So I did a thing. Or rather, I am doing a thing.
It's a complicated thing and a very slow burn. It's part a love letter to Bering and Wells, part a love letter to the excellent nonsense that is Elder Scrolls lore, and part me just enjoying rambling about Khajiit!Myka and vampire!darkelf!Helena and all of the original characters that snuck in there somehow.
If that sounds interesting... there's the link. ;D
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"The dunmer's familiar wickwheat loaf and saltrice were replaced with Imperial bread."
What you have just witnessed is history in the making.
I believe I have just pioneered a new genre of "ultramicro-fanfiction", a limited ruleset of style instructions designed to not only write fanfiction of minimal word length, but minimal content as well.
The above sentence is a coherent and complete fanfic for The Elder Scrolls series of video games, while communicating as little of significance as possible. The above scene is completely void of detail, but paints - at least, to those who understand The Elder Scrolls, an attribute essential to read fanfiction regardless - a vivid image of the universe in the game.
Though the fanfiction may suggest specific images to some people - for example, the migration of dunmer from Vvardenfell to Skyrim after the eruption of Red Mountain - but to most people it will communicate nothing at all. The very fact that the sentence is even paraseable is a miracle - but still suggests an image!
I believe that ultramicro-fanfiction has the ability to change the world of fiction as we know it. Down with wordy purple prose! We want less! Less words, less plot, less things!
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(MAJOR SPOILERS FOR GOTHAM KNIGHTS VIDEO GAME)
Ok, so I finished Gotham Knights, and here's my review.
I loved it! The story was amazing, and the plot twists! I totally did not expect Kane to be The Voice. And the Court of Owls!!! They're my all time favorite Batman villain/organization, so for them to be such a prominent villain made me undeniably happy. And the Labyrinth, it was so well done, I literally cried. The mind games and the way it hits you in the feels, it embodies the Court perfectly. The League of Shadow was well done as well.
The sibling bonding! I'm sad that only Dick, Babs, Jay, and Tim were there, but they did them so well! They showed Tim's insecurity and grief for losing Bruce, and I totally believe he's autistic. Dick struggled with whether to take up the cowl and whether he was good enough. Babs struggles through her own grief with her father's death. Jason grieves a father he barely got to know, and apparently the Lazarus pit gave him powers??? I'm all for it. And how Jay still struggles with the pit's effects, finally someone did my boy right.
But it's not all sadness and pain for the batkids. They bond, have fun and make fun of each other, true BatFam content.
I was spoiled for the end of the game, but even if I hadn't been I still felt the dread and realization that as we approached the Wayne cemetery that Talia was going to revive Bruce. That whole scene hit me in the feels and having to mourn Bruce a second time.
And Gotham city, I adored swinging/flying/driving around and patrolling. The subtle details like the fact that there is actually a Batman Musical in universe made me smile. The way citizens have differing opinions on vigilantes. I've never played a spider-man game, but I imagine they're pretty similar.
And the way Wayne Family Botanical Gardens was in ruins and not used, it made me so sad. How Bruce is buried next to his parents, how in the belfry he had the highest ranking score on the video game. I couldn't even bring myself to play it, if i removed Bruce from the leader board I would have felt so guilty and sad.
The graphics were amazing, the attention to detail made my artist heart excited and inspired, and I only ever experienced minor glitches, like the subtitles occasionally flashing, I've had way worse glitches in Skyrim or Knight of the Old Republic, so it really wasn't a big deal to me. I loved how both the end credits and Main Title adjust to whatever your heroes are wearing at the time. I haven't played multiplayer, nor do I plan to, so I can't give you a review on that.
This game was not only gorgeous and well thought out, but it actually made me feel with the characters. I would 100% recommend playing it. 100/10 would play again.
I'll be starting Arkham Knight soon, so stay tuned for that review. I've heard good things and I'm excited!
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How To Write Good by Corentine
THE DRAFTING PROCESS, PART 2/2
Writing guide continued! Here's PART ONE.
STEP THREE: THE START, THE END, THE BEATS
I’m of the opinion that every story should start with a bang. You could start mid-way through a notable event, as seen in GHD:
- O L
H A -
D - V
-
The words, incomprehensible, rattle around his head like the last rumbles of a great thunderstorm. Then, much like after a storm has passed, the air suddenly feels clearer, sharper. A sludgy fog he didn’t even realise he was in clears from his mind and he blinks, confused.
The first thing he sees is his own hands.
If you want it to be especially punchy, you can start with a line of dialogue or a short sentence, like I did for T4T:
CHAPTER ONE:
It is the end.
It’s reeeally easy to lose readers at the start, so you always want to write a strong opener. Something that grabs the reader by the collar and drags them in to read the rest of the chapter.
You don’t need to have all the details, but you should have at least a vague idea of how the story ends. If you’re writing fanfic that follows along the same plot as a game or existing story, most of the legwork is done for you – so writing GHD, I planned for it to end when Alduin was killed. As I got further into the story, I came up with a more narratively satisfying ending, because it’s okay if the ending changes. As long as you have an ending in mind, you have something to work towards.
So GHD’s original, very basic plot was:
START – the Last Dragonborn wakes up with total amnesia
???
He saves Miraak
???
They kill Alduin together – END
Now you have to map out those ??? parts by deciding the major beats of the story, i.e. notable scenes. This gives you something to work towards other than the ending. I ended up with notes like these:
START – the Last Dragonborn wakes up with total amnesia
Who is he? Don’t spend too much time on this, not important, can be answered later
Goes to Solstheim, meets Miraak
Finds a way to communicate with Miraak – sneaks into Apocrypha? Shares dreams? College of Winterhold has psijiics, use telepathy?
Finds a way to save Miraak
Go to Apocrypha, confront Hermaeus Mora, save Miraak
They look for ways to kill Alduin together
Hermaeus Mora comes for them
Prolonged recovery, tells reader that even ‘redeemed’ Miraak is still scary
They kill Alduin together
What happens after Alduin?
(Redacted for spoiler purposes) – END
The story beats should ebb and flow like the tide; high-octane scenes should be followed by periods of calm. You don’t want to do this too quickly or the story will feel like whiplash; rather this is a process that happens over many chapters. Let’s look at some examples in GHD:
⇈⇈ Miraak dominates telepathy and is really scary!!
⇊⇊ Chry wanders around Skyrim doing errands and Thinking About Life…
⇈⇈ Chry breaks Miraak out of Apocrypha!!
⇊⇊ They recover from the ordeal and have a honeymoon period…
⇈⇈ They go to Blackreach and it’s visually awesome, and also Chry gets jealous!!
⇊⇊ They do misc stuff for a while…
⇈⇈ They talk to Septimus Signus, Mora shows up, nearly kills Chry!!
⇊⇊ Miraak whisks Chry away somewhere to recover in peace…
You see what I mean?
Right, you know roughly what’s going to happen. Time to turn that into words, baby!
STEP FOUR: GOTTA START WRITING
My actual writing style is its own separate topic so I’m not going to tell you how I structure a sentence or anything, just my literal writing process.
In my chapter document, I start by making a bullet-point list of everything I want to happen in the chapter. What happens can, and probably will, change as you actually get the chapter down. That’s fine, you just need a starting point.
I very rarely write individual chapters in order, as in start to finish. Rather, I tend to write the scenes I can picture clearly in my head – then by the time I’ve written those I’m in a writing groove and the gaps in the rest of the chapter will come easier. When I’m done, I’ll stitch the individual scenes together, which sometimes requires altering the scene start or end to make the whole thing more cohesive.
There are times when the writer’s block takes me, and I have like two finished scenes and just cannot summon the words for the rest of the chapter. When this happens, to be honest, the only answer I’ve found is brute force: I sit myself in front of the computer, get rid of phone/alt tabs/other distractions, and force myself to type something. Or I hold myself hostage (i.e. ‘I am not allowed to play more Baldur’s Gate 3 until I have written GHD chapter 47’) that works too, for me anyway.
Whatever it takes to get something on paper. What’s mostly important is to get something written, even if it’s not very good. You can always edit, rephrase or even rewrite sections later. Usually I’ve found once you start writing, you get into a groove and then it’s no longer a chore.
I also aim for a certain word count / chapter length while writing. I know a chapter is exactly as long as it needs to be and blah blah, but I set myself a minimum wordcount to reach. Or if I go way over the word count it’s probably because I’ve waffled too much, so I either aim to split the chapter into two, or to ruthlessly edit it back down again.
For GHD I average 7,000 - 9,000 words, but I actually think that’s a bit too long and risks losing people’s attention span, so for T4T I aim lower, about 6,000-ish. Less is perfectly fine, but if I’m reading another fic I find a chapter length of 2,000 words or lower to be disappointingly short. That’s all personal preference of course, and certain fics will lend themselves better to shorter chapters.
Although I jump around scenes within each chapter, I make a point of writing my entire chapters in chronological order. If I’m on chapter 5, and I know something awesome happens in chapter 12, it’s imperative that I do not write chapter 12 ahead of time. If I do, I’ll reeeally struggle to write chapters 6-11, because I have already rewarded my brain by writing the cool thing. If I hold off, my enthusiasm to write chapter 12 may in fact motivate me to crank out chapters 6-11 in record time.
I do have one other thing – in my Scrivener projects I always have a document called ‘Unused’. Sometimes, usually at like 2AM when sleep has failed me, I’ll get a really good idea for some dialogue or description. I scribble it down somewhere (or it will be forgotten for sure) and later I type it into my Unused document, so it’s just filled with random bits of text like this (note, everything you see here is unused, so it's not going to feature in the last chapter of GHD):
At some point in time I’ll peruse it and think ‘yes, this line!!’ and drop it into a future chapter – again though I just write bits, not entire scenes or I’ll have written all the exciting parts already. Anything I edit out of a chapter (i.e. a paragraph I liked but didn’t quite fit) gets dropped here too, in case I can reuse it later.
STEP FIVE: FINAL EDITING
I will be honest, I’m pretty impatient. Once I’ve finished a chapter, especially if it’s one I’ve been struggling with for a long time, I want to publish it now. So I’m guilty of not editing as thoroughly as I should – but this is what I usually do and it catches at least most of my mistakes:
As a first step, I copy-paste the chapter from Scrivener into google docs. Remember I said Scriv’s word processor wasn’t the best? Yeah, it’s no good at picking up on dodgy grammar, but google docs is, so I run it through there and skim-check for wiggly blue lines, then make the changes in Scriv. You may not have this issue if you’re using Word or another more comprehensive software
Once I know the grammar is mostly fixed, I go back to Scriv and re-read the entire chapter start to finish – I’m looking for whatever google didn’t catch, wonky phrasing, repetition (i.e. I used the word ‘quickly’ twice in the space of two paragraphs, that sort of thing)
I go away for a bit (anywhere from a few hours to a few days) and do another careful re-read with a fresh set of eyes. Sometimes I use a text-to-speech software to read what I’d written back to me; you'd be surprised how much you pick up this way
In my great excitement, I publish the new chapter to AO3. As I re-read the chapter over there, I see a minimum of 5 glaring errors I somehow didn’t spot in the previous steps, and hastily correct them before anyone notices.
I like to get at least the first 2-3 chapters of a brand new story written before I post anything to AO3. This is to make sure my enthusiasm doesn’t immediately wane and I actually stand a chance of finishing it. After that I’m rarely more than a chapter ahead of what’s been posted, because go figure I’ll post the newly-written chapter once the editing is done, then start on the next one.
Some people won’t even post a story at all until they have the first draft fully written. This is admirable, but not always realistic – GHD is like 375,000 words, you think I would’ve sat down and written all that before posting chapter one and even knowing if anyone would read it? Hell no.
But while you don’t need a story to be fully written, you do need it to be decently mapped-out. I used to start fics with absolutely no idea where they were going to go; I’d finish 1 or 2 chapters, get really excited at writing that much and hungry for feedback, then post something that I would inevitably lose all enthusiasm for and leave unfinished.
So, know how it starts, know how it ends, and know the story beats in between so you always have a goal to write towards. There will inevitably be fics that you never finish and that’s fine – it’s all writing practice – but readers don’t like to be left hanging, so try your best to finish! Even if it takes ahem four years or so.
⭐ ⭐ ⭐
And there you go, that’s my writing process! I’m not sure how useful that really is, but if it was I could write more guides in future? I have…
A guide to my writing style (this one might be hard to put into a guide but people like my turn of phrase so, maybe useful?)
How I write a sex scene
How I write a fight scene.
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20 questions for writers
under the cut. Thanks to @everybodyknows-everybodydies for tagging🖤
Tagging back: @nuwanders @jiubilant @ervona @ehlnofay @druidx @blossom-adventures @sylvienerevarine @throughtrialbyfire @da3drat no pressure
1. How many works do you have on AO3?
Five
2. What's your total AO3 word count?
198327
3. What fandoms do you write for?
Just elder scrolls. I have a feeling that's gonna be it for me. I've been tempted to write stardew valley fic lately which would perhaps be classed as "crack" (I know what that is in theory but the way people use it makes no sense to me) but I took a cursory look at the tag and I don't think the stardew valley fandom is ready for a ray fic lmao
4. What are your top five fics by kudos?
Well. I have five.
5. Do you respond to comments?
I try 🫠 it haunts me how often I've left my beloved mutuals on read..... but if that's u and I did, I am telepathically beaming this: !!!!!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ Making out sloppy style etc etc
6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?
lol. lmao even
7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?
.....within AO3 I guess it's "Morning" but also that's set at a refugee camp? I will say the skyrim story will have a more peaceful ending but up until now fic writing has been an outlet for my thwarted rage and covid brain damage soooo
8. Do you get hate on fics?
I mean this is generally a culture of positive feedback. Someone did yell at me once for hitting martin septim with the transgender beam which is a level of no-life-havin loserdom which could be classed as "hate" but came off as pure cope and seethe
9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?
I really bristle at the word smut sorry its too cutesy. I was a prodomme for seven years I don't do euphemisms lol. I wrote a sex scene into IITT to see how I felt about writing sex scenes. I learned that I am only interested in writing them if they serve specific functions. I have absolutely zero judgment toward anyone who wants to write about fuckin and suckin, that's just not why I'm here
10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?
No but recently my household watched game of thrones together and my bf and his brother were cracking jokes like what if one of these medieval characters had a gundam. Neither of them read fic so I was like don't be too entertained by yourselves. I bet that has been written. looked it up on ao3 and sure as shit
11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?
I'm not gonna lie I did find a fic where someone very obviously ripped me off but I don't wanna call them out. One specific instance where they bit my style was so clumsily applied as to be obvious, but their prose in general was fantastic so like. who care.
12. Have you ever had a fic translated?
Not as far as I know but that would make me holler
13. Have you ever co-written a fic?
Nope. I'm not opposed to the idea but it's hard to imagine how I'd do this given my process. I think I'd be pretty difficult to work with
14. What's your all-time favorite ship?
?!? I dunno I don't have one. I put a lot of effort into writing martinhok but I could not say that one, due to how overwhelmingly heterosexual the tag is. I'm sorry but can everyone who's not a faggot please pipe down
15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?
I have my moments with the skyrim wip. I've signed myself up for something pretty complicated and challenging but I also learned that I can finish things so I'm not really worried about it. The fact of the matter is: I do not care if this is good. It matters that it is done so I can move on with my life. If parts of it are boring and overlong that's yalls problem
16. What are your writing strengths?
I get a lot of compliments on my worldbuilding. I do think a lot about the minutiae of material culture and think I have a talent for incorporating detail in engaging ways
17. What are your writing weaknesses?
I'm a cornball. This is a corny activity. I don't really care because I'm doing it for free. Enjoy the unsolicited view into an internet stranger's terrible psyche
18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?
I try to apply with a light hand. I'm a dumbass sheltered American and I can mostly make myself understood in a Spanish-speaking country but that's about it. I like playing around with language and the idea of multilingual societies matters to me so I include it, but I'm not a linguist so I try to work within my limits. Whether I am successful at this is up to others.
19. First fandom you wrote for?
Elder scrolls. Never felt compelled until i spent a winter playing oblivion and went wow this game has an incredibly bleak narrative behind a silly aesthetic. Oops now I'm in a lore pit
20. Favorite fic you've written?
The Nature of Fire is my best prose hands down. I'm gonna be real with y'all I am desperate for people to read it. It is genuinely the best I can do at this point and if you like what I've done so far, well, whatever u read sucks compared to this fic.
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“The Inquisitor And Her Commander”
As some of you may have noticed, I am a huge fan of the Dragon Age games, especially Dragon Age Inquisition. Last year, I had planned on drawing all the main [playable] characters up until Dragon Age Day (which took place on December 4th), but I just didn’t have time to draw more than three characters (the Inquisitor, Solas, & Varric…please check them out in my gallery) due to being busy with work and other things. I’ll eventually draw the other characters when I gather more motivation to do so.
For now, please enjoy this piece. I hope everybody likes this. I worked very hard on this artwork. It took longer than usual to create, due to all the small details, the poses, & the armour. (Armour is not easy to draw for me!) For those of you who are DAI fans, you may recognize the flowers: Crystal Grace on the bottom and Andraste’s Grace on the top. I know Andraste’s Grace is not in DAI, but I thought it would be pretty to add to the artwork (since it technically exists in the Thedas world).
My OC Inquisitor is named Bryony Trevelyan. She is actually my 2nd Inquisitor character, the first one having been an elf (which I may draw someday). I had been playing DAI for the 3rd time, a few months ago, as a male character (since I wanted him to be in a romance with Dorian, so yes, my male Inquisitor is gay), but I stopped for a bit since I am playing Skyrim at the moment (with updates & mods). Anyway, back on the main subject: I drew Inquisitor Bryony Trevelyan in the Armor of the Dragon Hunter outfit (from the Jaws of Hakkon DLC), which I had altered the colours by tinting it with Veil Quartz. I based her crown from concept art for DAI. So much armour in the game! Which I love, especially since the DA games don’t give female characters the stereotypical skimpy outfits…I love that I get to make my female characters wear bad-ass armour.
Cullen Rutherford is such an adorable and slightly awkward character around my Inquisitor. I knew I had to romance him right away, because his looks are the type of man I am attracted to in real life. (I’m not going to lie…in the game, he’s hot for a video game character. Ha ha!) I’ve always enjoyed the flirting in the DA games when it comes to the relationships. The best scene was right before their first kiss, when Cullen got interrupted by a member of the Inquisition, and then got mad about it. Ha ha. I liked when my Inquisitor asked Cullen, “The day you kissed me on the battlements…how long had you wanted to do that?” And Cullen replied (with a laugh), “Longer that I should admit.” Awwwww.
I also liked the part in the Winter Palace, when all these people were flirting with Cullen, and one asked him, “Are you married, Commander?” And Cullen replied, “Not yet, but I am…already taken.” Double awwww, because a loyal man is so dreamy. :3 I actually had Bryony & Cullen get married in the last DLC. :3 They adopt a Mabari (dog), too!
I love DAI too much. :D It’s such a fun game with the most gorgeous graphics (especially on the Xbox Series X).
Drawn with Sakura Pigma Micron pens, then coloured in with a mixture of Copic Markers & Ohuhu Markers. I used Koi Watercolours for the background. White accents done with both a gel pen and white watercolour. Gold acrylic was used for the Inquisition Symbol & the lines, which the scanner absolutely murders...the gold is such a pretty, shimmery metallic in real life. The light green around my art was done in Photoshop Elements.
Dragon Age Inquisition © Bioware & Electronic Arts
Fan artwork © Jacqueline E. McNeese
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So, was Starfield a disappointment? Just another sweet little lie?
I've no interest in playing it myself (at least, not until the modding scene has about 2 years to work on it) but the reviews say it's about exactly what you would expect from Bethesda: a solid 7-8/10 game. Many of the details shown in previews greatly exaggerated, you can't even really /fly/ anywhere, everything is separated by a fuckton of loading screen so it's more like you're hitting fast travel to go to places rather than ever actually making it there on foot which puts a damper on the whole exploration vibe (see that moon? you /can't/ go there, not directly. you gotta select it on a map and load for a bit, no actual flying there directly!), and the usual Bethesda bugs and inventory management jank.
So you know, like Skyrim. Or Oblivion. Or Fallout 3. Or Fallout 4. Or Morrowind. Greatly exaggerated promises, but a solid enough sandbox to serve as the foundation for years and years of mods to come. And hey, some of these reviews say that the main quest is actually excellent this time around.
Judging by the ridiculous player count on Steam before it's even officially released though, I'd say Todd's sweet little lies have successfully worked their magic yet again. Starfield's going to be a big hit, with a vibrant modding community for sure, and Todd's going to trick you into buying your 6th copy of Starfield: The Definitive Edition five years from now.
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How did you get started modding npcs? I’d love to work on making the elderly people in Skyrim feel less identical but the creation kit is intimidating. Is there an easy way to dip into the modding scene or do you just have to crack things open and make mistakes? It’s hard to find guides that don’t focus on cbbe 😔
Sorry for the lateness of this, Tumblr won't let me edit drafts for asks on mobile, so I couldn't jot down my thoughts as I had them which is my usual method of answering stuff like this.
Oh man, my start was probably learning to edit the NPC from Tame the Beast 2 lol. She stood out like a sore thumb in my game. I found a tutorial that ended up becoming my method through the RS Children page.
It primarily focuses around using RaceMenu, which has a function that allows you to export the head you make directly from Character Creation. This allows you to use the extra facial sliders (like the ones from and overlays (like Freckle Mania 2, my beloved). So basically, it allows for potentially far more unique NPCs than editing via CK.
I am going to warn you, it definitely is not simpler than editing NPCs in the Creation Kit alone. Sorry.
Links are to the SE version of the mods, as that's what I'm most familiar with. They likely have LE counterparts. Sorry, I am not the greatest at writing tutorials.
Things you will need:
RaceMenu (and SKSE; be sure to get the correct versions of both for your game)
NifSkope - you will use this to open and edit the mesh. Here's GamerPoet's setup video
Things I recommend:
Creation Kit Platform Extended for Skyrim - makes using the Creation Kit way less like pulling teeth
Unofficial Creation Kit Patch - if you're using AE
an alternate start mod - I like Dimes Quickstart for its simplicity, but any would work
Another Race Menu Rotation Mod - handy for seeing how the back of hairs look
Stand still in RaceMenu (OAR) - stops the character from wiggling out of frame
For your quest to edit elders specifically, you will probably need a playable Elder Race mod (I have not tested any, but just searching for them yields plenty of options.) You will have to know exactly what races the NPCs you're editing are, though
Fun Stuff for diverse options:
Extra slider mods (I like Expressive FaceGen Morphs)
Skin Overlay Mods (for extra detailed faces)
If you want to get REAL funky with it, you can also use OutfitStudio to have a lot better time sculpting/getting super wild with assets, but that's too advanced for this tutorial (and my method is very 'goof around until it just works.'
I don't really want to cover using mod-added headparts (like eyes, hairs, etc.) There are basically two options there: add them as new headparts for your mod or make your mod dependent on the mod the headparts are from. The second way is probably simpler for beginners, but I definitely suggest installing Creation Kit Platform Extended, as it will allow you to load the other mods as masters without the Suffering™.
The Workflow
1. Design your character like you would a player character. For this example, I am redesigning Arcadia.
A recommendation: unless you really feel like you need to change it, it is typically better to make the Weight slider match the NPC's actual weight. You can see this value using either SSE Edit or the Creation Kit. It is no big deal if you don't, but if you change the weight and load the mod into an already existing save you will get a gap between the NPC's neck and body (unless you use Save Unbaker.) Be careful, though, there is a RaceMenu bug where if you load up RM again after exiting, it changes the weight by .01. So annoying.
For Skin Tone choice, if you do a custom skin tone (by pressing 'E' while hovering over the slider) I would recommend leaving the transparency slider (the 'A' value) at 100% (though I usually make the exception for Khajiit and Argonians.) This info will go into the Interpolation Value box in the CK, and the RM values can't be directly input, so you have to calculate the value with a (RM Number/255 = X/100, solve for X which is your Interpolation Value)
1a. If you are planning on adding faceparts from mods to your own plugin, I recommend saving and doing that now. Then come back to your save and change your headparts to the versions from your plugin. If you want to just have the other mods as masters, you can skip this.
2. Once you're satisfied with your design, I recommend saving your game and saving your head as a preset (click to enlarge):
3. Now, you will need to write down some stuff.
Skin Tone (RGB value):
Hover over Skin Tone slider. Press 'E'.
write down the R G B values (and A if you change it, see above note)
Even if you use a default skin tone, this is the best way to make sure you get the correct value for the CK.
Weight (number)
Scars (name) (if applicable)
Hair (name)
Facial Hair (name) (if applicable)
Eye Color (name)
Brow Type (name)
Writing down Hair Color is optional: with this method, the hair will inherit color from the head you export, not the CK value. Plus, RM's values are not really useful, because the default hair colors are named.
It's the same with the Face Complexion (wrinkles, etc), with this method it is exported with the head mesh.
4. Export the Sculpt:
It should end up in your SKSE folder (SKSE\Plugins\CharGen), wherever that is for you
5. Now you can close down the game and open the Creation Kit.
Use the folder icon to load your masters.
Pick Skyrim, Update, any official DLC (if applicable), and any other mods you want to be masters for your mod (for eyes, hairs, etc.) If you've made your plugin already for headparts, just load it up.
6. In the Object Window, expand the Actors -> Actor -> Actor tabs and now you have a lot of tabs with Race names. Find the race your NPC belongs to then open the appropriate gender tab. Alternatively, you can just search the character's name in the searchbox.
7. Find your NPC's name and double click. This opens their Actor window, which is where you will use all the data you wrote down.
If you want a preview of their face, tick the box at the bottom of the window.
For weight adjustments: go to the Traits Tab. For all other values you need to worry about for this tutorial, go to the Character Gen Parts.
So, to parse this: you can ignore the Face Tint Layers box and pretty much everything on the left side of the screen.
Face Tinting Color
Type in your values for R G and B (you can ignore the Preset dropdown completely.) The Interpolation value corresponsed to the 'A' value, so unless you are working on Khajiit or Argonians, it will probably always be 1.
Base Head Parts
To change stuff in this section, click the line you want to change then go down to the dropbox below it and change it to what you want
Face - unless you're using something like High Poly Heads, you can ignore this
Everything else in this box: change to what you wrote down for each
Additional Head Parts
This is mainly used for scars and functions a little differently
To add a scar, you need to go to the Object window again
You can expand the Character tab and click 'HeadPart' then search the name of the scar you want. Click and drag the line with your scar into the Additional Head Parts box and it should show up there.
8. Once you've got the above like you want it, hit 'Ok', save your plugin. Now, to make the next step a little easier, you can click the NPC name in the Object Window again and hit f4.
This will export the meshes/textures file folders to wherever you have CK set up to export files (if you use MO2, it goes directly to the Overwrite folder by default.) Your plugin will be in the same place, (probably. Mine is bugged.)
Go ahead and exit the CK now
9. Go your your files exported from the last step. Open a second window from the files you exported from SKSE.
Open both meshes in two separate NifSkope windows.
You absolutely must make sure your headparts match the head you exported from RaceMenu exactly, or you will get the dreaded dark face bug.
If your SKSE head has a weird broken neck mesh, that's not a problem and can be ignored.
Now, you will need to find the Head textures in the head you exported from the CK. If your NifSkope is set up like mine, it should look like this:
Copy this line and paste it into the SKSE head in the same slot.
Save the SKSE NifSkope and close.
10. Rename the SKSE files (both .dds and .nif) to the number your exported heads are. You can then copy and paste your your SKSE files to their respective folders:
the .nif file goes in meshes/actors/character/FaceGenData/FaceGeom/[name of plugin]
the .dds file goes into textures/actors/character/FaceGenData/FaceTint/[name of plugin]
And now you're ready to pack up your mod for testing! At this point I also recommend taking a second and converting your plugin to an ESPFE via SSE Edit. It's pretty simple and there are probably tutorials out there.
Scully, you're not gonna believe this.
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Winterhold Arch-Mage's quarters in the 2nd Era w/ ESO Housing (Happy Anniversary ESO!)
In honor of ESO's 10th anniversary today, I'm gonna share an example of something I did with maybe(?) my favorite game feature, the ESO Housing system.
I'm working on a fic (not yet published) that involves the Arch-Mage's quarters and the College of Winterhold in both the 4th and 2nd Eras. Inspired by writer's block, I decided to recreate the Arch-Mage's quarters in ESO. (We have not yet seen the College of Winterhold in ESO canon.)
Note to writers: some of the details I knew going in, but I actually got some new key details of the story out of this effort. If you're feeling stuck, it can't hurt to try switching up your medium :)
Due to the limitations of ESO's housing system and the boringness of Skyrim's decor, it's more of an homage than a direct 1:1, but I hope it feels loyal in spirit :) More pics (and unnecessary detail) under the cut!
(Sorry I forgot to turn off the Skyrim HUD.)
The addition of fireplaces, built-in bookshelves, a kitchen, and general fanciness are because of the absolute criminal underdecoration of the Arch-Mage's quarters in base Skyrim. (Which actually fits in my fic, but.)
Like, come on Skyrim, not even a fire in the cavernous bedroom of this enormous stone refrigerator on the edge of a freezing ocean?
Most of the architectural discrepancies, such as the 8-sided room vs. Skyrim's 12-sided room, are because of my choice of venue or because of the furnishing selection in ESO.
The saddest of those is the loss of all the cool arches and the dope vaulted ceilings. The most annoying of them (imo) is the non-matching stone. Otherwise Forbidden Stronghold lent itself so well to this task that i chose it over options that would have let me keep the ceilings.
But actually, most of the more glaring discrepancies are directly related to the lore of my fic :)
The alchemy garden is newly-planted in the 2nd Era portion of my fic! The fact that none of those plants are actually harvestable plants in either ESO or Skyrim is just due to ESO's selection of furnishings. But a lot of things aren't: the lighting source being a Silvenari Sap-Stone that grows out of a wisteria tree (which, notably, is alive), the little spring, the moon-sugar—all of those are part of the story, and I think there might be additional Important Plants in there before I'm finished. :)
Also, in my fic, the 4th Era Arch-Mage is the Dragonborn of course, but the 2nd Era Arch-Mage is the first Khajiit Arch-Mage of Winterhold. Because of this endeavor, I wrote a whole scene where he talks about his decor choices 😂 Might get left on the editor's floor, but the overall gist is: the more public-facing areas of the space are Nord-core, so as to not rock boats unnecessarily. As soon as you step into the study and living quarters, it's Khajiiti af, so as to rock boats the right amount.
i have no idea whether people will be interested in this, so I'm going to stop there, but there's more, obviously. And if you made it this far, thanks! And happy anniversary ESO! 🥳
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Workshop Progress: Midsummer Update
Hello workshop followers! It's been about two months since our last major update, and for good reason: following the successful donation drive that we concluded in late May, we needed to reevaluate our staff timelines and prioritization of content, as we raised more than our initial goal. You can find more details and discourse on that discussion here.
Additionally, we had several of our staff busy with all the things that summer brings; vacations & holiday, graduations, and birthdays galore. It has definitely been a challenge to pass work between different members and maintain clear documentation so all staff members could stay up-to-date on current tasks while out living their best (IRL) lives. We hope to have another update on our current progress near the end of August.
Finally, we have set up our second commission with Paul Warren! It will be taking place this upcoming Monday, July 24th, 2023. Once again, we could not do any of this without your support, and we thank you all from the bottom of our heart.
Onto the updates!
Creation Kit & Assets Team: Much of our work has turned towards wrapping up the final implementation of the new lines, correcting subtitles to match the line edits proposed by the Writing Team (see more below), and turning our attention towards the rebuild of Kaidan's two personal quests, All of This Past & Blood and Fire. As our in-house alpha testing continues, we have fixed all of the reported bugs to date, in addition to our continued work on visual and quality-of-life-improvements, and supplanting new conditions for a more consistent dialogue experience when triggered.
Writing Team: Our work regarding the creation of new dialogue to accommodate pronoun and/or nickname selection continues, alongside new dialogue being created (or old dialogue altered) primarily to remove mentions of the player being the Dragonborn (so that players have more role-playing options), as well as fixing a few plot holes that would become apparent depending on the order in which the player approaches different quests in the Skyrim worldspace. To that end, the team has been working with CK & Assets to create full flowcharts of Kaidan's personal quests, in an effort to see what can be preserved and what will need new lines.
Community Team: Behind the scenes, we've been reaching out to other custom voiced follower creators to inquire about collaboration in the future, after we've cleared the full rebuild of the base mod. After the absolute success that was the new line livestreams, we will most likely be hosting another series of streams once we have spliced up the lines from our pending second commission with Mr. Warren. Besides that, we've been working with a member of CK & Assets to create a full blown trailer for our work in the Kaidan Workshop! We're still not quite finished with it yet, but in order to tide the masses over, here is a brief video from our alpha testing showing off Kaidan's brand new voice during his intro quest, A Bounty For The Hunter.
We'll see you in August!
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WIP Wednesday 💛
Wednesday again, and I'm on time this week!!!
More drawings of my Elder Scrolls OCs, because I haven't done any writing this week. Ivetta, Maewynne, and Aevra, who I believe are my last few Dragonborn on my list of characters to draw! I've just got a handful of OCs left to go in terms of sketches before I move on to neatening them up and adding colour....
As with previous times, more details about them under the read more!
Also been tagged by the lovely @thequeenofthewinter and @throughtrialbyfire since I posted 💛
Ivetta
A member of the Nightingales and Guild Master of the Thieves Guild, Ivetta thrives in the shadows. Even her identity as Dragonborn is shrouded in mystery, with only a select few in Skyrim knowing purely down to coincidence or necessity. A stark difference to her upbringing in the high society of Solitude.
The entire reason that she no longer finds herself in those circles is purely because she hated what was demanded of her. Sure, she knew how to maintain a business ledger and had sat in on a handful of deals and witnessed agreements being made during her youth, but she was always more interested in seeing what happened behind the scenes. Seeing who greased the palms of who, watching as septims were exchanged behind the scenes, and witnessed the employees who had a bone to pick selling goods under the table at their employer's expense. It always intrigued her. It irritated her parents to no end, in particular when it involved business dealings to do with her family... even more so when it involved her uncovering their plans to try and marry her off so that she was out of the way, out of Solitude.
Ivetta decided to take herself out of the way without any strings attached, but not after setting things in motion to make her family's business crumble beneath their feet - finances in ruin, ledgers which didn't add up, and alerting guards to some very illegal practices. She ensured that she couldn't be implicated by relocating over the border before it could come to fruition, into Cyrodiil, and only returning to Skyrim when she caught wind of her family's business collapsing.
Of course, when she returned, she got caught up in that Imperial ambush...
With time, she found herself in Riften, following her encounter with Brynjolf when seeking Esbern, and enjoying the thrill of carrying out his little scheme. She then joined the Thieves Guild, and gradually found herself the Guild Master and Nightingale after unveiling Mercer Frey's treachery.
Unfortunately, she finds herself in the line of sight of the Black-Briar family... Hemming Black-Briar, in particular. And he knows exactly who she was and is.
Maewynne
Maewynne is the Listener of the Dark Brotherhood and the Dragonborn... though to the population of Skyrim, the Dragonborn is an imposing Nord warrior who wants to live in solitude (not the city) thanks to little whispers which she left in the right ears - not a Bosmer with personal space issues brought on through her clashes with the Penitus Oculatus following her attempts on the Emperor's life.
At one point, after the Dark Brotherhood have properly re-established themselves in Dawnstar after their near-eradication, she finds herself... bored. Far too many contracts over petty squabbles, and hardly anything interesting. So when she gets approached by somebody with a proposal not to kill, but to set a chain of events into motion to bring about the downfall of somebody who had been a thorn in her side and a threat to one of the Brotherhood's closest associates, the Thieves Guild... who was she to say no?
Aevra
For most of her life, Aevra had been loyal. Loyal to her Empire, loyal to Skyrim, loyal to her duties as a soldier. She never gave anything less than her best, even when she was tired, bruised, and bloody. Her family had served since the Oblivion Crisis, and it made her proud to fight for the Empire. She fought through the Great War, and continued to serve the Empire ever since. She never found herself in the highest of ranks though, instead preferring being active and on the ground.
But one day, that changed. She participated in the ambush to capture Ulfric Stormcloak - a man she still vividly remembered fighting alongside back in the past, knowing full well that he would not remember her for she was little more than one of many new soldiers at the time. During the night, after having stopped on their way to the border, she was responsible for getting some more firewood... and as she did so, she caught sight of somebody in the trees. An elf - specifically an Altmer. Before she could call for them to come out of hiding... she found herself seeing little more than red.
When the redness faded away, she was horrified to find herself being apprehended by her fellow soldiers. Blood coated her hands, bodies were scattered around, and the axe she had been using to chop wood was discarded on the ground some distance away, clearly having been used as a weapon. She knew that she had been under the influence of a spell, but her allies saw only one thing - she was attacking them. A traitor. There were even whispers that she was a Stormcloak in disguise, even as she protested and tried to explain herself as she was arrested and taken to join the other prisoners set for the executioner's block.
Being saved from death by Alduin was something that she didn't know whether to consider a blessing or a curse, but she knew that she needed to prove her innocence when she caught sight of Hadvar, one of her fellow soldiers, about to return to Solitude after their escape from Helgen.
Even as she found herself in the spotlight after learning that she was the Dragonborn, no matter what she said or did, she was unable to persuade the Empire that she was innocent of murdering several fellow soldiers, and that it had no doubt been part of a Thalmor machination. She feared being arrested that much, she had to get Lydia to carry out tasks in Imperial-held lands in Skyrim on her behalf (unless it was a dragon attack, in which case she would try to get herself out of there as soon as it was handled).
There were those who heard her out though, who believed in her innocence, thanks to somebody who did remember her from the Great War. But when those people were Stormcloaks, people she had seen as the enemy... she finds herself in a dilemma.
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20 questions for writers
Thanks to @thequeenofthewinter for the tag <3
Tagging: @elavoria @atypicalacademic @gilgamish @nuwanders @ladytanithia @sheirukitriesfandom @throughtrialbyfire @lucien-lachance @miraakulous-cloud-district @bostoniangirl21 @terendelev
1. How many works do you have on AO3?
6
2. What's your total AO3 word count?
704,291 😅
3. What fandoms do you write for?
The Elder Scrolls and probably only ever the elder scrolls. Mostly Oblivion but I have one Skyrim lonngfic in the works. I read fic in several other fandoms, but this one has me by the throat.
4. What are your top five fics by kudos?
Well, I only have 6 in the first place so it's not saying all that much.
5. Do you respond to comments?
I do the best I can to! Sometimes one slips by me on a particularly busy week, and then I'm too mortified by the lapse of time to answer. I don't think it's happened too often, but please know I read them all and am always grateful for them ❤️
6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?
Haven't finished either of them yet, but it's gotta be The Illusionist Part 2, which is an Oblivion novelization with emphasis on the Dark Brotherhood and Mages Guild, or Beyond the Break, which is just me crying about Mathieu Bellamont.
7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?
Treacle which is still hella angst lmao, but Scar-Tail does live happily ever after, and it's all thanks to @atypicalacademic for the inspiration ❤️❤️❤️
I have also vowed to make my Skyrim fic, Slither and Writhe happier 😤 Thus far, it's going... well, it is going.
8. Do you get hate on fics?
I haven't, and the few dissenting opinions that I have received I wouldn't consider hate either. They're just opinions. I hesitated to mention this, but since I was LITCHRALLY talking about Lucien Lachance on one of Ray's posts a few minutes ago, in the past I have receive messages detailing how my interpretation of Lucien is distasteful, given he is unabashedly a villain in my story and 1/2 of a toxic relationship (also he's... kind of pathetic lol). It's a darkfic and not for everyone, I'm well aware. Fortunately, many of my very lovely, talented friends and mutuals write great Lucien fics that are different from mine, so at the end of the day we all get what we want :D Variety is the spice of life, and you can pry grossnasty Lucien out of my cold, dead fingies.
9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?
I write sexual content (idk what counts as smut). Originally, I wrote all the sex scenes as fade-to-black, and while they're not super graphic, while editing a few months ago I thought "you know what, this needs more cunt." So yeah. The sex scenes have become a bit more explicit now than they were in the first iteration.
10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?
Nah, and I don't think I ever will.
11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?
Not to my knowledge, and unless people are out there lifting passages of my writing and inserting it into their fics, I'm not going to claim ownership over ideas. We're all playing in the same sandpit, and while the execution is my own, I find it quite difficult to say the stories are totally original or novel because all my writing, from concepts to style, have been influenced in some way by the works of others.
12. Have you ever had a fic translated?
No.
13. Have you ever co-written a fic?
No, but I've tossed around some ideas with @zomboidatomic that may or may not one day bear fruit...
14. What's your all-time favorite ship?
I've worked them all out of my system at this point, tbh. Romance doesn't really do anything for me on its own without compelling characterizations and intriguing plot. I select by other tags over ship most of the time too. That said I've been driven crazy by some of my friends ships with characters I've never even spoken to before. If it's good it's good, you know. (Though I am currently re-watching Hannibal and I will confess that I am still ill about Hannigram ajkfhalg)
15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?
I'm going to finish them all, dammit!
16. What are your writing strengths?
Characterization, I think, especially when writing people who are awful lmao I've received a lot of compliments when it comes to writing villains and morally grey characters.
17. What are your writing weaknesses?
Ugh, I am so self-indulgent. Sometime last year I edited The Illusionist part 2 and trimmed out 60k words. It was so BLOATED (probablly still is). I think there were times when the plot got sidelined because I had an idea for a fun scene. Yes, I love writing Lucien and Nim hate-fucking and tearing each other apart in some weird mashup of Tommy Wiseau in The Room and the alien in The Thing. No, I did not need three chapters of this back to back, but I wanted it...
18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?
If the plot calls for it, then by all means 👍
19. First fandom you wrote for?
Hmm, now that I think of it it may have been a Fallout 3 Harkness fic that I kept in a composition notebook when I was 12. It will never see the light of day, obivo.
20. Favorite fic you've written?
OoOoh, that's tough. Slither and Writhe already feels stronger to me because I'm a more experienced writer, and I actually planned it out, but The Illusionist is my first baby.
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Ao3 20 Questions
thank you @kagedbird for the tag!! <3<3
i will tag some friends @daedrabait @miraakswhore @somethingscarlet13 @queerbashir if u wanna participate <3
How many works do you currently have on ao3?
Currently 25. holy shit, i thought it was more than that lol
What's your total ao3 word count?
98,336. Used to be like 200k before i cleaned out some old works i didn't care for anymore.
What fandoms do you write for?
Skyrim and Star Trek TOS & AOS
What are your top five fics by kudos?
Sorry Lass, Make Me Feel Mortal, Don't Shut Me Out, Fascinating, and Destroy Rebuild
Do you respond to comments?
Sometimes! Honestly it depends on whether or not i'm online and see them. if i don't respond right away it feels rude to respond weeks after the fact, but for repeat commenters or usernames i recognize i try to!
What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?
Idk i used to like to emotionally beat up Jim a lot, so probably one of the short stories where i explore all his traumas
What is the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?
Probably Sorry, Lass. I originally wrote it in 2015 and i'm fairly certain it ends with a mushy marriage scene.
Do you get hate on fics?
Surprisingly, no. I think i got a few rude comments back when i first started, but honestly everyone's been too kind to me.
Do you write smut? If so, what kind?
Hell yeah brother that's what i do!! I love angsty, emotionally charged smut. my personal favorite to write is angry, hatefuck type of stuff. or when they're using it to avoid talking about feelings.
Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?
Not that i've ever posted lmao. I don't usually post non canon compliant fics for whatever fandom i'm working in.
Have you ever had a fic stolen?
Kinda. a few years ago someone let me know that my work had been reposted to a fic site i don't use and one quick message got them to take it down. Also, i once posted a fic as a one off, forgot that i'd done that, and used the same scene much later in a larger story - and some nice commenter on the original let me know that someone had stolen my idea lmao
Have you ever had a fic translated?
Nope, never had anyone request that and don't want to do so incorrectly.
Have you ever cowritten a fic?
Kind of? an old friend and i used to write separate chapters of our self insert marvel fics and mush them together into one story lol. never posted it anywhere, it was just shared emails and google docs.
What's your all time favorite ship?
God, that's hard. probably McKirk. as i've gotten older and unlearned all the internal shame about self inserts it's gotten easier to do a self insert story instead of an established pair.
What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?
Every few weeks i pluck away at my regency au Miraak fic. i don't think i'll ever actually finish it because it's just so big in my head it's hard to get on paper, but i hope i do someday.
What are your writing strengths?
I'm very comfortable writing sex scenes. I think that often when the author is uncomfortable about writing explicit sex the reader can really feel it in the story and i put in a lot of work to get over those mental hurdles. i've been told i'm good at characterization, which is awesome! i love getting in a character's head!
What are your writing weaknesses?
Very often i find myself bogged down with the need to describe every little scene. it's a major reason i haven't posted a longfic in a while - i want to write these big stories but find myself getting lost in the little details. i also have a terrible habit of editing myself while i'm writing, which just gets me stuck in an unproductive loop.
Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?
Since i'm only fluent in English, this isn't something i am confident in. i've written in a few fictional languages for fics before but would probably reach out or suggest another author if a reader wanted something that heavily involved this.
First fandom you wrote for?
Twilight babey!!! self insert oc to smooch Edward Cullen when i was a little middle schooler!!! i didn't know what fanfiction was but i knew i had a big ol crush on him.
Favorite fic you've written?
not to be cringe on main, but most of my favorites are things that never got published. they're the little things still hanging out in my google docs that i go back to over and over. i rewrote all of star trek into darkness word for word just to make bones and jim kiss, i made a self insert just to smooch skurge after hyperfixating on thor ragnarok, and the weird time a few months ago where i wrote like 40k words of a cowboy romance. i read them often and wish that i'd written more on many of them but i do not read my published works.
thanks to anyone who read my rambling lmao. love you all sososo much, thank you for reading my silly little stories and caring about them. <3<3<3
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I’m finally making it, My Beyond Reach Review
Disclaimer: While I didn’t have the best time with this mod, that doesn’t mean you may not. I never want my opinion to sour someone else’s, and have the risk of them not playing the mod. So I highly recommend you check it out.
I’m putting this disclaimer as well since my playthrough of the mod is a bit unfair. I played it with godmode (since I suck at game combat,) and after a while started to clip through dungeons to get them over with. This started to happen around halfway through as I found myself more frustrated with the mod and kinda wanted it done. I also played through only mostly the main quest. However, a friend of mine did tell me about one sidequest I do have a problem with. So keep this in mind with my review that I may be treating it a little unfairly.
There’s also the point that mods are hard to make, let alone one of this scale. The mod author did an amazing job at creating this mod and I never want to invalidate that. With all that said, let’s get going.
CW: Sexual Assault, Child Abuse, Ped*****, Cannibalism, and Harm Towards Women.
And Obviously Spoilers!
First off, I’m not the best at writing reviews. It won’t be wonderfully crafted or anything, just mostly detailed bullet notes of what I liked and disliked. While there is more I disliked, I did find some positives and will be layouting things in a sandwich review (that’s the right word?) going from positive to negative. Here we go!
This is a review for the mod, Beyond Reach by razorkid.
Good: Grimdark. I will always love me some Grimdark. Hell, my current playthrough of Skyrim is currently a grimdark playthrough all with dead trees, gallows, horror monsters, ect. And while I think some parts of Beyond Reach’s grimdark-ness falls flat, most of it holds up and creates an eerie atmosphere. There were bodies hanging, creepy monsters, creepy dungeons, and a lot of stuff that fit the tone of the mod. However... some of it did not...
Bad: A lot felt like shock value. In grimdark there’s always a tendency to add a lot of stuff for shock value, and sadly, BR had an abundance of it. I knew the mod got dark, but still I decided to play the uncensored version as I did want to get all the content. However, some it felt just... unneeded. At one point the player is tasked to go raid an Orc stronghold where there are legionnaire prisoners. However, you end up finding two of them, both women, one alive, one dead. The player can piece together what happened from that alone, and yet the mod goes as far as to have the alive prisoner wail at one of the soilders about how she was raped and would have an Orc child. The only purpose of this scene felt like to show how horrible these Orcs were. But why not just do that with dead prisoners (doesn’t need to be SA,) or why have her go on a whole speech about it.
After playing through this part I really was trying to rack my head around how it could have been done better. And honestly, after a day, I was reminded of Red Dead Redemption 2, and the scene were Arthur finds a woman who was also SAed. The only difference is that the scene added more than just “wow, those guys we killed were pretty bad,” instead, it added to Arthur's character. He helps the woman home. When she’s about to explain what they did he simply said “I know.” Subtly in situations like this tend to be the most powerful. As people our brains peice together what we want to see and having the woman simply say “They...” and the solider reply with “I know,” would have made the scene much more powerful. (She’s also naked during the whole ordeal, let me give the woman a blanket, something!)
There’s other darker themes that I felt like were shock value (mainly the ending place with some children, however, talking about will just make me sick. So I think I’ll just move on. Basically, some stuff happens to kids and again I feel like it’s only there to prove how bad someone is and doesn’t give much of anything else. I feel like something horrible and big like that need to have numerous reasons to be there than a singular “look how terrible this dude is!”)
Good: Cool enemies. I don’t really feel like there’s much to say on this part. I just thought some enemies were really cool. I think the ones that stuck out to me are part of Vicn’s Creature Pack, but could be wrong. Mostly it was the bloody skeleton monsters. Very cool to see.
Bad: Not much role playing. Honestly, this part kinda made me the saddest as after one sidequest (which may have been my favorite part of the mod,) I had become an enemy of the state. It felt super in character as I was playing Alllin and despite being a serious guy, is also a little chaos gremlin who will flip off authority. But despite all that, I still ended up becoming a knight of the very state I was an enemy of and was forced to pick dialogue options that bended my knee to the king and was very formal. I’m not saying multiple path options in the way of a knight or criminal are needed, I just wish there were more dialogue options.
Good: Neat dungeon horror design. So this one is a bit here and there as the dungeons I went through had super neat astrosphere that did have the grimdark feel to them. One was an asylum dungeon which I found pretty neat. However, there was also a problem with length...
Bad: Long Dungeons. While this whole review is subjective, this part may be the most as I hate dungeons. If they’re neat looking I don’t mind. But when they take around thirty minutes to complete and little progress has been made I get real tired of them. This is why I started clipping through dungeons to just get the thing I needed and get out.
Good: Music is nice. (But as I type this I went to go find the composer. But I don’t see any credits to music, so a slight bummer. If you know who did the music, please let me know and I’ll edit this part with credits.)
Bad: A lot of dead women. And I get it, a lot of people in general die in this mod. And maybe I’m misremembering stuff, or looking to deep, but in the main questline there was one main female character. And she is killed. And then there are several spots that are just about women in harm. (Like the SA I mentioned before, a part where a little girl is killed by a griffin, an Orc woman being tortured, a brothel getting massacred.) And I just didn’t see so much focus on men. And that sounds weird. But when it leans to one side so much, it is just super noticeable.
Good: Voice Acting is nice. I know there isn’t too much to say there. I just really liked it. There were some unvoiced lines, but I don’t have too much of a problem with that since they are still looking for voice actors for various roles. I think the only problem I have with the unvoiced lines is that there’s no white noise for the line so the dialogue would just blink in and out and I couldn’t read what was said.
Bad: Very railroad path. You are forced to be a knight, and see red flags of the nobility and yet you can’t do anything. Most of the time when you question a noble why you should do something it’s “well I’ll just have you killed,” and sure, not dying is great, but then the next line I’ll talk as if my life wasn’t just threatened.
A friend of mine who tried to be a bit more through in the mod took a sidequest where it told you a noble (who turns out to be evil later on in the main quest,) is a cannibal. Can we confront the noble about it? No. Can we warn those who may be hurt by him in the future? No. Do we talk to him as if we don’t know that he eats people? Yep! It’s all just odd and I think again it just falls back to the lack of player choice.
Good: So on my list I wrote “Liked sick town,” which makes no sense to those who haven’t played it. So to explain it better there was a Side quest I really liked. Not only did it give a ton of player choice, but it actually made me feel like a good person, and the people were nice to me!
During my playthrough I made a rule that if someone was mean to me, I wouldn’t help them outside of the main questline. Cause why would I help someone who is rude to me? (There’s also an issue that most of the place is filled with mean people, so it creates little to no agency to help High Rock.) But one event was with some guards at a city I had to get into. I had to help them with an issue of some sick people and one of their guards who went missing. Come to find out the guard got sick and was trying to find medicine for the town so that they could live about three more years in peace. And in the end I was given a choice to kill the town, or help it. Obviously I helped it and became an enemy of the state. But I loved it! While the sick people would threaten you if you got to close to them, the guard with them was understanding. And his compassion for these people really stood out to me. It’s a shame I later had to bend my knee to the very people that wanted to kill them...
Bad: Lore Friendliness. This one is very short as I see lore in ES as free real estate. I don’t care what you add in your mod. That what makes it fun. However, I know this will be a turn off for some so I thought I would say it. I think the main factor is you talk to Mara on various occasions and I’ve been told that isn’t possible.
Good: City Design. I just like the layouts and looks of the city. What else can I say? Districts were interesting. (I think I'm running out of typing juices...)
Bad: Too much going on at one. There’s an Orc extremist group, there’s reach men attacking, there’s Namira shit, there’s a plague, and there’s a civil war starting. That is a lot, and it’s just the main quest. I realize it’s good to have a lot going on in a location, but not all of it needs to be in the main quest. All this stuff makes it super confusing and hard to keep track of what is really going on.
Bad: Buggy. I’m doing two bads in a row as I do want to leave the review off on a good note. There were quite a few buggy stuff. However, considering how I played through it I wouldn’t doubt if a lot was my fault. That being said, I know some who did play through it correctly did also suffer from bugs. That being said, I know the mod author is still working on the mod so bugs will most likely get fixed.
Good: Dialogue explanation. One thing I really found helpful was that in front of dialogue options were [lore], [quest]. These little tidbits made it super easy to tell what dialogue I was picking or which one I needed to pick. Very small detail, but works wonders.
Oh me, oh my, that is long... Sorry about that.
TLDR: The mod is successful in it’s eerie astrosphere, but is dragged down by heavy writing. lack of player choice, and shock value issues.
Thanks for reading all this and want to say again I don’t want to sway anyone away from this mod. I think it’s always important to try out something for yourself. Though, if the Content Warnings from above upset you, I recommend playing through the censored version (it will ask you in the game.) I haven’t played through the censored version, but it says it get’s rid of those events.
I may try and do more reviews in the future, but understand these reviews are never an attack on the modder as I get modding is extermley difficult. My reviews are here to be optional constructive critism, and if I’ve said anything wrong or you disagree with I’m more than happy to have a conversation in the comments. (I also say optional as sometimes modders aren’t looking for critism and just want to mod/create and that is 100% valid.)
Thanks for reading again, and hope y’all enjoyed!
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Hello, I'm Everilde (or Ash, as some know me best)! I have been writing all my life, but this is the first time I've ever created a Tumblr for it. I currently write fanfiction and post on AO3, but wanted a space with more community, where I could share my other WIPs and original fiction. Expect to find info on those, fanfic updates, and various other things here. I'm looking forward to experiencing this writing community and finding new stories to read and writers to follow!
About Me
Age: 31
Pronouns: She/Her
Likes: Writing & reading (obviously), digital art, video games, tarot, art journaling, dungeons & dragons, cartoons (never too old!), coffee, animals, and so much more.
What I Write:
Mainly Fantasy, Romance, Adventure… typically all at once. I write fanfiction as well, usually about video games I love. I also enjoy writing short scenes based on dreams I have, but I usually don't categorize those under specific genres.
Do note: My stories sometimes contain adult themes and nsfw content. Violence may also appear depending on the setting, but I am highly unlikely to write anything too detailed and gory.
WIPs under the cut!
I am still setting my blog up, so my pages dedicated to these works are not complete. I'll make proper WIP intro posts for each as I finish their pages!
(the most prominent right now)
Fanfics -
Dawns in Fire: A Skyrim Story
Follows the typical Skyrim main story (with various alterations).
A prostitute from Solitude has her life turned upside down after one night with an Imperial soldier. Now she has to save the damned world…
Tags: #dawnsinfire, #difskyrim
Hard to be soft, tough to be tender: an Overwatch Fic
This is a female presenting reader/junker queen fic,
You want to help the world find peace between humans and omnics. You don't t want to get kidnapped by two insane Junkers, hauled out into the dusty outback, and then taken hostage by a "Junker Queen". But, here you are.
Tag: #htbsoft
Smited and Smitten: An Overwatch Fic.
This is a female presenting reader/junker queen fic.
The Goddess of War guides mortals on a path of death and destruction. Everything you knew and loved lay in Her way, and those blessed by Her thunder lay waste to it all. Orphaned, you were left to grow in a Temple of mercy and healing... but you never forgot and you never forgave. The flames of vengeance burn in your heart and all you long for is to do the impossible: to kill a Goddess.
Tag: #s&sfic
Original Fics -
Beast (title pending)
A sapphic retelling of Beauty and the Beast.
Anwen never knew what lay beyond the dark woods, until fate forced her through a wall of thorns and into the cursed castle of a haunted lord.
Tag: #everildebeast
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If you’ve gotten caught up in the James Somerton stuff and haven’t checked out the rest of hbomberguy’s back-catalogue, take this post as your sign to reconsider that! His whole channel is pretty much devoted to bespoke, well-researched video essays that delve into different topics and try to separate the claims from the evidence.
I’ve seen pretty much every video of his(there’s remarkably few of them, considering his channel’s age, he doesn’t upload very frequently), so I’ve taken the time to more or less collect them into a few categories, in case you’re only interested in a specific band of his content.
Measured Response videos: these are the ones you’re familiar with if you’ve watched the back half of the Somerton/Tommy Tallarico videos, in-depth research into a particular topic that results in bullshit being discovered, dissected, and understood. Sometimes there’s a deep dive into a specific individual, but more often we get a rogues gallery of people talking about whatever the broader concept of the video is(including: Flat Earthers, Antivaxxers, Climate Deniers, people complaining about SJWs, and many others). An important detail in these is that the point of the video isn’t to mock or poke fun at the people holding these beliefs, but interrogating how they came to hold them in the first place, where they came from and why.
X is Y and Here’s Why: this category isn’t exclusive to videos with that naming scheme, but those are the poster children for this type of video. Hbomb often calls himself a “gaming YouTuber”, and I think these videos are the reason. These are his videos about specific pieces of media, deep dives into what makes a particular thing…well whatever he thought about it. It can be genius, garbage, disappointing, or fine, just in those videos that match this title, and other videos explore other media with the same care and attention, like Serious Lore Analysis, and other videos that are one-offs about a particular thing, like Outsiders, Dark Souls 2, and the 2017 Doctor Who Special(he gets very specifically fixated on things. There are two exceptions to this category: Skyrim is Garbage and Here’s Why, which is a joke video, and Speedrunning is Awesome and Here’s Why, which fits more into the last category.
Harris Bomberguy thought you should know about this: this final category is kind of a catch-all, but I think the videos are still somewhat unified by this theme because, frankly, the guy has a very focused YouTube channel. This is how I’d describe stuff like the speedrunning video and Scanline. Some of his older stuff falls into this as well, like What Makes An Action Scene Good? and WOKE BRANDS. Basically just more deep dives, but this stuff is less scientific and often leans more on Mr. Bomb’s actual academic education in film studies. They tend to delve into the history of a certain type of media and the mechanics of how it comes to be. Like How Stuff Works except for making media.
Oh and if you do go into these, please listen to the parts where Harry isn’t dunking on people. Those bits are really important to the videos and I can tell a lot of you weren’t paying attention to those parts because you’re just focused on how much of a bastard Somerton/Tallarico is
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