#brand highlight | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

mantisgodsdomain · 6 months

Note

3,4,15 for any member of team snakemouth!

...how about all three?

(for this ask game)

3. Obscure headcanon

For Kabbu, though we may have noted this before, we think that the North is quite firmly considered a patch of Deadland - and its inhabitants, as a result, tend to be very, very strange from the perspective of the rest of the world. For Kabbu, specifically, this means a variety of things, both biologically and culturally - though Northern beetles are a lot more common in Bugaria, deadlands in general come with a very high rate of mutation and a very high rate of death, and that means a high rate of superstition both in things that actively impact survival and in things that do not - as well as the simple fact that a constantly-changing set of genetics means that what a northern beetle is like is often very, very open to change.

Kabbu is an example of a burrower - a subspecies of sorts primarily identified by claws designed, very specifically, for digging. His claws grow into a sort of broad shovel shape and tend to be much sturdier than an equivalent beetle's - getting underground in moments in soft ground isn't really an exaggeration! Though he can dig through harder ground, it takes time and effort, and he can't go at it with the sheer speed of softer soil - technically, he could burrow through solid rock given enough time, but it would be both hard and extremely painful. It's a trait that's heavily prized in the North for its ability to create shelter and safety - beetles dominate the North's underground, and there's nothing that can really pose a threat to them. Tunnels are safety, and it really surprises and disorients him when things underground attack him, because back home that just kind of doesn't happen unless it's Another Beetle specifically targeting you.

In terms of more social things, he has a lot of trouble getting used to the concept of mimics. This is mostly due to the fact that mimics as a whole don't really... exist in the north, at least not in the means of gaining benefit from mimicking anything else. If you can talk to them as any other awakened bug, they're usually exactly what they say they are, and species mimicking normal geological features and plants haven't found any success, unless you're willing to get extremely generous with describing the snow-bank camouflage of a Northern Silk Moth's topcoat.

Though sand wasps or "white bees" still exist, the thing they're mimicking no longer exists in the same area. Any Hive that once was in the North is long dead, overly-large groups of bugs tend to die out quickly thanks to the handful of large predators that may decide the benefits outweigh the consequences when enough tasty beetles gather in the same place, and when the enemy you're dealing with is both too heavily armoured to be really deterred by most weaponry and capable and intelligent enough to stalk your group through the snow until the cost outweighs the benefit of eating you... well, the sort of small groups generally sent to start a new colony of social bugs really don't stand a chance.

It is, occasionally, very hard to get used to the fact that southern silk moths only grow a few heads taller than him. He's used to them presenting a lot more of a threat.

For Leif... we think he's completely, 100% blind. His eyes are frozen over due to quirk of his biology - the thing about his integration that makes him a failure, specifically. With any of the Snakemouth cordyceps, they do not naturally transfer the immunity to their own magic that any other variety of mage would have, and so need to alter their hosts in order to get the appropriate biology across. With Leif, that protection is not sufficient to protect the host, much less to preserve valuable organs - eyes, especially, are fragile, after all. The cold he naturally generates exceeds the host adaptations he provides, resulting in, even beyond the blindness, unusually brittle chitin, extremely stiff and easy-to-damage tissue, organic food processing efficiency appropriate for a bug currently freezing to death...

Well, you get the idea. Functionally, if alive, a host body would be in a state of perpetual hypothermia, prone to breaking down over time and needing persistent repair that his strain of cordyceps cannot provide, as any repair he could offer that's not within his host's natural healing capabilities requires manually breaking down and reconstructing any parts, which... is inconvenient at best. As he is, he gets around most of these issues by simply replacing his host body's soft tissue with cordyceps, but that has its own issues, mainly in making him look and move incredibly uncanny. Injuries take a very long time to repair, relatively, though the less tissue damage is done the easier it is to fix - being cleanly sliced in two, for example, might be easier to handle than any sort of crushing damage. As far as his eyes go... eyes of any sort are delicate, and the slightest damage can permanently blind someone. Any of Snakemouth Den's cordyceps tend to go blind anyways as the fungus burrows into ocular nerves - if anything, this is better for hiding, since the frost over his eyeballs conceals any mycelium in the eyes themselves. In theory, it can be repaired... in practice, it would be far too much of a pain for work that will be undone the moment he overtaxes his ice magic again.

...also, he doesn't really care. Sight is not the most important sense a moth has and his scent and ability to sense pheromones is fine, along with a general sensitivity to things like vibrations in the air. More than fine, even, since he's now kind of hybridized with both Ant and Bee and the number of pheromones he's sensitive enough to sense has shot through the roof. This on top of the "magic sense" he has means he has absolutely no trouble getting around, though reading books requires more or less sticking an antenna or fungal tendril over them and parsing out where the ink is by scent and texture. He full-on didn't notice he was blind until after the cordyceps reveal.

For Vi, while this might be one we've mentioned before, we headcanon that she's got a bit of minor mutation throwing her antenna... maybe 2% more towards a non-social relative, which gears her just slightly more towards being able to detect "foreign" scents - predators, prey, and any pollen or nectar in the area. Unfortunately, this slight shift in what scents she's made to pick up comes with a reduced sensitivity to pheromones and pheromone communication within the hive, along with loss of the general innate understanding that an average bee would have of how she's meant to "fit in" to a structure that utterly cripples her communication and social life in the hive.

It's minor enough of a mutation that she's never been flagged - she's a mutation of a social bee, not a normal variant of a solitary - but she smells weird, and she doesn't pick up on pheromones quite enough, and the variation in signals she puts off means that she both fails the communication to get across what she might need and fumbles the communication conveyed back to her about what she should do. Subtle things build up over time, and within the Hive, the negatives far outweigh the benefits - the Hive is only built with bees that fit to a standard in mind, and even minor deviations can get you dragged far, far behind.

This is getting very long so, uhh. Here's a cut. Everything else is below it. We enjoy getting very long-winded. There's a lot in here.

15. Worst thing they’ve ever done

Well, this one will depend on if it's "in general" or "by their standards". Putting any sort of objective moral judgement on just about anything is ridiculously difficult, especially with how values vary by culture or individual.

There is no such thing as objective worst, and we absolutely don't guarantee these would line up with your idea of worse, and so we'll offer two options here - what we believe they would think of first if posed with the question, and an alternative answer that would likely crop up.

For Kabbu, his own response would be easy - abandoning his teammates to The Beast. It haunts him to this day - really, what sort of beetle abandons their swarm to a fate like that? If he was a little faster, a little braver, a little less of a coward - but no. He abandoned those he was meant to care most for, and they died because of it.

For the other...

There are some things that are necessary, to survive somewhere as harsh as the Deadlands. Not everyone can be saved. Not everything can be helped. Not everyone can be taken in. Tradition and law is the heart and soul of the North - rules that everyone must comply to, if not for the sake of themselves, than for the sake of those they may interact with. To break a law, for any reason, is to be shunned by the community, most likely to your eventual death.

She broke a law. It could have been for understandable reasons, or not - it doesn't matter. She put the community at risk, and for that, she couldn't stay. She was put out in the cold, despite her pleading to the contrary. She was allowed to beg and plead and bang on the door, and yet, it meant nothing. The beast she would have lead to them caught up, eventually. He would still believe it was justified.

For Leif, his first response would be... exactly what you expect of him, really. The body he took without a care. The life he stole. He might vary on whether it's the action of stealing it or the lies he's told with that body, but the answer would be the same.

For the one he wouldn't think of... He could have spoken up. He didn't. He met their eye, slated for execution on crimes that he could parlay them on if he implicated himself, and he said nothing.

The look on their face still haunts him sometimes. It hurts more now that he's two, rather than one. It's what was needed to protect his family.

For Vi... a fault in a machine. The instructions were boring, and confusing, and hard to read. She tried to do whatever she thought might work, instead of following the manual. There was an injury. Then another one. It was her fault, really, for rigging it wrong, but she was tired and angry and she argued instead of just sucking it up and fixing it when confronted on it, and it went unfixed for days more. A minor fault can very well lead to deaths, and though this one didn't, it came close - one more inch, a slightly looser bolt, and it would have cracked a bug's shell clean open. It's a miracle it turned out as well as it did. It's a miracle that no one connected it to her enough, even when it was fixed. Someone else was punished, and she was old enough to know not to step forward - she's not stupid, after all.

The guilt still haunts her. The "what-if". The possibility of it. If someone died of her own stupid negligence, if she made someone else take the fall - she would let them, really, her sense of self-preservation isn't that bad, but she's not sure she could live with it after.

With the one she wouldn't think of personally... considering the background she's got, the journey to the Ant Kingdom, and the fact that it's already stated she took jobs before canon? We think there's a fairly good chance that Vi's off jobs got... shady. It's not like she has much in the way of morals when it comes to money, and "will do just about anything for enough cash" is a decent market. If you're willing to forsake your morals, you can get more money than your heart desires - at the cost of just a bit of risk, at that!

She doesn't think about it, really. It wasn't something she needed to think about. They were threatening her, they were a risk to her team, they were the price she had to pay to eat, the specifics of what happened don't matter much at this point. Put in the position again, would she choose their life, or hers? It doesn't matter. They're dead, anyways. She should know. She was the one to take the payment for it.

4. Favorite line?

We're copy-pasting these straight from the game! These Direct Quotes are all sourced from @aquilamage's Bug Fables Transcript project, which we highly recommend checking out! It's an excellent resource for double-checking dialogue without having to replay the game first, and a repository for just about all the dialogue in the game (provided it wasn't taken out by previous patches, of course).

We will be honest: there's a lot of dialogue in this game. This might not be our absolute favorites, as a result of a general poor memory as well as Too Much Game. Also, we have blatant favoritism towards Vi in all ways. Most of these are favorite interactions, rather than anything else, so...

For Leif:

Kabbu: Leif. If you need to take a break, let us know. Vi will carry you. Vi: That is not happening. Leif: Oh, the fatigue, it kicks in... Vi: I said it's not happening!

...and for Vi, we're fond of this dialogue, specifically because the first time we encountered it we misread "exploring" as "exploding".

Leif: Science looks like a lot of hard work. Vi: It's like uh...the thinking version of exploring!

But of course, our favorite Vi Dialogue as well as our personal favorite dialogue in the game in general would be the Bee Guard overworld spy.

Leif: Vi, you're the only Bee explorer, right? Vi: Huh? Uh, yeah! That I know of... Leif: We've been thinking it's a bit weird, to see so many Bee guards, but only one explorer... Vi: Look, they're not guards because they want to or anything, okay? Vi: They were born to be guards, so they guard. That's it. Kabbu: That's a bit somber... Vi: ...That's just how the Hive is sometimes.

"I'm allergic to bouncers" is a close second, of course. In terms of story implications, we pull on her Jaune interactions and especially the point just after getting kicked out of the studio for the first time during Jaune's request, but that's... it's less we "like" it, per se, and more that the implications are fun to toy with. In terms of the actual dialogue, it just... makes us feel sad. Sad, [], and maybe a bit angry on her behalf. We've been there more than we care to admit, after all.

We... wouldn't wish something similar on anyone. And no matter how good the good gets with Jaune, it still can't really outweigh the fact that the bad starts ticking boxes about emotional abuse in a way that makes relationships like Mothiva & Zasp that more people are willing to try and call out pale in comparison. We probably need to finish that essay some time...

Anyways, we like it when Kabbu gets mad enough to yell at people.

Kabbu: This is ridiculous! You realize you could be dooming us all!? Kabbu: What if the Termite King loses trust in the Queen!? Kabbu: What if you lose to the Wasp King without our help!? Kabbu: Have you gone completely, utterly insane!? Have you lost all intelligence! Mothiva: Yikes. You're overthinking this WAY too much. Mothiva: The Ant Kingdom's way better in our hands than with you LOSERS. Kabbu: We have SAVED YOUR LIFE BEFORE, you WITCH!

#asks #ask games #we speak #bug fables #headcanons #writing #kabbu hc section turned into north rambling but uhh. dw about it. you get to hear our cool northern worldbuilding now #hi. sorry this took so long. this is more than a thousand words of writing.#the Vi Worst Thing varies heavily by verse as does All The Other Ones #what's the worst thing they've ever done? depends on the fic!#for vi specifically the nature of the jobs she's done is often plot relevant and thus changeable by convenience #if we get into aus then there are some more drastic changes ofc but we're doing Canon TSM Only here so that's just a side note #the most notable difference in answers...#selkie vi would have a very #unfortunately selkie vi is also missing and assumed dead due to that so it would be hard for her to answer #we love kabbu but he is very much a product of his environment #the intense traditionalism is a Beetle Thing technically and kabbu's specific brand is even more specific than that #a bit of a Kabbu Thing we guess? highly area specific and notable in that its extreme even for northern beetles #you become an amalgamation of the little bits of the people around you over time #and the bits kabbu picked up. well. highlighted that law is The Way To Go for keeping people alive and safe #even if not quite happy #anyways we hope this is good. it took a longass time! we wrote So Fucking Much here. its a bit excessive.

23 notes · View notes

fictionadventurer · 1 year

Note

If you happen to want to tell us about General McClellen (and/or William and Frances Seward), I'd enjoy that! I've been so interested by your history posts lately, especially about Zachary Taylor.

General George McClellan. Or as I like to call him...

I won't tell you what I call him because I cannot refer to this man without descending into vulgar profanity.

I'm going to be light on exact facts and details here, because most of his maddening characterization comes from an audiobook that I can't easily reference. And the point of this rant is not to teach you facts, but to let you know that his personality drives me absolutely up the wall.

So, to understand how this guy was able to wreak as much havoc as he did, you have to know that the US did not have a great army when the Civil War broke out. The only war since 1814 had been the Mexican-American War, and the army used there was nowhere near on the scale of what they'd need to fight this war. 30-40% of the West Point graduates were loyal to the South, and even though the North had greater numbers of trained officers, they had to use most of them to man outposts across vast territories, while the South was able to have every single one of their trained officers leading active troops. The Union just plain did not have men with the training and experience needed to lead a large army.

The best general they had was General Scott, who had led the US forces during part of the Mexican War. Unfortunately, he was super old. Barely able to walk, much less ride a horse and lead troops into battle. He had to work entirely from an office, and that wasn't a great way to lead the army. So Lincoln brought in George McClellan--a 34-year-old West Point graduate who'd had success in the West--to work under him as a sort of assistant general. McClellan seemed like an ideal choice. He was young and impressive-looking, inspiring tons of confidence in the people who saw him. Unfortunately, he bought into the propaganda. He was convinced that he was the divinely-appointed savior of the Union, and then let his immense ego drive all his decisions.

This guy was a toxic narcissist obsessed with power and glory and honor and willing to do nothing to deserve it. It's almost hilarious how much of a contrast there is between him and Grant and Lincoln. They could be characters in a fable. Lincoln was willing to take blame upon himself rather than let others suffer attacks; McClellan would scramble to blame everyone except himself. Grant supposedly showed up to his army camp with only a spare shirt, a toothbrush, and a hairbrush; McClellan famously required six wagons pulled by four horses each to carry all his luggage from his home to the military camp. In his months of delay at the camp near Washington, he would host dinner parties for the officers every night with oysters and champagne.

He was so combative with Scott that Scott finally decided to retire, leaving McClellan as the sole head of the army. When Lincoln would come by army headquarters for meetings, McClellan would make the president of the United States wait downstairs rather than come down to see him (and then complain to his wife that the president took up his time with meetings). He would never, ever take the blame for any mistakes, always blaming the president or Congress for not giving him enough troops or equipment, even though they repeatedly told him that they were providing as much as they possibly could.

He was in charge of the Army of the Potomac, which was supposed to protect Washington from the Confederate troops that were right on their doorstep. Yet McClellan kept troops in camp for months rather than going after the enemy. At first, this was understandable--you have huge numbers of recruits coming in who have never had any military experience before; you need time to conduct drills and teach them how to use equipment. But even after they were trained, McClellan kept delaying. He kept wildly overestimating the number of soldiers in the enemy camp, and insisting that he needed more equipment and more soldiers before he could attack. People were like, "Please attack before the Confederates have a chance to bring in more troops." McClellan did not attack. Lee brought in more troops. Then McClellan justified this by saying, "Well, the more troops they bring in, the more complete our victory will be when we destroy them." Finally, Lincoln was like, "You absolutely must attack within a week." McClellan delayed for a month. When he finally attacked, the Confederates got wind of it and were able to abandon camp before the Union army arrived. When McClellan's got there, they found that the intimidating array of cannons that the army had feared facing were a bunch of logs painted black.

The Quaker Gun incident, as it came to be called, was hugely embarrassing for McClellan. Congress started demanding that Lincoln replace him. Lincoln's like, "Who do you suggest I replace him with?"

"Anybody," a senator muttered.

"Anybody may do for you," Lincoln shot back, "but I must have somebody."

McClellan was able to coast by for a ridiculously long time in his position just because there was no one Lincoln could be certain was qualified to replace him. The men did seem to like him, and Lincoln was hesitant to remove a commander who had the loyalty of his men and who knew the terrain.

His entire military career was just cycle after cycle of this:

Lincoln: Please attack the enemy.

McClellan: It's not my fault. You guys won't give me enough men and weapons.

The War Department: Here are more men and weapons.

McClellan: [loses battles, fails to pursue the enemy after victories, etc.]

Congress: This guy has to go.

Lincoln: I'll give you one more chance.

McClellan: [preening] I am the only person in the world who can save this country.

Finally, finally, finally Lincoln gave him one absolute last chance to prove himself, and when McClellan failed to pursue Lee's forces after the Battle of Antietam in 1862, Lincoln removed him from command.

But this guy wasn't done being a thorn in Lincoln's side.

As if the years of insult and insubordination weren't enough, McClellan became the Democratic candidate who ran against Lincoln in the 1864 presidential election. It looked a bit rough for Lincoln for a while, because people were getting tired of the war, but fortunately, the new commanders of the army had several key victories before election time that swung popular support back to Lincoln, so that McClellan only got 21 electoral votes to Lincoln's 212. (That was a particularly satisfying victory for me to hear about.)

This man is just so maddening--a proud, conceited, cowardly glory-seeker who is blind to all of his flaws. He is my new historical archnemesis.

#history is awesome #presidential talk #maltheniel #thank you for taking the bait #seward will get his own post because he deserves one #also i do have more zachary taylor facts because i've started grant's memoirs #and i highlighted every single mention of taylor #because i've adopted him as my special project now #(i don't even care all that much about him but i feel like i've got a bit of a brand going here)#(he was the first non-famous president to catch my attention and that means i'm a bit attached)

19 notes · View notes