#AND THAT'S WORLDBUILDING BABYYYYY

[fallenstarzz]

A background detail in the books that facinates me is that the Foxes were on the verge of being dismantled. And by detail I mean that it's a fact so widely known that we hear about it from chapter 1, just as passive knowledge Neil has before even dreaming of playing with them.

It ends up staying fairly background because Neil has... Bigger worries, but it is very much present for the whole series. There are plenty of descriptions of how Palmetto thought the Foxes would breathe life into the town; How Wymack lives practically alone in one of the apartment complexes built out of the expectation.

For four years, the Foxes placed dead last, and if they do it again, they ARE getting demoted from Class I. Of the original team, there was only Seth left. And if you do the math, that means that people were leaving up until the semester before TFC begins, because there are nine players including Kevin, who was an assistant coach, and Neil is replacing another recruit. Seth's death brings them down to nine again, and the ERC's response to that is to start a discussion on whether the minimum number of players should go up to 12. If it weren't for the intervetion of Coach Rhemann, they would have gotten disqualified anyway when Andrew went to Easthaven. PSU was against signing the girls, and both the university and the ERC fought back against making Dan captain.

They are not only fighting for their lives out here, they are straight up losing.

That puts a lot of things into perspective, I think. For one, I think it really explains a lot about Kevin's relationship to the Foxes. Like, imagine knowing your second – your last – chance at a life is under threat, and out of nowhere, the best player in your league offers to help you. And then he does it by saying all the effort you've made up until now was useless, that all your fighting wasn't enough. I'd resent him too.

It also says very interesting things both about who Wymack is as a person and exactly how big of a deal he must have been as a player, that he keeps facing these incredible odds and getting just one more chance. And even when he knows he's running out of strings to pull, he keeps on, because "one more chance" is what his team is supposed to be about anyway.

And then they turn around and not only break their own records by making past the first rounds, they go all the way up and dethrone the undefeated champion of their league for first place. It's no wonder not even they believed they could do it.

#AND THAT'S WORLDBUILDING BABYYYYY #you really do not get more underdog than this #started from the bottom now we're here. literally. fueled PURELY by spite and a 5'2 mafia refugee #but I find it supremely funny that the stakes of the season were already insane BEFORE Neil pissed off the mafia #his strategy is truly solving their problems by creating different bigger problems #all for the game #aftg

[cream-and-tea]

how do werewolves work in lmd (plus anything else like that)

OK SO.

(this got very very long)

(just as a warning)

(also i’m going to tag @transmasc-wizard bc i remember you asked about this a while ago and a lot of this response comes from what i had typed up to respond to YOU lol)

(okay here we go)

there are (putting it very very basically) two main kinds of magic in the Ghost Story Universe: mortem (Death Juice) and vita (Life Juice). they draw from the same source (God Juice) (which is also the source of the apocalypse but that’s another post entirely) and are kind of different aspects of one thing, but still act as opposing forces. equals and opposites, can’t have one without the other, etc etc. the point is that even though they’re two different types of magic they share the same set of rules and operate under the same basic facts. one of the most basic being that magic is physically taxing to use. no magic comes without a cost

so this is pretty straightforward. and generally it isn’t anything too debilitating, but the more powerful the magic and the more magic used, the more damaging the physical effects become (for example: early on agnes’s chitchats with the ghosts she sees don’t really wear on her because it’s a very passive form of her power, but as the plot progresses and she actively draws on it more and more she starts to develop chronic headaches). the more active magic bullshit you do in succession —> the worse you’ll be feeling the next morning. people would usually need to rest for upwards of a few days after performing a major act of magic and the reason The Library focuses so much on endurance and repetition is to prevent that from happening. it’s to the point that some majorly powerful stuff is possible but the benefit of it is almost completely outweighed by the potential damage it would cause.

rambly worbuilding aside, this is really just a preface so it makes sense when i say: vampires and werewolves are what happen when people push their magic to far.

they’re basically the most extreme end of the spectrum for either kind of magic. vamps are a result of overusing vita (blood life stuff), and wolfs are a result of overusing mortem (spooky death stuff). this happens to people when they’re drawing on so much magic that their body literally cannot support it anymore and starts canabilizing itself in order to support the magic and prevent the person from just. coming apart at the seams. a Regular Person body is just incapable of handling that amount of power, so in turn they have to draw their sustenance from a different non-human source. the comparatively small piece-of-magic-apocalypse-juice in them mutates and co-opts the functions of their body in order to save that body from collapse. both vamps and wolves have to feed CONSTANTLY or they risk their bodies giving in and all their organs straight-up failing. it’s a slow transformation process and sort of representative of how much Whatever Caused The Apocalypse has become so deeply ingrained in every part of the new world. again: it presents differently but it’s all the same stuff in the end.

the world is full of monsters and weirdness and general spooky bullshit but vampires and werewolves especially have an ENORMOUS amount of stigma surrounding them because of the fact that most people still see regular magic users as recognizably human, and view the transformation as a transition from Human Person With Emotions Who I Should View As Such Despite This One Weird Thing to Inhuman Monster. most magical creatures aren’t seen as sentient in nature and many of them are actively dangerous to humans, so if someone pushes their abilities to far and ends up undergoing the transformation then it’s seen as a shift from being one of Us (normal people just trying to survive this crazy broken down to world) to being one of Them (unnatural monsters that came about as a result of the evil forest and apocalypse and want to destroy humanity), except that obviously the people who are turned are the same people they were before, just with an extra set of challenges and probably more bloodlust (which i can see being a bit of concern but c’mon. are u really going to let a little killer instinct get in the way of a lasting and meaningful relationship. weak).

They’re also used as an excuse when it comes to hatred of people born with magic at all. bc sure it SEEMS harmless when you kid is learning from their dead grandma or healing a little bit faster than normal, but with ONE WRONG MOVE they could become A VISCOUS BEAST or a BLOODSUCKING MONSTER and do you really want to take that risk?? wouldn’t it be better to stamp that out now before someone gets hurt??? even in places like The Library, which usually serves as a safe-haven for people born w magic, vamps and wolfs are seen as somehow Lesser. The Library toutes them as cautionary tales and failures of magic, basically a warning of what not to do to their students.

to get into the more specific abilities and effects and What Being A Vampire Or Werewolf Means i’ve made some handy little lists (ft. calliope and luca macnamara, a book 2-3 character that nobody knows about lol) (please click tumblr absolutely wrecked the quality):

so. yeah.

#i hope this is coherent i am truly just Saying Shit #tldr is if you do to much extreme magic you get fuckin vamped. or wolfed. but i felt the need to dig deeper and also make silly little #drawings about it. as you do. #worldbuilding isn’t always my strongsuit but i LOVE LOVE LOVE vampires and werewolves and i think i managed to do something interesting here #idk we all know monsters are Queer As Fuck and i mean. obviously. but the way i think about vamps and wolves in the lmd-verse is a bit more #in line w being disabled? especially in terms of chronic exhaustion and chronic pain since those are what i have the most experience #dealing with. but it really is pick your metaphor. #the monsters are a metaphor for eeeeeverything babyyyyy #i got to draw luca for this that was fun i love luca #he’s just a guy. anxious guy. tired guy. he just wants everyone to leave him alone so he can do crossword puzzles in peace. #if i love anything it’s my little side characters. technically a book 2 antagonist is a vampire and has a bigger role #but he’s an asshole so i don’t wanna draw him #the joke i make about calliope and luka is that calliope is a gay werewolf #who dresses like a gay vampire. and luca is a gay vampire who dresses like a gay werewolf. #nblw and mlm solidarity if you will #wip: ghost story #creme does an art

[goatseabathing]

morally reprehensible merchant girl

writing a little character profile with some notes on her and a bit of extra lore and world building thrown in there

name: sithel meihuran

name meaning: sithel is a name meaning "child of si," si being the god of abundance and wealth in tolira's official religion. meihuran is a surname deriving from a toliran myth about a tyrant queen named meihur. sithel isn't religious but her mother was, and so is most of her family

sithel is a liar and a cheater and has no qualms with stealing from anyone she possibly can, whether rich or poor. she's a fan of jewels and furs and tends to steal and wear a lot of jewelry. she's a silk merchant who lives right on the beach in the city of joro. she's charming, a flirt, and a romantic, having taken many different lovers in her time. she hates being told no. she has an affinity for violence and weapons and kind of has a thing for the color crimson

sithel is moving around constantly but she always returns to joro, where she considers is her home. she lives quite close to the docks but never speaks to any of the sailors on account of having an irrational distaste for them for no reason, actually having heckled them once or twice on a drunken night before

#fantasy world #foretold #writing #original character #ocs #oc stuff #oc world #worldbuilding #my babyyyyy tkaes a biig bite of her like hamburger

[sedittedice]

MY VTUBER CHARACTER GOT A NEW DESIGN BABYYYYY

art by:

#womp womp #dice rants #art #vtuber #vtuber character #vtubesona

[sometimes-love-is-enough]

2, 4 (eucatastrophe), 7, 12, 15-16-17, 23, 24, 41, 47, 49 (melliferous) :>

2. Go to your AO3 “Works” page, to the sidebar with all the filters, and click the drop-down arrow for “Additional Tags.” What are your top 3-5 most used tags? Do you think they accurately represent your writing habits?

Body Horror (5)

Remix (4)

Friendship (3)

Suicidal Thoughts (3)

Time Loop (2)

I don't think they don't represent my writing habits, I'm just kind of surprised more common tags aren't in there.

4. What detail in [insert fic] are you really proud of?

It's very simple and very stupid, but I really love that Thomas's reaction to seeing Janus for the first time in Syzygy is 'so beautiful. so mysterious. i'm in love' and Janus's POV of the exact same moment is 'what the fuck is wrong with him. he needs a fucking nap'. It makes me laugh.

7. Any worldbuilding you’re particularly proud of?

most of my favorite worldbuilding I've done in Syzygy hasn't come up just yet, but I'm really fond of a lot of the stuff I did there that I've been explaining through epistolary. apart from that, the whole 'fae seven year sacrifice recontextualized as a eldritch lovecraftian ritual' is definitely up there.

12. Are there any tropes you used to dislike but have grown on you?

tragedy babyyyyy

15. What’s your favorite AU that you’ve written?

genuinely, it's still the Inception AU (not really an AU, I guess? I guess it's more like a flat crossover since it's actually plausibly canon in both universes. Okay. I'll pick another one) melliferous OBVIOUSLY

16. What’s an AU you would love to read (or have read and loved)?

hmmmm Fallen London AU. I just think it would be neat. Also, see answer to next question.

17. What highly specific AU do you want to read or write even though you might be the only person to appreciate it?

the one I occasionally rotate in my brain is the dungeons and daddies au. (NOT a bdsm AU) instead, it's the AU of six sides flung into the forgotten realms to rescue their missing centre, except they're all really bad at D&D. this week's side fact: patton is like 50/50 on the moon landing actually happening, to logan's intense anger. the other one i've been rotating i plan on writing next year so we'll see how that pans out

23. What’s a trope, AU, or concept you’ve never written, but would like to?

i want to do a soulmate AU to specifically deconstruct the idea of soulmate AUs. and/or hanahaki, same thing. i've had some ideas in the past but never got around to writing them.

24. Are there any easter eggs in [insert fic], and if so, what are they?

you didn't specify a fic so I'm going to go with Syzygy and I'm pleased to announce that quite a lot of the epistolary sections feature mini-cameos from either friends of mine or writing projects that i never ended up finishing. the play that thomas is in is vaguely based off a story i wrote in high school, everyone in the hollow-host.net chat room in chapter two is from one of my group chats (guess which one is me). oh, and in the review of AAHTDTL in chapter one, two of the plays listed are (obviously) Melliferous and Eucatastrophe.

41. Link a fic that made you think, “Wow, I want to write like that.”

In this fandom? Love and Other Fairy Tales kicked my brain with electric shoes and set me into writing overdrive with fairy emotions and a feeling's not a thing you own did the same with Thomas-Side feelings.

47. If [insert fic] was a pair of shoes, what kind would it be? Describe the shoes.

i assume this one's for melliferous. a good pair of walking boots that you loved dearly, but they're kind of squishy with all the honey you've been walking through and you know you're going to lose them eventually.

49. What are you currently working on? Share a few lines if you’re up for it!

Got the next chapter of Syzygy all drafted out, just need to polish it. It includes the phrase 'snex life' and a background weedmobile. Here's a bit:

Thomas isn’t sure if he should be shaking Janus’s hand or not. It seems like it would be a weird sort of thing to do. He actually kind of just wants to hug Janus as hard as he can, but that seems like an even weirder thing to do. He settles for a normal-person verbal introduction, instead. “Um, my name’s Thomas. Hi.”

For some reason, this gets a small frown out of Janus. “It is?”

“I... think so?” Thomas says, momentarily doubting it, before he shakes his head. “No, it is. Thomas. Thomas Sanders. Why are we being so weird about our names?”

the other thing i'm currently working on is a plan and research for (what will hopefully be) next year's big bang fic. nothing non-spoilery there to share, unfortunately. talk more about that later!

#fic ask meme #asks

[bsaka7]

13 & 25 !!

13. What's on the playlist babyyyyy (of course I listen to music to write ❤️) . These r all for different things... No coherent thoughts or project... but i am always always always looking for new tunes so hit me up

It ain't me babe (live at newport) by Joan baez and Bob Dylan. This song is yeah... Watch the video.... No further details.

Frug by rilo kiley. Idk I've been having Feelings about this one. For realsies. "I cannot fall in love you'll never see my eyes I will not call you back I will not do the smurf I cannot fall in love ill never fall in love" yes girl. This isn't even relevant to any fic I just love it.

This one has just been floating around in my head but out on the streets by the vaccines - "I'm not in love but can we just pretend" and MORE IMPORTANTLY "you told me I'm hard to live with but you said it out of spite I may put you through some suffering but I'll never prove you right" I LOVE this line. I want to do something with it with daniel & mclaren but I haven't gotten around to it.

I should live in Salt by the national. Yeah idk what's up with me...I've been thinking about Daniel a lot I'll say that much i guess.

posing for cars by jbrekkie. I was listening to this stoned in a hammock last Night. Self explanatory. This slaps.

25. What’s your favorite part of the writing process (worldbuilding, brainstorming/outlining, writing, editing, etc)?

i don't revise or edit like... at all (and you can tell) so that is NOT my fav. I do like WRITING (cuz like it's fun to go into the writing trance and make it all work but also its a little stressful) ...I also like when the idea is there but you're not frustrated with it yet and it's just kinda stewing. No pressure yet. I like that. When I'm writing down ideas but it's not a full outline yet it's just the impressions that will become one... that is pretty fun because it's all about opportunity. but i guess when it comes down to it I like writing the best because for me, it's sometimes like, what's the point of having an idea if I don't at least try and execute it? I'm uh. Very task oriented and completion driven if you couldn't tell.

#This is so rambly I'm just talk talk talking on my phone #Thank u for indulging me #Ask game #Ask