wherethemagichappens

[wherethemagichappens]

So, here's what confuses me, and I'd love someone who's spent some time actually analyzing and understanding Caleb and/or Essek to explain -

Essek, on loan from his partner, uses every opportunity to mention 'his partner' and imply, if not outright speak about, how incredible he is

and Caleb, who avoids speaking about him and sidesteps questions about Essek even from his friends, didn't try to message or go to him after Ruidus thing...

I know it's not about Caleb not valuing or loving him, I know he does. I also know that a part of it is trust and proectiveness... and I know "he's a good man" is a high praise with deep personal meaning... and I know it's fully in character, but I still don't quite get it...

[wherethemagichappens]

Did we say goodbye to Essek last week? Did BH move on?

-hey, I'm still catching up, but I want spoilers, but the posts are confusing-

[wherethemagichappens]

Seriously though, do you guys think our BH will go on a little VR adventure? Or are we getting another mini camping? If it is the main crew, do you think Ludinus plunged the NPCs in as well, or juat BH and decided to chill with Essek and Teven? If all present got plugged into the VR and our crew is playing some sort of a Mini-Game, do you think Matt will squeeze in with the players to keep his NPSs engaged? Or is everyone just at, like, a cinema, watching this movie narrated by Brennan play out and then comparing notes after?

Is it Thursday yet? Or well, the next one, if they are keeping to schedule and not doing the main campaign in the last week of the month...

Also, I low key don't want ANYONE else playing Essek! Not even Brennan! And Teven's growing on me too!

[wherethemagichappens]

It's been one looong day! it's lasted for, what, 4 episodes now?

Seriously, how long since they long rested? Zadash?

[wherethemagichappens]

I know most of us wish for a more badass Essek -Ludinus interaction, but let us just remember that Essek is awkward and anxious af, he is a researcher and was a politician, he is used to doing things in a "controlled environment", he might have taken risks and played games, but all of those were calculated and had structure and rules (he f-ed up bc he did not realize he and The Assembly were playing different games)... No matter what he feels towards the ancient piece of shit, there is no social script to this, or any structure with all that is going on... He may have gathered experience over the last couple of years, but he's still waaay out of his depth... Especially with trying to follow the BH mixed signal filled lead...

plus, Ludinus probably sees him as nothing more than a pawn and does not perceive him as a real threat and Essek knows it...

[wherethemagichappens]

I didn't see the show yet, I'm here for the spoilers.

My question is: if Brennan is in the DM chair, is Matt in player chair as Essek?! (it's not M9, but I'll take it...)

[wherethemagichappens]

It's around 1 am where I am, but in CR land (not America) it's only a few hours till the live show... can't wait to wake up to all the delicious spoilers and experiences!

so that my anxiety is lower when I finally get to watch the episode!

[wherethemagichappens]

We-Who-Are-Not-Going-To-The-Show have to wait another whole week for the crazy that is about to go down!

I am sooooo not gonna be able to stay off Tumblr till then... In fact it's probably gonna be one of thw first things I do Sunday morning...

[wherethemagichappens]

The satisfied wiggle Ashley/Fearne did after that insight check on Essek's talking about "His Parner(TM)" makes me really want to know what Matt told her!

[wherethemagichappens]

Guys, I have a question: Was there any word about if and when Sam will rejoin? I know it may take a while, I'm just wondering if I missed some info bc I don't follow talk shows or news and such...

[wherethemagichappens]

"I have a name--- pretty-ass motherfucker..."

Chetney Pock O'pea @ Essek Thelyss, c3, e97, 2024, just because he can

[wherethemagichappens]

My question is, what is The Kryn Dynasty doing amidst all this God eating business? I mean, The Luxon is their WHOLE identity!

[wherethemagichappens]

Essek constantly gushing about his partner but pointedly not giving his name hits me so hard in the feels.

Two formative childhood experiences for me:

ONE

I was severely, mercilessly bullied as a child at every school I went to even if they're was no overlap of kids, and authority figures either ignored me or directly told me it was my fault. I was socially toxic. Any other kid who publicly associated with me was also targeted for harassment. I was best friends with a girl around the corner but because I was a couple years younger (in itself an invitation for bullying) and a parish, we could never let anyone know we were friends.

I've been told I should be upset at her for this, but it wasn't her fault. It was the other children who made it a fact that she would be harmed by publicly being my friend. She didn't make those rules, we were both just honest that it existed and there was nothing we could do to change that. The best we could do to survive was at least protect her. And that benefited me by actually having a friend.

So if we talked about each other it was"my friend." No names. No acknowledging we knew each other in public. No introductions to other friends. Keeping that divide up was necessary to survival. I had a couple friends on the same freak level as we and we were in fact targeted with additional harassment to get to the other person. It was a legitimate threat to live with. At some point I just stopped thinking it was ever necessary to reveal who my friends or family are unless it's both explicitly relevant and necessary.

TWO

I learned to use the internet in the late 1990s when anonymity was considered a best practice. Don't give out your age, sex, location, or other identifying information. You don't know who is on the other side of that screen or what they will do to you if they know. Sperate your online and offline worlds to protect yourself.

This helped reinforce experience one because clearly adults also acted like those kids and this just normal human behavior no one will ever put a stop to that you need to be on guard for at all times. Build in air gaps so if one of you is compromised it's harder for the perpetrator to get to other people you care about. Defending them through anonymity is a way of showing you love them.

Also since some family are searchable through have state government jobs that right-wing nut jobs chips target them for, I wanted to make sure they couldn't be connected to me as a queer trans disabled person active online. In case something I said led to them being targeted.

(This is correct advice, even though it flies in the face of modern online conventions. There are tons of malicious people on three internet who will target you and anyone you love if they decide to hurt you.)

RESULT

By default, I refer to people by their relationship to me, not their name. My friend, my partner, my parent, my family, someone I know, etc. Often I avoid gendering them to make it even harder to identify them. I have to consciously consider if the person I'm talking to has any reason to know my associate's name. Blacklist everyone, then whitelist exceptions.

I do this even if both people know each other because the specific association feels dangerous. Better to be viewed as acquaintances than a meaningful relationship that changes how either of us could be viewed. It's not even really a judgement on thinking the person is untrustworthy, I just don't want to spend any extra energy thinking about it. It doesn't even feel relevant because my relationship to this person fellas like it conveys more information that actually matters.

ESSEK

Essek knows both he and Caleb are being targeted by powerful people who have shown they will target loved ones to get to them. Additionally, tensions between the Empire and Dynasty are still high and it could very easily compromise how their own sides view them if it's known that they're romantically entangled with someone from the other side. It could also blow each other's cover and make their meeting places more vulnerable to attack. Especially if their enemies know they could hit both of them at once.

It's genuinely dangerous for their connection to be known, so they don't name names. It's not even a matter of whether Bell's Hells would intentionally misuse that information, but what they also could just let slip to the wrong person. It's not really worth the risk when "my partner" is all the information they actually need to understand him.

My guess is that Essek said "Bren" is hiss partner because they already know a Bren sent them to Astrid. And since Caleb no longer uses the name Bren it would be much harder to connect them. It would have caused more questions, more prying, and more risk to give no name for his partner when directly pressed. So he gives a truthful but less dangerous answer. The anonymity is an act of love.

[wherethemagichappens]

Guys, Essek actually asked for Dorian's Morivational Speech for wisdom save advantage!

His wisdom probably isn't too high, maybe +1 or +2 (not taking into account estimations on Wikipedia), but he is proficient in wis saves as a wizard, so his bonus is pretty high (if he has the same proficiency bonus as a 20th lvl PC).

He is aware how bad it would be for EVERYONE if he was affected. And he is terrified of this thing!

[wherethemagichappens]

Do you think the cast keeps making Essek romance jokes to triger Matt to keep repeating how in love anad unavailable he is?

[wherethemagichappens]

Matt be like: " NOT THIS TIME! You succeed too well last time!"

My honest reaction when a bad bitch wizard wants to do unethical experiments on me (/j):

I love how the cast kept making jokes about Essek being rly hot and then Matt shutting them down like: ”HE’S IN A RELATIONSHIP 👹👹”

[wherethemagichappens]

Well Matt, 20th level anxiety wizard with tons of baggage is most definitely NOT going to be more of a problem then help in this particular arc....

is he?