the-unaligned-player

[the-unaligned-player]

s2 au where the plan™ works out and c!Dream and c!Punz manages to reset the server

but now the plan worked out. Everyone (except c!dream and c!punz cause they were the ones that caused it) has forgotten what happened and it's more or less peaceful. Sooo what now?

c!Dream has kind of lost his purpose and goal now. He can't keep following the plan cause the plan is already done, so what can he do? It's time for the trauma he's been running from to finally catch up to him. He's having a bit of an existental crisis but it's fine, he's alright, this is everything he wanted, right?

At least c!Punz is there to help him!

s2 Drunz healing fic but everything is going horrible, it's alright tho they're trying their best

(also, the rest of the server is kind of??? fine??? maybe possibly?? at least in the beginning but it doesn't last for long)

[the-unaligned-player]

to be honest, I think fandom exaggerating dream's analytical and intelligent abilities dream's plan is literally so stupid, like, many refer to it as "ignoring feelings for the sake of strict calculation, the end justifies the means blah blah blah a smart, logical plan that will nevertheless lead to psychological dissatisfaction", but the plan is literally the most ill-conceived thing I ever heard, like, that's not even a plan?? they're testing the revival book in hopes that one day it will somehow help them achieve immortality and restart the server - that's just ridiculous and I also have no idea how dream expects that restarting the server will solve his/their/servers problems, like how is that supposed to work? and this “if we are immortal, no one will have to suffer and we can live forever and know and blah blah blah” such naive crap, honestly I could ask a thousand probing questions or give a thousand reasons why this plan wouldn't work in any reality, and I doubt dream wouldn't have asked these questions in the months they've been running their tests; the plan is literally just his feelings: afraid to die → need immortality, lost everything and it's killing me → need a restart and so on - there's no analysis behind this shit

I literally find it strange not the fact that punz allows this, although the plan harms dream, but the fact that he really believes in this plan and follows it, like, come on, punz is +- fine, there is no trauma that can overshadow his ability to think, why is he indulging in this stupid idea?

strongly agree / agree / ambivalent / disagree / strongly disagree / don’t care whatsoever

I think you're conflating a bunch of things. Dream's plan is not the same as his methodology. His methodology is not the same as his motivations. Having emotional reasons for a plan is not the same thing as that plan being stupid. "lost everything and it's killing me → need a restart" isn't a description of a stupid plan, that's a description of an over-emotional motivation for a plan. Just because you disagree with what his goal was trying to achieve doesn't mean that the strategies he took to achieve that goal were stupid.

Like, take staged finale as an example. I can argue that it's overkill or a poorly considered goal to imprison himself in dangerous circumstances chiefly to achieve a) protecting his close ally b) getting the server off his back and c) getting a sick base. But I won't claim that the steps he took to set up and execute staged finale aren't evidence of someone successfully using strategic thinking to accomplish his goals, which is generally what people are talking about when invoking strategist!Dream.

Dream expecting that his plan will fix his emotional problems isn't stupid in that it's a failure of logic. It's stupid in that it's a failure in identifying that his problems are actually emotional. Which gets covered pretty handily in the genuine finale! Tommy didn't say "your plan is stupid because you neglected to consider these reasons that curing death won't actually work." Instead, Tommy said, "your plan is stupid because you're failing to see that you're hurting people here and now and you could have the friends you want here and now if you just put down your damn book and make peace." which, I'm gonna be honest, also sounds a bit like naive crap to me.

Also, you're acting as if his plan is based simply on an unspecified fear of death when all signs point to it literally being a reaction to the existence of the revival book! Like, sure, when you phrase it like "hur dur maybe this magic book will fix my problems" it sounds pretty stupid. But what actually happened was more along the lines of "permadeath didn't exist on this server as a concept, now it does. revival didn't exist on this server as a concept, now it does. maybe one of these can be used to fix the other." Which is pretty damn straightforward to my eyes!

I really, truly don't see what the problem is with "plan fix death" when you literally have a necromancy book. (Like, logistically, not ethically or whatever.) It seems like the supernatural complications with the balance of life and death, whatever XD's deal is, the server reset, Foolish and the experiments upsetting the balance, all of that, came later (and lacks its conclusion for doylist reasons). but WHY the complaint that fixing death doesn't make sense????? that's like. thing numero uno when you have a damn revival book. sorry if I'm getting carried away but I've seen this argument before and it genuinely makes no sense to me. Reads the same to me as "if you have a hammer and some wood and nails why are you trying to build a table." maybe because I have the tools for the job?

Not to mention that even if we pretended that Dream's only motivation was trying to stop conflict, the plan "learn how to revive people" is still a really obvious solution! Make conflict not have permanent consequences? that's like. an easy mitigating solution.

Also, there's a more general conflation happening here between Dream's unwellness and a more general notion of stupidity. Which I also disagree with. His paranoid spiral led to him locking himself in a prison, but that doesn't mean it was stupid for him to conclude he needed protection, and that his allies needed protection.

The thing with Punz is a separate question, but it's one that I think Punz has answered handily himself: Punz wants knowledge and power, he says so outright, in simple language. He's not indulging a stupid idea: he's in cahoots with a guy who's brought him a ton of knowledge and power. The revive book is real, it's got real results, and it's shown Punz a glimpse of a world he clearly thinks is achievable: a world in which the supernatural shit has indeed been solved. And I don't see why you think he's silly to believe so, given the evidence he's seen with his own eyes.

#c!dream

[the-unaligned-player]

jokes about the prison arc are all well and good but they also tend evince a very telling discomfort with the source material.

I know the prison arc has done its job well when people who take exile dead serious are forced to laugh and make uncomfortable jokes to avoid facing the tone of the prison arc head-on

strongly agree / agree / ambivalent / disagree / strongly disagree / don’t care whatsoever

REAL AS HELL !!! it's really interesting especially for the group of people as u mention, considering that honestly most of the prison arc is played Completely straight with the only possible exception of like, prison podcast, which really didn't do anything to make the prison a joke as much as it was just c!techno being c!techno. compared to exile, where like, anywhere from 80-90% of the discduo interactions were literally just fooling around bookended by srs rp (exploding tommy's stuff and an ominous statement before c!dream dipped for the day, basically.)

it's not that jokes about either or taking either serious are wrong, but it's kind of interesting to see how the prison is treated by certain groups of fans as unpalatable Unless it's a joke. the torture can't be anything but a meme. it's perfectly fine and dandy to look at the canonical torture and say "hey what if c!quackity was just doing [x inconsequential action] to piss c!dream off" when there's bloodstains on the prime path, but somehow Wrong and going Against The Spirit Of The Server if you take the torture in the opposite direction by taking it to its logical extreme of what could have been allowed in the literal explicit torture sessions of daily torture. and yeah, it all goes to show how well the prison arc did its job, because sometimes it feels like people can't quite look at it head on. which is fascinating.

#c!dream

[the-unaligned-player]

I can't explain it, but I'm convinced that c!Dream would be the best and also the worst friend of all time.

#hes extremely loyal but hes also very very anxious about friendships #hes a sabotager he ruins relationships before the other person can ruin it for him #he’s more likely to just let a relationship break without trying to salvage it

[the-unaligned-player]

It's a Haiku

[the-unaligned-player]

Just remembered how in the early days the streams would go like:

*People fucking shit up and being like some feral dogs*

Dream joined the game

"OH MY GOD ITS DREAM 😨"

Like they used to be so fucking scared of Dream joining yet they didn't follow a SINGLE rule he gave em 💀

[the-unaligned-player]

I think a fairytale about C!Wilbur would be called ‘The Lie That Ate Itself’.

#c!wilbur

[the-unaligned-player]

So. Punz and George. They're both very much defined by their relationships with Dream, probably more than anyone else on the server. It's hard to talk about Punz without bringing up Dream, and it's hard to talk about George without referencing him either. They have lives, of course, but Dream is always at the forefront of their minds. Punz spent a whole year of their life just waiting for Dream's escape; George dreams away the days even after the jailbreak in a fantasy world of his imagination where everything is perfect and he can be with Dream.

But they don't really have a relationship. They don't talk, especially not about Dream, because that would show that they cared, and George is trying to deny that to himself after the dethronement and Punz cannot allow anyone to consider even for a moment that they are on Dream's side or it was all for nothing. So the relationship they do have, weak and distant as it is, is based on bitterness and perceived betrayals and envy.

George doesn't really think about Punz much. If he did, he'd had to think about Dream, and not his Dream, not the Dream that exists only in his dreams now, but the actual, real Dream. The Dream who dethroned him without a second glance. The Dream he abandoned. The Dream locked away in an obsidian prison, rotting away as George sleeps. And George doesn't want to think about Punz. Not when it pulls him out of his dreams and makes him think about Dream.

When he does think about Punz, though, he's not exactly a fan of them. They betrayed Dream; undeniably, inexcusably, they did. They had his trust, and they threw it away for a little extra bit of money. George would never do something like that. Dream left first, after all. Dethroned George first and told him he didn't care what happened to him. Dream never did that to Punz.

And that's important. Dream never turned against Punz; they were the one who chose to betray him. Dream never quite trusted George the same way he did with Punz, and, in the period leading up to the dethronement, he let George in on less and less of his plans, grew closer and closer to his mercenary. George told himself it was because Dream wanted to keep him safe. After the dethronement, he accepted the fact that Dream just didn't care about him anymore, and that it had been a sign of that.

George tells himself that if he had been in the situation as Punz, if Dream trusted him, he would of never done what they did.

Punz...doesn't have a great opinion of George, to tell the truth. They might of pretended to betray Dream, but George (and Sapnap, and everyone who was there and just watched it happen) is the one who actually did. George left. He left and didn't come back, didn't even show up for the arrest/execution (because that's what it really was, an execution, no use dancing around it). He didn't even go visit Dream in Pandora's Vault, even when he had every chance to, even when he didn't have a plan dictating that he absolutely could not do that. Not like Punz did.

Unreliable. Untrustworthy. Uncaring. Those are the nicest words for what George is, at least to Punz. Dream died, twice, and George was nowhere to be found. Just because Dream had been trying to keep him safe. To make sure people didn't try to target George to hurt Dream. And George just left, like that was an option in this game they were all playing, that none of them save Wilbur had chosen to play, like you could just throw up your hands and say "okay, that's it, I'm done" and leave with immunity, taking everything you've done with you. That wasn't how the world worked. And it didn't matter if George understood that or not, because it still hurt Dream, and that was what was important. Because what George did was a betrayal, and because they were already familiar enough with that to know how bitter it tasted. Because Punz had to constantly pretend and reap what they had sown and deal with this betrayal they had committed - not the one they were infamous for but the one in their heart and their brain and the way people looked at them and laughed with them and the way they had agreed to the plan and let Dream die and the sneaking suspicion they had, growing louder every day, that something had gone wrong and that they had to do something about it but that too would be a betrayal - but George didn't, just because he had been there earlier and knew some people longer. Because people trusted him more and he didn't have to prove how reliable he was and how much he hated Dream and all that.

And because George had Dream's love in a way Punz never could. Dream loved too freely, that much was true, but he flinches at every motion Punz that was a little too fast, a little too sudden, and makes sure to call everything a business arrangement, makes sure they're mercenary and client, makes sure to suppress any little trace of attachment that could get either of them hurt. And, even now, even after George has gone and left, Dream still loves George; Punz isn't too blind to reality to miss it. And they had kinder days together, back before everything went wrong; there were no kinder days for Punz, and there never had been.

Despite everything, they're two sides of the same coin: wishing for something that is no longer reachable, no longer possible, because things have changed and because people have changed. Because Dream has changed, partially due to the decisions they made, and there isn't anything they can do to go back to how it was. Not truly.

And neither of them really care about anything or anyone else. They're not here to fight for ideals or morals, they just want to keep the people they love safe and away from the people who would want to hurt them. They are willing to kill for it, but, because of who Dream is, and because that would put them in danger, they can't. They're not allowed to, explicitly in Punz's case, implicitly by Dream pushing George away. Because Dream wants to keep the people he cares about safe, and that can't happen if it looks like he cares about them or vice versa.

(It's only okay if Dream's the one getting hurt, after all)

[the-unaligned-player]

c!dream and c!awesamdude have the same relationship that a lot of people think c!tommy and c!dream have. if you even care.

[the-unaligned-player]

always cracks me up a little when I see sympathy for c!quackity that's specifically centered on like, angst about him getting killed by c!techno. because like. my dude my guy. you formed an extrajudicial mob themed on c!techno's dehumanization and murder. mans was fleeing his own execution armed with nothing but a PICKAXE. how am I supposed to feel bad for you

[the-unaligned-player]

/dsmp /rp

I still can't get over the interaction between Dream and Sam where Dream asks Sam to list all the things that each person hates him for. Sam proceeds to list everything he did, from letting Tommy and Ghostbur die, to killing Ranboo and abducting Michael.

Everything, except for locking Dream in prison for a year and letting him get tortured. When Dream calls him out on this, Sam says, "Locking you in prison is not something people hate me for." The clip can be found below.

He specifically emphasizes that people don't hate him for what he did to Dream. Obviously, this means that Dream is not a person in his mind. Dream quickly realizes this as well and asks Sam if he's saying that Dream is not a person. Sam then offers the weak excuse of, "I wouldn't say that's true, but..."

Of course, this is exactly what he is saying. It's obvious that Sam doesn't consider Dream to be a person from the very start of Dream's imprisonment. He calls Dream "the prisoner" to visitors, and consistently calls Dream "the bad guy" to his face, even after Dream is in a position of power over him.

Only an actual person could hate Sam for the things that he did. Dream is the prisoner, Dream is the villain, Dream is the bad guy, Dream is a monster, Dream is evil. He isn't a person, so what Sam did to him doesn't matter compared to what he did to others.

It's such a small interaction, but I think it's really interesting how much it actually shows about both Sam and Dream. Sam's complete lack of self-awareness, Dream's resigned acceptance of not being seen as a person again, the way Sam tries to deny it and brush it off. One of my favorite interactions for sure.

[the-unaligned-player]

It makes sense why it would freak Dream out because it’s like “where the fuck did you come from and go back there immediately!”

YEAH!! He's always portrayed feeling some sense of responsibility for the server, even though he's not actually The owner of it.

Mans probably thought he was going crazy when no one else thought to ask questions (he was going crazy btw but still)

[the-unaligned-player]

The other thing cDream mentioned was that he didn’t know where they came from. Like he specifically states that cTommy “just appeared” on the server. That “people were suddenly on the server when they weren’t the day before” and other people got used to it but the whole thing threw Dream off.

That is such an interesting point!!

Whenever people write it out, it's always either c!Dream specifically let them in, or they chose to show up there. But they just appeared and ran with it..

I love that. There's so many unsettling ways to spin it

[the-unaligned-player]

/dsmp /rp

I've seen a lot of discussions about Dream and Punz's relationship in the past months. Mostly about how Punz didn't stop Dream from going on a suicidal path, and how Punz is mainly an enabler who couldn't or didn't offer Dream the (emotional) support that he needed. I do agree with this assessment in part, but I think there's a bit more nuance there that can be explored. This turned out to be quite long so the rest can be found under the cut.

Punz is not the one to take charge in his and Dream's plans. That's just not the kind of relationship they have. When Dream says they need to stage a betrayal, Punz is more worried about the execution of that plan than about the actual plan itself. This also happens with the Revival Book. Punz offers suggestions to improve plans or clarifications on how a plan will work, but he never tells Dream he can't do something, or that they need a different plan. Punz already had this role when he was still only Dream's mercenary and it never really changes. Dream has a plan and Punz helps him with it and offers suggestions to improve it. It's been said before that Punz is an enabler, and this is actually true. While Techno would say something like, "That's a dumb plan, you need to try a different plan," Punz would say, "That's a dumb plan, here's how to improve it." But I don't think Punz is like this because he cares about Dream's plans so much. Punz's friendship with Dream is very important to him, so I think it's more that he cares about Dream so much that he can't bear to tell him no.

When Dream gets out of prison, Punz is happy about two things. 1. Seeing Dream again. and 2. The plan being back on track again, the server being "back to normal." It probably becomes clear very fast that they cannot just continue their plan as normal, with Dream having been tortured and then wasting away in the prison after breaking out. Punz most likely already has a baseline level of anger towards the rest of the server and this only increases after learning about what happened to Dream in the prison. Punz is very, very angry at the other server members, and it's getting harder and harder for him to keep up this façade that he is against Dream. So when he and Dream find out about the imbalance on the server caused by too many revivals and also the subsequent corruption, Punz probably immediately jumps on the solution to kill everyone who is against them. Finally, finally, he and Dream can solve the problem with division on the server once and for all. Finally, he can get rid of the people who mistreated Dream so badly, who are so simple-minded and unwilling to listen.

Punz does offer emotional support to Dream, but not the kind of support that would pull Dream away from this path toward self-destruction. Punz's support mostly consists of him helping Dream with whatever Dream asks. Dream needs help with the Revival Book, Dream needs Punz to pretend to betray him, Dream needs equipment after escaping the prison, Dream needs Purpled's help with taking revenge. Essentially, Dream has nobody left but Punz, and Punz makes sure that Dream can always count on him to be there. Dream isn't the type to open up quickly about his feelings, so Punz tries to make him feel reassured and that he's not alone, that he can depend on at least one person after being betrayed by everyone else. Offering reassurance and compassion is emotional support as well.

I think Dream also hides a lot of his real feelings from Punz, because Punz immediately says that "Dream is always pretty happy" when Dream tells Tommy that he is "happy now". It could be that Dream is so detached from his feelings and so dissociated all the time that there's only the outward excitement about the Revival Book left, which Punz reads as happiness. Dream generally deals with negative emotions by telling himself that he'll deal with them in the future, that he has "forever to think about it", so he doesn't have to deal with them now. I think Punz desperately wants Dream to be alright again, but he doesn't know the right words that would get through to Dream, so he just tries to support him through actions instead and hopes that this is enough to make Dream happy.

I don't think Punz is aware of how destructive their plan exactly is either. In his and Dream's view, they will deal with the imbalance by killing (almost) everyone, and then they will live forever to unravel the Revival Book and fix everything. Dream will not be alone because he has Punz, and they will always have each other. They will have eternity to figure things out and can always revive people at some later point. It takes Tommy literally seeing Dream's perspective through his eyes to finally understand Dream, so it will be unlikely or at least very hard to get the rest of the server to listen to Dream. Until Tommy opens up the possibility that people might be willing to hear Dream out, this is simply not on the table at all. Most people hate Dream and want him dead. This is demonstrated by Tommy as well since he literally kills Dream even though Dream has not done anything to him in almost a year. Dream and Punz's plan is the only solution they see as viable in the face of so much hatred and destruction. And they can't just walk away either, with the problem of the imbalance, the corruption, and also the Egg complicating matters.

So in summary, I just don't think Punz is in any kind of position to be able to stop Dream from continuing his self-destructive plan. Punz helps Dream with his plans instead of offering a different plan, because this has always been the kind of relationship he had with Dream. Punz probably thinks that this type of support, this reassurance and loyalty, is also what Dream needs after being betrayed by so many people. Offering deeper emotional support is hard for Punz when Dream deals with his own emotions by pretending they don't exist and are a problem for later, so Punz just tries to do whatever Dream wants because he thinks that this will make Dream happy. Punz eagerly supports the plan of killing everyone since he is so angry at what the server has done to Dream. And as nobody is willing to listen to Dream, Punz sees no other solution either.

[the-unaligned-player]

The plot twist, the grand reveal, that everything we've come to know and understand is wrong is really cool.

The canon life system became so normalized to both character and viewer, only for c!Dream to announce at the end that it's not supposed to be that way. And we all know there was a time where it wasn't like that, it became like that, and no one questioned it until he and Punz did

[the-unaligned-player]

/dsmp rp

I've talked before about how frustrated Dream is that other server members call him evil and a villain and blame him for everything. But what I didn't touch upon is how early this frustration already started. And how it's the underlying cause for much of Dream's secrecy during the Manberg/Pogtopia era.

Dream first meets Techno with an offer of resources, telling him, "I support you guys but I can't get involved I have to be in the SHADOWS." He explains the reason why he can't involved in the Tyrant book that he leaves for Tommy:

During the L'Manberg vs Dream SMP War, Dream tried to "take a stand on behalf of the Dream SMP" in an attempt to keep the server together. He is very much aware that this was twisted (mainly by Wilbur) into him being seen as a tyrannical ruler and as the whole reason why "L'Manberg was not allowed to have freedom".

To prevent this from happening again, Dream now has to seem uninvolved, or else he will get blamed again. On the next page of the book, he writes:

Dream suspects that if he is seen breaking the peace treaty with Manberg by helping Pogtopia, this will get twisted into him being responsible for the war between the two factions and him being "touted as the villain" yet again.

And the funny thing is that he's right! Despite Dream (weakly) arguing against it, Wilbur tells Tommy during the Vassal discussion, "Dream only gave you that gear so that you could cause this conflict. Dream doesn't want us to win. Dream just wants both Pogtopia and Manberg to be weak!" The blame for the conflict is already shifting towards Dream regardless of his attempts to help "from the shadows".

No matter Dream's approach, no matter whether he stays in the background or gets much more overtly involved, this narrative of him as the villain just never changes. The server needs its scapegoat. And Dream is an easy target, one he remains until the very end.

#c!dream #dreblr

[the-unaligned-player]

characters who logically assess a situation and choose to minimize harm but cannot eliminate it entirely evil and ruthless and bad for not being able to do the impossible; characters that purposefully choose to act in ways that do harm because of decisions that are made irrationally/emotionally excused because of their mental state. characters who outwardly react are good and characters who keep things to themselves are emotionless monsters. incompetence is absolving and being highly capable makes one inherently more responsible and therefore more to blame. self-preservation is morally wrong and selfish dont you care about everyone else don't you care enough to throw your life away. the worst thing someone can be is cold, to take things seriously, to give enough of a shit to stop fucking around and not enough of a fuck to let half their damn people die for the sake of one etc etc etc forever. ARENT WE TIRED ???? ARENT WE TIRED OF THIS