#long post warn

[poupon]

Alone today? Not alone? Well i'll fix either of those: send this to someone who you wish to woo and they'll come rushing over to see if you're ok because it's a little weird to send a giant brain in a crown to someone. Or if you already have someone with you they'll run away. Problems done and dusted.

Enjoy your Baldur's Date!

[elkian]

Epilogue:

[ID: A long monochrome stick figure comic.

Panel 1: A baker with a small cake looks at a large cake on the table and thinks, "Aw man, that cake is way be-"

Panel 2: The baker of the more elaborate cake begins wailing, at top volume, "Oh my god this trash is so ugly, hahaha! I can't with this trash~ Did I actually make this garbage, lmao. I bet it tastes like dog turds." The quality of each sentence decreases over the course of the panel.

Panel 3: The second baker continues, bowing towards the sparkling, elaborate cake, saying "Come get your trash, everyone! The worst thing I have ever made!"

Panel 4: The second baker says "BRB, Throwing myself into the abyss! Peace!" and dabs and leaves. The first baker is still holding the small cake and is now on the verge of tears.

Panel 5: The first baker, still looking bereft, stands in the silent crowd. Everyone is desaturated.

Panel 6: A repeat of panel 5, with the crowd reacting to the second baker's outburst: "I... do not want to eat that.", "I don't think I like cake anymore.", and "I was gonna try a box mix, but maybe I shouldn't bother-"

Panel 7: The first baker, still desaturated, startles as someone asks, "Hey. You brought cake, too?"

Panel 8: The baker, visibly nervous and still desaturated, answers, "Oh, yeah. Do you like funfetti?" to which the speaker replies "Oh, nice."

Panel 9: The baker startles as someone yells "Did someone say funfetti" in all caps. Further dialogue pops up: "Omg funfetti my not so secret love," "Oh there's actually cake?", and "save me a slice!"

Panel 10: The baker, resaturated, now holding a plate with only one slice left, is chatting with one of the diners. Further chatter happens around them.

Diner 1: "Yo, I love the texture on the frosting!"

Baker: "Oh, that was an accident, actually-"

Diner 2: "Seriously? It came out so cool!"

Other chatter: "Have you tried using pudding mix in the frosting?", as well as small disagreement where one diner says "I've had better..." and another responds, "Give me your piece if you don't want it, then." Various guests mill around, eating cake.

Epilogue: The second baker returns to find the fancy cake untouched, and says, "Weird. I guess everyone hates cake now, lol."

End ID.]

Reference to Two Cakes comic.

[elkian-art]

[ID: A tall, full-color comic set in Fallout: New Vegas.

First panel: A back shot of the Courier, Caster, as they look up at the Moon in the night sky.

Second panel: A frontal shot of Caster looking up as Raul works on something off-panel.

Third panel: Caster says, “Do you think she’s watching us?”, startling Raul.

Fourth panel: Raul, looking around rapidly, responds: “Wha- who, boss?”

Fifth panel: Caster replies, “The Moon.” Raul looks on, dumbfounded.

Sixth panel: Raul is speechless.

End ID.]

I’m actually surprised the full-size image managed to post.

My previous upload showed as very dark once posted on Tumblr, so if this seems that way, try opening it in a new tab or checking it out on Pixiv!

No one knows when Caster is serious, and when they’re joking. (Caster is always serious.)

[onmyshippingbullshitagain]

Please enjoy the supercharged erotica in Play, pages 10-12. Herein i introduce the central conflict to the story. No, it isn’t erectile dysfunction as you might have been lead to believe from previous pages, but the fact these two people are on completely different stages in their relationship. Surprise! 

<<  Previous Pages  <<            >>  Next Pages  >>

Index      |   Start of part one  |   Start of part two   |

Bolded links are NSFW

Note: This adult fancomic was written before season 4 aired. The text is constantly being revised to comply with the evolving canon but inconsistencies are inevitable, as they are in  all fanworks based on a currently airing properties.  No harm, identity devaluation, erasure, or disrespect to living persons is intended.

[blackstar]

Hey hey, opinions on Giriko/Justin Law? I'm just a big sucker for those idiots together (as long as Giriko's loyalty towards Arachne remains his character trait number 1) and want your opinion ^^ (manga/anime?)

i THINK i’ve talked about this before (read: i have almost certainly talked about this before) but my extremely hot take is that giriko/justin does not work at all as a romantic relationship, which i know is a stance that thousands of late-2000s-era fanworks would gladly beat me over the head for expressing 

for one thing, giriko is absolutely, unequivocally head-over-heels in love with arachne and if you’re loyal enough to cheat death for eight centuries so you can protect your girl while she’s in a magic coma, you’re prrrrroooooobably not going to just go off and get flirty with someone else

THIS SAID: it does work as a blackrom* in the anime (the manga too, i think, but that gets a little more complicated), and in fact, it works really really well. justin and giriko are the only two autonomous weapons we encounter in the series so they are by nature foils to one another, and they serve that function beautifully. giriko’s hedonism and raucousness contrast really well with justin’s christian motifs and understated nature — and when you get down to it, they aren’t as different as they like to believe; they are both ultimately serving someone else’s goals rather than thinking for themselves 

sidenote: i would argue that dependence on a person/institution to provide guidance and purpose is one of the defining features of an autonomous weapons? they can never be ‘complete’ in that they can never be wielded, so they seek forces that can wield them as tools in order to fill that void. so dwma/asura and arachne are giriko and justin’s respective surrogate meisters, in a way 

in canon they’re a pretty typical blackrom; they clash repeatedly with each other and are so evenly matched as to push each other to their very limits as they each strive to snatch a victory — that’s rivalry, yes, but it’s also a very bare-bones form of blackrom that fanwork could easily expand on

and then you get into the manga and [MANGA SPOILERS INCOMING], things get a loooot more interesting. in the anime most of the blackrom elements are on giriko’s end, which is still true here, actually but in the manga you also have Things That Happen To Justin which make him, uh, a lot more willing to be sadistic. which is always what you want with this kind of thing (read: probably want giriko wants out of this kind of thing; it’s no fun to be the only person who’s not holding back) 

but there’s also the fact that in the manga, after justin’s downward spiral giriko doesn’t really... understand him as much, i’d say, which is kind of funny because justin post-fall in the manga is closer to being like giriko than he ever is, madness and all (justin’s madness is different from giriko’s madness and this is one of my primary sources on the matter). but they don’t really fight anymore (why would they if they’re on the same team), and since that’s been their primary means of interaction up until now, giriko’s left feeling really awkward talking to this guy normally. also he kind of still wants to kick his teeth in

...and on justin’s end i don’t think giriko ever really registered as more than an annoyance; he doesn’t have a personal stake in their fights and seems to declare a grudge against giriko more out of a need to prove himself (to dwma? maybe. he’s no good as their tool if he can’t dispatch one man) than out of any feelings towards/about giriko. their rivalry is much more mutual in the anime; in the manga it’s pretty clear that justin gives very few shits about giriko as a person while giriko gives too many about this goddamn prick 

i did ship them in 5th grade though lmao 

tl;dr: good mutual blackrom in the anime, good one-sided blackrom in the manga, but i can’t really see them being involved romantically (or sexually, but i didn’t touch on that here) 

[elkian]

Since I'm talking about Suspension of Disbelief today apparently, here's a problem that took me a long time to articulate correctly that I have with worldbuilding.

Example A (D?) is Vampire Hunter D. I liked the movies, enjoyed much of the manga, so I picked up the books, hoping for more information. However, I finally gave up on the books (after the volume that the Bloodlust film is based on). Part of this is because the story, which I'd really enjoyed the movie of but had some problems with, wasn't better in book form. It was actually worse in some ways - particularly how I found out that Charlotte's name was either added by the movie staff or not translated in book form. She was just called "the girl" for the entire volume.

But while that was the main reason I gave up on reading the series, it wasn't the only one. Vampire Hunter D has a setting that I'm interested in, a bleak post-apoc fantasy future that intrigues me, and a certain level of angst that I generally enjoy.

But it also had a major, ongoing worldbuilding problem (for me), and that was that the story didn't merely follow the protagonist, it only followed the protagonist. All worldbuilding elements tended to be about how bleak and unbearable the future was, with a handful of technological advancements. The world itself was only interesting when D was present and interacting with it, even though it had a lot of elements that would make for a world I would usually enjoy! From a fan creation standpoint, it was very difficult for me to workshop fic for the series, because the world was only really 'real' when D was Being The Protagonist at it.

He was the only one allowed to solve problems, to fix issues, to kill vampires most of the time. And while I liked him well enough, his personality and motivations are vague enough that he really cannot carry the series on force of personality alone, in my own opinion. VHD isn't a bad series, necessarily, but it was one I couldn't engage with past a certain point.

And to be clear, this post is not about me slamming this series. It had a lot of interesting things I enjoyed, and the Bloodlust movie in particular is still appealing to me, even with its weird moments. This is just about how narrative and worldbuilding work, and VHD is an example that I can articulate my problems with. It's especially frustrating to me because the series has so much potential appeal, but I just can't get any further into it.

Now, my counterpoints. For some reason anime is on the brain, so let's bring up Helck, Fullmetal Alchemist, and Frieren: At Journey's End.

All three of these series, in some respect, avoid the problem I had with VHD. Helck is especially interesting as a comparison, because it also has a Specialest Boy In The World protagonist... but the thrust of the series is partly about how just being obscenely strong and competent doesn't mean he's undeserving of help, and that help changes the trajectory of his story in a very positive way.

But one of the fun things about Helck is the side stories and side characters. There's a gag a few times involving a series of characters that are experiencing their Hot-Blooded Shonen Cooking Manga storyline, completely divorced from the dramatic stakes of Helck's core story. Helck and Vamirio even butt into their story for a cooking competition chapter, which is hilarious. And we sometimes see characters like this interacting with side characters from other arcs, in ways that don't refer to Helck or Vamirio or Piwi at all. Further, we see side characters like the Demon King Tourney participants doing things like making new friends, fighting against the antagonists and getting stronger, and writing the empire-famous manga that Asuta loves. Over and over, Helck as a story acknowledges a very wide world that isn't directly involved in much of the core story, yet when the protagonists interact with it, doing so affects them, changing their ideals and widening their viewpoints.

FMA does hinge a little more on Ed's journey, but many of the characters doing things he precipitated had never actually met him. And what's important to that story in particular is stuff like the epilogue with Al traveling with the chimeras, and things of that nature - of Ed and Al over and over displaying compassion to the point that it changed people's lives. The protagonists are important, yes, but the world is repeatedly shown to go on without them, even during core story moments, because the world is full of strong (even, at times, stronger than the protags) characters with complex personalities and motivations.

Frieren is a little less so, probably since her journey with Himmel was extremely important on a social level even now, but characters, trends, and locations are typically fleshed out to the point where it doesn't feel like the Special Protagonists have to Exist At Them for things to happen. Soul Track being broken down and integrated into basic offense magic could have been something Frieren did, so I like that it's something humans did on their own, completely divorced from her interference past the initial binding point. Actually, a theme of the series as a whole is Frieren being ancient and knowledgeable and yet, willingly and willfully, learning from humans and the world around her more and more.

Lastly, a non-anime example, is how Sir Terry deliberately wrote Ankh-Morpork in a way that it could feasibly exist outside of the immediate tracks of a story. He succeeded to the point that virtually every location and character in the Disc could be transplanted alone into a completely new story and still be recognizable. I could, and would, read a story that takes place in Ankh-Morpork that namedrops not one known character and still feel like it fits, like it's vibrant, like it's alive. You could tell me that Granny Weatherwax dismantled a cult of people who thought the Disc rested atop the backs of pigs as an aside in a book not at all about her, and I could go "yeah that sounds like her" and move on.

I've heard it mentioned in DnD terms, the idea that one should account for players not doing as expected and ignoring a major plot point, and what should happen if they do. In BG3, if you take too many Rests, an inn fire will burn down and kill everyone trapped in the building that you could have saved, which will have some effects on the quest(s) you get at that location. FNV had "hunting ghosts in Baja" that I really respect, the idea that not only is there a wider world out there, but that it understandably doesn't really care what one person, no matter how Special, is doing in a distant place, because they have their own problems to attend to.

I don't know if there's a particular phrase for this idea that I'm missing, and to be fair, there are plenty of times where it is okay for the story to revolve around the protagonist! it's often plenty fine and enjoyable to watch the Specialest Person In The World fix everything! But sometimes, worldbuilding that doesn't account for the protagonist not existing can fall so flat that it makes it hard, even impossible, to continue enjoying the rest of the work.

I guess that's it - whether creators consider how to answer the question of "if so-and-so didn't exist, what impact would it have on the world?" and how they choose to answer that.

[poupon]

After reading a post about waterproof notepads/bath crayons for capturing shower ideas i bought a pad on amazon

i expected this

but i did not anticipate.... This

[elkian]

Some Baking Tips if you don’t bake often

If a recipe calls for egg yolks or whites on their own, you can use two halves of an eggshell as cups. Transfer the yolk back and forth, careful not to break it, over a bowl to catch the white. You can cook off whatever you don’t use in a different dish later.

If you break the eggs first or into a separate bowl you can look for shell bits and fish them out. Use half an eggshell - it’ll help.

I’m decent at baking but not at breaking eggs. Don’t get discouraged!

Do your conversions and prep your ingredients before starting. This will help ensure you don’t get halfway done only to realize you’re out of milk.

Cake flour is different from bread flour is different from all-purpose flour. All of these have their uses.

The first time, follow the recipe.

Stop. Read that last bullet point again.

I’m serious.

I also get impatient but I’ve learned screwing around with unfamiliar recipes is a great way to waste 2 hours and a lot of ingredients.

Once you get a handle on it, though, feel free to improvise. Write it down so you can do it again.

On the note of recipes - check the reviews, both for online recipe sites and for the cookbook you might have. More than once I’ve made an online recipe only to realize the creator never actually tested it.

Ignore the snobs, they’re not your friends.

Seriously.

Don’t put a mixer on high when there’s a ton of dry flour (or powdered sugar) in it unless you wanted to redecorate.

Stand mixers are powerful beasts and should be handled with caution. Under no circumstances should you stick anything in the bowl while the mixer is running unless you don’t want it back.

That includes fingers.

If your hair is long enough for a ponytail, please put it in a ponytail.

Aesthetic videos are cute but you don’t actually need 15 bowls I promise you can get away with like 3.

Soft butter is different from melted butter.

Hot butter is a great way to scramble eggs and make you have to redo the egg steps.

Parchment paper is great for baking, wax paper is not.

Do not skip the pan prep.

Grease your pans as directed (silicone mats and/or parchment paper can take the place of this step).

Heat will melt frosting. Let things cool down first.

Sugar melts quickly enough that it can be counted as a liquid in recipes where dry and wet ingredients are separate.

Brown sugar should be packed while measuring.

Flour should not be packed while measuring.

There’s a difference between putting stuff in the oven while it’s pre-heating and after it’s pre-heated.

Don’t open the oven door halfway through. There should be a light button that lets you see through the window. Don’t let the heat out.

If you’re converting Imperial to Metric, a Cup is an actual measurement and there is a difference between fluid and dry. Yes, I promise this is also really confusing to us, too. Use an online converter.

Tablespoons (Tbs) and teaspoons (tsp) are also actual measurements and they are not the same thing. Read carefully.

Baking soda and baking powder are different creatures. No, I don’t know why they have nearly the same name, either.

I’m pretty sure the reason recipes specify “unsalted butter” and then “salt” on its own is a matter of control - unless you made the butter yourself, you have no control over how much salt from salted butter is going into the recipe.

Batter is thin enough to be easily poured, dough is sturdy enough to be shaped by hand.

Do not overmix. Follow the directions on this.

After something has been out of the oven for a few minutes, transfer it to a cooling rack. Otherwise the heat of the pan will continue affecting it and it won’t receive the same airflow it might otherwise.