#of the end times being extremely imminent comes from - a lot of complex calculations from numbers in daniel and revelation etc | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

iscariotapologist · 3 years

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Important question! I know you are former SDA. Aren’t they annihilationist? Are you still Annhilationist? This is so interesting to me because I have yet to meet a Christian who is not a little bit afraid of Hellfire! You see I myself have complicated feelings about Hell. I hope it either doesn’t exist or is empty.

eventually yes they are, but it is a little more complicated than that - in sda eschatology as i was taught, at the second coming the living wicked die (first time) and the wicked dead stay that way for the millennium (a literal thousand years) during which satan is allowed to run around on earth and plot and plan and whatever and the saved are in heaven. there, god and the saved are going over the records of everyone who ever lived to see why they were or weren't saved (this doesn't change anything it's just to see). at the end of the millennium everyone comes back down to earth and all the wicked dead are raised and join satan to try to overcome the new jerusalem/holy city, this goes as well as you might imagine and then all the wicked + satan are killed (again) forever and the saved are free to live eternally on the new earth. so yes, they are annihilated.

an important part of the sda idea of the state of the dead is that those who are dead remain unconscious until the second coming of christ. there are no humans in heaven (or hell which isn't actually thought of as a thing that exists until the end) except for those that the bible specifically names as being taken up to heaven (enoch, elijah, moses, those raised at the resurrection of jesus, etc.). this is why there's multiple alive-dead-alive again-dead again events that are important, and also part of why adventists are so weird about saints.

now, for all that growing up sda traumatized me in many ways, fear of an eternal hell wasn't one of those, and i think this is probably adventism's only not-horrible feature. however, an adjacent kind of fear was transferred to the part i skipped over where if you're a Real Christian in the end times you get hunted and tortured/killed by the evil catholic government for going to church on saturday. if you're lucky god will let you die first. also this is going to start happening Very Fucking Soon so better tell god you'd rather die now. this is a bad thing to internalize as a kid! but i did miss out on the eternal hell bit. i wasn't afraid of that, just of the government sponsored torture.

i don't consider myself christian, and i'm pretty agnostic about the afterlife, so i can't say i am afraid of hellfire. if i had to pick a belief about it, i resonate with the idea of purgatorial universalism, and the orthodox christian idea of heaven and hell not being different locations but rather being relative positions to the love of god.

#ask to tag if anyone wants for the apocalypse/end times stuff!#i hope this is coherent #it's difficult to explain this stuff to people without sda background knowledge because their whole worldview is very #carefully constructed to have a meticulous explanation for everything in the bible BUT its also very fragile and only makes #any kind of sense from within that paradigm. so if youre looking at this and saying 'what the fuck' or 'this doesnt make sense'#thats because it doesnt make sense.#adventists also refuse to accept any number in the bible as being not literal (yes this is stupid) which is where a lot of the sense #of the end times being extremely imminent comes from - a lot of complex calculations from numbers in daniel and revelation etc #that they have deduced to mean jesus is coming approximately in two weeks better get ready #god theres SO much more insane adventist stuff i could go on about its all so strange but this got long #seventh day adventism #sda #ex sda #the ask tag #freeandclear3567

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artemis-entreri · 4 years

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[[ Artemis is finally coming to Idle Champions! 😄🥰😍 I am super pleased with his imminent arrival, although this wasn’t always the case. However, Codename Entertainment has not only satisfied my expectations, they’ve blown them out of the water.

I’d been anticipating Artemis’ addition to the game with both excitement and dread. Excitement for the obvious reasons, and dread because I’m extremely particular about how he’s presented. Too many people erroneously depict Artemis too pale, to the point of making him a white dude, when in reality, as a native Calishite, Artemis’ skin tone would be dusky brown, similar to how people from our world’s Middle East look. Furthermore, an oft-overlooked fact is that even in canon, Artemis is stated to have brown skin. Post-Shade absorption his skin is tinted gray, but gray mixed with brown is brown-gray, not grayish-white like many people think it is for some reason.

The second mistake that many make is depicting him too young. While Artemis’ exact age isn’t known due to his birthdate not being known, during The Sellswords he estimates himself to be in his 40s. Calculating based on this, he first meets Drizzt in his early 30s, and first set off after Regis in his late 20s. While he’s not old, he’s not exactly young either. It is explicitly stated in the books that his aging was frozen to his middle-ages. Many people depict Artemis with the face of a 20-year-old, and while it is also stated in the books that he has the lean athleticism of someone half his age, this refers more to the exceptional state of his physique rather than his facial features.

I’m so happy about how Idle Champions has exactly nailed down Artemis’ physical appearance. His skin color is appropriately dark, comprising of an awesome mix of brown and gray. His portrait shows the wrinkles of an older man (who also happens to be done with your shit. XD)

His in game sprite is such a delight too! When I first saw it, I couldn’t help but wonder if CNE’s artists might’ve considered my own artwork in making his design. Pretty much everything I’d studied from Lockwood’s paintings is there: the concave shape at the bottom of his leather breastplate, the distinct triangular cloak clasp under which extends the two belts, shoulderpads over sleeves composed of strips ending in rivets, a double-belt with unique angular-shaped buckles, belt over one leg, vambraces arcing over and around his elbows, kneepads over his tall boots, dual belts over his boots and the double earrings. Heck, even the sword and dagger shape are the same as how I’d interpreted them.

Honestly, if I’d been designing his sprite, there is very little that I’d have done differently. For comparison, here’s the line art of a chibi-style painting I did back in 2015:

I can’t express how giddy I am that CNE’s artists apparently studied Lockwood’s paintings as much as I had. It’s something that pretty much no other artist I know has bothered to do. They picked up even the smallest details, for instance the shape of the base of Artemis’ sword, which is really such a minor feature in this painting:

There are some aspects in CNE’s depiction that don’t come from Lockwood’s paintings that I can’t help but wonder about. First, Artemis’ garment underneath his armor, it wasn’t until very recently that I noticed Lockwood having depicted it as a complex series of even more layers and rivets:

I’ll be changing my own depiction of his outfit from now on, but up until now I’d interpreted what was underneath as a gambeson, which can be seen in my lineart above. In CNE’s depiction, he’s also wearing a gambeson underneath his breastplate.

While both CNE and I apparently drew our inspiration for the vampiric dagger’s design from Lockwood’s paintings, Lockwood’s depiction of the dagger does not contain any gems, despite the weapon’s jeweled nature. As seen in the sprite above, Artemis’ dagger has an emerald in the crosspiece. Is it just yet another coincidence with this painting I did in 2017?

And of course, those double earrings -- a feature that most artists change, yet it is one that’s both prominent and consistent in all of my work.

Ultimately though, despite these similarities, as much as I’d like to think that my own art contributed to CNE’s depiction of Artemis in what’s an official WotC/D&D product, I fundamentally believe that it’s all just a happy coincidence. In Idle Champions, Artemis’ earrings are silver, his leg belt’s on his right leg rather than left, the pommel of his sword is different and his facial hair is different. However, I do know that I was able to affect his final appearance, for originally, his portrait had brown eyes, and his sprite’s dagger had a red gem rather than a green gem. CNE addressed both of these things after I’d brought them up.

Game mechanics-wise, without having seen him in action yet, I really like how CNE designed him. Artemis’ superb improvisational abilities are a big part of what makes him such a capable fighter, so his kit in Idle Champions being built around him mirroring other DPS champions’ buffs makes a lot of sense. His jeweled dagger, as his signature weapon consistently throughout the ages, is similarly adequately tied in to his damage-dealing capacities.

I absolutely love that Artemis will be in seat 3, next to a certain drow mercenary. (灬♥ω♥灬)

The one thing that is a little strange is the nature of his epic items.

Idle Champions’ snapshot of Artemis, based on his game description, is from the pre-Sellswords era. During this time period, Artemis had the bat-winged cloak and his dagger, but it wasn’t until after he thought he’d killed Drizzt did he acquire the nightmare figurine, the bolero, Idalia’s Flute, and Charon’s Claw. By that point, he’d lost his bat-winged cloak. The bolero was disassembled and presumably discarded after its final usage in Road of the Patriarch. In the current timeline, Artemis only has his dagger, Claw, and the nightmare figurine. Furthermore, he’d be quite displeased if presented with Idalia’s Flute again, and most likely would reject having it in his possession. All in all though, I can understand why CNE chose these items, and I really love how the flavor text isn’t Artemis discussing them as they are for other champions. It is definitely more fitting to cite them as rumors whispered among third parties.

Overall, it feels like the “real” Artemis has come to Idle Champions, and I’m very glad about that. I’ve been saving up forever for Artemis’ arrival.

He might very well fall flat like new DPS champions have in the past and/or not be up to par to the current meta best DPS champion, but the recent trend with new champion releases is that each has been better than the previous, so I’m hoping that it’ll mean Artemis will be the new meta DPS. However, even if he isn’t, I still plan on blowing all of this on him, because sometimes, personal preference trumps the need to min/max.

Thank you so much Codename Entertainment! Artemis coming to your game is already such a great joy, but to arrive in the way that he is -- I’m absolutely thrilled! ]]

#Artemis Entreri #Forgotten Realms #legend of drizzt #D&D #Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms #Codename Entertainment #ooc #appearance

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