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#but the two mediums dedicate different amounts of time to it if that makes sense
vasito-de-leche · 5 months
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I love how you write, your interpretations of characters are my favorite. If you're okay with it, may I ask for romantic headcanons of Horropedia (Reverse 1999) x Reader? I would love to know what he is like when he's developing a crush, how he confronts his feelings when he realized them, what he's like when in a romantic relationship, etc. Thank you very much!
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;R1999 HORROPEDIA - Relationship Headcanons
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Compilation of headcanons about Horropedia in a romantic relationship.
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awe! i'm glad you like my stuff! and thank you for the lovely words and request, cause i've been itching to write for horropedia <3
i got a liiiiittle carried away with this one, hope that's alright!
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Horropedia as a character is fascinating because at a surface level he's a mess and a walking stereotype - a "nerdy nerd" with a very specific hyperfixation on the horror genre, the tall guy with glasses who explains the plot and does his own thing regardless of how others view him, the first one to die in a movie solely because he's perceived as cringe etc, etc.
And yet, his medium is "logic" - he, better than anyone, understands the nonsensical laws that make up the concept of horror, he sees the patterns and the reason why some things are done this way instead of that way. Through logic, pattern recognition and analysis, Horropedia can pretty much understand anything and work his way around any problem, no matter how unorthodox his solutions may be.
In a sense, I'd compare Horropedia to Pavia. Both are characters who are subject to the stereotypes and images others assign to them - but whereas Pavia both fights and plays into all of these roles, Horropedia just brushes it off and continues doing his own thing, being genuine and unapologetically himself.
When it comes to romance, it's easy to assume Horropedia has no interest in it - they're two different genres that don't go together most of the time. It's also easy to assume that he would be a troublesome partner, due to the laser focus attention he gives to his interests. And the latter is partially true: his lackluster love life is entirely because romance hasn't entered his radar, at least not enough to pull his attention away from his one true love.
But I think this is where the aspect of "logic" comes into play. All Horropedia needs is that spark, to find something to truly become invested in when it comes to romance - once he finds it, he'll dedicate the same amount of attention to detail and care as the horror movies he loves so much.
On the subject of Horropedia developing a crush.
Similar to Click, Horropedia would need some time to start noticing the signs of a crush - the difference is that Horropedia is a little quicker when it comes to realizing he's fallen for someone. His forte is horror movies, but he still knows a thing or two when it comes to other genres.
When he cannot rationalize his behaviour around you in a way that makes sense to his current fixation or situation, that's when he knows. And given how straightforward (to the point of bordering on obliviously rude) Horropedia can be, I'd say he'd also be the type to address this crush right away. Now that there's this brand new thing in his life, he'd like to understand it better - to dissect and study the way romance is potrayed, explore how it feels and just analyze it to hell and back. Basically, he wants to know the rules, to figure out how to best proceed.
Of course, he wouldn't dream of confronting you directly, only an amateur would do such a thing. Instead, he asks his friends and pretty much anyone within his general vicinity. He wants to understand romance from every angle, to hear about it from all sorts of people until he feels like he knows enough to start forming his own opinions.
His questions are all theoretical situations that begin rather innocent, innocuous. What does the hero of a romcom do to get the romantic interest? Does it follow a three act structure? And should the third act climax start with a confession or the breakup?
Overtime, they become a little more specific. To the point where his closest friends might suspect something is up, until Horropedia finds himself asking about your interests so that he can figure out the perfect gift for you. Just in case. He finds himself watching romcoms and making extensive research and charts and essays into the genres.
The funniest thing to me is that Horropedia would be extremely casual about this whole ordeal, this crush makes him extremely intrigued in the concept of romance (an oddity for someone so themed around horror), he finds himself staring at you from across the room (this is the third time he's walked into a door because of it) and so on and so forth. But he's so chill about it.
When confronted about his crush - should Blonney or anyone else decide to tease him a little by prodding - Horropedia has no problem blurting out that he has, indeed, fallen for someone. But he'll take your name to the grave, not out of shame or embarrassment but because "he doesn't want to spoil the plot, as obvious as it might be".
On the subject of Horropedia confronting his feelings and some more insight into his mentality.
I'd say there is this small possibility of Horropedia feeling disheartened if he begins to neglect his real passion for the sake of his feelings - it's that sort of guilt and shock one gets when they realize they've forgotten their wallet the moment they're meant to pay for dinner, or when they realize they've forgotten to turn off the oven.
Horror is a huge part of his life and who he is as a person - literally look at the name he's chosen for himself - and given how heavily coded he is to be neurodivergent, I can understand this aspect of him. The feeling like one must choose between two things they enjoy, and all the other things that might come with hyperfixation, both positive and negative.
This is the biggest obstacle for Horropedia when it comes to finally taking the first steps into forming a relationship with you or confessing - the irrational thought that by doing so, he's prioritizing you and romance over horror, something that he holds very dear. One of his stories gives some insight about Horropedia's relationship with horror and how it's something he shared with (and possibly was started by) his grandfather.
I feel like he'll grow a little distant, as a way to set some boundaries for himself or draw a line between his identity and his feelings for you, separate the two so that he doesn't have to feel guilty for giving one more attention than the other. Maybe he simply stops bringing up films around you, because "you're probably not that interested anyway". Masking, he's masking.
But overall, I can see Horropedia being capable enough to get out of this mindset by himself - or with a little help from someone else. Either way, he simply loops back to realizing the obvious: you two were friends, before he realized his feelings for you. You were fine with the whole Horropedia Experience. You liked him for who he was. And he liked you just as you were.
Horropedia is the one who confesses first, the one who asks you out. 100%. And it's so unnecessarily dramatic.
I DO think that Horropedia would make sure to be the one who confesses, just so he can put everything that he's learned about romance into play. And he delivers the most award worthy performance. It would be all about redirection, an unexpected reveal - his skills and animations are also all about fake outs and misleading the audience, after all.
In my head, there's this whole scene about Horropedia asking everyone to help him out confess to you, and everyone is so excited for it - but then he just asks them to fuel this slow rift that formed between you and him, to act vague, distant and mysterious should you ask Blonney or Tooth Fairy about him. Again, unorthodox and weird, but he's cooking. This is all done with the intention of forcing a confrontation between the two of you, just so he can pour his heart out right there - it's all or nothing.
Again, I want to insist that Horropedia, despite being a logical man, still makes as many aspects of his life revolve around the things that he loves and is interested in - he likes films, he likes you. And while romance is not his preferred genre, he still wants to explore all there is about it all thanks to you.
That alone should tell you how much you mean to him. Even if his methods aren't the "proper" way, you know he's putting his whole heart into this. It's all over the top, there's fake rain, etc etc. Of course, your reaction to this is up to you!
If you're mad at him for such convoluted plan, he'll sit there and allow you to scold him to your heart's content - he's used to it as one of the many troublemakers that the Foundation failed to raise as model students. If you laugh at him because of how ridiculous this guy can be sometimes, he'll laugh along, trying to get you to tell him what he could've been done better to get a third act reconciliation. And if you start crying, jump into his arms and play along then he'll be over the moon, trying every single impactful one-liner from every romcom he's watched in the past few weeks.
On the subject of Horropedia and how he acts when he's in a relationship.
Dating Horropedia is pretty easy, because you're dating your best friend. However, it is very easy to misunderstand Horropedia's way of showing affection - those who are more on the insecure side or less receptive to his subtleties may feel like there's been absolutely no shift in the dynamic, that he's treating you the same way he'd treat Tooth Fairy or Vertin.
This is far from the truth! Once Horropedia finally settles into the relationship, he grows very comfortable and allows himself to just exist around you - which isn't saying much since he doesn't mask as much around friends, but it's all about the subtle things!
I like to think Horropedia is very particular about space, as in he makes a point not to invade people's spaces if possible and he'd rather remain in his little bubble. But when it comes to you, he's very casual with physical touch. He's not as cuddly and touchy as characters like, let's say, Matilda, Jessica or Pavia, but being able to rest his head on your shoulder means a lot to him, or just have you lean on him when sitting together. This is pushed to the limit when you two pull all-nighters, binging all of your favorite movies.
He's on cloud nine when you pay attention to his ramblings and makes sure to listen when you ramble to him as well. More than often, he'll do his own little research into the topics you like, just so you have someone to properly discuss things with! Horropedia more than anyone knows what it's like to be brushed aside for being too much or too weird, to have no one listen. Despite his confidence, he has had days of feeling like he keeps on talking to a wall, so he doesn't want you to ever feel like that.
It's all about sharing interests and recommending things that you may like, keeping up with the latest events and so on and so forth, having looong discussions at night about whatever topic you two are extremely invested in.
If these discussions get a little heated and end up as arguments, expect Horropedia to insist on arguing because he's just stubborn like that - it'll take him time to realize that he might've hurt your feelings, or that he might've be hurting too, but he'll come around eventually to talk it out.
Overall, dating Horropedia would be fun because he's full of surprises and excitement, but he's also considerate in his own way.
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raedshadowlegends · 10 months
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Why Lore Olympus and Miraculous Ladybug are the Same Thing but in Different Fonts
Good evening, good day, hello and howdy. I am INCREDIBLY bored and I'm here to go on a nonsensical tangent about two pieces of media that I hate and have dedicated a vast amount of my free time to. This is all in good fun and all of my rudeness is intended to be satirical and/or comical unless indicated otherwise.
Now just to preface, if you know me then you know how much I dislike Miraculous Ladybug. Folks in my circle got to watch as I descended into madness writing a 64k word review on season 5. So I've spent an uncomfortable amount of time dissecting this show.
I have also spent an uncomfortable amount of time engaging with the shitshow that is Lore Olympus. And now my ass is gonna try and compare the two because there's a lot of shit going on here.
None of this is going to matter and it's all in good fun. Like I said, I am bored. And sometimes it's fun to compare stuff you hate.
Now let the insanity ensue. FP spoilers and MLB s5 spoilers below the cut btw.
To get a major difference out of the way, Miraculous Ladybug is a tv show. Lore Olympus is a webcomic.
But mediums aside, these two things still have a lot in common. So for the first comparison, I'd like to talk about the insecurity in both properties.
Insecurity
What I define as insecurity in this context is a piece of media that is too afraid to commit or adhere to a certain tone, story, style, etc. In short-- they don't know what they want to be.
Insecurity in Lore Olympus is a bit more obvious than with Miraculous so I'm gonna rant about that first.
Lore Olympus just straight up does not have a story to tell.
There are too many random ass plots being added and discarded on a whim for it to be a coherent story. A good way to explain it is kinda like this-- In this episode of LO, something cool new and interesting is set up and you have to keep reading to see what happens! And then nothing ever happens. Or it happens because the audience won't let the author forget so there's a half-assed attempt to wrap up that plot point.
LO is so insecure about what it is, it feels the need to add more and more to make it actually something. But what it is is a hollow story that lacks substance. So all of these new random plot points are kinda like bandaid solutions if that makes sense.
There are so many unfinished/under-utilized plot points that if you were to count out each and every one, you'd probably keel over dead before you finished. There's that many.
It's too insecure to commit to any one of them in the grand scheme of things.
I don't know how coherent all of that was so here's a shitty tl;dr
LO doesn't know what it wants to say anymore so it's just adding more shit to keep the reader "invested."
Yeah ok I think that makes more sense. As for Miraculous...
God. I fucking hate Miraculous.
It's insecure as hell and you can smell that shit from ten miles away. It's insecure with it's premise, I think.
If it just kept to the simple "monster-of-the-week" formula, I do not think I would have written so many words on it's fifth season.
Miraculous (apparently) had a grander story to tell beyond the "monster-of-the-week revert back to the status quo each episode."
But we don't see any of that in full swing till season 3, really. Which is a long ass time to get the ball rolling imo.
It's a little jarring to see the show go from the stupid kid status quo adventures to a heavy and emotional story??? And I say heavy and emotional with the most sarcastic tone possible because the only emotion I feel watching this shit is rage.
Despite wanting to make that shift to a serialized type of show, Miraculous was too scared to stray from the successful status quo format.
To explain a bit more I wanna talk about my review of the season.
While it is mostly filled with rude jokes and incomprehensible jargon, I bring up a lot of points in it regarding the state of things.
One of those things being the show's hesitancy to move the story along.
The fifth season was supposed to be a grand final battle and a conclusion to this story arc. But it was too scared to commit to that so there's way more episodes that are nothing but shipping fodder.
There are many episodes that season that just... feel the same. Just with different coats of paint. "Marinette is trying to date Adrien but she's awkward and clumsy and oh no! shenanigans ensue!" We've been doing this for 8 years.
If they want to tell a serialized story then they need to grow some balls and cut the shit we've seen a million times before.
Their insistence to stick to the status quo makes the writing exceptionally weak downright painful to sift through. It was too scared, too insecure, to stray from its formula.
That's a part of the reason why I think the season is paced so bad. There's so little time spent on the interesting parts of the story because they had to cram in as much shipping shit as possible. So by proxy, there was less time to tell a good story.
Both of these stupid ass properties don't know what they want to be. There are too many things being added and not enough balls to commit to any of them.
Now with both LO and MLB, we can all agree that the writing is pretty shit. Nothing new there. But shitty writing often bleeds into the characters and making them shitty by exposure. Almost like a spill of toxic waste, infecting anything near it and turning into a rotten pile of sludge and chemicals.
So yeah, the characters are ass as well. But I only wanna complain about the female leads for both of these things.
But just to mention Adrien and Hades, they are pretty similar. I won't go into detail but the short of it is, "Character with deep seated issues that could have been interesting, has a lot of potential, but is just kinda garbage in the end."
At least Adrien Agreste isn't monetizing death and has a bunch of shades in his basement doing his work.
Persephone and Marinette
So I always say that I don't like using the term 'Mary Sue' to describe a character. But as it turns out, I use that term a lot. So I'm not gonna lie about that anymore.
These two characters are Mary Sues.
Persephone first
Oh my god I hate Persephone a lot. She just ticks every box on my list of 'THINGS I HATE IN A CHARACTER.'
Which is funny because her character had a lot of promise and heart in the beginning.
I related to her a LOT when I picked up this comic before my frontal cortex developed. I related with her character and her struggles. Especially after the Apollo incident. That really stuck out to me. It was so powerful.
But all of those tiny things I liked about her character were stripped away. Her ambition to study in school? Poof, gone. Her charm? Not charming anymore. That kindness everyone in the story gushes about? I don't even think it was there in the first place.
Truth be told, I do need to reread this comic because the beginning is fuzzy as fuck in my walnut-sized brain. But I can tell you for certain that the way she was in the beginning is not who she is now.
And this isn't the case of a character going through an arc and developing and changing. She's just getting worse and the narrative treats it as a GOOD THING.
"Oh yeah, Persephone trashed Leuce's apartment instead of talking to her husband like an adult. She threatened to kill this nymph but you're supposed to find that endearing." Like, what??? I will not have a story try and get me to believe this is a good thing.
If this were a good story, Persephone's actions in that episode WOULDN'T BE REWARDED. But she's rewarded with sex for being a fucking psychopath towards a random nymph. Wow.
And that leads into my next point-- she can never be in the wrong ever.
AOW? Retconned, not her fault. It wasn't her fault she killed all those people. It's actually Eris' fault because she gave her wrath.
Trashing Leuce's apartment? She was in the right for that, apparently.
Killing people in a famine during the 10 year banishment? That's never explored, we just know she killed people, burned a library or something, and probably shot the president too. But it's fine, she's the good guy.
And most recently (and potentially the most frustrating);
Persephone causes winter.
Not her mother, Demeter, no fuck the myths. Persephone is the one who caused winter actually. AND SHE DID IT ON ACCIDENT SO TECHNICALLY IT IS NOT HER FAULT CAUSE SHE DIDNT MEAN TOOOO UWU She also probably killed a million flower nymphs in that snap freeze but its ok it doesn't matter.
WHAT?
WHAT THE FUCK? CMON NOW.
She's not going to receive any consequences for anything because she is just too perfect.
She's smarter than Athena, prettier than Aphrodite, better than her mother in every way, all the boys want her, she has a perfect body, she's pink, her eyes go red when she's angy, she has the most power of everyone in the world, she's a super rare fertility goddess, she has all the gifts, all the blessings, and none of the development.
It almost feels like a wattpad fanfic.
"My mom doesn't like me so she sold me to one direction and then I became queen of the underworld."
Yeah, I don't like her.
And the same can be applied to Marinette!
A character who is so blatantly perfect, the narrative fucking BENDS TO HER WILL.
She's a creepy ass stalker and has done some weird ass things to get close to this random famous white boy and it's all excused.
It's literally excused.
There is a rule about character backstories. They are supposed to provide an explanation for a character's behavior, not an excuse for it.
In season 5, episode 14 - Derision, we see a bit of Marinette backstory. Some stupid bullshit happens and Marinette essentially says she isn't going to say 'I love you' to anyone unless she knows literally everything about them.
She says a lot in that stupid ass scene but it's basically just saying that all of her stalking and creepy behavior is justified. Which it is not.
Marinette can do no wrong. The narrative won't allow it.
She's perfect in every way. And even when SHE is in the wrong, characters somehow find a way to apologize to her. Either that or she turns a situation about someone else into one about her self.
She's just the perfect character who ends up saving the world.
Fuck having Chat Noir face against his dad in the finale, Marinette has to girlboss all over the place and save the day but then actually lose because the "plot" demands it.
Oh yeah and she's probably never going to tell Adrien that his abusive dad was the villain they had been fighting for months. Do you think that's a good choice? I'll give you a hint; it is not.
It makes Marinette look like a HORRIBLE character but it's painted in a way that makes the viewer believe this is the right decision.
I don't think I need to get into specifics as to why that is wrong and disgusting.
If I had to make a prediction for this show going forward, she isn't going to tell him. It's going to be forgotten and she's going to be painted as the hero.
No flaws, no accountability, nothing.
Garbage character. Fucking hate it.
Both of these characters will never see consequences for their actions. Their bad actions are either excused or retconned out of existence. And that's not how you write a character btw. If you want them to be real, give them consequences. The world should not revolve around them. They should have flaws and issues that should be explored. But apparently that's too much work.
It's funny how both of these properties claim to be about feminism and somehow completely miss what feminism is
Miraculous thinks that feminism means "Girl power! Girls are better than guys in every way!" And Lore Olympus makes no attempt to be feminist at all. Women hate other women, and they don't get a lot of opportunities to explore and express themselves.
I could get into the whole purity culture shtick but that's a shitty rant for another day.
I've been ranting about this for a while and I got the big ones out of the way, methinks. I do want to get into the creators of both of these things but that is also a rant for another day.
Cause if I got into that now, we'd be here a while.
So let me just make a final comparison and wrap things up here. I don't think any of this makes a lot of sense but I hate both things and I'm passionate about it so I'm gonna keep rambling.
Miraculous Ladybug and Lore Olympus never attempt to grow as stories. They are both scared to try new things and to stick with it. Most of the time this results in rushed writing and horribly done characters.
It's so clear that both of these things are desperate to be something great but they just can't put in the work to get there.
Honestly, they both feel like the product of a team of yes-men. Bad decisions and errors slip by WAY too often and it's kind of embarrassing.
These are popular pieces of media and they have the resources to be great but they just aren't.
They're both too insecure to make something of themselves.
It's honestly really sad and I don't want this for either of these things. I want LO to be stunning and retell the myth of Persephone with the respect it deserves. I want MLB to be a serialized show with focus on the lore. Sure it can start as episodic but it can ease us into a deeper story and intrigue the viewer. But I want it to flesh out the world and be an entertaining experience.
It's sad but it's the way it is.
Who knows, maybe MLB season 6 will be good. And maybe LO will have a 4th season and it'll fix all the problems it has.
I dunno.
Thanks for reading this incoherent nonsense.
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luses-art · 1 month
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collection of my fav quotes from my writing I collected together for organization (varying amounts of emo) that probably need more context to make sense, and the characters of mine that said it
"if the gods want a show... i'll give them a show." - senah indrajit
"shame claws at my ribcage, guttural groans escaping its pale lips. it threatens to tear me in two and leave me to rot." - sindri asdisdottir
"what a cruel god you must be, to resign something to a fate of flesh and blood." - senah indrajit
"that's all we ever were. the deer and the hunter. the girl and the flower she picked. the nails and the skin they scratched raw." - sipho ayanda
love not like a million songbirds but the wild banging of hands on a discordant piano. love like being shot by a cupid with wings of white hot flame. love like a cacophony of screams going over, and under, and over, and under. love like tooth and nail tearing at flesh." - daniele vierre
"and if i am to be buried before i have truly lived, bury me under the cooing of the koel and the mourning dove, and the tree god planted when i was born. at least, so i can live there." - queen indrajit
"the toil of your flesh and blood. all veins of circuitry and electrical impulses. metal teeth and a well-oiled jaw. aren't we one and the same? mechanisms made of different mediums?" - unnamed robot
"she met me like an apparition. like a kiss on death's cold lips." - daniele vierre
"how am I supposed to love when it always ends in loss?" - sindri asdisdottir
"when she was finished, she'd be the only star left in the sky for people to look up to." - sangre medina
"every swing of his sword and every curl of his fingers to form a fist led him to believe there were more violent than pious bones in his body, but he was too far gone. much too late to turn back and seek redemption from anything holy, but did it really hurt to try?" - alaric beaumont
"as it turned out, their savior was no god. it was a girl." - maeve
"you can see it in those yellow eyes that mark it as a demon-- the hunger. but what's more is a deep, quaking fear. like the animal that knows what it's capable of." - referring to riecka
"to paint a face was to be intimately acquainted with it. to dedicate yourself to every plane, the bow of a nose, and the curl of a pair of lips with fervent devotion. Her face, time and time again, had possessed his hand to draw her over and over like a broken machine, and when his mind wandered, it wandered right back to her. his muse." - daniele vierre
"all she needed to do was explain herself, and he'd help her cover the crime up. after all, what good was a lover who wouldn't help you dig a grave?" - daniele vierre, again (what a guy)
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literalite · 10 months
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literally just me talking about edit stuff because im in a mood
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these r what i would call like my base level of ingame edits (i dont reallyyyyyy count my cas screenshots as edits unless i spend an actual amount of time actually working on them rather than my usual blur+chromatic aberration+sharpen combo) theres usually very little? or like no actual basis in the characters "canon" or lore like its just done to make them look nice. right. or like its fun lighting practise for me really. theyre usually pretty simple in execution like in the two examples there its just plain yellow background for sunny and the neon cross for vin so i have to put a little extra oomf into it because the backgrounds are like not super detailed so theres less of an "interest" factor from that so the sims themselves have to look REALLY good to make up for it. the ones i end up happy with though usually look really dynamic so it balances out
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so these are more sort of abstract edits to me bc they have a basis in the oc lore or themes or whatever and most of my ocs have at least one or two visual markers (in the examples lucari or even just ari specifically gets a fair amount of celestial/sky imagery, i handled the colours here a bit sloppily but its meant to be blue and purple which are ari and luca's text colours, heiya's emphasis being on her muscles and scars and the clouded solar eclipse, redacted gets a lot of water/reflective surfaces/birds/rainbow flares?? and also lightning but that isnt being used in this specific one and sunny gets a fair amount of fire/smoke stuff as well as emphasis on primary colours like his more blue toned edits r usually in his darker stages of his life while warmer yellows means more positive stuff, red usually is just for uhhh violence oriented stuff) and like none of these are Actually happening. right. redacted isnt actually ever in that position with that era of hair in the water with the birds and sunny was set on fire at 13 not as an adult and they certainly never had a portrait of his family like that. but its symbolic, it means Something even if you as the viewer doesnt know it yet 😅 or ever aha
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OKAY LOL I PRESSED POST BY ACCIDENT LOL but these are my full lore edits or something likr theyre totally rooted in the background of the ocs. like these are scenes from their lives for real. obviously i fiddle with lighting angle composition a tinyyyy bit to make for a more pleasing or dynamic image at the end but if my ocs all got dedicated like. movies or shows these would be ripped straight from the scene. i take creative liberties with some stuff but in essence these could be story posts (like the 3rd example with idris/redacted is literally in the story itself in one of the posts) the difference is usually amount of images in the post and orientation of said image/s. to me an edit stops being an edit when it has more than likeeeeee 4 images and then i will usually keep that bulk all in landscape or maybe one as portrait for emphasis. edits will be 4 or less and mostly in portrait because i want the less images to take up more room on the dash. the backgrounds for these will usually be way more complex like ill build a mini set or use existing sets for each one. i just think that ingame edits have a lot more capability than you might think (u dont have to go into blender for every little thing promise 🙌🏼) its just like. u can do a lot with this game i swearrrrrr just treat it like an art medium. im serious
ALSO the song almost always is sooo relevant to the edit i swear its not enough to sound good. i have to be unwell about it as well and it has to make sense with what im showing u
ok thats my random unrequested ted talk for the day im going to go home now bye thank u for reading if u did that 😁
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psychicmedium2 · 1 year
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Psychic Medium
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References
Psychic
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychic
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lascltool · 2 years
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Ynab budgeting how to video
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Variable expenses are things you have more control over, such as groceries, travel, dining out, shopping, and charitable donations. In general, your budget should be divided into three categories of expenses: fixed, discretionary, and savings.įixed expenses are things you can’t avoid paying, such as rent or a mortgage, utilities, and loans. You can make a budget for a specific time frame (monthly or annual are the most common). Take how much you expect to earn next month and use the expenditure percentages from step three to estimate what you can spend. You can now set up next month’s budget.For instance, maybe your typical $500 grocery bill jumps to $700 in November and December, or you pay your homeowners insurance premium at the beginning of each year. Estimate how much you’ll spend in different categories each month over the next year.Use last year’s pay stubs as a reference point and adjust as needed (perhaps you recently got a raise or finalized a new business deal). Estimate how much you’ll earn each month over the next year.Variable/discretionary ordinary living expenses (such as food, clothing, household expenses, medical payments, and other items for which your monthly spending tends to fluctuate).Fixed costs (such as housing payments, utility bills, charitable contributions, insurance premiums, and loan payments).Separate your spending categories into main buckets.(This is an especially useful exercise if you have uneven income.) For instance, let’s say you spent $500 in January on groceries, which was 12% of your household earnings. Note how much you spent in each category every month, as well as what percentage of your monthly income that spending represented. Categorize all of your expenses over the past year.Add up your take-home pay over the past year.Most institutions let you export your transactions as a CSV file that you can open in Google Sheets, Excel, or Numbers. A year’s worth can give you a good sense of how much you tend to spend over a given period of time. Collect all of your bank and credit card statements over the past year.(Ever get hit with a large bill, such as for an auto repair or emergency dental treatment? Those kinds of things can throw your budget off track.) Spreadsheet-based budgets (and some other budgeting tools) prompt you to create a myriad of categories and assign a dollar amount to each one, which is not only overwhelming but also likely to fail. It tracks your spending, revolving bills, savings goals, and earnings history to estimate how much you have left to spend in a given month in any category you want. We recommend Simplifi for most people because it’s a happy medium between the two. Conversely, zero-balance apps encourage a more hands-on approach, forcing you to account for every dollar you bring in (X amount for savings, Y amount for rent, and so on), but they tend to be idiosyncratic and costly. Tracking apps offer a 30,000-foot view of your finances, display your transactions in real time, and require very little effort to set up. When you roll your own spreadsheet, it’s surprisingly complex to allow for cleared and uncleared transactions.There are two basic types of budget apps: trackers ( à la Mint) and zero-balancers. YNAB walks you through the process of reconciling your account. Reviewing Your (shared) transactions and resolving any discrepancies, aka budget reconciliation, is also very simple. You might actually keep a true budget instead of a ledger. If that happens it’s much easier to help them be engaged from the beginning thanks to a dedicated budgeting tool. Think about the following: your partner might want to pitch in from time to time, or sooner or later the person managing the budget will change. It provides a better, more efficient interface than Excel. It’s a system that doesn’t need maintenance and it’s constantly improving. It takes most of the work of your hands allowing you to purely focus on budgeting. When talking about limitations it can be good to compare to YNAB. These accounts can be investment accounts but also a mortgage. This an overview of my tracking accounts.
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nerdythebard · 3 years
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#7: Anubis, God of the Dead
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Well, now we've done it, Gods and Goddesses!
In our journey through the deserts of Egypt, we took a detour and found ourselves in the Land of the Dead. Now, we are under the watchful eye of Anubis. This psychopomp shall lead us to the Hall of Two Truths, were our soul will judge itself. Let's take a walk, shall we?
Next Time: I AM THE ETERNAL DRAGON! SPEAK YOUR WISH AND I SHALL GRANT IT! Sudden change of plans, dearies... Next time, we take a look at a strapping young lad who knows a thing or two about yard decorations. He got it from his daddy dearest.
So, what can we do to make Anubis chill our enemies to the bone:
Friends on the Other Side: Anubis has a connection to the spirits of the dead. He can grant them a facsimile of life to act on his behalf, damage and slow enemies in a wide AoE.
Crowd Control: Anubis can call upon a plague of locusts to damage enemies in a cone in front of him, as well as keep foes restrained with mummy bandages.
Death Glare: Anubis's Ultimate is a literal death glare, his sight becomes a piercing beam of necrotic energy heavily damaging enemies in front of him.
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Anubis's D&D race is a much more difficult case than I first imagined. Now, there is a race called Khenra
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which would be a dead-ringer for Anubis, but their stats from the Plane Shift: Amonkhet document is... honestly, it's pretty bad and wouldn't make for a nice build.
Instead, let's take a look at the closest we have to a lycanthrope in player options, the Shifter race. More specifically, the Wildhunt Shifter, who are described to often be "the spiritual leaders of the shifter communities", which I'd say fits Anubis pretty well. As a Shifter, we get +2 Wisdom and +1 Dexterity, 30 feet of walking speed, 60 feet of Darkvision, and our only known language is Common. As a Natural Tracker, we get proficiency in Survival skill, and our key trait is our Shifting ability. As a bonus action, we can assume a more beast-like form (in this case, jackal-like). The transformation lasts for 1 minute/until we die/until we dismiss it as a bonus action. When we shift, we get Temporary Hit Points equal to [our level + Constitution modifier], as well as a feature unique to the type of shifter we choose. Wildhunt Shifters gain an advantage on Wisdom checks while shifted, and no creature within 30 feet of them can impose a disadvantage unless the shifter is incapacitated.
For our background, I think picking Acolyte is the most suitable choice. We get proficiencies with Insight and Religion (to better judge the intentions of a soul) and the Shelter of the Faithful feature, which grants us safety at any temple dedicated to the deity we're the acolyte of (either Kelemvor or Jergal are a good option here).
ABILITY SCORES
Anubis is a light armour caster-type, so we're going to focus on those stats. We will start with Dexterity to pull off that leather armour, and follow it with Wisdom; we must be wise in our judgment, and it's also our spellcasting ability. Constitution is next, as it's pretty important for casters to have decent Hit Points.
The stats on the down-low side of things shall be Intelligence, followed by Charisma, and we shall dump Strength.
CLASS
Yet another pure build. To keep the flow of souls at a steady pace and guide them to Osiris's Halls, Anubis is a Cleric.
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As a Cleric, we get the d8 as our Hit Dice, [8 + Constitution modifier] initial Hit Points, proficiencies with light armour, medium armour, shields, and simple weapons. For this I suggest a studded leather armour and a dagger (perhaps like the one Egyptians used in the mummification processes, eh? :D), since this is a primarily spell-heavy build. Our saving throws is Wisdom and Charisma and we get to pick two class skills: let's go for Persuasion and History.
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Level 1 - Clerics are full-casters, so from the very beginning we get our Spellcasting feature. We know cantrips and ritual casting, and we get access to the entire Cleric spell list, from which we can prepare a number of spells equal to [our Wisdom modifier + our Cleric level]. Starting with cantrips, we get to select three:
Guidance lets us give a creature we touch an extra d4 to their next skill check performed within 1 minute of casting (concentration). Very useful for "skill monkeys" like rogues or bards.
Sacred Flame is a good source of radiant damage. It requires a Dexterity saving throw from a target within 60 feet of us, or results in 1d8 radiant damage (damage increases with our level).
Toll the Dead fits Anubis's theme. Calls the soul for their final judgement. Forces onto them a Wisdom saving throw. On a failed save, the target take 1d8 necrotic damage. If they already have some Hit Points missing, they take 1d12 damage instead.
We start with two 1st-level spell slots and we can prepare four 1st-level spells:
Bless gives up to three creatures of our choice an extra d4 to all attack rolls and saving throws for 1 minute (concentration).
Cure Wounds is THE staple healing spell at lower levels, and it reflects Anubis's theme of preparing and embalming the body for their journey to the afterlife. A creature we touch regains [1d8 + our spellcasting modifier] Hit Points. It doesn't work on undead or constructs.
Guiding Bolt deals 4d6 radiant damage and applies advantage to the next attack roll made against the target (it can be ours or somebody else's).
Sanctuary protects a creature from harm for 1 minute. When attacking somebody who's under the effect of Sanctuary, the attacker must make a Wisdom saving throw or choose a different target.
We're not done with Level 1 features yet, because that is also where Clerics get their subclass, their Divine Domain. There are two official subclasses that mention Anubis by name, but for this build I feel like Grave Domain works best. As a Grave Cleric we get access to some more spells - those are always prepared for us and we don't count them against the number of spells we can prepare:
Bane works similarly to Bless, except the target has to make a Charisma saving throw or subtract 1d4 from each attack roll and saving throw they make for 1 minute (concentration).
False Life transforms necromantic energy into a facsimile of life, giving us 1d4+4 Temporary Hit Points for 1 hour (or until they're lost).
Grave Cleric's first subclass feature is Circle of Mortality, which boosts our healing spells. Where normally we would have to roll dice on healing spells (like 1d8 on Curse Wounds), we can instead automatically use the highest number on the die. We also learn Spare the Dying cantrip, which saves a fallen creature from making Death Saves. For us, the cantrip has 30 feet reach instead of touch.
We also get Eyes of the Grave. It works similarly to the Paladin's Divine Sense except this one only shows us the undead present within 60 feet of us.
And that's it for Level 1. Clerics, man... they're early game powerhouses.
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Level 2 - This level gives us access to the Channel Divinity feature, which lets us tap into the Divine Energy of our deity to perform amazing features. For now, we can use it once per short or long rest. All Clerics get the Turn Undead effect - each undead within 30 feet of us must make a Wisdom saving throw or become turned (they cannot move towards us within 30 feet, and must spend their turn trying to move away from us as far as they can) for 1 minute. The Grave Domain gives us another CD effect - Path to the Grave. This effect curses a target of our choice within 30 feet of us, until the end of our next turn. During that time, the next attack that damages a target makes it vulnerable to that damage type (damage dealt increases by half) and the curse ends.
We also get a new spell - Inflict Wounds deals 3d10 necrotic damage on a successful touch.
Level 3 - We unlock 2nd-level spell slots. This means, we can now get a 2nd-level spell: Hold Person forces a Wisdom saving throw on one (or more, if using higher-level spell slots) humanoid target within 60 feet. On a failed save the target is paralysed for 1 minute (concentration). Flavour it as mummy bandages and we've got one Anubis ability down.
Our subclass also grants us two spells at this point:
Gentle Repose prevents a corpse from decay and turning into an undead (suck it, Ah Puch!). Useful if you cannot afford the resurrection of one of your party members, but besides that, it's pretty situational.
Ray of Enfeeblement is like a demo version of Anubis's Ultimate. On a successful hit, the target's damage that uses Strength deals only half the normal amount for 1 minute (concentration).
Level 4 - Time for our first Ability Score Improvement! Let's get some better HP with 1 point in Constitution, and we'll put the other point in Wisdom.
We get another cantrip: Thaumaturgy gives a list of multiple effects we can perform for, lasting for 1 minute (making our voice louder, dimming and brightening lights, locking and unlocking doors and windows, etc.)
We also get another spell: Blindness/Deafness forces a Constitution saving throw on one creature within 30 feet. If they fail, they are blinded or deafened (our choice) for 1 minute. They can repeat the saving throw on each of their turns to try and shake off the effect.
Level 5 - At this level, our Turn Undead becomes Destroy Undead. It works only on the undead with the CR of 1/2 and below (shadows, zombies, skeletons, etc.), but if they fail their saving throw, they are instantly destroyed.
We also unlock 3rd-level spell slots and spells: Speak with Dead lets us reanimate a corpse for a short while (10 minutes), enough to ask it five questions. The dead can answer only what they knew in life, and the answers are usually brief/cryptic. They may also lie if we're the one that killed them, or they're hostile in general.
Additionally, we get two more spells from our subclass:
Revivify might go against Anubis's ways, but it is a staple Cleric spell. Sacrificing a diamond worth at least 300 gold pieces, we bring a creature who died within the last minute to life with 1 Hit Point. The spell doesn't restore missing body parts.
Vampiric Touch lets us deal 3d6 necrotic damage to a creature we can touch, and give us the same amount of Hit Points. Until the spell ends (1 minute, concentration), we can use the spell again as action without a need to make a spell attack.
Level 6 - Our Channel Divinity has now two uses between rests, and we gain a new subclass upgrade. Sentinel at Death's Door is one of the more annoying features in all of D&D (speaking from the DM's point of view here). Whenever a creature within 30 feet of us is attacked with a Critical Hit (Natural 20 roll, doubles damage dealt), we can use our reaction to cancel that critical and turn it into regular damage.
Spirit Guardians is a spell that summons a horde of spirits in a 15 feet radius from us. We can select who is unaffected by the spirits when we cast it. Those who are affected have their speed halved, and whenever they end their turn within the spirits' radius (and first time walk into it) must make a Wisdom saving throw or take 3d8 radiant damage (if we're good/neutral; if we're evil, it's necrotic. Half damage on a successful save).
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Level 7 - Here, we only unlock 4th-level spell slots.
We get two more subclass spells: Banishment forces a Charisma saving throw on one target within 60 feet. On a failed save, the target disappears from the Plane it resides on. (right into the Shadow Realm! Egyptian Underworld) If the target isn't native to the Plane it disappeared from, it returns to its home Plane. If the target is native to the Plane it disappeared from, it gets transported into a pocket demiplane. If nothing interrupts our concentration for the entire duration of the spell (1 minute), the banished target doesn't come back (non-native), or it returns to the same space (native).
We also have subclass spells here:
Blight drains vitality from one creature within 30 feet of us. They must succeed on a Constitution saving throw, or take 8d8 necrotic damage (half damage on a successful save). It doesn't work on the undead or constructs, but if the target is a plant creature or a magical plant, it makes the save with disadvantage and receives the maximum possible amount of damage (64). If the target is a non-magical plant, it doesn't make a save - just withers instantly.
Death Ward prevents a person's death before their scheduled time. A creature we touch gains protection against being killed for 8 hours. If they drop to 0 Hit Points, they immediately recover one point. Any effect that causes instant death (such as a trap, a curse, or even Power Word: Kill) is also blocked.
Level 8 - We get another ASI. Let's get a +1 Wisdom and +1 Constitution again.
Because of our Wisdom modifier changing from 3 to 4, we now can get two new spells at this level. For this, I'd actually suggest taking just one spell and ask your DM whether we can save the remaining one for later. Otherwise, pick any throwaway spell to replace later.
Guardian of Faith summons a Large-sized spectre at a point within 30 feet of us for 8 hours (no concentration). Any creature moving within 10 feet of the guardian must make a Dexterity saving throw or take 20 points of (unspecified) damage (half damage on a success). The guardian disappears after dealing a total of 60 points of damage.
Level 9 - We unlock 5th-level spells here. If we have an empty spell from the previous level, we can now take two spells here. Plus, we also get two spells from our subclass!
Greater Restoration is a great healing spell. It is able to remove one curse/petrification/charm/reduction of Hit Points Maximum on top of removing one level of exhaustion. Really useful.
Insect Plague basically lets us re-enact the Prince of Egypt. We fill a 20-foot-radius sphere with a swarm of buzzing, biting locust. All creatures within the sphere have to make a Constitution saving throw or take 4d10 piercing damage (half damage on a successful one). This saving throw must also be done when entering the sphere or ending the turn in it.
Now, for the spells from our subclass:
Antilife Shell creates a 10-foot-radius dome around us. It lasts for 1 hour (concentration) and during that time, nothing organic/alive can enter the barrier. Only undead and constructs can get through. It also lets in projectiles and spells.
Raise Dead is what happens when Anubis says 'I quit'. The spell targets one corpse that died within the last 10 days and brings it back to life with 1 Hit Point. The raised creature gets post-resurrectional penalty of -4 to all of their saving throws, attack rolls, and ability checks. The penalty is reduced by 1 for each long rest taken.
Level 10 - Halfway through the build and we receive one of the Cleric's best feature. With Divine Intervention we can petition our patron deity to directly help us with a problem. We roll a percentile dice and if the result is equal to or lower than our Cleric level, the prayer is successful. The interpretation of 'divine help' is up to our DM; it can be a vision, a single-use spell that's gonna be helpful, etc. If the prayer is successful, we cannot use this feature for a week. If the prayer fails, we can try again after finishing a long rest.
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We get our final cantrip: Word of Radiance is a good anti-close range spell. It forces a Constitution saving throw on all creatures within 5 feet of us, and deals 1d6 radiant damage on a failed one (damage scales as we level up).
For our next spell, Holy Weapon infuses our weapon with divine energy for 1 hour (concentration). The weapon sheds bright light in 30 feet radius (and dim light for another 30), it becomes magical for the purpose of overcoming resistances, and all successful attacks deal extra 2d8 radiant damage for the whole duration of the spell.
Level 11 - Our Destroy Undead effect of Channel Divinity gets enhanced. It now affects undead with a CR of 2 or lower (ghouls, spectres, poltergeists, will-o'-wisps, etc.).
We also gain access to 6th-level spells. Find the Path represents Anubis's role as a guide of souls. It can last up to 1 day (concentration) and allows us to find the shortest and most direct path to a location we name that we're familiar with.
Level 12 - Time for another ASI! First, let's round up our Constitution to a nice, even number, and then let's start boosting our weaker abilities by raising our Charisma.
For this level's spell, Planar Ally allows us to summon an otherworldly minion (celestial, elemental, or fiend), which we could ask to carry out a small task in exchange for payment. The creature is under no obligation to listen to us but can be bargained with.
Level 13 - We don't get a class feature this time, only unlock 7th-level spell slots. With Etherealness, we can step into the spirit world for a brief amount of time (up to 8 hours, no concentration). While inside the Ethereal Plane, we can only interact with creatures from that plane. We see and hear into the Plane we departed from and can move in any direction (moving up and down costs +1 foot for every foot of movement). We can also pass through objects and walls of the Material Plane.
Level 14 - We have upgrade to our Destroy Undead effect. It can now affect the undead with a CR of 3 or lower (mummies, wights, phantom warriors, etc.).
With Regenerate, we restore one target's health by 4d8+15 Hit Points. Following that, for 1 hour the target recovers 1 Hit Point per turn (10 HP per minute) until reaching their Hit Point Maximum. The spell also regrows missing organs and limbs 2 minutes after casting.
Level 15 - Once again, no new class features. We do unlock 8th-level spell slots. Antimagic Field creates a 10-foot-radius invisible sphere, where no magic can exist; spells fizzle out, summoned creatures disappear, magic items become regular. When you stand before the final judgment, no magic will help you.
Level 16 - We get another ASI. Let's raise our Charisma and Strength.
Although we do have access to 8th-level spells now, we can back up for a moment and take Planar Shift. This spell lets us travel into another Plane of Existence, as long as we a metal rod worth at least 250 gold pieces and is attuned to our desired destination. The spell transports us, along with up to eight willing creatures. Alternatively, we can banish a creature within our melee range into the particular Plane, granted they fail a Charisma saving throw.
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Level 17 - This is a big one. First of all, our Destroy Undead reaches another upgrade, allowing us to disintegrate undead with a CR of 4 or lower (the banshee, ghosts, flameskulls, deathlocks, etc.).
We also get our final subclass upgrade - Keeper of Souls. If a creature we can see dies within 60 feet of us, we can choose another creature we can see within 60 feet and restore their Hit Point by the now-deceased enemy's remaining Hit Dice. We can use this feature once per turn.
At this level, we also unlock the pinnacle of Divine Magic - 9th-level spells. True Resurrection can restore a creature who has been dead for no longer than 200 years back to life with a full amount of Hit Points. The spell closes wounds, restores missing limbs, lifts curses, and neutralizes poison and disease. It turns undead into their non-undead form. If there is no body to resurrect, the spell can provide a new body for the soul to inhabit. The only thing the spell cannot restore is if death came from old age.
Level 18 - Our Channel Divinity feature can now be used three times in-between rest.
Mass Heal is a powerful restorative spell, which targets all creatures within 60 feet of us. We can restore a total of 700 Hit Points, divided evenly between all creatures affected, who are also healed from all diseases as well as blindness or deafness. The spell doesn't work on constructs and undead.
Level 19 - We get our final ASI of this build. Before the final boss battle, let's boost our Constitution by 2.
Gate creates a portal linked into another Plane of Existence. We can determine a specific destination by naming a location in the target Plane. The portal lasts for 1 minute (concentration). Alternatively, we can name a creature we know resides in the target Plane and pull them through the portal into our location.
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(yes, Doctor Strange is a Cleric in D&D terms, fight me!)
Level 20 - Our build capstone is Divine Intervention Improvement. At this level, whenever we decide to use our Divine Intervention hotline, the prayer is always successful, without a need to roll.
For our final spell, we get Astral Projection
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The spell makes us and eight willing creatures go on a trip into the Astral Sea. Our soul leaves the body (which is in suspended animation, requiring no food, air, and doesn't age) and enters the dimension of pure thought and psychic energy. There is a series of rules in the spell description, but it can be used to survey other planes of existence by entering the right colourful portal.
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And that's the end of it. Anubis, the Egyptian psychopomp. Let's see how we did:
We have good abilities, two 18s and a 16 where it counts, average Hit Points of 151 and 15 AC with studded leather armour. We're not the designated HealBot, but we have a few good higher-level healing spells for when things go sour.
Can't wait to show you folks the next one. I have a feeling some of you might enjoy it!
- Nerdy out!
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oathofoaksart · 3 years
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YOUNG JUSTICE/DC OC: MUNCH “YELLOW JACKET” MARTINEZ
bio under the cut!
BASICS
Name: Taylor Martinez 
A.K.A: Yellow Jacket; Munch, Munchie, Jacket, YJ
Age: 16 [S2], 18 [S3]
Gender: Transgender Male 
Orientation: Homoromantic Homosexual
 Race: Metahuman 
Ethnicity: Afro-Latinx, Black-Colombian
Location: Dakota City, Michigan
Hometown: Dakota City, Michigan 
 Skin: Dark Tan, warm undertones 
Hair: Black 
Eyes: Dark brown; glow fully yellow while actively using metagene 
Height: 5’10
Build: Lean with sinewy muscles
Distinctions: Has a large collection of hoodies and jackets, specifically of shonen anime merch. 
 RELATIONS
Parents: Gloria Martinez and Jamal Winston, Danielle Seymore [step-mother] 
Siblings: Tori Winston [younger half-sister] 
Friends: Virgil “Static” Hawkins, Jacklyn “Ferro” Ericson @generalfandomsofthefreak, Raquel “Rocket” Irving, Eduardo “El Dorado” Dorado Jr., Jaime “Blue Beetle III” Reyes, Karen “Bumblebee” Beecher, Malcolm “Guardian III” Duncan, Asami “Sam” Koizumi, Tye Longshadow, Roy “Arsenal” Harper, Tatsuo “Irezumi” Sumioka [@Triskata], Bart “Kid Flash II” Allen, Gi “Riot/Geode” Flores [OC], Shizuka “Oni” Amachi [OC], Tim “Robin III” Drake, Forager “Fred Bugg”, Violet “Halo” Harper, Brion “Geoforce” Markov
Partner/s: Richie “Gear” Foley [ev.]
Misc.: Augustus “Icon” Freeman, Jefferson “Black Lightning” Pierce, Ivan “Ebon” Evans, See-More, the HIVE 5, the Meta-Breed gang, the Blood Syndicate
Affiliations: The Team, Taos Metateen Youth Center, The Titans [ev.], S.T.A.R Labs [formally] 
 PERSONALITY
Personality Type: ESTP-A [Assertive Entrepreneur] 
Temperament: Choleric-Sanguine 
Alignment: Chaotic Good 
Passionate | Social | Upfront | Risk-prone | Defiant 
 Smart-mouthed, openly opinionated, and with an apparent lack of volume, Munch quickly cements himself as the class clown in any group. He enjoys living in the moment, a truly free spirit with an infectious energy. He is the textbook extrovert, finding himself to be bored out of his mind if not sharing with others, leading him to have quite the large group of friends and acquaintances. He’s notorious for poking fun at anything and anyone, but has no problem sincerely apologizing once he realizes he might have taken something too far. 
As a hero, Munch takes after his namesake, the Yellow Jacket wasp. Quick, nimble, and particularly aggressive, Jacket revels in the comic book hero lifestyle of kicking butts and taking names. His energy blasts aren’t his only weapons, he has as much fun slinging insults and burns as he does physically taking someone down. He certainly enjoys the attention of being a hero in a celebrity sense, but Jacket sees his role as a chance to inspire others to fight the good fight in any capacity. 
Hot-blooded as he is, Munch struggles with controlling his emotions. He can be easily frustrated, especially when things aren’t as straight-foward as he is, and blisteringly fierce when angered. It takes an ungodly amount of coaxing to get him to let go of past grudges due to his tendency of being bullheaded. 
 ABILITIES AND WEAKNESSES
Metahuman Biology: Metahumans by standard are more durable than humans. While not by much, Jacket exhibits increased strength, speed, reflexes and resilience. 
Plasma Manipulation: Jacket’s metagene allows him to create, shape, and otherwise manipulate plasma matter
Plasma “Stingers”: By shooting short blasts of plasma energy, Yellow Jacket creates his signature “stingers,” the potency of said stingers can vary from shocks to explosions. 
Variants include plasma beams and large spheres, but they currently require more concentration and stamina to use
He can also use his stingers to push him off surfaces as a kind of super-jump and can sustain limited flight mobility
Plasma Shields: Jacket can create small shields, enough to deflect low to medium powered attacks. Large shields require significant effort to shape and contain, once he’s made one, he’s stuck sustaining it. 
Inventory
Flight Belt: Jacket can fly thanks to the inertia belt made by his mentor Icon, based off Rocket’s Inertia belt. Since it was not made of the same material as the original belt, it allows only for flight and a decent powered body aura. 
Goggles: Jacket’s goggles feature different kinds of vision including: Telescopic, Microscopic, Infrared, and X-Ray
 Weaknesses and Limitations
Energy Stamina: Jacket stands the risk of overexerting himself if he pushes his plasma control too far. The reason why he tends to stick with short blasts is because they take much less energy to conjure. Attacks such as beams, energy spheres, and large defensive shields can potentially wear him down to unconsciousness if the strain is too much.  
High Metabolism: Similar to that of a speedster; Jacket’s plasma energy tears through his calorie reservoir. He needs a rather high end amount of food to sustain himself properly or else his energy suffers. 
 HISTORY
16-year-old Jamal Winston and Gloria Martinez figured trying to force their relationship made having to take care of their newborn far more painful than it had to be and called it quits. They continued co-parenting with both opting to drop-out of high school, Gloria a fulltime mother and Jamal picking up a fulltime job. Eventually the two managed to assuage any resentment towards each other and made steps toward genuine friendship, both turning out to be equally dedicated and loving parents. 
Taylor, named Clara at the time, enjoyed school. Not so much the actual studying as the playtime and socializing, but he was a bright student. In middle school he discovered a love for track and kept at it when he entered high school. Taylor was doing well, but struggled with his self-esteem in connection with fitting in with girls. He’d always been masculine and known a tomboy for nearly all of his childhood. His parents never had a problem with that, but he was picked at by other family members. It wasn’t until high school where Taylor discovered himself as trans, which both gave him answers he’d been looking for and terrified him as he had no idea how to go about this with his family. 
The topic of LGBTQ+ matters rarely passed through his household with his mother or with his father and step-mother. None of them openly expressed homo or transphobia, but Taylor had met enough extended family anti-LGBTQ+ and that stopped him from broaching the subject. Still he began looking into subtle ways to get a "head-start" on transitioning, including buying a binder and teaching himself natural voice changes. 
But Taylor was publicly outed during a family get-together, when a few of his younger cousins rifled through his belongings and brought with them the attention of Taylor’s uncle. When the situation turned into an all out yelling match and nearly physical, Taylor ran off. It would be the last anyone would see him for the months to come. 
While wandering around Dakota City, Taylor was abducted by the Reach and experimented on, the stress and torture he endured all the while activated his dormant metagene. He was eventually rescued by a team of young heroes while deep in the Western Pacific Reach mobile base, recognizing a past classmate, Virgil Hawkins. The two stuck close out of familiarity as they were eventually shifted over to S.T.A.R. Labs in Taos. 
They spent a month or so under the eye of Dr. David Wilcox, building resentment over being treated as lab rats alongside Tye Longshadow, Eduardo Dorado Jr., Asami Koizumi, and Nathaniel Tyron. It was during this time that Taylor’s commonly used nickname of ‘Munch’ came about because of his extreme appetite due to his metagene and at that point Taylor hadn’t chosen his name yet. The group, sans Nathaniel, then came to agree their stay at S.T.A.R was over and escaped. 
Their party was joined in by Jacklyn Ericson, unknown to them a hero known as Ferro and Team member, and were soon approached by Lex Luthor who offered them security in exchange for favors against the Reach. Little under two weeks later, the gang were fighting their way through the heart of the Warworld to rescue the captured heroes caught in stasis. Munch was on board with Nightwing’s invitation onto the Team, he’d always looked up to the Justice League and heroics called to him, but left with the others at seeing Arsenal’s dismissal despite him leading the rescue. 
Munch wouldn’t involve himself with heroes until their group until the League reached out to Jacklyn; they needed as many hands on deck. The Reach had activated field disruptors around the world which would eventually tear Earth to shreds if not shut down; Munch was paired off with Rocket to shut down the disruptor in Chile. Munch couldn’t hide his joy at being paired with Rocket, he’d been a fan of hers ever since she started off in Dakota City as Icon’s protégé. The two got on well and Rocket extended another invitation onto the Team stating their hometown could do with another hero, this time Munch accepted. 
He would take on the mantle Yellow Jacket and when Rocket’s former mentor Icon returned to Earth, was taken under his wing as a mentee. He and Virgil, who had also accepted the invitation onto the Team as Static, became the new generation of heroes in Dakota City. 
Just in time too, as from the shadows rise a threat spreading across the city’s metayouth, the Metabreed. 
  NOTES
Munch does eventually make it back to his parents, who have been been running themselves ragged organizing search parties for him. 
Because of his color scheme and insect motif, Jacket tends to be confused as Bumblebee’s protégé instead of Icon’s. Not that it’s cause for insult, but Karen and Munch note they wouldn’t make good partners. 
Munch comes to find out of another super in the family, although not of the heroic kind. His step-cousin is member of the H.I.V.E 5, See-More. 
He enjoys various shonen anime, occasionally reading the manga if he likes the anime enough, his favorite being the Dragon Ball franchise. He makes a nod towards this during the escape at S.T.A.R when Virgil asked him if he could blast open the door. When Munch’s first few blasts don’t cut it, he tries a larger beam in the only way he knows how, via Kamehameha.
Yellow Jacket has become very active on social media and has a notable following, much to Icon’s annoyance. 
Munch has recently taken up being a peer counselor at S.T.A.R Taos alongside Ed Jr.
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hadarmarkin · 3 years
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Mediterranean Medley: The Jewish Community of Tunisia
Tunisia is currently making global headlines. A decade ago the Tunisian protest for democracy sparked the “Arab Spring”, which led to vast political shifts in the Middle East. Now, its citizens are fighting to retain their past achievements and curb the ruler's authoritarian pursuits.
The recent events in this small country on the southern shore of the Mediterranean also provide an opportunity to discuss its Jewish community, a community small in numbers yet incredibly diverse in terms of socio-economic status and cultural orientation. This entry is therefore dedicated to exploring the complex history of the community, including the particularly tragic chapter of the Nazi occupation during the Second World War. As always fiction and culinary elements will be weaved into the discussion.
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(Tunisia on the map: between Africa and Europe)
Berber, Italian and French Mix
The Jewish community of Tunisia settled mostly in the coastal areas in the cities of Tunis, Sousse, Sfax, Bizerte and Monastir. There were also several rural Berber communities, in which Jews lived a semi-nomadic life.
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(The beautiful coast)
The origin of the Jewish community is disputable. Members of the community claim the first settlers migrated from Jerusalem after the destruction of the second temple in 70 CE. Several scholars, however, ascertain that the community originated from the conversion of either Phoenicians or Berber tribes.
Origin aside, archeologists indicate a viable Jewish presence beginning in the fourth century CE. Evidence also shows connection between Tunisian Jews and Jewries in Persia, Israel and Iraq. The Bagdadi community and its Talmudic centers, in particular, was a source of inspiration fueling the local Torah learning, and overall intellectual life.
In the fifteenth century, Andalusian Jews found refuge in Tunisia while escaping the Spanish Inquisition. Their influence is notable in architecture, culture, and clearly cuisine. Another wave of Jewish immigrants arrived to Tunisia from the Italian port city Livorno during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The Livornese Jews, mostly Portuguse Marrano descendants, built maritime trade between North African hubs to European Mediterranean port cities.  In 1741, the Livornese community (also called “Grana”) asked for autonomy on the pretext of having a different liturgy. Followed by this act, two separate communities- native and Livornese- were formed. The two sub-communities had their own rabbis, synagogues, cemeteries and philanthropies. The Livornese section, which actually encompassed all European Jews whether they came from Italy, France, Gibraltar or Malta- prided themselves as superior. They refrained from intermarrige with the native Jews, refused to speak Judeo-Spanish and continued speaking Italian. Some of the Livornese became rich bankers and merchants, but many were weavers, tailors, shoemakers, and even lived in poverty relying  on charities.
In the cities, since Medieval times, the indegenous Tunisian Jews, lived in the margins of the Muslim areas and the Souks, in quaters named Haras. The Haras became overpopulated starting in the second half of the nineteenth century with poor sanitary conditions, and no running water nor electricity. The residents of the Hara were mostly craftsmen- tailors, potters, leatherworkers and silversmiths. Those who could afford it, left the Hara to settle in the European quarters built by the French.
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(The Hara of Tunis, image #1)
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(The Hara of Tunis, image #2)
The French Colonization, starting in the late nineteenth century, created a new elite of Francophones. The upper Jewish class eagerly fostered French as their mother tongue, named their children in French names and sent their children to schools in Paris. The few, who managed to obtain key posts in the new colonial governments, were granted French citizenship, but the majority including some of the wealthiest families remained with the status of subjects.
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(The French Quarter of Tunis)
Despite the strong French influence, Tunisia continued to be fairly diverse as a port country luring people from different parts of the Mediterranean basin. Thus, the Jewish population (unlike their brothers in neighboring Algeria) lived in a multicultural environment, in which Greeks, Maltese, Italians and of course Arabs co-existed and influenced one another.
A Boy in a Ruthless City: The Nazi Occupation through the Eyes of an Adolecent
The cosmopolitan climate described above was the setting of Albert Memmi’s (1920-2020) semi-autobiographical novel, The Pillar of Salt. In the book, Memmi, a distinguished philosopher known for his work on Colonial Studies, disguised himself as Alexandre Mordekhai Bennillouche, a poor Jewish boy growing up in the Hara of the capital, Tunis.
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( Albert Memmi)
Bennillouche (or Memmi) begins his account in describing his happy childhood as an age of innocence and unawareness to his poverty and inferior status as a “native Jew”. Gradually, the protagonist discovers the world around him. He excels at school, but suffers from anti-Jewish violence from Chirsitan and Muslim peers.  Given  his academic performance, he is given a stipend to study in one of the city’s top schools, where he is introduced to the upper circles of the Jewish community and the general European society. This exposure causes a rift in the relationship with his parents, who resent his education wishing for him to continue the family leather business. Although deeply ashamed of his parents - their meager existence and traditional views- Bennillouche is quickly disillusioned from the enchantment of the elite. Being a critical thinker, he spots its insincerity and snobbery, yet he is forced to hide his contempt  as he is dependent on their funds for his schooling.
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(The capital- Tunis)
The six month Nazi occupation of Tunisia  (November 1942- May 1943) reaffirms Bennillouche’s beliefs about the hypocrisy of the elite. During the short- yet traumatic - German presence, Tunisian Jews were subject to constant harassment from the occupiers and general population, and were under the imminent threat of being deported to the death camps in Europe. Yet, the degree of Jewish misery varied based on socio-economic belonging. When the Germans issued a decree for Jewish forced labor, the wealthy ones of the community paid ransom to exempt  themselves and their dear ones. Impoverished men- however- were destined to greater hardship.
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(Jews assigned for forced labor)
Benillouche (and Memmi himself) was one of the unfortunate people.  Despite being friendly with people in high places, and holding a prestigious teaching position, he was deported to a concentration camp in the Saharan desert. There, he suffered from the brutality of the guards, the senseless work, and above all the merciless sun. However, camp was also a place of revelation. The hardship created a sense of comradery between Benillouche and his fellow inmates, of whom he shared similar upbringing. He was even reunited with some old friends, and enjoyed conversing with them in his childhood dialect of Judeo- Arabic, which he neglected in favor of French. In addition, the camp helped him to rediscover and reconnect to his Jewish roots, as he was asked to lead Shabbat prayers as the camp’s intellectual figure.
By the time the camp was released by the Allies, Bennilouche was a more grounded man. He still continued to march according to his original trajectory in the academic world but with a wiser outlook on life.
Topped with Harissa: A Quick Peek to Jewish-Tunisian Cuisine
Even while estranged from his family traditions, Bennilouche always maintained a fondness for his mom’s traditional Tunisian cooking. In fact, he recounts nostalgically the smells of Shabbat dishes cooking slowly in the tiny kitchen of his childhood home. When he matures, he recognizes the power of food as a source of comfort and festivity in a household that is poor and filthy. One of the dishes he highlights is Bkeila (also pronounced Pkeila) - a hearty spinach and beans stew served vegetarian or with beef. Below is Yotam Ottolenghi’s take on it from his latest cookbook  Flavor.
Bkeila, Potato and Butter bean Stew - Adapted from Flavor
(See my notes below to simplify the cooking process)
4 cups (80 gram), roughly chopped cilantro
1 ½ cups (30 gram) parsley
14 cups (600 gram) spinach
½ cup (120 ml) olive oil
1 onion (150 gram), finely chopped
5 garlic cloves, crushed
2 green chiles, finely chopped and seeded
1 tbsp plus 1 tsp ground cumin
1 tbsp ground coriander
¾ tsp ground cinnamon
1 ½ tsp superfine sugar
2 lemons: juice to get 2 tbsp and cut the remainder into wedges
1 qt/ 1L vegetable/ chicken stock
Table salt
1 Ib 2 oz/ 500 gram waxy potatoes, peeled and cut into 1 ¼ inch pieces
1 Ib 9 oz/ 700 gram jar or can of butter beans, drained
1.In batches, put cilantro, parsley and spinach in a food processor until finely chopped. Set aside.
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(Massive amounts of greens)
2.Put 5 tbsp of olive oil into a large heavy-bottomed pot on medium heat. Add the onion and fry until soft and golden, mixing occasionally (about 8 minutes). Add garlic, chillies and all the spices and cook for another 6 minutes, stirring often.
3.Increase the heat to high and add the chopped herbs and spinach to the pot along with the remaining 3 tbsp olive oil. Cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally until the spinach turns a dark green. The spinach should turn a little fried brown but not burn. Stir in the sugar, lemon juice, stalk and 2 tsp salt. Scrape the bottom of the pot if needed. Bring to a simmer, then decrease heat to medium and add the potatoes. Cook until they are soft for about 20-25 minutes and then add the butter beans and cook 5 minutes longer.*
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(Butter beans to break the deep green)
4.Divide into bowls and serve with lemon wedges.**
* As this dish was traditionally slow cooked using a slow cooker pot or a pressure cooker could easily do the trick. If using these- do the following:  Skip step 1. Saute the onions, garlic, chilli and species as instructed in step 2. Then add the rinsed spinach and herbs. Mix them well with the onions and spices in the bottom. Once the spinach begins to melt, mash them using a hand blender and then add the ingredients described in step 3 (beside the butter beans). Then let it slowly cook until everything softens. In the end, add the butter beans and press on the “stay warm” button.
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(loading the pot with spinach)
** I served it with bulgur to soak up the liquids a bit (rice, farro or any other grain will work as well). I also added hard boiled eggs for additional protein.
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(Healthy and heart)
In addition to the Bkeila- The Tunisian Shabbat table will not be complete without the famous couscous. The process of making it  from scratch without a food processor was quite laborious, but the result - whether served sweet with nuts and spices, or savory with meat stew or fish - was considered a delicacy.
The proximity to the Mediterranean shore brought fish dishes to the Jewish- Tunisian repertoire. Fish is mostly eaten fried or cooked as fish balls or oven roasted served with red hot sauce. Meat is also often served spicy, and often chunks of hot merguez sausage are added to stews or shakshuka.
Generally speaking, Tunisian Jews are fond of hot flavors, and their cuisine is potentially the spiciest in the diaspora (perhaps only second to the Yemeni). Harissa paste, now increasingly popular around the world - is liberally used to spice up any dish. This fiery red pepper condiment is added - for example-  to the famous Tunisian fricassee, one of Israel's most popular street foods. Click here for a recipe for this tuna loaded sandwich, and here to learn more broadly about Tunisian cuisine.
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(Tunisian Sandwich with some Harissa)
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I’m really intrigued by Rayla’s moonshadow assassin peers. I especially am interested in Andromeda because I think she is the only other girl in the group? Do you have any headcanons in how these teen/young adult assassins interacted? Do you think Rayla isolated herself from them because she was always iffy about taking a life? Also TDP finally colored their map and I know you live maps, find any new cool stuff? I especially love how there’s a frozen sea north and a spinning sea south, imagine the powerful Magic’s that channeled to make them.
Okay, so I jumped straight to the map, did 80% of it, and wandered away for a few weeks. I apologize, anon. Let’s get this going again:
I’ve got a few headcanons on the Moonshadow assassins! It seems likely that they hang out mostly with each other, when they hang out, to reinforce their teambuilding and to give them some socialization, since assassins tend to keep others at arm’s length. So I kinda figure they tend to roam as a pack on their evenings out in the village, if they’re not married to a non-assassin like Runaan is.
I think that could be part of the reason that Rayla might not have hung out with the others as much, too: Runaan wanted to be either training or at home with Ethari, so Rayla probably spent a lot of time doing those things just because he did them. And when Runaan was doing more serious training or missions, that’s when Rayla had her free time to run around the forest and make adoraburr friends. 
Runaan could’ve probably insisted that she do something more assassiny with her free time. Shadow an assassin, do more studying, practice certain prescribed skills on her own. But he didn’t. He let her play. Soft assassin is soft!
Listen, anon, I have a fun headcanon for you about Andromeda--and by fun, I mean it’s really angsty half a second after you start thinking about it. Ready? 
What if: Andromeda is Runaan’s half-sister. If they’re both Lujanne’s children by different assassin dads who kept dying in battle, but a Moon mage needs an assassin leader partner to defend Xadia with, and Lujanne knew her son Runaan wasn’t old enough to lead yet, so she burned through three or more husbands protecting him until Runaan was well trained enough to lead the assassins himself and had fallen in love with a mage who adored him and would be his partner in her place.
 Andromeda looks a fair bit like Lujanne, too:
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Along with Runaan, they all have long hair, side tails bound in silver cuffs, and some form of braids. Andromeda’s hair is sectioned in front similarly to Runaan’s. Her accent sounds more British than Scottish, though she only has the one line: My eyes for truth. And Lujanne and Andromeda are the only two Moonshadow elves we’ve met who have medium blue horns, while Runaan’s are dark blue. Almost everyone else’s horns have purple or pink as their base color.
But then, see, Andromeda went on Runaan’s mission, and she died. Her spirit was the most aggressive in TTM, usually closest to Rayla with her sword out, as if she hated Rayla the most. If she had a vested family interest in Runaan’s mission succeeding, and then it went pear-shaped because of Rayla, that would make sense.
No matter if she’s related to Runaan or not, she’s wearing horn cuffs, so she was in a dedicated relationship of some kind, and that’s so sad. Someone’s missing her the way Ethari’s missing Runaan. :’((((
Anyway, it’s just a headcanon, but since you asked, there ya go.
Okay, on to my thoughts on the map, of which I have a normal and healthy amount:
The Map Border: 
Everyone doodles in the borders. I love to see what they put there.
Starting in the upper left and going counter-clockwise, the five human crowns are cool
Cornucopia swirls center left look like an homage to Cabbage Man from ATLA
Bait is staring at Evenere. his home? Or maybe he just wants to eat the dragonfly on its logo
Human defender has a beard. Hairagorn. He's very heavily armored but has no helmet. Long hair is braided to rest on front of shoulder, like the blond elf in the painting at the Moon Nexus. Old timey hairstyle?
He’s defending Katolis Castle specifically. I wonder if the little white building is kinda random or if it’s supposed to represent the Banther Lodge. Nah, I have a better guess: that’s where Viren grew up
The crack in the map looks meta. It's been repaired somewhat. Makes me wonder if it's an in-world map, whose, who ripped it, and who fixed it. Sir Phineas Kurst seems like the kind of guy to almost shred his really cool map
The star behind Zym's egg has seven points
The two ships on the southern waters are western and eastern respectively. Tidebound elves from Singapore? Jack Sparrow would be proud
There is land just south of the Dragontail, wonder what’s there?
The leaves around the human figure are small and numerous while the Moonshadow elf has fewer but bigger leaves
The elf is standing in the way of one of the six leaves growing out of the rune rose and that leaf's curly tip seems to have been replaced with a curl of the elf's very long hair
The human pose is more offense and the elf pose is more defense. But the elf has two swords, and one has some wicked hooks in it.
Elf has 4 fingers instead of 3 so whether it’s in-universe or meta, they were drawn by a human :DDD
The elf's braid winds around their horn and I think that's clever
High collar shirt under protective layer, bracers and elbow gloves, bare biceps, complex shoulder getup, ornate hair that's butt long and partly braided, two long slightly curving swords... horn cuffs too. This is a Moonshadow assassin in the same gear Runaan's got, poised to defend the Xadian half of the map as the human is poised to defend his side
The rune rose isn't a compass. It has a two sided pointer and six primal runes. Just decorative I guess. ;)
More lettuces on right center.
Maybe a portaling caterpillar on the center knot? Little bug pal, I see you
“The Five Human Kingdoms” lettered in red, “Xadia” in blue. Giving me Stratego flashbacks. Even the flowers on their banners are color coded
Banners in the corners are similar but Xadia has more fluttery tips
Thunder drawn all attacky top center, does he have anything to do with the Frozen Sea being frozen?
Compass rose under Thunder’s wing
Dick island near the compass. Well, Duren is the breadbasket of the human lands. A most excellent cartography joke! 10/10 would chortle wholesomely again
The Human Kingdoms:
Neolandia
Capital Eboreus seems to be a lake city below a mountain and I'm here for all the Lake Town refs. 
It's also the eye of the elephant shape
Not a lot of trees, mostly grasses or desert. Only borders Duren across a couple rivers/estuaries/sea channels
Heart shaped island next to elephant trunk
Land generally broken into several sections by sea/rivers 
If it’s rivers, they seem to generate from the capital’s lake and flow in several directions. And they say there’s no magic left in the western lands! ;)
But if there was exactly one source of freshwater in a desert land, it makes sense that you’d find a way, magical or mechanical, to spread that lifegiving water in as many directions as possible so your people can thrive so kudos to Neolandia’s ancestors/Tidebound elves/whoever managed that, it’s brilliant
I can and will make up explanations for anything on a map. I adore worldbuilding
Del Bar
Two named locations. Since Del Bar’s national symbol is a serpent, I guess Serpentongue is the capital.
Hinterpeak is a sweet name. Looks like Helm's Deep with that retaining wall. What’s it for? Are there dwarves in this land? Is it an Earthblood stronghold? Maybe it’s like the Mines of Moria, and the Earthbloods were chased out and/or killed inside and now it’s full of nasty orcses but someone left a MacGuffin down there so *nudges hero* Off you pop.
Nice forests around the southern mountain range but northern DB is more arid or grassy lands like Neolandia. 
Considering that crops grow well in Duren, which is farther north, I assume there is a massive meteorological gyre over the human lands, with a southern wind blowing down over the western realms and keeping them icy until the mountains of Hinterpeak block and divert them, protecting Evenere. The winds don't blow eastward without warming right up-- and causing thunderstorms in Katolis how about that-- because there is a warmer side to the gyre over Katolis and Duren, blowing tropical warmth and moisture north and providing rain for trees and crops alike. Most years, anyway.
How does the weather fail in Duren for seven years in a row, anyway? That seems like a Thunder issue. Unless it’s a Sunforge issue, which I’ll get to below.
Ahem.
Borders Neolandia, Duren, and Katolis across rivers, but most border is coastline.
Serpentongue probably got its name from the two river heads around it
Cluster of dead little cracks spawns a single river. Looks like someone cracked the tub and it drained away. I wonder how much of this landscape has been affected by the Mage Wars. Big watery basins have flooded and other spots seem dead. The lands may or may not actually touch depending on how deep some of these waterways are
Evenere
Looks like someone punched holes in the land with a giant pencil to make it a separate island. Broken outline with scattered islands
That Pawprint Isles has only four toes
Moon-shaped island is very crescenty indeed
Are these isles home to refugees or outcasts from Xadia? Listen, I want pirates and that sea looks pretty Caribbean to me
No capital city, hmmm what's that about? Is it underground, does it move? Maybe Fareeda’s capital is on the back of a world turtle and she’s constantly on tour around the island?
That arm of land ending in a peace sign, please can we get surfers
The hills emanating from that claw shaped headland look like something is sleeping under the island, hello yes I am here for giant immortal creatures please
Katolis
its capital is also called Katolis, the only human realm to use the same name twice
Weeping Bay could be a ref to the tears the humans shed after they reached the west. Or the Moonshadow elves as they left their forest for the east. Or both. Both, in this case, is bad but balanced
Boomerang island next to the Dragontail
The river the Dragaang rode on was going uphill
The watery slash in the land between Katolis and Del Bar is awfully straight. So is the one between Del Bar and Neolandia. I call magical warfare.
Katolis has a bunch of mountains in the east, part of an old natural border before the lava one appeared
Mt Kalik is probably volcanic. It's a standalone mountain and it's really tall. Rex Ignius maybe? Oh, probably not, I think I see him peeking on the other side of the map
The trees of Duren and Katolis are different then the western lands. Softer green, deciduous. And the land itself is yellower, warmer in tone
Forests centered on Mt Kalik
The Moon Nexus looks like an eye on a dragon head near the Dragontail, and Evenere looks like a severed wing (Yes I am still wondering where Luna Tenebris went, why do you ask)
Weeping Bay looks like the most natural body of water in the western lands
Three red little trees scattered around the Katolis map. Fruit trees? How very Moonshadow.
Duren
The only land border among all the human kingdoms is between Duren and Katolis. Maybe it used to be further south along the river?
Capital is Berylgarten, set on a lake. Beryl is a stone that’s usually green, blue, or yellow in color, very gardeny
Second smallest realm but the breadbasket of the human lands. Has several little forests and great tilled fields
Being a farmer in Duren is probably as awesome as being an assassin in the Moonshadow Forest; you do what you do for all your friendly kingdoms
Northernmost land is cold and craggy, named Skall's Hook along the sea
Third ship in the Frozen Sea is icebound and crushed. Looks western, indicating no possible passage
Lots of colored trees and shrubs as if fruitbearing, I keep comparing Duren to the Yakima Valley in Washington State
Where the lava reaches the Frozen Sea, it melts the ice next to Duren's mountains
Northern Xadia:
Lux Aurea
Most of the center lands of this map has warm tones for its ground. Maybe that’s because of the long reach of the warmth and light of Lux Aurea’s Sun Nexus, and only the lands that are just too far from it are truly cold and icy. It would explain why Duren is a breadbasket realm so far north--it’s just across the border from Lux Aurea.
If there’s anything to that, then I suddenly worry for the fate of all the human lands now that the Sunforge has gone dark. It’s early summer now in Xadia, and crops in Duren will be ripening soon... Unless the sun’s magic was helping them grow. This coming winter could be rough. Next winter, people will die. Unless they can purify the Sunforge again.
Also, I have to wonder if Duren’s seven years of famine had anything to do with Sunforge shenanigans. They’d have happened at Khessa’s command, and we know she despises humans. If she was responsible for all the struggles that humans had to go through without enough food for seven years, and then their desperate attempt to fix the problem by invading Xadia for a Magma Titan’s heart which extended and exacerbated the war, I can see why Aaravos might feel Queen Khessa deserved to die
The city’s shaped kinda like an Egyptian pectoral necklace on this map, and that’s super pretty and not at all ominous
Also that’s a lot of gold for a whole city and I wonder how they got it all
The Shiverglades and the Shards
These areas are north of Lux Aurea and seem cold but not very icy, even though the Frozen Sea is right there. More thoughtful glances at the Sunforge over this one. Is it warming the land, or not warming the sea? Both?
Shiverglades is a play on Everglades, so this is a cold swamp, which sounds super fun I’m sure. Permafrost, tundra maybe?
The Shards seem to be rock islands with ice mountains. Glaciers are cool. 
I wonder if something broke those islands off on purpose. Have I mentioned how much I enjoy worldbuilding? Yeah, well, I like world-wrecking, too.
Storm Spire
Has a good view on everything that happens for miles, including Lux Aurea, the Midnight Desert, the Shiverglades, the Black Tundra, the Uncharted Forest, and Drakewood. 
Defensible position, no other tall mountains nearby
Also able to alert others to danger, especially since Avizandum could teleport like lightning
The Midnight Desert
It’s pretty big! And it looks like it’s littered with ruins of columns and dead palm trees. Like something else used to be in that great space and then something Very Bad happened to it. Maybe there was one great city where all the elves could mix together, and then it got utterly obliterated and the elves all fled to their respective safe places around Xadia. A city of black stone, back when Aaravos wore a crown? Now pulverized to dust and surrounded by not one, not two, but three primal nexuses? Hmmm...
All the wisps could be heat from the sand, or spooky spirit hints, or just an ominous sign of danger from the snakes below, but the overall effect is that the land is unhealthy if not cursed
The oasis is marked, and it must contain a spring since it runs a river out to join the river that passes through the Moonshadow Forest
Also the actual oasis kinda resembles a blue lizard which is adorable and probably also terrifying
Moonshadow Forest
The Silvergrove is the only village marked in the forest, so in keeping with the other lands and general map legend rules, it’s likely the capital/central village for the Moonshadow elves
The village is marked by four round-roofed homes between two tall leafy trees that shelter and hide them. It’s a hybrid balance between the blocky manmade castles of the human lands and the actual forest around them, showing a blending with nature that even the Sunfire city of Lux Aurea did not embrace, with all its golden buildings
It’s a good-sized forest, and it kinda stretches thin to the east but there it tentatively connects to the Drakewood Forest
Moonstone Path to the west just chilling in the lava like a blank alignment chart. Moonstone Path is Chaotic Hot.
Southern Xadia:
Ruins of Elarion
Elarion is a city, and it’s been lost to the humans for a thousand years
The building outlines are squared-off towers like the more modern castles in the west, suggesting that humans in Xadia built for strength and defense as soon as they could. They felt vulnerable and created protections in their architecture. The three elven cities we see also play to their strengths, but those strengths include magic. Elarion’s humans had to find a different strength, and they went with craftsmanship and ingenuity
It seems to be the only human city from before the border was drawn
“Ruins” doesn’t necessarily mean no one lives there at all, but it’s been emptied of humans and no one else has maintained it since
It had a great position on a vast lake, with sheltering hills and easy sea access
Sea of the Castout
This inland sea has five inlets and outlets. It’s hard to be sure which is which with some of them, with the way the water is drawn on this map. But I’m kinda liking the idea that all the water swirlies are places where Tidebound magic has been placed over the millennia, so the water can do whatever it needs to do depending on circumstances. That goes for the human lands, too. Katolis backward river, you’re off the hook.
With a name like "Castout,” I wonder if it was some kind of universal toilet to flush away things you didn’t want--including humans--who might wash up near Elarion and start to build there. Yeesh.
The rivers that flow into this sea pass through or near the Moonshadow Forest, the Midnight Desert, the Storm Spire, Drakewood, and the Uncharted Forest. That’s a lot of drainage.
It’s pretty far from the Tidebound Archipelago, so maybe its name is referencing Tidebound elves who have left their home colony
Was this always a sea, or did something that Xadia wanted to forget get flooded and hidden in the depths?
The land around it seems open and hospitable. It could be a good place to build/rebuild in a time of peace.
The Far Reaches
Open grassland with low hills
Two of the hills look like giant boot prints
Several colorful trees which I hope are fruit trees
Bounded by two rivers from the Sea of the Castout
Looks homey tbh, great spot to retire to get away from everything if there were a war that really shook you up
Ocean Point
There’s a Star rune here, and it could mean many things
The closest other marked location is Elarion
If this was where Aaravos lived of his own free will, I can see why he’d take a shine to the humans. They were his neighbors.
If he is imprisoned here, it’s literally the furthest point in Xadia from the other elven realms, with the Moonshadow Forest being the closest one and Umber Tor not too much further but in a totally different direction. If they were trying to isolate him physically with a portable mirror to watch over him, that’s a good spot for it
Possible location that the cube is leading Callum toward? Portal to the Star Touch home plane? Aaravos’s seaside B&B? Trap street?
Eastern Xadia:
Drakewood
Umber Tor looks to be the tallest mountain in all of Xadia, save possibly for the Storm Spire. It’s more traditionally mountainy, with a nice snowcap. Since it’s labeled, I’m guessing it’s the Earth Nexus, under which an Earth Archdragon sleeps
Also there’s a giant yellowish-brown dragon chilling next to the Tor. Yeah, he seems nice. Rex Igneous, I presume?
Or maybe not, since the neighboring forest is called Drakewood. Maybe this woods is just where a bunch of Earth dragons hang out? Ezran and Pyrrah flew off and returned with a crew of Sun dragons from somewhere, so dragons must have communities too
The mountains that edge the sea are shaped roughly like a stone dragon in flight
Drakewood seems to be the forest closest to Umber Tor, with both deciduous and evergreen trees, though there’s a huge swath of wooded land here, to the north and to the southwest. I wonder what the locals consider the border where the Drakewood becomes the Uncharted Forest and why. The way the evergreens are drawn almost looks like a border, a sort of kingswood set aside for a specific use. Rex Igneous’s best toothpicks?
Uncharted Forest
Okay this is a properly magical name, very mysterious. But uncharted by whom? People with charts? This might be a Sir Phineas Kurst name, which is outsidery, and it makes me wonder if the locals/neighbors have their own name for it, which the human explorer never learned, a la “Thunder” for Avizandum
Maybe “Uncharted Forest” just means no one ever turned those trees into charts though, old growth ftw
If no one lives here, will someone move here? If someone lives here, who are they? Earthblood elves? Moonshadow elves? Humans? This mystery, it calls to me
the trees are mostly deciduous and fill basically all of this whole section of land, up against the mountains and the rivers, so it seems very fertile land indeed
Earthblood elves could live here, but there is no city marked. Maybe because we haven’t gotten that far in the show, or maybe that’s the wrong sort of descriptor for how the Earthbloods live and organize. Maybe the whole forest is their city, like Pando, the interconnected quaking aspen clone forest
The northernmost part of this forest lies right between the Storm Spire and the Tidebound Archipelago, so it might get a regular flyover route for migration or messages
Yes, this forest is the most interesting place in Xadia to me, I desperately want to learn more about it
Black Tundra
Yeah this place isn’t ominous
Similar to the Shiverglades, but where that has shrubbery, the Black Tundra has single dead trees and creepy curving spikes. Scorched? Poisoned? De-magicked?
The water north of this area isn’t frozen, and with a lake to the south and a river and a moderate mountain range, the whole area looks like it would otherwise be decently habitable, but instead it’s cold and black
Is climate change a thing here, or will we get a nice horrible disaster instead?
Tidebound Archipelago
These islands have dotted lines around them, like they’re submerged at high tide, or maybe made of shifting sand that literally moves around like sand dunes across a desert, or perhaps they’re exactly at sea level with half their civilization in the air and half underwater or in cool bubbles, or maybe the islands actually float
Maybe the Tidebound elves even sank them on purpose for defensive purposes
The archipelago is about even latitudinally with the Storm Spire Lux Aurea, Berylgarten, and Eboreus so they probably get pretty nice weather
There’s no ice in sight here in any direction along Xadia’s east coast, so presumably the prevailing current is a warm one
do they have bridges connecting the islands? Ferries, animals who give them a lift across?
the islands have quite a bit of space on them. I wonder if there’s a big population, maybe a shifting population? Do Tidebound elves migrate up and down the coast like gray whales and return to the islands for certain holidays or social events?
This is probably the hub of the Tidebound elves’ culture, but the sea surrounds the whole land and infiltrates it with many rivers and lakes. The Spinning Sea and the Frozen Sea are pretty firm Do Not Enter signposts, but a determined Tidebound could get around either one if they wanted to
What I’m not seeing here is a city. Either it’s not been marked yet, or that’s not a thing that Tidebound elves have in their culture. If they don’t have a city, they’re possibly migratory in family groups, or maybe they stick to small villages like the Moonshadows do, but with even less central leadership
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juviin · 4 years
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Here’s literally all the rosie lore. 
(template 1) (template 2)
Name: Rosemary Nare Etana Alias: Ro, Rose, Rosie Personality: Rosemary is very open about her emotions. She takes a while to warm up to people, but when she does, she loves people very strongly. Relatives: Father (estranged), Mother (deceased), 4 older siblings, 2 younger siblings. Status: Alive Species: Human Gender: cis female Age: 19 Eyes: Gold Hair: Pink Appearance: Rosemary is 5′5 and has short pink hair. She has two scars, one along her back and one on her lower right abdomen. She also has a tattoo on her calf of a lily. Birthday: July 30th Constellation: Leo Height: 5′5″ or 165 cm Blood Type: O Occupation: Magic Knight -Squad: Black Bulls Country: Clover Affinity: Lava Magic (On a scale of 0-10: 0 being terrible and 10 being the best) Physical Strength 5/10 Magic Amount 7/10 Magic Control 9/10 Magic Sensing 6/10 Cleverness 9/10 Growth 8/10 Equipment: none
(this next one is all in first person which i am NOT used to writing in but...)
Part 1: The Basics
What is your full name?--Rosemary Nare Etana
Where and when were you born?--I was born on July 30th in a large city in the Common Realm, however we moved to a small town shortly after I was born.
Who are/were your parents? (Know their names, occupations, personalities, etc.)--
Lily Etana was my mother’s name. She worked several jobs while raising us, like waitressing and being a maid. She was very kind too, but a lot of people took advantage of her for that. I guess that’s why Val and I have taken to being aggressive about how we feel, and aggressive in sticking up for her. When I was 12, an assassin killed her and gave me the scar across my back. I’m sure he was sent by my grandparents, but they played the fool and even sent an advisor to her funeral. Since then, that advisor has scheduled meetings with me monthly to make sure I haven’t told anyone.
My father’s name is Andranik Typhos the fourth? something like that, but I don’t know very much about him. I know he’s a noble, but I’ve never met him. I don’t hear that many complaints about him, and Mother says he was a wonderful gentleman, but I’ve met his parents, and I find it hard to believe that they would raise a lovely son.
Do you have any siblings? What are/were they like?--I have four! On my mom’s side, at least.
Valerian is the oldest. He’s sixteen years older than me, so he’s a lot more mature than me, and very protective of us younger siblings. He has three kids, too, and his wife is Eli’s cousin. They have been married since I was only three, so she’s been in our lives forever. The two of them basically became my parents after our mother died, so I couldn’t be more grateful to them.
Then is Dahlia. Dahlia is 12 years older than me. She’s very calm, and there have been more than a few times where Valerian has been freaking out and Dahlia always keeps her cool and fixes the problem. She’s the best at makeup.
Basil is in the direct middle, and they’re 9 years older than me. They are very energetic and mischievous. I don’t think Basil wants a spouse, but they’re very dedicated to their craft. I blame them for the multiple scams of my father’s estate, but who’s complaining? Basil also has a scar along  their right cheek, running from their nose to their chin
Azalea is the closest to my age, she’s 25. She’s a lot like our mom. She treats everyone with kindness, but I worry about people taking advantage of her for that.
Also, I know that my father has two children younger than me with his wife, but I’ve never met them and I probably never will.
Where do you live now, and with whom? Describe the place and the person/people.--I live with the Black Bulls! The base is really crazy and always changing, but there’s always something going on, so everyday is fun.
What is your occupation?--I’m a Magic Knight, but I have also worked some other jobs in the past.
Write a full physical description of yourself. You might want to consider factors such as: height, weight, race, hair and eye color, style of dress, and any tattoos, scars, or distinguishing marks--I’m 5′5, and around 150lbs. My skin is pale, so I tend to burn very easily, and my eyes are yellow and my hair is pink. I like to wear warm colors and clothes that aren’t very tight, as well as boots. I have two large scars, one is about three inches and is a slash along my stomach, while the other one is about eight inches long and runs across my upper back, both from assassination attempts. I try to hide both of them. I also have one tattoo on my lower calf, so it’s usually covered.
To which social class do you belong?--I believe I’m considered a commoner. I likely wouldn’t be considered a noble unless something happened to my father’s legitimate children, though I have no interest in being taken in by his family. 
Do you have any allergies, diseases, or other physical weaknesses?—I get nosebleeds often because of an injury when i was younger. 
Are you right- or left-handed?—right handed
What does your voice sound like?—If I had to describe it, I’d say it’s medium in pitch and kind of airy. 
What words and/or phrases do you use very frequently?--nothing particularly?
What do you have in your pockets?—um. a handful of flowers, a pocket watch, and assorted candies. 
Do you have any quirks, strange mannerisms, annoying habits, or other defining characteristics?—I sometimes bite my nails. 
Part 2: Growing Up
How would you describe your childhood in general?--Average for the most part, I’d say. I had a loving mother and 4 great siblings. Still, my mother’s death hit all of us very hard.
What is your earliest memory?--Sadly, my first assassination attempt. That one was when I was around five and it was sent by my father’s family. It gave me the scar on my stomach, and also gave Basil the scar on their face from them protecting me.
How much schooling have you had?--I went to the small schoolhouse in town up until I was 12, and then I started going less so I could work more. 
Did you enjoy school?--I enjoyed learning, but I’ve found that I learn more outside of school.
Where did you learn most of your skills and other abilities?--I learned basic first aid and how to identify certain plants and herbs from my siblings. I mostly learned battle from experience and assassins.
While growing up, did you have any role models? If so, describe them.—my siblings, especially Basil
While growing up, how did you get along with the other members of your family?--We all got along very well as kids, though they were all a lot older than me so that did strain our relationships a bit, especially as the youngest.
As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?--As a child I wanted to work in medicine, even though my magic is ill suited for it. I only decided that I wanted to become a Magic Knight after my mother’s death.
As a child, what were your favorite activities?—i used to love helping my mother garden. 
As a child, what kinds of personality traits did you display?--I cried a lot more than I do now. I was always scared, as I knew from a young age that my father’s parents wanted me dead.
As a child, were you popular? Who were your friends, and what were they like?--My only friend was really Eli, but she hung out with all the kids from town, so i vaguely knew them.
When and with whom was your first kiss?--also Eli, when we were about 12 and 13.
Are you a virgin? If not, when and with whom did you lose your virginity?--I’m not. After Eli left town I kind of lost myself for the next two years until I became a knight. 
Part 3: Past Influences
What do you consider the most important event of your life so far?--My mother's death perhaps?
Who has had the most influence on you?--Eli. I think if not for her, I would be a very different person.
What do you consider your greatest achievement?--The amount of nobles I’ve insulted to their faces on official magic knight business.
What is your greatest regret?--being born.
What is the most evil thing you have ever done?--I don’t think I’ve ever done anything “evil”, only some malicious things, but I don’t regret them.
Do you have a criminal record of any kind?--No, but I probably should for extortion.
When was the time you were the most frightened?--The first attempt on my life.
What is the most embarrassing thing ever to happen to you?--My elder brother catching me lying about my profession. 
If you could change one thing from your past, what would it be, and why?—i would be stronger. 
What is your best memory?—probably the first few months with the black bulls. It was genuine happiness for the first time in a while. 
What is your worst memory?—the aftermath of my mother’s death. I don’t remember the actual event, some mix of trauma and head injuries, but I do remember the weeks following. 
Part 4: Beliefs And Opinions
Are you basically optimistic or pessimistic?—i think i’m more pessimistic, but i'm trying to be an optimist. 
What is your greatest fear?--My greatest fear is once again being too weak to protect the people that I love. 
What are your religious views?--I’m not religious.
What are your political views?--I think that the Clover Kingdom’s nobility is corrupt, and the whole system needs to be fixed.
What are your views on sex?--I think nothing much of it. 
Are you able to kill? Under what circumstances do you find killing to be acceptable or unacceptable?--I think I’m a hypocrite on this. I think killing is unacceptable, but I wouldn’t hesitate to kill the people that harm the ones I love. 
In your opinion, what is the most evil thing any human being could do?--In my opinion, the most evil thing one can do is to habitually hurt and abuse others.
Do you believe in the existence of soul mates and/or true love?--No. I don’t think that anything like that is real.
What do you believe makes a successful life?--I think that money plays a large part of success. 
How honest are you about your thoughts and feelings (i.e. do you hide your true self from others, and in what way)?--Very open. My emotions are very easily read.
Do you have any biases or prejudices?--Yeah i hate nobles. 
Is there anything you absolutely refuse to do under any circumstances? Why do you refuse to do it?--I try to stay out of the public eye as best I can. I also refuse to do jobs near my grandparents’ home. 
Who or what, if anything, would you die for (or otherwise go to extremes for)?--Finral or Eli. I’d do anything for them.
Part 5: Relationships With Others
In general, how do you treat others (politely, rudely, by keeping them at a distance, etc.)? Does your treatment of them change depending on how well you know them, and if so, how?—I try to keep people at a distance, but when I become close to someone, they become one of my People. I’d do anything for the people I’m close to. 
Who is the most important person in your life, and why?--Right now, it’s probably Eli or Finral. They’ve positively affected me in more ways than I can count.
Who is the person you respect the most, and why?—Captain Yami is the person I respect the most. Joining the Black Bulls changed my life so much for the better, and I’m so grateful that he gave me that opportunity.
Who are your friends? Do you have a best friend? Describe these people—Eli is my best friend. She’s loud and always smiling, but I worry about her. I’m also pretty close to Magna.  He’s a great friend and brings out my mischievous side more. 
Do you have a spouse or significant other? If so, describe this person.--Finral is great. He’s a little goofy, but he is very loyal and loving. 
Have you ever been in love? If so, describe what happened.--I think I’m in love right now. 
How close are you to your family?--I’m very close to my older siblings.
Have you started your own family? If so, describe them. If not, do you want to? Why or why not?--No. I think I’d like to at some point be a mother, but not for a while longer. 
Who would you turn to if you were in desperate need of help?--I think I would find it hard to turn to anyone, but if I was so desperate, probably Eli or Magna. I’m too afraid to show Finral my weakness. 
Do you trust anyone to protect you? Who, and why?--No. I need to be strong enough to protect myself. 
If you died or went missing, who would miss you?--I think that the bulls would. 
Who is the person you despise the most, and why?--My father. My mother spoke kindly of him, but he abandoned her. 
Do you tend to argue with people, or avoid conflict?--I argue more.
Do you tend to take on leadership roles in social situations?—depends who I'm with, but I’m more likely to take a leadership role.
Do you like interacting with large groups of people? Why or why not?—I’d prefer a smaller group, personally, but i’m not bad with large groups. 
Do you care what others think of you?—yes. immensely 
Part 6: Likes And Dislikes
What is/are your favorite hobbies and pastimes?--I enjoy reading romance novels, and spending time in nature. Flower fields remind me of home and give me comfort. 
What is your most treasured possession?—my pocket watch. my mother gave it to me, since it was a gift to her from my father. 
What is your favorite color?—i like warm pale yellow
What is your favorite food?—I like crepes!
What, if anything, do you like to read?—I like to read romance. 
What is your idea of good entertainment (consider music, movies, art, etc.)?--I enjoy reading. On days off, I often spend hours at a time sitting outside and reading.
Do you smoke, drink, or use drugs? If so, why? Do you want to quit?—I generally don’t, but I will drink sometimes. I probably drink an average amount. 
How do you spend a typical Saturday night?—generally hanging around the Bulls hideout. If I have a day off I often go visit home to see my mother’s grave and give her flowers. 
What makes you laugh?—My squadmates! I’ve been told my sense of humor is bad..
What, if anything, shocks or offends you?--I hate the prejudices of the Clover nobles.
What would you do if you had insomnia and had to find something to do to amuse yourself?—When that happens (because it has before) I will usually walk around the base, sometimes I eat a snack. I also like to head outside and look at the stars when I can’t sleep. 
How do you deal with stress?—I will usually end up letting it out, whether emotionally or magically. I don't like to bottle things up. 
Are you spontaneous, or do you always need to have a plan?—I prefer having a plan. 
What are your pet peeves?—people talking over others. 
Part 7: Self Images And Etc.
Describe the routine of a normal day for you. How do you feel when this routine is disrupted?--I wake up at about 7 every morning, and get ready for the day. If I have a mission, I’ll leave for it early. On days I don’t have a mission, I will either go visit my mother’s grave or go see my grandparents or their advisor.
What is your greatest strength as a person?--I’d say my strength is supporting people. And also throwing lava. 
What is your greatest weakness?--I lie a bit too much, and I am a bit indifferent towards people I don’t care about.
If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?--I would want to be more caring. 
Are you generally introverted or extroverted?--I’d say introvert.
Are you generally organized or messy?--Organized. I don’t like disorder.
Name three things you consider yourself to be very good at, and three things you consider yourself to be very bad at.--I’m good at lying, cleaning, and fighting. I’m bad at controlling my emotions, sewing, and cooking.
Do you like yourself?--No, I really don’t. 
What are your reasons for being a magic knight*? Are your real reasons for doing this different than the ones you tell people in public? (If so, detail both sets of reasons…)--I am a magic knight because I want to protect people. 
What goal do you most want to accomplish in your lifetime?--I want to heal from my past. 
Where do you see yourself in 5 years?--I hope to still be a Magic Knight, and hopefully a higher rank.
If you could choose, how would you want to die?--I would want to die swiftly if I could choose.
If you knew you were going to die in 24 hours, name three things you would do in the time you had left.--I would try to isolate myself from the people I love, so that they wouldn’t have to deal with grief. I think I would generally be calm.
What is the one thing for which you would most like to be remembered after your death?--I want to be remembered for my strength. 
What three words best describe your personality?--open. loyal. decisive.
What three words would others probably use to describe you?--Rosie is loyal, smart, and loving!!-Eli
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doomonfilm · 3 years
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Ranking : Christopher Nolan (1970 - present)
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From the moment he kicked the door down on the scene with the breathtaking Memento, the name Christopher Nolan has rung synonymous with high thinking, high level and high entertainment film.  He always finds fresh and unique ways to tell stories, be it visually, narratively, or some combination of the two, and many of his conceptual deep dives have opened real conversations in regards to different aspects of space and time.  For an artist, the impact the Christopher Nolan has had on the populous as a whole is impressive, which is why after recently seeing Tenet, I felt it necessary to take a look back at all of his films and determine where they stood in relation to one another (in my eyes). 
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11. Insomnia (2002) As stated with every instance of ranking the work of a director, there’s always one film that’s got to take the bottom of the list hit, and for Nolan, it was Insomnia.  The film in itself is not a bad one, and it does offer some strong visuals in regards to the unrelenting amount of sunlight that one experiences in Alaska, but it does suffer not only from being a remake, but a remake that pales in comparison to the original.  For my money’s worth, Nolan works best with original ideas, with one specific trilogy standing as an exception to that notion.
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10. Memento (2000) While not his debut film, this was the film that put Nolan on the map.  The story is unique and intriguing, and the manner in which it is told really makes it work, as a standard A to Z telling of the film would eliminate much of the dramatic tension felt.  That being said, this film suffers from a similar fate to that of films like The Sixth Sense : it’s cool the first time you see it, it really wows you the second time you see it, and then further viewings find diminishing returns in regards to the experience of the “gimmick” (for lack of a better word).  Definitely worth seeing if you’ve never seen it, or are looking for a gateway into the work of Nolan, but underwhelming when held up against his future work.
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9. Batman Begins (2005) As previously stated, Nolan (in my opinion) works best as a writer/director of original ideas, so like many, I was slightly surprised when he was tapped to handle the Christian Bale edition of the Batman movie canon.  There wasn’t so much doubt about his ability to pull things off visually, but with such a beloved franchise and character in his hands, there were thoughts about whether or not his style would translate in a way that an already dedicated fanbase would appreciate.  Batman Begins was an effective table-setter for his Dark Knight trilogy, but due to the necessity of having to address an already familiar backstory, many of Nolan’s best ideas would have to wait until the sequel.
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8. The Dark Knight Rises (2012) This film found itself the unfortunate victim of an all too familiar national tragedy in the form of a mass shooting during an early screening, forever putting a sort of black cloud over the film as a result.  That being said, the film was a stellar entry in the Dark Knight trilogy, anchored by an instantly iconic Tom Hardy performance.  If this film was attributed to any other director, it would possibly stand as one of their top works, but Christopher Nolan is a man of such depth and style that The Dark Knight Rises merely stands as above average output from a creator who is pulling back a bit to fit the Hollywood ideal (or his version, anyway) of a comic book film.
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7. Following (1998) Quite possibly the most personal of all Nolan films, which makes sense, considering it was his first.  It was the buzz that this film generated during the 1997 festival season, along with an already completed script for Memento, that turned Nolan from an aspiring director to a household name.  Following gives us a bit of insight into Nolan’s creative process, presenting us with a highly stylized version of an observational writer, forever receptive to the stimulus around him.  The look of the film displays Nolan’s eye for location and cinematography, and the non-linear nature of the story served as a sneak preview to a format of storytelling he would soon master and manipulate beyond our ability to initially understand.  Though a bit on the short side for a feature film, it is certainly a fun ride with much indication of where its creator was headed.
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6. Interstellar (2014) Throughout the 2010s, it seemed that Nolan was hell-bent on warping our brains through the entertainment medium, and after the warning blast that Inception was, Interstellar served as a sort of thematic and spiritual double-tap for our psyche.  Nolan took the basic structure for a story of familial, unconditional love and skewed it by thrusting our protagonist into the uncharted depths of space, skewing his perception of time so radically that the people he loved became old while he did not age, which in itself is enough of a heartbreaking concept to build a film off of.  Add to this the fact that we are presented with (to the best of our knowledge, anyways) the most photo-realistic depictions of a Black Hole and a tesseract, and the end result is a powerful genre-blending journey that stands in rare company, with films like Tarkovsy’s Solaris and Kubrick’s 2001 : A Space Odyssey serving as the closest points of comparison.
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5. Tenet (2020) When you have a track record like that of a Christopher Nolan, it is inevitable that people are waiting on your downfall, and with 2020 changing the way we take in films, many tried to seize this opportunity and label Tenet as this moment in time.  To me, this is an absurd stance to take... not only is Tenet one of the most intriguing films I’ve seen in years, but its efficiency in storytelling trims away so much fat that we are left with archetypical characters with subtle amounts of depth shepherding us through a narrative line that folds in and overlaps on itself numerous times.  With this premise set and our characters deeply devoted to their functionality (though not at the expense of performance), we are left with the spectacle of some amazing choreography and in-camera special effects work that makes you really and truly have to stop at times just so you can try and process what it is you are seeing.  Hopefully, in repeat viewings, the “gimmick” won’t take precedence over the film itself, as I believe there is enough going on outside of the visual trickery to keep one interested time and again.
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4. Dunkirk (2017) It’s no secret that Christopher Nolan has the talent to build vast, textured and deeply imaginative worlds with his films, but up until the point of Dunkirk, Nolan had not attempted a “period piece”.  Luckily for us film lovers, Nolan decided to try his hand at that style in the form of a war movie, and the result was the extremely moving and powerful experience of Allied troops in World War II caught in a situation where death seemed inevitable.  Despite the vastness of the beach and sea we are shown, the feeling of being trapped permeates through and through, and it is enhanced by stellar cinematography and practical effects.  Even with a cast full of familiar names and faces, the experience of hopelessness created soon eliminates the familiarity that comes with star power, and we are left with nothing but our investment in the story.   
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3. The Dark Knight (2008) Simply put, The Dark Knight really has no business being as good as it is.  You’d think that its placement between the two trilogy bookends would give it a transitional nature, potentially only existing to move the story forward to its conclusion.  What we are given, however, is one of the most nuanced looks at heroes, villains, anti-heroes, and just how much those roles can alternate based on the perspective of those applying the title.  For all of the horror that the Scarecrow character brought, or the pure intimidation of Bane, The Dark Knight gives us a complex agent of chaos in the form of Heath Ledger’s instantly iconic (and tragically final) performance as the Joker.  All of the pacing issues that weigh down the other two films are completely absent in this middle offering, and the movie hangs around in your mind well after the final credits roll.  To many viewers, this film set the artistic benchmark for what a so-called “comic-book” movie had the potential to be.
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2. Inception (2010) For many, Inception marks the culminative peak of all that Christopher Nolan brings to the table as a director and storyteller.  His ability to coherently weave together a narrative that deals with the perception of time as one goes deeper and deeper into the psyche is impressive in its own right, but the amount of breathtaking nuance, visual effects and mental gymnastics used to tell the story would bring a lesser director to their knees.  If The Revenant and 2015 served as the culmination of Leonardo DiCaprio finally receiving much-deserved recognition as an actor via an Academy Award, then Inception feels like the starting point for that final leg of his journey.  Everyone brought their A-game to this table on both sides of the camera, leaving us with a true visual and storytelling spectacle for the ages. 
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1. The Prestige (2006) Irony is a funny thing... I bring that up because Christopher Nolan has literally taken on (and, in some ways, conquered) space, time and perception in his films, all of which would be incredibly lofty concepts to illustrate and visualize, let alone make entertaining.  With all of that in mind, it’s ironic that his best film would be one that does not rely on all of the aforementioned lofty aspects and visual tricks.  The Prestige, at a base level, is a story about jealousy and how it can drive you mad, but it’s the way that this story is told that makes it possibly the best film in the Nolan canon.  Christian Bale’s performance (or performances, at the risk of spoilers) is enough to put this film in a class of its own, but the balance that Hugh Jackman’s performance brings to the overall equation keeps you guessing on whom we are supposed to root for right up until the final frame.  The triangle of love triangles in this film further serve to build up the eventual scale of damage that is presented when everything falls completely apart on both sides of the narrative coin.  Most importantly, like any good magic trick, the film sets you up with expectations, only to wow you in the end.  If you had to pick one Nolan film to watch, this would be the one that I recommend, hands down and without question.
Who knows where Christopher Nolan plans to take us next.  I, for one, would not consider myself clued-in enough to hazard a guess on this, but I would almost certainly put money on the fact that wherever he chooses to take us, he will entertain us and amaze us, if not both at the same time, as he always does.
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kvngjoong · 4 years
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hongjoong + nsfw a-z
finally my hard stan colours are shown. sorry if you now think of hongjoong as master. i’m trying to get over that now
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A: Aftercare
being the king he is, hongjoong is already the most caring and thoughtful person you will ever meet and even if he’s left you covered in bruises and bite marks, completely fucked out, he will still be ready to ask you if you need anything and have a cloth to hand to clean you up. even if you just want to lay there, he’s happy to comply, and he’ll look over to you with a smile on his face because he loves you so much
B: Body part
he’s in love with every part of you, don’t try to tell yourself any differently. he will look at every part of you with such love and admiration that it’s hard to consider whether there is a actually a favourite of his. but he lips your lips. he thinks they’re pretty. and he also likes your hands. they’re not a favourite though. likewise he can’t pick a favourite for himself, he likes it when you praise any part of him
C: Cum
he’s quite controlled when he cums and doesn’t usually make that much of a mess of things. he prefers to cum inside you rather than on you, but if you really don’t want him to then he’ll probably cum on your thighs or something else. there’s not that much of it compared to other people, probably a little less than the average amount, so there’s not that much to clean up anyway
D: Dirty Secret
I’m not saying he has a breeding kink, or pregnancy kink or anything, but one thing that hongjoong really likes is the thought of you and him in the future. He’s always looking to the future, and once he’s in love he’s thinking about the two of you not just him. So he thinks ahead to marrying you and what he’ll do to you on the night of your wedding, and he’ll be thinking about getting the chance to cum in you so he can knock you up. Not really a dirty secret, since you’ll know he wants to marry/have kids with you, but he’s definitely not told you he gets off to it
E: Experience
honestly i dont think he’s that experienced at all. he focused a lot of work growing up (like he said) so his priorities were clearly elsewhere. he’s so focused on music that i don’t think he has the time to be chasing pussy or whatever. so whilst he knows what’s going on, he probably does have all that much experience (not that you could have ever guessed it was the case)
F: Favourite Position
as a bit of a traditionalist, he may seem to prefer something like missionary but, and this is an important but, he low key (not that he ever admits to it) likes it when you’re in a submissive position and you can probably see it after a while. he likes it when you’re on your knees or your ass is up in the air. so overtime you’ll naturally just go into these positions and he’ll have a smirk on his face because ooh, you really do know how to get him going
G: Goofy
It’s definitely more serious with hongjoong, but that’s because he gets so caught up in the moment and his mindset is solely on you. straight afterwards he will be one for jokes and giggles but he most likely wouldn’t be the one who jokes during sex. if you joke, he’s fine with it, but don’t expect much of a response but a kiss to shut you up
H: Hair
he’s well groomed, but sometimes slacks and lets it grow a little. prefers to keep it neat for you so that you’re happy too. even if you tell him not to worry, he always will, because he wants to see you as being as perfect as he sees you being
I: Intimacy
he is intimacy x 1000, everything he does is with love and no one can convince me otherwise. though he likes it a little kinky, he won’t ever see you as anything other than the one he loves. there isn’t any part of him that looses the intimate aspect during any nsfw stuff. he showers you in affect 24/7 and that isn’t changing cause you’re naked
J: Jack Off
he doesn’t jack off often. he’s too busy. it’s probably the last thing on his mind given his schedule. unless he’s on the phone to you and has a spare 30 minutes. then he’s the biggest fan of jerking off
K: Kink
he’ll surprise you when he sits you down to tell you what he’s into. like… proper surprise you. you don’t expect the words to leave his mouth, especially stuff like call me master and i wanna make deprive you of your senses. he wants to experiment. take it as a good thing. you’re the only one he feels comfortable with, you’re the only one who he sees as close enough to him to share stuff like that with (because he’s definitely not gonna sit seonghwa down and be like, listen, this is what i’m into). he’s into a lot. he didn’t know he was into kitten play until you surprised him with that, though
L: Location
prefers the bedroom. not much else to it. he likes having his own space to you and doesn’t particularly like taking such a personal, intimate part of your life out of the bedroom (or at least your personal space). anything in your place/his is okay though. as long as it’s not public (unless it’s a hotel, which is fine)
M: Motivation
you!! you in pastel coloured underwear!! you with kitten ears and short shirts!! you with his shirt on!! literally anything you do has his heart racing and if it has a visual effect then that’s even better for him - he likes pretty things after all
N: NO
hongjoong is quite possessive. he doesn’t like the thought of sharing you. he doesn’t particularly like it when you role play, either. he doesn’t mind you calling him master, he doesn’t mind pet play, but he’s really not into you dressing up as a nurse, or him as a teacher. he thinks that it’s a bit weird
O: Oral
he prefers giving to receiving, though he’s not going to say no to receiving. he just prefers to have you in a position where you’re the one who’s responding to what he’s doing. even when he’s sub, he likes it when you ride his face opposed to you sucking him off. he’s an anomaly and you can thank him for it after he’s made you cum twice from oral alone
P: Pace
medium-fast. he’s definitely on the quicker side, but it’s not enough that you will be feeling the effects the next day. he can take it slow, but usually by the time he’s actually fucking you he just wants to get you both to cum. so he is a bit quicker. if you’re on top/dom, then he likes you to take things slower
Q: Quickie
he’s not a fan, and he doesn’t see the point in quickies to be honest. he likes to have an evening to dedicate to you, even if it means he has to wait all day and avoid letting anyone touch him or see him anywhere else than his desk (where he can hide absolutely everything). so don’t expect too many from him, unless you really, really want to
R: Risk
right, i’m taking a different stance on this. hongjoong likes taking risks. hence why he likes cumming in you and he low key has a thing for accidentally knocking you up. he doesn’t want kids or anything, it’s just the mental aspect of it. marking, i guess, making you his. but he likes taking risks in that way. if someone is going to walk in and see you dressed to please him, hongjoong will probably like that too
S: Stamina
he can go for as long as you need. it’s always gonna be a few hours with hongjoong anyway, especially the longer you’ve been together, so his stamina is well placed. he won’t need breaks between either. it’s all or nothing for you
T: Toy
he will build a collection with you over time and have a drawer full of them after a while. he likes using them, and for this i’m going to include more than just toys, he likes looking at you in white leather restraints and a matching collar, with cute little bite marks all over you as he has a vibrator on your clit and his smirk grows each time you ask him for more
U: Unfair
he’s a massive fucking tease. have you seen him? that fucking smirk?? kim hongjoong was made to have you writhe beneath him, begging him to touch you more or go faster. he makes sure you know not to best him, especially when you call him master (which is not very common, but when he’s struggling to assert his dominance as a leader he will most definitely take it out on you)
V: Volume
he’s not the loudest, but definitely not silent. the only time he’s quiet completely is when he’s close to cumming and he wants to concentrate on what he’s doing. he’ll have his mouth open, ready to moan, and when he finally does cum he lets that moan out and it’s kinda beautiful. on other occasions, he is more of a groaner and a talker, but that’s it
W: Wild Card
hongjoong isn’t the best submissive… to say the least. he wants to try it, though his nature is primarily domineering and he naturally takes the position of a dominant role so struggles to actually get rid of that side of him. he isn’t 100% dominant because he has a submissive side to him but getting it out of him is hard. it takes a lot to actually get him to try out some wrist restraints, but when he’s tied up and you’re laying all the teasing on him, he really can show how submissive one can be. he will bend to your every wish and be practically begging at the end. as soon as he’s cum though, it will be as if nothing ever happened… sub!hongjoong is a mystery we would all love a crack at
X: X-Ray
whilst he is on the smaller side, he makes up for it with his (natural) abilities and skills, as well as his tendency to get you off more than once with more than just sex. he’s not like small small (there’s a video floating around instagram, if you’ve seen it) but it’s not gonna make you wonder whether you can actually take him
Y: Yearning
he’s definitely needy sometimes, but only ever when he’s feeling a little lonely or he’s mad/sad about something. usually he’s not that clingy, but it’s worst when there’s tension around him and he wants an escape from the world around him. you can usually tell because straight afterwards he’ll be telling you the story from a-z anyway
Z: ZZZ
he falls asleep pretty quickly usually, but when you’ve just finished any nsfw sessions he won’t be sleeping straight away. he wants to cuddle for a bit first, discuss whatever is on his mind and yours, then go to sleep. but he won’t get up and go out with you straight afterwards, so don’t worry if you thought he was going to be hyper afterwards or anything
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endlessdoom · 3 years
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THT: Threnody 
20 maps for Doom 2.
By various authors, lead by Chris Hansen.
2016
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MAP01: Eirene by Chris Hansen
We start this megawad with an entry by the legend Chris Hansen. This medium sized map quickly introduces us to a style that is quite appreciable and sweet to admire, with solid visuals that combine a bit of vanilla design with a few new textures that bring new life to the map. The layout is as simple as it is attractive, offering small deviations from the path that reward us with new items, as well as interesting and well-balanced encounters. A great and fun map. 4/5
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MAP02: Rockage by Ilya Lazarev (joe-ilya) and Chris Hansen
With a similar premise to the previous map, this level has a sensible but sensitive design that is quite satisfying to admire. The combination of interiors and exteriors is well done, as well as a good variety of rooms that is complemented by a modest layout that doesn't complicate things. The gameplay is slightly upped in difficulty to offer a little more variety of encounters by making use of traps. All in all, a good and decent quick level. 3/5
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MAP03: Chemical Facility by Paul Corfiatis
A combination of the previous two maps in a larger and more diverse context. With deep paths and an interconnected layout, this medium-large map offers more diversity in terms of combat and gameplay, delivering several zones that are connected under a good design scheme with a decent and fluid style. 3/5
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MAP04: Manly Hatred by Chris Hansen
An interesting graphical style results in a modest and pleasant level in terms of visual aspects, which at the same time offers a layout that, despite being somewhat complicated and unusual, gives us a certain sense of adventure and offers interesting combat. 3/5
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MAP05: Nukevil by Adam Post (Doomkid)
Fun, fast and simple. A lovely adventure that contains both a challange and a good-looking map. 4/5
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MAP06: Cut Throat by Adam Post (Doomkid)
As an evolution of the previous map that reveals itself in a larger size, greater challenge and more fun. This map combines excellent areas with natural design that give a refreshing feeling, as well as an explosive gameplay that grows with each new and different room. 5/5
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MAP07: Fort Halderman by Gothic
Big and violent at times, but with interesting visuals and a good graphic theme. This is a large map with over 300 demons that can take a bit of time to complete, especially due to the layout that requires a lot of backtracking. 3/5
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MAP08: Fightnancial Crisis at Enwrong by dobu gabu maru
This is a massive level that bleeds detail into sheer absurdity. If you are one of those who enjoy looking at a map designed with absolute attention to every single centimeter, you will feel incredibly good about this map. A visual treat that unfortunately suffers from somewhat lackluster gameplay and a super complex layout that hinders the flow of the gameplay. 3/5
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MAP09: Forgotten Reaches by Adam Post (Doomkid)
Atmospheric and tight, but full of excellent combat in a setting so varied that the evolution and rhythm of the map is incredibly dynamic and enjoyable. 4/5
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MAP10: Fomalhaut by Brett Harrell (Mechadon)
Giant and brutal. A huge brown fortress that goes into a kind of valley surrounded by mountains, with a system of caverns and outdoor areas, as well as a huge graphic detail that give a magnificent flavor to this map. Unfortunately, the sheer size of the map means that it has an incredibly cryptic layout to manage and difficult to understand paths, as well as a few traps and encounters that feel repetitive. With a somewhat dick-ish slaughter ending, this is a visually appeasing map but one that disappoints me personally in terms of gameplay. 3/5
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MAP11: Parallel Dimension by Seongbae Park (antares031)
As the name suggests, this map makes use of parallel dimensions to transport us to a level developed with care and good attention to detail, being elevated in an excellent visual touch and a complementary look. Unfortunately, you have to reach a point where you have to wonder if it's worth sacrificing certain elements to get that visual quality; while the combat feels intense and well developed, the confusing teleportation system and complicated path system make this map one with an incredibly dull and complicated layout for its own good. 3/5
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MAP12: WormHell by z0k and Fonze
Big, dark and gothic. A particularly designed style that creates an excellent atmosphere, establishing a clear influence that combines different styles that complement each other quite well. With constant and tight combat, this map flows pleasantly thanks to an understandable and accessible layout. It can be tiring at times, but rewards it with nice fun. 3/5
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MAP13: Binde Haldetmand Palae by Paul Corfiatis
Short and gothic. A style quite reminiscent of Hexen. This small map makes use of a good combat system thanks to a well-defined layout and a progressive gameplay that remains constant. Entertaining and attractive, combining excellent rooms and height changes. 4/5
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MAP14: Labour of Despair by Philip Brown (Liberation)
Charmingly large but with a magnitude wide enough to give you a good sense of freedom. Some somewhat annoying paths at times, including pools of blood that slow us down, but with good, entertaining and challenging combat that culminates in a solid final arena. 3/5
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MAP15: TY45-15 by Didy
Solid medium sized level set in a medieval city with touches of dark fantasy. The gothic design permeates the environment and delivers a fantastic map in terms of visual style, along with good gameplay that delivers fun encounters and a layout understandable enough to not compromise the fun factor. 4/5
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AP16: Ayahuasca by Chris Hansen
Lovingly detailed and with a tight design that promotes the personal. It exudes ambiance and features a fascinating design that expands through a solid layout. Explosive combat makes this a challenging but enjoyable map. 4/5
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MAP17: Tyvivec by Angry Saint
Massive in terms of its outlook. A set of islands with fortresses linked by bridges in an ocean of lava. An epic view in every sense along with a brutal gameplay that punishes for certain moments in unexpected traps. Progress feels balanced and features solid moments but is at times a bit difficult to navigate. 3/5
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MAP18: Fallen Steward - Eternal Archive by Mithran Denizen
Medium but chaotic. It throws us into an explosive combat from the beginning, giving us a constant and brutal combat for the entire duration of the game. With a small progression system that goes down relatively in difficulty, this is a short but nice map. 3/5
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MAP19: Big Freaking Guardians by Fonze and Didy
Gigantic and extremely beautiful to admire. Full of details and variation of visuals, giving it a very dynamic and entertaining progress. On the other hand, it is a challenging and exhaustive map. You can expect 30 minutes of gameplay on this. 3/5
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MAP20: Sky Pillar by Seongbae Park (antares031)
An explosive ending to an explosive WAD. MAP20 is a big yet compact level with a great dynamic progression that allows for multiple combats at a time while still retaining a focus on progressing the level. The fantastic visuals evoke an eerie feeling that plays right into the overall theme. 4/5
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End.
Overall:
» THT: Threnody (2016) By various authors led by Chris Hansen
A collection of 20 maps makes this a respectfully large megawad that works in the style of Community Project, with the difference that the authors have managed to work under a fairly cohesive factor that gives a certain palpable identity to THT. Speaking of THT, this is also a WAD in the form of a tribute to one of the legends of the community, one of our greatest pillars and fantastic creator. THT stands for Ty Halderman Tribute, creator of the iconic TNT mappers group and also the maintainer of /idgames archive from 1997 to 2015. That's an amount of effort that very, very few of us in the community will ever manage to encompass. That's a lifetime of providing us with both content and pure hard work. This WAD is a dedication to Ty, a love letter of sorts that without needing to be an exact replica of his past works, has certain monuments to his legacy. A WAD that contains a particularly special essence, let's see what it is all about, shall we?
With 20 maps in total, created by legends like @antares031, the didactic @Chris Hansen, the passionate @Doomkid or the extra prolific @pcorf (just to mention a couple of the ones I've played before) this megawad leaves no loose reins and brings with it a pretty special cast, who working under the direction of Chris Hansen, managed to create something with a touch of palpable identity that at the same time works as an excellent museum of memories to all that many of us have appreciated thanks to Ty. Mainly, we have to frame that this WAD makes special use of textures created by TNT, the OG group, as well as a few references to other projects that can be found within the repertoire of Ty's work. Each map is a blast in terms of its visual design, delivering such a dynamic variety of visual themes that it becomes a complete visual pleasure in every encounter; even the small and short maps have such an attractive design that it makes us want to create a photo gallery of this megawad alone. This is in part thanks to the incredible texture set that manages to combine a perfect blend between the classic gothic style ala Hexen and a bit of pure Doom technology. Like a discordant dichotomy of two separate styles that together manage to establish themselves quite well. It's common to find more than one TNT logo there and then, and every time we look at them we probably end up smiling either from nostalgia or simple charisma.
The maps are, to put it simply, barbaric. The first set starts off slow, setting up a dynamic progression with a little extra challenge and a UV that gives us an idea of the type of combat we'll encounter as we progress. After the first 10 or so maps, things get more violent and at the same time more spectacular. MAP10: Fomalhaut by Brett Harrell (@Mechadon) is probably the wake-up call that will make us realize what kind of beast we have. This gigantic map is a work of detail and fortifications, combining lavish combat with somewhat bogged down but always steady progress. @antares031 also delivers huge maps of magnificent dimensions and incredible themes. MAP11: Parallel Dimension is probably one of the most unique and attractive maps we will find in the set, as well as a challenge that will ask for patience. MAP12: WormHell by @z0k and @Fonze is another giant that combines very well a 90s style that evolves to reveal a gothic work. MAP19: Big Freaking Guardians by @Fonze and @Didy takes the prize in terms of violence and magnitude, a huge map in every sense that will undoubtedly make us suffer through an adventure in the beautiful dimensional spaces of TNT. These are huge maps, violent and somewhat frustrating at times, but with an attention to detail and absolute visual glory that make us feel in another world. As I said before, a photo gallery. Of course, it's not all beastly here, we also have modest, short and simple maps that will deliver a rich pleasure in what we could describe as a quickie. MAP01: Eirene by @Chris Hansen, the first map, delivers an excellent moment of fun in a short but dynamic and constant level of pure balanced action and welcome for all types of players. MAP05: Nukevil by Adam Post (@Doomkid) and all his maps, are excellent examples of medium to short maps that work as excellent points of intermission where the balance between gameplay and aesthetics is perfectly succeeded in total linearity of evaluations. Nothing beats the other, and everything beats the other at the same time. MAP13: Binde Haldetmand Palae by @Paul Corfiatis is another great example of a short map with a compact design that evolves on itself, offering an excellent hard to miss layout that never stops progressing, while giving us an excellent visual style. These are some of my favorite maps, maps that work as well in their gameplay factor as they do visually, and of course, I can't forget the last one: MAP20: Sky Pillar by Seongbae Park (@antares031) is a magnificent work that ends this megawad in an arena of eternal confines where melancholy combines in the air with the blood of eternal demons under the autumnal sky of a forgotten hell.
While the megawad is designed in the form of a tribute, it does not attempt to replicate Ty's style exactly, nor copy directly from his creations; on the contrary, it chooses a system of references so subtle that they function like little poems whispered in silence. As we move forward, we will see things that remind us of his great contributions, while at the same time we play with the vague notion that we were already in this place once. A kind of dream that we never dreamed, and in that this megawad manages to carry that fantastic tribute idea.
On the other hand, while the megawad is a marvel for the eyes, I'm sure it won't be to everyone's taste for those who prefer to focus on the gameplay. Only 20 maps, but you can expect about 5 hours of gameplay in UV, counting deaths. The final maps are incredibly long and challenging, giving us an excellent beating if we are not prepared for it, to the point that many will have to rely heavily on trial-and-error to overcome these maps. This, added to the sad side effect of large, layous and confusing maps, makes the levels often feel overcomplicated for what they are, punishing the player with an unstable, tiring and extremely long progress. But then I get to thinking, isn't Eternal Doom like that? Maybe it's all part of the tribute, who knows. One way or another, if you want to throw yourself into this megawad, I think I can tell you with a firm hand to do so. It's not just a simple project, it's one made with dedication, passion and a lot of love. The maps you will find here are of a higher quality than normal, and each one of them feels like a long and memorable adventure.
I may have felt quite frustrated at times thanks to the constant hordes of enemies and the pseudo-slaughter gameplay at times, but every stage made it worthwhile. On the other hand, I'm capable of putting up with punishing combat, but confusing layouts? That really kills my patience, but I understand that sometimes the glory and fun lies in this singular aspect, the exploration and the feeling of being lost. On the other hand, don't let my words sound so extreme, this isn't Eternal Doom either, but you will need to pay attention and take note of where you've been and where you're going. If you like that, then you will love it. But even if you don't, let me tell you that I had a great time and thoroughly enjoyed the megawad. It's a long, but satisfying adventure that ends on a nostalgic note through space and time, like a dimensional goodbye from mirrors we don't see. A fine tribute that I'm sure Ty would love.
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psychicmedium2 · 1 year
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Earmarks of Online Psychics For any Psychic Reading
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References Psychic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychic
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book blogging #6: I Choosing My Own Romantic Adventure
a humble recap of my journey through My Lady’s Choosing: An Interactive Romance Novel, by Kitty Curran and Larissa Zageris.
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in case anyone isn’t familiar with the premise of a choose your own adventure book, it fucking slaps: at each critical crossroad in the story you’ll be offered a handful of actions to take, each of which will direct you to a different page where you’ll see how your fate plays out. 
I did a lot of the Goosebumps choose your owns as a kid and those usually ended with me either dying or transformed into a horrifying monster no matter how much I frantically flipped back and forth trying to cheat the system, so I felt like an absolute genius playing through this book purely on the basis that I never managed to die.
what did I accomplish? well, in order for that explanation to make any sense, first I have to talk about our romantic options. 
as depicted on the cover, starting in the top left and working clockwise, we have Garraway Craven, who seems to be a bit of a mishmash between Heathcliff (ew) and that bitch that Jane Eyre gets involved with (double ew). spoiler alert, I don’t know a ton about Garraway or his storyline because I never got anywhere near it. I’m not nearly dedicated enough to book blogging to run off to some godforsaken moor and flirt it up with a maniac just for the #content.
next we have Sir Benedict Granville, our obligatory Mr. Darcy stand in. if you know anything about me and the normal amount that I like Pride and Prejudice you’ll be unsurprised to learn that he was a priority on my romancing to-do list, but reader beware: he’s not fucking worth it. more on this in a moment.
the dashing kilt-wearing man on the horse is Captain Mac; that’s a nickname, but I’ve forgotten what his full name was. he seems to be more a parody of the entire “rugged yet sensitive Scotsman” trope so popular among romance novelists. in case it’s not obvious yet, Curran and Zageris are extremely aware of the tropes of the genre, and have an absolutely delightful time tossing them around like birdies in a spirited game of badminton.
lastly we have Lady Evangeline, a scandalous lady of adventure and academia. she parties, she knows her way around London’s dens of iniquity, she can translate Egyptian hieroglyphs. if you read that and thought “wow, gay,” you are extremely correct.
those are the four big names, but it’s also more than possible to wander off on a sidequest and find love with a secondary character. Curran and Zageris really do manage to cram an impressive amount of story and options into a relatively small book, and while the story sometimes feels a bit rushed or lacking in detail, it’s entirely excusable given the constraints of the medium. 
so, the all important question: whomst did I romance?
first, of course, I did my queer due diligence and and went after Evangeline. it’s a bit of a slow build to get to her, but once you allow her to whisk you away from England for an adventure in Egypt things really take off. there’s action, revenge, kidnapping, chase scenes, an ancient love temple that can only be discovered through the power of orgasms, you name it.
(a note about sex in this book, since I know that’s not everyone’s cup of tea: while you can certainly find yourself in some saucy situations, it never gets much more explicit than some vague descriptions and double entendres so obvious that they’re really just single entendres.)
after Evangeline I set my sights on Benedict, but ultimately determined him a lost cause. there is a fairly intriguing mystery of familial drama to unravel around Benedict, which is fun, but the man himself is insufferable. using banter to conceal romantic tension is one thing, but there comes a point where a dude is rude enough that you have to bail - which I did, in order to help Mac out with the orphanage he runs for children who have lost their parents in the war.
(what war? you know. The War.)
Mac’s a fun one, even if his phonetic accent is painful to read, and according to the narration the two of you can possibly invent the concept of having sex in a shower. his plotline gets a little convoluted once the orphanage burns down and you have to move all the orphans to a falling-down castle in the Highlands (I know) and at risk of spoiling a chose your own adventure novel I ended up absconding with my childhood sweetheart to work as a British spy. wild!
as I said, I wasn’t nearly curious enough to find out what happens if you go to the moors, but I did circle back to Evangeline’s Egypt storyline to go after a minor character who seemed like prime romance material. his name is Kamal, he curates a museum, and the narrative really goes out of its way to mention how bookish and boyishly handsome he is before giving you a chance to go on a date tour of the market with him. I went after Kamal, a bit of action ensued, and the two of us ended up happily married with a kickass museum and several children to whom Evangeline is a doting godmother, which isn’t a bad ending at all.
overall? it’s silly, it’s fun, I’d absolutely nab another book of this nature. I appreciate how far out of its way the book goes to avoid giving defining physical characteristics to the POV character, meaning she could plausibly look like almost anything, although there’s a definite assumption of her being able-bodied and cisgender. 
there are a few less than perfect slip ups: the book often wobbles on that line between parodying how other books exoticize Egypt and also shamelessly exoticizing Egypt, and while including a f/f romance is cool it does feel a little token-y when Evangeline is the only female love interest among at least half a dozen men. if there were any other female options they must have been out on the moors with Craven, because I certainly never found them (and believe me, I wanted to find them). 
overall? sure, pick it up. the worst thing that could happen is marrying an abysmally old man who dies on your wedding day and leaves you an impressive fortune. 
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