#have this exploration page just in case i don't lol

[iersei]

happy III day !!! have a doodle page <3

#yugioh #yugioh zexal #i might do a bigger piece later but #have this exploration page just in case i don't lol #iii arclight #michael arclight #trey arclight #tossing my art into the void

[leighsartworks216]

You Have A Type, Don't You?

Astarion x gn!Tav/Reader

Based on this post

I wrote this instead of doing any of the work I need to do! I'm gonna go do that now lol

Warnings: innuendos, minor references to sex, the barest hints of jealousy

Word Count: 1,601

Masterlist

AO3

Tag List Form

Your pencil scratched across the paper, drawing Astarion over and over again on a single page. This wasn’t anything surprising; you drew all of your companions. Gale, Wyll, Karlach, Shadowheart, Lae’zel - they all had pages of their own, but it was usually only one drawing. Some had even posed for it. It was just a way to relax, and their faces always lit up when you showed them, even if they tried not to show it.

Everyone needed a break from fighting and exploring day in day out, so you decided one more day here wouldn’t hurt. As such, you’ve spent the better half of the day just drawing. At first it was little doodles of Scratch, but then you realized you hadn’t drawn the vampire spawn yet.

Most of the expressions you captured came from memory. You’d occasionally sneak a glance for quick reference, pretending to stretch or get distracted by some birds. But at some point, he’d disappeared from camp. You just assumed he’d gone off hunting.

That assumption was proved quite wrong when a voice tsked over your shoulder, almost directly in your ear.

Startling away from the sound, you whipped around to see Astarion crouched down. He wore a self-satisfied smirk and settled down into a full sit on the ground.

“It seems someone is infatuated,” he teased. “So who is it? Someone we saved from peril, perhaps?”

Oh. Right. It had completely slipped your mind.

You cleared your throat as your cheeks warmed and smiled. “Y-Yeah, something like that.”

He chuckled. “Come on, darling, there’s nothing to be shy about. Spare none of the juicy details. What’s he like?”

“He’s, well,” you stammer, “he’s interesting.”

He scoffed. “That’s hardly juicy or a detail. Or is he just another pretty face?” He leaned forward, trying to get a better look at your drawings. You wanted to pull them away and hide them, but why? All the others had drawings done of them, and you loved showing it off when they were done. Why was this any different?

“No, he’s a lot more than that,” you admit quietly. You weren’t good at lying - usually Astarion took the lead any time you had to - but maybe if you didn’t tell a complete lie… “He’s funny, charming. His laugh lights up my world. He’s had a rough go of it, but he doesn’t like it to show.”

“He must like you if you know,” he hummed. Your heart leapt into your throat as he pointed to the pin pricks drawn on the neck. “Is he a vampire, too?” He chuckled, but it sounded strained. “You have a type, don’t you?”

You scoffed even as warmth flooded to your cheeks. “No! I do not have a type.”

“No, of course not,” he played along. “Certainly not for creatures of the night who bite into that pretty little neck of yours.” Despite his smile, there was a tension in his eyes. “I don’t mind, dear. I’d be more than happy to scrounge around some nights so you may indulge your new lover.”

You shook your head. “You don’t have to do that, Astarion,” you assured. “He’s not… We’re not together.”

“No?” You shook your head again. He opened his mouth to give you advice or console you, but you cut him off. It was better to end this fantasy now, before it began to hurt too much.

“It doesn’t matter. Besides, you shouldn’t be sneaking around so you can look over my shoulder. I could have been drawing something terrible.”

He laughed. “All the more reason to risk a peek. You’re so good, it would be nice to know you can be tempted.” Then he scowled. “Unless it’s something terribly dull. You deserve much more than missionary.”

If your cheeks weren’t already blazing hot…

“In any case, I was only wondering when you’d draw my portrait. You seemed more than happy to provide the others with a likeness. And…” He looked past you, seemingly far away. “I haven’t seen myself in two centuries. One gets curious, especially when you’re as vain as me.”

If he heard your heart start racing, he didn’t comment on it. Drawing him would make him realize it wasn’t some other vampire crush you were drawing. But, it had been a while since your adventure began, and you’d drawn everyone else. You swallowed down your anxiety. “Yeah! Of course! Did you wanna pose, or anything?”

He blinked and suddenly he was back in the present. A sly smirk covered up whatever emotions could be lingering on his face. “If your little vampire friend doesn’t get too jealous. I would actually like if you could draw me just,” he paused, “smiling. It would be nice to know what everyone else sees. Make sure I’m not off-putting, you know how it is.”

Once he was sitting comfortably, you turned to a fresh page and began drawing. The paper was hidden from his view, but he watched as your hand, wrist, and arm all moved in tandem like a clock’s gears to create an image. Your eyes moved between the sketch and him multiple times. Sometimes you’d glance up and draw for almost a minute. Then other times you kept going back and forth, constantly checking for reference.

Watching you work was fascinating. All your surroundings faded away. Karlach being her usual loud self, Wyll dancing, Gale cooking, Lae’zel sharpening weapons - nothing could turn your attention from him. He almost felt subconscious with the intensity of it. Your eyes studied him, taking in every single feature, and translated it to your journal. What did you see when you looked at him, he wondered. What did the world see? It had been so long, he couldn’t even remember his face. All he knew was he was attractive.

With a final few marks, brushed away to blend them into the rest, you looked down at your masterpiece. You were so caught up in the drawing you forgot why you were hesitant before, but now that Astarion stared at you from two different angles, your anxiety came back full force. There was no way out of this.

“All done, dear?”

You smiled shakily up at him and turned the journal around. His face scrunched up in confusion. When he met your eyes, he was decidedly unamused. “Darling, if you’re going to draw your fleeting fancy, don’t trick me first. I know it’s hard to see past the depraved bloodlust, but we don’t all look alike, you know.”

“No, Astarion, it’s not- I-”

While you fought to find words, Karlach picked up the slack. Cupping her hands around her mouth, she shouted across the camp, “IT’S YOU, FANGS!”

Dread washed over you. You closed your eyes. If a merciful god was going to kill you and rid you of this embarrassment, now would be the time. A bolt of lightning, perhaps. You’d even welcome decapitation.

You risked a glance when you felt your book being tugged carefully from your hands. His eyes were wide, mouth slightly open as he tried to comprehend what the fuck had just happened. Gods, now he was going to leave camp. You buried your face in your hands. He was going to pack everything up and leave before the sun even touched the horizon. And you’d never see him again. Maybe you’d go find Cazador yourself, just to kill the bastard.

“All these drawings… are me? Darling?”

You inhaled deeply and lowered your hands, but you couldn’t bear looking at him. He could stab you with his dagger and you’d apologize to him for it all. Hell, you’d let him drink you dry if it meant leaving this all behind you. “You’re very pretty,” you admitted quietly. “I didn’t know how to ask, and just- You can rip the pages out, burn them, whatever makes you feel better. And if you leave, I won’t blame you or chase after you or-”

“I’m not upset.” Your head never shot up so fast. “Well, a little. You’re not subtle when you stare, you know. I thought you were just uncomfortable being around a vampire, but this…” He turned back to the portrait you’d just finished. “This is really what I look like?”

You swallowed away a small portion of the shame. At least he wasn’t running away. “As best as I can capture you, anyway. Y-You’ve got these sharp eyes, and your hair curls around your ears, and you get little wrinkles around your eyes and mouth when you laugh - and I just like drawing you.”

The page flipped over again. The page of expressions, capturing everything you described. When he smiled full and bright his fangs were on full display, accented by the laugh lines on either side of his mouth. And the puncture wounds on his neck…

“Ah, so when I said you had a type…” He chuckled, but it didn’t hold as much warmth as usual.

“Your laugh does light up my world,” you admit. His red eyes were on you in an instant, flickering over your whole face. “Just, for the record.”

He glanced at the drawings once more, contemplative. Then, he held the book back out to you. “I wouldn’t be… opposed to trying this. Whatever this is.”

You reached out to take it, but he pulled it away. “But, no more sneaking glances across camp when you want to draw me. I would be delighted to model for you again, in any pose your sweet heart can concoct.” He held the book out again. “Deal?”

You grabbed onto the book, finally relaxing as you smiled. “Deal.”

---

Tag List:

@satelliteapotheosis @hypopxia @mjmygd @flsalazar @thedevilssinner @marina-and-the-memes @softempest @rebeccasship @pinkishredlemonade @faeoran

#fanfic #fanfiction #astarion #astarion x reader #astarion x tav #baldur's gate 3 #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 #baldur's gate astarion #baldur's gate tav #baldurs gate astarion #baldurs gate tav #bg3 astarion #bg3 tav #gn reader #x gn reader #gender neutral reader #x gender neutral reader #fluff

[innocent-cat]

Ok but. Percy’s idea of romance is most definitely from his parents. Traditional romance, courtly love and chivalry. Him sending flowers to reader as a secret admirer and her not getting it at all because they’re all single flowers that are very different. Until she drags Keyleth into it and they do some research. Look up “Victorian Language of Flowers” for inspo.

“Undying love” “true beauty” and all kinds of sweet meanings behind each flower. He’d get Keyleth to help because she’s a romantic and number 1 shipper.

HEY guess whose back xx

Percival de Rolo x Reader

Warnings - cussing lol, sharp objects????

"Victorian ways of loving.", Percy x Reader

.·:*¨༺༻¨*:·..·:*¨༺༻¨*:·..·:*¨༺༻

(A/N - very thankful thank you to leopard for giving me the silly little flower sites for this!!!)

Recently, you had gained a secret admirer. Overall? Weird. But.. entertainment wise? The most interesting mystery you've put yourself up to in a while.

Of course, it wasn't just you who was "solving" the case of a seemingly allergy-less admirer, it was Keyleth helping you. Knowing she worked so well with plants, who else was there really to go to?

Every time you received a new flower on your windowsill, your doorstep, or handed to you by someone on the street, you giddily sped-walk to the druid's ivied library she hung around daily.

"You'll never guess what I got this time, Keyleth. A single violet."

"..That's not a violet."

Taking the delicate flower from your hand, she rotates it clockwise and counter, careful not to touch the petals. She smiles. Still looking at the flower, she speaks;

"This is an Iris flower. Isn't she so gorgeous? Whoever gave you this, has to be thinking into something a little more than just flowers. I mean, I've personally never seen someone just give less than a bouquet of flowers to a special someone, have you?"

She shakes her ideas off onto you, still analyzing the flower. You lean against the table she was just sitting at, and watched her explore the library with the Iris.

"Where you going?"

"To get a book on Victorian flowers, of course. I remember my mom telling me something about Victorian flower meanings being something heavily carried throughout the years."

You followed Keyleth on her heels, sticking close to her and watching her actions. Her finger glides against the cloth covers of books, as she whispers, 'Victorian flowers, Victorian flowers, Victoriannn..' She lets out a small gasp, and leans the book out of it's place.

"Here it is! C'mon. Let's sit."

Sitting down, she heaves a sigh.

"So. Tell me all about those flowers you've been getting." She raises her eyebrows, flipping through the pages of the book, the scent of aged paper wafting faintly into your nose. She flipped, occasionally turning back for the table of contents.

"Well.. there've been a few. The first time I got one from them? It were these yellow little pansies. It was wrapped with a thin purple ribbon. I bit the stem, it was a little sour."

"Why would- Iris! Well, reads here that your little lover here is trying to say they think you're smart, and they put faith in you. Isn't that just so romantic?" Keyleth smiles, reading the words with her fingers.

"Well- what about the pansies?" You scoot closer to Keyleth, eyeing the book next to her.

"Hey, while I find flowers, why don't you keep telling me about the little expressions of romance you received?"

"Oh! You know what? There was this pair of flowers I got three days ago. Cute little white and pink daisies. It had a lively sense to it."

You listened to Keyleth flip through pages, double checking the contents, book marking pages with her fingers. You watched her read the page numbers to herself.

"Okay, pansies and daises right here! Lets read?" She turned a smile to you, bringing the book to the middle of the two of you. She points, she reads.

'Pansies. A flower commonly traded between secret lovers, but evolved into a flower that expresses to the receiver that the giver has been thinking of them.' She stops.

She reads again.

'Daisies. A flower that belongs to the 'Aster' branch. With a variety of colors, they were used to express differentiating terms. Most commonly for romance, white and pink were used. The white flowers expressed true, and pure love. The pink daises were often associated and linked to gentleness, romance, and love.'

Keyleth lets in a sharp breath. She had read all that in one go, and you didn't blame her for needing air.

"Isn't that so cute? Agh! You guys would be so cute together."

"We don't even know whose giving me these, Keyleth. What if it's like- some super betrayal from some random guy who hates us?"

"Uhm. It wont." Keyleth shined a toothy grin to you, and turned back to her book, to the contents.

"Well.. two days ago I got a bush heliotrope. It had a note in it. I think I remember it saying something about the sun. Super weird and poetic."

Keyleth leans forward, sitting her head up on her hand.

"Why don't you go get that for me, then? I don't think that's a flower in here.." She frowned.

"Yeah! Of course." You pushed your chair back, pushing yourself up with the table.

You frizz Keyleth's hair before continuing out the library. You open the beautiful spruce door, clicking it behind you. You sped-walk, trying your best to not make Keyleth wait for you for too long. It was sweet of her to help you with your romantic predicament.

You make a sharp turn into a hall, and you walk directly into a wall. You yelped in shock, stumbling backwards with the unexpected change of interior.

Before you fall flat on your ass, you're wrist is caught by another hand, and you're pulled up.

"Oh- I'm so sorry. I didn't notice you. Are you hurt?"

It was Percy. Oh how humiliating. Your small little fun crush on the man grew during your ventures with him, and you couldn't help to be stunned at the inconvenience of the moment.

You took his body language in. His face was tucked with guilt and concern for you. His hand gracing your face, cupping it. He brushes his thumb upon your cheek softly.

"Yeah. Thanks. I would have fell if you didn't catch me. I genuinely thought you were a wall for a few moments." You changed your stance, releasing his hand. You tucked one hand under the other, crossing your arms under your chest.

"Wait, you thought the keep had just- suddenly changed so you walked into a wall?" You watched his face dissolve from concern to a humored smile.

You turn your face, studying the wall that was to your left, and not in front of you. You hear him emit a small laugh, so pure and gratifying you couldn't help but smile too. You fought it, but you smiled.

You feel his other hand drop to your waist. You felt the hem of your shirt slightly lift, your sensitive skin jumping at the cold mechanical hand.

"Hey, don't be like that. Not the nicest thing to not look at someone talking to you, is it?" His hand that rest on your face turned you to look at him.

You looked back up to him, ruffled by his confident move. Mouth slightly ajar, your hand moves to his face. You drift closer to him.

Both of your eyes closed.

"Now.. as much as I enjoy your company, de Rolo the third, I'm afraid I have something to do."

You let go of his face, you pull away. You walk down the hall, your hand outlining his arm, and picking his hand up with your's, letting go when you're out of his reach.

You walk up the stairs, and close your door and listen to it creak shut, slowly. It clicks. You slide against it.

"Oh my god."

You deeply inhale, knowing you wasted the opportunity of kissing the Noble who lingered in your dreams. You stand, fixing your dragged hair, and open the nightstand next to your bed.

Shuffling through pens, papers, feathers, beads, knife sharpener, switch blade, nail filer, and other trinkets you kept roughly tossed in the drawer, you find the note you received with the flowers.

Your hands softly traced the neatly and delicately assorted letter as you read;

'My love,

You are the beaming sun that I turn to like heliotrope. Without you as my stream of light, I would be lost. You as my guide, I require no assurance that all will turn peacefully. Even with my name that of which is untold, I stand with you devoted, infatuated, and confidently regardless to your obliviously and curiosity. Please, allow all the flowers I send to sink to your heart and be remembered, kept, and admired for all your prosperous life.

Sincerely,

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ PFvMKdR |||'

Although romantic, the sign off was tragically confusing. You smiled, and tucked the note into your pocket. You rush down the stairs, jogging to the library.

You open the door slowly, and crack it enough to not make noise.

You could hear Percy and Keyleth talking, and you couldn't help but eavesdrop.

You snaked yourself around the libary, reaching a shelf that covered you, and was close enough to hear what they were saying.

"Percy. I won't be making orchids, or any flower in that matter, if they aren't to actually express yourself. No more notes!"

Keylath bantered Percy, complaining of how shy he was.

"Okay. If you make me these orchids, I'll.. tell them I love them."

"Yes!" Keyleth cheered, swiping the pot filled with moss, bark, and dried root. She worked her magic, and out came the loveliest orchid branch anyone could ever lay their eyes on. If only they were to be received by you instead of whomever the gunslinger showed interest in.

"Thank you Keyleth. I'll forever be in your debt."

"Pay me back by being super romantic."

Keyleth raised her voice as she watched the noble walk away, and exit through the door.

You rose, and walked back to the table, smiling at keyleth.

"Guess who got the little paper back super duper fast?"

"Aw, thanks. Lemme read."

After reading the note sighs. not having a clue what to do with the meaning.

"Hey, do you have any idea what that little sign off means?"

Keyleth lets out a knowing laugh. "Yeah. I bet they could be the initials of somebody."

"No one could possibly have initials that long, Kiki."

She picked a ink felt pen up from the table, spelling out the name.

"P - Percival. F - Fredrickstein. v - von. M - Musel. K - Klossowski. d - de. R- Rolo. See those little lines? Those stand for 'the third'."

You watched her map out the name on the love letter. You turned to her, waiting for her to say something more.

"What are you waiting for? I didn't make a bunch of flowers for nothing!" She laughed, and pulled you up from the chair, dragging you to the door, and shoving you out.

Before she closes the door, she peaks her head out.

"Oh, and make sure to not tell Percy I told you. He'd kill me." She let out a tired, and oddly terrified laugh.

The door slams. At least someone's eager?

You treaded slowly through the hall, your steps swift and quiet. You listened carefully for Percy throughout the keep Vox Machina collectively lived in. It wasn't late at night, so everyone was still up.(Not like it being late would stop any of them from being awake..) Regardless of this, everyone walked in their own distinctive way, and if they didn't, the weight of their steps revealed who was walking.

Eventually you heard the door to the yard of the keep open and shut. You assumed it was Percy, and it was best never to doubt some things.

You ran after the sound, opening the keep yard door when you reached it, and softly shutting it behind you.

You turned, softly taking in the scenery. It was sunset. The sky was a soft glow of pink and orange, and the sun was kissing goodbye. You smiled.

Shaking your head, you return your thoughts back to Percy. Or.. you could let his 'super romantic' confession play out on his own terms?

Nah.

You walked through the yard, your feet rustling against the short and soft blades of grass. You spot Percy, pacing back and fourth, with a pot of Orchid Branches set on the bench beside him. The pot was a beautiful off white, with golden rims, a matching design of pink flowers bloomed on the center.

You walked towards him timidly, debating if you should turn back on your heels and go to sleep.

"Hey."

too late.

Percy stops pacing, his eyes locking on your's when he hears you.

"Hi."

You take a seat on the old bench, patting the seat beside you. Percy accepts the direction, and sits beside you. He sits on the opposite side of you, eschew from touching you.

You scoot closer to him, leaning into his side.

"Who are the flowers for, lover boy?"

You spoke softly and teasingly to him, head leant on his shoulder, inner arm hold his inner arm.

"They're.. they're for you."

"Did Keyleth tell you what they mean yet?"

You hummed curiously.

"Rare and delicate beauty. That's exactly what you are to me."

There was a moment of unmoving silence between the two of you. Not awkward silence, or a gross silence, but quiet.

It was a moment of knowing peace between the two of you. The truth of who your bouquet arranger is, and Percy gaining the sense of acceptance and wellfare sitting next to you.

"That's nice of you, Percy." You tenderly spoke again, interlocking your fingers with his. You used your free hand to circle small shapes into his hand.

"And so were all your other flowers. They were very gorgeous, Percy."

Percy rested his head against your's.

"Thank you."

The two of you leaned into each other in the warm weather, watching the sun kiss you goodbye.

#percy #percy de rolo #percival de rolo #percival x reader #percival de rolo x reader smut #x reader #vox machina x reader #oneshot #fluff #flowers #tlovm #the legend of vox machina #percy x reader fluff #percy x reader flowers #percival x reader flowers #percival x reader fluff #percival de rolo x reader fluff #percival de rolo x reader flowers #keyleth of the air ashari

[babacontainsmultitudes]

So you wanna sell your art on Redbubble but you don't know how?

(Or, I meant to write this months ago but better late than never lol)

OKAY okay. I have a bunch of friends as well as mutuals who have lovely lovely art and have considered selling it online (specifically on Redbubble lol that's what's being covered today anyways) but don't really have any clue how RB works, if it's right for them, or what to expect. SO I'M HERE TO GUIDE Y'ALL THROUGH ALL THE BASICS and hopefully, if I've done my job right, this tutorial will help you set up your RB shop and start selling your art online (or help you decide that RB isn't for you lol).

Table of Contents:

What the heck is RedBubble and should I use it?

How to make your account and set up payment

How to add a new work

Pricing? Markup?

Extra: Checking sales and payment history

Extra: Taxes and copyright, in case that scares you.

Extra: The Partner Program (or how to make "officially licensed" fanart)

What the heck is RedBubble and should I use it?

>> RedBubble is a site that allows you to upload your artwork and sell it on quite a variety of different products.

>> The main benefit of using RedBubble, aside from reach and visibility, is that RB handles *everything* when it comes to the manufacturing and shipment of your product. You are literally not responsible for anything other than making the art, uploading it, and deciding how you want it to look on different products. If there is any kind of problem with material quality or delivery (though in my experience they're pretty good with both of those things), it's not your responsibility to correct!

>> RedBubble does not charge you to sell on their site, but they do set a base price for all products to cover manufacturing and to ensure that they make some level of profit for each sale. We'll look into the specifics of this in a later section when discussing pricing and markup, but it would be considered pretty standard, for example, for an item to cost $20 and you to make $4-$5 upon making a sale.

>> At the end of the day, whether or not RB is right for you largely depends on whether or not you feel their pricing and payment is fair, and whether their available products correspond to what you wish to sell.

Okay, so how do I get started?

Well first you're gonna need an account!

>> Head over to the RedBubble main page and click "Sign Up"

>> Select "Artist Signup"

>> Fill in your email, shop name (this is your username also), and password

>> Click "Sign Up"

>> You will be brought to this dashboard page:

>> We will discuss creating products in the next section. Everything under "Set Up Shop" is optional and I'll let you explore that on your own so we can focus on the essentials. That just leaves... Getting paid!

>> First, check the email you used to confirm your email address. If you didn't receive an email to confirm your email address, don't worry, we can resend the form- keep going with the steps for now.

>> Then, under "Get Paid", click "Add your name & address". Note that all of the options in the "Get Paid" section actually lead to the same form, but selecting this option starts us near the top.

>> Fill out all the fields on this page. If you didn't receive the email to confirm your email address, click on this button:

Then check your email again.

>> Note when choosing your payment method: if you are from Canada, like me, then paypal is your only option. Same for parts of Europe that aren't in the UK. Otherwise, you also have bank transfer options:

>> Once you've finished filling in everything on this page, click "Save Changes" at the bottom and... That's it! Now you can get paid :)

**Note: I believe RB still requires you to make a minimum amount of money before they do a transfer (for me in Canada I believe it's $20 CAD?), so do keep that in mind!

>> Payments are made to your account monthly, generally on the same day every month (assuming you've made profits!).

How to add a new work

So you've made your account, fantastic. Now you're ready to actually add your works to RB and make them available for purchase to the wider public! To demonstrate the process, we're gonna use our pal Nicky here (who was a gift from my lovely friend @llumimoon) and pretend that we want to upload him:

Ain't he a doll? Anyways, let's begin.

>> Hover your mouse over your pfp in the top right corner to make this drop down menu appear:

>> Click on "Add New Work"

**On a new account with nothing uploaded, this will look a bit different. instead choose "Sell Your Art" from this dropdown menu, then "Add New Work" from the top right corner of the same dashboard page from earlier.

>> Click on "Upload New Work" (and note the file type and resolution requirements at the bottom. I always stick with PNGs, but in theory JPEG or GIF works as well.)

>> Select the file of the image you want to upload. In our case, that's Nicky.

>> Now write a title for your work, tags, and a description if you want. The tagging system is how people will actually find your work, it works a lot like Tumblr's! Try to choose things that are relevant to whatever your piece is. If you're uploading fandom-related art and aren't sure what tags are used for your fandom on RB, try looking some up and seeing what generates the most relevant results!

>> You may have noticed the "background color" section right below Nicky. This sets the default background color for your piece on different products. We're gonna keep this as the default white here, and I'll show you how to adjust this for individual products very soon.

>> Scroll down. This is where we decide what products we want this design to be available on and how we want Nicky to look on each thing we've enabled.

For example, if I were actually selling Nicky here (if that wasn't clear obviously I'm not actually selling my friend's art lol don't do that ofc) I would definitely want people to be able to buy him as a little sticker :]

>> In this case, "Stickers & Magnets" have been enabled by default. If you wanted to disable them, you would simply click that little "Enabled" button. Similarly, if we want to enable a product type that is disabled, just click that same button (which will be grey rather than green and say "disabled").

>> If a product is disabled and you are being prevented from enabling it, that's because the dimensions of your image are too small for the product in question! You'll wanna resize your image (preferably in a manner that retains its resolution of course) and come back.

>> Hm. Let's use the hats here as an example of how we might make edits to the layout of a specific product.

He's kind of cut off, as you can see actually that's pretty in-character, and I think I want this hat to be pink rather than this default beige-looking color.

>> Click on "Edit"

So, the first thing I'm gonna do here is use that "Scale Image" slider to scale him down a bit. I'm also gonna click the image and drag him up a bit to re-center him.

Next, I'm gonna pick from one of the default colors and choose the pink one.

>> Notice the two arrows beside the words "Bucket Hat"? This lets me go through the different types of hats available and change the background/base color for each of those, like the dad hat:

>> Before we apply our changes, click that little gear icon right under the pencil icon

>> This lets us adjust the markup price for each individual hat. It is 20% by default. Changing the markup percentage affects how much you will make off of a sale, as well as how much your product will cost. More on that in the next section!

>> Click "Apply Changes"

The "dad hat" was the last hat I had selected (when setting its color), so the display has changed to show that one in the preview. Here's our bucket hat from before:

Nice!

>> The specifics of how you can adjust your design will vary depending on the product. With pillows & totes, for example, the editing menu looks like this:

Using the "Choose pattern" option, I can make the Nicky image repeat as a pattern like so:

(note that I also scaled the image down a bit here too).

>> One last thing. See that "Replace Image" button near the top?

You can use this when you want to use a different version of your image altogether for a specific product.

>> That's the gist! Play around with the settings for each item as you see fit. You can always edit them again later.

>> Scroll down. Select up to 2 relevant media types.

I'm pretty sure this affects search results when users choose specific filters, but tbh otherwise I don't think it's all too important.

>> Let's look at what remains.

>> I have the "Who can view this work?" section set to "Only You"- THIS IS SO I CAN FINISH THE STEPS HERE AND SAVE THE WORK WITHOUT ACTUALLY MAKING IT AVAILABLE TO THE PUBLIC. In practice, you'd only use this option if you wanted to buy your own work on something but didn't want other people to be able to see or buy it. Otherwise, you're always gonna choose "Anybody (public)".

>> Collections can be created to organize the pieces in your shop (for example, by fandom), but we won't cover the specifics of how to do that here.

>> Set whether or not your work contains "mature content".

>> If you want, you can set which product shows up in the preview for your work when people view your shop. If you think your piece looks especially nice on a mug, for example, you can make sure that's what people see first.

>> Finally, agree to RedBubble's User Agreement (read that little blurble, since that's basically all you generally need to care about when it comes to what you can and can't sell on RB, but more on that later).

>> Click "Save Work" and voila! Your piece is now available in your shop, and can be found in the search results of whatever tags you left on it (this may take a few minutes to take effect).

>> If you want to check out your design in your shop, navigate to your pfp and click "View shop"

>> Don't fret if the design doesn't appear in your shop right away! Again, this can take several minutes.

>> To edit your design again (and to view/purchase privately uploaded designs like Nicky here), click the "Manage Portfolio" option instead:

>> Here is Nicky as he appears in my portfolio (again, your portfolio and your shop are different things- Nicky will not appear in my shop at all because he is set to "private")

>> You can click that little gear icon to do a variety of things, like return to the editing menu from earlier. The three icons below Nicky refer to the amount of comments, sales, and likes your design has received in total.

>> Click on your design either from your shop page or your portfolio page. Wow! Your cool art is now available on all the products you enabled. Be sure to look through them and make sure that everything is to your liking!

Pricing? Markup? What's that about?

Well good tumblr user, RB handles everything regarding the production (and shipping) of your product, which means that they set a base (minimum) price for every kind of product to account for materials and production, and of course make some amount of profit themselves. The *markup* is a percentage that you the artist set (see the previous section on how to do so), and will determine how much you actually make off of a sale. Note that increasing the markup price means that your product will increase in price as well!

>> An Example (using hypothetical but more or less realistic numbers):

Let's say that the base price (0% markup, i.e. no profit for you) of a phone case on RB is $15. You set the markup to 30%. 30% of 15 is 4.5, so the public price is increased to $19.5, and if anyone purchases this phone case with your design on it, you will make $4.5.

And that's really the gist! Ultimately the markup price is up to you and what you feel is reasonable, though RB sets it to 20% by default.

Extra: Checking sales and payment history

Eheh, unfortunately I've reached the image limit for this post but:

To check your sales:

>> Click on your pfp

>> Click "Account Settings"

>> Under "Artist Tools" (on the left side), click "Sales History"

To check your payment history:

>> From the same "Artist Tools" menu (see above), click "Payment History"

Extra: Taxes and copyright, in case that scares you.

>> Do I need to report the income I make on RB when I do my taxes?

Yup! But dw, it isn't anything special. I mean, I'm not here to do your taxes for you, but money you make on Redbubble counts as "Self-Employment Income", same as if you sold your art just about anywhere else really!

>> So what am I actually allowed to sell on Redbubble? Is fanart okay?

Generally speaking... Yes! Obviously work should be your own, and it should not contain any company logos or names that you don't have the right to, nor photos of actual people unless you have their explicit permission.

>> Hm, okay, but what if I *do* accidentally sell something that isn't allowed?

In most cases, it'll just get taken down 👍. And no, you won't be asked to pay back any profits you made off the work in the meantime.

**A more extreme case: Story time. So, years ago a friend of mine uploaded some official Rick and Morty art that he forgot to set to "private". Overnight he made... Let's just say he made quite a bit of money. RB responded by taking down the work and banning his IP address, effectively preventing him from ever selling on the site again. But they still let him keep the money he made, and he didn't get into any actual trouble outside of that. What I'm saying is, even if you really fuck up, it'll be alright. And again, this was a pretty extreme scenario.

***Note: if your work falls under one of the brands in Redbubble's "Partner Program" (see the next section), it will be temporarily removed from the search results and your shop while it undergoes review. So don't panic if you see your fanart suddenly disappear from your shop!

Extra: The Partner Program (or how to make "officially licensed" fanart)

Very briefly, Redbubble has their partner program, which I won't explain in full detail here, but basically it means that if you upload a work and tag it as one of these brands, it will be inspected for review and, upon passing that brand's guidelines, will be considered "officially licensed" merch for that brand. Just felt worth mentioning!

So that's really the gist folks! There's certainly much more to play around with when it comes to RB, but that's all you need to know to get started! Hopefully this was useful? Hopefully lol. In any case, good luck out there!

#*breathes* OKAY #gee I sure do hope this is actually useful lol #artists on tumblr #redbubble #selling art #idk what to tag this as lmao #baba's tutorials #<- new tag ig lmao #if y'all have other questions (especially friends and mutuals and followers) feel free to reach out and I'll answer what I can! #so if you're wondering. yes I've sold on the site before. no you don't get to know what haha. #bought a lot from RB too- their shit's good quality! #but to be completely clear ofc I don't speak on their behalf haha this tutorial exists so that I can buy more of my friends' cool art lmao

[psiirockin]

I'm not sure if you've said anything about this but I just want to 100% make sure. Are you okay with minors on your page or commissioning your work? I know some people on here don't want minors on their page so I just wanted to ask and make sure. Sorry if this is a dumb thing to ask lol

Yes I’m OK with that!! As long as they’re not commissioning something inappropriate or trying to make inappropriate conversation with me during the exchange.

I will always shut down or deliberately avoid weird topics if the customer brings them up + I will not do very heavy gore or nsfw for a minor.

As long as that isn’t the case! You’re all good!

And obviously I can’t control who is on my page generally. I try to steer away from too many Nsfw topics + of course don’t post Nsfw art. But still, I am an adult and I don’t make things FOR people under 18, so as for the horror/gore art and darker topics explored sometimes— I have always enjoyed drawing gore and things of that nature so I often times don’t refrain from it- viewer discretion is advised!

#asks #asks open

[trans-cuchulainn]

Saw your post about Emer possibly having a Fomorian heritage. I'm curious if there are sources about it. Ngl I wish we could explore more of her character outside of her canon roles in the Ulster myths. Her family seems interesting especially since her father was called 'Forgall Manach' (the wily).

i'm not aware that anyone has written any articles about that detail, but it comes from the longer recension of tochmarc emire if you want to see it in situ (meyer's 1888 translation here). it's not a plot point or anything, the text just tells us in passing that her father is a nephew of tethra, one of the fomoire.

i did a quick search on BILL (bibliography of irish language and literature) and didn't turn up many articles on emer and none that seemed relevant, BUT it's pretty out of date so if they're recently published (by which i mean within the last five years... or possibly ten years...) there's a strong chance they wouldn't be indexed yet. so that doesn't necessarily mean no one has published anything, it just means it's hard to find it if you don't already know where to look for it

i'll have a look on codecs too but a) same problem applies, recent articles tend not to be on there and b) for some reason the TE page is under construction and not a published page and i'm not sure why bc i could've sworn it used to be a normal one. however all these sites are maintained by like... one person doing it in their spare time tho bc celtic studies is small and not very digital so i can't be too mad when they're not 100% perfect!

eta: okay idk what was up with it being in preview mode the other day but the TE page is normal again now. scroll down for bibliography but there isn't much that looks like it would touch on this subject. an agent search for emer also doesn't get you much -- three publications by joanne findon and one by marie-luise theuerkauf, none of which are on this kind of topic. looks like forgall does show up in one other text but it's a poem that hasn't been translated so. lol. shit outta luck there, fuck poetry

i will say that i don't think epithets are always super significant. like. there's one character whose epithet is "strong-kneed" or "of the great knees" and i have NEVER got to the bottom of what that's supposed to mean (it makes me laugh every time though). so far i have not found any stories in which his knees are relevant. in forgall's case, it could be as simple as meaning he's a bit clever and makes life difficult for cú chulainn in this one story and there may be no more to it than that. but there also might be more, which might be lost (i.e. it was the focus of texts that didn't survive), or might just be unclear to me (bc i have never looked hard at forgall)

#answered #anonymous #tochmarc emire #emer

[transgenderastarion]

hello baldurs gate 3 community again: This time im talking about modding!

hello adventurers and shifty-eyed people, I bring to you some important stuff. Mod compilations! Below the cut, if you are interested, I have compiled a few things for what I think the bg3 tumblr modding community wants (based on me being in the tag for a month straight). Things I have compiled include: - Super basic install of baldur's gate 3 mod manager (and a bit of vortex) (9 Easy Steps!) - My OWN special "Computer helper" mod bundle with super easy installations (helps it run on my piece of crap laptop who hates me so much but I love her <3) - Companion and player mods (visuals only, and like de-ab-ing and stuff, I'm not going around adding all the extra eye colour mods) INCLUDING TRANS TOP SCARS AND DADBOD MODS + MORE - Some personal favourite mods that really helped enhance my experience. Enjoy! (if you enjoy bg3 modding, please consider reblogging because I think posts with links are still shadowbanned in the tag lol)

HOW TO GET THE MOD LOADER FOR BG3 IN 3 EASY STEPS

go to the github download page and scroll down until you see the first downloadable file that reads "BG3ModManager_Lastest.zip"

extract the file into an accessible area (your downloads folder should work fine, I just put it on my desktop) (just anything that won't require you to give admin permissions to download it. I would also keep this off Local Disc (C:) for convenience) You can use any free extractor program, 7zip works, i used to use Peazip and now I use Breezip and that works well.

Tada! You should have an open folder in your extracted location. 2 things may happen here: You will get the extracted folder with the other documents inside. Congrats, you're done! If you have an extracted folder with ONLY the .exe file in it, go back into the zip file and drag the other files into the folder. This should fix the problem, all files from the zip need to be there to work.

(OPTIONAL) you CAN use Vortex mod manager to manage your bg3 mods on there, in which case any nexusmods mod will have a direct download button for you. Personally I have my subnautica mods loaded from there so bg3 is unavailable.

HOW TO MOD BALDURS GATE 6 IN EASY STEPS + SCRIPT EXTENDER

Make sure you have Baldur's Gate 3 Installed. I have it on steam, I don't know how to help with EA, sorry.

open your file explorer/documents. Go to Admin -> AppData -> Local -> Larian Studios* -> Baldur's Gate 3 (leave launcher alone). Create a mods folder if you don't already have one, but one should have been created on your first bootup. DO NOT CLOSE THIS TAB. THIS TAB STAYS OPEN UNTIL YOU ARE DONE MODDING. * I also just search Larian Studios in Local Disc (C:) but that does take some time to load

Congrats, you're ready to mod! Now, most good mods will need something called the Baldur's Gate 3 Script Extender. You can find the download page here, and this time you're going to hit the green "code" button. Ignore everything else. Hit download zip

Extract the file again, but this time into Local Disc (C:) -> Program Files (86x) -> Steam -> Steamapps -> common -> Baldur's Gate 3 -> bin* ** * MAKE SURE to extract it to the bin folder. Some other mesh and texture mods use the data bin, so confusing them is bad. ** you CAN directly extract the folder to the bin, but I personally find it easier to extract the zip back into downloads, then open my other file explorer and click and drag the whole extracted file into the bin folder

The fun part begins! Go find some mods you like (nexusmods mostly, gamebanana MAY have some). Extract folder to your mods folder in larian studios -> baldur's gate 3 -> mods. ONLY DRAG THE .PCK FILE. YOU DO NOT NEED ANY OTHER FILES UNLESS THE MOD MAKER SAYS SO.

USING THE MOD LOADER: you are done with file explorers! Go ahead and boot up the bg3modmanager.exe file from earlier. Any INACTIVE MODS must be CLICKED AND DRAGGED over to the ACTIVE MODS side. If you don't see any mods, hit the blue circle refresh button. After that, hit the "export order to game" button right beside "export". If you see a green popup at the bottom, you are good to go!

All done! You are now on your modding journey! (if you have any outlying problems, my dms are open and there is a whole host of modders out there with answers!)

NOW TO THE FUN PART: MOD PACKS!

My own Game Optimizer Pack (basic): includes General Fixes (general bug fixes), Improved UI & Improved UI Assets (necessary for customization mods), and Mod Fixer (necessary for mods to work) *you CAN download all of these files individually from https://www.nexusmods.com but this is basically. a short version of that.

My own Game Optimizer Pack (deluxe): includes all previous mods as well as 5e Spells (spell fixer), Additional Backgrounds, Customizer Compendium, Show approval ratings in dialogue, Purchase camp clothes from merchants, Tav's hairpack

COMPANION MODS:

No Abs for companions/pcs

"oops all futas" (all female companions have penises, if you want like an all transfem run or something)

Customizable Origins (lets you customize if you play as an origin character)

Astarion:

Astarion Moles and blemishes mod

Vampire Ascendant (ability fixer mod)

TAV MODS:

Freckles and Moles as Tattoo replacers

Trip's Accessory Collection (has glasses & monacles)

Ophelia's Body Shop (top heavy/bottom heavy/chubby body alternatives)

Stronger Tav - Muscular Upper Body Mod

Top Surgery Scars

Alternate Top Surgery Scars mod for bodys 1 and 3

Strongfat body - humans and half orcs

Tav's Dadbod Mod

Softie Body - Tiefling 2

New Eye Colours and Blindess for all eyes

Transmasc Clothing options

Actually feminine and lore friendly dragonborn legs

Femme obese dragonborn body (no clothing options developed yet)

Chubby/thick/bbw body mods and clothes

Big gut dragonborn (male)

Female muscle mod

Less defined abs for male bodies

Game Enhancing Mods that I recommend! (if I have one marked starting spoiler! just. just download it and ad it just trust me dont look to far into it I promise it will be good. If I have one marked late spoiler! you can look at it and decide if you want it or later)

Faithful & Faithless - no mandatory choice of god

Mundane Blindfold (one eye cover)

No Romance Limit (polyamory mod)

highlight everything tooltip

Party Limit begone

No more spiders (all spider models replaced with dogs)

Ritual spells for rp fun

Colourblind friendly spell slots

Camp event notifications

Autosaver/Save timer (GET THIS IT SAVED MY LIFE SO MUCH)

Histories & Occupations - new backgrounds

Scratch colour variety (late spoiler!/not spoiler heavy)

Just Story (for those who just want the story. every enemy has 1 hp)

Wyll's Devil Form (starting spoiler!)

Eyes of the beholder (eye alts + scleras)

#lying flat on my back after typing this i think it took like 3 hours to compile everything #my neck hurts OTL #bg3 #baldurs gate 3 #baldur's gate 3 #baldur's gate iii #bg3 mod #bg3 mods #baldurs gate 3 mods #modding #mods #modblr

[kyomunosaki]

I started Hypnospace Outlaw

...and I've noticed a few small things that are super interesting, mostly with the idea of tutorialization.

I didn't plan to do a writeup on this, so I don't have any of my own gameplay's screenshots. I remember most of the gist, so I can probably write a few sentences on this topic that really stuck with me. I would've gone back for more screens but I'm feeling very lazy and I might repost this with editing/photos in the future lol

So Hypnospace Outlaw is basically a pre-2K "internet janitor simulator" except that you don't do it for free. You're like a free contractor/PMC janitor, where you get comissions to hunt down certain infringement of internet/Hypnospace law.

The first case is to find instances where the copyright for a 1968 of a cartoon character named Gumshoe Gooper is being infringed upon. I found this case to be a phenomenal tutorial for both the game mechanics and the philosophical(?) questions the game wants to ask.

Gumshoe Gooper (Hypnospace Outlaw)

At first upon getting this case, I was still grappling with the game mechanics, exploring the Windows 98-ass interface with the skill of an old man in a nursing home. At the time I entirely forgot about the search function, so I just explored by going through various web portals and webrings, a la Geocities.

I found a lot of interesting sites that I don't really have the time (nor screenshots) to talk about and do justice with, but there's a lot of awesome things to find in Hypnospace if you're willing to just take time and look around. I do want to possibly talk about that later if there's interest.

After just stumbling around the internet and remembering how hard it is to find stuff through web portals, I remembered the search function existed thanks to one of the sites I ended up on having tags that open up the search window. So I searched for "gooper"

You find 3 sites from that search, two from AbbyWrites58 and another from another woman who's name I can't recall right now. The first site is a typical late 90s personal site you might find, for a first-grade teacher. It contains mentions of memorials to dead lost ones, a Hypnospace Heaven or something, and is part of a "Spirituality" web ring, but otherwise not much to note. The first link however, is a link to "Drawings of Gumshoe Gooper by my first graders"

Webrings on Abby's World (Hypnospace Outlaw)

On the link, its filled with pencil/crayon sketches of Gumshoe Gooper by a bunch of children, but also 2 gifs that seem like legitimate copyright infringement. I still felt apprehensive about reporting this page to the Hypnospace Enforcers, because it felt like a teacher just wanting to share the work of her students and I was hoping to find other violations to fit my quota. Regardless, even if I were to fill out my quota there were only 2 very clear examples of copyright infringement on the page.

So, I went back and checked out the other site by AbbyWrites58, and this one was... a political support website for a local politician? Who was seemingly a politician that had different views than, I, the player did? And she was using a GIF of Gumshoe Gooper saying that he supported her? I didn't have much hesitation just hitting her with the copyright violation on this page.

The third page was just another site but with an official Gumshoe Gooper strip posted on it. As you can tell the rest of this essay is lazily thrown together and just a retelling of events, but I do not remember the exact details of the page. I just remember still feeling apprehensive about reporting stuff on the page with children's art, so I think I reported that strip.

I still hadn't reached my quota of 3 violations reported, so I begrudgingly made my way back to the initial site I had landed on in my search. I decided to report one of the GIFs, and didn't feel too bad about it since while she did teach first graders I did find her political views somewhat, off-putting. I was going to make my way back to the case page to finalize it, but I got a notification on the not!Clippy software, telling me that if I find more violations I could get a bonus on closing the case?

A child's drawing of Gumshoe Gooper (Hypnospace Outlaw)

So, I decide to report the other GIF on the page as well, and look at that: more money. And then I have a dark urge to test something out. What about this first grader's art? What if I file it for copyright infringement, what would happen? Would the kid get in trouble? Will the teacher get the blame? Did the teacher even deserve any blame? Well, I hit the report. It works. So I go through the page, filing every crude drawing of Gumshoe Gooper by children as a violation of copyright law.

I get a lot of money, and I don't feel too bad after learning more about AbbyWrites58. Besides, the other members of her webring were openly fascists! That sort of association makes you liable to uh, getting in serious trouble over copyright infringement of a 1968 cartoon character right? It's just my job! I needed to hit the quota! And what if I flag her account to the authorities, her account with her location and other personal information tied to it?! What is the worst that could happen, and maybe I would feel a bit more bad about it if her political views weren't so, wrong?

This sort of self-justification I found myself doing just felt fascinating. It was some of the most engaged I felt with a game's narrative in so long, and it's only been made more fascinating by later cases like even the one just following this with ZANE_ROCKS_14. If you liked this post, maybe I'll actually try to edit this one down properly and actually take screenshots too. Regardless, if you got this far thanks for reading!

Edit: I can see how this makes me look like kind of a dumbass but I guess what's more accurate is "what her political views were being signalled as" is more accurate for some of the stuff I say above lol, but I'm too lazy to edit the post more than this

#hypnospace outlaw #ludonarrative #game tutorials #essay #video game essay

[owlish-owlhouse]

I read headcanons of the older sibling of the collector, can I request what would their sibling relationship be like if they were together? (without shadows or Belos around lol) the same as with the headcanons of the human reader being next to him with the difference of being his brother/sister, thank you!

Of course if you don't wanna its totally ok 👍💖

I love your writing skills! Keep going (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

So I'm going to do Collector Sibling Headcannons before cannon happened. I haven't seen the new episode yet so some of this lore may be disproven. Oh well.

These are all based off Headcannons I have about an o.c of mine who isn't related to the Collector but their both Star Children and she's older so she takes care of him.

...

You're both celestial beings, children of the stars. Born in the same universe from the same event happening thousands of years later you are the closest thing your species gets to siblings and families outside of mentors. Celestial bodies usually being singular entities (unless they created multiple consciousnesses/ personalities)

Because of this it's your job to take care of The Collector. While they can take care of themselves they are a young star child that need guidance while you are much older and understand your roll better. You bring balance to their chaos, order to their fun, and make sure they don't go too far in their games.

You've seen the beginning of time. You know the ending of the universe. Yet none of it matters to you. Your life is separate from the beings who live below. You are a cosmic entity someone who explores galaxies and the ruins of ancient civilizations. You have seen magic, science, technology, and everything inbetween. You document it all just like you were taught.

You spend your days playing and dancing in the stars. Holding each other's hands as you spin and laugh scattering stardust across the ages. Racing shooting comets across the sky and taming wild constellations, changing them to your image. You explore the vast cosmos and see the people below documenting them before you move on.

Every Collector collects in a different way. Some are more artistic and metaphorical in their approach. While others Collectors are given certain abilities and roles in how they collect depending on how they were made or formed. Different celestial bodies have different celestial abilities after all. Elements and where and how they were made in the universe forming who they are and what they can do.

You are more artistic. You write and draw out pages and pages of history and culture documenting everything and everyone into a large book, as large as their planet in some cases. Weaving their stories into the Collectors common languages for all your kind to observe.

You use your collection as a storybook to read to other young Collectors when they visit or cross paths with you. To help them learn how collecting works and what collecting does if they are still learning. You answer their questions and guide them as well as you know how before sending them off back to their other mentors and galaxies where they are collecting.

While your exact style is unique to you it's easy to learn and allows young Collectors to experiment in their own ways. Collector your brother copies you in a sense, but he started much smaller.

Trapping various creatures into scrolls is similar to your book. You help him catalog everything so he would never lose his toys and while he's not supposed to play with his collection you never told when he wanted to revisit something he captured often bending the rules to do the same.

The Elders are the ones who pick where you go and how you collect if you can not find your own way. While you are older and help guide the young if your species you are not yet an Elder. You listen to them dutifully as the ones before you did and make sure your brother does the same, upholding your species traditions. Until one day everything changes. You and Collector change. You get to close to the beings your observing and you become attached.

That's when everything goes wrong.

#majesticas the star child #o.c majesticas #majesticas lore #collector lore #star child lore #platonic collector #collector #collector x reader #platonic collector x reader #toh collector #toh star children #toh collectors sibling #collector spoilers #the owlhouse collector x reader #the collector #owlhouse collector

[tideswept]

Making Of Monday (TMA/SW + Obikin)

A look into the writing process - “how it’s made” for fics (for more on what it means see this post here)

So this first MOM is an interesting one! It's for and inspired by @sweet-cynic during our meandering conversations about horror and eldritch things and TMA and Obikin and of course they all fused and it's like, yeah, we're doing this baby!

Granted, that's not normally how the process goes for me. I'm usually a solitary kind of writer. But it's good to talk with people! Throw silly ideas at each other. Sometimes one of them sticks. Like a magnetized bowling ball.

In this case the catnip quotent is high. I don't want to divulge too much ahead of time (even though I've gushed to way too many people about it already lol) but there's a fascinating element of inherent otherness to Anakin that I love to see explored, and this is a good fic to play around with that.

And Obi-Wan, good god, Obi-Wan, canon-wise and in this fic--he's handed this walking nuclear bomb and he still only sees Anakin (always only eyes for Anakin) to the point that he doesn't see other things as clearly. Things that alarm others.

Did I mention we're flirting with horror? We're flirting with horror. ;)

Horror is... hm. Honestly? I never thought I'd vibe so hard with writing horror. But there's something fascinating about it that I find exposes characters in ways that are fascinating. So I like to, if it's feasible, Put the Blorbos in Situations and then sit back and watch what happens. But it has to be the right idea. I do think Star Wars has some intrinsic elements that make it horror-friendly, but it's certainly not usually the focus and therefore, I like to tread carefully, wait until the perfect reason comes along, rather than manufacturing one. (Good on writers who can do this! alas, I am weak.)

So. Idea. Where does it go from there? It goes to "I don't know what I'm doing but the vibe is right, LET'S GO" and I zoom over to Google Drive. (I know, I know, there are better programs out there, but I'm just... so used to it.) I try to keep the main page of Drive neat, with only the things I'm actively working on being listed. Which, yeah, sometimes can mean up to 5 WIPs, but once I hit that number of active WIPs I put the pause on everything until something clears out, like a queue. Otherwise it really starts to feel... oppressive.

And writing can be difficult for a lot of reasons, but it should never feel oppressive. It should bring joy even when you're clenching your teeth and muttering darkly about characters being assholes and not doing what you want, or having to rewrite entire scenes because they don't work anymore.

Actually, I have a confession; I used to never edit. Like. Ever. It bored me. My brain would say, scene done, moving on, there's no looking back. And honestly that was fine for how I felt at the time. But I'm glad I've learned to edit, to line edit, to accept with begrudging grace that oftentimes I do have to kill my darlings.

It's for the better. Even though I was kicking and screaming about it like a baby for the longest time.

(Maturity? Don't know her.)

#making of monday

[scarlet--wiccan]

I’m still meh about marvel. I believe that teddy and billy are still underdeveloped characters that are being used as a golden ticket for Disney. I feel like they’ve both ‘lost’ traits about their personalities and are very attached to each other, this is being used in a devious way imo… also they’re comics biggest lgbtq+ couple yet it doesn’t seem like it, more tokenised. Forever stuck together in infinity comics. I wish the best for them, I do for the whole maguns family but I can’t help but be sick of the way marvel treats them. Like also tommy, I think luna has more appearances than him lol. There’s so many cool things they could do but don’t, explore dynamics, re write retcons exc.

I mean you’d think billy would be really mentally unwell fighting these wars in space. Plus the identity issues both the twins would have. Marvel could do so much yet decide not too. I just feel melancholy when it comes to billy and teddy these days. I feel like it’s gonna get worse, especially since the mcu is trying to adapt ‘billy’ but in the most horrific way. I’d love to hear allan heinbergs thoughts on that lol. But yeah I don’t mean to be sappy, I just feel meh when I think of the missed opportunities and the way disney/marvel is treating them. bland in its nature.

While Billy and Teddy have never reached A-list status, I wouldn't say they've been underutilized. They are the only characters, along with Kate and America, to succeed as breakouts from Young Avengers, and they were consistently employed by Al Ewing for, like, six years, with an actual continuous storyline that spanned multiple titles and a major event. That doesn't happen for many characters, and I'm sorry, but that's not tokenizing to me. They had a really strong arc and were written by multiple authentic voices. They have been more out of the spotlight lately, but they're also coming back soon in Guardians. I'm not saying you shouldn't be critical, but I'm honestly grateful that the 2010s worked out as well as they did, and I try to remember that until very recently, championing LGBT characters was an uphill battle at Marvel. In many cases, it still is.

Of course I want to see more of them, and of course I want there to be more follow-through on the implications of the Kree-Skrull Alliance. I loved Empyre and there's really not much I would change about that story, but it created a lot of loose ends and open questions that haven't been resolved yet, and that is frustrating. That's kind of the theme of the last couple years, though-- my main frustrations with Krakoa are very similar.

Regarding Billy's mental health, I'd rather see him demonstrate growth and healing than continue being defined by his depression, and to their credit, Ewing and Oliveira illustrated that pretty clearly on multiple occasions. We know that Billy still experiences these challenges, but we also know that he's better equipped to work through those challenges than he was in CC or YA-- and that resilience translates literally into more powerful magic.

I feel similarly about Wanda, and in both cases, it's a fine line to tread. You want to show hopeful futures, but you don't want to diminish the reality of the situation-- and in Wanda's case, the desire to repair her character from ableist, sexist writing can make it difficult to linger on her mental health. Ideally, there would be more time and space to show these characters going to therapy or putting in the daily effort of recovery, but unfortunately, that's not the sort of thing that gets prioritized in limited pages.

#billy kaplan #teddy altman

[rayssion]

TSATS, Finally!!

This's a very long post guys...

Idk if I have a natural ability to ignore responsibilities or I'm just genuinely not good at keeping promises. But yes, finally the long awaited review of tsats is here.

So, the general rating for me is 3.5, which is... Really good, considering the book,,

Now you know, points to talk about:

Firstly guys I want to tell you that, unfortunately the sun and the star had me run into a deep reading slumber, which is something I never expected it to happen. Idk if you noticed this but my favourite character in whole Riordanverse is Nico! And Will comes closely after him, so I thought tsats would only be a fast run to me, it's basically a solangelo fanfic just written by the original author. But as I ran the first 100 pages I found myself drained, I was bored, I was tired and we really weren't going anywhere. It was a displayer of Nico and Will's love for each other, and I'm sorry to be that person but!! I dislike it when the ship is just out there living and laughing like I'm sorry but I need them to suffer first then some smiles and laughs at the end would do (insert some offended face).

Yeah, let's talk real. I know we had to go through that introduction to know where exactly the two of them stand in their relationship to be able to observe the change and development later on, but it was very repetitive.

Nico is made from darkness, Nico had so much darkness, Nico lives in the shadows, Nico doesn't think he deserves love, Nico doubts Will's love, Nico feels he's not enough for Will. It all goes in circles and I didn't like it. Nico I know you're emo and such but I just think the narration focused too much in it on expense of getting good Will expressing.

And this coming from a big Nico di Angelo lover, I feel like we don't quite exactly know Will even after this whole book, there's yet so much to unfold about him, his mother, his life at camp, his feelings after all toa happened like his father was a teenager just like him and was the biggest loser ever (lol, I just love Lester), how come we didn't discuss that? Nico is a character we all know, we lived with him, we experienced every feeling he went through, he wasn't new to us which is not the case with Will. What's the difference between us and the troglodytes? All we know that he's a son of Apollo, a healer and Nico's glow-in-the-dark boyfriend.

I just felt the need to summarise because I felt that what I wrote could be compromised in better wording: the narration was too repetitive and too focused on Nico and his dark past™ which is not necessarily a bad thing but I just feel it'd be better if cut it a bit shorter and clear the stage for Will, because -surprise surprise- Will also has some dark parts (although not much like Nico, and yes I know the book touches the topic later on but it'd have been way better if we were introduced to it from the start thus it'd grow on us and would be very convenient later on. Tbh the book just goes "oh, Will also got a dark side, he must share it with Nico..." But what I'm saying is, we never were exposed to it, what's the darkness within Will? Those pigeons? His mother performing and him staying backstage? I feel like we could explore it much better) anyways, it'd also be really great if we got to experience Nico's dark past yet from Will's point of view more often, that way the whole communication arc would be better, because we will know that Will already had a solid image of Nico in his head (yes his lovely little emo boy with miserable history but we'll get to know what he knows about the Nico and also the flaws he had picked up in him) and as the time goes we'll get to experience that image altering.

I know someone will think "but it's a Nico di Angelo adventure!" Yes I know, but don't you think getting to know Nico, our adored character, from his boyfriend perspective would be much interesting? Come on guys, see the potential.

Let's rewind a little bit, so 100 pages, I'm bored I stopped reading for three days then picked the book yet again and..... Stopped after 50 pages ;-;

I'M SORRY BUT I REALLY WASN'T FEELING THE VIBES OKAY I KNOW IT'S TOTALLY MY FAULT AND I'M SORRY GUYS.

And picked the book for the last time today and finished it.

Oh yes, another thing that felt off for me is how Chiron and Dionysus are portrayed here, idk they felt so out of character and the whole "dO wE hUg nOw?" I'm sorry, that was cringe, dw it's on me guys.

And there were points where the writing was so inconsistent, I never read anything of Oshiro's work before, but it's so painfully obvious when his and Rick's writing styles clashes (ugly clashes) that it makes the book really obviously written by more than one author, and other points where idk if Rick is trying water down his style or Oshiro is trying to level the work up to the satire and sarcasm Riordan's books are known for. Anyways, it could use some editing (and it's definitely edited but not enough to mask every hole, because if a dumb person like me speed reading the book was able to pick all that then it's obviously not enough).

Also Nyx was stupid. Yes, that's my statement. Iget it you refuse to change but I hate how dumb her plan was. First of all, why leave Bob without guard? I mean you obviously have better chances in luring Nico and maybe killing Will if they don't have a Titan with them?? But yeah this's not about her.

I also hated we lost originality here, I already told you guys it read like a fanfic, but it really was a fanfic, every fanservice they could include they did include. For example the Hades allowing Bianca and Maria to talk to Nico once again, look I'm not complaining (as you'll read later) but really WHAT THE FUCK??! Weren't they reincarnated or whatever? How the fuck is that possible?

Also isn't Tartarus like, beyond the powers of the gods?? Then how is Hades going to retrieve whoever-was-his-name-centaure-satyr out of it? And just because Nico asked nicely?

Another thing, I know that you can issue a quest (just like what Percy and Annabeth did to rescue Grover in SOM, and like what Ares did in SON) but how the fuck do you send a prophecy?? Isn't this also too much of a godly power? Like Apollo (the god of prophecy himself) stated that they're way above him then how can Hades send one???

So we mentioned the narration, we've done the character portrial that I didn't like, now we're off to good stuff!

A big point! A huge point! For solangelo's relationship, I loved how they often had fights, disagreed with each other, hid things from one another, had miscommunication yet still managed to figure it out as mature humans whom are much better than half of adults nation. I loved how quickly one apologise once they realise they were wrong, I loved how they stayed by each other's side and how they supported each other, like bro it seems like they can't stay angry at each other more than five seconds and I love for it!

This's actually Rick's trademark (along with having Percy in everything he writes) that he always sets a good example for kids, younger audience who read his books have a good exposure to an excellent functional relationship not like some other booktok authors whom I'm not naming (totally not about you Colleen Hoover, you do you honey🙂).

Hiss-magisty and oh boy how much I love them! They were so cute I really liked how they looked up to Will, especially that the boy needed such encouragement because of the whole child of Apollo, underworld, tartarus things going on. And yet another point to tsats for representation (never forgetting Epiales).

Nico, Hades, Maria, Bianca!! You just have to love them!! They're literally my favourite family in the whole Riordanverse, yes I'm so madly in love with Sally and yes I love Percy but the Hades/di Angelo family?? That's where my discussion ends.

And speaking about family, can we have a moment of appreciation for Persephone like I truly loved her back from mythology (which I know nothing about, like she's Hades wife, that's it, yet I still loved her because she seemed nice, and she's nice!) This whole journey won't be if not for her, girl single handedly opened Will's eyes and her love for Nico??? Told you that's my family right there.

Lol I just remembered when Demeter was lecturing Persephone for not marrying a doctor and now I just know she loves solangelo, so yeah even grandma is an icon, I stan by it, that's my family.

Okay I also wanted to talk about the concept of grief and ptsd and how it was represented. This actually deserves a major applause because that's really how you write a good deep psychological analysis of losing someone and having to cop with it, especially that part when Nico tells how he just shunned all his memories away, how in his mind Jason just went to a quest and someday he'll return to camp half-blood as if nothing happened, because surprisingly it's the same method my brain took when my mother died, it's like all these years had been deleted and I was just brought to world after her passing, a lot of times I try to remember some particular incident from the time but I just can't wrap my mind about it, sometimes I became alert because for a minute there I couldn't recall her name, it was like all the pain associated with her just disappeared, it is locked far away in my brain and I still can't get access to it. So yeah, away from this pity party, I love how it was represented here, with Nico really suffering the trauma and how he eventually learned to let it go. (I cried at that mention and also when he was reunited with his family for that little amount of time).

Can we name the cocoa puffs?? Because I just adore them so much and I feel like Nico and Will will name them such cute adorable names and I can't stop thinking about that. Lol, percabeth are yet to get engaged then married and solangelo already has kids.

Ps actually but the pet names??? OMG NOTHING SWAYS MY HEART LIKE PET NAMES. I was pretty much hooked when I read "Noble McSacrifice" SSKFHIDJ

Another ps. I liked the whole Gorgyra thing as a way to show us their memories like a breeze amidst the flames every couple of chapters. At first I was like "wtf is this, did it happen or is it gonna happen or is this an alternate universe??" Don't blame me I was sleepy.

Yet another ps. I hated the "DREAM SEQUENCE" that just comes in the middle, like bro the boy just went to sleep of course I'd know this's a dream no need to point it out every time it was so annoying.

I think I covered all of the points I wanted to talk about, I was going to say "yay, first review with me having actual time to write it and think it through!" Yet auntie barged in in the middle and everything seems all over the place now.

It's like a characteristic in me now, heh. But yeah, sorry for the long wait, sorry for this shitty review, but bear with me please.

I totally adored this book once I figured out how to keep up with it ").

I'm yet to read a bunch of books all by Rick, hopefully I'll start with the chalice of the gods and come for a quick chat later.

Until then, eat, sleep and take care of yourselves♡!!

#the sun and the star #tsats #nico di angelo #william andrew solace #will solace #solangelo #rick riordan verse #riordanverse #rick riordan #rrverse #book review

[writingmccord]

I figured I should introduce myself officially since I’ve been lurking on Madam Secretary tumblr for a while now. Some of you may (or may not lol) know me from FanFiction as gypsysfeather! I just wanted to make a master listing of my MSec fanfics in case anyone is looking for some “new” ones (maybe that you haven’t seen on FF yet). I’ve loved being immersed in this MSec world for the past year!

On top of writing/reading MSec FanFic, I also am a full-time graduate student and am (trying to lol) write a book in all my "free time." I like to explore the human experience as much as I can, particularly through Elizabeth and Henry's characters. I like writing Henry/Elizabeth because they are so human in the show, which is something we don't always get to see in television and movies.

And of course, I'm ultimately a big Tim and Tea fan (how could you not be?). I also like to read romance novels and listen to memoirs on audiobooks, which sometimes my memoirs I'm reading appear in my stories because, well, I'm reading a lot of Madeleine Albright right now.

Thanks, everyone, for being so welcoming! Wish I'd have been part of this fandom when it was still on TV.

These are organized by flash, flash series, and stories, and then organized by rating as well. I have blurbs about the stories underneath and tell whether they're pre-Secretary (some of my favorites to write!) Scroll through and you can click on the titles to go to the FanFiction page.

Chapter stories

Flash

Flash series

#madam secretary #fanfiction #msec #elizabeth mccord #henry mccord #madam secretary fanfic #madam secretary fanfiction #msec fanfic

[hangfiretales]

new book looks interesting! the big question, does it have smut 🤣

Thank you!! That's a big question though, since I don't know what your comparisons are lol

Some characters in Rare Birds have sex on the page but it's not a romance nor romantasy not smutfic. That's not criticism against those things since I've written plenty of smutfic - maybe you even read it, and that's why you're asking! In which case these scenes might feel tame.

When I write fanfic it's about filling all the gaps (innuendo? at 8am?? yes) and exploring the source material's relationships in obsessive detail. Whereas this book IS source material. It suggests, it leaves gaps. This series is plot-heavy and the first book just happens to revolve around other things. Currently there's a trend for queer fantasy which delves deep into the central attractions and that's delicious but not the deal here.

If a reader approaches Rare Birds like an adventure fantasy, adult but not 18+ Spicy Adult, more like Gaiman's Neverwhere or something, then I don't think they'll be disappointed.

#asks #rare birds #hangfire #me answering a one-line ask in earnest detail as usual #the smut will be intense and plot-relevant by book 3 but yeah not yet lmfao

[lunapwrites]

I am only going to post about this once.

Doing a little cleanup on my about me pages... kinda feel the need to revisit the author-induced HP-verse blowback and renewed fan creator exodus for a moment, just bc I keep seeing... discourse.

For context, in case you're reading this far and are unaware: I am pretty open about being nonbinary probably most accurately agender? still kinda feeling that out, and about being queer in general. So I feel like I have at least a small leg to stand on in this conversation, given the umbrella I fall under.

I understand why other authors and artists feel the right decision for them is to disengage from fandom, or to remove/orphan their body of work. I support them in their choice, and I wish them the best. Likewise, I understand why others may choose to remain, and to continue creating content (subversive or otherwise) that speaks to them and to others who are able to see themselves and their experiences in it. As a member of this camp myself, I salute these people. It's not an easy decision to make to continue in this climate.

I am extremely fortunate in terms of where I'm at in my journey, and where I live and work, and a supportive partner who is cis enough for the both of us lol. I understand that my situation comes with a certain degree of privilege - but that privilege is bought with the sacrifice of my truest self. These online spaces are one of the precious few places I have where I can express those sides of my identity, and my writing is the best place I have to explore them. Characters like Remus and Sirius and Tonks? They're the most familiar to me, and therefore the safest. For me, continuing is the best choice for the sake of my mental health - even with the pressure to quit.

To that end, it... bothers me a bit when I see discourse claiming that people who continue to engage in and create for this fandom are morally deficient. That, by and large, is not the case. Most folks are just out here trying to do the best they can. I don't think that shaming or call-out posts are constructive.

If you are expecting me to post disclaimers or to self-flagellate on every fandom post/fic, you will be disappointed. I will instead continue as I have been and put my limited bandwidth and energy into keeping my queer friends and family housed, fed, and safe. And I will continue to do so without posting about it because frankly I don't have the spoons to advertise every time I do something. (That said, if you're in the US and in need of help, please reach out privately: I probably have resources I can leverage.)

I am a big proponent of doing what you can with what you have and that every little thing counts. Make friends and network. Promote causes. Feed each other. Show up for each other. That's the important part. Like, it's not all big activism and protesting and bold proclamations. Sometimes it's just buying eggs.

Idk. I just feel like we all have better ways to spend our time than all this empty grandstanding. Just go... do something positive. Even if it's just providing emotional support, you know? Everything counts.

#support each other #do good recklessly #or carefully. i'm not your dad. #this is not to say don't boycott #it's just that i think we give boycotts too much credit #they are powerful tools #and can send a message #they work best in tandem with other action #but you do more good if you take care of your community #at least directly. #yelling at people online is easy #do better #obviously there is nuance even with this #and levels based on ability #available resources. etc #i get that. not saying do the most all the time. #it's not a contest. just do what you can for who you can. #i am very small. my arms only reach so far. #but i am still helping who i can how i can. #i think if we all do a little we can do a lot of good #discourse #fandom wank #anti jkr #hp #between fanfiction about dead gay wizards #and laws passing nationwide making your existence a felony #only one of those things is actively harming people #and it ain't the dead gay wizards #like. i love the energy. #but maybe we direct it more constructively.

[fraudulent-cheese]

So i watched the first half of ROTI! i don't have many thoughts honestly?

I don't care for Staci, i'll be honest. Her gimmick is repetitive and im glad she got booted first if this was the only thing the writters were gonna do with her. It would be funny if there was a grain of truth to her claims tho.

Dakota's pretty fun and i like the added focus on the interns this season, because let's be honest outside of one "haha the interns keep dying" joke in both TDI and TDWT there isn't much i belive? So yeah

also samkota's cute, idk what to say? God i wish the writters explored Dakota's character before the whole mutation thing.

Honestly all the ROTI girls are great, wish they got more than arcs about which boy they wanted to kiss because MAN ANNE MARIA AND JO ARE GREAT, Jo especially, she's currently my fav of the season. I wish they did more with both of them man!!! I don't like the jabs made about her appearence but i find them fine from Anne Maria specifically? Like yeah she would do that! I wish the girls were fighting for longer!

Dawn's one of the better characters but i wish her conflict with Scott lasted longer than one episode. Same with her friendship with B! What is it with Total Drama and throwing away interesting rivalries the episode they start at?!

B's fine i'll be real. I like how they don't actually make him speak! Other contestants do make jabs about it but like, they're teenagers, and one of them is from Scott and he's kinda shitty so it works lol

SPEAKING OF! Scott's pretty fun! He's not the best antagonist ever but he's fun to watch and that's enough for me rn. He's pathetic and shitty it's great

Team man is also fun, i like Brick especially. Don't like the frequency of the pissing himself jokes tho. Like, i get it! he's a military boy who likes fashion and pisses himself! Do something else!

I don't care for Cameron i'll be real. Neither for Zoey, i wish her flaws were explored more because dang she's judgy in episode 5!

I guess i'll talk about Mike here too? I think he's ok, but man i wish his alters were treated more like people. I don't mean the other contestants, i mean by the show. Svetlana's great for the small amount she's on screen for, and I like Chester and Vito more than i thought i would! Please show explore them a little more! (and, well, to state the obvious, don't call it mpd why did it call it mpd it wasn't even the actual term for it when the show was being written)

My least favorite part is the love triangle tho. It's suffering from a critical case of "Warrior's miscommunication": a miscommunication plotline that could be solved in a single conversation, but the characters involved don't tell anyone because we need to stretch this book to 300 pages! or in this case, the plotline to last the whole season!

I get Mike not wanting to tell Zoey because his whole thing is not wanting to tell people, and Vito not telling Anne Maria because he's fucking dumb and considering his relationship with Anne Maria wasn't in a position where he needed to disclose it, but LIKE!!! COME ON MAN!!! this could be solved so easily and they just,,, didn't. Also why can't Vito still date Anne Maria at the end he's his own person!

i'll be real i think i like the idea that Anne Maria and Vito are still friends they just make-out too, mostly because that's all they really do in the show (and also i like Jomaria more)

OK ENOUGH ABOUT THE SYSTEM MORE ABOUT THE LAST CONTESTANT

I don't care for Lightning oops. He's funny sometimes. The "Jo is a guy" jokes get old quick tho.

THAT'S IT ON CONTESTANT THOUGHTS SO FAR!

The challenges are fine? I think a couple are pretty good (the treasure hunt for instance) but a couple are less good? (the Obstacle Course is eh, i don't really care about the mine one) but honestly i wish they just executed a couple better. Like the Embarrasing questions, climbing the mountain, hell even the relay-race could've honestly been wayyy better than they actually were! At least they're camp related!

But yeah so far ROTI's pretty good, 6/10 with 8/10 characters.

#cheese posting #roti #total drama #total drama revenge of the island #long post #“i don't have many thoughts!” makes a bunch of paragraphs #string cheesing