#it’s to be expected that they would apply morality to the gods when dnd has a morality system yk

[j-esbian]

i feel like there is so much to be said about drizzt do’urden’s religious views and how he’s a stand-in for culturally christian atheists. he grew up in a corrupt religious society and has religious trauma, so as a result he views all religion as bad. at first it seems like he’s going to have a “pagan finds jesus” story but he eventually rejects mielikki too, and imo, it always felt out of character that he followed her in the first place so i wasn’t surprised when he changed his mind. he was looking for a name to label his preexisting system of ideals, which feels very much like christians who claim “all that matters is that you live by the bible and live in a godly manner”. many religions are about teachings and traditions as much as they are about “just being a good person and following god’s vibes” (which i feel like is INCREDIBLY standard in american protestantism)

i think a lot of it comes down to the fact that the forgotten realms (and a lot of fantasy tbh) treats the gods as just Very Powerful People instead of the forces of nature personified (and again this is to be expected from a christian culture, where jesus was Just A Guy)

#ik i don’t really post about dnd lore bc most of it sucks ass and i prefer to ignore it lmao #only a very large sum of money could get me to reread those books tho lmao #it’s to be expected that they would apply morality to the gods when dnd has a morality system yk #it doesn’t work imo. but the way they approach religion feels like it was written by someone who is not religious and doesn’t rly understand #it’s the latent catholicism talking but religions aren’t synonymous with moral systems #it’s ethical guidance for sure but more than that #it’s belief AND practice AND also faith that you can’t know everything #the latter is kind of off the table in a world where the gods tangibly exist bc then it just becomes #‘the king is so powerful and better than you and has many secrets that he keeps for your protection’ #in this type of religious system it makes all clerics seem like sycophants or fools #and yet we also have drizzt who says the gods and their worship are pointless #(which is why i never really bought that he was bought into mielikki) #if you want to make a criticism about systems of power. most fantasy still has kings and queens #been thinkin about drizzt and the drow a lot lately after one of my side moots and i were talking lol #and just how. utterly garbage the official lore is. from all aspects #mine #dnd

[your-turn-to-role]

ayyyyy happy 4/13 have my second list of classpects, vox machina edition! (@lostsometime to add to the homestuck au)

(m9 here)

vex - thief of mind

vax - rogue of blood

percy - witch of light

keyleth - page of breath

scanlan - thief of life

grog - prince of rage

pike - heir of space

tary - witch of mind

first off, there are a couple copies here, and they don’t have a time player, so vox machina on their own could not win the game. but hey, weird plot shit exists, and the alpha kids managed it by combining their session with the beta kids, so who knows how this would go

(explanations under the cut)

1) vex - thief of mind

vex has a lot of ideas about her sense of self. but when you get right down to it, none of them are actually about her sense of self, and rather about how people see her. image is important to mind players, but it’s not really linked with identity. in fact, the canon description of mind players states they have very fluid, shifting concepts of identity, it’s far more important to them that they remain rational and have a logical line of reasoning than sticking to things just because they feel right or wrong. and i think this is very true for vex, she doesn’t often doubt herself, but she doesn’t really know who she is, beyond just what she’s trying to emulate or avoid.

thief bc she’s still one of the stealth twins, it is very her thing, but she’s definitely the louder of the two, the thief demands to be known, the rogue quietly assists. she’s headstrong, stubborn, and the world owes her everything it’s taken from her, which she definitely plans to steal back. and honestly that’s her right and i love her.

2) vax - rogue of blood

god i really love the fact that the twins are a thief/rogue pair, it not only fits who they are as people but vex being the active version of vax’s passive class and vice versa fits so well

(also fun fact, i have something of a personality test/checklist i grade characters on when i’m struggling to figure out their class or feel like i’m being biased towards one particular classpect. there’s 15 possible points per class, most characters will get a highest score of maybe 9 or 10, homestuck characters get something like 12-13. vax, however, does what no one else has ever done, and scored all 15 points in rogue. he is more rogue per rogue than any rogue in homestuck. 100% pure distilled rogue boy.)

personality quizzes aside though, he really is so obviously a rogue. he’s got everything of the thief archetype built into his entire character, but while a homestuck thief steals by their own will and for their own benefit, all of the rogue’s same actions go towards supporting their friends. also, as a passive class, their decisions tend to be less personal drive based and more guided by their aspect, as if the universe was working through them, which is definitely the case for our champion of the raven queen. they’ve been described in canon as the robin hood class, rebellious, but in an altruistic way. true punk. fuck the system, love recklessly

blood players need a family. they draw their strength from the bonds they have with those around them, they’re stubborn as all hell, especially when it seems like there’s no way out of a situation, but it’s in determination to protect their chosen family and keep everyone safe and happy. if they’re leaders, they’re inspirational ones rather than commanding ones. and this is “dramatic speeches about teamwork and morality” vax, “what the fuck do we have in this world except for moments with each other” vax, “how lucky i have been to have had all of you” vax. what else could he be?

3) percy - witch of light

so percy’s an interesting one, because i kinda wanna give him two classpects? like, if you classpect percy before or during the briarwood arc, he’s a prince of light. after that, he becomes way more of a witch. (though, to be fair, light players and witches are both incredibly prone to getting possessed, so, maybe he was a witch all along and just acted really prince-y)

he’s definitely an active class, no doubt about it. percy will fight gods to achieve his own ends. prince, being the most active class, and one designed to cause destruction, definitely suits orthax percy. but then things change, and you realise what he actually is

witches are manipulator classes, like knights, but active manipulator classes. they can’t create things out of nothing like some classes do, but instead bend and twist and transform their aspect (and the world around them, using their aspect) to achieve their goals. percy’s human, and not magic. he doesn’t have any particular special abilities in order to do things, he gets by on ingenuity and reckless bravery. that post that was going around a while ago about how all of vox machina are basically gods and percy’s just a guy with a gun does well to prove the point here, because he keeps up anyway. he’s made mistakes and there are things in the world now that he can’t change, but he does his best to work within those constraints and make as good of a world as he can with what he has

and what he has, usually, is knowledge. which is the main dominion of the light aspect, along with luck (and, you know, taliesin and dice rolling). light players are scholars first and foremost, but very rarely bookish scholars, instead the kind of scholars that think they can make a demon deal and get away with it because they’re clever enough for that, and also they’re extra enough that they’d do it anyway for the aesthetic

4) keyleth - page of breath

this was the easiest of all of these for me to do, it just slots so neatly into place. pages are a slow moving class that have to work their way around all the side quests before they get a lot of their power, but after that they’re powerhouses. they’re easily underestimated, by others and by themselves. keyleth takes a while to come to terms with herself and her power and her effect on the world, most of the plot takes place within her slowly completing her aramente, she often worries she won’t be good enough for anything that’s expected of her, but once she hits level 20 she is a master of the elements, a true leader of her people, and literally unkillable.

breath fits for two reasons. the first is being the aspect of freedom, of acting without being controlled by anyone else’s thoughts or decisions. and keyleth, for all her anxiety and all her bad luck, has never made a choice she didn’t agree with. along with vax she’s the first to speak up when she feels like the group’s moral choices aren’t holding up to her standards, when they’re moving in a direction that isn’t right. the second is that it’s the aspect of air, and the wind, and she’s literally the leader of the air ashari. she can and does in fact do the windy thing

5) scanlan - thief of life

we’ve covered life already in my nott/veth explanation, but it really is so scanlan. look at this excerpt and tell me it’s not written for scanlan shorthalt

[If you're poisoned, chances are the Life-bound have something for what ails ya. This applies to both physical and mental suffering, though it might not be a cure you'll like. They also have the tendency to put other's needs before their own, which never ends well for anyone, because the Life-bound can grow bitter if they feel their own self-care has had to be shunted aside.]

figuring out class was harder? a lot of vox machina classes are pretty difficult to figure out. prince would work to an extent because of scanlan’s self destructive tendencies, bard would work to an extent because he often feels like things are out of his hands, but i think i’m going with thief. scanlan’s more of an active class, despite playing support in dnd, he’s very self motivated and not one to listen much to the guidance of the universe. thief i feel fits with the headstrong attitude, the creative out of the box thinking, and the need for attention in a very specific way (less so having people celebrate you, scanlan enjoys that but can easily shrug it off if it doesn’t happen, it’s more causing things for the sake of knowing and having other people know that you caused them)

6) grog - prince of rage

honestly this is the one i’d be most willing to bend on? it, took me forever to come up with any kind of classpect for grog, he seems to resist being classpected. i know a lot about him as a person, but translating that into either class or aspect was just hard. but i’ve gone with prince because grog’s never stopped for anyone (except maybe pike), because it’s a destruction based class, because it’s the most active on the scale, and grog is definitely one to go do things purely because he wants to do things and wants to do them now.

rage because rage players are about truth at all costs, even if that cost is often destabilizing entire systems and leaving the rubble to pick itself back up. and it makes me think about how grog has never really wanted to disguise himself, and especially about just before the kevdak fight - he knew he would probably get killed if he went back there as himself, but he refused to go in under false pretenses, because that wouldn’t be right

7) pike - heir of space

ashley’s just always drawn to those heirs. i think though with pike it definitely is a consequence of her being in and out a lot, because she’s not just an heir, she’s an heir of space.

heirs tend to stumble into their role rather than creating it or seeking it out. on a meta level, ashley only created pike because the team needed a cleric and she worked it out from there, but as far as pike herself is concerned, she doesn’t really know what she’s supposed to be doing or what her purpose is, but she’s been trying to do her best to follow sarenrae’s teachings, trying to do her best to guide her friends, and hoping that nothing goes wrong along the way.

space, too, is an aspect of patience. it’s about valuing the journey more than the destination, it’s about seeing what the universe has in store for you and trusting that it’s just as likely to turn out good as it is bad - you��ll know when the time comes to step in, at which point space players are pretty fierce fighters. but for now, for pike, it’s trying to help her friends one step at a time

8) tary - witch of mind

tary is like percy but cheating. he has a lot more resources to work with bc he just goes out and buys shit. but the witch reasoning still stands, they are very similar people in that respect, good at working within a set of restraints so well you don’t even notice the restraints are there

mind rather than light because, tary doesn’t quite hunger after knowledge in the same way. instead he’s much more concerned with the application of it, of how to get from point a to point b as efficiently as possible, and how that benefits him. (also because he’s not nearly as extra as light players. have you met light players? like i love them but jesus christ. who let them be Like That)

#i also have essek and gilmore classpected #but i only have so much writing energy in a day #so we're spacing these out #cr1 #cr thoughts #text #meta #homestuck #classpects #vax'ildan #vex'ahlia #percy de rolo #keyleth #pike trickfoot #scanlan shorthalt #grog strongjaw #taryon darrington

[koszmar-zycie]

All of the fun, random questions! Do it!

Oh lawdy! To quote Ace Ventura: “Aaaaaalrighty, then!” - Apologies for the janky post, since I can’t space them without the site making the numbers all screwy.

Do you have any “yeah I’m good at it but I hate it” kind of skills? - hmmmm. To be honest, leading. If you buy into horoscopes, I’m a Dragon. And maybe it’s natural, maybe it’s theatre experience. But when I apply myself as a leader, I do AMAZING. The issue is that I generally like to be a support. Sometimes I like leading, but usually I’m not into the idea of being this focus or figurehead guiding the way as the leader. Whether projects or even fun, I tend to fall into a like... intermediate leadership role at best. 

If you could make one type of food cease to exist, what would you banish? - To be honest, I can’t do that. Even foods I’m not fond of are foods, and I would be remised if I were to remove any.  

You’re allowed to know everything about one highly specific thing/topic. What would you choose? - Deep sea thermal based biology. The deep sea is my 100% very favorite place on Earth. If I die and there’s an afterlife, I want endless ocean of all kinds. If I’m reincarnated, I want to be a Dragonfish or something. At any rate, I would do anything to have such a wealth of knowledge. Especially about something as fascinating to me as the ins and out of how the deep sea creatures that survive and thrive around the *extreme* heat and pressure of the vents. 

What’s a fictional character who you want to be like? In what way do you want to be like them? - I would love to be like Nathan Ford from Leverage. I want to be able to live my life as freely and wildly as he (though maybe not as illegally lol), and also pursue what I feel is right for me. Live through and persevere through hardship as well as he, even if he struggled.

If you had to live in and not leave a city for the rest of your life, what city would you choose? - That would be a VERY hard call between Avalon on Catalina Island USA, or Sedona, Arizona. While Sedona overall has more of what I love, Avalon has the sea. And I’d probably die without my ocean. 

Do you tend to say what you’re thinking? What would people think of you if you did the opposite?  - Usually, yes. But in a careful way. It WILL happen periodically, because I’m also an emotional hunk of waste. But in general I do a decent enough job of being honest without being harsh about it. When I’m provoked or something really gets to me, then I can just vent without thinking.

Is there anything that you’ve done/experienced so much you hate it now? Easiest to come up with are like, food or music. - Hmmm. Not really. Halloween got SEVERELY killed for me, though. I still like it, but Haunt people are by and large the most obnoxious and hypocritical. Since I adore haunt, I HAVE to deal with them. Hatred for Christmas and other holidays while spouting about Halloween has drained my interest in Halloween. So yes an no, because that’s really OTHER people killing it for me. But I’m also sort of involved because of my love of the haunt business.

Were you afraid of anything “silly”/irrational as a child that you’ve since outgrown? - Deep water. As a kid I HATED the deep end of pools. Now I’m obsessed with deep water and the dark, unknown, crushing depths. Funny how things work out! I used to hate going near the slope in a pool if it was even a little dark (lighted pools were fine). Now, the only thing stopping me from just continuing to swim down if I go diving is my tank limits.

If you were to impart one moral lesson (think Aesop’s fables, Golden Rule, etc) on the world, what would it be? - Treat others as you wish to be treated. It’s SO easy to say, and yet nobody does it. 

If you were a DND character or a game character (or something like that) what would your highest stat be? What would you want your highest stat to be? What about the lowest, to both of those? - HA. I think about this way too much. I’d be a sea elf druid. STR 10 INT 12 CHA 16 DEX 12 END 18 WIS 18 - If I were to apply myself logically as an analog of myself, I’d have good durability and understanding and social capability (again, in specific regards), but my outward strength and dex would be kinda average. I like to think that I’m decently intelligent, as I LOVE books, learning, and figuring things out. But I’m also far from genius. Hence my focus on Wisdom. I’m also surprisingly dexterous, but in certain circumstances more than others, so that’s also pretty average. I don’t think I’ve really have any “bad” stats, but I’d definitely mix average with a couple high ones.

Is there anything you judge others for when you probably shouldn’t? - Probably. I have a huge mistake of expecting others to be courteous and offer a common decency/open perspective on things.

Who are “your kind” of people? - Goths and hippies, my friend. If you want to know my style? Goth Druid. lol 

If you had to come up with your last words right now… what would they be? - “Don’t regret not accomplishing what you set out to accomplish. Regret having not tried. I do not regret trying, even if I did not succeed.”

Do you have any “weirdly strong” opinions about things that don’t really matter? - This is VERY obscure (I have others, but it’s late and this came to mind first) But if you play Fate Grand Order.... SET YOUR GOD DAMNED SUPPORTS.

Your goal is to completely confuse the people around you in as short a time as possible– what do you say/do? - Honestly, just start quoting Lorne from Season 5 of Angel. Or act like a Malkavian. One of my VTM characters was a Malkavian who got in a fight with a parachute he had. Her name was Kitten.

What’s the most comfy place you’ve been in? - I don’t know, actually. Maybe the Luxe Hotel in LA during Anime Expo?

Did you have any “silly” beliefs as a kid? Where did they come from (parents, friends, out of nowhere, etc)? - Not that I know of. At least in terms of anything that’d have changed or something. I’m sure there’s Something, but I honestly can’t dig anything up in my memories.

If you were to add or remove one physical feature to yourself… what would it be? Can be from animals, can be from imagination… whatever. - Hahaha, I ALWAYS think about this one. Right now, I’d want maybe the electro-vision of sharks. 

What could you happily give a two hour lecture on? - Ocean conservation, and what’s correct and what isn’t.

What would a mirror opposite version of yourself be like? It doesn’t necessarily have to be an evil version– any feature can be reflected! - Someone who’s mostly optimistic. More bright colors than dark, short hair. Focused on socializing and extroverted. More than happy in one place forever, without an interest in travel. 

What’s an occasion you’ve done a double take? - Anime Expo a number of times. Seeing weird or unexpected, or legendary cosplays. 

If you could only see one color (and its varying shades– dark/light) for the rest of your life… what would you choose? - Blue. Guess that was probably obvious. But it’s a cool color and associated with calming. Between dark midnight and navy blues to vibrant aquamarines pressing towards green (without actually going into it), I feel like there’s a happy spectrum of all kinds that would be enough to get through without going too crazy.

Do your friends all share certain qualities? Major or minor! - Despite my.... unique personality, and preference towards quiet etc (INFJ), I have a lot of radically different kinds of friends. I honestly don’t think I could put any one thing down. Other than that I choose my friends carefully on who I think I can trust and is a good persona at heart. To a sufficient degree anyway. That’s also a huge part of my downsides, too. By being sensitive (and having certain conditions), when a friend does something that hurts me, it REALLY hurts.

How do you motivate yourself to do things? - Oh man, that’s funny. It is entirely circumstantial. As an artist/writer/creative (I use artist in the broad sense, but I figured I’d add that to help specify) I can VERY easily just have motivation on a moments notice. So it’s often pretty random. But if not, I jut need to think of why. I Looooooove gardening. Weeds need pulling? I think about what’ll happen if the roses or tomatos or lemon tree don’t get their water because of weeds sucking it up. Need to write? I’ll never leave my creation for *any*one if I don’t at least crack down on notes, and make slow and steady progress if nothing else. It’s usually just a small thing I think of to act as a spark, but it’s usually very effective.

What’s one of your favorite jokes? Tell it to us!  - Okay, so this isn’t a joke, but it’s seriously STILL making me laugh just thinking about it. I was going to reference an old comedian in a previous post (I didn’t end up doing it, but still). Anyway, I was really confused as to why I couldn’t find him in google. It turns out, instead of looking up “Groucho Marx”, I was googling “Marco Grouch”. LOL That’s probably not quite as funny to y’all, but for some reason it’s killing me. XD

Hooooooeeee! Well, that was long, but actually really fun! Thank you @scatteredstoryteller! That was like... an essay. lol But definitely fun. I love asks. XD