#iterators are arthropods

[slugcatmusings]

... less serious follow-up to the last post.  Iterators are arthropods.  They have big metal exoskeletons with all the squishy bits inside, lots of eyes and legs, and have “segments” in their bodies in the form of rooms.  Thank my sister for THAT image.

#rain world #rain world iterators #rain world shitpost #not-so-serious musings #iterators are arthropods #Five Pebbles is definitely crabby enough to be one lol

[tenspontaneite]

Sigs make interesting bodies for themselves sometimes 🙏

#rain world #no significant harassment #assembly #3sig+ #this body is designed and produced substantially post assembly into the 3sig+ timeline #it's intended as a mobile bioengineering bay capable of producing neuron flies for iterators who have a shortage or who can't make their own #it has a technological version of centiwing flight and can get around very quickly #and is an effective hunter. meat fuels its mostly biological body and allows it to produce more neurons #sigs who pilot these platforms will find themselves deadlier than usual as they did a pretty good job with the body's hunting instincts #this is good because my sigs are usually ass at fighting #the body starts out the size of the largest regular centipedes but can molt and grow larger as it ages #i imagine with time they can get a good bit larger than a red centipede #this is definitely the most visually intimidating body a sig has designed so far #they usually prefer cuter or lower key forms #bug #insect #arthropod #centipede

[azul1462]

LET HER REST.

Moon was right in that yellow pearl, they's gotta let Sliver Of Straw and her name rest peacefully.

!![Gore under cut]!!

Why did I end up drawing the canonically dead character super pretty looking 😔

#rain world #iterator #sliver of straw #blood tw #horror tw #body horror tw #death tw #also i see iterator blood being a greenish yellow color like arthropods but that is something i will explain later #probs through a speculative biology post or video... eventually.

[ikayblythe]

live by the cross.

die by the cross.

alts and nerd shit under the cut! ⬇️

I was experimenting with iterator designs. Again. And settled on going full bug! Stylized anthro bugs and robots tend to look similar, so why not blend the two? Here, you can see Sliver of Straw's endoskeleton underneath her thin layer of synthetic flesh. This whole thing was just gonna be some more iterator specbio diagrams but I had Fun too.

The "endoskeleton" (though it's just an exoskeleton with skin thrown over it) is what holds the puppet's guts and all, the darker bits being more flexible parts like cartilage as opposed to full chitin.

In my rw headcanon iterator puppets and scavs come from the same group of purposed organisms ("arthrohomuncularia") that are heavily arthropod-based. Here I tried comprehending insect mouthparts and incorporating them into iterators. In iterator puppets the mouth is completely fused, forming the main faceplate. The puppets are born with large eyes on the side of the face that get surgically removed and replaced with the "headsets" and antennae they normally have. Meanwhile the three tiny ocelli have been repurposed into the main eyes (though the third is often removed—however LttM's puppet retains the third eye as decoration!) with the eyes being supported by orbital rings. Long story short, iterators are bug pugs and their production is just as unethical!

#digital art #artwork #art #rain world #artists on tumblr #digital illustration #original art #rainworld #rw #rain world fanart #rw iterator #sliver of straw #specbio #xenobiology #i guess #worldbuilding #maybe??

[vulturemimic]

"Iterators off the strings" "Disconnecting umbilical of the puppet" "Anthro iterators" are all cool concepts but I've been thinking about iterator "hatching" out of it's exterior like a fucked up arthropod, walking away from it's molt in mess of tangled wires, exposed nerve and processors.

Machine abandoned. Just jumble of flesh and divinity frolicking in the horizon.

Where is it going? What will it do? Crimes probably

#rain world #iterators #the spiritual discourse #all is well that mimic vulture #if four bebsi thinks he is a bug in a maze he should just metamorphosize and fly away

[saltycharacters]

[ID: Digital artwork featuring a collection of ocs with arthropod familiars. The 1st image is a lineup of 4 adults, including (left to right): A ducky isopod man named Tito Chen with a pompadour, sunglasses, and flashy suit, a shorter man named Dante-Enriquez Rivera with a toadbug familiar, curly hair in a bun, facial hair, and suspenders, a person named Blizzard Dunkley with a buzz-cut, agrias butterfly familiar, long blue coat, red-and-blue glasses, and large earrings, and finally a woman named Yolanda Sali with a harvestman familiar, in a nurses coat, stethoscope around her neck. Next drawing features 2 new adults, the first of which is named Maikel Miguel Patagara, who has multi-colored hair, prominent freckles, overalls and a prosthetic on their right foot, alongside a cayenne tick familiar. The second iteration of vim has eye shadows and an unhappier expression, and two prosthetic for each foot, seemingly home-made unlike the previous one. Zi is also wearing a necklace with a giant cat-eye type jewel, alongside a coat that’s on the 2nd person in the drawing - a little note mentions that this is xyr look “after Ireneo died”. Ireneo (Maria) Ressa, the 2nd person, has short grey hair, a long, fluffy coat, black cloth gloves, and some vitiligo, alongside a sowbug familiar. He's holding a notebook, pen tucked behind eir ear, and the 2nd iteration shows them without the coat. The final drawing is a doodle dump of Ireneo and Maikel mostly, showing such things as: them at a bar, Ireneo’s arm around Maikel’s shoulders as she says, “Hey me & my partner saw you from across the bar and we think your vibe sucks ass. Can we beat you up”, them kissing, Maikel at a pottery wheel while Ireneo watches, their familiars with hearts around them, and finally Maikel holding a phone up to their ear and saying, “Hey could you come pick me up they’re pelting me with rotten fruit in the town square again”. End ID]

Been thinking about my bug familiar story again

#look at my gay bugs boy #gonna get standard tags out of the way then ramble one sec #my art #ocs #tito chen #rubber ducky isopod #dante-enriquez rivera #big eyed toad bug #blizzard dunkley #agrias butterfly #yolanda sali #harvestman #prepona claudina agrias butterfly #hadrobunus grandis #Maikel Miguel Patagara #cayenne tick #Ireneo (Maria) Ressa #sowbug #i love tito x dante as much as the next guy but rn im focused on the tragic queers of the hour ie Maikel and Ireneo #the version of Maikel with his coat is after he watches Ireneo die* #with an asterisk because. :] hmmmmmmm #ireneo stuck their nose too deep into shit as an investigative reporter and paid the price #fun fact about maikel though. theyve tried almost every art/craft under the sun at least once. fav being pottery and painting. #ni tried to get ireneo into some of it but it didnt end up being for them. but he did make the cats eye jewel #Maikel also made xyrself a fursona. Obviously. its a dog. ANYWAY cant do more tags FUCK

[flickering-nightfall]

"Hey I think I'll do a little writeup on some iterator-related worldbuilding type thoughts. Let's see, loose biology, nonverbal expression, planetary weirdness, inherited and developed culture, the logistics behind puppets versus cans and severing one from the other, hey wait when did it become 4AM-"

Anyways I'm tentatively headcanoning iterators to have copper/hemocyanin-based blood. This aligns with prevalence of giant arthropods/insects, which may also all have hemocyanin. On RW's planet the oxygen levels may be elevated compared to our planet's modern atmosphere. In this essay I will-

#text #rambles

[flecks-of-stardust]

Pinned Post Eyyy

Call me a name enough times and I'll probably start responding to it, which is what happened to me with Fleck. I also go by Stardust. Pronouns are yes and whatever is funny, but as a general rule of thumb, please use neopronouns and they/them for me if I don't know you. I also use mirror pronouns.

Not a spoiler free blog. I can and will post full spoilers of the stuff I'm interested in. Most commonly blogging about Rain World (including Downpour) at the moment, with a smattering of Hollow Knight and Bug Fables stuff. You can blacklist the main tags if need be.

I may occasionally talk about politics related to my home city. If I do, it'll be tagged with #hong kong rants for blacklisting purposes.

If you talk about hating any sort of arthropod and wanting to kill them I don't want you here. I don't care if you have a phobia or if you have a legitimate reason to be afraid, I don't want to see bug hate. Yes this includes wasps, yes this includes mosquitoes, yes this includes generally unpopular bugs. I block on sight if you leave comments like that on my blog.

For those interested in getting a better look at my header image, here is the associated post!

Current main project(s)

I run @innocence-wont-save-you, an interactive fiction game about Unparalleled Innocence! You can find more information about it on that blog and its pinned post.

I sometimes post IWSY stuff on this blog as well, particularly stuff that is not in character for the IWSY blog. Those posts are tagged with #IWSY, which also includes posts that I find relevant to the overall story. I love talking about the story and the worldbuilding I've done for it, so feel free to talk to me about that! I will gently nudge you over to the blog itself though, because it's designed to take questions like that!

I am also conducting independent research on people's experiences with imaginary friends. If you'd like to participate in the research, this post has more information and a link to the survey.

Other projects

You may have seen me talk about Dreamless and Deathless on this blog before. Those are now split off from their respective source material into an original story universe, Godslayers. Their respective tags, #dreamless au and #deathless au, now serve as archiving, if you'd still like to look through them for whatever reason. They are not linked because I'm unsure of how much I'm comfortable sharing; expect posts in there to be pruned.

I have some stuff related to my Hollow Knight work that I am comfortable sharing, though!:

bug color vision, specifically worldbuilding around non-human color vision that you can use for your buggy writing

language analysis of hollow knight, which is what it says on the tin

and there is #translation complaints, a series I started to talk about Hollow Knight's Chinese translation. It's been a while since I've updated this, but I will go back to it eventually.

Crochet Patterns

I currently have two released crochet patterns! All are free to use, and if you make one with my pattern, feel free to tag me to show me what you've made!

Mini Iterators — Make your own fun sized iterator puppet! (Cloak not included.)

Tiny Slugcats — Make your own pocket sized slugcat!

Tag directory

I crochet and knit a lot, as you may be able to tell from my header! I have dedicated tags for my crochet and knitting projects, which are #crochet shenanigans and #knit mischief respectively.

I have a general tag for my art, #my art, for non-fiber art pieces as well.

Writing wise, I've put a lot of my writing on Tumblr. Rain World pieces use the tag #rain showers, and other writing (usually prose) is tagged #little natterings. Additionally, I've put a few multi-chapter stories on my blog, which are:

#the echo of destruction, a series of seven stories about the iterators.

#avengeance, a four chapter short story about Arti.

#lunar greetings, a five chapter story about Moon and those she meets.

#memory fragments, a series that features the various members of Survivor and Monk's family. This is currently still being written.

All of these stories can also be found on AO3, where I use the same username.

I'm very lazy about following people, so if I talk to you a lot but haven't followed you, don't take it personally. I just like to keep my dash tidy.

For my own use: Pup Masterlist

#this wasn't as bad as i thought it'd be

[cubicpeebles]

Tried out drawing in the Rain World art style, and made a selection screen for my new OC, The Luminous!

A little bit of lore for them: Their campaign takes place between Monk and Rivulet's. What eventually became the constant rain that threatens Rivulet began as a dense fog, which is what The Luminous deals with during their journey. Because of the increased darkness, Spiders (of all types), Centipedes, and other creatures from Shaded Citadel and Subterranean are far more common, being found in many other regions (Mushrooms and Spore Pods grow more as well). The Luminous deals with the increased darkness via bioluminescence, which also has the added benefit of attracting Batflies and baby Centipedes (their prey is any kind of arthropod. Batflies, Centipedes, Dropwigs, etc.). The downside is that it attracts predators as well (even making Centipedes see them when they are standing still). They are slightly faster crawling through pipes, and they'd have the ability to make rubbish into flashbangs using one food pip (the same way Artificer does). I haven't thought much about the story (or what's going on with the Iterators).

#rain world #rain world art #rain world fanart #slugcat #slugcat oc #rain world oc #I'm so happy with how it turned out!

[sunsetrains]

Drawing of my boi Sun on Mountain High!

An old iterator who lives below his half of a unified superstructure, as it’s broken down lizards and other creatures have taken refuge. He finds the lizards pleasant but arachnids and arthropods not so much.

#rain world #rainworld #oc #iterator

[lotitheism]

ARTHROPODA AU MASTERPOST

there's not much yet/this masterpost is a slight wip but i figured i'd make this both as a checklist or myself & a way to see what is upcoming depending on asks sitting in my askbox!

first thing's first:

trigger warnings/eventual triggers for this AU:

pretty much everything under the arthropod family (obviously), but occasionally drawn in full detail.

miscommunication/refusal to communicate properly

tentatively laying down suicidal tendencies, and ideation.

tags

arthropoda au tag (chronological tag) <- contains everything related to the arthropoda au

arthropoda au comics (chronological tag) <- every comic (official or otherwise) related to the arthropoda au

arthropoda au art (chronological tag) <- every art piece (official or otherwise) related to the arthropoda au

reference work

iterators (+ scug concepts) - iterator individuals - slugcats

species choice explanation (text) - arthropoda relationships (post lttm collapse, drawn + text)

official comic

CHAPTER ONE: MAINTENANCE OF REGARDS episode one: our thoughts will follow you (wip) episode two: prayer of significance (wip)

#arthropoda au

[afterglow-of-a-star]

Oh hey there! What’s the area around your can like?

AoaS: Hello! I would love to tell you about it!

AoaS: The majority of it is comprised of sprawling fields, with old, decayed buildings strewn about. The biodiversity is astounding! So many forms of flora and fauna, that it can be hard to keep track of all of them! I think the most impressive of them all would have to be the Rain Deer. The way they stride over the buildings with ease is incredible!

AoaS: Much of the plant life is a deep shade of red. I've yet to pinpoint the exact reasoning for it, but I'm too intrigued to simply ignore it! There is an abundance of fungi as well. The Rain Deer seem to enjoy eating a particular variety of it.

AoaS: Small marshes are scattered throughout the area, which likewise house many forms of life. The leeches there are frightful, to say the least. Watching them pull their prey under the murky water is difficult to watch. The salamanders do not seem to mind the leeches, though. I find them very beautiful, so I'm happy that they are spared from such a horrid fate...

AoaS: The subterranean ecosystem is lively as well. I can't say I enjoy some of the arthropods there, though. Especially the spiders... I can appreciate them from afar, but the thought of one scuttling within my can unnerves me greatly. At least the centipedes are pleasant.

AoaS: I suppose I should mention my can itself. I have become my very own ecosystem! My construction was cut short, as my creators departed before they could finish. This has caused problems, of course, but more importantly it has fostered the growth of plants within my can, and allowed creatures to enter it! It is very helpful for research, and allows an entirely new experiment to take place, one that I did not even need to prepare myself! How will the behaviour of wildlife be affected if living within an Iterator's can?

AoaS: Truly, I feel somewhat lucky. Sure, I may have to deal with some extra trouble by having my can like this, but having such a marvelous opportunity for my research makes it all worthwhile!

AoaS: I would be curious to hear about how things are where you are located as well, if you do not mind! I haven't been able to see much of the land outside of the limited range of my Overseer, so I'd love to learn about it!

#iterator oc #rain world oc

[snoligostranssexual]

making a bunch of druid subclasses :3 because the default ones fucking SUCK ASS :3 theyre so boring and i hate them :3 they don't iterate or allow for unique modes of play at all :3 So here are my ideas Circle of Love and Justice Circle of the Swarm (formerly Circle of the Reef) Waykeeper (now a background, previously the Circle of the Road) Circle of the Arthropod Circle of the Cauldron Circle of the Air Circle of the Shade Circle of the Deep Circle of Mycorrhiza Circle of Bark its very likely ill change these and more likely that i just wont do some because im very bad at doing things.

will update if any of these get done

heres the rough draft of Circle of Love and Justice, completed about 10 hours after this original post: https://www.tumblr.com/snoligostranssexual/716796362440753152/heres-what-ive-got-on-circle-of-love-and?source=share and heres the similarly rough draft for the Circle of the Swarm that i forgot to post until just now lol: https://www.tumblr.com/snoligostranssexual/717681370481229824/and-heres-the-circle-of-the-swarm-previously?source=share

update on waykeeper/circle of the road (I’ll put the actual background here once I’ve made it in the morning and I have a reference for the layout of a background in front of me. Goodnight to anyone seeing this.): https://www.tumblr.com/snoligostranssexual/717802068424949760/im-replacing-circle-of-the-road-with-a?source=share

#snoligostranssexual #dungeons and dragons #dnd #d&d #5e #d&d homebrew

[deceitful-garden]

CHARACTER MASTER POST:

SIU:

A large, 'fluffy' slugcat, poleplant hybrid, with many tendrils, with 8 long ones on their back, their fur consisting of many small tendrils. Their diet is exclusively carnivorous in nature.

Pronouns: She/Her/They (identifies as a gal)

Personality: Bold, and somewhat sassy, a bit of a jokester, but also harsh to those they dislike. While also caring deeply for those she considers friends.

Abilities: Can climb on just about anything as long as it isn't too slick. Can grapple and suffocate medium-small sized creatures, and attempt to use tendrils to escape the jaws of a predator. Can camouflage her tail to resemble a pole, as well as oddly enough, the ability to hide out in dens, though they don't close for her, so she still has to find a shelter. However due to the stickiness of their tendrils that allows her to climb, she is unable to throw things, only thrust them.

Affiliations: They were made by NSH to act as his sorting algorithm, friend, and organizer, however she left when noticing hunter, her big sibling, was infected with some kind of plant. She has not met Lumi, or Sushi.

Text Color:

GREEN

Speck:

A medium sized slugcat with a ribbon on their neck. While physically pretty weak, they're smart enough to pilot a drone with mounted guns.

Pronouns: they/them

Personality: taking after both of their main iterators, they're vigilant, self-reliant, caring and defencive. Can act a bit cold and calculated at times, but always swoops in to help ones in trouble.

Abilities: Drone piloting, can move through air and scavenge the land, aswell as use the drone as a shelter from the rain in the lack of other options. They also can fire from their guns, but the ammunition supply is limited and needs to be refilled every now and again. Out of the drone they're fairly quick, but can't deal much damage.

Affiliations: Has connections to the entirety of the L0RE G4RDEN local group, mainly GCF (as their mentor) and RCS (as their best friend). In fact GCF was the one who sent them on the mission to figure out what this "Blooming Rot" is. Out of the three here, Speck only met SIU.

Text color :

BLUE

Sushi:

A small, sleek slugcat with webbed feet, fins, and frills. It is heavily aquatic and doesn't fare well on land, its speed being significantly lowered when having to walk. It can hold its breath much longer than others.

Pronouns: It/it (Hermaphrodite)

Personality: Carefree and silly, this slugcat mirrors the personality of its creator who is located deep under the sea. It doesn't know much about the surface and thus, isn't very cautious about things, seeing the surface as a cakewalk compared to the depths below. Within the water Sushi is a slick and graceful little slugcat who can easily escape predators, but on land it is clumsy and slow.

Abilities: Larger lungs, it can hold its breath for hours. Its coat is always wet and slimy, so it can slide through tight spaces. It is incredibly fast underwater, but as a result, is slower on land. Its throws are weak due to items simply slipping out of their hands.

Affiliations: Created and modified by [MISSING DATA] as her messenger and friend, comes from the deepest depth of the sea with a pearl, it searches for another iterator to deliver it to.

Text Color:

PINK

Lumi:

A small, scruffy Slugcat with unique glowing lanterns on its tail and antennae. It exclusively hunts a diet of arthropods, though it can also eat fruit.

Pronouns: They/It/She (genderless).

Personality: Very skittish and shy. They dislike being touched, and they get startled easily (unless they feel safe where they are).

Abilities: Bioluminescence which can be brightened or dimmed, Waterproof fur, Slight webbing between the front limbs, and the ability to flash the lanterns to disorient predators (like a flashfruit).

Affiliations: They were modified by an unknown Iterator, though they have no recollection of them. They haven't met the other Slugcats yet.

Text Color:

PURPLE

#SIU #Bloom au #rain world #Speck #Sushi #Lumi #NSH

[ikayblythe]

Scavenger Study

taken me too long to figure out how i wanna draw these guys but im in the scavs are fuzzy bugs camp!

in my canon i also speculate they are somewhat related to iterator puppets, both being humanoid arthropod GMOs.

Now im gonna go finally enjoy downpour on switch

#digital art #artwork #rain world #art #artists on tumblr #rainworld #digital illustration #original art #rain world fanart #rw #rain world art #rw scavenger #speculative biology #spec bio

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

Godspeed you, good aliens

Many of the latest installments were procedural notes. The investigators had begun their investigation. They had completed their investigation. After work, she had gone to a show with people. She had gone with them to eat after the show. They had talked about work and stories and movies and feelings and aspirations and ideas.

Then she had gone home. And she had done the thing.

This was an iteration of the thing she did after every show. What if they did not understand it? What if they noticed? What if they asked about it? And what if they did, and then what if they hated her for it? What then?

And then she had gone to bed.

She rolled over and reached for the clock on her bedside table.

It was reading 8:10. She felt a wave of relief. The thing had gone fine.

Somewhere in the future, it had gone terribly.

She had broken out of the habit of calling her future self "Val." It was too easy to do so. It was disrespectful, in a sense.

At the time, she had had no way of knowing the magnitude of this prescient habit. She had been asleep, or about to go to sleep, or about to get up and leave. Some of these predicates had been true and some had been false.

She read the clock and closed her eyes. There were often surprising things in dreams. This had been a dreamless night, though.

She made up for this by thinking about an intricate alternate-universe story she had made up, in which not everything was the same but many things were, and the things that were not, had been. It was important that this thing happen. So she lay awake in bed, and thought about that story. The story's events were too subtle and unexpected to be likely in reality, but she had already learned the limits of her own narrative power.

She had started with a minor perturbation. And then she had told Val, on the pages that had not been her own, in the words that were not hers, a story about that perturbation that had swelled, over the course of centuries and millennia, into something incredible.

A story about herself and her life, and about the lives of her friends, the lives of her friends' friends, everything that came after them, the many-armed, many-tentacled arthropod force of narrative persuasion,

And the story's climax was the author's correction of that minor perturbation.

She did not know how it ended. She did not even know which version of herself she was going to go on to read. There were many visions of Val, in many universes.

There was one, though.

It was the version in which this thing went fine. She had been right -- that it was safe to do this, that it would work. She had not told a lie, and she had not painted herself into a corner from which there was no escape.

She had good friends, in a world with a fairly reliable narrative function. People had helped her, and she owed them something. And if they were willing to help, and if she were willing to ask . . .

It had gone fine. It had always gone fine, all of the times it had happened. There were many times it had happened.

She pushed away from her bedside table and got out of bed. It was 8:32 now. She would go to the kitchen and microwave an instant oatmeal packet, so it would be 8:40 when she finished eating.

She lived in an apartment in upstate New York. She lived there with someone else, but she did not care about it. She liked it, but it was not very important.

She dressed in the clothes that had been in the bag on her floor last night, and went into the kitchen. Her kitchen had a window with a view to the street, which was quiet. There were cars and bicycles and people, but never anything unpleasant or upsetting. She knew this.

She knew a lot of things. She was scared, but she also felt a kind of settled calm, the calm that comes from having done one's duty, of having become accustomed to the thing. There were a few more things she had to do, before she went back to sleep and did not wake up. And she knew she was going to be OK. She knew everything was going to be OK. She had lived in one world, but she now lived in many worlds.

She was going to eat some oatmeal, and then go to the living room and look at the mail.

There were always letters for Val. Many of them were letters for her, too. She was the address.

She could not understand some of the letters. She had read all of them. She was in the habit of talking about them. But some of the letters had a strange flavor. Some of them left her with a physical sensation that was like cold, like the inside of a cold metal box. She talked to her friends about them.

They were all like this. She did not understand them.

She did not trust her friends to understand them either.

There was one letter, though, which was different. It was the only one she did not talk about. And it was the only one she understood, and the only one she wanted to understand.

Another day would come, in a version of reality where nothing changed,