#the world can provide for us

[thesocialgremlin]

If I were in charge, first order of business is to taxe the super rich for a universal basic income.

Next, we're tying politicians wages to the average income of their riding. You can't represent people if you think yourself above people.

With that, we tie minimum wage to inflation and use it as a baseline to cap rent, utilities, insurances. Create a public record so nobody can rip you off.

End price gouging entirely. Enforce the retail/wholesale markup and investigate companies with suspicious profits. Tax businesses higher based on the CEO/Baseline staff pay gap - less than 30% are eligible for government grants, everything above gets taxed heavier with the highest gap.

No more super rich. Nobody needs that much money. Those people need to start investing in their companies and their people instead of making millions a day on the back of their workers.

Housing programs. Land allotments. You turn 25 years old, congratulations, here's a house and a plot of land. Do with it as you may, but you may not be allotted another plot for another 25 years if you squander it. Why's that?

You turn 50? Welcome to your retirement package? You want travel? You want crafts? You want a cottage in the woods? Ask and you get; you served your time, we've got you. Rest, enjoy the rest of your life. Spend your years doing what brings you peace. As long as you're not hurting anyone who doesn't want to be hurt, you good, boo.

#what a world it would be #politics #universal basic income #we can take care of each others #tax the rich #social justice #democracy #we're all human #we deserve better #we deserve rest #machines are already taking our jobs #the world can provide for us #but it cannot provide for greed #the only reason we can't all have nice things is so ten assholes can play gods #off with their heads #we need ubi and we need it now #make the world a better place #like isn't it the whole point of society #we could do so much better #if we just lived and let live #i hate it here #dream world

[gummi-ships]

Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance - La Cité des Cloches

#kingdom hearts dream drop distance #khddd #la cite des cloches #scenery #my gif #the battle music that plays here creates such a cool and grand atmosphere #i'm so used to spending most of my time in the town or at the cathedral that i forget how dark and gloomy this world can be #sora has to walk past thousands upon thousands of skeletal remains and we don't even get a single cutscene of him reacting to any of it #but i like that there are at least some big open spaces that let you go crazy with flowmotion and climb up the tall buildings and towers #and that you can actually climb up the cathedral from the town square below #but one of my favorite parts in the whole game is playing through riku's side of the story in this world #i love the themes it explores and the insight it provides for his character. so good

[oatbugs]

Jack Marsh (2005), Friendship Otherwise - Toward a Levinasian Description of Personal Friendship

#saw carnation lily lily rose by john singer seargent irl today. it was basically at my doorstep all along idk why i never went to see it #it was placed at a corner in the gallery. me and my friend sat down and sketched the paintings of beautiful naked people quite badly. paper #provided by tate britain. she told me about how she couldnt look her boyfriend in the face after a harrowing film about war. when i say the #interview was informal i mean the person who was supposed to be my boss told me let me get you a cider and then he said after #50 years of life he knows people are inherently good and it only takes a little bit of kindness to save this world. he said he tricked #his wife into keeping the baby and then he said he quit his job at a US bank to help people find meaning and in it #he would have liked to find meaning. instead he started climbing with his friends. he said he chews his cigarettes because its a habit from #when he had to hide things from people. the entire time i felt uncomfortable and incredibly enlightened. this is my friends mentor. she has #his pattern of pauses and expletive and penchant for ends-justify-means attitude. i do think im not very clever #but maybe one day i will love you enough to make up for it. i wrote code i dont understand staring at the final error i thought about how #we both thought of how when we're too old to remember the voices of our friends we would like to stand in the pathway of the LHC beam pipe #cut it open and eat light in the freezing cold vacuum (kills you long before radiation will) the invisible puncture wound unfolding dna #back to the start larger than you ever were. you go to heaven once youve been to hell. my friend is in my bed #practicing calculations of eigenvectors by hand and she is uninterested in a visual proof you are uninterested in incompetence #we catch a train this is your kind of burden you tragic hero wincing at that word you only do this because you have to. im the only one #who can. i am a coward in this for the fucking poetry. the visual proofs. the pretty numbers. an architect who was horrible at maths wanted #to be a philosopher and accidentally ended up neck in deep in 70th Error On Visual Studio Code i want to kiss your eyes before we say #goodbye we both know there is no love in the way there should be. I still have your dress in my wardrobe. i hope you make art. #you think im alright head-wise i think you fucking hate me i think ill never be so clever you want me to tell you my idea? #if you wanted more of this world i would have liked to kiss you harder. we cant both be like this. im sorry i cant be with you the whole wa #the love is gone if you have to ask it. his breath catches his eyes feel stiff it is -1.9 kelvin he is near the beam pipe i miss holding #his hand i miss her singing voice i miss his hair and i found the antonym of pain thank you for carrying me home.

[exhausted-archivist]

In regards to my last reblog on the scale of Thedas, latitude and stuff. I’ve been thinking about how much thought I give all this. Especially because this topic is one I’ve been talking with a lot of people about lately. It crops up a lot with people who, like me enjoy natural world building or are fanfic writers. Or really anyone who sits down and reads the lore at length. More times then not the question of Thedas’s scale comes up.

So, I want to establish I am very well aware that I’m likely giving it more thought than the devs. I have that luxury as a fan and consumer of the series. It is extremely relevant for me because I like making maps for the series, plotting out travel paths, and scaling things for da ttrpg campaigns I write.

So because I think about it a lot, I notice all the many different scales of Thedas in terms of travel time. How the scale they gave the ttrpg doesn’t match up with any scale they established in the main games or books. I think if the devs sat down and thought about establishing a standard scale and also considering just basic stuff we also wouldn’t have the Deep Roads be 2-4 miles / 3.21-6.43 km below sea level and display a lack of geothermal qualities. I think they’d consider how they built a world with at least 9.1 million people and tons of mega fauna such as giants and dragons and 14’/4.26 m tall bears that hunt dragons, all squished into roughly 1/4 of Europe and how much that isn’t really sustainable. How there would be much more impact if nature encroachment in civilization and how common things like that would be in places. Which they do consider it to a degree, I’m not saying they don’t. But I think if they thought about it just to make the world something that holds up a little better to idle musings, it wouldn’t be a bad thing. That the world would feel more real and alive and also narratively give them more to work with.

The contradictions and lack of consideration for the natural world has always been one of my critiques of Dragon Age, among other things. The reason why that is, is mostly because of a noticeable trend the lack of natural world building in fantasy. It’s a topic that has been discussed elsewhere and at length by other people, but to summarize nature is slowly having less and less impact in fantasy even in an ambient quality. Obviously this isn’t a universal statement, nor a universally required thing for a story to explore and have. That there are things that do focus on and explore it, but speaking in general terms, it is a trend in the majority of media.

Which for me is a bummer as it is an aspect of writing and world building I enjoy. I really like themes of man vs nature and to have that you need to have a basic level of natural world building. Which BioWare doesn’t really explore in Dragon Age despite having elements of it - such as how regular raw lyrium is explosive, mages get sick around all lyrium unless it is diluted to a safe amount for mages, and raw lyrium straight up kills them if they’re in the same room.

So then you have questions of how do mages go/handle being underground with such a risk? Dwarves have stone sense but would mages be able to tell when they’re getting close to large lyrium deposits because they’re getting sick? Does this impact grey warden mages? Darkspawn mages?

Things that don’t get fully acknowledged or explored despite being mentioned casually in codices most people don’t read. And they don’t for a couple of reasons such as potential coding issues but also all the questions you’d have to ask:

How would you implement that as a mechanic? Would you lock mage players out of entire areas featuring raw lyrium? Would they take environmental damage if you wanted the players to explore it regardless? Would it be a mechanic only applied by in harder difficulty modes? Do you acknowledge it in banter but not in any other way? Create a way to explain why the pc mage and their mage companions aren’t dropping dead?

BioWare’s answer seems to seemingly just ignore it because it would make gameplay too challenging/punishing and likely might not be fun for a player to deal with. But they compromise by keeping the lore active in the canon through codices and low impact additions. Which is a completely okay solutions, not my preferred but I get why they do it.

When I approach this lore, I do so without expecting them to fully flesh out each nation or know which city has the most resources and the geologically rich lands in said country. Dragon Age, and BioWare in general, relies on semi-soft world building. The world was after all designed for a game. They only need to build out what they need and what hopefully won’t paint them into a corner with future installments.

Additionally, the writing style for Dragon Age doesn’t suit the hard world building that I prefer, I’m quite aware of that but also know that when it comes to talk about world building in any media, there is always the issue of people (like me) who world build for fun and consider all these small aspects but ultimately they aren’t always needed and necessary for the story a game like Dragon Age is telling.

Dragon Age is told with the intention of things being given from an unreliable narrator. Built on the concept of: there’s three sides to the truth, what x thinks happens, what y thinks happens, and then what actually happened. Which works and I love the premise.

That said, I think that it also impacts lore that shouldn’t be subjected to the unreliable narrator. Foundation or anchor lore points to be specific. Which, as we know, BioWare has always struggled with consistency in their lore, particularly with Dragon Age.

Distance is one of those foundational points that shouldn’t change, and it’s also one of those points that you don’t have to give exact travel times. You can leave it vague and stick to the official statements like the ones we have of Ferelden being the size of England (or Ireland depending on the source you use). If you’re going to be giving specifics, then I think being consistent with how long it travels to get to point a to b and not changing it multiple times in one game should be a basic expectation that is met.

Other ones the series has and is pretty consistent with is how we know Thedas has 24 hours a day, they have seasons like we expect, and are in the southern hemisphere.

Do they sometimes slip up because editing doesn’t catch they’ve made a reference that applies only to the northern hemisphere? Yeah, and that’s not bad. There are a lot of people working on the project and things slip through.

I know I have the luxury to think about Thedas in a capacity that allows for the hard world building that I like. I also know I focus on and enjoy aspects of lore that are not exactly popular for their main audience and are pretty niche.

I don’t expect BioWare to world build how I do because I’m not world building for a massive and varied audience. Not even when I do world building for my tabletop games, because I’m catering to a smaller and more specific audience.

Still I think it’s valid and worth pondering these little elements of the world building. For fun, appreciation, and to nurture one’s own creativity and understanding of media, the world, and what they think makes a believable world.

Devs might not have time to consider it but we sure do and that’s half the fun of enjoying media I think.

#dragon age #archi is musing #long post #I saw some people on my older posts while I was writing this talk about how its ‘not that deep’ and not everything needs to be explained #and like I’m aware of that lol #I’m just critiquing how logic and immersion breaking it can be to not be consistent on the fundamentals #how much I personally don’t enjoy a world built that starts crumbling if you think too hard on all the provided lore #love the game and the series but evaluating the media you consume and engage with is a good practice to have #as a creative who world builds knowing what I value and like in world building allows me to grow as one #I also think dragon age has a lot of really cool and under used elements of natural world building and while I would love to focus on that #BioWare gives the curve ball where I’m sent down a rabbit hole often because I realize it doesn’t make sense in context of the lore

[spadesmain]

Two ourple kittlings!!!

#old grampa and teenage garbage dweller gurl friendship >>>>>> #they tell lots of stories to each other #seam’s are very historic and can provide a moral lesson #while catty’s is like ‘omg like— today all my books fell down in front of everyone in school oh my gosh it was like so embarrassing🙈!’ #also I’m using catty’s undertale version instead because why not and her dark world outfit is supposed to be stained and full of things #and they sell garbage with bratty cause they are like besties heart emoji #anyways incoming tagsss!!! #catty and bratty #bratty and catty #catty undertale #undertale catty #catty ut #ut catty #undertale bratty #bratty undertale #bratty ut #ut bratty #the court magician #seam deltarune #deltarune seam #seam dr #dr seam #undertale fanart #undertale #deltarune fanart #deltarune #utdr fanart #utdr

[corvid-language-library]

first of all, grats on getting out of a relationship second does that mean you are going to stay in japan?

Hi there! Thanks, it's honestly been the hardest thing I've ever done because he's not a bad person and I still care about him a lot; we just wanted different things in life and I didn't want him to keep waiting on me to outgrow something I think is just a part of who I am. It felt cruel and it was eating away at me so it felt like the best decision, even though it doesn't necessarily feel right, y'know?

And secondly, yes it does! I've not decided how long for, but certainly another year, maybe more. Japan's not my forever country, but I still have a lot of room to learn and grow here, so I'm going to stick around until I'm ready to move on.

#what does the jay say #the two bravest things i've ever done i did last year: #1. move to the other side of the world alone #2. break up with a person i love just because neither one of us can provide what the other ultimately craves in life

[leos-regression-cove]

I think it says a lot about me as a person now that that the easiest way to make me cry as a child (and still now. I didn't think I'd tear up while writing this lmao) was to imply that the majesties and wonders of childhood and imagination are all a dream that inevitably leaves us as we get older that we can only regain in death and that the vivid inner worlds and personalities we give our toys in our early years either feel abandoned, vengeful, or die entirely as we age.

#i would literally have to leave the room for some movies or skip the endings of others because I found them so upsetting #a quick list of properties this post is about: #frosty the snowman‚ the polar express‚ the Carebears movie: the next generation‚ the velveteen rabbit‚ peter pan #the third tinkerbell movie‚ winnie the pooh‚ toy story 3‚ narnia‚ the wizard of oz (books)‚ the miraculous journey of edward tulane #and the songs goodbye yellow brick road‚ hey there delilah‚ and rainbow connection (by my own 9 year old interpretation) #The idea that adults can't access magic and it is something you HAVE to grow out of and this mystification of childhood upset me so much #I'm so glad I can put it into words now that I'm older #there are also probably many other properties that fit this description btw #like the brave little toaster and the raggedy anne musical I think #but after being traumatized by the velveteen rabbit I purposefully avoided most movies about toys #there are a lot of christmas shorts I also skip for that purpose #so anyway I'm putting it down this low for a reason #but I was reminded of this because now I'm using these same tattered toy and attatchment motifs in my own writing #but subverting that original meaning by sewing the toys back together so it becomes about repair and healing AS WELL AS the horrors of time #but also how such things can bring magic to people of all ages #and how love and comfort can still be provided by these inner worlds so many years later #the world is filled with beauty and wonder at any age and turning to cynicism and rejecting that reality is NOT what 'growing up' is about

[butcherb1rd]

question for world builders who know how to create planets n such. i would love some help!

the planet i’m designing has essentially one big continent that encompasses the entire north pole. the northern hemisphere is primarily land until it hits the equator. the south pole is entirely water, while the southern hemisphere is roughly 60% water/40% land. i should note that the average surface temp is much less than earth’s, the land is usually at a higher elevation, and the axial tilt is less than earth’s 23 degrees.

okay so: would both poles have ice caps?

one is entirely land and one is entirely water. there’s also a lot of rivers that flow north off a massive plateau in the center of the continent if that makes a difference

#world building #worldbuilding #sci fi #planet design #speculative worldbuilding #maps #fantasy maps #i could really use some help!!! #i can also post a pic of the world map if that helps #sorry this is so long I just need to provide enough info #panthilids

[legionofpotatoes]

I played Season over the weekend, which if I had to condense "thematic meandering" into a videogame is probably what I would most closely end up with; but it was still a cozy chill time that targeted my very specific niche of robust cow petting mechanics. Followed by journaling the heck out of them.

I do think cute indies living and dying by their sincere desire to paint the human condition should never ever ever fall into the temptation of obtuse and nebulous worldbuilding that desperately needs to explain itself so it can function as an aesthetic blanket for their vignettes. Just keep it loose and metaphor-heavy, fellas.

Cause if you're not extremely, painfully specific about your intention with a story that centers ignorant tourism and historic preservation, you're gonna beef it, bud

#season a letter to the future #I have so many nitpicks but it feels mean lmao. in a very subjective sense I had a good time with it. I am a boring playstyle guy #scrapbooking and cycling in a pretty world is right up my alley. wish it wasn't so #man idk if I can call it what I want to call it cause it's so unclear of its own optics. the intention feels pure #for whatever good that can do in a context this god damn loaded :D but at least I recorded the froggies on my tapes #(a game like this does not need elaborate lore that it then fails to adequately explain anyway. that is a barrier to many of season's #emotional high points. shit just lacks clarity of purpose and happens as a given and banks on its aesthetic and melancholic context to #provide the necessary backbone for that punch. but then you end up revealing your hand and general flippant disposition towards this #nebulously coded cultural backdrop that you've constructed for ultimately shallow purposes. especially irt to the core ethos #like the game ultimately asks us if dispassionate preservation of a dying culture is more valuable than the vicarious experience of it but #then that binary is never meaningfully weighted since the protagonist survives and succeeds in either option BECAUSE of the journal and? #it all fizzles out in thematic incongruity. maybe it's my own hangups with glorification of legacy to such a manic degree #or maybe it's really just meant to be sort-of aimless and 'human' in that way. which again negates the need for this lore-brain barrier #just keep it simple without the oddly pedestrian mechanics of the literal apocalypse and the mass amnesia prayers and tell #the exact same story. with a tighter grip on the context of who the protagonist is in this land. there's your game) #text

[ereborne]

Song of the Day: January 22

"My Love Mine All Mine" by Mitski

#song of the day #I tell you true me having this song stuck in my head is entirely separate from the CoD nonsense also in my head #but the absolute hilarity of me singing it incessantly 'I love my my mine / nothing in the world belongs to me / but my love mine all mine #nothing in the world is mine for free / but my love mine all mine all mine' me on loop in a low sweet soft croon #watching as Duncan plays through the 'Alone' mission--which I can recite step by step using fics as if they were walkthroughs-- #Duncan so intensely in the gamer zone and me incidentally providing a romantic soundtrack as Soap says 'so you do like me' #they don't make comedy like this #also I made root vegetable fries (parsnips and carrots and my own grown sweet potatoes) and blue-cheese burgers for dinner #and it was so tasty and made me so happy #work was ungood but everything since has been lovely

[solarissantaella]

I honestly don't trust writers who say that you should never spend that much time describing characters' appearances or how they dress... tell me you don't respect fashion as a form of worldbuilding without telling me you don't respect fashion as a form of worldbuilding.

#worldbuilding #this is mostly for sff where you really get to go wild coming up with new fashions #and even if you're using very old fashion trends you can ascribe new meaning to them in the world you've created #but in ANY work of writing fashion can still be used to provide insight about characters #obviously you don't need to be throwing gratuitous chunks of my immortal-esque text in there describing every outfit every time #BUT how characters dress can say so much about their culture! how they perceive themselves! how they want others to see them! #and if they're dressed in a way that DOESN'T really tie into any of that- why? #imo the problem people have with these descriptions is mostly that they're incorporated clumsily and can kill the pacing #but there are WAYS to do it subtly! you don't HAVE to grind the story to a halt to get a few details in there! #(I'm yelling at myself here while crying)

[littlemousejelly]

haven't seen anyone discussing their hoid box so is it safe to say everyone's as disappointed as i am? the only thing i really like is the mouse pad because i can cover his smarmy face with my mouse

#tbf the only thing i really like about hoid is that he's (usually) there to provide encouragement to the characters i love #and it's fun to recognize when he's on a different world again and wonder how the hell he got there and WHY he's even there #i also already have a better thicker mouse pad anyway and i'm just putting the hoid one over the top of it #SPECIFICALLY so i can get SOME use out of something in the box and so i can be satisfied in covering his face #i don't hate him he's just some guy #but not Just Some Guy (affectionate) #just some guy (indifferent) #actually i think i liked him more before this iteration of official art of him came out #he REALLY has a punchable face (which i suppose is what they were going for) #you cannot convince me jasnah is in a relationship with this fucker #ace lesbian jasnah forever and ever amen #brandosando box discourse

[maimingkillingiii]

I need my sense of smell to come back... NEOW!!!

(I went on a whole rant in the tags)

#eating is a chore. i cannot taste anything unless it has so many flavors. i do not go to school somewhere that provides us with flavors. #i can sorta almost taste sweet and spicy. umami is gone. haven't sought out bitter yet. sour is sorta there??? but yeah no i need my spice #wheres my spice. where is it. huh (redacted) university? #provide me with SEASONED FOOD. I REQUIRE IT. #and they provide me with a shaker of black pepper #im about to go buy myself some spices or at the very least a pepper grinder instead of the weak-ass shakers. #GAWWWWD i hate it. i cant even get snacks when i go see saw because I can't taste them. #hell world hell world #the creature speaks

[capfalcon]

i think people should be required to do 10 hours of volunteering/community service every time they say the word "problematic"

#i hate it. i hate it. as someone who deals w social media and studies it for a living/career #i fucking hate that word #its like just one step away from people saying 'ive decided these things are all immoral' and lumping them all together #i understand why the word is used i just think its literally meaningless #problematic could mean conflict. it could mean important discourse. it could mean someone has had a negative impact #it could mean that what they said has harmed people #problematic means literally nothing #it provides no nuance no substance #and people throw it around like it means something when it doesnt #and they act like its this Terrible Complex issue when in reality #its just some fuckin buzzword people use to describe a myraid of much bigger much more interesting conversations #and you dont get to the heart of those conversations by throwing the word problematic around as if its some #Genuine label #ur not the social justice activist you think you are just by using the word problematic #and its so frustrating listening to people talk on and on about race and 'problematic' people and issues #idk man. shut up and go volunteer somewhere. #make a difference in your community. spend less time talking about old tweets or pedagogy and more time helping people who need it. #and its also. i also really hate the word problematic bc i feel like the only people who use it #are people who think the world can be divided into black and white #like go help build some houses or pack food for homeless people or garden at ur local park #make a difference and then worry about all this shit #actions speak louder than words #stop talking about how fuckin problematic it is that this guy hates queer people and actually go and help some queer people #etc etc. ugh.

[gibbearish]

dont starve is kicking my ass btw

#really wish there was a way to like. restart a bit ahead?? if that makes sense??? like spawn with a few items already instead of having to #do it all over again every time #esp cause like. i dont have enough health to really spend time learning how to fight the enemies. #so i either stand still and kill them while losing 90% of my health and learning nothing about them #or i try to dodge and fail and die and have to start all over AGAIN #also the wiki for this game fucking sucks can i just saym i should not have to go seven links down in google to confirm that full moons #make it bright enough you can do stuff all night. that seems to be literally its number 1 function #'xyz mobs will turn into abc mobs' 'this one special item will show up' GREAT THOSE SEEM MAYBE LESS GENERALLY HELPFUL THAN JUST. #'the full moon provides full vidibility and prevents Charlie from spawning throughout the night' #easy peezy #grinding and gnashing my teeth like it is definitely fun and thats probably honestly a big part of the frustration #is that its like. im having a lot of fun and then in three seconds my world is ruined and i have to spend another hour or two building back #up from scratch #idk im used to hardcore being an optional difficulty increase rather than the baseline #except of course for binding of isaac but that game has WAY more in terms of self defense options #here i have a spear at best

[cxnthie]

how is this dorm room so fucking cold

#cathy wuthering heights 🤝 me: being so cold #it's gotten do cold this weekend and they're not even heating yet #this must be one of their saving money mechanisms #along with the fact that they won't provide toilet paper because 'we'd use too much of it' #so now every time i wanna use the bathroom i need to walk like an idiot all the way down the hall with a paper roll in my hands #this is such a 1st world problem but come on... #i can complain a little bit #rambles