7, 17, and 20! i’d love to hear about things that have inspired you :)
(ask game in question cause its been a second)
7. Who are some artists that have inspired you?
this ones tough cause obviously theres been So So many and my memory is. so so bad ... also i admit other than the just.. influence osmosis that Happens when youre an artist who sees other peoples art i dont really conciously incorporate other peoples styles into my work. i dont do studies of other peoples styles AND I SHOULD i just dont because i ???? forget i can, i guess
i guess just going from recent stuff thats been on my mind ive been very very inspired by the works of @/pincushionsoup , specifically i really enjoy his lining and hatching work
ive also been wanting to incorporate more... visual noise and surreal elements into my art and @/slitherbop 's work has been a big inspo for that, even if i havent really gotten there yet
id also like to shoutout my mutuals @/scruffybargain and @/tacomicfujoshi , goldie (former)'s anatomy and sense of form is sooo huge to me and i find myself staring at its work basically any time i have to draw paws, and fig (latter)'s coloring/rendering style is a big inspo to me for largely the same reason as my favorite of pincushionsoup's work.. compex rendering with minimal or no useage of gradients is something im very interested in atm and he does that very very well
ive been into weirdfur stuff lately but i dont actually really follow anyone specific whose work i go to for That... i just go in the tag and then get annoyed cause its too normal in there LMAO
17. Your personal favorite works of art (not made by you) are...?
can i choose all of my little pony g4. unironically ... mlp fim got me into drawing as a kid in the first place and i still admire a lot of the art and designs so much. esp lauren faust's art done for the series but outside it like concept art and stuff... i cant really think of anything else that could take the title of "favorite" in any capacity ... a lot of pressure there. and my memory is bad its possible theres more and i just cant recall right now and its probably lost to time
20. What motivates/inspires you artistically? (topics, emotions, etc)
in general emotions! i dont have much of an artistic drive per se... i dont really care about artistic improvement, overall, or at least i try not to, and i only really care about sharing my art as an avenue to talk to people, most of it is just.. braindump. trying to organize myself as best i know how i supposeeee. unknowable forces move my hand
i'm also wondering abt 1 and 4 for all ur ocs!!! + 23 (for all o:) aaand 6 (i love... learning more about nisus's family ;'), 13, and 25 for nisus, 7, 16, and 20 for alexis, 9, 15, and 21 for eirian, and 14, 17, and 14, 17, and 19 for dai!! >:D
tHANK YOU!!! >:))
nisus:
1. Origins! How did you come up with the concept for your OC?
confession time: when i first started playing dao, i kind of just thought of it as ‘the game that comes before da2′ and didn’t put a whole lot of thought or effort into creating my pc beyond ‘i wanna be an elf mage’. so nisus was just the result of me creating a character i liked to look at and naming him after one of my fave characters in the aeneid lmao. a lot of his actions throughout the game were based on the choices i would have made. after a point tho i ended up getting really attached to him and i created a backstory for him :’) so i used that, plus the choices made + his relationships with the companions, to really form his character and make him his own person.
4. How do you get into your OC’s mindset to write for them? How do you find the muse for them?
bc of how his character was created, it’s actually really easy for me to get into his mindset. i have some music that reminds me of him but i don’t need to listen to it to get in his head, y’know? he’s very straightforward.
6. What is your OC’s family situation? Do they get along? Do they fight? Or are they alone?
(okay so i love talking abt nisus’ family a lOT, so it makes me rly happy that u love to learn abt them ;v; ) nisus has a good bit of family! they all live in the denerim alienage still, with the exception of an uncle who left to find the dalish before he was born. his father died in a riot when he was five, but his mother and little sister are both alive and well. he also has an aunt, uncle, and two cousins (his maternal grandparents were still around when he was a kid, but they died sometime after he left for the circle).
nisus loves his mom and sister very much- they never really fight or argue. he and his mother have similar temperaments, which is to say that they’re both very chill lmao. his younger sister, aelia, is a sweetheart, but much more rambunctious as a result of their cousins essentially helping raise her. she’s already started a family of her own when nisus comes back to the alienage, and things are a little awkward between them at first (she was only five when he left so she barely remembers him), but it doesn’t take too long for them to reconnect. his cousins, carys and ifan, used to tease him when they were all children bc he was so quiet, but things are tense between them for awhile after he comes back. ifan lost a leg during the purge of the alienage and carys was one of the first people on the scene after the slaughter at the orphanage, so they’re p bitter about what they perceive as nisus’ ‘luck’ for not having been there. eventually they warm up to him again thanks to nisus giving them space and time to heal and they have lunch together every so often. they still tease him sometimes but now he gives as good as he gets.
finally, ofc, there’s nisus’ nieces and nephew. he absolutely adores them and tries to see them as often as he can. they p much climb all over him and zev every time they visit, bringing out a carefree side of nisus that most ppl wouldn’t have ever thought existed. they love listening to his stories about his travels and his friends and he loves entertaining them and playing games with them until they tire themselves out (their fave game is Wardens and Archdemons, in which zevran v graciously agrees to play the archdemon).
13. Do they have any favourite foods? Would they eat it all the time if they had the chance? What do they hate to eat?
roasted + seasoned vegetables are his favorite, but he probably wouldn’t eat it all the time. he’s v much the kind of person who prefers variety in his diet, most likely due to the fact that in the circle they had a limited selection of food to choose from (esp for someone who’s a vegetarian, like nisus). he really hates eggs tho. like. no matter how they’re cooked, he thinks the taste and texture are awful and will not touch them.
23. Any ships for your OC?
nivran, ofc! and i think i mentioned it before, but nisus/carver, too. ;’) i have some pet writing projects with the latter pairing bc i feel like they’d actually get along pretty well and they’d have a v different dynamic from nivran. nisus isn’t really daunted by carver’s attitude (he’s friends with sten and morrigan, so like...) and lets carver vent to him a lot, especially in the first couple years after he becomes a warden. and kinda despite himself, carver really likes and respects nisus and finds it surprisingly easy to get along with him.
25. What are your plans for your muse in the future?
he finds a cure for the calling and lives happily ever after with zevran, probably in denerim, although they make frequent visits to antiva, too. i mean he still trains and leads the wardens for a time, but i don’t think i could see him being the warden-commander forever. with 'grey warden’ no longer being synonymous with ‘death sentence’, he’d probably retire in his late 40s. perhaps a certain surly hawke would end up taking over as the warden-commander in his stead. who knows! but nisus gets his happy ending with his husband, his family, and his friends.
alexis:
1. Origins! How did you come up with the concept for your OC?
well i did my first da2 playthrough with garrett, which was fun and i adore him, but i decided afterwards that i really wanted to make a custom hawke. custom pc’s are ultimately the Most fun for me bc they feel more like they’re mine, haha. his personality is v similar to my garrett’s bc i wanted to use most of the same headcanons and whatnot that i’d come up with. ;’) alexis has definitely grown and changed some since his inception but i wouldn’t say i came up with it so much as it just. happened. and i chose his name bc i love ‘abc’ hawkes lmao and alexis just felt right.
4. How do you get into your OC’s mindset to write for them? How do you find the muse for them?
alexis is another easy one to get into, honestly- i don’t really have to do anything to find my muse for him. certain music puts me in a good headspace to write him and honestly, i draw a lot from my own familial relationships when thinking about alexis’ feelings towards his mom and siblings. ;’) alexis has the easiest voice for me to capture out of all my oc’s.
7. What does your OC look for in a friend? Do they value friendship a lot?
i don’t think alexis really looks for anything particular in a friend, actually- he’s the sort of person who can be friends with just about anyone. as for how much he values friendship...i mean, there probably isn’t anything that he values more. alexis lost bethany just before coming to kirkwall and essentially loses carver a year later when he has to give him to the wardens. his relationship with leandra is incredibly difficult, especially with beth and carver gone. the friends that alexis makes are essentially his found family- the all have his undying loyalty and love. he would do just about anything for them.
16. What are concepts they value? Virtues? What do they look down upon?
freedom and peace are the two concepts i’d say he values the most. i mean, alexis is an apostate from a family of apostates, so that’s probably not a surprise. he thinks highly of people who are kind, even if the kindness manifests in unusual ways, and he really admires determination. unsurprisingly, what he absolutely cannot abide is wanton cruelty.
20. What are Tropes you associate with your muse?
oh man. deadpan snarker, earn your happy ending, papa wolf, why did it have to be snakes?, undying loyalty, heroic bsod, family of choice, successful sibling syndrome, he’s a friend, big brother instinct, the dutiful son, resigned to the call, accidental hero, beware the nice ones, big damn kiss
23. Any ships for your OC?
fenalex, ofc. i...don’t really have any other ships for alexis tho. o: i sometimes wonder if he could have ended up with anders, but i tend to think not.
eirian:
1. Origins! How did you come up with the concept for your OC?
rIGHT so i actually have a story for this! i came up with eirian before i actually got da:i and he came about from my desire to play a character that was totally different from nisus and alexis, who were both v calm and easygoing individuals. i decided that my inquisitor would have zero chill, be brash + opinionated, and unafraid to step on people’s toes. i wanted him to be very dedicated to his culture, people, and religion, since neither of my pc’s beforehand were v religious, and i also wanted him to be fun and much more boisterous lmao. choosing mythal’s vallaslin for him was p important too, bc that’s when i decided i wanted him to, at his core, be dedicated to the concepts of justice and mercy. oh and his name means ‘bright, beautiful’ and i rly liked that. ;’)
4. How do you get into your OC’s mindset to write for them? How do you find the muse for them?
it definitely takes more work to get inside eirian’s head than the others. listening to songs that remind me of him helps, but i generally find that what gets me into his mindset is visiting the emerald graves + the lost temple of dirthamen and reading up on elven lore. his culture is so important to him that it really fuels my muse for him. ;’)
9. What is your OC like when at work? Are they diligent? Slacker? Do they get along with their co-workers?
when it’s something he’s even remotely invested in, eirian is a very focused and hard worker. before joining the inquisition he was often up before sunrise and getting started on whatever tasks needed to be done and took any job assigned to him pretty seriously. which isn’t to say he couldn’t have fun while working, he was just careful not to get too distracted from his actual goal. even though he initially wants nothing to do with the inquisition, he does bring the same work ethic to the table that he’s always had. he just didn’t get along with uh, half the people he was supposed to be working with lmao. eirian is on better terms with most of them now but he’s v headstrong and therefore still ends up butting heads with some ppl haha. one of eirian’s major faults is his inability to recognize that he’s not always right and people with dissenting opinions are not always wrong, so it causes a lot of friction with others.
15. Does your OC have any awful fears? Do they get paralyzed with fear or can they work through their fears?
he absolutely does. i’ve mentioned before that eirian’s greatest fear is failure, and it’s a fear he has to face many times throughout the inquisition. eirian’s very good at compartmentalizing and working through these situations when he’s in the moment bc he knows he can’t afford to freeze up; it’s only when the danger’s past and he’s certain that he’s alone that he’ll allow himself to break down over what he experienced.
21. Name an embarrassing situation that your muse has been in.
oh man. so, the first time eirian ever went to the storm coast he immediately fell in love and wanted to explore everything. cassandra tried very, very hard to convince him not to just go wandering through the woods and hopping all over cliffsides since he didn’t know the terrain, but at the time one of eirian’s fave activities was Doing the Exact Opposite of What Cassandra Wants. plus, he’d been to several forests in his lifetime and he knew what he was doing, tyvm. so he kept running ahead and kinda tuned cassandra out, focusing on the rain, the waves, and the trees. he was so focused on these things, in fact, that he didn’t notice a nug running by at one point until it bumped into him and made him shriek and scramble several feet away. to a very slippery, very muddy ledge.
on the bright side, eirian received minimal physical damage from his tumble down the thankfully short hill. on the less bright side, he received max damage to his ego and was covered in mud for the rest of that particular foray. worse, varric still tells that story to anyone who will listen.
23. Any ships for your OC?
well there’s eiridori, naturally, but i have a few others. even tho they’ve moved past romantic feelings, eiridai is still a sweet ship that i like to write about. :’) eirian could have potentially worked with bull, i think; they get along quite well and they’d have a lot of fun together. i also...sort of...think abt soleirian sometimes. bc eirian had a weird baby crush on solas that i did not see coming. ;( a relationship between them would not be v good given Events, so it’s not something i consider too seriously, but it’s interesting to imagine how eirian’s feelings would have developed if dorian hadn’t come along.
dai:
1. Origins! How did you come up with the concept for your OC?
so initially dai’s creation was sort of an accident. i was sketching out a potential design for eirian and the end result didn’t fit him at all...but i liked it so much i had to use it. ;’) so i decided that he would be eirian’s best friend, drew a cleaner version of the design, then came up with his backstory. i wanted him to be fairly different from eiri, so i decided that he would have all the chill that eirian lacked, much more tact, and a generally softer disposition. however, bc all my pc’s heretofore have been p straightforward, i wanted to make dai much more enigmatic (which is actually why he has june’s vallaslin, tho everyone assumes it’s bc he loves crafting). and this is kinda rly personal, but i wanted dai to be trans in large part bc of my own struggles w gender. i wanted him to be happy + secure and surrounded by ppl who were v supportive of him. ~wish fulfillment~. anyway. i’ve always loved the name ‘dai’ (”to shine”) but if i’d had an ounce of common sense i would have named him something that wasn’t the fucking abbreviation of the game he was created for orz
4. How do you get into your OC’s mindset to write for them? How do you find the muse for them?
i think of puzzles and matryoshka dolls, haha. i don’t really have any music that reminds me of dai yet, but certain weather actually puts me in a really good place to write him? dai lives for sunshine and cloudless skies and gentle breezes so on days like that, i like to think of what he would be doing and how he would be feeling. also, forests.
14. Pet peeves. Tell us what would really tick them off. Do they have a Berserk Button?
well, teasing him about how short he is really irritates him, and he doesn’t like it when ppl try to talk to him while he’s crafting things? even if he’s just carving a lil halla or something he gets annoyed bc it’s his chill time to think and be in his own little world. but i’d say his true berserk button is seeing people pick on the weak or helpless; he doesn’t bother masking his feelings in the slightest and he will put a stop to it, one way or another. this goes doubly if you hurt children, which is basically a one way ticket to getting an arrow or five in your chest.
17. Do they have any guilty pleasures? They embarrassed about them? Do they flaunt them?
see, this is difficult bc dai p much never feels guilty for anything he enjoys. perhaps the closest he gets to this is his love of children’s stories. he’s a little embarrassed when he gets caught paying rapt attention to the clan storyteller regaling kids with tales that most of the adults have long since stopped paying attention to. mostly, though, dai likes what he likes and doesn’t particularly care if other people find it silly or strange. :’)
19. Have they ever been injured? Sick? How do they deal with it?
well he’s a hunter so yeah, he’s definitely been injured before, though he only rarely gets sick. when he’s injured, he just kinda sighs and resigns himself to taking it easy until he’s healed; he’s a p good patient in that respect. when he gets sick tho...p much the only people who can deal with him are eirian and their friend talfryn, bc dai is so miserable that he ends up making everyone around him miserable, too. he tends to act like he’s dying and gets v whiny while simultaneously snapping at everyone who tries to take care of him.
23. Any ships for your OC?
josiedaikrem is the canon ship for him. =v= as i mentioned in eirian’s section, i also love writing about eiridai a lot. :’> as for other ships, tho...hm. dai has p much zero romantic interest in his companions? he thinks dorian and cassandra are attractive but his feelings for them never go beyond platonic, and he had a little crush on bull for a time bc their personalities mesh p well, but he could never be in a relationship with him (dai cannot do bdsm). kate and i ship izzy and dai together, tho. >:) esp in the “eirian is inquisitor” timeline.
