Mom, techie, and Sims fanatic. I post stories from my game and write Pets mods. I only play Sims 3, but I'll follow a story/gameplay blog for any game! More recently, I talk about Minecraft YouTube, a fandom I am legally too old to be hanging out in. Blame my teenager.
So, yeah, I think I am legally too old to be a part of Minecraft YouTube fandom, but they're stuck with me. Blame my kid.
I will never get over Vampires SMP.
I'm interested in film editing, and I edited VSMP into a TV show format as a way to play around with building a narrative through editing. You can find it here: Vampires SMP TV Series.
I have a tag #literary analysis of minecraft storytelling where I write walls'o'text analyzing MCYT creators and their block people. Usually it's VSMP, but I expect that will expand with other POW Creations YouTube exclusive stories. I don't have the resources to follow streamed stories. My kid watches and writes me up Cliff's Notes on those.
I also have an AO3 account, where I am writing a series of novels called The Monster and the Lunatic (series == 1 complete novel, 1 complete short, and 1 novel in progress right now). The idea of a genuine monster trying to reform really grabbed me, so this is a long look at what might be going on with Scott Goldsmith at the very end of canon and immediately post-canon. This is an AU where Avid made it out alive and provides a balance to Shelby and Drift. TMatL is heavy on the romance. The sequel TMatD has romance, but it's really about the Coven as a unit.
I chatter about writing it on the tag #the monster and the lunatic.
For anyone NOT in the VSMP fandom who might want to peek at it, I wrote an overview of the premise as it relates to TMatL. The sequel, The Monster and the Demon, probably stands on its own, with most relevant backstory included.
Previous to me falling into the MCYT hole, this tumblr was devoted to The Sims 3. I write mods, which you can find at ModTheSims. There are also several Sims stories, all of which are currently on hold but I hope to return to.
OMG I had to search hard to get a gif of actual waltzing. WTF, gif search? Most of the first results didn't even have dancing. I'm sure someone will tell me "waltz" means some kind of slag I don't know.
Scott Goldsmithâs Native Environment is a Horrible Murder Box
this has consequences
Vampires smp was originally billed as an amongus alike with light roleplay elements, so Scott Smajor basically just took a pile of life series conventions and built a character around it.
The life series, for the uninitiated, is a competitive minecraft youtube series where everyone has a limited number of lives (times they can die), and the goal is to be the last one standing. The mechanics gradually allow more murder to happen over time, so everything starts with people making nice with each other and ends with an absolute bloodbath. The tone is kept light by the mutual acknowledgment that everyone is a youtuber playing minecraft, but there has been plenty of discussion about how much actually living in that kind of world would suck.Â
And then we have Scott Goldsmith
Scott Goldsmith, who wasnât intended to be much of a character in the first place, winds up playing the life series conventions to the hilt as genuine character traits and social standards. For the most part, this worked out incredibly well! Scott Goldsmith is an interesting character that works well with the rest of the cast and is fun to watch, which is basically everything you can ask for in an improv series. There are, however, some artifacts from this that have some big impacts on how Scott works.Â
Most notably, Scott Goldsmith works from the baseline assumption that he will have to crawl over the bodies of other people to survive, and that thatâs just normal. Itâs not even anyoneâs fault. Everyone lives in a horrible murder box and the only way to succeed is to make sure that itâs you on top.
(this doesnât stick out too badly because noble power games are frequently just a slightly more free range murder box, so Goldsmith being murderbox georg does not particularly contradict his lore or backstory)
The other major consequence of murder boxes being Scott Goldsmithâs main thing is that Scott actually follows a fairly rigid set of rules and assumptions when dealing with other people. His own personal vampire code, if you will.Â
The code of Scott Goldsmith is as follows:Â
1: The in group deserves everything and the outgroup deserves nothing. Everything the in group does is good and justified, everything the outgroup does is not.Â
This is the bedrock of the gaslight, gatekeep, goldsmith social interaction special, and the governing principal behind what Scott is willing to justify and when. Basically, if he or someone he likes did it, then he will defend it and deny even the concept that it might have been wrongdoing. People that are not members of his coven generally have their actions weighed by how dangerous or inconvenient they are to himself or His People.Â
The most obvious example of this is the interactions with v!Avid in episode 6 and 7. In episode 6, he complains about Avid burning down Shelbyâs house, but in episode 7 he defends it by claiming that âit was uglyâ. The same instance of the same action performed by the same person goes from something worth complaining about to something worth defending based entirely on where they stand in Scottâs regard.
Note also that this rule has no interest in fairness or reality. If Shelby says âthe sky is green and the moon is made of cheeseâ, and Martyn says âno it's notâ, then Scott will back up Shelby because Shelby is coven and Martyn is not. If Shelby kills Martyn, Scott will immediately decide that Martyn had it coming. If Shelby kills Martyn, burns down the town, and declares her desire to destroy the world and rule over the ashes with an iron fist, Scott will fully support her in that endeavor.
2: A lone vampire is a dead vampire. Your power is directly proportional to the number of people that answer to you
On one level, this is just mechanically true for vampires smp. Every person turned is another set of hands that can corrupt the beacons, and, just as importantly, one more person taken away from the effort to consecrate them. Even if that person never switches sides, the fact that they canât consecrate any more or use the various human powers makes it a worthwhile effort, which is why there was a general OOC limit to turning only one human per episode. (and they had to take a break from turning people if they accidentally turned too many)
a more character driven level, Scott is very much a social threat, and acts the part. Turning people lets him acquire minions, who are easier to manage than outsiders, and generally arenât going to cause him problems.
Vampirism is generally more then enough to force someone into his faction, because once someone is turned the humans will do the bulk of the work in driving the new vampire away from them and into Scottâs waiting arms. Itâs a phenomena Scott is very confident about and takes shameless advantage of.
This is also why in episodes where Scott doesnât turn anyone (due to the OOC limits), itâs styled as him stopping because the new vampires arenât joining up- growing his power base is the main benefit of turning new vampires, and when that peters out he becomes more hesitant to do so.
3. Your actions should always advance your agenda
In other words, Scott mixes business and pleasure in the sense that his hobbies always contain some practical value.Â
This is, honestly, the one Scott haters get wrong the most. While thereâs nothing wrong with having a villain in your story, Scott isnât the sort of person to torture someone in his basement for the sake of it when he could be torturing someone in his basement for information, or to break them down into something more psychologically dependent on him.Â
Even if recreation is his main goal, he should ideally have a secondary goal as a matter of both practicality and preference- itâs just more fun for him if heâs being paid to be evil. (or buy some ice cream. Or pet a dog. Or help someone out)
4. Betrayal is a crime of the highest order. Loyalty is a virtue of the highest order.Â
What, exactly, Scott considers betrayal varies over the course of the series, but this is generally the governing principal behind the various times he menaced Pyro, why he didnât see v!Avidâs murder coming, and why he was both so pleased with v!Avid and so angered by his death.Â
Scott Goldsmith values loyalty, and to a degree both expects it as his due and considers it an obligation to give loyalty in turn. This isnât surprising- most Scott Smajor characters run along lines of loyalty and devotion. Scott Goldsmith is not an exception just because he is also a Dracula.Â
5. Support your allies however you can
Scott is, in fact, an incredibly dedicated ally. He does things like give Pyro food while having low hunger himself as early as episode 2, and the tendency to act like that only goes up over time.
This makes a certain amount of sense- helping other members of your faction also helps you because youâre all working together for a single goal. In Scottâs case this is especially true, since as the leader heâs deciding a disproportionate amount of the groupâs goals. A well fed minion is a productive minion. A productive minion is a lot more likely to succeed at your goals.Â
This one is the part that can be the hardest to reconcile with Scottâs everything else. However, itâs important to remember that Scott is not immune to the desire for companionship, and also that he actually needs to keep people on side in order to not die. In some ways, this is very much an extension of rule 2.
6. (new) be a good friend
Over the course of the series, Scott gradually gets attached to the other vampires, and comes to see them as companions with needs he should consider outside of their mutual victory. He realizes that he likes the people around him, and he wants them to be happy. That he cares about them as people, and not just as tools.
The process of this takes the entire series, but by the end of it his friends are a big enough priority that he points out opportunities to escape to his own detriment.
In conclusion:
1. Scottâs core character concept is âguy that is trying to get a good grade in Minecraft Hunger Games, something that is normal to want and possible to achieveâ
2. Scott Goldsmith does not so much have a moral compass as he has a set of rules designed to keep him alive. The bad parts of this are obvious, but there are good parts, too: when it mattered most, Scott was able to change and grow to suit the people around him. Owen and Ren, by contrast, violently self destructed and that hurt the people around them because they were too rigid in their personal convictions.
3. The support he offers to other people in the coven is real and sincerely meant. The expectation that those coven members will aid and abet his own misdeeds is also very real. Scott himself doesnât recognize the difference until the end of the series, where he asks Abolish to stop him from doing bad things.Â
4. The finale of vampires smp from Scottâs pov very much pivots around v!Avidâs death. It turns out that the rules that Scott shaped himself around werenât as ironclad as he thought, because the people around him would literally rather die than put up with them. The mechanics that demand violence and bloodshed can be subverted in a way that causes unnecessary death and suffering.
And, to be clear, Owen and Pyro are dead to him as soon as they do this. In part because heâs planning on killing them himself, yes, but also because their actions are tactical suicide.
When he next talks to Pyro in what is basically his eulogy, Scott thanks him for the reminder that he should expect death and misery, because as far as heâs concerned death and misery are the normal course of events. Scott was winning so much he forgot that murder boxes suck, actually.
This is increasingly a problem because, by the laws of murderboxes, Shelby and Drift are almost certainly going to die- they both struggle with pvp, donât have the aggression to cover for it, and with Pyro and Owen lost they donât have enough front liners to cover their weaknesses. If things continue the way theyâre âsupposedâ to, more people that Scott cares about are going to die.
So, Scott starts looking for another way out. After all, if the rules can be broken in ways that are bad, maybe they can be broken in ways that are good. Maybe they donât have to kill everyone. Maybe murderboxes are bullshit, and all of this was entirely unnecessary.
So he starts looking, and, surprisingly enough, there is a path out. Itâs not easy or bloodless, but it is a strict improvement over the status quo. Itâs an option that keeps his friends alive.
Of course, just leaving this murderbox isnât enough. Scott still has to deconstruct the murderbox in his own head, because otherwise his actions will simply create another murderbox around him.
Thatâs a bad outcome, so he enlists Abolish to kill him if he starts causing problems. Scottâs not great with morals, but heâs excellent with rules and practical consequences. So long as backsliding into the worst of his old behavior is guaranteed to go badly for him, he can be fairly sure that he wonât do that.
Actually figuring out how to be a functional person outside of the torment nexus is basically an entire novellaâs worth of character development that the series doesnât have time for, so instead it settles on âthey figured it out eventuallyâ.
This is why Goldsmith fascinates me so much. He fascinated me before his late-game turnaround because he makes sense as a villain. Solid villains who make sense are hard to come by, and VSMP managed to produce two of them. But then he pulled off that turnaround and made me believe it. That was such incredible storytelling craft. Goldsmith lived by a clear set of principles that you could map out when he was at his most villainous, and he changed by just those principles.
"Actually figuring out how to be a functional person outside of the torment nexus is basically an entire novellaâs worth of character development that the series doesnât have time for"
This is basically what made me want to write fanfic. I've been trying to do a deep dive on this concept in The Monster and the Demon. (That's the sequel to TMatL, but the first story largely sets the stage for the difficult stuff.) When Goldsmith appears in fics, it tends to be either in line with canon or after a handwavy 200 years, during which he "got better." I really want to dig into what that getting better actually looks like.
I have him modeled as someone with extreme empathy impairment. Power - empathy - consequences = monster. Three vampire fledgelings have shown him devotion. He craves it. Nobody else matters, certainly not humans, but in order to keep the fledgelings and the way they feel about him, he has to take increasing restrictions on himself. It's not easy. There's a sort of addiction-relapse cycle to it. He's a schemer, and he looks for loopholes. But as I spool my take on the character in my head and follow him around, he's actually moving closer to genuine reform than I expected at this point (approaching halfway through the arc I had in mind).
Mine is an Avid Lives AU because one idea that pulled me in was the balance of Scott in the middle of two fledgelings who care but expect him to be better vs. one who offers him devotion with absolutely no strings at all. Would the unconditional devotion make it harder or easier for him to change? I actually think it makes it easier. He's so far away from who he needs to be for Shelby and Drift, but Avid is there to provide a place for him to stand while he reaches for more.
My wife thinks I'm insane to be this into the reform arc of a certified murder diva, but it's just grabbed me and won't let go.
It makes me so happy to see VSMP analysis drift over my dashboard when it's been over for such a good long time now.
In 2026, Jack von Pyroscythe decides to check up on the Goldsmith Coven. They have a chat over coffee.
If I do a modern day story in this AU, this will be the first chapter.
This is platonic -- or sort of platonic because v!Pyro is v!Pyro. That's completely unrelated to any creator drama going on at the moment. I actually wrote it before the current creator drama dropped.
Scott Goldsmith woke up after his 600 year nap and nothing was as he left it. The trees had changed, his castle was leveled, and on top of everything else his style was now centuries out of date. This will take some getting used to, and maybe a translator.
That âcomment on your a03 workâ email hits like a line of cocaine every time. unmatched dopamine increase. shoutout to everyone who leaves a comment on fics. you deserve the world
âWho are we talking about?â Drift interjected. âIs this about how you went to sleep? How did that happen? If the sleep spell is somehow related, maybe that matters.â
âYeah,â Shelby said. âYou never told us what happened.â
There was a long pause. Scott stiffened. His eyes darted between Shelby and Drift, then came to rest on Avid, tucked together with Elle. âThat's a private matter I'd prefer to just discuss with my coven.â
Avid perked up and looked warily at Elle. âYeah,â he said to her, âyou probably shouldn't be here for this.â
âLike hell I'm leaving,â Elle growled. âIâm the person who saw whatever it was. I'm the person who could find a connection if there is one.â
Scott stood like a stone statue, hand still resting on Avidâs shoulder. Avid reached up to put his hand on Scottâs as reassurance. Scott pulled it away. There was no comfort for this.
He and Shelby stared at each other across the table âI didnât know you,â Scott said, voice dry. âIt might have been different.â
I am playing a boardgame at a party with actual in person friends, and I am having trouble concentrating because gay vampires are literally dancing in my head.
oh im incredibly late to this but a post or two about how upset your daughter was about the boundary update have just crossed my page. folks like her are the number one example i hate the way boundaries are enforced in mcyt fandom these days. making ârulesâ for what fans can or cannot create in their own space is so stupid. i hope sheâs feeling better about it, you seem to be incredibly level headed about the whole thing and i so glad that sheâll have that. i hate thinking about all of the young artists and authors who got started because of mcyt and then quit due to being ânot allowedâ to create things of their favorite characters and ships. i hope your daughter (and you!) keep writing and drawing and everything. that drawing of hers looks awesome (i love scottâs face, the expression is so good) and iâll try and check out some of your writing soon! have a lovely day
I'm actually kind of freaked about how those boundaries essays are still circulating, but in a good way. đ
She is feeling better about it, after a lot of venting. She's taken her fic anonymous, which I think is wise in the current state of things. Even without the drama, she's been wanting to keep her media accounts just for lurking, but I'll post more of her work here. After the (awesome if I say so myself) tmatl!Scott portrait, she's working on a VSMP animatic for, "Choice" by Jack Stauber's Micropop. The song is pretty weird to my out-of-generation ears, but I'm wowwed by how the art is coming along. We'll probably go with the same plan, and I'll put it up on my YouTube account when it's done and link here.
[ETA: The kid says, "It's not just weird for your out-of-generation ears. It's designed to be weird." *eyeroll*]
She's been drawing more than writing, but the fic is still in the works, and it still has v!Majorscythe in it (less toxic than canon, but still pretty nuanced -- Scott is not a sweetheart).
And she reads all this stuff going through my account. The encouragement after the boundaries bombshell has meant a lot. Thanks so much. This art really does matter, for all of us. It's not a throwaway pastime for me, and it isn't for her either.
