then their lower class is capable of providing. The roman legion and its constant campaigns was the apparatus by which the imperium fed its insatiable need for cheap slave labor. Subsistence raiders generally don’t take slaves en masse unless they know somewhere to sell them, because if you’re having trouble feeding your own people you’re not going to capture more ( this is what d&d gets wrong about monstrous humanoids most of the time). 

Tax Farmers: special mention to this underused classic, where gangs of toughs would bid to see who could collect money for government officials, and then proceed to ransack the realm looking to squeeze as much money out of the people as possible. This tends to happen in areas where the state apparatus is stretched too thin or is too lighthanded to have established enduring means of funding.  Tax farmers are a great one-two punch for campaigns where you want your party to be set up against a corrupt authority: our heroes defeat the marauding bandits and then oh-no, turns out they were not only sanctioned by the government but backed by an influential political figure who you’ve just punched in the coinpurse.  If tax farming exists it means the government is strong enough to need a yearly budget but not so established (at least in the local region) that it’s developed a reliably peaceful method of maintaining it.  

Robber Baron: Though the term is now synonymous with ruthless industrialists, it originated from the practice of shortmidned petty gentry (barons and knights and counts and the like) going out to extort and even rob THEIR OWN LANDS out of a desire for personal enrichment/boredom. Schemes can range from using their troops to shake down those who pass through their domain to outright murdering their own peasants for sport because you haven’t gotten to fight in a war for a while.  Just as any greed or violence minded noble can be a robber baron so it doesn’t take that much of a storytelling leap but I encourage you to channel all your landlord hate into this one. 

Rebels: More than just simple outlaws, rebels have a particular cause they’re a part of (just or otherwise) that puts them at odds with the reigning authority. They could violently support a disfavoured political faction, be acting out against a law they think is unjust, or hoping to break away from the authority entirely. Though attacks against those figures of authority are to be expected, it’s all too common for rebels to go onto praying on common folk for the sake of the cause.  To make a group of rebels worth having in your campaign pinpoint an issue that two groups of people with their own distinct interests could disagree on, and then ratchet up the tension. Rebels have to be able to beleive in a cause, so they have to have an argument that supports them.

Remnants: Like a hybrid of brigands, rebels, and taxfarmers, Remnants represent a previously legitimate system of authority that has since been replaced but not yet fully disappeared. This can happen either because the local authority has been replaced by something new (feudal nobles left out after a monarchy toppling revolution) or because it has faded entirely ( Colonial forces of an empire left to their own devices after the empire collapses). Remnants often sat at the top of social structures that had endured for generations and so still hold onto the ghost of power ( and the violence it can command) and the traditions that support it.  Think about big changes that have happened in your world of late, are the remnants looking to overturn it? Win new privilege for themselves? Go overlooked by their new overlords?

Art

[miwiheroes]

Light = Truth

So this whole Byler post is literally just based off something that my friend who has a studies film at school said to me about lighting. Me and my friends do a presentation night like every few months and obviously my hyperfixation atm is byler so I did '10 reasons why I think byler could be canon'. My friends were convinced by the end btw, which is fun (and they kept pointing out yellow and blue things afterwards i loved life), but they also contributed so many things that I have never even considered or seen on byler tumblr before.

For example, my friend who studies film (btw we aren't just kids who like movies or smth, we are adults studying film lmao), stopped me during my presentation because I wasn't talking about lighting choices that were super clear.

I guess you can take what they said with a grain of salt because they aren't like, a professional ig, but they said that so many times during film, light is symbolic to mean truth. And it's like... oh my god. Suddenly, after they said that, everything made sense. Of course, light means truth in all these scenes! So I just want to point out two Byler/ Mike is gay moments that I think are related to this:

Light in the Closet tm

Hello??? Why is there a light in the closet here, not just to draw ur attention towards it, but also to symbolise something. Who tf has a light in their closet unless its massive, and why would it even be on in this scene?

The truth is, you're in the closet, Michael. We've all seen these images before and how he has his eyes open, yada yada, but the light literally means truth here, and its framed on his head, like he's thinking of the truth.

In literally the first scene in season 4 with Mike, as we know, we see a closet. That's almost comical. Not only that, but the light is on. Meaning, the truth is, Mike's still in the closet, again it's framed near his head. (Pair this with the one way sign, it's very obvious what they're trying to say here)

Let's talk about this image right here:

First of all, the light is literally shining out of the closet, not just in a blurry fashion, but it's literally a ray of light pointing at Mike who's standing in front of it. This being in the very first scene with Mike in it sets up the sort of arc he has in season 4, the fact that the truth is he's in the closet, but the one way sign shows he's still in it.

I showed this image to my friends during the presentation and the one I mentioned earlier also said that the set designers put the lamp where it is for a reason as well. The lamp in Mike's room is, of course, lighting up Will's drawings on his notice board as well as the buff guy posters. So, his true feelings are that... he likes men. Yah

2. Lights on Will

In the Van scene, everyone knows about how they spent a reallyyyy long time getting the lighting just correct, and if it was meant to mean truth, it all makes sense. (Also to get that heart in Will's eye lmao)

In this shot, (not particularly this frame but yknow) Will is literally bathed in sunlight, and it could just mean that Mike's seeing him in this light because he's pretty to him or something, or it could mean that Will's literally telling the truth/ Will is Mike's truth. Playing D&D and Nintendo for the rest of their lives is really what he wants, as established in season 3.

(my fave byler scene yes pls) When I showed this photo to my friends in my presentation, my film studies friend literally laughed. Yes, it is very very clear what they are trying to tell viewers here. The light is purposefully shining perfectly on Will only. Mike is completely cut off from the light and is in the dark. Some think that it's because he's 'in the dark about Will's feelings' (and yeah he is) but I think it's because by the end of season 4, Will has kind of admitted the truth to himself. He loves Mike, but Mike hasn't admitted his truth, that he loves Will.

However, we get clear foreshadowing for the next season in this scene because:

Mike reaches into the light, for the truth. It also foreshadows him supporting Will more in season 5 perhaps, but the fact that the next shot is this:

kind of just makes it super duper obvious that he's going to (very cheesy but) 'find his truth' or true feelings with Will/ in the next season.

Okay thanks for listening to me ramble about how light = truth, i would love to hear any other moments that could also mean the same thing :) Anyways, byler endgame.

[prokopetz]

Re: your post about genre limitations of D&D

There was like a ton of d20 games back then, from browsing forums it feels like half of genres and IPs got their d20 book printed, and the other half got some homebrew.

Did it carry the genre implications of D&D itself? Was it something subtle or did it straight up feel like reskinned D&D? If yes, is this because the implications are that deep mechanically, or simply because the authors didn't do enough hacking?

The thing you need to understand about the d20 System renaissance is that the overwhelming majority of licensed d20 System games genuinely do not give a shit whether Dungeons & Dragons is a good fit for them or not. Indeed, many were created with the explicit understanding that it isn't, and no intention of trying to address that in any way. The bulk of such adaptations exist for one of two reasons:

The author and/or IP owner wanted to publish a worldbuilding bible for their setting (or, in the case of a television franchise, an episode guide), but getting people to pay money for a worldbuilding bible or episode guide is hard. However, if you take that exact same worldbuilding bible, staple some game mechanics to the side of it, and call it a licensed RPG, nerds will line up to buy it. Most worldbuilding-bibles-pretending-to-be-RPGs use the d20 System because the OGL allows you to copy and paste D&D's rules into your product verbatim, which cuts down on development costs.

A media franchise with an existing tabletop RPG wanted to get a foot in the door with the D&D crowd, so they bashed together a d20 System version of their core rulebook as a marketing gimmick, gambling that some non-zero percentage of D&D players who tried it would be interested enough to check out the non-d20 System game it's adapted from. In this case, the d20 System version doesn't need to be good, or even playable, because its purpose isn't to be played – it just needs to exist.

Hasbro, for their part, encourages all this because it reinforces the popular perception that Dungeons & Dragons can do anything, and that's worth more than the relatively tiny number of players they're likely to poach. The fact that half of them are unplayable copied-and-pasted garbage which exist only for marketing purposes and the other half boil down to logistics-driven dungeon crawling with a thin veneer of the licensed setting painted over it just isn't terribly important.

(To anticipate a variety of inevitable responses, please note that no part of this post remarks on the merits of Dungeons & Dragons as a game; I'm talking about marketing here, not game design.)

[yumecel]

Closer to God ❤️

yandere wriothesley / reader | 3k words

summary: the duke finds himself fascinated with you. to an almost unhealthy degree. scratch that, it is unhealthy. but in the underground world of vitamin D deficiencies, questionable mystery meats, and near-agoraphobia towards the overworld, does the “health” of one’s desires really matter so much?

character specifics: uhhh i think nothing but so heavily written from reader’s perspective that you may not feel his essence is fully Captured

reader specifics: female reader girl/she/wife terms

world specifics: i have no idea how fontaines legal system works and it will show. hinted matchmaker sigewinne but don’t hate her

tws: yandere, non con kissing, stalking

a/n: i could chew through fucking steel right now i am so full of lust and felt possessed to write something to this iconic song despite there being NO ACTUAL SMUT sorry.

i promise i’m 18+, i promise i’m okay with seeing dark content, i know this will haunt me in the world to come should i lie [yes⬇️] [no↩️]

——❤️——

You have been instructed to deliver his tea. The box feels like it’s more valuable than your entire existence, all gold-trimmed edges and swirling designs. That’s probably why it was entrusted into your hands when the usual runners are preoccupied.

Probably.

But it’s the third errand this week, and it seems so unnecessary for you personally to run it. And your sentence will be over in six weeks. And seeing the Duke now only makes your anxiety spike, lest you stumble straight into a crime you wouldn’t even know you were committing and somehow end up extending your sentence.

He’s not like that. Surely not. But you’ve been worrying.

Something in his bone-chilling gaze towards you betrays his casual demeanour. It’s the same something in the forced lingering, the excuses. The ways that he swindles you into staying in his office for an hour or two when you want to leave. Today is no different. One of the teas comes such a long way, you see, all the way from Inazuma, and you must indulge in a cup and let him know your opinion on it. Is it similar to the last one from Liyue? They have different methods of drying out the leaves. Did you drink any of it when you were in the overworld?

You always answer his questions the best you can. It’s easiest when they’re all small talk like this, and you’re not trying to play oblivious at his advances. There’s going to be a further advance soon, you can feel it.

It’s six weeks until the end of your sentence and Wriothesley’s interest in you seems foolish. With a little luck, you’ll never return to the Fortress of Meropide in your life. You did everything right, you deserve to leave, surely?

But you know that Wriothesley is no fool, and that he would not be playing these games so boldly if he was not certain to win.

——❤️——

Eleven months ago, you didn’t make much conversation with anyone in the prison. You did what you always thought you should do in a prison; kept your head down, worked hard, and didn’t associate too intimately with anyone.

Ten months ago, you had started to assume Sigewinne pitied you, or whatever the closest melusine approximation to “pity” was. Somehow designated to running errands for the infirmary, you talked to her more than any of the prisoners. Though you were grateful for her support, you kept displaying the autonomy and dignity that would let her know you were of the composition that didn’t desire company. It wouldn’t fool a melusine as observant as Sigewinne. You knew this. But you persisted, holding onto shreds of pride.

Nine months ago, Sigewinne had managed to get you to open up. You had believed at the time you were contributing to her understanding of human emotions, but now you suspect that she had motives of helping you.

“As for why I don’t really talk to anyone outside of working, well, I… I’m still processing everything. I feel like people won’t accept what I did, and get the same pushback I felt from people up there and I just… can’t relive that. People that I thought would understand didn’t, and it’s been difficult to recover trust in others.”

Sigewinne’s eyes examined you thoroughly. You maintained a perfectly still expression, under the impression that her observations of your face were for her research.

“Hmm… what if someone was guaranteed to understand you?

You took a little time to think before answering, “I think it would help. But I doubt I would personally pursue someone like that.”

“You wouldn’t?” Sigewinne queried.

“I wouldn’t. And I don’t know where I would find someone who understood.”

“Where indeed…” she whispered, more to herself than you, eyes flitting back to yours. A slight raise of the eyebrows indicated that she had come to a conclusion about something, and you weren’t sure about what. You were just happy to help, and it didn’t occur how deeply you had revealed your emotions until later.

Eight months ago, you had started running errands for Wriothesley. This followed a mixup with your records, where Sigewinne accepted blame for not filing your work hours accurately as your manager. The Duke himself had to personally review your entire record in prison to confirm that there were no inconsistencies. You were a little embarrassed by the whole thing, though Sigewinne insisted she was entirely at fault and deeply sorry. You didn’t blame her as it was an exceedingly rare mistake on her part. If anything, you were a little touched that Sigewinne cared so deeply about this. Also, the apology cake from the overworld certainly washed away any remaining feelings of irritation you held.

Eventually, you found yourself walking into the Duke’s office like Sigewinne had told you to, hands clasped in front of you. “Sigewinne sent me, Your Grace.”

“Oh, (Y/N). Thank you for coming along. I just need you to read some documents and sign them.” He said, motioning to three papers on his desk.

Hearing your name spill from his mouth so casually felt surreal. Nevertheless, you took timid steps forward and examined the documents.

“Sigewinne speaks highly of you, you know.”

Unsure how exactly to respond, you paused for a moment. “I’m glad she does, Your Grace.”

You continued examining the documents, quickly signing the first one off.

“If you wouldn’t mind, I need someone trustworthy to help me hand some medical records to Sigewinne for me. Well, maybe “hand” is an understatement.”

In your peripheral vision, you catch the way he gestures towards some boxes, more than one person could reasonably move at a time.

Ink meets paper on the second document.

“Of course. I’d be more than willing to help.”

“Ah, great. Our head nurse is capable, but I’d just feel bad making her carry these on her own.”

“Yes, I understand.”

“I knew you would.” The Duke says.

Silence hangs in the air. You pull the final document closer towards you to interrupt the unbearable quiet. Eventually, you make the final signature and turn around, moving towards the boxes.

The files look rather haphazardly thrown in, papers sticking out from their respective folders. That’s when the Duke approaches from behind, placing a hand gently on your shoulder. Not expecting the touch, you jump slightly, and then pretend to act like it never happened. He felt it though. He couldn’t have not felt it.

“Also, maybe you could do me another favour and help me sort these before we give them back to her?”

There is nothing else to do other than nod and say, “Of course, Your Grace.”

Eight months ago you learned that the Duke is exceptionally chatty around you. Eight months ago, your work became more divided between his office and Sigewinne’s infirmary.

Seven months ago, you had first divulged information about your crime to the Duke.

“What are you in for?” is a common enough question in the Fortress of Meropide. His Grace has never asked you it, and he wouldn’t need to either. And yet, his speech is peppered with implications about your crime that you can either refute or accept. You had dodged every hidden question artfully, and he would be very blatant about acknowledging this, saying you didn’t have to answer if you didn’t want to. Comforted by this, you had started trusting him.

Seven months ago, you had started trusting Wriothesley, and that had been a mistake.

Of course he already knew your crime. How could he not? A murder in self defence is quite a notable trial in the overworld regardless, and nothing in the underworld slips past Wriothesley.

You may have been a free woman if it was simpler. If the man in that alleyway had been less beloved by his community, if you had not ran away from the crime in fear, if you submitted evidence at the time, if being dragged back to Fontaine was never part of the ordeal. If it hadn’t divided the people around you over whether you should’ve really did it.

If they just understood.

You accepted the sentence nonetheless. Evading the court is a crime in itself, and in that respect you could be considered a prolific criminal.

Sat in his office, you had retold the tale.

Wriothesley understood.

——❤️——

Six months ago, you had entertained the thought of Wriothesley as a fling.

Your heart wanted emotional connection, your brain knew it would be unreasonable to pursue a long term relationship. And your pussy really just liked the idea of him pinning you down and fucking you like an animal.

Some of his little gestures towards you supported this notion. A hand on the small of your back, maybe going a little low, the warmth of his presence behind you. The leering that’d stop when you picked your head up, but you still caught in reflections and out of the corner of your eye. The occasional innuendos. Wriothesley is fairly down-to-earth all the time, but with you, some more primal desires seep through.

But sometimes, it was different. The way he’d sweep hair away from your face. The possessiveness around you when other prisoners- now seemingly assuming you were a member of staff rather than an actual prisoner- talked to you. Always played off as professionalism. And the endless desire to know exactly what you were up to, inside and out.

Noting this, you were a little less reciprocative of his hints, afraid of feelings being hurt. He seemed to accept it. You were friends now. You knew about his crimes, which he had confided to you in private. He knew everything there was to know about yours. You would come to chat over tea. You continued working with Sigewinne, but saw her less. Wriothesley dominated most of your waking moments.

But the possessiveness didn’t stop, and the curiosity was starting to become intrusive.

——❤️——

Four months ago, you had learned that Wriothesley personally went through all of your mail.

All mail of yours was immediately forwarded to his office, where it would be opened and sent back to the mailroom. You had only found this out when you wandered into the mailroom and inquired about the mail, expecting a monthly letter from your family that was a little late.

“Oh, I take it she’s one of your patients? All of that mail gets forwarded to the Duke first. Guess there was a contraband incident or something. Anyway, don’t have it.”

It was information the attendant would have never divulged to you if he realised who you were. You blended in so well as a member of staff that people had started to see you as a nursing attendant before anything else. The clothes you now wore that treaded the line between prisoner and staff member were another layer of this disguise, courtesy of Wriothesley. Now, it was working against him.

Despite how perturbed you were, you managed a, “Oh, thank you for telling me.”, and immediately darted towards Wriothesley’s office, knocking with a shaking hand before you heard him telling you to come in.

“How nice it is to see you on your day off. Take it you missed me?” He said, closing his book and getting up to get another cup. It’s like a routine to him, and one he’s very comfortable doing.

“Well, I do have a reason to be here.”

“Cold. Well, let me pour you a cup, and you can tell me all about it. It’s Chenyu adeptea today.”

After getting seated and engaging in a few pleasantries with him, you pose your question, about if what you heard in the mailroom was really true.

He doesn’t deny it.

With a piercing gaze that doesn’t deviate from yours, he says, “Hm. I didn’t want to worry you at the time, but dangerous contraband came through in a parcel addressed to you a couple months back, and I’ve been going through it ever since.”

A reasonable explanation, you suppose. But why keep it from you this long? Surely he must understand this is a betrayal of your trust?

You remain quiet, still trying to process everything.

“My apologies if your feelings are hurt, but I acted in your best interests. I promise that.”

Your fingers glide along the edge of the teacup. “That’s alright. I shouldn’t have doubted your reasoning.”

You finish the cup of tea over lighter conversation, until just before leaving, you pose one last question.

“Ah, uh, you don’t go through my outgoing mail too, right?”

Wriothesley chuckles dryly with a smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “There’s no reason to do that, is there?”

You’ve known him too long, been confined in his presence with nothing else to do but observe. His perceptiveness is second to none, but you’ve trained yourself. Dodging the question is suspicious. As you close the door to his office, there is no doubt in your mind that he reads every letter you send.

It didn’t surprise you that the mail attendant you first spoke to seemed to no longer work in the mailroom when you next approached it.

——❤️——

It was difficult to remain amicable after that, but you tried your best. Treading a thin line between not upsetting him (not that he’d ever show it) and not allowing him to encroach further on your personal life, you may as well have been walking on the edge of a knife.

The advances started again. He’s more demanding of your time. Sigewinne simply lets you off work to do whatever he demands. She seems to believe there’s something amusing in all of this, and you don’t dare confide in her about your discomfort around the Duke. You don’t think she’d be playing on your side.

Two months ago, he started getting far too touchy. He wants to be next to you, he finds any excuse to put a hand on you, rub your back, your shoulder, the top of your hand- all gestures of comfort that come across more like domination and marking territory. You don’t feel like you can tell him to stop. He has too much power, and you don’t wish to interfere with it. The reality of who he is seems more imposing than ever, and you steel yourself, trying to remain as professional and inoffensive as possible.

The clock ticks down. Less and less days to the end of your sentence.

——❤️——

Two weeks now remain of your time in the Fortress of Meropide.

“I think you might owe me something for that.” Wriothesley says.

You stare down at the cards scattered across the table, remnants of a finished game that Wriothesley had won. He looks slightly smug about it. It’s only been a few rounds, too. He’s often happy to play many more.

“Like what?”

“Something I’ve always wanted.”

You look up at him, seeing his hand beckon you closer. You get up slowly, carefully stepping around the table. He pats the sofa beside him and the world around you starts to feel dreamlike as you sit down.

His hand touches just under your chin, thumb stroking your jaw, before reaching up steadily to your lips. You know what comes next, and shut your eyes as his lips eventually meet yours. Obediently, you kiss back until he pulls away. When your eyes meet, you immediately look down, observing how his hand was now on your thigh, touching lightly.

You gasp as he squeezes, feeling his gaze remain on you. “I… I’m not sure if we should be doing this. I’m l-leaving soon, and I don’t want anyone’s feelings to get hurt.”

“Leaving to where?”

Your blood runs a little cold then, but you steady yourself. “The overworld.”

“You don’t have to.”

Making an earnest attempt to get him to sympathise with you, to understand like he always has, you place your own hand on top of his. “I think I do. I’ve served my sentence with the intention of getting out of this place. I need to go back up. Reintegrate before I forget how.”

Wriothesley doesn’t understand.

When you look up, he’s now looking right through you, into space, into nothingness. “I guess you’re not going to make this easy.”

“I don’t understand what you mean.” You say, roughly swallowing. Against your will, you do understand. You always do.

“We’re made for each other. Circumstance is a powerful thing, (Y/N). If it wasn’t for circumstance, you wouldn’t be in jail. You wouldn’t be like me. I wouldn’t be here either. Two people, who can perfectly understand each other, in the same place. But I suppose you don’t think that’s something worth pursuing?”

“I can’t be here forever.” You reply definitively.

“Don’t exaggerate things, now. I do go up to Fontaine every now and then, you know.”

“You know what I mean.”

Wriothesley sighs.

“I guess I can have your sentence extended. I didn’t want to play that card, but…”

“I- I’ll report you to any authority that will listen!” You exclaim, retracting away from him in horror.

“And it’ll be your word against mine. Wonder how that would work out.” He states, as if he was simply pondering the results of the card game.

Tears have started falling from your eyes. A wave of nausea rolls over your entire body as a thumb gently swipes over your cheeks. You’re utterly stunned and lost for words, slowly collapsing into yourself. Wriothesley takes the opportunity to inch closer and wrap his arms around you, letting you freely sob into his shoulder. There is nothing else to do. His arms are like a prison, and his hot breath is tickling against your ear.

“You’ll understand in time. For now, let’s calm down and maybe we can start preparing for your permanent residence, huh?”

As another sob emerges, his hand rubs your back with overwhelming tenderness.

[canmom]

a polemic

every so often you see a conversation on this website that goes like this:

based story game enjoyer: D&D is a limiting game because of xyz design assumptions. cringe D&D fan: actually I changed these assumptions by editing the game to fit my group's needs. it works pretty good. story game chad, closing in for the kill: have you considered playing the perfectly designed game for your scenario that surely exists out there in the indie game milieu? you wouldn't have to homebrew. you'd be having better fun. foolish and wrong D&D incel: but I am already having fun with "modified D&D" and I don't particularly see a need to do that thing you said. wise story game sage, a single tear rolling down their perfectly sculpted face: do you not see that defending D&D, the product printed by Hasbro Inc., by pointing out that you can modify it, is self-defeating? tragic. there is no hope for these people. 42069 notes

along such lines, i saw someone today refer to homebrew in TTRPGs pejoratively as 'unpaid game design' and like. my fucking god guys. i don't love D&D-as-printed either but you've lost the plot.

not only is it good to modify the games you play and make them your own, it is inevitable. nobody ever plays TTRPGs exactly 'by the book', it's always filtered through the dynamic of the group. yes, even in those games that literally tell you exactly what to say like the quiet year or whatever.

you will ignore rules and guidelines. you will put your own interpretation on the wording of this or that rule. you will develop your own rhythms and at some point, yes, you can, will, and should change the rules to better fit whatever you're doing with the game.

the designer may throw up their hands and say "you are no longer playing Sorcerer By Ron Edwards, you are playing some other game! you're messing up my perfectly tuned mechanism!"

let them. it's an understandable frustration, perhaps, but once the game is in the hands of the players, the designer has had their say.

play the game you want to play, even - especially - if you have to invent it. use whatever tools you find useful to help you get there - whether that's a printed RPG book, a blog post, a memory of another game, a story that inspires you. maybe you want to take some existing and familiar system, such as PbtA, and adapt it - awesome (I reckon 95% of indie game designers pretty much do this). maybe you want to start from scratch and make a bespoke system for that one story - also awesome.

'this book requires a lot of work to adapt into something decent' is a fair criticism. 'nobody even plays this game by the book, so it's a bad game' is dogmatism. what game do they play? how do they learn to play it? what function is the book providing in that game? if you want to criticise a game, you need to talk about actual practice. there can be plenty to criticise there, for sure. but that's where you gotta start.

and sure, if someone wants to design a game, particularly to print, I would definitely recommend they look beyond D&D for inspiration. there are some really fucking cool and creative indie games that come up with wild ways to approach 'making up a story through a game' that I'd never have imagined. very often it's fun to follow a designer's frame and discover something new.

but don't make a fucking religion of it lmao.

[aoi1dee]

Alexander (Alex) Morello :D

Ah yes here is my very handsome olnf MC

also...

HIP HIP HOORAYYY 101 FOLLOWERS tysm <3333

okay now here he is...

This is Alex in step 1 !! he is a very shy and fear filled kid. Basically anything can make him overthink and believe bad things are going to happen. He's been like this since he was just a little boy :(

His fears also causes his social anxiety. If someone looks at him the wrong way, he's already walking away as fast as he can with watery eyes because he believes that that person hates him. Because of this, he grew up having a hard time making friends + no one really wanted to be his friend. According to other kids, "he is super weird and too much to handle. I don't want him clinging onto me when he's scared"

No one (not even his own mama) knows why he is afraid of everything he doesn't even know himself. Alexander wishes that he could be able to do fun things like all the other kids and not have his brain tell him all of the things that could go wrong.

Though when he meets Qiu and Tamarack, something flips in him. Though he is still scared of doing anything, he is willing to get over those fears if either one of them wants him to do it. He wants to make his two new (and first) friends happy!

(here is the full body design)

moving onto step 2...

Thanks to his two besties (and crushes) Alex is finally able to do the stuff he always wanted to do! Like go skateboarding by himself or order himself food at a restaurant (even though it takes him a little bit) But sadly that doesn't mean that those thoughts are still there. They are.

Alexander and his Ma were finally able to put a name to why he feels like everything is out to get him.. Anxiety~ So all of those thoughts about "what if this happens" "or what if I do this" are still there but they don't affect him as much as they used to.

Because of this, Alex was able to find some things that he was into. He realized that he really loved films and wanted to make some himself! He has a current obsession with horror movies though. If you asked him how many times he has watched Scream he wouldn't be able to tell you. (because he is embarrassed about how many times he has watched it.) But he has also taken Bass guitar lessons! He carries his bass guitar around everywhere (even if he doesn't need it).

As he grew older though, certain things start to bother him. He is always comparing himself to others. While his two neighbors have perfectly clear skin, his face his covered in acne. The way he walks is weird, the way he talks his weird. Everything about him is weird according to his own mind. He's just never pleased with himself. Even after all of these years, the thoughts about wanting to be normal still torture him. Why does he have to have anxiety? Why does he still have trouble with talking to others?

All of those thoughts fly away as soon as he talks to Qiu and Tam. He still will do anything for them but those feelings when he was younger starting growing into actual teenage crushes. Every single thing that those two will do can make his face turn red. Both of them are just so pretty!

here is the full body drawing of alex...

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ah yes.. if you compared Alex when he is 18 to Alex when he was 10 there was an absolute clear difference between them.

As Alex grew even older and went through those high school years, he was finally diagnosed with an Anxiety Disorder and is taking meds for it!! Now that his anxiety is finally at bay he started to realize a couple of things.. Why should he care about what other people think? Why does he have to dress for other people? Why was he afraid to be himself?

Though it took a little bit, Alex started to actually find himself. He already knew that he wanted to go to school for film and that he liked to play bass. But! He finally got the strength to join a band as their lead singer and bass guitarist! Even though this band is only planning on staying in Golden Grove, Alex is super proud of himself that he is doing this anyways.

Because of Alex slowly growing to be more confident about himself, it started to be seen by other people too. Other people started to see how beautiful Alex really is and he started to see it to!

And something extra funny, his personality ended up being a copycat of his Ma's. After being total best friends with his Ma his entire life, he ended up becoming exactly like his Mama with the way he stands, the way he talks, just anything is exactly like his Ma. (Though he is still a little shy)

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That's my MC!! If you made it this far tysm!! And I'm so sorry if it was difficult to read I was spilling all of this from my head to this post lol.

Byebye!!!

[pastabaguette]

Do you like making fan trolls, if yes, what are some commonalities between them

yes! :D

sorry for a bit of spam. i know i've posted some of these before, but i am posting them again here because i like them.

i like to keep their visual designs pretty simple. in general, i don't like making very cluttered character designs.

as for my fantrolls, i like to follow the original homestuck canon more than hiveswap/pesterquest. that way, there's more flexibility within each blood caste (not all goldbloods have vision twofold, etc). as in homestuck, i've tried to base each of them off of certain internet stereotypes. (for example, one is a crypto bro, although he isn't depicted here.)

i've got ancestors for a few of them (you can see two here, a lime and an indigo), although not every one of them will have dancestors. most won't be playing sburb/sgrub at all. (however, some will be in a comic some friends and i are working on!)

i do have more of them, but i'll keep them for another bigger fantroll post down the line. i'll share more details then.

[aziraphales-library]

Hi, hello! I remember seeing this really good one but I can't find it, if yall can turn the description to the public to take a look I'd seriously appreciate it!

Fair warning it's nsfw

It was, like, I think it counts as a pollen fic, technically? Crowley was cursed with an Asmodeus amulet of some kind (I believe the Metatron was the one to do it), and the curse was that if the afflicted individual engaged in lustful acts, they would die. But until then, they'd be consumed by an almost debilitating feeling in their body.

The only way to break it is, like, to sleep with someone whom they genuinely love, and who genuinely loves them back.

Crowley is too consumed by the pain of the curse, and is willing to die to get it to end. So he seeks out aziraphale practically and begs him to hook up. He knows it would kill him, because surely there's no way Aziraphale would love him back, but he can't take it anymore.

Aziraphale, on the other hand, stubbornly refuses. He thinks he's being selfish in doing so, because he doesn't want to lose Crowley. He's well aware of the type of curse this is, but according to his knowledge, demons can't feel love. To be with Crowley would mean his destruction, and Aziraphale can't even imagine it.

After stubborn argument from both parties, they confess their love for one another, and in utter relief, break the curse together.

I'm gonna make it an anon post so that it's not my main, but if anyone knows what it is you can reach my alt @dinoace-reblogs . If anyone can help me out please, I'd be super grateful! Have a lovely day :]

I believe you're looking for...

We Only Said Goodbye with Words, I Died A Hundred Times by ras_elased (E)

Aziraphale felt his cheeks flush pink. “Yes. Well. It appears to be a curse for a cheating lover. The design is to create an ever-increasing obsessive need for the person who—” “I’m well aware of what it does,” Crowley interrupted. Aziraphale glanced up from the book and took in Crowley’s stance, the apparent lax posture belied by the way he was clutching the edge of the countertop with white knuckles. Aziraphale swallowed. “Is it…” Aziraphale faltered, then tried again. “Is it…” painful is how he told himself he wanted to finish the question. There was no other possible word to end that question that Aziraphale wanted to know. “Don’t play dumb, angel. It doesn’t suit you.” Crowley’s voice was low, an edge of something to it that Aziraphale hadn’t heard since the Tadfield airbase, the moment Crowley was ready to give up and accept the apocalypse. He met Aziraphale’s eyes. “You know who I want.”

- Mod D

[milksnake-tea]

hello my favorite star rail writer i am back bc i saw you reached 1k followers (CONGRATS BTW I DIDNT SEE EARLIER BC I STARTED CLASSES) and im a sucker for mutual pining its sickening to see two ppl so in love and blade, so blade + fluff prompt 10 would be amazing :D

extra points if mc isnt a fellow stellaron hunter, like in my head reader is sighing dreamily while march 7th is all "thats a wanted criminal"

❀ ˎˊ- prompts: You two have been pining over each other for God knows how long, and your friends are sick of it. ❀ ˎˊ- 1k followers event ❀ ˎˊ- character: blade ❀ ˎˊ- warnings: none! just fluff :D ❀ ˎˊ- a/n: IM SORRY THE LAST PART MADE ME LAUGH SO BAD GOODBYE I LOVE THAT !!! also..... IT GOT KINDA CRACK IM SORRY GOODBYE IT'S LESS PINING MORE DAN HENG BEING DISAPPOINTED IN YOU

It wasn't often that Blade strayed outside the mission.

Just as the sword he wielded, Blade cut through his missions with precise cuts, following Elio's script like law. While Kafka and Silver Wolf would take liberties with their scripts, going off to shop or to fight, Blade stayed at his designated spot, staring blankly at the clock until he was called upon once more. He never did more, never did less.

So to see him gazing off into the distance, a hint of a smile on his face, was definitely out of the ordinary.

"What's on your mind, Bladie?" Kafka asked, her pupil-less eyes peering at her partner from behind her drink. "It's rare to see you so... restless. Has the mara been bothering you?"

Blade shook his head, a disgruntled sigh escaping him. His gaze reached past Kafka, focusing on the silhouette of your person as you chatted away with Dan Heng.

Kafka hummed, tilting her head as she played with her straw, mindlessly stirring her beverage. "Hm... Then is it them?"

Blade's fingers stilled. Kafka smiled, knowing she had hit the spot.

"So it is," she mused, stifling a giggle as Blade shot her an annoyed look.

"They're talking to him," Blade muttered, laying his hand flat against the table. Surprisingly, the mara did not strike, nor did Blade become irritated. His voice was gentle, soft like the breeze.

"Indeed they are," Kafka took a sip, licking her lips at the burn of alcohol. "Do you wish that was you, Bladie?"

Her teasing wasn't lost on the man, but he didn't bother with a reply.

"No," Blade murmured, resting his head in the palm of his hand. The artificial sunlight of the Xianzhou bathed you in a heavenly glow, your carefree laughter a sweet symphony. "I wouldn't dare disturb such beauty."

And yet, it seemed as though fate had glanced his way, just as you had. Your eyes met with his, and you smiled, waving at him. Blade's heart thudded in his chest, and for a moment, life returned to him.

His hand twitched, wanting to return your greetings, but the rough drag of his bandages stopped him. Blade averted his gaze, hiding his slowly flushing skin behind his palm.

Kafka snickered at his predicament, quickly snapping a photo of his flustered state and sending it to the other Stellaron Hunters. Instantaneously, Silver Wolf sent back a vomiting emoji, while Sam excitedly congratulated Blade on his newfound emotions. Elio didn't reply, he never does.

"Aren't you adorable," she cooed, turning her phone off and tucking it away. "You know, I doubt they'll mind if you just walked up to them."

Yes, you certainly wouldn't mind. However, your very disturbed friends would.

"What are you doing?" Dan Heng hissed as you waved to the Hunter, grabbing your wrist and snatching it down. "You know how dangerous that man is."

"But isn't he so cute?" you chuckled, the tips of your ears flushed. "Besides, he hasn't done anything to hurt me yet."

"Yet being the operative word," Dan Heng sighed in exasperation. "I hope you didn't forget how he threw a sword through me."

"I try not to think about it." You stretched back your arms. "Don't get your tail in a twist, Dan Heng. I'm just being friendly."

"That's not what your face says," Dan Heng commented, poking your cheek. "I can still see you mooning over him."

"I am not- mooning over him!" you objected, swatting his finger away. "I was just... thinking."

"Of course you are. Thinking of the man who stabbed me, that is."

"And he looked good doing it- Dan Heng!" you yelped as Dan Heng elbowed you. Your friend only crossed his arms, raising a brow at you as you glared at him. "Alright, alright, fine. I just- I know I shouldn't like him, but..."

"There's a but in this?"

"His arms are really toned, okay? Have you seen his muscles?"

Dan Heng gagged, pretending to throw up over the railing. "Far closer than I'd like to admit- Point being, he's a wanted criminal."

You stared blankly at him. "So?"

Dan Heng stared back. "What do you mean, 'so'?"

"I can fix him."

The only words you could use to describe Dan Heng's face was pure disappointment. Swiftly, he turned on his heel, and promptly walked away from you, quickening his steps as you chased after him.

"Hey! Where're you going so quickly-"

Dan Heng stopped for only a moment, his expression unreadable as he glanced back at you. "I don't talk to people who kiss wanted criminals."

You held up a finger. "To be fair, I haven't kissed him yet-"

"I'm leaving."

reblogs w comments are appreciated !!

[maximumzombiecreator]

What's your preferred system for megadungeon play? I tried to make one in 5e and while it was fun I really had to fight 5e's rules to make it work

Yeah, I had a similar experience when I ran a 5e megadungeon, and as I've mentioned in a few posts I've run Abomination Vaults in pathfinder 2e, and I think that system isn't good for megadungeons either.

Broadly, I think for megadungeons, I want a couple things from a system:

First, I want combat to be fairly quick. I think room restocking and wandering monsters are important, and I don't want to feel like I'm bogging things down with extra combat. I want easier combats to resolve in 5-10 minutes, not 20-30.

Second, I want meaningful attrition. If there are going to be easy fights, those easy fights still need to have stakes. The party should still want to avoid them if possible. This means resource management, difficult healing, injury systems, consumables, etc. Anything that is going to create a cost that small fights can incur even when death isn't on the table.

Third, I want good timekeeping. Making dungeon time matter is important. If dungeon time doesn't matter, it takes away a lot of decision points. When you're tracking every 10 minutes, the decision to stay in a room and rest / investigate / plan becomes significant, and that is going to drive interesting choices constantly.

Fourth, I want a good balance between the players having interesting tools to interact with the dungeon and the players being able to trivialize the dungeon. I like players getting access to spells like Spider Climb or Water Breathing that are going to allow them to interact with the dungeon in interesting ways. I do not like spells like Tiny Hut that take away interesting problems like finding safe places to rest. (And yes, I know that there's all kinds of advice on the internet for "dealing with" Tiny Hut, but I find most of it very adversarial in a way that I do not like at my table.)

I think any system that ticks those boxes is going to work fairly well. Most of my megadungeon experience is in AD&D 1st and 2nd edition, as well as OSRIC, which is just AD&D but someone has taken off its glasses and puts its hair down so you can see that it was beautiful all along. But I've done some megadungeoning in other OSR systems¹, and it always went well.

One thing I am actually eager to do is try out a megadungeon in a game that ticks those boxes but isn't a fantasy OSR game. NSR games, like Troika!, try to accomplish similar things to old school D&D but from more modern design sensibilities. I'd love to give them a shot. And I've been chewing on the idea of running a cyberpunk megadungeon in Cities Without Number for a while now.

But if I wanted to play it safe, I'd probably go with OSRIC or OSE. I know they'll do what I want.

¹ Old School Revival, a set of games and table practices focused on recreating the playstyle and vibe of OD&D / AD&D.