#dst theory

[placeholderdoe]

In Don't Starve's adventure mode Maxwell on the throne has 10,000,000 health. The only character who can kill him with no preparation is WX as they are not damaged by the lightning that strikes them with every hit towards Maxwell. WX just got their skill tree and Klei posted this image showing an empty nightmare throne and Maxwell holding a withering rose.

Charlie's days are numbered

[orbished]

YAP ABOUT WX/WOODROW INCOMING❗️❗️❗️❗️❗️❗️EXPECTAMUS ARG SPOILERS

Rambling about expectamus (I love this arg to bits. my Woodrow/WX crumbs), and I don't really know if anyone has discussed this yet since I'm new here lol but. I think the scene where WX's human body (just going to refer to them as Woodrow for convenience) is twitching and moving might be related to the proximity of WX's conciousness in their robot body? I know they're not LITERALLY close (they're only even seeing their body because of the projector), but it starts to leave its comatose state when wx approaches and stills after they leave.

Maybe because the body of any living being is inherently created for a consciousness, the separation of such consciousness from the physical vessel causes it to try unconsciously seek it out? (I refuse to use the word 'soul' because their whole shtick is. Being soulless 😭) Of course, then comes the question of whether Woodrow and WX-78 are even the same person anymore, considering how Woodrow's eyes open in the last few panels which doesn't really seem to be from WX's perspective at all?

Personally, I believe they are in one way or another, but there are so many interpretations possible from just this one comic!!! When WX permanently separated their conciousness from their original body, there are (essentially) what I think are the main possibilities of what happened:

1. The body is simply a shell that Wagstaff refuses to discard (against WX's wishes). It has no conciousness, it is literally just a meatsack. Any movements are pure instinct from the conciousness being near, or some other trigger. (Doubtful, to be honest...)

2. The body retains some form of conciousness when WX's main conciousness in their metal body draws near. It briefly awakens from its coma and reacts as a part of WX's conciousness (that WX is aware of)

3. The body develops conciousness when WX draws near SEPERATE from the main conciousness. WX is not aware of this conciousness, and it is independent from WX as an 'other half'. It dies as soon as they turn away from the path of reclaiming their past.

4. The conciousness has ALWAYS existed within Woodrow's body. When WX transferred their mind into the robot body, a part of themselves remained in their human one; their 'human' half, for a lack of a better term? The conciousness of the human half (or fragment, really) remains stagnant in the comatose body, which Wagstaff sustains until he gets decked and WX comes near. They briefly awaken, but WX chooses to cast that part of them away from themselves, and that fragment of conciousness dies with the body when it runs out of the amber juice... thing(?)

5. Woodrow and WX are completely different consciousnesses: 'WX' is created when 'Woodrow' transfers their mind into the robot body, either as a separate entity or a 'copy' of the original mind.

There's a LOT of body horror potential in some of these oh lord😭 imagine being WX and there's a semi-sentient flesh body you scarcely remember desperately trying to get your mind in its body, chasing you relentlessly with some sort of unholy drive... scary...

BUT I'm getting off track. Of course, there are probably more probable theories out there BUT. These are just the thoughts of someone relatively new to their lore and trying to figure stuff out! If anyone else has any differing opinions PLLEEEAASSSEEE let me know I need to learn more about the fandom's general consensus on their past. Also please do tell if my theories about their consciousnesses are just. Deadass wrong and it's something else entirely😭 currently a believer of 4/3 but I'm still figuring stuff out...

Of course, there's the fact that WX's sprites show a skeleton inside the robot body?????? And the skeleton under Wagstaffs floorboards???????? So it's possible they're not even the same person at ALL and I'm just crazy but that's a whole other can of worms...

Thank you so much for reading if you got this far! Yay :D

[maxblonda]

forgone: so.. whose dream is this, anyways?

it's been about a year since i talked about the william carter puzzles and the kind of information the viewer gets about maxwell and charlie's inner worlds. they're honestly some of my favorite of klei's lore drops. and now we've been given even more insight with this intermission's animated short. so lets review this trailer in depth!

i've watched it a couple times, and i've watched other don't starve players watch it to see the things they've paid attention to and the things their chat paid attention to. it seems like everyone was able to tell with enough time that this was a dream, a vision, or something that is otherwise not actually something that happened in the reality these characters lived. but something that i didn't see anyone begin to ask is, whose point of view is this supposed to be from? who is actually experiencing this dream? because charlie.. never knew a man by the name of william carter.

she's in the car with someone younger, a little rounder, a little softer. it's maxwell, but it's not exactly maxwell. she knows maxwell doesn't smile like that. he doesn't dress like that, in warm browns and beiges. she doesn't even know maxwell wears glasses. it's uncomfortably normal. she went to the city to escape normal. she answered the ad for crying out loud- she's got "a curious demeanor and a keen interest in the mysteries of the universe."

she knows her destination like the back of her hand. the family cabin up in BC. she remembers telling maxwell about it in a letter. she's been there countless times. you'll know it when you see it. but this time, as special as the destination is, she can no longer tell you a thing about the journey to it. not when all the trees look the same and the sky looks like it's been bright and blue for days. she can't even tell you a thing about the car she's in. all she knows is that it's not exactly his.

no sane person would say it out loud, but they both have to be thinking the same thing. there's no way they can't hear it. but it's not exactly a thing you can ask. the moon is.. crackling, isn't it?

winona doesn't hear it. and if she secretly does hear it, she doesn't act like she hears it. and so neither do charlie or william.

just like we can all pretend that william has not brought it upon himself to take the codex umbra with him.

that hellish thing. maybe it's become a safety blanket at this point for the old man. young man. whatever.

but he's not going to open it, anyways. only if winona asks for them to show her one of their tricks that they use in their shows. but she doesn't ask. so they don't offer, either.

but there are certain things that can't be ignored. not when they look right up at you, waiting for you to look back.

it is only when william looks at her, checks in on her, that things begin to change for the both of them. maybe he hasn't noticed the eyes because they're not both looking right at him with the same kind of intensity They looked at charlie with.

and now that is a familiar face. either maxwell is breaking through the illusion himself, or charlie is imagining the disappointment he might feel. a disappointment in a target that no one can exactly place. all she can do is hope it's not her.

but the look doesn't linger. someone wants the dream to remain sweet. to remain soft, kind, and warm. we don't exactly know whose will that is, whether it's charlie, maxwell, winona, or the wills of something beyond any of them. the heat from the setting sun against charlie's back is hotter than the gentle heat of the candles inside the safety of their family cabin.

it's.. red-hot, actually.

it burns hot until it doesn't. in the same way that time passes until it doesn't. in the same way that survivors die until they don't anymore. until they learn. because it is Constant.

it's.. always been the Constant, hasn't it?

shadows lie in wait when the magician is not looking for them. when the magician is not needing them. because it's all illusion, right?

(it's your move, winona)

and speaking of winona, winona's actually one of the three survivors seen present when a piece of the moon crashes into the sea and changes the landscape of the constant forever. one has to wonder if the ripples of the moon finally giving way above the cabin might give her some sort of twisted deja vu.

maybe that's why she doesn't budge when the shadows begin to elongate. when the shadows take shape. she's fought them before. maxwell has too. maybe the same ones. they look very similar to the shapes in the "encore" short.

and y'know, at this point in the Constant, both maxwell and charlie must have gotten to know shadow magic very well. regardless of whether they were fully in control of themselves or not. they've both been to the archives- in part, thanks to the moon crashing through the land. that's actually the last time we saw the three of them together.

how funny. the moon being given power has opened the way to the remnants of a civilization in which its inverse- shadow- has been given power. both sides are always in lockstep with each other.

black fire. white fire.

the tragic torch's description reads: "At first glance this torch appears menacing, but holding it makes you feel quite sad."

and maybe, at this point, sadness may be worth resigning to. he's done it before. he hangs his head in the exact same way in a conversation with charlie in what is pretty clearly presented as his dreams, too.

maxwell's words to charlie's beckoning shadow hand asking for dreadstone is "I'll... see to it."

the tragedy is not only in the fact that you can't control yourself, but also in the fact that others inevitably will end up in the crossfire. because neither sister was responsible for the way the game has ended up. all charlie's done is move a pawn.

she hasn't even really moved a single pawn. because in reality, she never got to play any kind of board game with her sister. she never left san francisco in 1906.

so... whose dream or vision is this? presumably charlie's, right? she's very clearly the focus of the story- she's the only one who is seen reacting to the fabric of the dream fall apart for most of the trailer. she's the one seen changing and growing from the girl she used to be before the constant to the version of herself that dragged winona through the portal, then to a version of herself we've never seen before, and then finally at her most current version as the shadow queen. it mirrors the different versions of maxwell we see in his animated short quite well. it could also be interpreted that when she opens her eyes at the end, that she has woken up from her dream. this is also supported by the fact that only after that point do the edges of the screen stop being blurred out.

but again- and it was the first thing i clocked when watching it for the first time- charlie never knew william carter, she knew maxwell. so how could she be dreaming of a version of a man she never met or presumably saw any picture of? there's also the fact that the story she dreams has maxwell implied to have put something in the portal (william putting fire in the fireplace as an analogue) that leads to the tendrils that pour out of the ancient gateway in the dream in the exact same way they do at the end of the trailer.

it's already been implied in a few of the shorts as well as in game quotes that maxwell and charlie (or rather, maxwell and the shadow queen) have some sort of agreement that's been reached or plan set in motion, and maxwells actions in front of the portal could be part of that larger plan. they've also communicated this in his animated short, given that she gives him a rose in his dream that affects the rose on him in the constant, as well as the chessboard that is set up before maxwell in his dream is also then used by charlie at the end.

so i'd say that "forgone" is as much maxwell's dream as "encore" is as much charlie's dream. which is to say that one is the focus, but the other is integral to and also may be experiencing the same dream or on the same plane of consciousness, and also that much of this is only possible through either the a) contact they've both had with shadow magic or the nightmare throne, and/or b) the general weirdness of the constant.

and as for winona and whether or not she was in some level experiencing the events of "forgone"... i can't say i'm sure that she did, but i also can't say for sure that i think that she didn't. i think that a majority of the winona we see in the trailer is charlie's imagination of winona, her love for her sister, her fear of hurting her and not controlling herself, the guilt she feels for winona being wrapped up in the constant and other thoughts she may have. but i wouldnt be surprised if there's some part of winona that experienced some limited amounts of the events as well- specifically the parts on the chessboard where she's transformed. i imagine that as much as winona wants to see her sister and rescue her, there's likely a part of her that also fears the consequences of charlie not being able to control herself.

i also imagine that if there is something related to shadow magic that allows maxwell and charlie to communicate, that winona's affiliation with wagstaff and therefore a lot of the lunar story path could lend to difficulties or blockage or inability or simply just distrust for the shadow queen in regards to communicating with her sister at times. i mean, winona's appearances in a huge chunk of the update trailers pertaining to the lunar path imply that she's a pretty big player in the lunar developments in the constant. and why wouldn't she be? she's the only one of the survivors other than wx that know enough about wagstaff and his technology to be able to help in moonstorms more reliably than anyone else.

but beyond the people that may be experiencing the vision/dream in any capacity, i think that the ancient gateway/large amounts of shadow magic/Them are conduits for all of it. like none of the events in "forgone" would be possible for any of them to experience in any capacity without Them or the powers of whatever thing or function is powering the constant, which then makes the dream or vision of "forgone" not just charlie's, or maxwell's, or even winona's, but also a dream of Theirs.

[ekletia]

I have a very crazy idea. I played with the thought "What if...."

"What, if Wilson is Cyclum? The ancient King?" He just Reincarnated in another world. The "real world" in United Kingdom.

I first thought about it because of the eyes. Cyclum looks like wilson used to look.

If this is true, it would make sense why Wilson is valuable.

What if Maxwell kidnapped people because the shadows were looking for Wilson? - Wilson was the last person to be kidnapped in 1921, but he was the only one who made it to the throne room.

What if Wilson really loves science because he's been doing it in his previous life?

The ancient king helped his people with his knowledge and magic. Became a strong technologically advanced species in the caves.

and now....

Wilson helps survivors with his knowledge and inventions. Helping Yourself and Others. Btw: And yes, a very curious person and his heart is in the right place. Eg: He wanted to rescue the nightmare werepig because he felt sorry for him.

What if time repeats itself?

What does Wilson say about you?

Yeah. He is a genius and not the "camp boss" just the Modern Major-General.

He invented that....

-search the moon piece -> The moon island

-rescue the nightmare werepig

-discovering the cave system

-exploring the Ancient Civilization (Here I think of the stone tablets most and the iridescent gem.)

Almost all his ideas unleashed chaos in the constant.

What about Charlie and Metheus?

when wilson is brutally tortured she'll be very pleased. If all this is true, then you might be smiling so hard to get revenge. Because of the past. Because he recognized Wilson and knew that he was actually the ancient king.

And in the last video, they showed how much Charlie didn't like Wilson.

What about Wilson's beard?

It's a little interesting how natural you can grow. The magneficident Beard. Okay, This is a normal human things, but he use with meat effigy. Meat effigy is a magic item.

Why is magic things? The wood and meat not have magic, just a beard. He beard has magical powers.

If it is true that he is the ancient king. Reincarnated in another world. Then it is logical to have a shadow power or a property that comes from the constant. What if he is a Human-shadow creature? But just have magic shadow power?

If you lose your mind, the rabbits will turn black. They can give you beard hair like Wilson. Wilson has a beard as big and full as a rabbit man's.

Yeah this is very crazy idea, but what if is true?

Would be a very big twist in the story.

Continue

[waokevale]

WICKERBOTTOM REWORK SPOILERS

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Okay, but can we talk about this?! The secret room? And that peculiar eye symbol.

Could this mean Wickerbottom belongs to a secret society? A cult? Is she perhaps a witch as some people speculated?

What do you guys think this sigil could mean?

Also, the fact that she already had the knowledge of the existence of the Constant and its creatures is quite interesting to see...

To be honest, I already speculated it was Willow, who burned down the library.

Though this little piece of paper seems rather interesting, was Willow at any point involved with the strange dissapearances? This fire seemed to be quite intentional and throughout planned. Did she just randomly decided to burn this specific library? Or...Does she work for a certain someone, or at least used to at some point in time.

[thejeksburyguy]

With the new Don't Starve lore animation, I can't help but feel like Wilson's piece not veing on the board is intentional. If it were another survivor, sure, they probably can't fit a drawing of every character on there, but Wilson? Someone who is arguably the main character? It makes me think of the fact that, in order for a pawn to become a king.. it has to go unseen and unnoticed.

[nat-a-nat]

WX-78 THEORY NUMBER 2 WAGSTAFF WAS NOT ALONE, SOMEONE CREATED WX WITH HIM

The flashback sequence is all possibly are from a characters perspective

In my previous theory i assumed the perspective switched from Wags to WXs, but theres a better explanation

Wagstaff wasn't alone

This the first scene of the flashback sequence

We enter a room then look down on a clipboard in our hands

We get some flashes of WXs blueprints and the helmet

In the next full scene we see Wag, and what's more important he turns towards us It wouldn't make sense to change from a first person perspective to third person for one scene

But WX wasn't functional yet

Next scene, we see WX on a table and we put on the helmet

And who do we wake up as? 

WX

We see from their eyes now

And when Wagstaff walks into frame he looks surprised seeing WX moving implying he didn't think it would work or that he wasn't the one to make them work

Switching reflections of WX

This proves WX was previously human

It doesn't match Wagstaffs silhouette, i thought for a bit it might be Webbers dad, as he has a connection to Wag as seen in the Webber short but the hait doesn't match

In this scene i first thought it was possibly a flashback within a flashback. That the human hands were a different memory from WXs hands

But it might also be WX hallucinating their old body what's supported by WX looking down on their hands and Wag looking worried

So, yeah, WX used to be a human that worked with Wagstaff

The empathy module might hold these memories, WX crushed it to destroy them

The only question is, why dont they want to remember?

But most likely the module doesn't have anything to do with memories as seen by WX lines in game

Maybe WX is trying to escape from the guilt. They might have done some questionable things while working with Wagstaff

Or maybe escape the pain of being sent to The Constant by him

THIS PICE OF INFORMATION I EITHER DIDNT KNOW OF OR FORGOT Everyone say thank you tumblr user @blacknight7890​ :)

[ekletia]

Wickerbotton find Willow on the attic

I guess you didn’t expect this one…

That I’d post this comic. Especially now, when I’ve just started unfolding a completely new story thread.......(DST: The Urban Legend)

The last mini comic came out in May — so it’s only been two months.

What changed since then? Everything.

And that’s why I want to thank you for your patience. For still being here, for reading, supporting, watching this grow.

When I first began this comic, I had a concept in mind:

How Wickerbottom would find the strange girl in the attic. I imagined a scene where Willow attacks her with toys, or a dramatic wide shot of the attic with Willow in the center, terrifying and still. But in the end… those were just images.

It inspired me for this story.

And then I realized —

I didn’t really know what I wanted to tell. Or rather, I knew, but I didn’t know how to say it. Maybe that’s what they call writer’s block.

But that’s okay — because even that is part of the process. Instead of focusing on humor or horror, I went back to the core:

What did this meeting mean?

For Willow, it was the beginning of a new reincarnation. For Wickerbottom, the start of a life filled with wonder and mystery. And maybe for both of them… something they could never turn back from.