does a gay little dance that kills u off (from the nishiki extended cut)

Guppy Breeding But Like, Intentionally

Alternatively titled “Git Gud At Guppy Breeding ”

I’ve been meaning to do a little how to on getting into the guppy game whether it’s for fun, show or a little bit of pocket money so here it is.

Guppies are probably the easiest tropical fish to keep. They don’t need high heat, are undemanding in terms of pH, don’t require any sort of special diet, don’t need tons of space, thrive in groups and breed readily.

Pretty much every person who’s ever kept a tropical tank has had guppies before. They’re icons of the hobby, and with good reason. But if you want to make something special out of them, you’re gonna have to do the legwork. Which brings me to my first point:

1. CHOOSING A VARIETY.

If you want to succeed at breeding seriously, your best bet is to go for an established line and keep that going for a bit before you start doing anything bananas like outcrossing. If you’re interested in wild guppies, bear in mind that genetic diversity should be your top priority. Different people would probably give you different spiels on what kind of domestic lines to go for, but I’m gonna be honest here. Go for something you love. I mean goddamn, you’re going to be producing them for a while, so go for something you won’t get sick of looking at. The only thing I will say is to steer clear of any varieties with altered finnage such as ribbonfins. Any mutation that alters the shape of the male guppy’s gonopodium will make the males infertile. Females can still breed with non ribbon males, but it’s an added difficulty. Pet store animals are a bad idea, since their genetics are totally unknown. Also be aware that certain albino lines, particularly full reds, are prone to fertility issues. Bearing that in mind, the choice is up to you!

2.  KNOW WHAT YOU’RE AIMING FOR

What’s your goal with this line of yours? Is it colour, pattern, fin size and shape? Are you breeding to a standard? If you’re looking to sell, you need to make people actually want to buy animals from you. If so, why should people spend their money on your fish, what makes them so special? These are all things you’ll have to figure out on your own - before you start breeding.

3. BREEDING TRUE

What this means is ensuring your animals only produce animals that look like them. I’d recommend starting with a small group of 3-4 pairs, all of the same kind. Whatever setup you choose, the females should outnumber the males at least 2:1 so no single female is getting unduly harassed. Once you’ve got your pairs, remove all but the best male. Keep the other males as backups in case the worst should happen to the chosen one. If any of the females are rather unfortunate looking or weak, remove them as well (and get the breeder in a headlock and demand to know why they sold you bunk fish). Make sure you’ve got good food, clean water and comfortable water parameters, and fry will naturally follow.

4. SELECTING FRY

All goes well, and you’ll soon have your second generation of guppies flitting about. The selection process starts pretty much as soon as they’re large enough for you to see faults. Immediately remove any with physical issues such as bent backs, kinked tails, malformed fins etc. Also remove any ‘runty’ animals that fail to thrive. Don’t be tempted to keep them - you’re poisoning the genepool if you do. It’s better to focus your energy and resources on the healthiest animals to give them to best possible start. Don’t fall into the trap of focusing on the males alone. The female is the one who carries the fry, so if she’s weak or ugly, your fry will be too! What you want is the strongest, best looking females and the strongest, best looking males. Always have a few holdbacks, but remember not to keep too many males. A single male can service multiple females at once, but too many males together will cause fighting. After a few rounds of fry, you should have the next generation of breeding groups made up of only your absolute best, as well as some holdbacks for safekeeping. Remember, if by some stroke of misfortune you end up with no males, all is not lost! Females can carry sperm from previous matings for a long time, so don’t rush to outcross when there’s still a chance to salvage things!

5.1 OUTCROSSING - IS IT FOR YOU?

That’s what most of us are probably here for, isn’t it? The ability to make our very own line of unique, true breeding guppies by mixing other strains is one of the biggest draws of the hobby. It’s a powerful tool that requires a lot of work, time and dedication to get right, but it’s worth it when you do. Just understand that it may be many, many generations of little guppies and disappointment before you get close to your ideal fish.

5.2 OUTCROSSING - SENSIBLE STRAIN MIXING

Everyone’s seen those listings on eBay or wherever where someone’s thrown a pair of totally unrelated random animals together and is bragging about how it’s the first time this particular cross has been attempted. There’s usually a reason for that. My personal favourite was a recent listing I saw trying to sell Snow White/Dragon cross fry. The Snow White, as implied, is a pure white fish free of any other pattern or colour, that may or may not be albino depending on the line. Dragons, on the other hand, are bred specifically for their striking patterns and brilliant colour, even on the females. What the seller was obviously aiming for was the Snow White body with the Dragon finnage. What they got was a group of fry where 50% looked like worse versions of either parent, and 50% greyish looking messes. It’s far better to combine strains that have similarities than strains from total opposite ends of the spectrum - it’ll get you where you want to go much faster, and it’ll be easier to find homes for spare animals.

5.3 OUTCROSSING - HOW TO OUTCROSS EFFECTIVELY

This of course depends on what you’re aiming for - whether it’s colour or fin type or just a single gene like albino that you’re trying to get into your line. Your best shot is to keep back a few clean females from your established line. This means females that have been separated from all males since the earliest point you could tell the difference. Pre-hit females won’t work, as they can store sperm from previous breedings and totally skew your plans. Next, get your hands on a breeding pair or several of the desired line to mix in. Keep the pair or pairs together to ensure you have backup true breeders of this new line, just in case. Once they’ve settled in and completed quarantine, introduce some of your clean females. It’s vitally important to make sure these females only ever breed with males of the new line, to give you a good starting pool of F1s.

5.4 OUTCROSSING - HOW TO NOT SCREW UP THE NEXT BIT

Let your first generation of selected fry from your cross reach adulthood. This will give you the best idea of where to go from here. How close are they to what you wanted? If the answer is “really close” then congrats, you’re a lucky bastard and I’m jealous. The best idea for you would be to breed together animals that best fit your ideal from your F1s, and take it from there. But for most of us, it’s a bit more difficult than that. Maybe the colour’s not right, maybe the fin type doesn’t look anything like the standard. In that case, it may be best to backcross - breeding one of the F1 females back to the original new line male or one of his true line descendants to try and fix those traits in. This can take GENERATIONS to get right, so don’t feel bad if you end up spending a year or more just trying to get the ideal breeding group.

5.5 OUTCROSSING - STARTING A LINE

So you’ve got your breeding group of ideal fish. Where do you go from here? Linebreeding is where you go. Once your new breeding group has fry and those fry grow, repeat the same process as before only without any other input from the line you crossed in. Pick out and breed only those animals that fit your ideal closest, and after much work and effort and time, you should end up with a group of fish that are what you set out to achieve. The most important thing at this point is to get them breeding true, and making sure they produce healthy fry. Once they’re true breeding, that’s it - your line is founded. Congratulations!

6. GET YOUR FISH OUT THERE

Whether it be a show line your perfected from another breeder’s animals, a rare wild guppy species you’ve helped preserve, or a line you founded yourself through careful outcrossing, share your success! Get on to guppy groups in your area and get involved, especially if you plan on showing. Guppy groups are also an excellent way to sell animals you don’t need, or to get unrelated pairs for genetic diversity in wild type strains. 

Is/Was BB rich like it's implied in the comics? What about now that he's with the Titans? Does anyone know? Does he like to spend money? On what?

[ EDIT: apologies for terrible formatting, tumblr asks are apparently having a glitch that i didn’t know about when i posted this. i’ll clean it up once this whole garbage can is resolved! ]

----------------------------------

tl;dr answers: yep. yep. debatable to no. ehh kinda. gifts.

idk where he is comic-wise as far as new 52 & rebirth go ( because to be blunt, i don’t care lmao ), but from what i do pull out of the comics pre-reboot for my own writing gar being rich is something i include. that’s basically the only reason nicholas galtry wanted custody of him after he was rediscovered... he was gonna wait around until gar was old enough to inherit his parents’s estate and then kill him. because, you know. gotta get that sweet, sweet cheddar ( you can’t see me but i am rolling my eyes, using hella sarcastic tones and overall wanting to strangle an asshole with my stringy hands ). 

ANYWAY

the way i write gar, specifically, he IS rich but he definitely doesn’t flaunt it. this is partially due to not... really knowing what the hell to DO with all this money he just finds himself sitting on for no other reason than his parents are dead ( *bruce wayne voice* awesome ) and also i think it comes from wanting actual friendships instead of surface level bullshit. y’know? he’s already a freak by society standards, a bit socially inept due to years of being isolated and/or abused, and he knows it. i think he has a string of underlying suspicion with a lot of first impressions buuuuuut his eagerness to befriend people and desire to believe in the good of humanity rather than the bad overrides that string. flaunting or making it publicly known that he’s rich would just add to that because when you got money, suddenly everyone wants to be your friend and shit’s shallow and it’s probably exhausting and he just... no thanks. he’s already got a lot of internal hatred whispering in his ear and he doesn’t need another voice muttering “they only hang out with you for your cash”.

i would say that the doom patrol knows if not just because rita and steve are his parents/legal guardians, and larry and cliff would know through them. steve’s also richer than bruce wayne, apparently, so lmfao amazing. 

as far as his friends/the titans, i don’t think anyone KNOWS outright, but i would say those closest to him and who are observant might have suspicions ( or if you’re a bat-family member, you may have done some digging and found all the legal paperwork and whatever and do know outright but just don’t think it’s important to bring up in conversation, idk ). 

for the most part, i would say gar isn’t much of a spender. the animated series can fucking fight me on this ( miss me with that “my goal is maximum couch time” bull ), but i think he WOULD want to get himself a job and earn a modest living on his own whilst setting aside all that money for emergencies, donations, or a Treat Yo’ Self sort of day when you’re like “fuck, i just got through a garbage can of a week and life is short, i’m buying that video game i’ve been staring at for the past two months”. i know that he’s cool with not being ‘normal’ and that being weird is something he’s not only accepted but is very proud of, but i also think he would want SOME sense of normality when it comes to just... day to day living, you know? having a day job, having a little apartment or something, and earning his own money would provide some of that.

( unrelated: i know gar wants to be an actor in the comics and i know/understand/respect why that’s important to him but... i’m also super sick and tired of shapeshifting being synonymous with acting as a profession, so i don’t really write him with having any desire to be an actor; instead i write him working at various animal sanctuaries NOT due to his powers but due to animals providing him a source of comfort and wanting to give back to them/teach other people about conservation and welfare and all that jazz )

when gar DOES spend money for the sake of spending money, it’s usually on friends. HEY, you guys want pizza? it’s on me! (uuuh don’t ask how or whyyyy i just uuuh--foUND THIS random $20 in the park after Dr. Light knocked me into a bush! weird, huh??). HEY, VIC, it’s your birthday, check this COOL NEW GADGET I GOT YOU (i’ve been totally saving... stuff for MONTHS, yeah, definitely didn’t just waltz into the store and grab it because i saw it and immediately thought of you or anything??). yo, raven, LOOK, i found that third book in that series you’ve been reading, you want it???

... this answer has gotten stupid long and i need to go get dell some ingredients for her dinners this week so i’mma end it here BUT IF I NEED TO ELABORATE ON ANYTHING, LEMMIE KNOW?? thank c: 

A couple of months ago, after finishing COUNTER/Weight, I spent about a week in a total hangover, relistening to scenes and having feelings. I took some notes, but procrastinated posting them, and then finally got distracted. But, a) I hate leaving things I intended for tumblr unposted, even if they have value only for me, and b) I also hate posting things out of order, and there's a big TM liveblog incoming. So, here's a bunch of really random thoughts about C/w from past me.

The gnosis virus did go nowhere huh. I was hopeful for a minute when one of the finale intros mentioned it, but that was it. What was the purpose of that arc even. [Note from present me: Lol. At least I feel better about this one!]

Oh, and the patch AuDy left never reappeared either. And the idea from the faction game that Aria's images owned by EarthHome/Petrichor transmit Rigour code… That's the flip side of the coin. On the one hand, it's really cool to see the creative process – on the other, it sometimes feels like you're listening to people write a script for the tv show, but only get to see a half of the finished product. It's fascinating to see the universe grow organically and the players to come up with new ideas and get excited about them – but that means numerous retcons, some of them not even presented as such, because the creators forgot what the previous revision was or didn't thought it was important. It's a unique feature of the medium that player choice directs the narrative and it's not bound by railroading – but that means some roads lead nowhere, and some branches dry and fall off.

It's a bit harder to make peace with something that could have easily been developed more within the existing plot of the show. How come there's a player character whose consciousness consists of three different people in various combinations, but nobody seems to be curious how that works? No PC or NPC ever asked “Which one of you is speaking right now?” or something. The final episodes made a lot of things clearer, but it still felt too little, too late. Hard not to be reminded of that gripe about certain two characters sharing one character sheet one of whom was left underdeveloped and half-forgotten… Both are very ambitious concepts that require a double amount of work from the player, so I feel bad complaining they weren't realized to full potential, but…

Speaking of L&D… I still want to know how the hell did that one engineer all by herself design 4 gods, one of which became a basis for technology that was advanced even for the civilizations 80,000 years later? This woman singlehandedly surpassed any technological achievement of humanity before and after. Who Is She

I saw a “Wake me up: before you go go / when september ends / wake me up inside” meme and thought “heh, this sounds relevant, which member of the Chime is which?” and it already made me sad, but then I realized that I'd never actually heard the september song and looked it up and. The lyrics fit so well. What the fuck. It's an old song everyone keeps joking about. Why is it appropriate for a legitimate fanmix. What. I guess the word “September” will never be the same again for me.

I looked up the rules for Firebrands, the game used for the finale. Oh my, challenges for the dance minigame are so overtly romantic when you see them in a list together! Imagine this cast of characters having to answer to “do you place your hand upon my elbow, shoulder, waist, or hip?” lmao. Also I didn't realize “May I?” was part of the rules for “stealing time together”. (And I found out there's a party version of that minigame with bug-themed challenges. I might have dug too deep…) "Tactical skirmish" is a really fascinating concept, I've never seen such a masochistic combat system! Really faces the player with the violence they're inflicting: sure, you can always fight on, but are you ready to live with what you'll have to do? But for it to work fully, you need a lot of non-expendable NPCs on both sides. The one with the most likeable team wins! (Like Mako did.)

I'm relistening to Three Conversations and it's pretty interesting that Ibex has a bunch perfectly lifelike android bodies, right? There is no such technology seen anywhere else. Did Righteousness develop and privatize that? Are they so complex that only a Divine would have enough computing power to successfully mimic organic life? Can Aria convince Righteousness to help her perform on stage without leaving her duties? Also, like with AuDy, I wonder how Ibex & Righteousness' consciousness works. Is it a single mind, spread across every body he has, or even anything Righteousness is running on, having a bunch of different conversations at once if he needs to? Or is the original Ibex just gone, and what's left is a personality imprint hanging on to the connection to his still living body, imitating his former self like the automated recording Cass saw wore his face? In other words, has Ibex completely fused with Righteousness, or assimilated and destroyed by it? Does he not exist anymore as an independent singular being, or does he not exist at all? Most info indicates the former, but there was also “You’re not in there anymore” “No”.

If Orth and Jace are anime fans with their Kingdom Come and Panther, then Ibex is the guy who's way too into dinosaurs or paleontology. It's as if the heads of various confessions were called Triceratops, Stegosaurus etc. and only one of them knows wtf that means, and also he compares his Divine to… Were there scavenging dinosaurs? I'm looking at an article that suggests T. Rex might have been a scavenger, so yeah he would compare Righteousness to a goddamn T. Rex.

Hey what do you think is the most thematically aproppriate part of the Hieron anime for Orth to watch alone at night during the Kingdom game. What's the best thematic parallel for when he turns off the episode and thinks he made a mistake. Do you think that he once, after a long day and a long month and maybe a long year of feeling helpless and doomed, sits down for a distraction but ends up sobbing “How could they let this happen to Mother Glory”

On Joypark, there are definitely statues of Eidolons, ancient and holy, that were repainted and repurposed as Hieron deities. Imagine a giant Greek or Roman style marble statue of Apote – and it’s painted over as Samot, with an anime face and in really bright plain colors like these “reconstructions of original coloring” that actually only use base colors so they look like cheap action figures.

I was reading Austin's top ten games of 2016 list on Waypoint and he gave first place to The Sprawl! Aww!

The Downloads folder in my phone gallery is funny bc it mostly consists of every freely available f@tt map and also that one photo of Tristan Walker (because I tried to redraw it, very unsuccessfully). I go check a map and every time am met by Ibex just. staring at me. It's unsettling

Some of the many options for how Apostolosian gender could have been presented:

Apostolosians prefer to be addressed by the most neutral available human pronoun, represented as "they" in English, because the human languages don't have anything close enough

Apostolosian pronouns are represented in English by a set of real-life common pronouns and neopronouns

There's a list of Apostolosian pronouns and they're just used in English verbatim (Really impractical because the players need a cheat sheet, but the most fair)

Humans apply human genders to Apostolosians. Apostolosians may be offended, may find it convenient, or something else

As Austin said in the post-mortem, the Eidolon system is not gender. It's represented in English by titles/honorifics/etc

Any of the above, and the creators are aware of the difference between personal pronouns, grammatical gender, and social gender

And that’s not even touching the core problem of what the concept of gender in a futuristic, techonologically advanced society would look like. Yes, I'm complaining about this for the third time but I'm just. So tired of native English speakers' takes on gendered language. They could have made Apostolosian gender look like anything and they made it look like that fucking mess... God, I really hope TM is good enough to make me forget and forgive the experience of listening to “he... sorry, they” for 100 hours. [Note from present me: Well… mostly]

Here’s my take on this: eidolons in Apostolosian language are absurdly broad noun classes with associated classifiers (which fits both the idea that they’re gender but not actually, and that each of them is a patron to several unrelated aspects of life) Apostolosian: the word “(Apo)thesa” is used to refer to people who follow the corresponding eidolon, as well as for counting buildings, heavy machinery, military units, specific strategies and tactics, log entries, historical documents and chronicles, history textbooks and monographs, and eras :) Human: what the fuck

Very critical, imaginative worldbuilding in which 80,000+ years into the future humanity somehow has 21st century gender and 21st century capitalism! TBH, I find any sci-fi set in the far future inherently silly – we can’t really imagine the future technogy and its effect on society. But it feels like C/w barely even tried, and to hear it boast about “critical worldbuilding” is kinda strange. I assumed that meant they build the world critically, not that they recreate modern society or some aspect of it and criticize that! It’s just another Star Trek then! And it was already clear right during the setup when they said “We don’t want Star Trek aliens” and immediately created Apostolosians.

I haven't seen a single piece of fanart with Taako and Mako. Come on, does nobody want to see these two next to each other! Especially considering the outfits artists like to put Taako in!

I really don't understand how and why people do fandom activities on Twitter and Discord where the creators also have accounts. It gives me so much secondhand embarrassment. I can barely peek at Twitter posts before running away. Old-fashioned opinion apparently but I strongly believe the main fandom space and the interaction-with-original-creators space should be separate. I need a space where I can voice my opinions, especially negative ones, with complete freedom. I need to be able to say exactly what's on my mind. But I wouldn't want any of the people on the podcast to read something unfiltered like my complaints above. Being in the same space as the source content creators obliges any decent person to be diplomatic and constructive. And the creators, in turn, need a space where they don't come across complete randos yelling at them about something they said in a podcast three years ago. I'm already feeling uncomfortable because hearing to strangers pour their hearts out for hundreds of hours gives me way too much insight on who they are as people. Of course, nothing’s stopping them from lurking on Tumblr or AO3 and even reading this very post, but a platform where they have official accounts is still a different thing! I even feel uncomfortable talking about the podcast creators using their first names so much. To my ear, referring to a total stranger by first name, especially if it's a shortened form, sounds so rude! I'm not their friend, I don't have that right! But, of course, writing something like “Mr Walker” in my liveblogs would have been even weirder, nobody does that...

Is it a common experience to not even think about fanfiction after listening to Hieron, but going straight to AO3 after C/w? I feel like since Hieron is still a work in progress, writing/reading about it is stepping on the GM&players' toes, and C/w is finished so it's like they gave us the keys to the playground, it's the fandom's turn now. This story has so much blanks and they must be filled! In one of the early episodes they joked that something cute they said would encourage people to ship Mako/Cass and I was like "Bold of you to assume they aren't already" and, indeed, I was right and it's the most popular C/w ship on AO3. Too bad I’m so indifferent to it…

It’s a shame we never had a full scene with Ariadne or even learned what they were up to during the finale.

I still don't understand how Ibex went from “evil CEO” to “leader of a proletarian revolution”, these sound like completely opposite concepts to me

I probably have talked about this too much and have pretty much given up on ever getting a clear picture due to all of these reimaginings but… Righteousness and Voice… Ibex takes Righteousness out of Mako but he still has Voice, that was pretty much openly stated, correct? So how does that work? I’m guessing Righteousness is hidden somewhere in Voice’s code. But if so:

Did Maryland know? On the one hand, she’s too competent not to. On the other, why would she ever allow or accept that?

How did Righteousness not get corrupted by Rigour too? Maybe it did, but broke off the connection with the rest of itself to contain the damage? Or maybe, on the contrary, it kept in contact and was sending intel to Ibex the whole time? But in that case he would have provided more help in the finale.

GIOVANNI’S RP PLOTTING CHEAT-SHEET!

Want new-and-exciting plots for your character? Long to reach out to more of your followers, but don’t know where to start? Fear not! Fill out this form and give your RP partners both present and future all the of juicy jumping off points they need to help you get your characters acquainted.

Be sure to tag the players whose characters YOU want more cues to interact with, andrepost, don’t reblog! Feel free to add or remove sections as you see fit. Template here.

Mun name: Chrissy OOC Contact: Ask/IMs for the most part. I tend to keep my discord private.

Who the heck is my muse anyway?

Giovanni was the primary antagonist for the first generation of games in the Pokemon series and has been such an iconic character that he’s made appearances in the anime and manga. Up top of that he’s been referenced multiple times throughout the game series culminating in his return in USUM. He’s the head of the Pokemon world’s version of the yakuza/mafia known as Team Rocket with the ultimate goal of stealing Pokemon for profit so that he can eventually dominate the world.

Points of interest:

My portrayal of Giovanni actually borrows from multiple sources though mostly I lean heavily towards the games and the anime. Game wise you can consider this blog canon divergent since I completely ignore the Tohjo Falls retcon that happened in HGSS. Giovanni might have heard the radio signal from his executives, but he chose not to answer it and therefore never battled the young trainer from New Bark Town.

Giovanni’s identity as the leader of Team Rocket is a well kept secret that very few people know. Though he has a very public identity as both the Viridian City Gym Leader ( which retains a reputation for being the fiercest and strongest gym in Kanto ) and as a wealthy businessman who’s made generous donations across Kanto

Giovanni is still the Viridian City Gym Leader and in fact rebuilt the gym after Ash’s disastrous battle with Jessie and James. Beneath the Viridian City Gym are the main headquarters for Team Rocket and is generally where Giovanni can be found if he’s not travelling.

Giovanni is Ash’s biological father. Over a decade ago, Giovanni met and fell in love with a young girl from Pallet Town. This has been the single most defining relationship he’s ever had as no other woman has ever compared to Delia Ketchum. But when Giovanni learned of his mother’s death and he chose his career over his family and Delia in return, chose to protect her son over Giovanni and left.

I have two main verses: Rocket verse and Exile verse. My Rocket verse is a general verse for all scenarios that involve Giovanni as head of Team Rocket whether it’s pre-series or post-series in a scenario where he never disbanded Team Rocket. Exile verse is more game oriented and follows the period of time in which Giovanni disbanded Team Rocket and went solo. Although this verse can also apply to scenarios in which Giovanni might have disbanded Team Rocket for different reasons unrelated to the events that happened in the games.  

What they’ve been up to recently:

ROCKET VERSE: Giovanni is currently in the midst of launching Team Rocket’s expansion into the Kalos region after the fall of Team Flare. Though it’s been slow going as he’s facing opposition from outside sources along with remnant Team Flare factions.

EXILE VERSE: Giovanni is currently in Alola mostly to keep an eye on his sons, but also to learn more about the pokemon unique to the region. Mostly though he’s disgruntled and unimpressed with the people and the customs of the region.

CONQUEROR VERSE: having made the discovery of other worlds Giovanni has made plans to conquer the entire multiverse. He is king of his world and intends on being king of several first by taking what resources and research he can while he expands his empire.

Where to find them:

MAIN VERSE / MOST VERSES: Viridian City either at Team Rocket Headquarters or in his personal estate. 

EXILE VERSE:  Generally in his summer home outside of  Hau'oli City, though this verse tends to vary a lot as Giovanni will travel quite a bit.

CONQUERER VERSE: in what is considered TRR headquarters located in an unknown realm that shifts from reality to reality as Giovanni moves to invade another world.

Current plans:

KALOS EXPANSION: with Lysandre dead and Team Flare effectively gone, Giovanni has plans to further Team Rocket’s reach by adding the Kalos region under his control.

RECONCILE WITH SILVER: in the Exile verse, with Team Rocket disbanded Giovanni has come to the slow realisation that his son is the most important part of his life that he’s been ignoring for so long. Unfortunately that relationship has been falling apart for years and he’ll readily accept Silver’s decision if he chooses to cut ties with his father. But until that happens, he’ll do what he can rebuild what he can with his on.

Desired interactions:

More Rocket interactions: I don’t do enough of these. I know there are quite a few Team Rocket blogs floating around, but strangely I’ve yet to get off my ass and plot things out with them.

Early Life/Rise to power: I’ve always wanted to explore this part of Giovanni’s life, basically his teen years to when he becomes head of Team Rocket.

Mafia verse: I have a mafia verse sitting here that I very rarely touch and I want to use it since I’m trash for mafia stuff. I mean look at the character I’m roleplaying, is this really a surprise anymore?

A different choice: lately it’s been really rattling around in my head how different Giovanni would be if he didn’t choose Team Rocket. What kind of man would he be without the corrupting and enabling influence of his organisation? What career would he choose? Would he still just be a criminal anyway? All that stuff that I want to explore.

Recruiting: nothing tickles me more when Giovanni manages to convince someone to join Team Rocket.

Hunting: Giovanni personally hunting down a traitor = fun times

Marriage of convenience: Giovanni marrying someone for advantage. No romance. Nothing. Him and his partner are in this fully knowing that the marriage is a sham. Bonus points of Giovanni ends up divorcing later.

Down with the law: Giovanni evading the law is A+++, especially if it’s with Looker or Anabel.

Offered interactions:

Need a boss? Giovanni is your man as he offers a stable job with great benefits and you’re unlikely to have a boring day.

He’s totally not a dad: if your character needs a dad, then Giovanni is here to fill that role.

Mentor: something Giovanni will very rarely admit and hardly realises himself is that he actually enjoys teaching, but it’d take extenuating circumstances for him to admit that much

Antagonist: well duh, he’s a villain. He’s here to ruin your day if you need it.

Current open post/s:

Not really one for making open posts.

Anything else?:

I happen to have a few pet peeves when roleplaying that I’d appreciate my partners to take into consideration:

Nothing makes me drop a thread faster than characters who have no business knowing that Giovanni is the head of Team Rocket since this is a secret that he’s taken great pains in hiding. There’s canon evidence for this in the games and in nearly every version of anime. So unless your character is a super great at information gatherer as in that’s their career and they have the resources or they’re a high ranking member of Team Rocket, your character should not instantly recognise him as the Rocket Leader.

While it’s a fun little jab OOC now and then, if you seriously start an interaction with me where your character is basically “lol you got defeated by an eleven year old” I’m dropping the thread. In a world where EVERY trainer who isn’t the protag in EVERY game was basically defeated by an eleven year old trainer, this is god damn irritating. And also in character wise? Giovanni wouldn’t put up with that kind of mockery anyway.

Don’t force headcanons on me. Don’t. If you have headcanons that involve Giovanni in some way, discuss them with me and find a middle ground. I really dislike when people make assumptions about my character.

Keep all of the above in mind and we’re all gravy baby!

Tagged by: no one, dug it up from my old blog 

Tagging: @magmaichor, @aquaichor, @caniseirios, @wrathcrowned, @tcpdog, @soulsilvcr, @leaf-fuguri, @agentcatman, @hisrighthand, @rocketsecretary & everyone else!

"How Do I Stop Being Kin!?”: A Helpful Guide (Long Post)

so... yup. tumblr ate some of my archive, including one of my most important posts: a list of steps on how to distance yourself from the kin community. as there’s no way (that i know of) to get that post back... here’s this! 

how to use the guide: all complaints/problems that kin frequently send when they don’t want to be kin anymore? those are in large bold. each complaint has a list of steps on how to solve it; the steps (my responses) are just in the normal font. don’t see what you need? send an ask saying you want to see it in a part 2! 

“I don’t want to be kin with (x) anymore!” 

okay! this one centers mostly around keeping lists. and as i said to the most recent anon, the first step toward stopping is wanting to stop. 

1. get two separate sheets of paper (or start digital documents you can print later). on one, write “(Your Name) List”. on the other, write “(Kintype Name) List.” 

2. fill the YN List first. write down every one of your own traits that you can name. they can relate to appearance, gender, hobbies/interests, mental health, neurodiversity, hopes and aspirations, etc. these do not all have to be good things. try to have a 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 balance of good, bad, and neutral traits. (an example of a bad trait/habit is “nail biting”, because that’s harmful. not “brown hair”. if you don’t like your hair color put “brown hair” down as a neutral trait. it’s not bad, you just want a different color.) 

3. fill the KN (kintype name) list next. do not use “i”, “we”, “myself”, in this list becase it’s not about you. 

  • if it’s a fictional character, write down facts relating to the character’s creation. who’s the author/designer/creator? what year was the source released? what type of media is the source -- a fantasy book, a video game, a movie? emphasize that the character is fictional, not real (add ‘in this universe’ if you believe in the multiverse theory) and cannot be reincarnated. 

• if it’s an animal, write down all of its behaviors: does it eat meat? what sounds does it make? is it dangerous or not? now, if you believe in reincarnation, it’s way more plausible that animals can be reincarnated and their next lives can be as humans. emphasize that even if you were the animal in a past life, you are a human now -- it is not healthy to think you literally still are the animal and/or to behave like it. 

•  if it’s a part of nature, like a star or a tree, write down all the facts about it that you know and emphasize that it is not sentient, it doesn’t have a soul, and it cannot make choices or be reincarnated. 

keep the lists with you (as a physical copy/paper). 

4. tell yourself that it’s okay to like the character, animal, or thing, it’s okay to feel that it represents part of who you are. it’s okay to feel comforted by it when you’ve had a shitty day or you’re in a bad mood. feeling these things does not automatically make you kin. write these down on a small piece of paper and keep the paper with you. 

5. even though it is okay to like the character/animal/thing, slowly start avoiding content that includes it. if you are trying to stop being fictionkin, do not watch the source. stay away from fanfic, pictures, etc, that make you have strong emotions about it. 

6. if you ever are feeling guilty about something your kintype did (and this applies mostly to villain kin), you are projecting. whether you’re feeling guilty about your own mistakes without realizing, or you want the chance to fix something/apologize, you are projecting. if you are acting out what you really, really want the villain to do -- ie, you relate to them strongly but they’re not repentant and you want them to be... rp. start a roleplay blog, write a redemption au. look back at your lists again. 

• if it’s not a villain, but you’re feeling guilty about something bad your kintype did, still do a bit of rp and keep looking back at those lists! 

7. whenever you have “kinfeels” or “kin memories”, look at your YN and KN lists. read them to remind yourself that you are not the same person as the character, not the same being as the animal, and not something inanimate. 

8. try new things and (now i’m not saying this to be a bitch) go outside. i mean it. vitamin d is good for you. you don’t have to exercise, but if you are able to, go for it. visit the library, the park, a coffee shop, the mall, anywhere. test out new hobbies, like 

• writing fiction (could be about the character/animal/thing, if this is how you maintain a connection with it while not identifying as it) 

 • traditional drawing  

 • digital drawing 

 • sewing, knitting, or crochet 

• writing movie critiques/analyses 

• jewelry making 

• making non-kin-related selfcare 

• sports 

“I want to get out of the community, but I’m not ready to let go of my kintypes!” 

so you’re not ready? okay. this is still your first step. you will fuck yourself over badly if you push yourself to 100% stop being kin before you can function without it. this is true in situations like abusive households or trauma: if you pretend that you’re someone else who’s never had to deal with those things, you are using escapism to let off stress and unwind. 

1. change your blog theme. i know it sounds dumb and unrelated. however, having a visual change will make you more inclined to change other things -- and it will start to tell other people in the community that you are able to change. 

2. update your about, kin page, and byf. take things like “don’t follow if you don’t see me as (kintype)”, “no doubles”, and kin-related discourse out of those pages. anything that typically appears in kin cringe comps? take it out. (look through my blog for example of typical cringe comp material.) 

• don’t say “literally me”, “100% me”, “ID” about the kintypes you list. 

• instead of having separate sections for “primary”, “secondary”, “tertiary”, things like that... just say “kintypes” once and list them/insert their pictures. 

• do NOT link to others’ blogs saying “this person is my (canonmate name)!” or “i found my (important canonmate)! 

• whatever your stance on ace discourse... take that out of your pages. i have no idea why, but the kin community is fucking overrun with people thinking that aces/aros aren’t lgbtq+. removing this discourse from your blog will remove you from another common kin community behavior. (it’s totally okay to post ace/aro positivity, but don’t involve yourself in heavy discourse and don’t put “Aces/aros are/aren’t lgbtq!” on your about/kinpage/byf.) 

3. if you list kin friends or kin blogs on one of your pages, consider taking out the links and just describing the friends/blogs. this will distance your blog from the network of kin on here. 

4. instead of requesting “kintype selfcare/positivity” from those kin resource blogs: 

• reblog aesthetics that remind you of the kintypes, but is not labeled as “(kintype) aesthetic”. 

• make some aesthetics yourself based on the kintypes. if you’re tagging, then just use general tags (ie, “kin”, “otherkin”, or “fictionkin”), not specifically the character’s name or the type of animal you identify with. 

• write positive affirmations for yourself, such as “i got enough sleep so this will be a better day!” or “i didn’t lie in bed all day so i feel motivated!” or “i ate something healthy instead of junk food!” 

• if you’re writing affirmations specifically about a kintype, don’t refer to the kintype using “i” or “we”. instead, write “(character) tries their best to fix wrongdoings, so i will too!” or “(character) makes an effort to overcome anxiety, so i’m going to try harder too!” or “(animal) isn’t inherently bad/gross; it’s trying to survive like me!” 

• basically, when writing positivity/affirmations, pick a trait that the kintype has that you want to have too. don’t just say “i have this trait because i am (kintype)!” 

• sorry not sorry, but the overwhelming majority of the positivity on those blogs is useless. it might make you feel better for a couple minutes, but it’s superficial. even if the person running the blog genuinely wants people to feel better, they are still operating under the obligation to give positivity. 

it is not as genuine as it should be. the person doesn’t know who you are, and they might not know a lot about the kintype. the positivity from those blogs is generic, ie, “even if you’ve done some bad things, you’re not a bad person!” You need specifics, which only you can come up with -- because only you know yourself. when something is vague or general, we think deep down that it’s not true. (btw, that’s the same psychology behind the “sounds fake but okay” meme.)

5. if your mutuals get into kin drama, or if you see kin drama on your dash, stay out of it. it does not matter right now if these people are your best friends in the world, because once the drama dies down, your url is still all over those posts. even if the people who started the drama delete the posts, other people have everything saved. the things you said in anger or anxiety or whatever are still on tumblr. and tumblr has an extremely difficult time recognizing that what someone said three months ago doesn’t define what they say now. 

6. unfollow people who have ‘typical cringe comp material’ on their pages and/or people who frequently are involved in drama. 

• if they have “ask to unfollow” on their pages, unfollow anyway. if they harass you about it, block them (and maybe report for... violating community guidelines. or harassment). DON’T PUT THIS ON YOUR PAGES. EVER. FOLLOWING YOU IS NOT A CHORE. MAKING PEOPLE ASK PERMISSION TO UNFOLLOW YOU CAN CAUSE THEM HUGE AMOUNTS OF ANXIETY. IT’S SHITTY AND ENTITLED. DON’T DO IT. 

7. if you’re going to send hate to antis, i can’t stop you, but for fuck’s sake, do that on anon. (”what!?” you say as you read this post. “but don’t antis think anon hate is cowardly!?”) you just don’t want to be known as someone active enough in the community to send off-anon shit. 

8. if i have or another anti/cringe blog has screenshotted your post/page, ask for it to be removed. no promises that other blogs will remove your stuff, but here on kce and over at @only-on-tomblr, we will. having your content up on popular cringe blogs can definitely get you recognized among the community, and you don’t want that. 

“I don’t want to rely so hard on being kin -- I want kin to be a casual thing!” 

1. first off, follow the “i want to get out of the community” list. you don’t have to stop identifying as kin, you just need to distance yourself from that network of over the top, hardcore kin people. 

2. recognize that kin is your coping mechanism. it is okay to use escapism (that’s what kin is tbh) to cope. it is okay to step away from reality, unwind, then go back to reality after a few hours of doing kin stuff/rp. 

3. recognize that any coping mechanism is going to be harmful when you take it too far. when it goes too far, it becomes an obsession. (because i am sure someone’s going to say this, i’m not dragging special interests. those are not the same as coping mechanisms gone wrong and this post does not relate to special interests.) 

4. guess what? you don’t need just one coping mechanism. and because you’re not completely dropping the kintypes, you need to focus your kin-related energy into a creative outlet. what i mean by that is... write about them. draw pictures of them. do commissions, even for people who have the same kintype. not to mention, if you write about/draw them a lot, you are getting so much better at those skills. 

5. optional: it would also help to make lists of your traits and the kintypes’ traits, like in the first section of this post. 

6. as with the other sections, do not refer to the kintypes as “myself”/”i”. 

that’s about it 

Other things you can do 

• write a brief analysis of an episode, movie, chapter, etc in which the character/kintype appears. what does the person/being do and why? how do their actions result in the episode/chapter/game/movie ending? how do other characters react to it? and how is this different from what you would do, right now, if you were in the same situation? (obviously no one has to see it, so doesn’t matter if it sucks) 

• interact with people who have the same kintype so you can become more comfortable with “doubles” and thus be less intense about being kin 

• when you’re watching/reading/playing/listening to new media (’source’), and you begin to have “kinfeels” for someone, step back. put the book down. pause the show or podcast. remind yourself that this is fiction. even if the multiverse does exist, your kintype cannot cross between universes and ‘be’ you. you are most likely projecting onto the character or you are inspired to create a similar character/oc. 

• aaand.... here it comes... oh god. oh no. limit your time on tumblr. do not spend all day on this forsaken hellsite.  

Things to absolutely NOT do 

• post anything like “why did the author put me/kintype in a relationship with a girl!? i’m gay!” all that does is imply that you think you have some kind of ownership over someone else’s character. it makes you look like you want everything to go your way -- and not everything can. i am not saying that to be a jerk. 

• ask people to unfollow you. as i said before (now, i don’t have anxiety so this isn’t from firsthand experience), do you have any idea how much anxiety that causes people? and how shitty a thing it is to do? 

• harass someone over being a double 

• tell them to unfollow/stop interacting because they are a double 

• compare being kin to being trans or nonbinary. for fuck’s sake. there’s no such thing as a “kingender”.

                     - even if your kintype was female in ‘your source’, but wasn’t                                  female in canon... that does not mean you are trans and it does                            not mean the kintype is trans.    

                    - even if you are trans yourself, it has absolutely nothing to do with                        you identifying as kin. they are not related. you are a trans person                        who also happens to be kin.    

                   - things like “canidgender: a gender that feels tough and ready to                           defend, a gender that makes you feel alert, a gender that....” are not                     real. gender is not an emotion. besides, these descriptions have                            nothing to do with gender. 

  • say that you have dysphoria about your kintype. again, if you have dysphoria, it’s because you are transgender/nonbinary. you do not have “species dysphoria” about your astral ears. just because it’s listed on google with a definition does not mean it’s legit. 

• use ‘kin pronouns’ like glitch/glitchs/glitchself. ne/nes/neself. star/stars/starself. it/its. the very concept of kin pronouns suggests that gender is automatically tied to kin. it’s not. and you are not an object. 

• send people hate or get into discourse about headcanons involving your kintype 

• tag art as “me” or “kin” or “id”. even if the artist says it’s okay, avoiding this is another way to distance yourself from a harmful community. if you need/want to keep a tagging system, just tag it with the character’s name or the type of animal. 

• tell someone that they are “your (important canonmate). 

• especially do not tell someone that your characters dated and that you must begin a romantic relationship because of that! 

• insist that someone just has to remember something that you remember! here’s an appropriate exchange on this. 

              you: “do you remember when our kintypes had that huge fight, then                     made up and dated for a few months? we drifted apart and stopped                    dating.” 

              them: “no... i recall something different.” 

               you: “oh. well, that’s okay!” 

comments i just know i’m going to get (they’re useless. don’t post them and don’t send them to me) 

• you’re policing our identities! 

•you can’t dictate how we cope! 

• you can’t take away our fun! 

• how would you know how this stuff works? you’re not kin! 

• ableist! 

• go do something productive! 

• i don’t care. i’m doing these things anyway! 

-k 

Failed Terraforming Experiment Mastertheory

You may have seen this one on FV itself, but some of the first posts I’m going to be making will be compiling some headcannon/theory things I’ve said around the forums. A lot of my personal theories and headcannons tie back into this one, so I figured this would be a good one to make the first post. I’m going to try to keep this one compatible with any on-site lore, so this theory may change as official lore is added. Enjoy!

The world of Furvilla is the modern remains of a failed terraforming experiment, started by humans. The Minipets and the Villagers were both created as tools to eventually make the planet of Furvilla suited for human use. The project was abandoned thousands of years ago, and humans have long gone extinct from this world. Let's start at the beginning... Humans decided to expand their reach in the galaxy by habiting a new planet, something they may or may not have done before. This planet was specifically chosen for its resemblance to Earth, with a similar star, orbit, and temperature. The only two issues with this planet were 1, humans couldn't survive in the atmosphere without the use of oxygen tanks and bio-suits, and 2, the planet was already inhabited by a thriving ecosystem. Four bases were eventually set up, each in a unique biome and strategic location that would be pivotal to destroying the existing ecosystems and molding the world for human habitation. The first and most important base was underwater, as this location was the safest from local fauna attacks. Long after the base and its buildings had rotted away, this area would later become Oceandome as later settlers found it just as safe as the humans had many eons ago. Later bases were made in the regions that would eventually become Olde Foxbury, Dragonsmaw Manor, and Tigereye Peak. In every case, these bases and most of the buildings that were part of them were slowly eroded away by weather and aggressive monster attacks, eventually leaving only manmade objects such as metal pieces and toxic waste. (Quetzal Palace was settled much later) But, let's get back to the past. After establishing themselves on this hostile planet, the humans got started on changing the planet to fit them. Logically, it made the most sense to tackle the 'simpler' problem first: destroying the native life. It would reduce the risk to the humans if the planet was wiped clean of hostile fauna, so that they could change the planet's atmosphere and native floral life in relative peace. On top of this, the 'monsters' were just not aesthetically pleasing to humans. Enter the "Minipet". Technically just called "animals", minipets were genetically engineered to be the ultimate invasive species. Every minipet was created to occupy the same niche as a native 'monster', aggressive or non-aggressive, and drive it into extinction by out-competing it. This is why minipets breed so quickly and are born almost fully formed, only needing a full breeding cooldown to go from newborn to maturity. However, this had an unintended consequence. Though most of the monster species were driven to extinction, there were many gigantic predators that seized this new opportunity and thrived. Many of the worst of the aggressive monsters ended up coming even closer to the encampments than before, chasing their new food source like a fox chasing chickens right back to the farm. This is why most of the monsters you know are so belligerent and come close to your modern villages. Your excess minipets are monster chow. If you've ever wondered why minipets and monsters look so very different, the artificial creation is the reason why. The two groups are completely unrelated, minipets were created to resemble Earth-concepts and be aesthetically pleasing to the humans while monsters evolved totally independently in an atmosphere different from Earth. Thanks to their engineering, minipets were able to survive in this environment without a bio-suit just like a native monster, and this ended up being more useful than the scientists ever thought they would be despite the extra monster attacks, which gave the humans a new idea... Enter the Villager. A genetically engineered creature didn't need a bio-suit to work, it didn't need to eat human rations, and it was disposable if it got injured. They had already made animals, the next step was to give them a useful upright gait and make them intelligent enough to take human orders and do human work. After a few experiments with minipets and making them more intelligent (one of these experiments lead to the Quetzal Palace serpent), the first Villager was born. The Villagers were created to be the servants and workers of the human colonists. This is why Villagers have a deep desire to expand, explore, and colonize. Another big upgrade from the minipets was the ability to change to fit any scenario. At every villager's core is a Shifty, and morphing potions were a quick way to change a villager from one form into another form that better fits the task they needed to complete. A human could quickly change their flying corvid into a strong bear when a monster attacked, without the need to bring multiple Villagers. Every human only needed a few loyal Villagers thanks to the potion system, and towards the end of their stay, they needed even less when the Shifty potion was eventually created, giving Villagers the ability to freely transform into anything they could personally imagine. The shifty potion was the last potion to be created, all other potions and forms were created before the Shifty potion but are just being re-discovered. But, the human civilization did not last. Perhaps the project ran out of funds, perhaps the encampments failed from repeated monster raids, perhaps the Villagers revolted. The terraforming experiment was abandoned, and the humans evacuated. While many of them took their personal Villagers and minipets, far many more Villagers and minipets were left for dead on a wild planet. Without the creators, the creations were aimless. Little more than 'servants' or tools to their human owners, very few Villagers knew how to read and even less know how to work the leftover technology, and thus they were essentially sent back to the stone age. They had to go back to using spears and axes, and created tribes as they tried to survive. Any humans who got left behind eventually either died from bio-suit malfunction, monster attacks, or just plain old age, despite the best efforts of their Villagers to keep them alive. This is why human skulls can be found all over the world, especially near the colonized areas, and why they're super-rare. That was thousands of years ago. Humans and their accomplishments are barely a memory, remembered only by ancient remains and leftover technology such as amulets or the impressive Quetzal Palace serpent. The sites of great civilization were uninhabited for centuries, but no longer! It has been a slow climb, but Furvilla is on the cusp of a great technological revolution. Five major cultures have appeared, and with them, five great nations. Education, new careers, and a greater standard of living is within Villagerkind's grasp, scattered all about the places they currently call home. The game we are all playing is the start of a golden age, and things are finally looking stable on this unnamed planet we've been calling Furvilla.

GIOVANNI’S RP PLOTTING CHEAT-SHEET!

Want new-and-exciting plots for your character? Long to reach out to more of your followers, but don’t know where to start? Fear not! Fill out this form and give your RP partners both present and future all the of juicy jumping off points they need to help you get your characters acquainted.

Be sure to tag the players whose characters YOU want more cues to interact with, andrepost, don’t reblog! Feel free to add or remove sections as you see fit. Template here.

Mun name: Chrissy OOC Contact: Ask/IMs for the most part. I tend to keep my discord/skype private.

Who the heck is my muse anyway?

Giovanni was the primary antagonist for the first generation of games in the Pokemon series and has been such an iconic character that he’s made appearances in the anime and manga and has been referenced multiple times throughout the game series. He’s the head of the Pokemon world’s version of the yakuza/mafia known as Team Rocket with the ultimate goal of stealing Pokemon for profit so that he can eventually dominate the world. 

Points of interest:

My portrayal of Giovanni actually borrows from multiple sources though mostly I lean heavily towards the games and the anime. Game wise you can consider this blog canon divergent since I completely ignore the Tohjo Falls retcon that happened in HGSS. Giovanni might have heard the radio signal from his executives, but he chose not to answer it and therefore never battled the young trainer from New Bark Town.

Giovanni’s identity as the leader of Team Rocket is well kept secret that very few people know. Though he has a very public identity as both the Viridian City Gym Leader ( which retains a reputation for being the fiercest and strongest gym in Kanto ) and as a wealthy businessman who’s made generous donations across Kanto

Giovanni is still the Viridian City Gym Leader and in fact rebuilt the gym after Ash’s disastrous battle with Jessie and James. Beneath the Viridian City Gym are the main headquarters for Team Rocket and is generally where Giovanni can be found if he’s not travelling.

Giovanni is Ash’s biological father. Though the only Ash I’ll acknowledge this with is @ofpalletown​. Over a decade ago, Giovanni met and fell in love with a young girl in Pallet Town. This has been the single most defining relationship he’s ever had as no other woman has ever compared to Delia Ketchum. But when Giovanni learned of his mother’s death and he learned that Delia was pregnant, Giovanni chose his career over his family and left Delia in the middle of the night without a word.

I have two main verses: Rocket verse and Exile verse. My Rocket verse is a general verse for all scenarios that involve Giovanni as head of Team Rocket whether it’s pre-series or post-series in a scenario where he never disbanded Team Rocket. Exile verse is more game oriented and follows the period of time in which Giovanni disbanded Team Rocket and went solo. Although this verse can also apply to scenarios in which Giovanni might have disbanded Team Rocket for different reasons unrelated to the events that happened in the games.  

What they’ve been up to recently:

ROCKET VERSE: Giovanni is currently in the midst of launching Team Rocket’s expansion into the Kalos region after the fall of Team Flare. Though it’s been slow going as he’s facing opposition from outside sources along with remnant Team Flare factions.

EXILE VERSE: Giovanni is currently in Alola mostly to keep an eye on his sons, but also to learn more about the pokemon unique to the region. Mostly though he’s disgruntled and unimpressed with the people and the customs of the region.

Where to find them:

MAIN VERSE / MOST VERSES: Viridian City either at Team Rocket Headquarters or in his personal estate. Though lately he’s been spending more time in a certain house in Pallet Town.

EXILE VERSE:  Generally in his summer home outside of  Hau'oli City, though this verse tends to vary a lot as Giovanni will travel quite a bit.

PREQUEL VERSE: As a guest in Delia Ketchum’s home in Pallet Town

Current plans:

KALOS EXPANSION: with Lysandre dead and Team Flare effectively gone, Giovanni has plans to further Team Rocket’s reach by adding the Kalos region under his control.

RECONCILE WITH SILVER: in the Exile verse, with Team Rocket disbanded Giovanni has come to the slow realisation that his son is the most important part of his life that he’s been ignoring for so long. Unfortunately that relationship has been falling apart for years and he’ll readily accept Silver’s decision if he chooses to cut ties with his father. But until that happens, he’ll do what he can rebuild what he can with his on.

Desired interactions:

More Rocket interactions: I don’t do enough of these. I know there are quite a few Team Rocket blogs floating around, but strangely I’ve yet to get off my ass and plot things out with them.

Early Life/Rise to power: I’ve always wanted to explore this part of Giovanni’s life, basically his teen years to when he becomes head of Team Rocket.

Mafia verse: I have a mafia verse sitting here that I very rarely touch and I want to use it since I’m trash for mafia stuff. I mean look at the character I’m roleplaying, is this really a surprise anymore?

A different choice: lately it’s been really rattling around in my head how different Giovanni would be if he didn’t choose Team Rocket. What kind of man would he be without the corrupting and enabling influence of his organisation? What career would he choose? Would he still just be a criminal anyway? All that stuff that I want to explore.

Recruiting: nothing tickles me more when Giovanni manages to convince someone to join Team Rocket.

Hunting: Giovanni personally hunting down a traitor = fun times

Marriage of convenience: Giovanni marrying someone for advantage. No romance. Nothing. Him and his partner are in this fully knowing that the marriage is a sham. Bonus points of Giovanni ends up divorcing later.

Down with the law: Giovanni evading the law is A+++, especially if it’s with Looker or Anabel.

Offered interactions:

Need a boss? Giovanni is your man as he offers a stable job with great benefits and you’re unlikely to have a boring day.

He’s totally not a dad: if your character needs a dad, then Giovanni is here to fill that role. 

Mentor: something Giovanni will very rarely admit and hardly realises himself is that he actually enjoys teaching, but it’d take extenuating circumstances for him to admit that much

Antagonist: well duh, he’s a villain. He’s here to ruin your day if you need it.

Current open post/s:

Not really one for making open posts.

Anything else?:

I happen to have a few pet peeves when roleplaying that I’d appreciate my partners to take into consideration: 

Nothing makes me drop a thread faster than characters who have no business knowing that Giovanni is the head of Team Rocket since this is a secret that he takes great pains in hiding. There’s canon evidence for this in the games and in nearly every version of anime. So  unless your character is a super great at information gatherer as in that’s their career and they have the resources or they’re a high ranking member of Team Rocket, your character should not instantly recognise him as the Rocket Leader.

While it’s a fun little jab OOC now and then, if you seriously start an interaction with me where your character is basically “lol you got defeated by an eleven year old” I’m dropping the thread. In a world where EVERY trainer who isn’t the protag in EVERY game was basically defeated by an eleven year old trainer, this is god damn irritating. And also in character wise? Giovanni wouldn’t put up with that kind of mockery anyway.

Don’t force headcanons on me. Don’t. If you have headcanons that involve Giovanni in some way, discuss them with me and find a middle ground. I really dislike when people make assumptions about my character. 

Keep all of the above in mind and we’re all gravy baby!

Tagged by: tagged by @meiliva & @pxgtails

Tagging: anyone and everyone!

Video Games Turned Me Into a Nazi

Hail The Guardian for saying what we're all thinking despite reams of academic data to the contrary. Games are far right tools of indoctrination. Every Head-Crab you crowbarred to death in Half-Life makes The Wall a few inches higher. Do you really think the aliens in that game were called 'Race X' for no reason? Wake up, racist gamers.

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});

"Although affected by context, video games have long focused on the expulsion of “aliens” (Space Invaders to XCOM), fear of impure infection (Half-Life to The Last of Us), border control (Missile Commander to Plants vs Zombies), territory acquisition (Command & Conquer to Splatoon), empire building (Civilization to Tropico), princess recovery (Mario to Zelda), and restoration of natural harmony (Sonic to FarmVille).

Second, video games put the user to work on an instinctual level, making the gamer feel impulsive agreement with these ideologies."

Sonic is a Nazi now. So writes Alfie Bown with a sub-par rehash of Sigmund Freud's most outdated ideas. This piece isn't going to be a slam dunk piece on how stupid that idea is; Twitter has already trampled it into the dust, and I'll splatter a few choice tweets like alien brain matter through this piece for your delectation. I want more to have a look beyond Alfie Bown and his reductive nonsense to the deeper tale. For years now we have talked about a certain pursuit being the Fountain of all Evil, corrupting the young and making the world a degenerate place. Bown is making an ideological argument instead of the intellectual one. There is an argument to be made that the ever-presence of technology as a whole has changed humans. Have you ever found yourself alone at a restaurant table and discovered you were suddenly online? This is followed by the not quite understood social faux-pas of someone returning from the bathroom whilst you are in the midst of tweet composition. Do you delay interaction with someone in the real world while you drop knowledge bombs on anime avatars? This applies to messages, Facebook, and yes mobile games are included. This is a conversation that should about what effect our technology has had on our attention span and our willingness to be alone with ourselves for any fraction of time- not that there are political ideologies being stealthed into our culture through shoot 'em ups that will make you a race realist.

Yes, you read that correctly, XCOM has xenophobic undertones; it doesn’t matter if your squad was a beacon of diversity or that you were defending yourself from a hostile alien force that sought out to violently subjugate humanity, those aliens represent refugees, silly!

— Bunty King ♔ (@realbuntyking) March 12, 2018

So, how is it that we still see claims of video games being the root of all evil? Because psychologically we are trapped in a confusing reality of polarized political opinions that are resistant to change. I don't know if any leftists read this magazine, but let me assure you- this isn't an attack on left ideology per se, though I have come to see incredibly dangerous flaws in that thinking. This mental cage we have built for society is not a left or right wing idea, it is a deeper concept, one of a purity test. The Christian Right burnt records by The Beatles, and racists attacked Elvis for bringing the corrupting power of Black music to White audiences. Now we see the Regressive Left building another filter through which to strain the dregs of culture, and this frame is fixated on trying to understand how people come to be woke on ideas like ingroup preference within ethnic groups, replacement migration, the Islamification of Europe and even that it is okay to be White.

The answer when you are viewing the world from a purely ideological perspective is of course that all the evil in the world comes from who you believe are your enemies. Bown believes that what he thinks of as conservative ideas like border control and sexual dimorphism are not just ideas to be contended with and argued against, but examples of impurity in society. As his own subheading states:

"Violent, isolationist and misogynist desires course through games – and push rightwing ideologies on players."

A better statement would be perhaps- violent, isolationist and misogynist experiences course through humanity itself. We might disagree with this and wish to become more than the animal we are, but this hierachy still exists! How we deal with this and reconcile the advanced mind of human beings with the animalistic, tribal desires of the beasts within is important. That might be a good question- instead, Bown projects behavioral traits onto people as a group through their shared activity- the classic GamerGate tactic which the records show doesn't work and makes you look rather silly in the process.

As we know,  Fritz Heider (1958) suggested that we have a tendency to give causal explanations for someone’s behavior, often by crediting either the situation or the person’s disposition- this is Attribution Theory. I hold this statement to be true, born out by observing reality as impartially as we can. You are a Nazi because I disagree with you and you are a Nazi because you do this unrelated action that I think made you into even more of a Nazi. This is the argument from the Left today- this is the anti-Gamer Gate argument, this is the argument that led to Martin Sellner, Brittany Pettibone and Lauren Southern being denied entry to the United Kingdom. It is this attitude that leads to Tommy Robinson being attacked in the street by masked men and the disruption of lectures by Carl Benjamin, Peter Boghossian, Christina Hoff Sommers and Jordan Peterson to name but a few.

Because these people are overtly opposed to broad church Progressivism, they are attributed with the trait of being a known fascist. This perspective is reinforced because they give speeches against Progressivism- that means, against authoritarian states, against neo-Marxism- they take actions that confirms their opinions, they are authentic in this manner, realized. That's the second attribution, now we have a physical and psychological image of who these people are in our minds, we know they are not just in disagreement, they act, and they are acting against us so they must be our enemies too and that is why we have to suppress or stop them. If you are familiar with Jeanette Falarca and her group By Any Means Necessary you will see how far this line of thinking will justify violence and harassment towards people who have been labeled as Nazis.

I was in his lair fighting him on a platform over lava, where the platform kept shifting, trying to throw us both off of it. I persevered, and as Iggy was thrown into the lava at the end of our battle, he shouted out, "have you read Mein Kampf?!" before slowly burning to death.

— Colin Moriarty (@notaxation) March 12, 2018

Attacking video games is a method leftists have struck on to try and explain to each other why their enemies exist. This indicates such a paucity of discourse between politically engaged people that we are looking at a discourse-less future of disagreement, and with the effective banning of right-wing opinions in totality in the United Kingdom, this future can only be violent.

Because someone disagrees with you does not make them an enemy that needs to be dehumanized and destroyed. Bown argues that video games can cause violent behavior along ideological lines as the themes in video games are not neo-Marxist. Well, isn't that just an expression that he feels that his ideology is losing in an arms race? I disagree with his premise, but surely his conclusion is the worst form of tribalism also.

"Currently, the new desires incubated by games lean far to the right, and without more progressive games on the market (though some are emerging), the future may be even bleaker than the political present."

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});

The link in that quote is to a Kotaku article about a video game that is about making a socialist society. It is not that Bown cares about the potential of technology (including video games) to alter humanity. He cares that technology is not being used to change humans in the right way according to his ideological beliefs. As a society we have to transcend this partisan thinking or at least find a neutral field in which our polarizing beliefs can engage with each other without descending into demonization. The survival of our civilization depends on it.

Thank you for reading Republic Standard. We publish this magazine and the Freebird Forum because we believe in free speech- but it doesn't come cheap! Will you make a small donation towards our running costs? You can make a difference by clicking here.

The Republic Standard Web Shop is now open! Every piece of merchandise you buy is a victory against the nerds.

from Republic Standard | Conservative Thought & Culture Magazine http://ift.tt/2FEf8Nl via IFTTT

The Week in Anime (Week of 7/17/17)

Hello hello and welcome to another weekly edition of TWiA! We have some words for a bunch of shows as always, so let’s start it off right away with the classic:

Rankings:

1 (+6). Isekai Shokudou (great/10) [2/?]

2 (NEW). New Game!! (great/10) [1/12]

3 (+1). Kakegurui (8/10) [3/12]

4 (-2). Sakura Quest (7.5/10) [15/25]

5 (-4). Ballroom e Youkoso (great/10) [2/24]

6 (-3). Tsurezure Children (good/10) [2/?]

7 (-2). Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season (7/10) [15/25]

8 (0). Nana Maru San Batsu (decent/10) [2/12]

9 (-3). Centaur no Nayami (decent/10) [2/12]

10 (NEW). Isekai wa Smartphone to Tomo ni (meh/10) [1/?]

Awards

The Sequel Show of the Week: New Game!!

The exclamation points symbolize my excitement for this show. Because it’s back, with those colorful characters we all know and love! This episode started off a bit... questionable with the whole fanservice scene but otherwise it was nice start to the series’ second installment. Not to mention my favorite character from last year’s back and better than ever, with the new goal to overcome her shyness (Hifumi if you don’t know). Who knew that crippling social anxiety could be so cute?

Otherwise there’s not much else to say about the show for now. It’s still super colorful and the storyline with the new game (heh) sounds like it could be a nice platform for the characters to develop further. I’m excited to see the new characters shown in the OP too, though also a bit weary knowing all too well how one bad character can ruin a show for me (Stella no Mahou, Hinako Note). 

The Old School Sports Show of the Season Award: Nana Maru San Batsu

I mentioned this last week, but it was reaffirmed with this week’s episode. Because this week we get introduced to “rival who’s better than everyone and knows it”, and “old childhood friend who’s now on the opposing team”. Wao, how creative.

On an unrelated note, I actually dropped this show at first when they introduced the rival. But then I gave the show a second shot, and hey it wasn’t too bad. It’s definitely got the feel of a sports shounen, which I’m not really too keen about given I don’t usually like these shows. But I’m sticking around for the quiz questions and to learn more about quiz bowl. Hopefully we get more of an emphasis on that.

The “Something’s Off” Award: Centaur no Nayami

Finishing the episode, I didn’t know what to feel. Because it wasn’t really that bad of an episode. Sure, there were a few moments that were questionable, like the whole dress-up thing with Akechi or the wing-cuddling scene with Akechi or just any scene with Akechi (who’s apparently become my least favorite character in the show). But IDK, I wouldn’t say it was boring or a bad episode of anime. Yet there’s something that felt... off about the show. I don’t know what it is exactly, but there were a lot of factors in the show that made it feel kinda weird.

The first thing I noticed off the bat was the lack of BGM. It can be good if used correctly, but not here. The silent moments felt awkward and didn’t really contribute to anything. Another thing I noticed was that the pacing of the show was off. An example of that was the sudden jump from the main trio to a random couple in the background: it was pretty jarring, even with the somewhat cute payoff in the end. Finally, and the most important, was that it just lacked emotion. I went through the whole episode, and in the end I felt... nothing. Like I was just sitting in my chair for 23 minutes doing nothing. All of these problems could probably be traced to a lack of good directing, which makes sense given the director and the studio behind the show. With all that in mind though, I’ll still continue watching this show. It isn’t terribly boring to me and there were some enjoyable moments despite what I said literally a few moments ago. And honestly that makes it better than a lot of shows I’ve given a shot this season, so it’s still a nice Sunday watch for now.

The “I Guess It’s a Thing” Award: Isekai wa Smartphone to Tomo ni

I guess this is a reoccurring award now. At least until the season settles in and I have a static list of shows.

So yeah, this show with the isekai and smartphone. It was a thing. One thing that was on my mind the whole time was that this show reminded me a lot of Flying Witch, and not in a good way. For those of you who don’t know, Flying Witch was a show I didn’t like, and for a somewhat silly reason. That reason? It just... feels off. Like the characters are “too happy” for lack of a better term. I mean every character in that show lacks any snark/sarcasm and everybody’s so positive and happy. Coming from someone who hangs out with some sarcastic self-deprecating people, it’s weird.

So we come back to this show, which had that sorta same vibe. The main character felt... off. He wasn’t overly positive, but he kinda took everything thrown at him a bit too calmly. Sure, he did the right things by showing a willingness to learn stuff like magic and reading/writing, but he wasn’t very interesting. Like the shows below, I’m strongly considering dropping this, but I’ll give it a few more episodes to see how the other characters are. But so far it’s not particularly an interesting watch.

The “Red Flags” Dropped Show of the Week Award: Several shows below starting with...

Hajimete no Gal

Just... I’m not about that lyfe. Ecchi shows aren’t really my thing and on top of that the character design is pretty questionable and I really don’t like the main character’s friends. I didn’t get very far into this show (like 4 minutes in), but it was enough to know that there are better shows that I could be spending my time on.

Dive!! and Gamers!

Boring. That’s really what it boils down to for these two shows. Funny considering the total number of exclamation points in both of the titles.

Konbini Kareshi

Technically I should’ve watched this show last week but I didn’t like having the voices come from only my left earbud. Well I found a legitimate source (AKA I renewed my premium Crunchyroll subscription) and finally watched the episode. And... then I dropped it. You know that type of character design that’s present in a lot of BL-type media? Well that was a thing with this show. I didn’t let that stop me though, and continued on. In the end it was the fact that this show, like the two shows above, was pretty boring. Plus romance isn’t really in short supply with the shows that have it this season (well show), so it’s not too necessary for me to watch this to get my romance fix.

Youkoso Jitsuryoku Shijou Shugi no Kyoushitsu e

Before watching this episode, I saw comparisons to Oregairu. Well, that’s not really true. This is the second time I’ve watched an anime because of Oregairu connections, the first being Gi(a)rlish Number. The problem with this show was not with the characters, but with the premise. Character-wise I can see how people compared it to Oregairu: the MCs of the two shows are kinda similar, there’s the long black-haired ice queen, and there’s the genki characters. But with this show, the whole idea of the show didn’t attract me too much, and I didn’t get very far before deciding to watch the next show on my list.

Best Episode of the Week: Isekai Shokudou

One word: WHOLESOME. This week’s episode single-handedly put this show all the way up to #1, and the reason for that is how wholesome it was. Apparently watching people enjoy eating good food is comforting. Who knew?

But yeah, that was a dang good episode of anime. I was smiling the whole time watching the people eat, and I got emotional both halves of the story when the girl was talking about her dead grandpa (relative?) and when the guy was rushing back to the restaurant with the biggest grin on his face for frickin fried shrimp. It’s still too early, but so far this show’s risen up to be my favorite of the season, and dare I say year? Well, that might be a bit premature. If there’s one thing I don’t like about the show so far though it’s the fantasy elements during the beginning of the storylines, but that’s kinda nitpicky since those help to create a backstory for the character so there’s more impact when we see them enjoy the food. I’m also a bit worried about the dragon character from last episode (with her whole treasure = restaurant thing potentially causing issues down the road) and there’s also the concern of how the other characters’ll be. But for now, I’ll just enjoy the show and the food.

And that’s all for this week! Hopefully with only one more show on my radar for this season, the rankings above should be fairly solid (give or take a few shows). So far this season’s off to a good start; hopefully it stays good. As always thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post!