You Ever Hear That Old Chestnut About How Most People Neglect The Part Of The Story Of Icarus Where He

The White Wolf🖤

Everyone’s favourite cute, dorky, grey warden 💖

Found my old sketches of Arthur

taking out the complexity

I have this hypothesis that at some point quite late in the writing process of Veilguard someone came in and pushed for the moral complexity to be taken out of the game. Because there are several plot lines which seem like they were potentially intended to be more complex than they ultimately were:

Isseya and the griffons. When I first played this I assumed that the punchline would be that she stole the griffons because she didn't trust the wardens with them after what happened - then deciding what to do about her would have raised interesting questions about war, sacrifice, the greater good etc. But instead there was this reveal that she was planning on blighting them, which makes no sense at all and feels shoe-horned in just to make it clear that she is Evil and Wrong.

Ivenci feels to me like they were originally intended to articulate the very reasonable point that it's not good for Antiva to be ruled by a group of unelected assassins - thus setting up an interesting chance to reflect on the nature of the Crows and the necessity of working with groups who do harmful things. But instead the Crows have to be the good guys so Ivenci is made into this weirdly cartoonish villain to make it clear that they are Evil and Wrong.

Relatedly, Lucanis' plot line feels like it was supposed to culminate with a reflection on his relationship with the Crows and the abuse he suffered, probably with the option to turn down being the First Talon and maybe even leave the Crows. But because the Crows have become the good guys this never happens and hence his whole arc feels quite inconclusive.

As this post points out, it feels like Emmrich's lich choice was intended to be darker and for the lich route to be genuinely a selfish option, but instead it's become this somewhat toothless 'dilemma' where both options are right and you never have to feel bad about your decision.

The initial ritual feels like it was a set-up for Rook to unintentionally do terrible harm while trying to stop the world from being destroyed, thus offering the opportunity to reflect on the dilemma that Solas faced in making the Veil and to understand the moral complexity of his situation. There is apparently even cut dialogue from the regret prison on this topic. But instead no one ever blames Rook and Rook is not allowed to blame themself at all, because they have to be The Hero in an uncomplicated way.

I don't know; it just seems to me that there are all these fossils of a more interesting game in there and they've been sort of clumsily written-over because some exec etc wanted the game to be less challenging or targeted at a younger audience or something.

My paladin again!

<Ir abelas,vhenan>

sketch

05 / 05 / 2025 🌵🤠🐎

sorry for the lack of art altogether for the past many months

Arthur Morgan has me by the balls rn so i'm studying his face the past few days - his likeness is pretty damn difficult to capture

pray for me on my Red Dead journey

if there's one thing the breeding kink discourse taught me, it is that most of you aren't weird enough to handle solas. i'm taking him off your hands. solas dragon age is my character now and i decide that he's a freak. i decide that he's a slut and a freak and that he is capable of doing bad shit with bad intentions.

solas did drag a low approval inquisitor to the eluvian by the arm and shut it off to dismember them most traumatically. he did that shit and he was swinging his hips as he did so.

solas will sometimes bite into something particularly crunchy and think fondly of times he was in his dread wolf form eating animals bones and all while they were still alive. he might even have a lil smile about it.

solas is of the persuasion that everyone around him is inferior to him, that the lives of everyone who survived his error hold so little value that he's willing to sacrifice countless of them. he has a prejudiced and highly racist remark for every inquisitor be they elven, qunari, human, or dwarven. solas is a cunt.

and yeah, this is the same cunt who protected a random wanderer who fell asleep between the paws of his statue. yup the very same as the one who goes "that was a kind thing you did" with the softest voice in the world if his companion goes out of their way to spread some stranger's ashes where they would have wanted. same dude as the one who beelines to offer his aid to hurt refugees at the crossroads in da:i. and yes it's the same freak who loves dancing and gossip and tiny cakes and painting and who calms cole down from a panic attack. he is all of those things at once.

but give me warlord!solas. give me the solas who followed a man for twelve years to drive him to madness with laughter. give me the solas who carves vallaslin into the faces of his foes when he kills them. show me the solas who faced mythal for the first time after betraying and rebelling against her. the solas who saw the first dwarves crawl from the titans and perceived them as being beneath him, as being the severed arm of a once mighty hero, lying in a pool of blood, undirected, whatever skill at arms it had gone forever? zoom in. enhance. rotate. this solas is just as true as the caring, wise, sad solas.

i'm not saying he's evil, i'm just saying that he's not a good man. he isn't. treating him as one and excusing his failures and crimes as exclusively poorly executed but well-intended mauls him. he's such a complex, multidimensional character and i wish people would stop woobifying and sanitising him because it is such a waste!!!!! it's such a waste!!!!! let him be freaky!!!!!

"Why is it a problem if students use AI to get through college"

Because if you demonstrate to me that you're willing to set aside concern for truth, evidence, and verifying things with your own eyes whenever it happens to be inconvenient for you, I have a solemn responsibility to make sure you don't get into medical school.