Rigel (n) : awesomesaucery

The more they release about the upcoming fourth campaign of Critical Role, the more excited I am for it to start. CR3 was very much dragging for me by the end, mainly because it felt almost as if it was more a sequel to CR1 and CR2 with the CR3 characters taking the back burner at times. There's a reason that I don't, for example, like the big crossover events that Marvel and DC like to do, and that's what it reminded me of for the last six months or so of the campaign.

Everything I'm seeing about CR4, though, has me optimistic that the fresh start in a brand new world it's promising will be a good thing. I can't wait to actually meet the characters and see how many of them I properly mesh well with.

In tonight's game, ( the rest under a cut for those who don't care. )

And that's where we left off.

I wanted to take a minute to type up my plans for the weekend while I'm thinking about it. I'll probably type up a proper to-do list sometime tomorrow (well, I suppose it's technically today at this point) so that I can mark things off as I do them, but I thought it would help to at least come up with a summary of sorts.

( More under the cut. )

In general? I'm really hoping that Monday will mark a new beginning of sorts. That's the plan, as long as the universe cooperates. 🤞🏻

Life has been exhausting even without all of the stuff going on in the US in general, and I'm just so fucking tired. I need a new beginning, even if "autumn is finally here" is a relatively arbitrary one.

So, yes, I posted my usual summary last night, but the events of the game itself deserve their own post.

( More about the utter chaos of extremely lucky wild magic rolls under the cut. )

In tonight's game, ( the rest under a cut for those who don't care. )

And that's where we left off.

Two fandom-related posts in a row? Really? I can't even remember the last time that happened.

Critical Role has its fourth campaign starting in just over two weeks, and they posted the first artwork of the new characters earlier this week. They haven't released any other details like classes and such, but I'm very, very, very curious about several of them. Especially since they posted a video earlier today about character vibes, some of which sound kinda amazing.

The fandom is definitely ramping up again, which is helping with forcing my brain to get through watching as many of the specials that I've missed as I can before CR4 starts. I've missed having a proper weekly fandom, and I really want to try to get back in the habit of napping after work on Thursdays so that I can stay up late watching the new episodes live.

Yuletide nominations are officially open, which means I have to get my ass in gear and actually figure out what I want to request and nominate this year.

A couple of my usual requests are almost always nominated by other people, so I can hopefully scratch those off the list. That doesn't help narrow it down a lot, though, because I've written down a frankly ridiculous number of fandoms this year that I've been considering requesting.

Right now, I'm leaning towards the following for my nominations:

Black Ships - Jo Graham OR Hand of Isis - Jo Graham OR Stealing Fire - Jo Graham
Home Alone (Movies) (mainly because of this post)
Hornblower (TV)
Peacemakers (2003)
The Witch Wolf (Webcomic)

My other requests will depend on what does or doesn't get nominated, but some of my ideas for fandoms that tend to show up in the tag set regularly are:

Gargoyles (Cartoon)
Jurassic Park Original Trilogy (Movies)
Justice League International
The Martian (2015)
The Scarlet Pimpernel (1982)
Titanic (1997)
Treasure Planet

Of course, there's always a chance that I'll see something in the tag set that I wasn't expecting that calls to me. That's definitely happened before, and it'll probably happen again.

For anyone who may be Dark Souls-curious, here is a very long video essay of which I've only watched part (because I'm trying to limit spoilers) and of which I mainly want to rec part -- the first 30 mins or so, where the essayist discusses something that the mythology about the game’s supposed uber-difficulty tends to obscure, namely the gorgeous, generous array of different tools and options that it gives you for engaging with its difficulties, and how it tries to teach you to use them:



I think this is some of the stuff that prompted me to declaim “Dark Souls loves me and wants me to be happy.”

The game is difficult, it is intended to be difficult (and I still don't know if, for me, it will at some point be insuperably difficult), and progressing and learning through difficulty and failure is the core gameplay loop. As mentioned, it took me a total of seven hours to beat the most recent boss, the Capra Demon. I am currently camped out in the Depths, where I intermittently fall through holes and get cursed by basilisks. I recently got invaded for the first time, by a player who watched as I ran directly under a slime and got enveloped, facepalmed*, and then waited politely while I extricated myself before murdering me**.

And yet my major feeling at this particular moment is of being spoiled (in the pampered sense, not the knowledge sense): I have too many good weapons to try (my beloved halberd, now upgraded to +7, a Balder Side Sword -- a rare and coveted drop -- and a Black Knight Sword)! I'm having to actively try not to over-level! I have so many upgrade materials! I have the world's largest stockpile of charcoal pine resin (purchased on my endless boss runs back to the Capra Demon, so I'd spend any souls I was carrying and not distract myself with losing or trying to retrieve them) so I can make my weapons burst into flame any time I want! I have opened the latest incredibly-convenient shortcut! There's a handy new merchant just before the next boss! I am holding an armful of presents and Dark Souls keeps trying to pile more on top!

{*I went off immediately afterwards to Google "dark souls how to facepalm”, but it looks like you have to join the Forest Hunter covenant to learn that emote and I have other plans. Still tempted, though.}

{**I had expected to loathe being invaded — and had initially planned to play offline mainly to avoid that, but did not for reasons which need to be a different post — but in the event, it was brief, non-inconveniencing, and actually pretty funny.}

D&D is cancelled tonight so that the DM can drug herself into a stupor and try to get more than 3-4 hours of sleep for once. As for me, I think that I'm going to take a short nap for the next hour or so and then settle in to play video games all night.

I'm leaning towards playing more of that Mass Effect: Andromeda playthrough that I started last weekend, although I may switch over to Baldur's Gate 3 or Dragon Age: The Veilguard for at least a while. We'll just have to see what my brain seems most interested in tonight.

Hey, there was a positive for once today!

Me: Here's my money to cover another another week in the hotel.
Hotel Manager: Thank you. Would you like a brand new 43" TV to replace the 13-year-old 32" TV that you currently have?
Me: ... so is this a trick question?

But, yeah, they apparently are updating some of the televisions in the hotel, and the manager likes me enough that I'm near the front of the list. Which means I got a brand new TV in my suite today!

My poor cleric, Siân, has had a really bad couple of weeks in-game. Over the course of the last not even a full two weeks, she has:

- woken up from being held captive by mind-controlling plants for a week
- found herself in a prison camp in the middle of a warzone
- watched a friend die while trying to escape said prison camp
- failed to resurrect said friend
- watched the resurrection fail again when someone else attempted a higher level spell
- found out that her family has been accused of treason and placed under arrest
- found out that a bunch of powerful nobles want to make her father emperor
- saw the instant destruction of an entire town via a weapon of mass destruction
- watched the friend who died come back to life separate from his still-dead corpse
- given up the very last gift her deceased mother ever gave her
- had a bunch of ancient knowledge magically dumped in her head
- had her right arm chopped off
- found out that her father named her his legitimate daughter due to obvious coercion
- had her right arm unexpected regrown by way of alchemy
- almost been killed by malfunctioning golems
- almost watched her entire group be killed by a shadowspawn beholder
- been publicly seen with magic users in an empire where magic is illegal
- been involved in a very bloody battle
- joined a pirate fleet
- found out that the empire-wide newspaper has been smearing her name
- almost been killed by assassins
- found out an assassins' guild with a reputation for never quitting has been hired to kill her
- been involved in another very bloody battle
- found out that she's one of the most wanted people in the entire empire
- almost been killed by lightning
- almost drowned
- died instantly from a magical trap while in a shadow plane surrounded by enemies

Considering the circumstances of her death, I'm honestly not sure what's going to happen. Resurrection may or may not be on the table, especially considering the rest of the group is about to go into a pretty massive bit of combat without a healer.

Next week, I'm planning on basically just being off camera the entire night unless something very unexpected happens. I'll figure out future plans after I see what happens in-game over the next, uh, 60 seconds or so.

They do technically at least have access to an item that will let them cast unlimited Gentle Repose, but said item is on their ship which is currently shrunk and inside a bottle. Plus said item is being used on the dead body of the group member who came back to life by other means and therefore has both a mostly-alive body and a corpse sitting on the ship, so... yeah.

(Don't ask. Trust me.)

In tonight's game, ( the rest under a cut for those who don't care. )

And that's where we left off.

Autumn starts in about a week-and-a-half, and the first day of fall is on a Monday this year. Which, you know, kinda bodes well for new beginnings in my mind since it's the first of the work week at least. And, considering how things have been going so far in September, I feel like I really need a set point for a fresh start.

So, you know, Mabon works fairly well for that.

Things have been pretty chaotic in my life the last year or two for a variety of reasons, and I think that I'm going to force myself to set up a strict daily schedule to start following again come September 22. I won't stick to it forever, but I've found in the past that the structure really does help me even if it's just for a month or so to get me back in the habit.

Now I just have to force myself to start thinking about a set schedule that will work for me while still having some flexibility for when things don't go quite as planned...

I've fallen behind on watching Critical Role's various specials and miniseries since they went on their CR3-to-CR4 hiatus, mostly because they've been releasing them on Beacon and then eventually showing them on their Thursday stream. That's made it hard for me to convince my brain to keep up with things, because I need a set schedule to follow every week that I'm watching alongside other people, so... yeah.

This is part of why I have trouble watching a lot of streaming shows (it was a problem with Rings of Power especially but there have been lots of others that I just never got around to watching at all), because for my brain there's a difference between "watching live with everyone else" like with more traditional shows and "watching it when I have the time because once it drops everyone's watching it at different times so it's pointless to watch it immediately."

Anyway, I really want to force myself to get caught up in the lead-up to CR4 starting - if only to get myself used to watching their long episodes again - so I'm going to list out the various specials that I still need to properly watch. And then I'm going to try to set aside the time to watch them over the next few weeks. If I can manage it, I may also try to make a few posts about them as I watch them, but watching them in the first place is my priority.

If I have time, I'll also try to watch Age of Umbra, which I started but had to drop because of stuff going on with work and IRL at the time. It's lower on the list, though, so we'll see if I manage it. And, hey, if a miracle happens then maybe I'll even find the time to watch some other miniseries they've had going further back that I never found the time to watch.

But, yeah. We'll see how it goes? Live Shows are the "must watch" part of the list. Everything else is just gravy.

( List under the cut. )

In tonight's game, ( the rest under a cut for those who don't care. )

And that's where we left off.

Side by Side (1506 words) by Settiai
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age - All Media Types
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Oghren & Female Surana (Dragon Age)
Characters: Female Surana (Dragon Age), Oghren (Dragon Age)
Additional Tags: Alcohol, The Black Emporium Exchange, Friendship, One Shot, Sparring
Summary: Oghren might have been a nug humping bastard, but he couldn't just stand by and do nothing after he realized that the big scary Warden everyone was talking about was barely more than a kid.