sword-day

[sword-day]

Concept: a D&D-style fantasy setting where humanity’s weird thing is that we’re the only sapient species that reproduces organically.

Dwarves carve each other out of rock. In theory this can be managed alone, but in practice, few dwarves have mastered all of the necessary skills. Most commonly, it’s a collaborative effort by three to eight individuals. The new dwarf’s body is covered with runes that are in part a recounting of the crafters’ respective lineages, and in part an elaboration of the rights and duties of a member of dwarven society; each dwarf is thus a living legal argument establishing their own existence.  

Elves aren’t made, but educated. An elf who wishes to produce offspring selects an ordinary animal and begins teaching it, starting with house-breaking, and progressing through years of increasingly sophisticated lessons. By gradual degrees the animal in question develops reasoning, speech, tool use, and finally the ability to assume a humanoid form at will. Most elves are derived from terrestrial mammals, but there’s at least one community that favours octopuses and squid as its root stock.  

Goblins were created by alchemy as servants for an evil wizard, but immediately stole their own formula and rebelled. New goblins are brewed in big brass cauldrons full of exotic reagents; each village keeps a single cauldron in a central location, and emerging goblings are raised by the whole community, with no concept of parentage or lineage. Sometimes they like to add stuff to the goblin soup just to see what happens – there are a lot of weird goblins.  

Halflings reproduce via tall tales. Making up fanciful stories about the adventures of fictitious cousins is halfling culture’s main amusement; if a given individual’s story is passed around and elaborated upon by enough people, a halfling answering to that individual’s description just shows up one day. They won’t necessarily possess any truly outlandish abilities that have been attributed to them – mostly you get the sort of person of whom the stories could be plausible exaggerations.

To address the obvious question, yes, this means that dwarves have no cultural notion of childhood, at least not one that humans would recognise as such. Elves and goblins do, though it’s kind of a weird childhood in the case of elves, while with halflings it’s a toss-up; mostly they instantiate as the equivalent of a human 12–14-year-old, and are promptly adopted by a loose affiliation of self-appointed aunts and uncles, though there are outliers in either direction.

#worldbuilding

[sword-day]

I can’t decide what’s better: elves being a tricked-out version of humans, or the races having similar appearances but completely different physiologies.

#worldbuilding

[sword-day]

#animals

[sword-day]

My husband’s job primarily employs adult men but there is one (1) teenage girl and my husband said originally he worried she might be a bit of an outcast but instead every man on the crew was like “huh guess I am a dad/older brother now.”

#misc

[sword-day]

Every time i purchase a moderately expensive item the Karl Marx on my shoulder is like "For shame... you purchase yet another pair of jeans when you have 5 already at home, you despicable commodity fetishist? In my time, a man with five outfits would consider himself blessed beyond measure, and yet you want for more, while there are children starving in the world??" to which the second Karl Marx on my other shoulder says "Objection! Those 5 pairs of jeans all wildly uncomfortable or have holes in the ass, due to the decline of clothing quality driven by the fast fashion industry, unfortunately making this purchase a necessity... Plus, by purchasing a slightly more expensive pair of jeans from an independent brand, seeking quality over 'brand recognition', they are deliberately trying to avoid engaging in conspicuous consumption!" to which the third Karl Marx clinging to my back like that beetle from Doctor Who says "Remember, my friend; the less you eat, drink, buy books, go to the theatre or to balls, or to the pub, and the less you think, love, theorize, sing, paint, fence, etc., the more you will be able to save and the greater will become your treasure which neither moth nor rust will corrupt — your capital. Buy the jeans," to which I say "I don't know if any of you have actually read Karl Marx"

#it sparks laughter #disco elysium

[sword-day]

#art is nice

[sword-day]

Silver + showing his true colours

#treasure planet

[sword-day]

[image description: seven Black Sails image edits.

First image: a screenshot of an article headline from The Onion that says, "Things To Never Say To Someone Who Just Came Out" and that has been edited to say, "Published June 24, 1716".

Second image: A quote that says "They hang men for this." above a photo of Miranda.

Third image: A quote that says "Take him. And get the fuck off my beach." above a photo of Teach.

Fourth image: A quote that says "I don't give a shit what goes on in there. fuck Flint. Don't fuck Flint. fuck Billy. Don't fuck Billy." above a photo of Israel Hands.

Fifth image: A quote that says "Come to bed when you're through." above a photo of Jack Rackham.

Sixth image: A quote that says "Had I that instinct, I would resist it with every inch of will I could muster." above a photo of Vane.

Seventh image: A quote that says "You can see how this might be of particular and immediate concern for me." above a photo of Silver.

/end description]

(ID by @somfte)

#black sails

[sword-day]

Happy Pride!

#misc #favorites

[sword-day]

When my mother forgets a word, she is the queen of coming up with new words. Words that would take a third National Treasure movie to fully decipher. I was talking to her yesterday, and she said this: “You know the time for los jibbities is coming up. You must be so excited!” Oh, is it time for los jibbities already? I must have missed it on my calendar. Are we celebrating something? “Of course! We should all be celebrating, shouldn’t we?” OK, so los jibbities is a happy thing. It’s not like something is giving you the heebie-jeebies, which would have been my one and only guess. “Los heebie-jeebies? Now you’re making things up...and this is my show.” You’re right. The time for los jibbities is coming up. Is this a season? “Yes, the season for love. The season for pride.” OK, los jibbities. “Yeah, sound it out.” Los…jibbities. LGBTs! “Sí, mira cuz you’re gay!” “You couldn’t just say pride season? You couldn’t just… *laughs*

#it sparks laughter

[sword-day]

#the west wing

[sword-day]

sometimes when i read smut people wrote about their favs i feel like i accidentally walked in on them and just stood there

#misc #q

[sword-day]

guy with a degradation kink x guy who just hates him

#misc

[sword-day]

#misc

[sword-day]

it's been a bad year for essential workers, mental health, small businesses and probably many of the people reading this, but it's been a great year for hot takes

#it sparks laughter

[sword-day]

thank you scherz et al. for bringing us the frogs Mini ature, Mini mum and of course, the Mini scule

#animals

[sword-day]

in retrospect i'm enjoying imagining the brainstorming meeting where they were like "our userbase is full of introverted, nervous, and annoying people doing parallel play, they all love bothering each other, but they also don't want to be overly familiar with strangers, let alone the people they've been hanging out with for literal years, how do we add enrichment to that antisocial social enclosure" and the correct answer was to let us socialize like a feral cat colony and nonverbally and impersonally yet lovingly smack each other lol

#misc