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am-i-the-asshole-official · 2 months

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am i the asshole for yelling at my dad?

🚗 to identify

TRIGGER WARNING: somewhat stalking, anger issues, mentions of violence, mentions of threats. stay safe guys.

just to provide some background, i (14n) am a bit of an unregulated crier. the tiniest things (like what happened today) make me start bawling. i'm trying to work on it since my mom (47f) says it's me being a bit dramatic. on the other hand, my father (48m) has some problems when it comes to getting frustrated. the place where i live can have a lot of traffic and road rage incidents so this isn't too uncommon for me to experience. i just never reacted quite like this before.

anyways, what happened was my dad had just picked me up from school. i had just had a very long day (school hours are from 7:30-2:30, i stayed until 5 for additional extra curriculars) and was letting him know about my day. we were talking, he was driving a bit slow, and everything was kinda okay. but when we got to this intersection, someone turned in front of him, cutting him off. i could tell the random driver was in a bit of a rush, so it wasn't really that upsetting to me. but my dad got really angry, flipping them off and honking loudly, as well as rolling down the window to give them a few choice words.

i told him to calm down, and he kind of did, saying to me a couple of curse words about that driver but i ignored him. but as we kept driving he seemed to get more frustrated. eventually, someone else cut him off and he completely lost it, screaming and honking and cursing really loudly. again, i told him to calm down, it wasn't really a big deal. but he wouldn't stop.

he continued to get mad about that driver, saying he was going to speed up and catch up to them to give them a piece of his mind. he ran a red light just to do so (he later told me it wasn't that important since its one of those tiny lights by little gated communities and no one was in the road). eventually when he caught up, he followed them for a while, and noticed them turning into our neighborhood.

he got weirdly fixated from then on, going in circles around our neighborhood to see where the car went. he kept making comments, saying that the driver was screwed because "he'd know where they live", and that "they were going to regret it".

i got scared, because i know sometimes when he gets into one of these moments he won't be sensical. there have been several moments before where i've begged him to just let things go because they (to me at least) aren't a big deal. he's repeatedly made threats in our house to the neighbors (he doesn't like their fireworks) and has mentioned specifically how he planned on getting a gun and sh00ting them. so i might've gotten a bit scared.

i told him to stop, and i told him he wouldn't find them because i saw them park. immediately he turned on me, demanding to know where they went. i got scared again but didn't say anything. he got really pushy and so i took my phone out and called my mom.

my mom (47f) is one of the only people my dad listens to. after calling her twice, she picks up the phone. it's hectic because he's still circling the neighborhood, and im trying to tell her that he's trying to chase someone to their house and she has to tell him to stop and to take us home.

she does tell him that, and he relents. we take a turn back to our house but that's when he sees the other driver's car. and that's when all shit goes down. because he starts laughing and saying they'll get what they deserve, and that they'll regret it, and he memorizes their fucking address.

i tell him to stop, to just ignore it (for the fiftieth time) but he ignores me. i just explode, yelling at him and telling him not everything is a personal slight against him, and not everything requires such an extreme response. i tell him he gets upset over minor things, and he doesn't have to be like that.

he just replies that he isn't the one upset, and that i'm the one yelling at him. i cry.

so tumblr, am i the asshole? it's none of my business what my parents do and i could've told him nicely to let it go. and my fears were based on assumptions of prior comments i didn't have the full context of. i really hope i did the right thing but it bothers me i stooped to his level by getting upset.

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

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bruhstation · 10 months

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casa tidmouth celebrates its one year anniversary..... 2 days ago! but hey, it's the thought that matters! thank you very much for everything -- the support, the fanarts, the asks..... I truly appreciate them all!!!

truth to be told, when I first started this blog, I never thought it would grow to such lengths like this. I wasn't good at drawing engines (and I still am. but hey at least I'm learning! >:]) so what did I draw first? the engines as pokemon for my old pmd AU XD it was what started everything, but then I tried my hand at turning the engines into humans and voila. casa tidmouth is born. I grew alongside it, developed the story and characters as time went by, and garnered an audience, even friends!

(they'll be back. if the public demands. someday.)

I'm eternally grateful to those who stuck around this entire year. I know I'll be busier than ever as I'm starting med school and life will get tougher from here on out, but knowing that I have people who got my back uplifts me. thank you for support!

and look!!!! in a year, we managed to reach 850 followers! and it's all thanks to you! I hope you look forward to what this blog will bring in the future!

wanna know a fun fact? the reason why I revisited this childhood show of mine is because the twitter account sexymanotd posted a pic of duck the great western engine. then I talked about it in my priv, then a friend sent a couple of gijinkas from various people (mainly asktrio156). I decided to look more into it in tumblr….. the rest is history!

#thomas the tank engine #thomas and friends #ttte toby #ttte percy #ttte edward #ttte gordon #ttte henry #ttte thomas #ttte james #casa tidmouth #senjart #a senja post where he doesn't rant in the tags and does it in the post itself? woah!#blasted this fanart at mach 5 speed right after I got home from vacation!!! ahaha #also have fun dissecting meanings behind this picture >:] senja classic

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letteredlettered · 29 days

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Hi!! Have you ever struggled with burnout, depression, or overwork? Currently in my first job post college and it’s been very intense as we are currently like 3 people doing the work of a team designed for 7 people (two roles they are working to fill and two people are out on leave -> one is out on vacation and the other on parental leave). Have spent many ours on overtime (around two days a week I usually sleep five or six hours and spend a few more hours working —> other days I work a bit less but still some overtime) for the last few months. It’s really hard to decompress and stop thinking about work as I work remotely. I need to get better at setting limits and advocating for myself but I think one issue I’ve been dealing with is getting caught in a cycle of having a lot so having not a lot of time to do an analysis of like what needs to change and this is my bandwidth. Also it’s hard to predict bandwidth sometimes because I’m still very new to this industry and department, so I’m still learning how much coordination is necessary to get something done. Another problem is that everyone is stretched to their limit and extremely busy, so I feel kind of bad rejecting projects. I think an issue is that I also have relatively low self-esteem and confidence but a deep desire to be “good” from like an academic perspective and a work perspective, and the main leader of my team is someone who I like a lot and appreciates what I do, so I keep trying to do more or at least meet expectations. I also receive assignments from different people (five people total, usually), so people generally don’t have visibility as to my bandwidth unless I speak up. One person in particular gave me a lot of assignments with a good deal of time pressure and was the person that I was working the closest with —> still trying to catch up to some of the more evergreen projects I had with him because the other projects I’ve had in the last two months have even way too intense to do anything else. I’m really grateful for this job and I like a lot of the people I work with, but I’m kind of struggling.

I mention all of this because I really respect the way you are able to commit to creative projects and create incredible works and really focus on making something. I’ve never really had an ability to stick to a creative project or hobby for an extended period of time —> frequently I disappoint myself in my lack of consistency or follow-through for a lot of my personal goals. I also really appreciate the way that you engage with certain themes in your work and value your perspective. So just kind of curious if you’ve been through this before or have any thoughts about this sort of thing

I've thought a lot about what to tell you here.

What anyone would recommend is that you set boundaries and take care of yourself. They'd say that your well-being is more important than your work. If they read your ask carefully they'd realize that maybe your performance in this job is connected to your well-being in your mind. If they're looking at the strings that control the system they're going to tell you capitalism has brainwashed us into thinking that we should sacrifice our health for the sake of production, and then they'll tell you you should do what you can to break out of the capitalist mentality. If they're not excited about seizing the means of production then their in-universe advice (in-the-capitalist-universe advice) is going to point out that you cannot produce more for the capitalist machine if you're burnt out (I'd call these people the neoliberals of tumblr but I'm not sure that exists; I haven't seen it).

But none of that is really addressing the problem here, because you already know all of that, or if you don't know it, knowing that isn't going to help you. You don't need to be told to set boundaries. You know you accept too many projects; you know that you haven't been clear with your colleagues about your bandwidth. You know you're trying too hard to please others and that part of the reason is you have a low self-esteem.

Something that people don't talk about enough is how bad it feels to set boundaries. When people advise others to "set boundaries" it's always as if it's never occurred to anyone else to stand up for themselves. The problem is that it usually has occurred to us, but it's hard to do and feels bad. Hearing "stand up for yourself!" repeatedly can sometimes help us feel like we did the right thing when we do manage to stand up for ourselves, but it can just as often make you feel even worse when you can't stand up for yourself. You're being overworked and you're not doing the thing that everyone tells you you should do.

And another thing that people do not talk about enough is that most workplaces do not like employees who set boundaries for themselves. They like people who say yes. You often won't get in trouble for setting reasonable limits for yourself, but you won't advance. The ones who work late and work on weekends and take on every project and say nothing about bandwidth are usually the ones who get promoted. I'm not saying this because it's right or okay. It's another flaw in the capitalist system. But it is very often true, and I've been a little frustrated that in all these glorious discussions about boundary-setting, this is not something that gets talked about more.

So what to do, when you know the answers, but it doesn't feel great, and might not get you where you want to go?

Spend time with your feelings. A lot of time with your feelings. Imagine ways to communicate your bandwidth. Imagine how you would feel in each scenario. Pick scenarios that feel more comfortable and less intimidating for you. Imagine saying no to a new project. Imagine how you would feel doing that. Pick a way of doing it that feels the most manageable.

Think about your colleagues, what you like about them and why. Imagine how they would feel if they knew that you were struggling. Imagine having an honest conversation with them about how hard this is for you. Would they listen open and compassionately? Would they try to make changes that could help you? Or would they say, "We're all going through it," and "there's nothing to be done?" Imagine saying to them, "I know we're all going through this, because of the staffing challenges we're facing," and "I know there's not much to be done about this, but this is how I'm feeling." Would they accept your vulnerability? Would it make you feel bad to be vulnerable in that way? Would it make you feel worse to be vulnerable in that way or to say nothing?

That's not a leading question. Saying nothing is okay. There have been many times where I am facing a problem and I realized that doing nothing was the thing that made me feel best. There were other times when I really didn't want to do something and I knew it would be incredibly hard, but I knew I would feel much better having done it.

Think about your self-esteem and confidence. Why don't you feel confident? When you imagine saying no, and it feels bad, what makes it feel so bad? Is it because other people don't say no? Are you measuring yourself against those other people? How can you stop doing that? Or is it because you feel like a good worker always says yes? Where did you get that idea? Was it an idea communicated to you by people who love you? By society? Are there people who haven't made you feel that your worth as a person was predicated on how much you were able to accomplish? When is the last time you spent time with them? What makes you feel good about yourself? When is the last time you did it? Are there things you can do outside of work to boost your confidence? What are they? Can you do them? Why not? If work is holding you back from doing them, is it worth it?

It's okay if work feels worth it. I'm not endorsing the capitalist machine when I say that it is okay to do something that is really difficult or unpleasant for a certain amount of time to get where you are going. But if that's what you're going to do, then develop a plan of escape. Ask yourself how long you're willing to put up with this. Ask yourself what the next step in your career or life journey is. Ask yourself what you will put up with to get there and what is unacceptable. Write it down if you have to, then try to abide by that, and if you are unable to bear your plan six months down the line, make a new one.

I am fortunate in that these kinds of questions come really naturally to me, and I think they must not come so naturally for a lot of other people. Definitely, there are blocks in my mind; I'm not always able to understand myself or my own feelings; I don't know what's best for myself or how to make myself do things I want. But this kind of thinking is not going to give you immediate answers. Instead, it's going to build the skill of getting to know yourself.

The ultimate question you should be asking is "What will make me happy?" It sounds like a simple question, but it is in fact the most difficult of all. It is the question we struggle with every day, and every book that was ever written, every song that was ever sung, every painting that was ever painted is about that, in the end. The answer to that question is the meaning of life. Most people never find it, but the search is worth it.

It's definitely worth it.

#work #jobs #capitalism #life

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agracefulfall · 3 months

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All of Us Strangers ... oof. No spoilers and honestly, I don't know what I'm about to say. I may need a century to process the weight of this film. So what's to follow is unscripted, free flowing.

I'm bisexual, queer. It didn't click until a few years ago (even though I knew subconsciously when I was in junior high). I'm not completely out. Just my best friend, my pub friends, and my online community know. I've dropped hints, albeit subtle, to my family. However I'm not sure how perceptive they've been. There's no doubt that they'll accept me. My sister is trans and queer. Our family has been on this journey with them since I was ten (I'm now 33). It's just that I know they'll make a big deal of it and have a thousand questions to which I don't know that I have the answers to (or that they would understand the answers I do have, and I don't have the energy to explain).

I have SO many thoughts after AOUS ... so so so so so many. Again, I may need a century for thoughts to stop spinning. But one that I keep coming back to is, "tell them, before they're gone". It's one of many regrets that I had with my grandmother. She passed before I was able to even type the words "I'm queer". Instead, I spoke them at her grave and somehow, I know she heard. But my parents? They're still here. Physically and mentally.

The diner scene. When Adam's dad told him how much he loves him and even more so now that he KNOWS him. Oof. In the words of Phoebe Bridgers, "I know, I know, I know". I need to tell them, I know. I just don't know how ... yet.

I think that's all for now. If you've gotten this far, thank you for reading and listening. Please go support All of Us Strangers. There are many more thoughts I have about this beautifully, heartbreakingly tender film.

If Andrew Scott, Paul Mescal, Claire Foy, Jamie Bell, or Andrew Haigh happen to scan Tumblr and find these words ... thank you, from the bottom of my incredibly sentimental, emotional, delicate, queer little heart, THANK YOU.

#all of us strangers #paul mescal #andrew scott #claire foy #jamie bell #personal #queer #biseuxal #andrew haigh

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winslowat3am · 1 year

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You prob won’t see this but hi! I follow you and your beautiful wife bc of your love for black women and life tips! I wanna share a story that happened yesterday where I was harassed in a gas station by an aggressive black male security guard and get nonblack poc feedback bc I no longer feel safe around black men and just curious to what advice or thoughts you have.

Last night I walked inside a pilot gas station to use the restroom where I wore a yellow camo track suit with the hood up bc I was cold. The security told me to take my hood down even tho there was no policy where I could see and followed me to the restroom door and called me out my name (I heard him thru the door), after I finished in the restroom I went to confront him at the register he was hiding behind where we got into a heated verbal exchange , I cussed him out amd I hurt his ego evidently bc he felt the need to follow me outside to escalate it but I outtalked him and got in my car. I never took my hood down. I went back in the gas station with a girlfriend for water after informing her of what happened where he then tried to make me remove my hood again and tried to encourage the women at the registers to refuse me service bc I wouldn’t remove my hood, we got into it again. He was aggressive, approached me slamming his hand on the counter, got loud, and sensitive bc I got the best of him twice verbally and in the end I still got the water and never took my hood down; the nice white lady at the register took my money from my friend who paid for it, the black woman at the register was a m@mmy. He nitpicked my outfit and physical appearance but ppl passing thru wore hoods and had pants hanging off their asses, tummy shirts, brought dogs in the store, but was never harassed like I was. I don’t have a problem following a policy but I won’t follow a policy when it’s enforced on me but no one else. So I called the police and they told me to file a complaint with corporate and see what I can do about it so I will be calling them in the morning. Did I mention the security tried to get me banned for trespassing just bc i didn’t back down and verbally whooped him?? LOLL!!! I’ll be carrying a switchblade from now on and learning to shoot a gun real soon!

Read my tags. I'm assuming you're a bw? It doesn't take all the hoodrat buffoonery Glocktavious displayed to ask someone to remove their hood. Talk to a lawyer, they'll help you go about prosecuting Dustavious the right way. So unprofessional. I hope this isn't a late response, I don't really check Tumblr lately or read every ask but yours grabbed my attention. You did the right thing! Always stand up for yourself. You're a savage for checking his ass. Never be afraid of a man, & keep a weapon on you. 👏👏👏👏Insecure, pussy "men" pick fights with women, they think being aggressive & loud intimidates you & they never prepare for a strong retort that shuts their shit down. My completely honest & straightforward unfiltered pov: We need to address the fact that the bullying of bw is a problematic behavior that is perpetuated by bm primarily (not all, but atp it's so common it might as well be). You'd be better off opening up your dating options to men outside of your race, tbh. (Be very selective & careful when itrl dating). Non-bm build their communities & protect their women. [Redacted] That's why I don't understand why some ww leave wm, who have privilege & power, for bm, who 9/10 don't have anything to offer except dick, kids & struggle love. Even when bm manage to have success it doesn't change their crusty ass mentality. I recently learned that a bw is killed by a bm every six hours. [Redacted] Bm are the only race of men who publicly bash, degrade & bully their race of women while praising, fetishizing & worshipping non-bw. But you can't expect men who hate themselves to love or value you. I see the bs bw have to deal with daily & it saddens me. I feel like they target bw cause they think it'll make them men & acceptable in the eyes of wm, it's embarrassing. [Redacted] I can't imagine treating my baby like that. [Redacted] I'll never post or reblog a "this is a safe space for everyone" post. It's not. I don't post for them. I don't want racists/colorists in my space where bw & woc tell me that they feel safe, seen & protected. I gatekeep my blog so that you're safe expressing your feelings here. I thought it was obvious since I never acknowledge bm but it needs to be said. I 100% agree with the bw advising bw to choose higher quality men. You should watch Cynthia G & Paris Milan on YouTube & other black women who cover domestic & racial topics, it's very educational & insightful, they offer a lot of perspective & I agree with so many points they make. [Redacted] The best advice I can give you is to run & never look back. Good luck. ❤️

#you can sue him personally for discrimination & verbal harassment & file a complaint with corporate #If you're banned from the store then you can have the cops get his information & press charges #once corporate finds out about the incident he'll more than likely lose his job #Make sure to stress that he intentionally embarrassed you by making a scene followed you to the bathroom & outside of the store in attempt #to escalate the situation he was highly aggressive & approached you & that you felt scared for your safety which caused emotional distress #those are super important details & ultimately where he fucked up #& if you're able to write down the date/time this occurred & have the camera footage obtained by police & your friends as witnesses #it'll help your case #The moment someone loses their cool & lowers themself even lower than they already are you already won #As you go through life the more jackasses you'll encounter & you'll become so immune that shit won't even anger you the way it used to #Speaking from experience #I don't see him living long cause losers who fuck with people & think being loud & ghetto gives them an upper hand never live a long life #toxic masculinity is a fear of strong women masked by a fraudulent superiority complex #he's corny asf if the only thing he could think to call you was ugly like what guy doesn't automatically run to that as an insult?#They even use it when they get rejected it's always that or 'bitch' cause they're sooo original #they're tiring #long post #ask

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whatiwillsay · 1 year

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Tea Time Anon

note: in this post i refer to tumblr user Spade-Riddles as "ttb" the whole time (her suspected old blog's nickname was ttb). wherever you see me say "ttb" i mean tumblr user Spade-Riddles.

alright, guys, i got the ok from the original tea time anon who found me and told me about how they tricked ttb into thinking they were an insider.

i'm sharing now because the damage she's done to queer people in this community is insurmountable and the idea that little baby kaylors are thinking about missing out on the show of a lifetime because they want to skip eras tour because they're sad about karlie having another baby with josh is just breaking my heart. ttb has been leading people to believe that kaylor is still together and saying her "insiders" have proved it to her and every time karlie does anything with josh all those people get upset. it's not fair for this woman to mislead people and ruin their taylor/gaylor experience by getting their hopes up that karlie and taylor are just around the corner from coming out when obviously that couldn't be further from the truth. i mean it's insanely obvious to me that karlie and taylor have long gone their separate ways and are no longer involved at all but i digress.

i held back on sharing this for a while because while ttb is kind of humorous to watch she IS dangerous and i just didn't want the heat from her. her (or her followers) have harassed, stalked, and outed multiple gaylors in retaliation for speaking out against her:

but i think it's time i get over that. i don't think they'll find my identity and even if they do whatever i'll be alright.

so long story short- someone reached out to me to tell me they were tea time anon and that they did it to see if they could get ttb to believe them as an insider source. i got the code they used to verify themselves to her and to prove to myself they weren't pulling my leg sent in a message about the coney island bridge because cara's birthday was coming up and the bridge says "happy birthday". i capitalized ISLA in the word because cara likes that name. it was a bit of a laugh but mostly i just had to send something to prove they weren't just pretending to be tea time anon.

here's some of our convo (make note of the dates):

so those are all from april 6th and as you can see here's the anon i sent in posing as tea time anon that was posted on april 7th:

and here's a message from the next day- tea time's reaction to it and me mentioning why i capitalized isla:

and at some point, one of us (idk who) went back and told them yes the baby is named isla:

so yeah... if you're reading this and you've ever thought ttb had legitimate info from her myriad of insiders from Spade to Tea Time Anon to that flag person who's sending in stuff these days now you know... she just doesn't. it's people making stuff up or fanfic-ing or trolling.

let me just say i do think all of this is childish and i don't encourage this kind of thing but sometimes childish stuff is gonna go down in fandom spaces. it's just the name of the game. i've had my childish moments and i'm not exactly proud of that, but ttb misleads and harms so many innocent people, especially so many innocent young queer people it's time someone shined the light on just how misinformed she is and provided hard proof that yes coincidences happen. just because a fake insider mentions "isla" and taylor wore isla boots or an isla ring 3 years before that doesn't mean they are legit.

i encourage everyone reading this to try and learn how to enjoy gaylor without plummeting into complete conspiracy theories. there are a lot of healthier and more realistic ways to appreciate taylor's music from a queer perspective than what they get up to over on spade-riddles.

and another reminder that ttb is dangerous. she (or her minions) harasses and outs people who disagree with her. if you're a fan of hers, please be careful. never share your identity or personal details about your life with her or her henchmen.

AND FOR GOD'S SAKE IF YOU HAVE ERAS TOUR TICKETS GO AND ENJOY IT DO NOT SKIP THE SHOW OF A LIFETIME JUST BECAUSE KARLIE KLOSS IS OUT HERE LIVING HER BEST LIFE! YOU WILL FOREVER REGRET NOT GOING.

#kaylor #gaylor #gaylor swift #kaylor is alive #ttbask #spade riddles #spade stopped by 🕵️‍♀️♠️#swiftgron #karlie kloss #gaylorswift #koincidences #kaylor fanfiction

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rorywritesjunk · 16 days

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WIP TITLE GAME

rules: post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet or tell them something about it! and then tag as many people as you have WIPs.

Tagged by @galaxycunt

I am also gonna tag @operationroots @hey-august @lostfirefly @fanaticsnail

Okay ready for the excitement (I am not really creative with document names)

"Untitled Document" is Taron and Buggy smut. I'm quickly doing an edit on Chapter 2 before I post it today or tomorrow.

"Tumblr Prompts" is where I work on requests/prompts. There's only one in there so far and it's Buggy and her Husbands for the Swap AU.

"slow burn request" is Cupcake x Buggy. I'm working on Chapter 15 to get the smut going again. There's a possibility I could break 20 chapters with this story Im realizing.

"400 follower story" is slowly getting worked on. It's the story I had people vote for some things for it and am prolly two pages in? It's going to be fluffy and smutty.

"bakery story" is Birdie and Buggy. I don't imagine that one going past 12 chapters.

"Untitled Document" is my Howl's Moving Castle AU. Still working slowly on that. I think I'm going to set aside a day for me to just hash that out and get it finished to slowly share it.

I actually have a file called "WIP" where I throw in chunks of writing that I didn't like for something but wanted to keep around just in case. It's over 100 pages. Some included things were a bit more angst for stories that I didn't want to add in. There's enough angst out there and I didn't want it in my writing necessarily.

Things that I cut were a misunderstanding between young Buggy and Sunny caused by Benji being a little shit. Benji told Buggy that Sunny had a date with someone else when he showed up one day so Buggy assumed he was being led on the entire time. The two had a fight over it. It involved Sunny quitting Miss Pins' and leaving. I couldn't find a good way to fix the situation so I cut it.

Another thing was Buggy suggesting to Birdie he leave her on an island somewhere until the baby was born because why not, he didn't want to leave his ship and be on land while she waited out the rest of her pregnancy. But I didn't want to undo some of their growth. They'll still have some misunderstandings but I felt that was too much.

And Cupcake and Buggy had many hiccups. I decided I didn't like how I was writing Cupcake so it changed to misunderstandings in the bedroom instead of Buggy losing his temper all the damn time and Cupcake crying constantly.

#writing stuff #tag game #buggy the clown

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wonder-vixen · 8 months

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Well, my little experiment told me that no matter if you label something, it will still be flagged. So I've made a side blog that will house these posts. So please follow if you're into that kind of that. They'll still be labeled

#new blog #side blog

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misc-obeyme · 4 months

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I was a bit disappointed with what happened next, but I knew we'd be disappointed. I'm still hoping that we'll talk a bit more about what happened in the next lesson, it's pretty unpleasant to leave it like that. Also, I love the anon's idea that "Father" planned to put Lucifer in this situation to manipulate him into and "saving" him. it makes "Father's" intentions in this story a lot more coherent, it just makes me worry even more about the boys. 1/2

My biggest issue was that everybody just seemed to forget about the events of the last lesson all together. It wouldn't have been so bad if someone had at least mentioned it?? It just seemed like okay, moving on! And I was like no wait but my feelings are still all wound up from the last lesson, you can't just move on like that! But really, I shouldn't be surprised.

I hope we get some more about it in the next lesson, too, but at this point I'm not counting on anything anymore. And I agree! That take on Father being manipulative and trying to coerce Lucifer into forgiving him and all that does make the whole situation make a little more sense. It's still incredibly annoying, but at least it wouldn't be completely out of left field.

It does make Father's character potentially more conniving, though. And that can't be good, as you say. My main consolation is that Lucifer, while still accepting Father's love and all that, wasn't like okay time to go home. He was still going to stay a demon. And the rest of the brothers will follow him, so even if Father tries to manipulate them, I think they'll be able to withstand it.

If MC gets to meet Father I'll lose my whole mind. So far it's all been Michael, I don't think MC has ever spoken to Father directly? Not that I can remember. But of course just thinking about letting MC straighten that guy out is pretty satisfying lol.

At this point I have zero confidence in their time travel writing abilities. Considering the dumpster fire that was Lesson 16, I'm not expecting this to go smoothly. Especially because I think this Nightbringer arc is more complicated.

I haven't been told anything by people with access to game files, but I've seen a few comments in the community and the general consensus is "prepare for disappointment."

So I am going into the next lesson with zero expectations. It's probably gonna make me crazy and I'll likely get on here and rant about it, but I've come to accept that this is simply the way of the world now. Solmare butchers their story and I write unhinged tumblr posts about it lol.

On the one hand, it's frustrating, but on the other hand, it keeps me on my toes! I can almost never predict what's going to happen in this story and that's a fairly unusual thing for me.

And in the end, as long as I get to read silly daily chats and kiss demons occasionally, I'm willing to overlook the rest. I just file that stuff away under the "Never Actually Happened" file in my brain. 😌

#unless they totally change Barbatos or Solomon #by revealing something about them that I can't pretend isn't a thing #that would be the most upsetting outcome for me personally #but I don't think about that if I can help it #obey me #obey me nightbringer #^^ anon #misc answers

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oleworm · 8 months

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@bacchanalium that's Americans not seeing foreign people as human beings. That's why they always put people to the impossible standard. Like when they tell refugees who fled extremist violence. "Co co co go back to your country where you can be killed and fix it. I am so smart!". And when people do oppose extremism by supporting education and human rightds, they are still called slurs, accused of being "not real" or "as bad as", ignored or further insulted

It's like people who come from the situations like the one in Afghanistan are doomed if they do, doomed if they don't speak about their experience or seek better life. They have impossible expectations on them to not only fit Western sensitivities, but Western imagination of them.

Hope that it's OK to reply like this, if not tell me and I'll delete it!

I don't think it's only people from the United States, though a lot of them are from there, but also those who spend too much time on social media and watch people get piled on for having a slightly different opinion than a bully.

I remember that we had a conversation once about how you could go on Reddit and find that the top comments were indistinguishable from each other, even on threads about different topics. That is, you wouldn't be able to identify any of those users because of their ideas or speech patterns because users tended to upvote those that had references they recognised or ways of writing that they identified with. And that's talking about people who use it to share a positive feeling I would imagine--you approve of the thing, you belong to the group of those who approve of the thing. On Tumblr and Twitter I've seen a more aggressive way to promote sameness, where if you don't follow the script it means that you disagree and that's bad, and then people allow themselves to talk to you in a way that would be considered very offensive if they did it in person. Some people are very hurt by this! It's also creepy because it gets to the point where you literally wouldn't be able to tell any of these users apart.

I refuse to believe that any one nationality is full of idiots. If I could talk to a regular person about the problems that people face in different parts of the world, I am sure they would understand that it's not nice to live through all of that and that no one should be punished for suffering in a way that does not fit your mental schematic of the world. It might take a moment to explain the situation but I think most people would get it.

But with a lot of what you see online, it's like they're just repeating what their cooler friend told them. They also want to be cool, so they repeat it to someone else without understanding it. It might not make any sense but they'll sure as hell say it. After all, it takes a few seconds to type. It reminds me of when I was twelve and pretended to be more familiar with certain bands that the other kids were listening to, but now they use the same dynamic to talk about what opinions are evil and racist.

It could be that we're bombarded with the real-time thoughts of twenty-one year-olds that are specifically fluent in English, with all of their cultural biases and the issues a lot of people have at that age, and because of how social media works, this is what ends up being pushed--the half-baked thoughts of the average teenager or very young adult--not the most mature, well-read, or most empathetic person in that age group, but the most average. Whatever that means. I know that at that age I was saying very messed up things. Definitely not ideas that I would like to be amplified in any way.

You see some adults acting that way, but I don't know if it's adults acting more like teenagers nowadays, more eager to impress and with a lower frustration threshold, or if it's because when I was a kid adults weren't losing their temper in front of me and when they did it was so rare that I considered it the sign of a person being very mentally unwell. I'm not a scientist, I really don't know. People definitely have always had thoughtless opinions but now you see it all the time and it continues affecting what others think and say long after the fact. I can't say I like that.

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barbwritesstuff · 1 year

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Hi Barb! I love your work, and I was curious about how you managed to branch out into so many different areas. How did you find an artist for your visual novel? Is trad publishing as hard to break into as I feel like it is?

Sorry this isn't a super focused ask; I just find the breadth of what you've been able to do really impressive and wondered if you had any advice to share for someone looking to achieve something similar.

Sure! I love talking about what I'm doing and how I'm doing it. I think creators should be as transparent as possible, because by doing that we help each other and can avoid scammy situations.

I found an artist for my visual novel by posting here on tumblr. A really cool artist who follows me approached me and we were able to do a deal that I could afford. I'm really happy with the work they've done so far and I'm really excited to put it into the game. Finding artists isn't always easy, and I'm still fairly new to this whole commissioning thing (the first art I commissioned was the cover art for Blood Moon), but there are a lot of really good artists just hanging out online that you can approach and talk to. If they're already in your circle, then that's even better, because they'll know the sort of thing you want.

Trad publishing is super hard to break into and I have not really achieved it. I'm looking for an agent as we speak (meaning, there are unanswered emails in inboxes around the world), so hopefully I'll get lucky and will be able to talk more about this subject soon, but right now? I'm still VERY MUCH trying to figure it out. My first novel, Crying Wolf, was traditionally published but with a very small publisher that didn't require agented submissions. At the time, that seemed like a good idea. In hindsight, I don't think I would suggest small publishers. I wasn't able to sell many books through them (my royalties for that project are <400 USD over two years) and the editing process was extreme. I'm hoping my latest novel will do better and hope an agent/bigger publisher will help that happen. But... I don't know. I may never find an agent or publisher for this novel I've been working on. In which case, I'll have to rethink my strategy.

Writing is tough, and being a writer isn't easy. A lot of writers I know have outside financial support, especially when starting up. Spouses are, I'm told, very useful in this regard. I'm single, so I'm working odd jobs part time to try and make ends meet.

But I love it. I'm also getting better at it the more I do. I'm trying different things (games, etc) and that's been a great experience. I'm never going to be one of these crazy successful authors that has a breakout best seller in their twenties and never looks back... but I'm enjoying myself and slowly trying to carve out my own little space in the writing world.

I hope at least some of that makes sense.

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moboxcritique · 8 months

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Blurry sent me an ask today

I won't include the ss because he seems angry in this one (idk if Kev will post it though cause I've spent a long time typing out this ask and I do NOT want to go out and check and rewrite this entire thing AGAIN😭) But he's holding a grudge against me for accidentally outing him as trans to his dad, which happened back in July 23rd and it happened in twitter replies.

1), I didn't mean to blurry, I assumed your dad was purposely misgendering you, especially when he was being transphobic to me calling me "a little whatever you are", plus, my other assumptions was that your dad had twitter, and I thought he knew your socials and you were openly trans online. However, I shouldn't have assumed and kept quiet about it, Kev told me about it back in July and I felt guilty finding out about it. Here are old messages from July when I was talking to Kev about my mistake:

No, starry (they're a follower of mine), wasn't apart of it, it was only me who accidentally outed you as trans to your dad, not Kev, not Kev's friends, only me. If there was anyone else, they had nothing to do with us.

2) your dad was threatening me and another minor, alongside with threatening to 'find where Kev lives' alongside with violence, your dad has said to another minor "you're 17? I'll wait" with more of the violence he said to us with "they'll put me away once they'll see what I'm about to do to you", and all because he wanted to protect you

My evidence? The twitter replies are deleted, but I'll show them anyways as you can see the dates on the replies and the context in my replies (you can see when I outed blurry as trans in one of them, a couple times infact)

- I know I posted the proper evidence on my twitter back in July, however when I search through my tweets, twitter is being a pain in the ass. BUT once I find the proper evidence, I'll send them in! I'm not sure if I posted them on this blog before, I think I did? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

- I got a new phone a couple months ago, so no I don't have any backed up pictures, my evidence is lost! But I can always rely on my old twitter posts, and with this blog and Kev, since they archive a lot of evidence.

- it's suspected that Marcy and blurry are still friends, if you guys don't know even though I talked about it twice, Marcy is a groomer and stole 3-4 OCS from Kev and tried to sell them. I talk about it a couple times in the ss with me and blurrys dad in the twitter replies. cause blurry for all we know is probably still friends with the two predatory proship artist creators, I even once told him about one of them with their bad behaviour and like 6 months later he's still talking to them and is in their helluva boss discord server. Blurry once reached out to me on Tumblr and I told him stuff about mob, he said they weren't mutuals and that he'd stop talking to mob, but then me and Kev find out blurry rebranded after he deleted all of his accounts and went into mobs discord helluva boss server despite what we told blurry about mob with given evidence 😭

3) anyways, continuing, you and your sister disregarded your dad's actions, your sister went out to DM Kev and to tell her to stop, however I won't forget how the both of you defended your dad's actions in threatening kids with creepy behaviour.

Although, I told Kev back then to split blurry and blurrys dads behaviour, as I felt like blurry shouldn't have any blame with his dad's actions. But blurry and his sister instead just tried to downplay their dad's actions towards me, Kev and a minor. Even if his dad is sorry, he shouldn't have done any of that in the first place.

Anyways, blurry sent an ask to Kev too (I know the blog already seen this but I'll still include it) this one doesn't seem personal like what blurry sent to me. Because this is just plain vile and deserves to be on display, sorry blurry ┐(´ー｀)┌

Here you are, calling Kev and her friends "harassers" yet you send in this ask to Kev. Calling her art shit, with other insults.

I understand you're angry blurry, but I'll have you know that just yesterday, Kev was planning to make a doc on you and Marcy, when I told Kev not to (for now)

Infact, there are times I told Kev to consider at least some of your opinions. but instead it disappoints me that you send in a hateful ask to Kev out of anger, I don't know what happened, If this has to do with Kev making a debunk thread on twitter, or if it's me talking about Marcy here and suspecting the two of you are still friends, despite the fact Marcy is a groomer and stole Kev's OCS plenty of times.

I'm aware both blurry and Kev talk crap about each other's art style, however I don't want to be involved in that, cause I can't do anything about that 💀

However I don't agree with anyone and everyone here talking crap about each other's art style, cause that's none of my business and it shouldn't be anyone elses. However that's frequently normal when it comes to a 'problematic content creator' with their art style. people shit on the danganronpa art style a lot on twitter, same with the fnf art style sometimes, etc etc. However it shouldn't go far to where it involves harassment. Now blurry bursted out in anger for whatever reason and just sends in a sudden ask to Kev with insults 😭

^^^^^^

Yeah, we got evidence of Blurry's dad saying that stuff to Starry and Kev as shown here and here

The guy's being a literal hypocrite like always, not only insulting Kev but insulting an entire streaming service, basically an entire community. It's insane

#mod cagney #ask #blurry kun #cultc0re #zombifykid

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quartzalynlove · 2 years

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Hey! Can you do a steve Harrington x reader- like they meet the reader at a party- bcs their friends left them? Sorry if you can't

I absolutely can i hope you like it! Tysm for requesting🙂

Ditched

Pairing: Steve Harrington x reader

Summary: you got ditched at a party, but it’s okay because so did Steve

Warnings: none

A/n: Tumblr likes to make me cry so this will be a block of text, I'm sorry. Also as you can see asks are open again!! Steve Harrington asks are highly encouraged, but you can find the pinned post and request anything in the tags, following the rules ofc.

You knew you shouldn't have let your friends talk you into this, you always hated parties. Now, you were hugging the wall as you tried to keep tabs on them with your eyes; they were mostly flirting and dancing with other people while you were tasked with drink holding. Everything was too loud, and it reeked of sweat and cheap cologne and perfumes. The next song that came on had enough bass boosting through the stereo to take the whole house down, so, rolling your eyes, you escaped out of the back; there were still people in the pool, but there was less loud music.

Steve knew this was a mistake too. He let this girl drag him to a party hosted by a guy they knew in high school; was he really getting that desperate?

It was fine while she was interested, but Steve turned his back to grab drinks for one second and she was with her old friends, flirting with some guy. He sighed, looking around. He wasn't going to talk to anyone, half he recognized as people that didn't like him, and the other half were people he had never met.

He saw that the vibe outside was slightly more chill than inside and snuck out of the back. Surveying the area, Steve looked for a place to hang out until his date remembered him.

Everyone was messing around in the pool, but you were sitting with your back against the house, looking up at the stars with your knees pressed into your chest.

He thought he recognized you, but he wasn't sure. Curious, Steve walked towards you, and sat down. He looked up at the sky with you.

"It's nice, right," Steve said before looking over at you. "You here by yourself?"

You shook your head and looked through the glass door that led back inside, "Nah, my friends are in there, flirting or screwing or something," You looked back at Steve. "You?"

Steve's mouth hung open as he rubbed the nape of his neck. "Um, my date ditched me."

You rested your head on your legs, looking at Steve, "Sucks." You smiled softly.

Steve stared at you; he swore he had seen you at school back in the say, but he wasn't sure.

"Did we know each other in high school?" He asked.

"I knew you," you said. "But, I think this is our fist time officially meeting, I'm Y/N."

You held out your hand for Steve to shake, and, suddenly, it clicked in his head as he remembered your name.

"Wait, Y/N" He realized. "You were friends with Martha Weston in drama club, right?"

"Oh," you gasped with a smile. "Yeah, you did date her."

"How's she doing, now?" Steve asked.

You winced before turning back to the door, finding Martha leaned against the pool table.

"She is currently sucking faces with Marty Windberg."

Steve looked over at you shocked and poked his head over by the door to confirm. His eyes widened.

"Wow, really, that douchebag?"

You shrugged in response. "Eh, she'll be fine."

You looked at Steve, he was a lot different from when you knew him before. Back then you didn't trust him, and you hated that Martha wouldn't listen when you told her to stay away from him, but she always did have a horrible taste in men.

You thought to yourself, if your friends ditched you and Steve's date ditched him, you both should just ditch together.

You grabbed Steve by his wrist, standing up, "My house's not far from here, and I have an Atari if you wanna play?" You offered.

Steve looked up at you before standing, "You sure," He looked back through the door. "What about your friends?"

You started walking backwards, slowly, "They'll call me in the morning when they wake up wherever them and their hookups got busy; c'mon, I'm bored here!" You smiled tugging on Steve's arm.

He looked back at you and started walking with you until you turned around and started running, chasing after you.

Steve didn't just remember you as Martha's friend, but also as the nerdy ball of energy he saw bouncing around the auditorium at the end of club meets when he came to pick Martha up. He remembered your smile, your laugh, and the innocent, but witty, quips you'd throw at your friends. On top of it all you were really attractive, but, according to his friends, Steve was already pushing it when he was dating Martha. It didn't matter that she was the best singer in the school and got all of the lead roles, she was still a theater kid. That was why he had to dump her even though he never told anyone. He ended up never asking you out to not ruin his reputation anymore than he already had.

However, he wasn't in high school anymore, and his reputation was already shot. No one cared if he dated someone who wasn't in social standing with him because the hierarchy didn't exist anymore.

The two of you made it to your house; you put your key in the door, opening it and letting Steve in. You stayed up the entire night playing on your Atari, laughing, and talking.

He almost had you in stitches on the couch; you sighed, "Man, I was so wrong about you; now I get why Martha was so into you!" You smiled.

Steve smiled back, slightly sad; he looked down, "Yeah, I don't think you were too far off about me, though," He said. "I really was a jerk back then."

You sat up and looked at Steve, "Yeah, well so was I," you shrugged. "It wasn't just you I didn't trust; I never liked anyone that I deemed too popular. We were all idiots in high school, Steve, that's why they're the worst years of you life, but the good part is," You reached out to push a strand of hair behind Steve's ear. "None of it matters anymore."

Steve looked into your eyes before bringing a hand to caress the side of your face; he began to lean in, and you leaned with him until your lips met.

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quick-catton · 2 months

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Hi quick-catton!! First of all I love your page and I love your personality💕💕💕 I also LOVE Saturn and Felix and Oliver just-😫😫😫 I love it every time you post, it makes my day!! Right now I just really need your help. Today I had to go on another account just to send something to my ask box because since I started my account last year, I’ve gotten nothing and it really hurts.

I love how open and freaky you are in your posts and I’m honestly the same way with Saltburn and an anime fandom that I’ve shaped my blog around. I used to be a little calm and collected but you’re inspiring to just let go and let my freak flag fly but the problem is, with my fandom, I don’t think people are going to be very inviting. Like literally the only thing I wanna do right now is babygirl code my favorite anime character sooo badly but I’m afraid I’ll lose all my followers and when I try to I get no engagement.

Like I wrote three freaking paragraphs about how good he’d look with a navel piercing! That was this morning and I got nothing all day but four likes. No reblogs, no comments, I literally had to make another account and send myself some praise for that post just so I could post it to show people that at least someone else agrees with me.

And I know I should give it time but that’s the problem. Some of my other posts like that don’t grow. They just get five likes and that’s it and it sucks because all I wanna do is engage with people that want to see this boy in lingerie or a skirt or goddamn pregnant (told you I was a freak)

I just don’t know what to do. How do you deal that? I’m honestly this close to deleting my account coz it seems like I’m posting to a blank wall and it’s so embarrassing coz everyone can see it. Sorry this is so long! Thank you for quickcatton 💕💕

WAH ANON ur so sweet omg, thank you?? <33 honestly i feel like i don't have good advice because i only made a tumblr for the first time EVER at the beginning of january!!! i am 23 and had never set foot on this app, but i saw that most of the saltburn fandom was here, so i gave it a shot and i've just been learning as i go.

i think that's half of my 'luck' with having a good experience on this app, is that because this fandom is so fresh, it's super active, but it's also a very small fandom (relative to some others) so we're all kinda like a hivemind here LOL, and because of the source material of the movie itself being weird/freaky/psychosexual, we all know that anything goes and the more freaky the brainrot, the better! i'm in other fandoms where if i said half of the shit i say here, i'd be ostracized, so it's really a case by case basis unfortunately </3

ik i yap a lot here but i also hold back sooo much because even tho ik we're all weirdos here, i still get nervous about putting out my writing or not having people vibe with an idea– you're not alone in that, i promise. it helps forming friendships in your fandoms so you know that there'll always be people who you can get hype over ideas with, but i know that's easier said than done sometimes <3

i don't have advice on engagement because i honestly don't look at that stuff (which i know is so annoying to say lol but it's true); i made this account purely to have a place to dump brainrot/art etc and view other people's saltburn content and i didn't care about engagement, i just got lucky to meet some cool people and make close friends through it.

i think if people can tell you're having fun through your posts, they'll vibe with you! it does take time with the good ol' algorithm, i'm sure, but as long as your page brings YOU joy, that's what matters most. people don't have to agree with your takes, life is too short to be vanilla and water urself down for others :^) making fandom friends and gaining interactions will come along with being yourself, but if posting here and running the account feels more stressful to you than it is fun, it's okay to step away too!

if you're on ao3 and sites like that, leaving comments on your fave works can be a great way to get conversations going as well. i met my closest friend on here bc she stumbled across my fic on ao3 and then sent me a message; it was purely up to chance, but branching out and being brave starting conversations with your fave accounts can be a great way to feel more included in the fandoms you're in and maybe you'll meet cool people along the way!! <33

#if anyone else has other advice feel free to reply with it <33 #because i'm not good at this stuff LOL #i literally just open this app say shit and then go back to yapping in a google doc #also this made me realize idk if i've ever put my name anywhere on this account #so i just added it to my display/pinned hi i'm sam #quick-catton asks

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zydrateacademy · 3 months

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Starfield Addendum: Ryujin and Stealth Design

I posted my review on Steam and here on Tumblr before completing the Ryujin questline. There's things to like about it but the penultimate mission was an awful experience.

Disclaimer: There are spoilers. I don't get into specifics on the who's and what's and I don't name names so even reading this post you can still mostly experience the story on your own. I just kind of spoil the general expectations and layouts of certain missions.

Side thought: I've already been told that there's a 'cheesy' way to blitz through the questline. Ryujin doesn't want you to ever murder anyone but they actually don't ever really care if you're marked as 'caught'. So there's a strategy of literally sprinting through the missions, hitting the objectives, eating food and medpaks and just escaping the area. In theory you'll still get the bonus rewards.

Just in case someone wants to "um actually" parts of this post. I just don't feel that that's the intended style of gameplay here. So let me start with the stealth.

Playing the game normally, still doing my first run clocking at about 24 hours. Some main quest, some side stuff, some spacefaring, some contraband. All of it trying to stealth through most encounters.

Just kind of experiencing the game as a first timer. At first stealth was a chore, nigh impossible beyond the first hit. I got an early lucky drop when an enemy bandit gave me a suppressed pistol (my review talks about how stupidly obtuse crafting is, ~24 hours and I still can't really kit all my own stuff out yet, just wearing what was dropped or rewarded) that luckily had a scope on it and stealth finally became a viable option even when I was only one or two perks into the stealth skill. So stealth is sadly not something you can just dive into, at least not in the same way as Skyrim.

I haven't tested stealth melee but judging from the low damage numbers I can't imagine it being very good. The stealth perk only gives bonuses to suppressed weapons, not melee attacks. So very quickly, melee could potentially fall behind. There's a blurb somewhere on TVtropes on Starfield that mentions that melee is almost completely useless as 98% of enemies will be shooting at you. I only see a melee enemy once in a while, meanwhile Starfield follows the same formulae of "dungeon bosses" that they did in Skyrim. The area's boss can be about 8-15 levels above you and they can hit incredibly hard with the scaling so it's a bad time to try and rush them while they're dumping bullets on full automatic.

So there's no sneaky stabby here, the game's main stealth conceit is making sure you're a suppressed sniper. And I haven't even acquired a proper sniper rifle yet but I have a silenced pistol and single shot rifle that do just fine.

Now, shooting a spacer in the head will still put your stealth meter in the orange and force enemies to patrol. I think over a decade of Skyrim (and even some in Fallout 4) have made the open world RPG gamer community a bit complacent, as everyone seems to miss the days where you could silently pick enemies off without their mates knowing. But if a spacer sees their heavily armored mate hit the deck with a crack in their helmet and blood on the ground, they will of course start doing some patrolling. They'll give up the search eventually.

However, enemy sight lines are both incredibly wide and far reaching to the point where there's a mod with 170,000 downloads trying to nerf them. I might have to get it.

So let's veer into the game's stealth faction, Ryujin Industries. Supposedly this game's version of the Thieves Guild, with Neon City serving as a cyberpunk version of Riften. Their introduction was neat, giving me a fair bit of Arasaka-but-worse, with their black/red motif and Japanese ownership. I liked their vibe, especially since I am effectively playing the same character I do on 2077.

I briefly had a few warning signs before being given one very good mission, then it went downhill.

First, Ryujin has a fairly strict no-murder policy. Now I have no idea if they actually kick you out or not because I tried to play by their rules for the experience but I do know you get chastised if you do actually kill anyone. This actually proves to be a huge detriment as you can't eliminate patrollers without angering your employers. I think they took Skyrim's TG as a lesson about how you could murderhobo your way through that questline without much of an issue but they forgot to split the difference. Starfield could have benefitted from Oblivion's style where if you kill someone in the same interior as where your job is supposed to be, you get kicked out of the guild. In Skyrim, Fallout, and otherwise I think Beth doesn't want people to lose out on content so they try to make everything accessible. They should be appealing to logic. If you fucked up, reload a last save you filthy animal.

The first five or so missions are like a baby's introduction to basic espionage. Go hack someone's computer, go slip this item in someone's storage, go talk to a guard to get their keycard (though I think I could have actually just pickpocketed them for that one). There's no danger or any real threat as long as you're not playing a braindead murderhobo.

To contrast, Skyrim's thieves guild sets you loose pretty quickly. You have the two radiant questgivers, all give 7 or so different "types" of missions to pick from. (This comes as a post-questline reward for Ryujin). So you can pick up two (more with mods) of those and go to the island estate to sneak around a bandit-controlled base. Now it still encourages stealth because those mercenaries have absolutely ungodly amounts of hitpoints, like five times the amount their counterparts in the open world do. They only hit as hard as their level demands (and wielding iron weapons) but if you're a fledgling thief they can be a real bastard to deal with in open combat.

That's what Ryujin should have done. Beef up the security, let us kill them if we have to but you can still figure out how to punish us for entering open combat beyond some chastising in dialog. As it stands I save-scummed through some missions (the penultimate mission, which we'll get to, I think I near broke my F9 key) but ultimately got through a majority of the questline with nary a bad word to my name. I think on any NG+ I might go get a bit head-shotty and see if I get kicked out completely. If I do, then that means Beth weren't fucking cowards and my previous commentary is null and void.

So after baby mode I am given a mission where I'm like oh hell yeah, the actual questline is starting. It's the mission called "Background Checks". Without spoiling any specifics about it, you're actually infiltrating your own employer's base (everyone but a security team is given some fake story about maintenance) to hack into an employee's computer to find some potential espionage. All well and good. The layout should already be partially familiar to you, the vent system is unlocked for your benefit... After that you're just ducking and weaving through some hallways in order to get to the computer. There was a moment where I had to savescum through a couple of encounters because the stealth... just isn't quite there.

So the perk system isn't as robust as Skyrim's was. There's literally only one stealth perk that eventually, all it does is make you 100% harder to detect while also giving the final benefit of opening doors not alerting enemies. Helpful, right. I also made sure to unequip my space suit which you are still technically wearing even if you clicked the option to "hide in settlements", but you're still wearing it and benefit from the stats. Well that's more weight, and it makes you "louder". And let me tell you, it only helps slightly. So with the perks, the weight knowledge, and even eventually an outfit that adds another 25% more detection reduction, I keep running into situations where I peak into a hallway or slightly out a doorway and my alert meter goes from "Hidden" to 90% into the orange "caution" notation in a single second. A half second more and it's red and put in "danger", where enemies will open fire and sound alarms. I still can't grasp why this is, except that they're still working on outdated Fallout 4 coding where some similar problems persist even then.

Beth caught some flack because Starfield is still running on a decade old engine. That wouldn't have bothered me because some of these problems didn't exist with Skyrim. I've had my stealth fuckups on Skyrim but they still didn't cascade in an entire base or cavern assaulting me. Usually just the immediate area. That went away in Fallout 4 with ballistic coding, where a single missed bullet, suppressed or not, will send legions of enemies to investigate you.

So after the quite excellent "Background Checks" mission you're given two other missions and they're... fine, but basic. You can infiltate some criminal base with a couple different options but the option I took I was literally able to just walk in, not make a fuss, talk to the person, then leave. So it was more of a persuasion minigame than a stealth mission. Same with the mission after that. With one or two persuasions you can literally just talk to two guys and pick up a briefcase that doesn't even have the stolen tag on it. Despite you stealing it, it's still something of a scripted event where a guy won't leave his desk. (Maybe he does and I didn't give him enough time). Either way, both missions are thematically fine for the story its telling. I just didn't sneak through them.

And now we approach the problem with Ryujin. We're forced to not defend ourselves properly, at least not in a preventative capacity. There is a damage type where you can nuke robots faster and stun human enemies but that's already a post-fuckup option. During this questline we still can't just snipe guards from afar to make the pathing easier. I did everything Starfield wanted me to do within my power and abilities. Rank 4 in the stealth perk. That one piece of clothing. Took off my space suit. I used detection based chems. Yet even still if you're in the vaguest periphery of the enemy, your hidden meter hits the orange instantly. This is the problem I had with the penultimate mission, "Sabotage".

This is essentially the finale. In theory this should be the "test" of all the things you've learned before, in a normal game. It's not. You're given one skill of "Manipulation" which allows you to temporarily mind control people. You can make them run off, open doors, use objects, etc. Typically in the fashion of getting them out of your way. Half the time it doesn't work and just puts me in their sightlines which was a huge problem in this mission.

It's tutorialized once, where it took me several attempts to even get the guy to move before finally getting it done. I barely learned how the mechanic actually functions, and then I'm shoved off to do this multilayered, multi-objective espionage assault on a rival company. There's elevators, you activate some gas leak to get all the civilians to leave, it's like a whole fucking thing.

It's fucking awful.

Maybe my second attempt will be better. Maybe I should have picked some more pockets. But the mission didn't give me room to learn and breathe.

I wasn't clear on the order of operations. You're able to get into one floor freely, and I tried breaking into other places that way but there were too many guards everywhere. I later then realize; I probably should have just done the gas-evacuation. Several alerts and reloads later I just full on reload an actual save, not just a quicksave, back at the beginning of the tower and I go hit the gas leak. So now most people are gone and the tower is replaced with specific patrolling-type enemies.

They were fucking awful.

I don't know if it was coding, behavior, or all stealth concepts just glitched out on me fully. All the problems I listed before came to me on this mission full force, a wrecking ball to my patience. Between quickloads, enemies would sometimes stop patrolling and just stare down the hallway I needed to go. At one point, dozens of quickloads and attempts, I was once stuck in this room with some guy who just wouldn't stop looking at the doorway I was in. I'd peak out the door and get hit with full caution or danger/alarms instantly.

I only fixed this by letting it go full orange which put him in a semi-alert status and only then would he actually move a bit. He and his buddy came to the door, gave up, and I could sneak behind them as they were walking away. Ten minutes of this shit and it wasn't even where I needed to be at all.

Also during that, my objective kind of glitched on me. The only marker was on the elevator which didn't work. I don't know if it's because the building was on lockdown or what. Where I ACTUALLY needed to be was back in the Marketting area (the place you can get legit access to) and find some vents and shafts and make your way deeper into the level.

And let me tell you, the actual level design... was fine. You can sneak on the vents and actually hop on the lights at catwalks and sneak above people. The same option was a thing back in the superior mission "Background Checks". So in theory we'd be familiar with the lessons. The design of the place itself was fine, but everything else was dogshit.

I was fucking around this mission for something to the tune of an hour and a half. I eventually gave the fuck up completely and someone on a discord server told me about the "tdetect" cheat which turns off enemies ability to see you. And EVEN THEN it still took me 10-15 minutes or so to find my way back down to the place where I was to steal a prototype. I literally couldn't figure out where to go even without worrying about enemies. Not because the level design was broke, but because the game itself kind of broke on me. Stealth wasn't working. The elevator didn't work. My objective marker didn't work. Players can whine about objective markers if they want but I did play Morrowind and was able to read the journal because NPC's gave you exact directions. There was no direction here, was the problem. Just "go do these five things," which is why losing the objective marker was such a problem at one point.

That last mission pissed me off that I just wrote 2550 words (that's about a chapter in a fucking novel) to rant about it.

Crazy thing is, the storyline wrapped up really well. The final-final mission is this unique thing where you go lobby a bunch of board members, and you can choose the level of ethics to employ on two different issues at once. It was really cool with a lot of dialog options and that characterization from the leadership I so craved from before.

To contrast, in Skyrim's Thieves Guild, you work with the leadership often. They give you those radiant quests, you're sent to speak with them to get tips on the mission. In the first mission, talking to one of them will give you some characterization about infiltration; and she points out an extra entry point that avoids guards. Ryujin needed more of that here. They really should have brought the lessons they learned with the Dark Brotherhood as well. In Oblivion and Skyrim's DB questlines, you're encouraged to speak with every guildmate and they'll often offer some kind of insight to the mission. Sometimes it's just a quip, but other times they'll actually give you an idea of positioning or something.

All of that soul is lost here. They hit the vibe. The story is actually really neat and fairly underplayed compared to a lot of other things. Nothing particularly world-shattering (except the issue of the whole mind control device, which you can address at the end), just a bit of Corpo on Corpo violence. There was a lot to like and it just came up a bit short for me.

Thanks for coming to my ted talk.

#Starfield #Bethesda #bethesda softworks #gaming #pc gaming

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