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infinite-xerath · 3 years

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Runeterra Retcons 4: Varus

Unlike the other Champions I’ve covered, Varus’s history is surprisingly straightforward. He was released all the way back in 2012 and, as far as I can recall, was the first Champion to ever receive any sort of major promotional material in the form of a short comic. He’s very straight-forward in both concept and design: a man willing to sell his soul, his very humanity, for revenge on the people who took everything from him. Given that this was before Kalista was added to the game, Varus had little choice but take matters into his own hands by bargaining with a vaguely-defined Eldritch being who would give him the power he needed in exchanged for taking over his body.

Original lore here

Varus’s lore is a very traditional revenge story, albeit with a slightly interesting twist in that he is the maker of his own tragedy. Varus opted to place his duty over the well-being of family and, in the process, was unable to even TRY to protect them while his village was being reduced to burning rubble. Out of grief and rage Varus turned to bargaining with the very entity he fought so hard to keep confined now that he no longer has anything to lose.

I and many others liked Varus’s story, and to be honest, Riot could have honestly just kept him more-or-less the same when they updated him post-retcon. Just remove the mention of the League and maybe better-define what the black flames were, and you’d be good. In fact, Riot technically did the former, as his second lore is basically identical save for removing any mention of the League of Legends.

Now, it’s at this point that things start to get a little more complicated. Now, if you want a more comprehensive breakdown of the Darkin and their history, I advise you go check out the part centered around Aatrox and his long and convoluted history, but tldr: the Darkin were a race of beings of whom only five remained, and it was later confirmed with Rhaast that they’re specifically a race of living weapons with the ability to possess whoever wields them. Now, while Varus was specifically possessed by an ominous black flame called Pallas, many drew parallels between him and the other Darkin characters, especially since Varus’s also seemed to be alive.

Given that the flames were never really elaborated on or given a proper origin story, Riot decided that it would probably be best to just go ahead and retcon Varus into being a Darkin as well, and nobody had any real qualms with this. It was a common fan theory for years, so why not? Just change the story a bit so that the flames were actually just a Darkin bow all along and boom, you’ve pretty-much done all you needed to properly fit Varus into the new post-reboot Runeterra.

Well, apparently Riot did not feel this way, as it was with Varus’s 2017 retcon that they decided to finally give fans a proper origin story for who and what the Darkin were. That origin story goes a little something like this.

Alright, so Varus is now an alien. They decided to make Varus himself the Darkin, rather than the man who would later claim the bow. OK, that’s fine. I mean, the whole alien thing is kinda weird and still very vaguely explained, but again, my full thoughts on the history of the Darkin as a whole can be seen in the Aatrox analysis. What I think is most important here is that Riot made an attempt, however sloppy, to explain who and what the Darkin were and finally give context to why Aatrox and Rhaast are such big threats to the world.

Now, it’s the next change that got a lot of controversy around it. Rather than just change the name of the Ionian guard who let Varus possess him, the guy who lost his family to the Noxian invasion, Riot decided to replace him with a pair of entirely new characters: Valmar and Kai, a duo of gay Ionian hunters.

Now, I’m just gonna get this out of the way: I’ve got no real qualms about gay relationships in media. Hell, we have a few LGBT Champions in the game already, and even some in the broader expanse of the world. My main gripe comes from the introduction of Valmar and Kai themselves, and how they’re just sort of these… Nothing characters. I mean, in the first lore, we knew who Varus was. We may not have known him well, but we could at least get a general sense of his character: he was proud of his skill, committed to the duty given to him even at the risk of his family, but ultimately succumbed to grief and rage when his decision caused him to lose everything he held dear. Varus was a good man warped by the loss of his home and loved ones, and that made him a fairly compelling character.

Valmar and Kai are… Two gay hunters. That’s it. That’s literally all we know about them from the bio alone. I mean, yes, Riot released a comic to further expand on these characters, but if your answer to the questions raised in your story are “go and read this extra supplementary material for context,” that’s… A problem.

On the topic of supplementary material, Riot also released a music video about Varus. It’s… OK. I personally don’t care much for the song but the visuals alone are really well-done. It’s supposed to detail the conflict between Valmar, Kai and Varus, but most of the context behind it is explained in the comic and short story.

Honestly, Varus’s retcon is kind of baffling. I mean, he didn’t receive a visual rework, his kit remained pretty-much the same as it’s always been, and he doesn’t even have any new voice lines in-game to indicate that he’s three different guys all stuck in one body. In fact, people who play him in-game without reading the lore probably wouldn’t ever be able to guess as much. Riot went to so much effort promoting Varus’s lore update with a music video, a new bio, a new color story, and a three-part comic, but they really haven’t changed anything about him in the game itself. They put more effort into him than they do for most ACTUAL Champion VGU’s. So… Why?

Admittedly, this is where I’m going to delve a bit into conspiracy theory territory, but I genuinely believe this is a case of Riot trying to push League’s first openly queer relationship. Seriously, Valmar and Kai are the first time a character in League has been confirmed gay IN THE LORE ITSELF and not just through a random tweet. Now, the word “pandering” gets thrown around a lot these days, and I don’t really like to use it, but it really does feel like Valmar and Kai were added JUST to have a confirmed gay couple in the lore.

The fact that they’re not even acknowledged IN THE GAME ITSELF really makes the whole thing feel like an attempt to just appeal to the LGBT crowd, though I’ve seen plenty of people in that community react… Less than positively to the portrayal. I mean, two gay guys are literally trying to hold back a corruptive, even influence with the power of love. I don’t wanna delve too much into the political side of things here, but that’s honestly about as cliché and stereotypical as you can get. Fans in general were extremely displeased that the man they knew as Varus, this genuinely tragic figure from the original lore, was replaced by two guys who’s only defining character trait is how much they apparently love each other.

Apparently, these complaints came through loud and clear, as Riot would update Varus one final time after deciding to retcon the whole alien plotline. So, let’s have a look at how his current, canon bio handles him.

Alright, well… Riot heard the complaints, but whether or not they fixed him is another matter. It seems like they tried to give Varus back his original origin story, basically making the archer we new from his first bio Shuriman. The problem is that there’s significantly less context for him now; we don’t know anything about his family, we don’t know why the temple he’s guarding is so important, and the story never even explicitly states that his family died!

I guess it’s implied because the Ascended acknowledged his “sacrifice,” though him being rewarded by becoming a demigod doesn’t quite have the same impact as exchanging his life and soul for a shot at revenge. On top of that, Varus seems pretty quick to give up on the whole “sacred duty” thing, despite the story claiming that being the thing he “he held above all else.” It all feels like a botched effort to mix his original bio with the new Ascended lore that Riot tied in with the Darkin.

Then, of course, there’s Valmar and Kai, who are… Still just gay hunters. They haven’t been expanded on at all. They helped drive the Noxians off from their home, Kai was apparently wounded, and Valmar decides that dipping his lover in an ominous pool of evil to save his life is a bad idea. Seriously, the bio states that they “inadvertently” freed Varus, but there was nothing accidental about it! There was no bargain, they weren’t tricked, it was literally just one guy making a stupid decision that got him fused with his lover and an ancient evil being.

Also, can we address the fact that Varus still wants to avenge the destruction of his race? Who does he want to avenge? The other Ascended? The Ascended who literally warred with each other for centuries? The same Ascended that HE FOUGHT AGAINST during the civil war for control of Shurima? Did Riot just… Forget that he’s not an alien anymore in that brief paragraph? They stated earlier that he was a cruel, merciless killer who just went to slaughter whoever he was told to slaughter, so for some reason I don’t feel like he’d care all that much about his “race” being felled. Oh, and there’s also still the unnamed warrior queen, who I THINK is meant to be a precious Aspect of the Sun? It’s never really stated in the bio itself.

Alright, enough ranting. Varus’s current lore suffers from one major fault: it is trying way too hard to tell several stories all at once. It tells the story of Varus as a human, Varus as an Ascended, Varus as a Darkin, the “story” of Valmar and Kai, and how they got fused with Varus. The writers tried way too hard to cram everything into a single bio and, as a result, nothing is elaborated on. Nothing is really explained, we don’t get to know the characters who are involved in the gestalt entities now known as Varus, and reason for his current existence AS a gestalt entity are just kinda silly, if we’re being honest.

So, how can we fix this? I admit: this was a tough one. There were a lot of different directions I could go when rewriting Varus’s lore, but I decided to take the Kayn approach, where the human host in the focus of the bio. Originally, I did have a whole bio written out for Varus and how he became an Ascendant, but I ultimately realized that I was going to run into the same issue Riot did: trying to cram way too much into a single character overview. So, instead, I chose to focus in more on the story of Valmar and Kai, and how the Darkin Bow was freed after ages of confinement. Without any further ado, please enjoy.

For years, the Darkin Bow has remained confined within the Ionian city of Pallas. The bow’s true nature has long been lost to time, though legends say it holds the spirit of an ancient god from a vast desert land. Others claim that the bow itself is something much older and viler than history itself dares to remember. Whatever the truth may be, the people have Pallas have guarded the bow for generations, choosing only their most skilled warriors from the task. Among them, none seemed better-suited for the task than Kai and Valmar.

Kai and Valmar were inseparable since they were children. Kai, a prodigy marksman, was known for his sense of humor and fierce resolve. Though infamous for his pranks, Kai would never hesitate to step in and defend someone in need, no matter how poorly the odds stood in his favor. By contrast, Valmar had trained in the ways of swordsmanship since he was old enough to grip a blade. Diligent and studious, Valmar was what many considered a model samurai in the making, yet he was also unendingly curious about the world and the many wonders it held.

At a glance, Kai and Valmar seemed near-total opposites, yet the two formed an unbreakable bond from the day they met. Kai would often accompany Valmar to explore the surrounding wilderness, only for Valmar to shelter Kai whenever one of his pranks went awry. As each boy matured, mastering the bow and blade respectively, their bond became something deeper than simple friendship. Valmar was a part of Kai, and Kai a part of Valmar. Neither was complete without the other, and so it came as little surprise that when Valmar was chosen to guard the Temple of the Bow, Kai soon followed.

Together, Valmar and Kai drove off many would-be thieves seeking to claim the cursed weapon’s power as their own. The two fought as one, each arrow from Kai’s bow in perfect sync with every swing of Valmar’s blade. Eventually, they came to be known as the Locust and Mantis, for the whirring of Kai’s arrows and the elegance of Valmar’s blade. It was believed that none could stand up to their combined might… Until the Noxians came.

From their post at the temple, Valmar and Kai watched in horror as the invaders stormed their home, setting fires and killing anyone who dared to stand in their way. For the first time, two warriors found themselves at odds; Kai wished to help defend the people of Pallas, but Valmar insisted on protecting the temple. In the end, neither had much choice in the matter, for the Noxians soon had them cornered on the temple steps.

Valmar and Kai fought for hours, their combined might slowly waning against the invaders’ onslaught. Kai’s strength was the first to give out, yet before death could reach him, Valmar stepped in the way to shield his partner from the blow of a Noxian axe. Kai watched in horror as Valmar fell to the ground, lifeless. Enraged, Kai fired all the arrows he had left before taking up Valmar’s sword, slaying the Noxian forces assaulting the temple. Even still, he knew it would not be long before more came, seeking to claim the forbidden bow.

In that moment, Kai heard a voice calling to him from within the temple. It promised him vengeance and the strength to fight back. Driven by rage and grief, the wounded archer let the voice guide him inside, just as more Noxian invaders began their ascent up the temple’s stairs. It was there, in the darkness, that Kai at last set eyes upon the cursed weapon he and Valmar spent years protecting: a bow thrumming with unearthly power. Kai hesitated for only a moment before grasping the bow, letting its power wash over him.

Kai’s mind was filled with images and thoughts not his own: a vast desert empire, a man made a god, betrayal, war, and finally, imprisonment. These were the memories of Varus, an Ascended being who devoted his life to serving Shurima, only to be abandoned in his time of need. His bitterness and hatred had summoned the Darkin Bow, granting Varus the opportunity to seek revenge on those who had wronged him. In the end, Varus was sealed within the bow, becoming one with it… And now, he would become one with Kai as well.

As Varus’s memories filled Kai’s mind, the Darkin’s power corrupted his body. Varus prepared to usurp Kai’s form entirely, but to his surprise, the Ionian’s drive for vengeance matched his own. Kai was prepared to give anything to avenge Valmar, his fallen half, yet he would do so with his own hands rather than entrust the task to a fallen god.

Even as their minds fought, the archers’ new, fused body moved on pure instinct. One by one, the Noxian forces in Pallas were felled by crimson arrows born of pure malice. Seeing the corpses of his kinsmen and the ruins of his home only fueled Kai’s rage, which in-turn empowered the Darkin in his grasp. Finally, the two archers came to an agreement as the Noxians fled: Varus would lend Kai his strength, in exchange for the Ionian’s body once Kai’s vengeance was complete.

Now on borrowed time, Kai has but one objective: to find and kill everyone he holds responsible for the destruction of his home and the death of his partner. To Varus, however, the destruction of Noxus is but the first step toward a much larger goal: revenge against the gods who betrayed him, and the world that sealed him away…

So, that’s my take on Varus’s lore. Now, the first thing you’ll probably notice is that I only have one of the lovers being possessed. Frankly, I felt that this was probably the best direction to go with; Riot still hasn’t updated Varus in any meaningful way to include Valmar and Kai in any of his voice lines, and something tells me that, being owned by a certain Chinese company, they probably never will. Given the circumstances, I figured it was probably best to give him a backstory more befitting of his in-game voice lines, which still portray Varus as a man on borrowed time who’s giving what little he has left in pursuit of vengeance.

Even so, I decided to try my hand at fleshing out Valmar and Kai. The first thing I did was change them from random hunters to trained soldiers tasked with guarding the temple. This not only harkens back to Varus’s original lore, but it also gives them more of a reason to stand their ground against the Noxian invaders. I also wanted to flesh out their personalities a little more, because I’ll be completely honest: I legitimately couldn’t remember which one was which even after skimming back through the comic. I forgot that Kai was the one who was injured in the original story, not Valmar, but quite frankly it matters so little given how poorly their characters are fleshed out.

Now, as for Varus himself… Well, like I said: I did have a whole bio written out for him that ties into the new Darkin lore I introduced in my Aatrox analysis, but I decided to focus the story more on Valmar and Kai and only have that backstory briefly alluded to. A tad disappointing, I know, but hey, it’s still more than what we learned about Rhaast from Kayn’s bio.

So, that was Varus, the Arrow of Retribution, otherwise known as Riot’s botched attempt at LGBT representation. He’s a far cry from what he started out as, and yet, hilariously, he’s really not on account of them still not updating anything about him in-game. In that respect, the Varus you play as in League isn’t really even the same character(s) presented in the lore. While I still firmly believe that his backstory never needed to be changed so drastically in the first place, I least wanted to present the potential that this direction held, and how badly the opportunity was squandered.

Oh well. At least the music video still looks nice.

#Runeterra Retcons #Varus #League of Legends

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sam-roulette · 4 years

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Recommending Free Old School RPGMaker Horror Games based on what Entity You Vibe With The Most

The Hunt: The Crooked Man. You play as David Hoover, a man going through a rough patch in his life who feels as though he has little prospects for a future and who cares for a mother who doesn’t even recognize him. After realizing that his house is haunted, he goes on a quest to see if he can find the previous owners and figure out what’s going on, all the while chased by a monster called the Crooked Man...

This ironically enough also applies as a recommendation to Martin kinnies. This is also one of the few games on the list where you’re expected to fight back.

The Slaughter: The Witch’s House. You play as Viola, a girl who must find a way out of the woods she’s trapped in. She eventually ends up having to enter the constantly warping witch’s house, where she has to figure out the mystery of the witch before the house kills her...

The character that’s being slaughtered is you. Literally anything can kill you and if you so much as look at an object wrong a random death will trigger. It is trying to hurt your character specifically all the time.

The Spiral: Yume Nikki. You play as Madotsuki, a recluse who refuses to leave her small apartment. When you go to sleep is when the game begins; your goal is to open 12 doors into a myriad of strange and unexplained worlds and collect artefacts which distort the main character’s body beyond recognition. I don’t know what else to say honestly; this is just as Spiral as it gets.

The Flesh: Porterminus. You play as Julie, a spunky teen who ends up getting controlled by an eldritch cat into fighting a myriad of terrifying flesh abominations to stave off an equally eldritch plot. A lot of the enemies look genuinely gnarly (especially since most of them used to be human) so big body horror warning on this one.

The Lonely: Escaped Chasm. In this game by Temmie Chang (and the prequel to Dweller’s Path), you play as a girl who is wholly alone, waiting for her parents to come home as reality begins to fall apart around her. This one isn’t particularly long, but the atmosphere is genuinely lonely enough to make you ache, and there’s no save function, meaning you have to finish in one shot. The cut scenes also happen to be fully animated and are absolutely gorgeous.

The Eye: Your Turn to Die ~Death Game by Majority~. You play as Sara Chidouin, a kidnapped high school student who suddenly finds herself in the midst of a life or death game with ten other people. The name of the game is simple, really- after being given challenges with which to build trust and camaraderie, all contestants must vote on who among them will have to die, debating on the merits of each person’s life using all the information you’ve gathered at your disposal.

This one narrowly avoided being classified as The End by the virtue of the death game itself, which you discover more about as the characters try to plan an escape- the people running it just want to see what happens. And you, as the player, may just want to see how things play out as well.

The End: Mad Father. You play as Aya Drevis on the night of the anniversary of her mother’s death. She and her mother knew that her father was experimenting on humans, often using people deemed of little value to perfect his work in attempting to overcome death. On this night, his subjects come alive and attack, and it’s up to Aya to save her father- if he even deserves to be saved.

This one is mostly in The End for the theming of it- there’s a large theme running throughout the game, especially if you do side quests, about the meaning of life and helping people pass on to their deaths, and whether someone has the right to decide whether to hasten the inevitable.

The Dark: Forest of Drizzling Rain. You play as Shiori, a college student with amnesia who goes back to her hometown in an attempt to illuminate all the gaps in her memory. The village is haunted by the legend of Kotori Obake, said to be the ghost of a woman looking for her child, and whose arrival is always precipitated by rainfall... It’s up to Shiori and the mysterious museum owner, Suga, to figure out how to escape the spirit’s clutches.

This gets to be the Dark due to the fear of the unknown, which this game has in spades. This one also happens to have the plus of one of the protags, Suga, actually being mute but not a silent protagonist (as he communicates primarily through notes, which are displayed on screen), which was a really nice touch.

The Corruption: LiEat (1, 2, 3). You play as the lie-eating dragon Efina and her guardian, a con-artist whose name changes each game, as both travel from town to town to solve the mysteries surrounding a horror story. Each game centers around a different mystery, but the common thread is how Efina eats lies: by being in proximity to a liar, she can make lies appear as creatures to eat, and if the liar has deluded themselves enough, their lies will consume them and turn them into oil-smeared monsters.

These games are a little more tame compared to some others on this list, and are honestly a great ride for if you love parent-child interactions. (Fun fact: we loved these so much, we actually loosely based our eye-eating dragon Jon au off of it!)

The Buried: Mermaid Swamp. You play as Rin Yamazaki, a woman going on vacation with three of her friends when the car breaks down in the middle of the mountains. While they’re able to find shelter at an old mansion near a damp and dirty swamp, things start to go south when their friend Mika comes down with an unexplainable illness and a constant feeling of being drowned...

I’d go a little more detail into the Buried themes of it, but, well, that would run right into spoiler territory. Please heed the trigger warnings provided at the link.

The Vast: Witch’s Heart. You play as Claire Elford, an ordinary woman suddenly swept away into a manic search for the fabled Witch’s Heart. While every version of the story is different, every story has the same thing in common: the Heart has the power to grant someone’s deepest wish. Claire, now trapped in a mansion in the heart of the mountains with four others, must fight her way through a variety of monsters and spectres to try and find a way out, all the while exploring vast spaces hidden through portals throughout the house...

This one is Vast less because of the heights and vast places (though there are many here) but for the everpresent feeling that no matter what you do against the vastness of the universe and fate, it doesn’t matter. Getting further into it would be spoiler territory, and I feel like it’s best experienced without knowledge :)

The Desolation: OFF. You take control of the Batter, who has the sole mission of “purifying” the entire world of evil. The entire world, as it turns out, is also just incredibly unsettling.

It may not exactly be a horror game, but it’s extremely disconcerting and you genuinely cannot get more desolate than this game. I don’t want to spoil the ending (even if the game is like over 10 years old at this point) but suffice it to say, when the credits rolled and “Somewhere Over The Rainbow” started playing for the first time, I felt like everything someone ever loved was burned to the ground, and like I couldn’t do a damn thing about it.

The Stranger: Ib. You play as the titular Ib, a child trapped in a haunted art gallery who has to try and get to the real world alongside two friends she finds along the way. That’s easier said than done, however, with everything in the gallery coming to life and trying to kill you...

There are a lot of things that mark this as a Stranger game, but to avoid touching on the twist, the most genuinely frightening part is That Doll Room. You’ll know it when you see it.

The Web: Close Your Eyes (Original). In this one, you play as a bouncy little Marshmallow Monk who has just escaped death row and is currently running for their life. Before too long, they find themselves in a constantly changing, distorted world, egged on by a mysterious entity called the Narrator who watches their every action and guides their every movement. The goal: get out of this alive.

This one also very narrowly avoided being branded as The Eye due to the eye imagery, the spider, the manipulation, and the Narrator, who is fully voice acted.

#tma #the magnus archives #magnuspod #sam tag #game recs

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mollyencrypted · 4 years

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I'm going to put my bullshit Carter/Pickman PacRim AU initial thoughts up on the hellsite because it's late and I need sleep and to get some of this crap out of my head and also this tag needs more content so that's happening.

So I'm naming and modelling the setting's Kaiju after various Mythos entities, but Cthulhu can't be Slattern no matter what 2013 PacRim Livejournal hoped for because, much as I love him, Cthulhu ain't shit. There's no way the big squid lad is a Category 5. You can defeat Cthulhu by ramming him with just a regular boat and he'll give up and go back to bed. (Cthulhu is a Mood.) Cthulhu is probably Trespasser. Maybe Azathoth would be a good Slattern. God knows where the PPDC got these names from.

Carter left the Jaeger program after his co-pilot Warren got Yancy'd by the Cat 3 Mordiggian, because whilst I don't really vibe with Mordiggian it's really the most fitting namesake. He didn't drop off the map like Raleigh did and stayed on-board in some kind of support staff role until everyone gets laid off when the funding is pulled. He'd kind of rather never get into a Jaeger again after experiencing that, but whoever our Pentecost stand-in here is (please don't ask me for a name because everyone in these stories is kind of not great and I wouldn't want to follow any of them into battle) doesn't have a hard job talking him into it really because at the end of the day he'd rather die on his feet than be crushed under a Kaiju's. Humanity still needs Jaegers no matter what the higher-ups think, and someone's gotta pilot Silver Key, right?

Technically, two someones. And Carter is kind of regretting his decision when he finds out who the best candidate is. For a bit of context, Carter's whole vibe is somewhere between Burn Gorman as Hermann Gottlieb and Mark Kinsey Stevenson as Carter, and Pickman is just kind of a mess who maybe hasn't grasped concepts like 'doing laundry', 'having table manners', or 'reading the goddamned room'. He's graduated from the Jaeger Academy just fine but was never actually put into active service because he's not compatible with a wide enough percentage of people and even the people that can Drift with him don't want to because he's an insufferable hipster edgelord. So they look at each other with a kind of 'really, this guy?' thing and are Not Impressed.

But their minds actually mesh really well in combat and they realise they actually have a lot in common outside of it too, and okay, maybe having to look at each other's dumb faces every day until the end of the world isn't the worst thing ever.

The idea of Herbert West and Walter Gilman as a darker mirror of Newt and Hermann came into my brain maybe a year ago but then I got bored and moved on, but I think a version of it could be repurposed for this dumbfuckery. So like, you walk into the K-Sci lab and pretty much immediately feel awful for poor Gilman because he's just this okay guy just trying to do his job and make the maths do the thing, but he's stuck sharing the space with a guy who keeps making Things with the discarded Kaiju specimens for reasons everyone's too scared to ask about and there's that rumour he murdered Doctor Lee, but they can't get rid of him because it's the apocalypse and everyone else refuses to come back so Gilman's stuck with him and vice-versa. And it's not even an 'I care about you but you come across as a colossal douchebag and neither of us can communicate worth shit' deal, they just genuinely hate each other. (Well, Gilman hates West. West is mostly just indifferent to anything that isn't his work.)

But Gilman got it into his head that Drifting with a Kaiju brain would be a great way of getting Intel without having to rely on the asshole Frankenstein wannabe, and promptly got assimilated into the hive mind and is now basically an unwilling double agent for the Anteverse. Meanwhile, West couldn't care less about individual human lives but he does want humanity to survive overall, if only because he's technically part of humanity. So now he's the only person capable of fixing this particular problem. This will definitely end well.

I like the idea of the Algol sibs as a three-pilot team like the Wei Tangs, but they do not die because I love them. Also LOCCENT Officer Sofia Gray because I am adopting this abandoned character and you can't stop me.

Also, at some point Silver Key gets to punch a Cat 4 designated Nyarlathotep in the face because fuck you Neil.

So there ya go, have some sleep-deprived nonsense. Don't do eldritch maths, kids.

#too tired for grammar #carter x pickman #pacific rim #lovecraftiana #yog-sothothery #dreamquesting #randolph carter #richard upton pickman #herbert west #walter gilman #amina algol #mine #raising the dead for fun and profit #this is a nyarlathotep hate blog #jaeger pilot carter au

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reggiehargreeves · 4 years

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Hargreeves + DnD

I started playing DnD earlier this year and it’s become my weekly escape and obsession, and because my brain is a *dumpster* I’ve been thinking about each of the Hargreeves siblings and which DnD class + subclass they’d be if they were characters. In fact, I have spent TOO MUCH time thinking about it. Call it a US election coping mechanism. Spoilers for the show under the cut.

Luther - Paladin, Oath of Devotion. I thought fighter or barbarian would be too obvious of choices. Paladins are hardy adventurers, driven by a belief in something, most typically a divine figure. For most of his life, Luther lives in service to his father because he believes, deep down, despite how cruel and strict Reginald is, it’s all for a better, higher cause. He makes excuses for Reginald’s abuse until he absolutely can’t, which shatters him a bit. It’s only when he transfers 100% of his loyalty, belief, and love to his family, is he righted again. For his subclass, I considered Oath of Redemption, but I think Devotion fits our big guy better.

Diego - Rogue, Swashbuckler. Maybe this choice is a bit obvious, but it’s difficult for me to imagine Diego as anything else! Rogues are more than capable combatants, but are also known for their reliance on stealth and cunning. Now...Diego may have his moments where he is decidedly not cunning, but he wouldn’t be a Hargreeves if he could fire more than 3 brain cells at a time. I almost went with Assassin for the subclass, but I also don’t think my bb is necessarily sneaky enough, hence Swashbuckler. There’s also the stereotype of the Broody Rogue, and while Diego genuinely has a Tragic Backstory™ and Mommy Issues™, his tough-guy-with-a-gold-and-incredibly-soft-heart nature speaks to the class.

Allison - Bard, College of Eloquence. I can hear you now. But Avery, doesn’t Vanya play the violin??? Yes! But Bards are an expansive class when you look beyond their stereotypes. Bards can be accomplished diplomats and storytellers thanks to their natural charisma. Allison’s power of rumoring others lends itself nicely to the class. She is capable of making others do as she pleases and up until a point in S1, we know she’s used her powers enough to provide herself with a very comfortable life outside the Academy. Bards are also capable of filling ability gaps in parties of adventurers in support roles. Need another sword or caster? Bards can fill that spot. Allison’s power, like Klaus’s, is more subtle than Luther and Diego, but as we saw in her fights with Cha Cha and Lila, she’s more than capable of holding her own in a physical fighter when she needs to.

Klaus - Wizard, School of Necromancy. I mean, you knew it was going to be a necromancer of some kind, right? Our spindly boy is our reluctant wizard of the party. Klaus can commune with the ghosts of the dead, and is not only able to speak with them, but also capable of commanding and even touching them. Necromancy is considered taboo in the world of DnD, and most societies frown upon wizards just up and reviving dead loved ones. Klaus, for the most part, hates his power. As a child, Reginald locks him in a mausoleum to be tormented by the long-dead ghosts that live there in an attempt to make him “”stronger””, and he is traumatized. As a teenager and adult, he develops addictions to numb himself from facing the dead. For most of his life, the only positive thing to come from his power is his ability to summon Ben. He doesn’t come into his powers for several years. Klaus would make a fascinating inspiration for a reluctant I’d-rather-not-use-my-natural-abilities necromancer. Runner up: Grave Domain Cleric.

Five - Warlock, no subclass choice at the moment. I struggled with Five as he, to our knowledge, is perhaps the smartest of the siblings. This is partly due to his lived experience, as well as the work he put into figuring out his time traveling abilities. It speaks to the whole “warlocks are driven by an insatiable need for knowledge and power”, wherein warlocks seek to strike deals or create pacts with entities far more powerful than them. After getting himself stuck alone in an apocalyptic future for decades, unable to figure out how to get back, he’s approached by the Handler. She offers him 5 years of service, after which he may retire to any time/place he wants. HMMM. How Warlock-y. Anyway, we know that this isn’t the first deal he is forced to strike with the Handler in exchange for knowledge and power.

Ben - Monk, Way of the Astral Self. I really struggled with Ben. My first thought was a Circle of the Moon Druid, BUT I don’t think of Ben as nature-y as a stereotypical Druid. However, he’s fairly shy, studious, and sensitive. Monks also require a mastery over their own body in order to harness both their physical and magical abilities, which reminds me of Ben’s eldritch power. When you have a kind of void or passageway to another hellish dimension in your tummy, learning self-control at an early age is probably paramount. Way of the Astral Self Monks also struggle with their magical ability (ki). To quote DNDBeyond, “They see their mystical energy as a representation of their true form, an astral self. This form has the capacity to be a force of good or destruction, with some monasteries training students to either temper their nature or embrace their impulses.“ We see Ben’s hesitancy to use his power at the bank robbery mission. He doesn’t just kill the perps, he annihilates them, and I’m sure it was not the first time he was forced to do it. Just think of the depressing internal despair that sensitive bb felt after every mission. I’m sure there are plenty of Trauma!Ben fics out there to explain it better.

Vanya - Sorcerer, no subclass choice at the moment. Sorcerers are supposed to be rare in the world of DnD, and if you look at the player’s handbook or do a little reading, you’ll get the gist why. Sorcerers have raw and unpredictable magic flowing beneath their skin. It can be frightening at first, much like Vanya’s discovery of her powers and their suppression, but maybe even intoxicating. Difficult to control when triggered by external forces. Sorcerers are akin to the rage ability of barbarians, and prefer to blast enemies into kingdom come. Sound familiar? I would imagine Vanya much like Klaus in DnD, reluctant to use her powers, especially after finding out just how sideways things can go when she uses them. Yet I also think she’d be excited to be *special* after a lifetime of being told she’s useless.

If you made it this far -- thank you! I am a DnD newbie so I’m sure more veteran players have better choices/ideas/explanations than I do.

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rogueshipagogo · 4 years

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ppl have been asking me my opinions on space channel 5 vr... and i guess since i bought a vr headset off craigslist just so i could play it and speedrun it before work the day it came out... i should talk abt it now... i dont rly think i’ll be able to separate it into ‘good’ and ‘bad’ things i think i’m just going to do a rambly stream of consciousness bc i have a headache... but i DO have good things to say abt this game... so st.... sta stay t tune d

right off the bat, the thing i appreciate most abt this game- i like that space channel 5 vr doesnt have cash grab vibes. i Do genuinely believe that they Wanted to make this game For the people who are still obsessed with it, and that they ultimately did what they set out to do when they intended to scale certain aspects of the series up conceptually to match the way the fandom perceives it nowadays. but like i’ve said before... i’m not going to Disagree with the very common conclusion that it Needed to be longer, or at Least more intricate plot-wise. one of my fun and fresh excuses for sc5vr being as short as it is is because you arent really supposed to be playing vr games for too long anyways, its really disorienting and kinda painful, but even that doesn’t account for why so much of the game that we got is a rehash of old settings, concepts, songs, and characters. [i dont even have a problem with reusing old songs, i just think the ones they chose ended up being misleading]

for example i think it makes sense that the first report is a remake of the first games first report on the surface, it’s meant to take you back to the way the first game felt and give you an idea of what it means that the games classic scenery can be rendered in actual high quality detail now [same with the recurrence of events like encountering the space pirates in the asteroid belt/the last battle against a villain being singing to it about what it’s done wrong], but i really thought, like, report 1 was going to end up being a simulated scenario for the benefit of lou and kee’s training... which i dont think ended up being the case??? i think they really did write ‘ok here you are in the first game’s setting again, fighting the old enemies again, because... :^) ok have fun playing report 2!’

and then whats report 2... you fight another old boss from the first game... but theres Still no clear villain or motivation for anything thats happening... and there wont be until like... basically the end of the game...

like, glitter is a really cute character, but its kind of underwhelming that shes just a random citizen who was kidnapped by an entity that we NEVER LEARN ANYTHING ABOUT... like part 1 was extremely notable for being about corporate greed and corruption, part 2 honestly wasnt that political in comparison but at least made you do a think wrt purge’s motivation and his methods, and this game just has a plot device that feels like it’ll do smth but then ends up not doing anything beyond what we already learned about it from the information on its character bio before the game was out. if it turns out that cell x is actually relevant again in a future entry in the franchise and they do have a more developed concept for what cell x Is in mind, i’ll do an entire backflip, but for now its just chalked up to being the result of More Space Hijinks that dont need to be explained

ESPECIALLY WITH ALL OF THE ALLUSIONS TO CELL X BEING AN ENTITY THAT FEEDS OFF OF DANCE ENERGY... it had me thinking that there would have to be some New Method of fighting it off that didn’t just lend it more power in the process, but nah apparently just tacking on the disclaimer ‘*this dance energy is not for glitter’ is enough to turn it from smth it can consume for power into big attacks you can use to kill it... like honestly it sounds like im asking for a lot from a game that has Never made too much sense, but considering that in part 2 they could add details like ‘oh didnt you know purge can open pocket dimensions? ulala is capable of manifesting tangible dance energy and the only other person who can do that is purge???’, its not like they havent come up with weird new shit for dance energy to do within the plot before. they just didnt do it in this game fsr

like did anyone else think that cell x/glitter was going to be the result of tossing purge out into deep space and him encountering the sc5 universe’s equivalent of an eldritch alien creature, smth more bestial than morolians?? even if purge wasnt part of it, when you say ‘uh oh, this guy Eats this society’s only source of energy!!!’ i expect the stakes to get HIGH, and i want the ramifications of it to be kinda STARTLING, because blank wanted money and purge wanted to ritualistically end the world but something this near to an ecological disaster that would force an entire paradigm shift hasn’t occurred yet in the series?? its totally new!!! there’s a lot they could do with this but OH DONT WORRY ABOUT IT EVERYONE ulala knows how to make dance energy kill cell x instead of feed it she’s got this we’re good no need to investigate more into all that

i can’t explain why the game is like this. and i dont expect grounding to address it in any meaningful way either. i’m sure they’re Aware of these complaints by now- the game reviewing community has Not been kind to sc5vr specifically due to all of these shortcomings [i didnt even touch on the issues with motion sensing and how many of the games mechanics were removed in favor of smth presumably easier to program yet much less satisfying, like Secret Moves just being mini quicktime events and Turning Your Ratings Into Stars just being replaced with the standard Three Strikes You’re Out method of scoring], but the pr team still seems very enthusiastic abt the game and is still promising dlc and potentially even more games in the series after this one- heres hoping that they’ll at least take these grievances to heart and consider making the experience not only more accessible [aka it will... go back to being a rhythm game with controller input.... and not... an exclusive vr experience...], but also as immersive and detailed as the old games, with less reused plot beats. i can let some of it off the hook in this game simply because i’m aware that it began its life as a tech demo that was only supposed to be that initial first report from the first game But Happening All Around You!, but i Really dont think they could get away with doing this little to expand upon the groundwork set by the first two games again. not with the way people remember part 2 being such a vast upgrade from part 1... the bar had been set so high that this just felt like a huge backslide into something even sillier and harder to take seriously than part 1 before we had any idea what kind of staying power the franchise would have as a hallmark of sega’s quirky antics. like... this game is what i think space channel 5 looks like to people who don’t understand the appeal of the first two games. and that scares me

but i guess for the most part, aside from wishing they had done more to revitalize the setting and the lore of the sc5 universe itself, im kind of glad it didnt do a lot to change the existing storylines the characters have kinda forged for themselves- here i was stressing out that they would pull out some plot development that would utterly and drastically change the way we talked abt the series for the rest of time, but so little happened and so little was added to the bank of sc5 lore that we can kind of all just carry on as usual and keep having the same headcanons we always had.

BUT!!! there ARE a lot of cute little details here and there that make the experience feel wholesome and like i said not an utter cashgrab- like so many of the character profiles referencing previous games [all of the references to npcs in this game being relatives of the npcs of the last games made me lose it] and how often ulala changes her expressions up and looks right at you and talks to you. the new music they wrote for the game also all slaps and everyones redesigns [if they got a redesign... rip pudding] are stunning

one of the most important things they did in this game was give a nice sort of Update to every character.... for example explaining that ulala isn’t a rookie reporter any more like she was in the first 2 games, that she’s moved up to being in charge of training new channel 5 reporters, and that while pudding is still somewhat stuck on her rivalry with ulala her career isn’t stagnant either, she was just cast in a romcom series as the lead... which is really nice considering how in the past she was portrayed as somewhat of a loser with almost no remaining fans left from her idol years

and you knew i was going to bring up jaguar at some point HES ALL OVER THIS GAME AND IT LITERALLY MADE ME FEEL LIKE MY LIFE WAS WORTH POWERING THROUGH THESE LAST FEW YEARS AND ALSO LIKE IM A GENIUS FOR SPENDING SO LONG POSTING EVERY SINGLE DAY ‘NO REALLY, HE’S THE SECONDARY PROTAGONIST OF THE STORY, ITS ABOUT CHANNEL 5 AS A COMPANY AND THEIR IMPACT ON EVERYONE WHO HAS EVER ENCOUNTERED THEM AND THAT INCLUDES JAGUAR AS WELL AS ULALA HES INTEGRAL TO THE PLOT BC SHE WOULDNT BE ALIVE IF IT WEREN’T FOR HIM’ i feel like it’s really incredible how in this game he has genuinely nice energy and doesnt withhold praise from ulala just to be helpful in a mysterious way later and he like HAS FRIENDS now. like consider how he went from disgraced former ch5 employee who got mad every time he saw them, to kidnapped robot henchman kinda humbled by the fact that now the turns tabled and ulala had to rescue Him, and now 3 years later his bio is all about how he has a new tv show thats super popular and he has a new entourage of ladies who he considers his '’’’’’comrades’’’’’’’ within the station he founded??? AND AFTER 20 YEARS THEY WERE FINALLY ABLE TO GIVE HIS MODEL JUICY ASS CHEEKS??????????????? NO MORE PANCAKE BOOTY???? THE BOY HAD A GLOWUP AND NO I WONT STOP TALKING ABOUT IT

WHEN I SAY MEOW MATCH THE POSE MOTHERFUCKERS THIS BLONDE BASTARD GETS TO BE IN CHARGE OF THE HUNDRED STAGE BATTLE NOW TOO THIS IS THE YEAR OF THE SPACE PIRATES BAYBEE

#its almost 4 am. idk i will probably have more to say tomorrow. my head still hurts #the galaxy depends on my funky moves

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twitchesandstitches · 5 years

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i’ve had a few talks about the Angels of Neon Genesis Evangelion and how they fit into Crossthicc, and they’ve since given me some info on how AT Fields work to factor it into things, so here’s how they work in Crossthicc

firstly, terminology here: much as how ‘demon’ is a super general term for pretty much any supernatural being that happens to look like a demon (or even mortal beings, like tieflings, with a similar look) and that ‘fiend’ is the word we want when referring to actual entities of infinite malice and wickedness, the term angel is similarly broad. Entites such as those based on the actual Biblical Angels, D&D’s aasimar and celestials. the antagonists of Bayonetta, and other things are all around. Angel, however, is not that much of a general term, and where possible, they are given their own proper names since while you can point at a red creaturew ith horns and goat legs and go ‘demon’, the same cannot be said for angels, who come in a variety of forms. Sometimes they are voluptuous humanoids with curve gigantic even by this AU’s standards; sometimes they are multi-faced creatures that speak with the voice of Goodness itself and are profoundly alien in a way that makes even eldritch horrors look approachable.

But for brevity’s sake, i’ll just call the monsters of NGE ‘angels’ for short. In-universe, though, they are unlikely to have any consistent name, as few people realize they are related in any way whatsoever because of how different they are.

the Angels, as per canon, are incredibly old beings. They were not created as they are, though; in the very beginnings of the multiverse, there was a primordial race beyond all others, beings akin to modern lizardmen, dinosaur kings, and Argonians. This primordial race was the first true sapient, or the ones who survived to claim it. Pursuing transcendence, they found it, and they individually became divine entities, surpassing everything around them and transforming into beings of almost limitless power, their forms dictated by the purposes they assigned themselves.

the AT Field, which can be described in Crossthicc as the magical term for the distinction between ‘you’ and ‘that which is Not You’ (a very important thing in magic, as all magic is the soul’s influence on reality), has transformed for the angels. it has evolved, mutating and morphing, into a zone of absolute dominion, a sort of private universe around them where their will is law. They view this as a sacred thing of a sort, and while its hard to make general statements, it seems they have coe to view this dominion over their immediate space as preservation of who/what they are, in a very alien way.

Within this space, the angel determines physics. Attacks warp into being. Atoms sunder, spells unravel, and threats are annihilated. They are absurdly powerful, on the level of many gods; they have refined their understanding of Self for a very long time, and their alien understanding has developed to the point that within their AT field, they determine reality itself. Many magic users would love to figure out HOW they do this, as it would be a huge boon to sorcery. Even if an angel was inclined to convey such knowledge, it would be difficult for one to explain it, as they are profoundly alien creatures that genuinely cannot comprehend mortals any longer, and have long since lost the ability to really relate to most other beings.

They generally seem content to ignore other beings, lurking within the realms of magic and doing... something. They don’t work in groups, each one an entity unto themselves. They ignore each other, and anything they encounter; their vast power annihilates anything that would impede them, and anything that tries to communicate with them (even through violence) is viciously attacked in a kind of panic; they seem to dread the idea of the Self becoming diminished through mingling with another Self, and perhaps fear that they can change through inter-personal interaction.

Nevertheless. They may still yearn for companionship. Certainly, they periodically make things or alter worlds, even as their mere presence completely warps magic for miles around, and its hard to say why they do anything. Sometimes they ignore anything in their path, and other times they calmly attack everything they see, at apparent random. Guardian kaiju, such as Godzilla or Gamera, greatly detest them and often attack them on sight in pre-emptive self defense.

Appearance wise, Angels are super curvaceous, even if they’re not particularly humanoid; due to their raw power, they boast extremely feminine forms with ludicrously massive curves; they are often dwarfed by their own endowments, and these can manifest in some odd configurations; taur-style bodies with bizarre numbers of legs, an unusual amount of breasts, and wings resembling long hair wouldn’t be unusual. Assume that they look as much like monster girl-ified versions of their canon forms, if possible. In-universe, they are highly suspectible to the mental nergies of sapient species, and may be influenced to take on their forms, so they tend to look at least little like anything around them. If they’re near humans, they will look more humanoid. Near krogan, they will look like monster turtle things.

some angels really hate this and will become extremely hostile and attack worlds just to rid themselves of the offending psychic intrusion. Others don’t seem to care, but are just as dangerous in their drifting indifference.

And Angels are very, very, VERY large. With their sheer power, they are far larger than planets; within the magical realms where they can exist at full size with ease, it is hard to perceive them at all, only the drifting outlines of a massive breast, or a projected face-helm. Ships pass into their shadow, and remain in the dark for weeks even moving at full light speed. Within the material realm, though, it takes longer for them to grow to their full size, starting at planet size, and they continue to grow until they might dwarf galaxies, and they still grow. Their AT Fields are thus absurdly powerful, and an expanding zone of reality going completely bonkers as the angel works their strange will.

they can’t really be fought. They might be able to be killed, but it’s highly unlikely and probably going to make Very Bad Things happen. For the most part, they are a cautionary tale for the dangers of transcendence, approached recklessly.

That said, they ARE a species of a sort, even if a small one, and smaller angels (similar to canon ones) do sometimes appear. Lilith is responsible for these, and she is chiefly obsessed with reproduction. Rei may have been made through harvesting an ancient remnant of Lilith herself, though it must be noted that the Angels have no connection to humanity in any particular way here.

Angels are, ultimately, not a threat to face as much as they are a force of nature that can be redirected or at least inconvenienced, but their sheer power makes this an extremely chancey bet. The main factions (Fleet, Stingers, Ringers and Task Force X) can do so, but it’s likely to be so taxing its better to just run and leave them alone. Of these groups, the Fleet, with their transhumanist leanings, are most interested in them, and have figured something out:

the angels are lonely, and at the same time, too afraid to breach their ancient shields and dare to mix their Self with another Self.

The Task Force, for their part, are the only other ones involved with them actively; the Ringers generally ignore them except as a potential threat, while the Stingers have a policy of ‘look, you see one pop up, you run like hell’. the Task Force’s goals with them are unclear, but it seems that they are trying to pacify them in some way.

each Angel is effectively a power unto themselves; they don’t really have any common goals, drifting about and attending to their own weird whims, and their alien mindsets makes it VERY hard to communicate with them at all even if you can do something about their hair-trigger response to having their sense of self threatened through that. Above all else, they are genuinely alien in a way that makes a lot of people uncomfortable and breaks brains.

Pitable, perhaps, but nonetheless, very dangerous.

And Rei Ayanami is becoming one; humanoid, yes, more human than they are, but she is quickly growing in size, and her status as Endowed means that she is quickly becoming more of an uber-mother than Lilith is (thus making Rei more of an Eve). What’s more, the organic mechs operated by the NGE trio are apparentely pseudo-Angels mixed with human genetics and now fueled by Rei and Asuka’s own souls, effectively becoming their true bodies and the seat of their motherhood-fueled powers. Shinji has a more... complicated situation but something is going on there, all the same.

#/#//#///#////#/////#queued #twitchy ideas #crossthicc!Neon genesis evangelion

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