#you'll do great things!!!!!

[taexual]

hello! do you perhaps have any tips/advice for those starting their first writing blog?

hii! all i can say is believe in yourself and all that you create!! it is wonderful that you've made a decision to share your work with the world, but you don't owe anyone anything, so don't feel pressured, write and post at your own pace, and always stay confident about your ideas!! try not to feel discouraged if the response you get doesn't meet your expectations--write what you want to write and what you would want to read, and your audience will find you!!! 🤍

on more technical terms, get acquainted with the platform you'll use--whether it's tumblr or wattpad or anything else--namely how the tagging system works, because it's how you get your writing out there! you can also do a little field research and take notes of how other writers advertise and publish their works (what pictures / descriptions / warnings / other fandom-related terms they use, etc), but this is just to get a general idea of what's 'popular' right now. ultimately, how you decide to post your writing and what you want your posts to look like, is your choice!

chances are, you'll make a lot of great friends (i did!!!), so this should be a wonderful experience! 🥰🤍

[corpocyborg]

all of goro's ambient combat dialogue is stellar but i think my absolute favorite is when all the enemies are dead and he says "i have nothing more to add". like it's a business discussion that we're concluding. especially juxtaposed with how outright aggressive a lot of his other combat dialogue is it's just 🤌

[shikai-the-storyteller]

[soup-is-here]

Mouthwashing Spoilers

TW: Addiction and Self Harm

I wanna go on about Swansea's final monologue but it's hard to put into words, but I'm gonna try anyways cause it's a short, but strong story about autonomy again. This post ended up significantly longer than I wanted though

It's the autonomy to choose the "less healthy" option because it's appealing to you. It's the moral assignment to normality and stability. An alcoholic is an alcoholic by choice, technically, but do they owe us otherwise? Is it morally reprehensible to enjoy taking LSD at a party? Should we see someone as less than because they relax with a xanax instead of a hot shower? It's not healthy. We know that. We've seen anti-drug ad after ad after ad. But is that the part that's morally wrong, in and of itself? Does enjoying the drugs and chaos make Swansea a worse person?

Like him talking about his entire life and ending it by saying between the "stable" "normal" life and him waking up every morning with a new hangover, he preferred the latter. People always talk about getting clean and fixing their lives and Swansea did it! He did the thing "good men" do! A wife and kids and a trade job and sobriety! He was doing it! He was finally "worth" something!

And he hated it! I mean I don't know if he actually hated/despised it, but he misses his previous life. He misses drugs and partying and living like you might not wake up the next day. He said the thing that changed him was seeing himself dead in a ditch under the bright beam of a streetlight. Now he's looking down the barrel of a gun. And as he looks down it, he looks back. That was his preference. It felt good to be like that. And he wouldn't be here if he stayed there

We always have a narrative about drugs or gambling or sleeping around where a person suddenly realizes that they aren't "doing anything" with their life and becomes stable and it's always played like addiction is a false pleasure. Swansea got to the stability people said would be the real pleasure of life and that just wasn't true for him. One bad paycheck could've been the difference between his stable life and falling apart anyways. His lifestyle was going to kill him someday apparently, yet he's staring down the barrel of a gun at his steady trade job to feed his wife and kids.

I don't know quite how to word it but Swansea is the poster child for rehabilitation. There's this weight to him saying his alcoholic period was the best time of his life. Like it just hits at that pang that makes people wear DARE shirts while smoking weed and post those videos of smoking 100 cigarettes at once. Anti-vaping ads tell you about the damage they do to your body but everyone knows that already. Everyone knows "this is what your brain looks like on drugs." I smoke medical marijuana and it isn't good for my lungs but it's good for my pain. Doing drugs isn't good for me and I know that and that's sorta the point sometimes.

I don't know it's just this weird pang where I know what Swansea means, just not to nearly the same extent. I don't have an addiction so I don't think I could fully understand it. Maybe a better thing I could relate it to for myself is self harm. It's not healthy sure, but who do I owe health? Myself? Other people? And what is healthy? Is it feeling better now? Is it resisting now and feeling worse for it until it stops? What if the coping skills I learn make it worse? What if they make it better? Do I want it to get better? Does Swansea want to get better? What would better feel like to either of us?

Who knows until you try. Swansea got a collared shirt, a mortgage, and a credit card. He got a job and a wife and kids. He got sober. He got healthier, depending on your definition.

But did he feel better? He's looking down a barrel of a gun and he has to decide if he feels better. It doesn't seem like he regrets his new life. He says he wants his kids to be better than him. He wants good things to happen for them. He saw himself as one bad slip away from falling again. I don't think he felt better though. I think he got healthier. He likely would've ended up in the ditch he dreamt about, but we don't know that. We also don't know if that's what he'd prefer. But, we do know he got healthier, depending on your definition.

[qqueenofhades]

I am now being actively courted by TWO master's programs at the university. Terrible dilemma, etc.

[evocatiio]

if chibnall was the one writing this season you lot would be talking VERY differently

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

running a blog where i try to dodge spoilers from a show that aired 30 years ago is adjacent to extreme parkour over a pit of bubbling lava. while being shot at with arrows.

[batsplat]

casey's story breaks my heart. im reading your post about amatriaín and jorge now as well and i just........ these were only kids :( this isn't to assume that all parents/caregivers/people in their lives are negligent and/or abusive but i always wonder who is protecting child/teen/younger adult riders and drivers esp when they are in the highest levels of their sport at such a young age. it seems like, especially in years gone past, there was just so much scope for these kids to be abused. although i remember a couple years ago that clip of a young rider getting hit by mechanics so that kind of stuff isn't even in the past rly.

yeah not much to say really, I mean honestly it's... I'm not going to say every guardian of a professional athlete is abusive because that'd be a crazy thing to say, but I would say that the process that makes these kids so good at what they are does also in many, many cases not reflect particularly well on the parents. tbh a lot of the safeguarding has to be taken more seriously way before these kids even get to a grand prix paddock, but that also isn't easy to do... I can only speak to my own experiences, but as someone who spent a lot of my teenage years hanging around tennis clubs, it is pretty horrifying how normalised parental abuse is in sports circles. it's just something you see all the time - and this is obviously still only the public stuff, the gossip you hear, where you can read between the lines. though honestly, a lot of the times you really don't need to be reading much between the lines. the most extreme example was when a father of a kid I trained with went so far he had the cops called on him when they were at a tournament, but again. obviously this is only the extreme. even a lot of the public abuse is tacitly accepted, and there's a lot of parental behaviour that might not qualify for the 'abusive' label but sure isn't in line with what I view as acceptable. and that's just the parents - you essentially get a lot of cases of them outsourcing this stuff to the coaches, who often get a carte blanche to do with their kids what they please. obviously I'm only familiar with this stuff personally on the juniors circuit, but unhealthy coaching relationships is also a recurring and troubling talking point on the pro circuit. especially in women's tennis you get some pretty horrifying stories. the whole thing just feels pretty rotten

ideally what you've got to do to at least TRY and stamp this stuff out is having a zero tolerance policy - whether it's in clubs or in paddocks. a system of consequences in place where physical or verbal abuse comes with repercussions... I know the risk is you just take this stuff behind closed doors, but to me the starting point problem is that it's also the culture of juniors sports - where if anything treating your kid like absolute shit is almost celebrated at times. you have to make this stuff more shameful. I have no clue to what extent motorcycling juniors clubs look like what I was accustomed to, but in all honesty I reckon you'd see a lot of the same behaviour from parents/mentors - and that at least you've got to address. but obviously that doesn't just like. fix the problem. with someone like jorge, you very obviously did need someone else to step in... but if you don't have very visible, obvious abuse, then how do you enforce that? talent spotters like amatriain have immense power within the system - jorge's father was practically begging this bloke to take jorge on, jorge wouldn't have thanked you for getting rid of him until towards the very end of their partnership, he very likely wouldn't have the career he did without the guy. and it's one of those jobs that (like sports parent) tends to attract the exact type of person you really don't want to give power over kids. again, I'm not saying they're all like that, I wouldn't know, but so many of these managers just have so many stories that raise an eyebrow... even when it's not actively related to how they're treating children, but the fact that so many of them have a history of being aggressive to reporters? the thing is, if they're being awful to these kids in all likelihood we'll never hear about it - but reporters are obviously way more likely to tell people about it. which means that every time I read one of those stories, my main takeaway is that these managers are blokes who will get aggressive when things don't go their way. also not ideal

and below that is a layer that becomes increasingly impossible to even begin to address. I mean, look at casey. I have no reason to accuse his parents of being abusive towards him. I'm not trying to make it sound like I think they're horrible people. and I do think we do always need to be clear here - like yes, I'm talking about a general concern I have here about the relationship between mentor figures and the kids in their care, but obviously that covers a very wide variety of sins. I am not drawing any equivalences between them. there's 'being a bad mentor' and then there's 'having a restraining order filed against you'. so with that massive caveat in place... I agree with you, anon, that I also feel sad about casey's story, and yeah, it makes me uncomfortable

casey does think his parents pushed their dream onto him and ensured that his future would always lie in motorcycle racing... which, I mean. god. if you read him saying it was always his parents' dream side-by-side with him saying they always put pressure on him to work for his dream, then it's just one of those parental dynamics that read as achingly familiar - kids who have been convinced they're doing this for themselves and are then made to feel guilty when they're not living up to their parents' standards. we've sacrificed everything for you, right, you need to make it worth it... casey was told that this was his dream, and the stakes for success and failure were horrifyingly high. he had his entire family's livelihood on his shoulders from age fourteen... his family invested everything into him, told him it was all for his sake- and ensured that he would feel like he was letting them down every time he didn't perform. by some miracle, he had the talent to make it through the system, but think about how precarious his journey was despite being perhaps the most talented motorcycle racer in the history of the sport. how many turning points in his career easily could have gone the other way. for every casey, there are so many more kids who won't make it, and will somehow have to live with the consequences of that failure. and these dynamics... again, I'm not going to label them outright abusive, but think about the kind of stress they place on the parental relationship. idk. it might be a reality of professional sports... parents do often have to sacrifice a lot for their children's career - and given how early kids need to start out to succeed these days, inevitably quite a bit of that desire and drive will come from the parents. but it isn't a reality that sits comfortably with me

so, what do you do about any of this? well, again, I do think you need to do the bare minimum and not tolerate clearly abusive behaviour in sporting environments. which feels like stating the obvious, but this is a low bar that often just isn't being cleared. and yeah - that recent example within the motogp paddock of a rider being assaulted by a team member... definitely not going to be a one-off. just feels inevitable that this will be happening behind closed doors, especially when you get to the lower rungs where the competitors have less power and are less likely to be willing to risk anything (+ are also generally younger)

there's other safeguarding measures you could put in place, but it probably won't happen because people just don't care enough. first off, you need a riders' union - an organisation that's there solely to listen to riders' problems and act on them, advocate on their behalf etc. a big reason why young riders simply are not going to report any abuse is that this will almost certainly cost them professionally. you are essentially asking them to cut off their already limited support network, often the people providing them direct financial support or even employing them. if you cannot build up trust by having the mechanisms in place to take action against the abusive party (through cooperation with the series organisers), as well as provide support to the rider, then the reality is that basically none of them would ever come forward. secondly, you simply need stronger regulation of the career ladder. there's too many of these big name talent spotters who just coast through the paddock by having accumulated influence over the years, with zero reason to believe they have their charges' best interests at heart... often former riders themselves, but that's not exactly a pedagogical qualification. look, it's tricky to regulate because the exact roles these blokes play in riders' lives is so malleable and comes associated with all kinds of job titles - maybe you're a rider coach or manager or team boss or something else entirely. but ideally you want a system where certain privileges - like even entry to certain areas of the paddock - has to come along with accepting a certain level of regulatory oversight. make these blokes directly accountable and force them to uphold a professional code, in line with what you'd expect of any other professional who hold power over a vulnerable population. make it clear to them that they're being watched. I also don't think it's crazy to suggest that if you let minors race in a grand prix paddock, you should have some sort of system in place where the series organisers directly and regularly check in with the minors in their care. there will be a lot of behaviour that children do not themselves see as abusive - obviously it's very plausible that they just won't tell you the truth, but you have to start somewhere. motorcycle racing does actually have an advantage over many other individual sports in how centralised it is, how everyone is constantly going to the same location. they would have the power to enforce some of these standards

thirdly, and this is even less likely than the others to gain any traction. ... man, you've got to make sure these kids have options. this is becoming worse and worse the more professionalised sports become, the more they all chase their youthful prodigies... but, y'know, think about how early so many of these children drop out of school, how it's increasingly unlikely they've had the time to foster any sort of other interest (another theme of casey's account, "I don’t know if I was allowed to have any other attraction"). how motorcycle racing is the only thing they've ever known, how it's their whole world. you're raising a group of young people to whom leaving that world would basically feel like dying. it makes the stakes of everything so enormous, it twists these parental relationships, and it also ensures that certain figures have so, so much power over these kids. obviously nobody is forcing them at gunpoint to race - but in reality, it feels like they don't even have the option of walking away. again, this is obviously a massive problem to address that no sport has entirely sorted out, and the series organisers can rightly say it's not their responsibility to make kids go to school. honestly, my first step would be to just... do something about these age limits. they're too low! too many of these kids are too young for grand prix racing! a starting point is to try and make it so that kids aren't being actively penalised for attempting to pursue an education. this feels another area where you'd really want to have an actual union - even to just have someone to talk to. and again, as long as the series organisers let children race, then I do think it's actually also some of their responsibility to look out for them. realistically, a lot of these kids don't actually want to walk away from racing - however you get to that point, it is also very much their dream. but anything you can do to lessen the influence of the worst people in their lives, anything you can do to at least remind them they can walk away... idk. it's the right thing to do. especially for the kids who aren't succeeding, help them on their way out

now look, this isn't a detailed manifesto. I do know that some other sports have implemented similar-ish measures to the ones above but I couldn't give you a breakdown without some research. I'm not an expert on preventative measures for child abuse, and I'm sure some of these could come with unintended consequences I'm unaware of. I also know all of these things range from 'desperately unlikely' to 'never going to happen'. and even if you did, it's really only taking a pickaxe to the tip of the iceberg. or something. to reiterate what I said at the top, I don't want to make it sound like I think all parents of athletes are abusive. I also don't think the mentors are either. I do think a lot of them are... and even beyond that - the way sports is structured, the way the ladder to professional sports is structured, you are going to see a lot of unhealthy dynamics involving very young people in vulnerable positions. and I don't think that's in any way easy to address... but y'know. sometimes it'd be nice if somebody were at least trying. the sport is doing less than the bare minimum. and for every story we hear, there's going to be so so many more where we'll remain entirely ignorant

[girlivealwaysbean]

can someone tell me how to keep going if your hardwork does pay off but you don't feel anything when you achieve your goal just relief and numb again

[whiteboardartstudios]

Goodbye, Gendaen

fan art for @mtqcomic

Thoughts and LONG ramble under the cut! (includes spoilers!!!)

A while ago (like last week maybe?) I realized that I've been following this comic for almost a year, and I still haven't drawn Mysta yet! I figured that with the recent end of Chapter 3 and that *huge* lore drop (I was NOT expecting that oh my goodness the theory wheels are turning in the void that is my brain) now would be a pretty good time to draw her! So that's where this came from! :D

I thought that it would be fun to draw Mysta looking sort of like a knight? Partially because it makes for cool posing and composition but also because I think that if she was in D&D she would be a paladin due to the whole "Hero sent by Destiny" thing (I considered sorcerer or warlock as well, but her moveset is mostly melee at the moment so I thought that paladin fits better. Plus this opens up the possibility of Gendaen being an Oathbreaker paladin, depending on how that whole situation with the Crimson went. (also now I kind of want to put the main cast of mtq in D&D even though I don't actually know a lot about D&D ToT. I think Eth would be a ranger maybe multiclassed into something magic-related, because rangers have a favored enemy mechanic that gives them advantages on fighting a certain type of enemy, which could be Crimson enemies for D&D Eth. Yele is (kind of obviously) a druid because of the whole dryad thing, and Zaïl is definitely giving rogue energy to me.)) Anyways, D&D-related sidetrack aside – hello??? End-of-chapter-3 lore drop? (/positive) I have SO many questions. First of all, what happened to convince Gendaen to switch sides? For someone who allegedly spent his entire life trying to cleanse the Crimson, it would've taken one heck of a worldview-upending revelation to get him to join it. With the information we currently have, it seems pretty clear that Gendaen isn't mind-controlled or corrupted or anything – not just because of the reasons Eth gave in page #169, but also because from all the interactions we've had with Nelun Soma'o/Gendaen, he seemed to be pretty chill? I pointed out in my first fan art post that it doesn't seem as if Nelun Soma'o is being built up to be a villain character and is instead more of an antagonist with a slight mentor role, and I think that still kind of holds up now. Gendaen definitely wants Mysta to help him and/or the Crimson with something, and as Yele said in that recent comic, things aren't really adding up. I'm still slightly suspicious of the Order of Learning as well (insert person pointing at conspiracy theory board meme here lol), since you would think that if Gendaen and Eth are really close then Gendaen might have told Eth about the whole Crimson situation, right? On Page #250 (which is marked as 150??? probably a typo but idk) Gendaen says that he didn't want Eth to be roped into this whole situation, which could be a reason for keeping him in the dark – though if he knew Eth really well then he might have suspected that Eth wouldn't just let him disappear and would go searching for him. Another possible reason (in my theory) if the Order is evil or something and Gendaen learned something that he shouldn't have learned, maybe he knew that Eth wouldn't believe him because of his loyalty to the Order? I may just be connecting random dots and calling it a picture here but *something* is going on and until we get more clues on what that may be, I'm sticking with this theory lol :P EDIT, I was rereading Gendaen's character sheet and it says there that he has a strong code of honor and fights for the underdogs (not the exact phrasing but it's close). 👀 does that mean the Crimson is in some sort of underdog position? 👀

Anyways back to the drawing a little, I gave both Gendaen and Mysta a sort of braid-like element in their designs to sort of tie them together a bit visually (Mysta's is on the sides of her head, which is kind of hard to see so I added a little ribbon to show that parts of her hair is tied back, and Gendaen's is in his golden hair accessory thingy). I think that there's definitely some sort of correlation between Gendaen's disappearance/switching to the Crimson and Mysta being sent to Sol Ybberia, and I also think that both of them are going to play an important role in whatever happens in the future, hence the braids (to show that their destinies are kind of intertwined, as the two Heroes of Sol Ybberia). I also thought that it would be fun to put Gendaen in a stained glass window instead of actually physically being present, because up until the Nelun Soma'o reveal, all the things we know about Gendaen are basically all from Eth's recollections of him, which for me definitely paints a bit of a "Character haunting the narrative" kind of vibe. I also think that with the Nelun Soma'o reveal, the somewhat glorified (for a lack of a better word – I think Eth might be a little biased when it comes to Gendaen, considering that Gendaen has been missing for about 5 years, if my math is correct? 5 years feels like a long time to me and I think that if a person important to me has been missing for that long then my impression of them would definitely start warping to how I want to remember them/who I wanted them to be and I might start unintentionally ignoring the things that doesn't quite match that image in my head. Speaking of/case in point, Eth's reaction to the Nelun Soma'o reveal!) image of Gendaen that we had got thrown in a metaphorical blender with our idea of the Crimson at the time, and it just makes things a whole lot more complicated in a very interesting way. (If you look at the bottom right of the image you can see Nelun Soma'o's cloak coming out of stained-glass Gendaen's cloak, which I thought would be a fun little detail to include). Hence, the stained glass is kind of the "perfect Hero who disappeared to advance the plot" Gendaen and we can see Mysta kind of splitting the glass with her Rotted Fork from a composition point of view, referencing that huge lore bomb she dropped a couple of pages ago and how that changes our (or at least my) perception of Gendaen as a character entirely. I really do like the plot twist, as I think it makes Gendaen a more 3-dimensional character with more complicated motivations and narrative significance, as before I mainly knew him as "predecessor to Mysta" and "one of Eth's sources of motivation", but now he my understanding of Gendaen also extends to things about Gendaen himself and not just about his role in relation to other characters (for example, "Gendaen is helping the Crimson for reasons currently unknown" or "Gendaen is planning something that involves Mysta??? and he's in the Void??? And apparently Mysta is supposed to jailbreak him out at some point in the future?" He definitely has something planned behind the scenes, I don't know what it is and I want to find out).

MORE THINGS about Gendaen (can you tell that he's my favorite character at the moment ToT), what's up with those last words? If I'm correct (and I think I am, I scrolled all the way back to the page where the gods were introduced just to check this ToT), Nomù is Compassion? How is compassion related to Gendaen's alliance with the Crimson? I mean, when you think of the Crimson, compassion definitely is NOT the first value that comes to mind. Right now it seems that to me, Gendaen's plan with Mysta and the Crimson and the Void is connected to Nomù somehow? (the "I won't disappoint you" is definitely interesting). I don't have a lot of thoughts or theories on where this might be going, I just thought that it was something interesting to metaphorically chew on for the next while. It definitely seems like it has some sort of narrative significance, at least.

There might be more things that I wanted to talk about, but I can't really think of them off the top of my head right now (it might be due to the fact that it's currently quite late in my time zone ToT I am sleepy) so that's all from me for now :D (Also dropping the version of the drawing with just the lineart here because I think it looks really cool)

I hope you have a really nice day and/or night! :D

*a starry rift in space opens up in front of me and I faceplant into it like it is a mattress* (gotta make that dramatic exit!) [Image ID: The first image is a colored and rendered image of Mysta from the Mysta's Terrarian Quest webcomic standing in front of a stained glass window of Gendaen. She is holding the Rotted Fork spear from Terraria, and she has a determined expression on her face. The stained glass shows Gendaen with his back turned to the audience, and one closed eye is visible. His cloak is flowing to the right of the image, where it emerges out of the stained glass as it fades from green to dark grey. Crimson vines, green trees, and white clouds surrounds Gendaen in the stained glass. Outside of the glass portrait, real crimson vines are creeping along the stone walls that the portrait is on, framing the portrait and Mysta in the middle. A red light source is shining down from the upper right corner of the drawing. End ID.] [Image ID: The second image is a work-in-progress version of the first image without any color and only some minimal shading, with all shades being in monochrome. Mysta's lineart is noticeably darker compared to the line art of the background. End ID.]

EDIT: Forgot to add image ids, they're here now TwT

[baycitystygian]

promising myself that if I send in five job applications or more in the next 24 hours I can give myself a little treat (an 8x10 of paulie I saw on eBay that made me downright critically DEHYDRATED for that man)

[natjennie]

do NOT message me. I'm busy mourning all of the languages I'll never learn and countries I'll never visit and books I'll never read and foods I'll never eat and art I'll never see and history I'll never know and skills I'll never have and events I'll never be able to go to and people I'll never meet and hobbies I'll never try. btw.

[mermaidsirennikita]

sometimes it drives me literally insane to see romance requests that are like

--I want a romance wherein it's basically the happy epilogue throughout the book

--I want a romance that has great communication and they never withhold anything from each other ever

--no "miscommunication trope"

The last thing is just a general gripe about how so many of the things people say are tropes are not tropes, and it's pedantic and snobby but like. Miscommunication is so broad. It's not a trope. People are miscommunicating. WHAT are they miscommunicating about? Is one of them keeping a secret identity from their partner? Because a secret identity romance iS a trope. Is one of them withholding their feelings out of fear of rejection?

Because people DO miscommunicate. Often writers do write it clumsily. If people miscommunicate for no reason, sure, whatever. But if they miscommunicate BECAUSE of a REASON--like, often it's not even miscommunication lol. It's the hero keeping his dire supernatural secret from his wife because she'll die if she finds out (honestly, valid to me, but whatever). It's the heroine finding it difficult to trust the hero with her heart because her dad left when she was young (maybe cliche in theory, but actually a very real thing that happens).

If all you want is plotless nothing wherein everyone is happy and nobody makes mistakes, I personally have a hard time thinking of it as a book, because there is no story. It's just vibes. And essentially EVERY time, people have to mess up and make mistakes in order for there to be a plot.

I just don't understand the point.

[dairyfreenugget]

I could count the amount of original stories of mine that don't have horror elements on one hand and idk what that says about me

[nebulousfishgills]

As much as I love playing embrace Dark Urge runs (discussion in therapy pending), there's something so narratively satisfying about how a Resist Durge playthrough can go once you get to the Bhaal Temple. Your character steps into the ring with Orin, it's intended to be a duel, but odds are you're getting eviscerated pretty quickly. You then switch to one of your other characters in your party and throw an attack, effectively breaking the duel and setting the whole temple upon you.

(Adding a cut because this ended up being longer than I thought)

But, I think it's a very satisfying way to play. Your party members have grown fond of your Durge, seeing them as a friend, a family member, even a lover. They've watched you and your pain over your Urge and what it makes you do or want to do. Maybe you've slipped up once or twice, but you've been trying so hard to be the hero they know you can be, that Faerûn needs. So, when it comes time to finally face your demons and you're getting so horribly hurt in the process, they can't help but rush to your defense. It'll put all of them in danger, but it doesn't matter because they want and need to help you, their ally and companion.

Bonus points if you select your character's romanced companion as the savior/duel interruptor to make it extra delicious. They've fallen in love with you, stayed with you when your Urge craved their blood the most, maybe by this point in the game you've helped put their demons down as well. They see you in pain, a final valiant effort to overcome your Urge against the power of Orin, a whole cult, a god of murder himself. They want to protect you, save you as you saved them.

I'm also fond of the extra beauty of Astarion being your Resist Durge romance since it puts the two of you in very similar situations. Fighting against the will of your masters, finally defeating your demons with your newfound companions' help and being offered the greatest power you could ever fathom... only to deny it, ignore power in favor of your party and your love.

This isn't even mentioning just how goddamn good the Withers resurrecting you cutscene is. This skeleton in your camp with unknown and unfathomable power (also apparently supposed to be Jergal himself if I've done my research properly?) is able to bring you back to life, free of your Urge. The line along the lines of "Bhaal could only destroy what of you that he knew, but because you've grown past your Urge and become your own person, he couldn't destroy that new growth" is just so weirdly powerful narratively. Tav may be a default character for you to create upon making a new save file, but Durge is the canon protagonist and I think that entire scene shows it the best. It's a beautiful secondary climax of the narrative (primary being battling the Netherbrain of course).

And, perhaps it's just an oversight on Larian's part or something that'd be a bit difficult to work into the cutscenes mechanically, but I think that it could only get more impactful if your companions could comfort each other during these moments. Everyone and their mother wishes you could hug Astarion after he kills Cazador, but also imagine your romanced companion cradling your body after Bhaal kills you. It seems just a little odd that they all (meaning your party) kinda just stand around staring at your corpse, especially with how close y'all have gotten.

Idk, I have a lot of thoughts about this section of the game in this particular type of playthrough and some of them are hard to articulate into words. It's just such a damn good narrative peak and can really make you feel things.

I've completed I think two resist Durge runs and just hit this point on my third and it really stuck out to me this time (then again my new antidepressants are kinda fucking with me so that might be playing a role). I left it as my last mission before dealing with the Netherbrain and I think it helped build the anticipation of that moment. Everyone else has been helped by you, and now it's your turn to come into your own. I really felt so connected to my character walking into the temple, feeling like everything has been building to this, that regardless of what happens our suffering will finally end. And you have your party there to help you in your time of greatest need as you've done for them.

There's a reason this game was Game of the Year, the narrative is just so powerful and the replay-ability is just insane. I've beaten this game ten times, heading for my eleventh and it truly just never gets old and never fails to make me feel so many things so strongly.

[pistachiopie]

me when I'm brave