I can't remember if this has been asked already, but do the troll religions play a part in sovstuck?
If you mean things like Worship of The Sufferer and Belief in Ancestors? Yeah.
If you mean the Juggalo Cult? No.
Religion is pretty... I want to say, decentralized? On Sovereignstuck's Earth C. It's not segregated by species or location or anything.
Focusing on Sufferer Worship here: Tejuri is (Texican) Troll Catholic, with a particular interest in The Psiioniic, the Forgotten Saint of Prolonged Suffering and Aviation. She dragged Retris into gaining an academic fixation on this as well, even though he was raised in a country almost entirely populated by Carapacians.
Dynama, however, intensely believes in Human Christianity. She doesn't particularly believe other forms of religion are as valid as hers. Kind of a dick move, but not fully unexpected.
Kurloz isn't in the Clown Cult because that whole thing was kinda fucking lame and we don't really want to do anything with it. He is goth now, though. Hopefully this makes up for it.
If Retris is named after/based on Tetris, are all the Sovstuck original characters based on/tied to classic video games? Like Space Invaders, Pong, Snake, Pac-Man, Frogger?
A few of them are! We’ve got extremely overly complicated and extremely simple reasons for each one, too! Here’s a few I can think of right off the bat:
Tejuri is inspired by Snake.
Dynama is inspired by Frogger.
Presae is inspired by Centipede.
Meseri is inspired by Polybius.
Ajax is inspired by Space Invaders.
I would also like to take a moment to say that while, yes, Retris’s name is literally just Tetris with an R in front of it (there are very simple and very complicated reasons for this also,) the inspiration I derived from the game for Retris’s character is largely based on The Tetris Effect. Don’t think about that too hard! Or do. I’m not the boss of you. :)
Which character arc in sovereignstuck you worked on/wrote are you most proud of? Which of the other writers arcs are you most excited for ??
Oh, god. This is such a hard question. Some of this shit gets positively thespian. Going to try to avoid overt spoilers as best as I can.
Content Warning: Long.
As far as myself goes… Kankri’s growth has given many issues. He’s not that difficult to write, per se, and it’s not like writing him isn’t fun. He’s just hard to get a good angle with. Character arcs have an angle. There’s no improvement without there being some kind of focus to that arc of improvement. If something is to be fixed, you need to know what there is to fix, and how. What’s the root of the issue, and how do you address it without unintentionally making it worse?
It took fucking ages to find a good angle with Kankri, and when we did find it, it was through an offhand joke. Emotional attachment skyrocketed with it, though, and I personally find it to be a highly satisfying arc. I’m definitely proud of my other work with character arcs, but Kankri’s is the first one to come to mind, and it’s absolutely the most dramatic change I’ve written. As I said earlier, though, it’s genuinely hard to pick a favorite.
As far as arcs from the other writers go…
Emeric’s character arc is genuinely fascinating to me. I’m so fucking excited to see it written out fully. Emeric is such a fascinating character, and it’s really, really satisfying seeing a Bard not get defaulted to a villain role. She’s incredibly complex, and incredibly fun to watch. She’s one of those characters where you think she’d get shafted as pure comic relief, but she’s so much more than that, and I love her. Her battle with herself is one of those that those who have felt neglect can really relate to. Her struggle is a brutal one. Every moment she’s alive, she’s fighting for something, and her efforts are felt. (@unexiled)
Tejuri’s arc is dramatic in ways we never thought it’d be. She starts as an awkward, nerdy, southern troll-Catholic girl with very little self confidence, and the way SVURB makes her confront and challenge herself really makes her blossom into a complete badass, weaponizing other people’s belief in her and her friends in an absolutely catastrophic way. She deserves every victory she gets, and I feel like her humble, clumsy beginnings as a character really help you feel like she’s someone you would have been best friends with in high school. She’s a character where you don’t realize how much you believe in her until you’re actively cheering for her, it’s amazing. She’s a true Rogue of Hope. (@scalematez)
Meenah’s growth as a character and as a person within Sovereignstuck is one that I hope invigorates others just as much as it does me. She’s someone who’s slowly come to realize just how much hurt she’s caused, but she’s so deep in her routines that being a good person is something she has to fight tooth and nail for. She fucks up constantly, but she really is trying, and it honestly hurts to see her fail. She’s battling with the fact that just because she’s trying to be better doesn’t mean people will forgive her for the past. She’s built to hurt people, and she knows she is, she truly believes so, but the blood on her hands is starting to sting. She’s done so much damage in the past, and yet seeing her hurt isn’t even satisfying. Improvement really is Sisyphean sometimes. (@octopeixes)
Kausat’s arc is quiet. At least at first. Most of those who are Voidbound don’t tend to have a very loud, dramatic arc. But you don’t need to be flashy to be interesting, do you? Their story is one of growing into who they are- watching how his arc ties into his status as both a Seer of Life and a Seer of Void is really interesting. Change is an inevitable force of nature. It’s what makes things a tangible concept. Sometimes change is unexpected- mysterious, unexplainable, intangible. Sometimes it’s slow, like the growth of a tree, the decomposition of a body, and sometimes it’s dramatic- lightning striking the tallest construct it can find, an explosion in a lake, so on and so forth. Life, and living, is about change, and acceptance of that change, even if you don’t understand it. It’s the only way to survive. It’s quite an intimate topic, honestly, but rather fun to pick apart. (@santostrife)
Maybe tell us 3 random character facts about sovereignstuck?
Absolutely! Questions/Prompts like this are always welcome, lol.
Despite having joined a Tech Club, Tejuri Kromab sucks complete ass at computers, and actually tried to download more RAM once.
Retris Morage is nearly physically incapable of keeping his feelings secret. He thinks he’s unemotive, and thinks he has a low level of emotional reactivity. Neither of these things are true.
Emeric Sargas just straight up eats rat poison. For fun. She thinks she’s built different, so she is. Logic bends to her will.
