"Waa why aren't fandoms fun anymore" because you keep policing people's headcanons, make fun of cosplayers,make fun of selfshipers, make fun of beginner artists and just make fun of people for having fun 😐
Also nobody talks to each other anymore. People lurk silently and sometimes like stuff, but nobody exchanges their thoughts and ideas anymore. Which is pretty shit considering fandom is a hobby that is supposed to be about community and not mere consumption.
it's also because the only time you make a comment on someone's art it's to say shit like "i thought (x part of drawing) looked like (completely different thing that is most likely supposed to be humorous or weird)" to a complete stranger. am i supposed to feel amused by that? are you only capable of viewing everything in life through a lense of what is and isn't cringe? people are not flattered when you are constantly scanning for flaws and stretching the truth of what you see. this is what makes fandom not fun anymore
I was talking to my partner about this last night but it is so much harder to make friends and have conversations than it used to be. A lot of people seem to be very socially anxious about bothering people. A lot of people (myself included at times) will reblog posts about wanting more fandom connection but not do things to actively get it. If we all sit passively waiting for people to come to us, then nothing changes.
But also I have to admit that when I interact with people’s posts, reciprocal interaction is relatively rare. Sometimes it feels more like commenting on someone’s YouTube channel than their blog. I don’t obsess over this by any means and it’s not at all that I feel entitled to someone’s friendship just bc I like their blog and replied to some of their posts, but the point I’m trying to make is that creating any kind of back and forth, that active social kind of fandoming, is really hard. On the very rare occasions I do get asks responding to my posts, people are on Anon, which I have zero problem with apart from the fact that this makes me sad I can’t check out their blog and see if I’d like to follow them. Again, hard to build something that leads to ongoing interaction, mutual meta-writing or other collaboration, or friendship - whether that’s as casual as “mutual you talk to through tags” or “person who becomes off-site/irl friend”.
Socialising all being on Discord servers also means that you sort of have to choose between going to a house party every day or staying at home with no friends. I really wish we hadn’t split “socialising” and “sharing fanwork” into things done on separate platforms because I remember when I used to talk to people a lot as a part of fandom, either on tumblr or in conversations in comments on Ao3. There’s really nothing stopping us from changing it back except social pressure to adhere to what’s currently “normal”. Unfortunately social pressure is a pretty powerful force.
Finished the Fate/Star Rail collab last night and enjoyed it much more than I expected. I don't know much of anything about the Fate series, so I figured it would be a slog, but it was both funny and a nice breather after the main story of 3.4. Also--a surprising feast for Aventurine fans in terms of both lore and characterization. I am definitely the fan that was served.
Some of the stand out stuff:
Hope this event will finally put the nail in the coffin for those people who kept insisting that Aventurine secretly hates Jade or that she's abusing him somehow. Their first scene was very nice, giving us insight into their relationship within the IPC; we see them discussing the plan, and it's clear that although Aventurine is very smart and clued into exactly what Jade is thinking, she's also certainly got the upper-hand when it comes to strictly business sense. Watching Aventurine follow her thought process to the conclusion tells us a lot about how Jade has mentored him throughout his time with the Stonehearts.
Aventurine is also willing to discuss his personal concerns and vulnerabilities with her:
And, ridiculously important for lore and dropped completely casually into the conversation: Aventurine told Jade about his dalliance with Boothill. This pretty much confirms that Aventurine and Boothill's deal is to hunt down Oswaldo Schneider specificially, and Jade not only approves of it but is encouraging it. Oh they hate his ass, for real.
This also implies that Aventurine isn't keeping secrets from Jade; he trusts her enough to tell her even about his under-the-table dealings.
I think it's clear they have a much better relationship that most of the players were giving them credit for.
In terms of other treats from the event, look! Aventurine is comfortable sharing space with Boothill and (later) Archer:
I've written before about how the devs normally position Aventurine's character further away from others during conversations and cutscenes, but it seems that he's a little more in his comfort zone now than he was in his first visits to Penacony. It's not just anyone that Aventurine is willing to stand shoulder to shoulder with--it says a lot that he was willing to put aside the space bubble here!
(This is also funny because Boothill in particular is the opposite of Aventurine, in that he's almost always positioned RIGHT NEXT to the people he's talking to--the space bubble is kind of nonexistent--but it still looks hilariously out of place to see him standing so close to Aventurine because Aventurine doesn't normally stand with anyone lol.)
Also: Boothill making a reference to xenophobia while the two indigenous characters from colonized worlds are on the screen? Wow, one of the members of the writing team actually remembered and cared enough to make note.
In fact, I thought whoever handled the writing for this questline in general did a much better job than the HSR writers normally do with characters' pasts affecting their current behaviors. Aventurine's consistent discomfort with the Master-Servant dynamic was excellent to see.
"Dead class structures"--my goodness, the word "master" showed up and the Proletariat just jumped straight out of Aventurine. A very good note for those interested in his characterization.
And speaking of characterization, Archer and Aventurine's dynamic was a definite high-point for the collab questline. I don't even know anything about Archer but his chemistry with Aventurine was great--mostly because it was actually just Ratio/Aventurine with a stand-in because the devs are allergic to giving Dr. Ratio screentime nowadays lol.
Aventurine's type is clearly "strapping, competent, reliable men who will lightly bully me into becoming a better version of myself."
We even got the "Trust me and my plan so we can trick everyone and beat our enemy." The fact that Archer was able to catch on with just one sentence from Aventurine was great, and the fact that he was even worse than Ratio at acting was pretty funny ngl. (Well, at least he put less effort into it!)
Archer and Ratio even have the same complaints:
Ratiorine fandom, I am politely requesting 5956760 fanfics of Ratio's eye twitching at some random new man showing up and folding Aventurine's laundry without asking and then just "poof"
disappearing lol. Thank youuu~~
And pointing out some other fun snippets:
Aventurine being a horror movie buff was not on my bingo card, but it's an interesting tidbit to add to his characterization. Understandably difficult to spook someone who has beaten people to death with his bare hands to survive the Hunger Games. You know he's the person who watches the gory slasher flicks and is just devouring the popcorn while everyone else is getting grossed out.
Also interesting to note that Aventurine, the "give me two of everything at the highest-end luxury shops in Penacony" guy also apparently still shops at "interstellar junk markets." You can take the community bazaar out of the nomad but you can't take the nomad out of the community bazaar, apparently.
I want to know what dev managed to get this past the censors!! 😂
And Aventurine's tininess... I know the devs writing this quest were Aventurine fans; I know it.
This moment in general:
When are we getting our Bonnie and Clyde/Aventurine-Boothill western shootout with Oswaldo Schneider, Hoyo, when?
And, despite the tone of Aventurine's text messages post-Penacony sounding very much "I want to be friends" with the Trailblazer, it seems that, canonically, Aventurine hasn't made much headway in actually becoming Trailblazer's friend. Trailblazer's reactions to Aventurine were pretty :T through the event, and Aventurine's first claim is that maybe Trailblazer wouldn't even want to come out to meet with him. This is why Jade sent you to the Penacony Daycare Holy Grail War to make better friends, Aventurine. You gotta work a little harder at it, my dude.
Finally, I really appreciated this event taking the time to acknowledge that Aventurine is actually extremely smart and adaptable, capable of keeping a cool head under pressure, figuring out the enemy's strategy, immediately developing a plan to solve the problem, and executing it flawlessly.
And even more so than just painting Aventurine as a smart cookie who can see through others' ploys, I love that the reason Aventurine was able to see the ploy wasn't because of his status as a movie buff... It was because of his interest in business.
Aventurine can be a fake idgafer about his work all he wants, but when it comes right down to it, he was so interested in Grady's marketing strategies and business acumen that he went through the entire archive of Grady's works and learned the full history and tactics of this completely no-name director from a totally foreign planet. He's being unironic when he calls himself a "fan" of Grady's--not of Grady's terrible films, but of Grady's ability to achieve success.
My boy isn't just smart, he's still building his portfolio of tricks to get ahead in life.
Repeatedly, Archer asks whether Aventurine doesn't want to be a "hero of justice" sometimes, to which Aventurine never really fully responds. Yet in the team's time of greatest need in this quest, Aventurine was the actual "hero" of the moment--not using noble tactics, but by being true to exactly who he is: the shrewd schemer whose knowledge of underhanded methods and the cutthroat world of commerce can be applied even to righteous causes.
Aventurine's character in this event was, in essence, a perfect microcosm of the IPC's role in the game's overall story. Their methods might be less than ideal, their perspectives on right and wrong might be skewed at a 90 degree angle--but when push comes to shove, you're really going to need someone who isn't worried about getting their hands a little dirty, someone with the know-how to scheme their way out of the pitfalls, but someone who--deep, deep down--might (mostly) have their heart in the right place.
I doodled some scenes from my fic Finding our Shelter, inspired by Rota Fortunae.
I know Aven's eyes aren't supposed to work like that in Rota Fortunae, but I wrote my fic before Megane gave confirmation his eyes are naturally red, so welp-
@havanillas I need to kiss ur hands the new Yuri post has me in shambles that my kids went straight to doomed royalty Yuri thats basically the entire movie of sleeping beauty but one of them actually sleeps for eternity oh ratio you beautiful knight how does it feel to finally hold your estranged lover in your arms (you'll never see her smile or hear her laugh again)
i just want a corny romcom setting for this one like "we were forced into an arranged marriage by our families but wait why am i getting more and more attached to you" and they proceed to become the most smitten pair of lovebirds in less than a year
gummygunk
kianamaiart
jbbartram-illu
jacobvanloon
theartofmadeline
yousharknotpass
baratheonpilled
