I just finished the 2018 God of War game and started the Ragnarok one. They're pretty nice games. Love 'em.

quick yasha doodles

You witness the final miracles. You will need to be strong.

I think D&D players, even 5e players, who treat the idea of death being on the table in the game as a matter of "mmmmm I don't know I mean it's nice to ask players first what they feel because losing a character can really make them feel bad" are in active denial about the game. This is one of those things where D&D, the game as it exists within all those books, is pretty clear: a character who loses all their hit points is at the risk of dying and combat (the activity these games are the most opinionated about) is a leading cause of losing hit points. This is not an accident of design. Saying that death being on the table in a game of D&D should be something the group needs to discuss beforehand is just rejecting the buy-in of the game.

I swear, if you don't like death as the main failure state in the game there are other games out there. But this attitude is just further indicative of the idea that running the game as written is just seen as dysfunctional by its own players.

does it *need* to be discussed beforehand? no, probably not. could including a discussion about the possibility of PC deaths in the normal pre-game conversation of house rules etc positively benefit and increase the enjoyment of everyone involved? yeah, totally.

a huge part of D&D is the opportunity for homebrew to modify rules and the dm to make discretionary decisions to make everybody have a better play experience. the rules are frameworks, not laws.

"as written" was never the point

This attitude simply doesn't cut it for me any more as someone who has been playing RPGs for the better part of my life and a very large portion of that D&D specifically. By assuming this idea that D&D is an unopinionated game that has death as its primary consequence for failure for no particular reason which can just be discussed away if people don't like it, instead of allowing yourself to look at other games that might provide gameplay with consequences that are more amenable to the type of stories you want to produce, you are adopting a position that is not only hostile to actual game design but creates unhealthy expectations around the game. There does not need to be a discussion about which parts of the game are on the table if everyone is bought into the fact that they are playing D&D.

Allow yourself to look at other games and in turn accept that D&D isn't the way it is by a pure accident and in fact that there is value in the type of experience it natively produces. And if you don't want that experience, you can instead play other games. Trying to force D&D, the dungeon combat game of doing combat in dungeons, to fit into every possible shape is not good for the game and maintaining curiosity about other types of games will make you a more discerning player.

Multiplayer games with two factions be like "Who will you join;"

"The GLORIANUS MAGNIFICUS, a kingdom of honor, morality, beauty, and faith..."

"Or the CRINGEFUCKS, a clan of dishonorable barbarians who kick puppies and drown babies and worship Satan?"

And literally without fail 75% of the game's population plays Cringefuck.

VALID.

⚔️🐎 𝕹𝖊𝖔𝖑𝖔𝖌𝖎𝖈 𝕽𝖔𝖍𝖆𝖓𝖊𝖘𝖊 🐎⚔️

It's finally here! The document I've been threatening to put together for ages 📯

Compiled in one place are all my notes on neologic Rohanese, reverse engineered from the few legitimate Rohanese words we have and supported by Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse.

Following the linguistic sections are multiple sections discussing my personal framework for Rohirric culture, extrapolating from historical, mythological, and archaeological sources pertaining to the Iron Age Norse. The entire document is sourced; superscripts within the text can be connected to the links in the final section.

At the very least, I hope you enjoy reading it!

If you use anything from this document in your own writing, please reblog/share this post!! (and maybe send me a link? I'd love to see more folks' neologic Rohanese conversions)

I believe I mention them in the document, but I want to credit @theshakespearetrash for assisting with some of the conversions present in the neologic dictionary, for encouraging me with this project, and just listening to me ramble about Rohan all the time 💚💛

Surprise! You’ve been Isekai’d into a D&D World… but it’s specifically a 3.5 Edition D&D world and due to a weird Glitch in the system you have been assigned not just a Base Class, but also one of that edition’s weird and wacky Prestige Class as well! Spin this wheel to see what you got!

(I added a short little summary for each Class explaining the basic gist of it. Although obviously you can also look them up to get more detailed info)

Didn't even know about this one but hey, it could have been worse. I could have picked up Archmage or some shit

Children do not go to Valhalla

I saw one of those "Valhalla does not discriminate against the type of battle you lost" posts go by my dash. I really want to say something but the notes are full of people grieving and saying how much comfort this re-interpretation gave them and I'm not that much of a bastard.

This story of the littlest cancer patient going to Valhalla is kind of upsetting but I struggle to articulate why. It's like Christianity wearing my faith like a costume.

I don't want to call it cultural appropriation because, you know, Norse Paganism/Heathenry/Ásatru is a reconstruction of a dead faith - a (more or less) historically-informed best guess based on scanty surviving evidence (much, if not all, of that Christianised). It's public domain mythology, reuse and remix as you like, etc, etc.

But...

Valhalla is not and has never been a place of rest and healing, and to say it is is to fundamentally misunderstand the mythology. Valhalla is where Odinn is building an army to fight the war at the end of the world. It is not a place for children or victims of domestic violence or cancer patients or anyone like that.

If you're drawn to Norse mythology, if you're grieving and you want to believe that your loved ones are in a better place, let me give you a different story.

It starts with a little girl, a child whom the gods deemed monstrous. Her name is Hela and she's the daughter of Loki, so she every right to claim a home in Ásgard. But, as I said, she was called monstrous for her appearance and her heritage and all but cast out. She was given her own realm, far away from the gods, and tasked with caring for the dead that Odinn (etc) have no use for.

The charge that the gods give this outcast child was considered shit-work. Un-honourable, if not actually dishonourable. An insult for a goddess.

But Hela took that duty with solemnity and made Helheim a home for her wards. It's not a hall full of warriors feasting and drinking and fighting. It's quiet; a rest at the end of a hard life. A place full of children and grandparents, mothers and fathers, farmers and shepherds. You and me.

Helheim, like its mistress, is misunderstood and maligned. When we, who have no place in war, die, Hela will accept us into her hall, care for us, and let us to rest, instead of demanding we keep fighting forever.

It's where most of us will go, and that is not a bad thing. There are no entry requirements. It's not heaven, it's not even The Good Place, it's the default - to be with our people, to be cared for and looked after, to be free from pain and struggle. Helheim is a place of acceptance, care, peace, and rest. It's not paradise, but I don't think it sounds that bad.

My personal take is different, but bear in mind that this is my own unverified personal gnosis, so take this with the biggest grain of salt.

None of it matters.

None of the language or the technicalities matter at all.

After all, according to the lore (which at no point includes the words "die in battle weapon in hand," BTW,) Freya takes half the battle slain men and all the battle slain women to Folkvanger. Odin let's her choose first, then he takes his pick, right?

I think that Odin knows who he is choosing for Valhol, and I think the only variable is that he has chosen them. Doesn't matter how they die, Odin's Hall is where they go. But it would be foolish to assume the only options are Valhol, Folkvanger, and Hel. The Dark Elves are ancestor spirits. They guide us as we go. Are those aspects of passed people that are in Valhol? Or Folkvanger? What about Thor? Does he have no host that will ride out to Ragnarok with him? Tyr? Freyr? They are war gods too, and yet they have no listed host.

I think that the way you live your life, the dedications you make, and maybe to some extent the gods you serve determines where you go in the afterlife. If Odin calls you to Valhol, thats where you're going. If not, somewhere else. and I don't think there's anything necessarily wrong with mist of the answers.

But again, this is just what I have been led to believe through my own research and my own experience with the faith.

That makes genuinely no sense. Even if we subscribe to the idea of being able to compare a firearm to an archaic weapon, this is a bizarre comparison.

Something almost bitter about how Denethor held the line for years, how Denethor endured despair and grief for years, and kept Gondor in the hands of those loyal to it, and only right at the end did he break, and succumb to years of suffering, and decide that instead of waiting any longer for the unbeatable enemy to kill him, he would at deny the enemy that and take his death (and Faramir's) into his own hands, and because of that his legacy would forever be tarnished and scorned, meanwhile we know that for five years Theoden had succumbed, Theoden had given in, he had granted power in his land to a traitor, his people and his family suffered, and he only pulled it together right at the end for a glorious last stand and because of that he would be honoured for years to come as a great and noble warrior king.

And there is something to be said for celebrating those who manage to heal and recover from such despair, but then you have to ask what Denethor might have achieved had he been able to heal as welll.

Obviously there's more nuance to the discussion but I think that a big part of it is that Tolkien always intended us to see Denethor as something of a snake. A tragic character, absolutely, but also an asshole.

I think that Denethor, like Boromir, could have been a great man once again if he had a chance to heal. He proved for decades that he was a capable ruler (at least a capable steward) and IIRC eas a great captain in his early years, only being overshadowed because Aragorn was so incredible. Maybe if he had a chance to see Aragorn in action, to work with him and serve at his side, he would have realized that Aragorn was a good man and been honored to serve with him. I think he would have been a great advisor to the king and a great vassal.

As a SH/su*c*de survivor, I think that there's a lot to be said about the narratives of both rulers. Denethor succumbing to the dark power is a great example of what happens when you face the darkness for too long, especially alone. What if someone had been there? If he had leaned on someone and confided in them? We'll never know.

I think Tolkien actually had some great representation of mental health struggles, particularly PTSD. Between Denethor's struggle against Mordor, the Palantir, and his grief over the loss of his wife, he had a lot he was going through. Losing his son's was the last straw. I think Frodo is another great example, where he failed but we dont judge him for that. And in the end, he "sailed into the west."

Denethor was not a good man, and thats important to remember. It's kinda like Azula. Azula was awful and so we enjoy seeing her get her just rewards. But she was a victim and its important to remember that (not to mention a child.) Denethor was also a victim, despite not being a good man. As much as I don't feel bad about what happens to him because of that, that doesn't mean he didn't deserve redemption. And i think we are supposed to see his story as a tragedy.

YASHA!!!!!!!!!

In case you writers ever wondered. Made by Carrie Patrick on Facebook.

I’ve blocked people I should have shot in the head