You Know Something Insignificant That Never Fails To Get Under My Skin?

desperate to do a Mohg deep dive after all the DLC content on him. There's just... so much.

Ansbach's entire demeanour seems completely backwards compared to modern Mohgwyn loyalists we know of. He holds Mohg is such incredibly high regard, and is probably one of, if not the most respectful warrior in a fromsoft game. Were the other pureblood knights like this? What happened to them? Why is Ansbach the only one left?

What could Mohg have been like to install such loyalty and respect in one of his followers, to the point where they'd face a newly born god just to do right in his name?

What caused Ansbach to decide to challenge Miquella in the first place? What tipped him off that Mohg was being used? How long were they interacting before this happened?

Was the Mohgwyn Dynasty always a vicious murder cult? was their once more to the group before Mohg's charming? If there wasn't, why didn't Miquella use his bewitchment of Mohg to stop it? Did he indorse Mohg's actions? Did he incite them.

I’ve touched upon this in the past, but there’s a couple reasons I don’t believe the vow was mutually upheld by the end.

Radahn loved war and the glory of battle, but he was also a deeply sentimental person, as we can see with a lot of his history. He initially learned gravity magic so he could keep Leonard as his mount, and he later used that very same magic to freeze the stars in place to protect Selia. When he cares about something he cares hard and clings onto it as much as he can. And the battle of Aionia destroyed all of that. All that he held so dear that he challenged fate itself to protect it. It infected his horse and decimated Selia and all surrounding locations.

He desperately clung to life, even past the point of being driven insane by the scarlet rot. It’s possible to read this as him just wanting to be put down in a worthy fight, but personally I feel like it goes further. That motherfucker did not want to die.

Presumably none of Radahn’s followers had any idea about the vow with Miquella. On Miq’s side at least Malenia knew, but none of the Redmanes had even the faintest clue. Not even his closest allies knew what the fight was about, which is odd considering how glorious a final honourable battle for Radahn to become the lord of a new age would be. It was just kept incredibly secret for some reason. Even when it comes time for the Radahn festivals, they’re specifically to put Radahn to rest in an honourable duel. Not to uphold any sort of vow he might have had.

Going off of the previous point about their respective followers. The Redmanes and The Cleanrot knights fucking hate eachother, to the point where their spirits continue to battle in the wardead catacombs to this very day. This, to me, doesn’t read as a mutually agreed upon and honourable duel to the death. It comes off as there being extremely bad blood between the two groups. The malice between them is so palpable that they won't stop fighting each other even in death.

Radahn doesn’t really come off as being “present” in his promised consort bossfight. When it comes to every other major demigod in the game, they all have something to say. Every single one of them talks to the player before, during and after their boss fights. Radahn however, says nothing. He barely makes a sound throughout his entire fight. It’s like he’s just going through the motions. Like a spirit ash, or a puppet. He’s even able to make use of some of Mohg’s bloodflame abilities, which he shouldn’t be able to do if it was actually just Radahn.

Y'know, I've been thinking about the vow between Miquella and Radahn a lot recently, and I feel like I've come up with a possible explanation for why Radahn seemingly agreed at first but later backed out of the deal.

If Radahn truly did agree to become Miquella's consort, what are the chances that it was made under the pretense that he'd be the next elden lord in the golden order? Continuing the legacy and age of both his personal hero and father, alongside Miquella as the new god of the age, but things remaining overall the same.

Once Miquella became disillusioned with Marika's age and decided to do his own thing, and create his own age, Radahn probably lost interest in becoming his consort because he wouldn't be the lord of the age he loved anymore, infact he would be a major factor in it ending. Something that he historically does not stand for.

This probably lead to a disagreement between the two that lead to Malenia invading Selia. Miquella feeling betrayed because Radahn was now refusing to uphold his promise, and Radahn feeling betrayed because Miquella turned his back on the golden order he loved and was now trying to bring it to an end.

It’s such a shame honestly. She’s travelling with us for the entirety of the game, across this massive world with so much to discover and talk about (barring farum azula and onward) and I’m pretty sure she has less unique dialogue (not counting Marika’s spoken echos as actual interactions with her as a character) than Ranni, who only really interacts with us within her specific questline.

Hell, Even Latenna has some pretty good travelling dialogue when we’re doing the Haligtree quest.

I felt more connected to both of these characters as travelling companions than I ever did with Melina, which is really sad because I also really like Melina but I just tend to forget she’s there most of the time. It feels like the biggest contribution she makes to the story is being a talking piece for other characters, explaining Torrent's motivations to us and being a scribe for Marika but like… I want to know about you Meli!

I am glad we’re of one mind that Melina is a character whose potential was sorely wasted in Elden Ring. I mean, it’s probably why I can’t get too invested in her.

people are currently freaking out over the elden ring lore book and what it has to say about promised consort Radahn, and I'd just like to point out that despite being an official piece of merchandise, they aren't exactly accurate to the source material.

Like, the very same set of lore books says that Malenia narrowly won the battle of Aionia (despite the game making it abundantly clear that no one won that fight), that Godfrey's banishment and war march happened after the shattering began (which is literally impossible) and that Romina "created the scarlet rot" (do I even have to say anything?).

Elden ring endgame spoilers

You guys wanna know what I think the scariest thing about Radagon is? It’s the fact that in the bossfight against him he fights us using Marika’s hammer. He’s not even using his own weapon. There’s a very real possibility that he may have never even wielded that hammer before in his life (except when he was trying to fix the ring) and he is still a terrifying force with it.

From what I’ve come to understand Radagon seems to actually prefer greatswords when it comes to his choice in weapon since he has pretty substantial connections to multiple greatswords in the lore. For example there’s the moonlight greatsword that he got from Renalla and also the golden order greatsword which he reforged it into. On top of both of these there’s also the form he takes as the sacred relic sword that the elden beast wields. These may seem like rather superficial details but considering that all the major weapons he has connections too are greatswords I feel that it has some meaning to it.

Even after being sealed away for centuries, having his body crumble to pieces, not being able to use his sorcery knowledge and quite possibly not even using a weapon that he’s familiar with or fond of he still wrecks shit when the time comes down to it.

Words cannot actually describe how much I am interested in this whole scene of Marika doing....something important.

Is she ascending to godhood? Sealing the Land of Shadow? Creating the Golden Order? Fucking summoning the Elden Beast? I don't know, but it seems like a greatly significant moment.

The way she walks through that massive pile of bodies, and then stands there looking all gold and holy and powerful in front of that portal of flesh and blood. Her divinity being born of such vileness, created in a scene that Rykard would find appalling.

Also how the trailer says that the war happened after this. It feels like whatever she is doing here is so horrible that a war was bound to start from it. Is that why this war was completely hidden? Because there is no angle where Marika is not 100% at fault?

I think people who see the tarnished in elden ring as just murder hobo assholes who kill everything in their path for no other reason than wanting to are kind of missing the point of them.

First off, they’re not just some random asshole that strolled into the lands between looking for a fight. Our character was resurrected, torn from their home and thrown into this unrelenting hellscape against their will. They are just as much victims of circumstance as everyone else in this game.

Also there’s the whole aspect that we’re supposed to project a personality onto the tarnished ourselves. They’re not literally mute, determined, personalityless killers. If someone comes out of elden ring thinking the tarnished is just mindlessly killing everything in their path for no reason then I think that’s more of a problem with the player themselves. 

That being said, if someone doesn’t care to do that sort of character building or likes the idea of that being their tarnished’s personality then that’s perfectly fine, I’m not here to judge how you play the game. I’m just not a fan of people who call the tarnished in general a horrible person for doing what they do.

I know this is basically a pointless argument but the fact that people generalise the tarnished as one character instead of what they actually are (a blank slate that can be any type of character) kinda annoys me. Your tarnished and mine are not going to be the same type of person.

TLDR

“The tarnished in elden ring is an asshole” no, no, no, your tarnished is an asshole, mine is fine actually.

here's the original description btw

paramour basically means a lover or partner, but one amazing detail I forgot to mention was that the description specifies that he was one of Rykards paramours, meaning there were more. He didn't just have a boyfriend, he had a whole ass polyamorous relationship with an unknown amount of people.

idc whatever the fuck else fromsoft cut or changed in elden ring I demand to know why this was changed:

LET THE MAN HAVE HIS CAT FROMSOFT PLEASE I BEG OF YOU.

As far as I've seen recently, I've noticed a pretty big shift in public opinion regarding the DLC's final boss. I can't speak for everyone, but I think it's starting to make more sense to people after being given a bit more time to think it over.

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Interestingly enough, I think Messmer is the only one of her children that we know her interactions with. No one else has any mention of times spent with her. Most demigods don't seem to have anything to say about her at all. The only outlier being Melina who also doesn't seem to really know much either.

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Kind of, but it's not a very clear picture. We know he upheld the golden order's ideals but we also know that he was not as battle hungry as his father or as dedicated to the horrors of the order as his mother, due to his diplomatic approach to ending the war with the dragons. Instead of forcing them into the order (or out of existence) they managed to come to an understanding and live harmoniously alongside each other, in stark contrast to the outcomes of every other war the order has waged. (despite the fact that they still kept Lansaxx's corpse in their city as a war trophy)

Unfortunately most of Godwyn's past, even including the golden order's proper gander has been lost to time, but from what we know, he seemed to have been a pretty upstanding guy.

While this is more headcannon territory, it's known that Godwyn at some point did have children of his own (due to the golden lineage going all the way down to Godrick, who is a distant ancestor to the rest of the royal family) and I believe that his consort was actually the dragon "Fortisaxx" who he met during the war against the dragons and became good friends and "companions" with, which directly led to the end of the war and peaceful integration of the dragons into the golden order. I have a whole post going over the topic if you're interested in seeing they deeper thought process behind this.

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unfortunately I don't know much about the albinuriac woman, but she seems to be an incredibly important figure in the albinuriac society.

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Sadly, where the land of shadow fits into the timeline is a little bit muddy. All we know is that it used to be a part of the lands between, being the centre that is missing in modern day, but was at some point separated and isolated from the rest of the world, probably in order to hide Marika and the Golden Order's deepest darkest secrets.

I don’t think I ‘hate’ a single Elden Ring character. Each and every one is designed so compellingly, their stories are so varied, their interactions while sparse are the type to carry magnitudes of meaning.

Example:

For the longest time I did not realize that the scene we stroll into at Castle Morne is a slave rebellion. The misbegotten are treated as chattel. My first go around I assumed “ah yes, monster attack castle, understand”

It wasn’t until I watched a random lore video that only referenced it that I got it. I went back and read the descriptions of stuff and I’ll be damned.

There’s a lot of little tidbits hidden here and there that flip entire perspectives on their heads. Preaching to the choir on this point.

Even the characters that I generally dislike/disregard (dung-eater, (hot take) Varre, selvus) I still find fascinating. One of the cool parts about the game is you can just kill the character you don’t like. If you’re doing a run and you want to get a little roleplay in, sometimes murder freak be murdering.

Personally, I’m not on twitter, instagram (used to be), deviant art (do people still use that), or anywhere else ((I Do have a blue sky but I think I’m too dim to use it just yet)) . I’d love to be in a space where people talk more about lore or art things! I haven’t the foggiest clue where to go though. When I hear people say “everyone hates on xyz character” or “this fandom is so nuts” or whatever I am genuinely confused. I’m only seeing a portion of the stuff here, and so far it’s been more than pleasant! Big ups to the people on here, so far you’ve all been very kind 😊

So I guess, could I ask anybody to fill me in? Or where to go to get filled in?

In the meantime I want you to know I’ve started working on a pair of drawings centered around Malenia and Miquella - ooooo be so tragic oooooo

Y'know I'm usually quite apprehensive to consider cut content as canon material... But I make an exception for Radahns cat and Rykards boyfriend. They're just too good not to have in the story and they're such minor details that considering them as canon effects nothing.

idc whatever the fuck else fromsoft cut or changed in elden ring I demand to know why this was changed:

LET THE MAN HAVE HIS CAT FROMSOFT PLEASE I BEG OF YOU.