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rohirric-hunter · 1 year

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@isi7140 so last night when I was playing Skyrim with Radanir he displayed a weird propensity for. Putting himself physically in between me and enemies I was facing. Which is not something I have ever observed in a Skyrim NPC before.

Other followers will push past you to get to enemies, but what Radanir was doing was quite distinct. We cleared out a couple of dungeons, and Radanir would regularly abandon fights he was already having in order to go and place himself between me and an enemy. One time I ran away from a fight by dropping down into a pond in the bottom of a cave, and the bandit I was fighting started to run through a series of twisting tunnels to get to where I had landed, and Radanir abandoned the other bandit that he was fighting to chase the one that had gone after me. But he didn't start fighting him until he had gotten in front of him, blocking the narrow tunnel and preventing either him or the other bandit from getting out of it. Another time I ran away from a fight with a single bandit to heal. When I started to run away, Radanir was on the other side of the bandit from me. But when I turned back around, he was again between me and the bandit. I let the fight play out a bit before I rejoined it and Radanir did not move from that spot.

Once or twice is a random coincidence, but this happened consistently over the course of about three hours. With Skyrim's vanilla followers, this never happens. They move around way too much and their only clear intention in fights is to get to the enemy, or get a clear shot at them. The only time they get into a certain spot and don't move is when you walked into a tiny little room, at which point they'll stop in the doorway and refuse to move to let you back out of the room. (To be entirely fair, Radanir did this too.) Occasionally they'll do a thing where they'll circle around an enemy, typically when the enemy is blocking and they're waiting for the block to drop, but again, they move based on the enemy's position, not the player's. And when Radanir did this, more often than not he would stop between me and the enemy, even when the block was still up and he had plenty of space to keep moving.

This actually isn't the first time I've noticed this behavior: all three Rangers also behave this way with each other. A lot of my testing and learning with the Creation Kit is done by simply spawning a bunch of bandits or some trolls into the camp and watching how they handle the ensuing fight, and I'd noticed that when one of them enters bleedout something similar happens. IDK if you play Skyrim so quick explanation: when an NPC is tagged as essential, meaning they can't be killed, and their health bar reaches zero, they enter "bleedout," where they fall down and cannot move or act for a little while (longer if they keep getting hit while they're down) until eventually they'll regain a little health and either rejoin the fight or run away, depending on if their AI is set to "Foolhardy." You'll occasionally see non-essential NPCs enter bleedout, but not very often because usually a hit bad enough to send them into bleedout just kills them.

Back to these specific NPCs: if all three of them are in a fight and one enters bleedout, the other two will go and stand over him until he gets up again. If more than one of them are in bleedout, they will make their way towards each other and huddle together. I thought this was odd, but didn't think anything else about it, because I assumed their behavior was influenced in some way by their relationship: as far as the game engine is concerned, they are all siblings, and I haven't experimented with how vanilla Skyrim siblings behave in dangerous situations, so for all I knew it was normal. (Typically NPCs in bleedout don't move at all, much less make their way towards... anything, really, but I haven't experimented extensively with it.) However, them behaving that way towards the player is very odd, since they aren't siblings with the player -- the player is noted simply as a "friend" and their relationship status is actually as low as it can possibly be while still having them available as followers. So any vanilla follower in the game is going to have at least as good a relationship or better -- and yet none of them do this.

My current theories are limited: either I changed some setting while customizing their AI that made this happen and didn't realize I had, or it has something to do with enabling dual-wielding or the custom classes I made for them, which are the only things that I consciously and intentionally changed that set them apart from vanilla followers. Or. Maybe my custom Skyrim followers are becoming self-aware. Always a possibility, I guess.

#rangercamp #its worrying because. how did he learn to do that #i didnt tell him to do that whats he doing that for #sweet for obvious reasons #also kind of funny because as an essential npc he has the plot armor now #'look at me. look at me. i have the plot armor now'#long post #also #maybe next time i do a test or just play around with them ill record it #i swear im not reading into it his behavior is actually different

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beanghostprincess · 3 months

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Late Valentine post (really late holy shit)

But zeff is not great at gift giving and his default was just chocolate and flowers but he remembered the yasopp doesn't like chocolate (usopp doesn't like chocolate either) and fucking panicked and he called up his son for help. Sanji being the hopeless romantic instead of talking through snail he physically visits his dad to help him with Valentine's Day gifts. He ended up buying most of the stuff I'm going a little bit overboard. Like he didn't need the stuff seeking nor did he need the wine but his son gets lost in the moment and just picks up anything he thinks is nice. He honestly forgot why he was there and just started buying stuff for usopp

This is so cute 😭💙💛 It doesn't matter that you're late to Valentine's Day because this was definitely worth it!!

Zeff has never been good at gift-giving, actually. The first Christmases/Birthdays he had with Sanji were... A bit difficult. Sanji wasn't expecting any gifts at all, and Zeff had never had a son before, so what was he supposed to do? He was a pirate! He's not made for these things. But it was so sad to see his little Eggplant not asking for anything or even being excited about it that he started getting him stuff. But Sanji was an easy kid, you know? At least he used to be before he started getting into tailored suits and big romantic gestures. When he was a kid, even a small book brought joy to his face. A new knife. A new apron. Whatever the kids were into nowadays-- Zeff literally had no idea what kids were into, he just knew his kid was into cooking, so he got him the stuff he liked. Never animals, though, he had enough of him befriending random rats if they ever got inside the restaurant (happened once, never again. Zeff almost murders Sanji for feeding the little thing).

The man has never been good at this, right? So when he finally dates (kind of dating. Sort of. It's complicated. They have something romantic going on) somebody after years of not even thinking about it... He needs to ask Sanji for advice. It's a bit too embarrassing to do so, you know, asking your own child for romantic advice. But at the end of the day, Sanji is the most romantic person in the world. And at the end of the day, Zeff can just say he's asking him in case his boyfriend knows something about it (actually, Zeff personally asks Usopp but the guy just stands there like "??? My father left me when I was a kid and we recently started talking again, do you really think I know what he likes? But he doesn't like chocolate. Oh- You've already tried that? Huh. He likes fish? And dancing? I don't know, man, he's your boyfriend." / "Please, don't say that to my dad." / "Babe, you need to start moving on from this, you're literally the only one acting like a fifteen-year-old seeing his father kiss someone for the first time."

Sanji ends up visiting his dad because he has little to no perception of personal space when it comes to romantic gestures, and if his father, for the first time in his life, is going to show he can do something similar to a grand gesture like that, he doesn't want to miss it. Also, he's sure he's going to mess it up on his own. And he really, really, really doesn't want Usopp's dad to be all sad about it because then that would mean less time with his boyfriend.

I think it'd be really cute if Usopp and Sanji had been together for a while, but since Zeff and Sanji don't see each other much, seeing Sanji's romantic side (actual romantic side and not the 'I wanna fuck every girl that appears in front of me' side) is actually... Liberating? Kind of? It's not that Zeff has been worried about the kid, he can handle himself just fine. But... But it's a relationship they haven't talked about much and it's clearly important to him. So realizing that he has people who love him and somebody he's willing to do something romantic for makes Zeff feel extreme joy. A joy that he would never express out loud because it'd get too quickly to Sanji's head. But yeah.

So they go shopping together! Sanji starts explaining to him different things he can do for Yasopp. Either an activity or maybe just a simple present like wine. Clothes. Maybe a romantic dinner, so they should buy ingredients, too. Fish, because everybody likes it. Usopp only happens to like it too, so Sanji will just use the chance to think about what he should make for his Valentine's dinner. Also, speaking about clothes, Usopp needed a new hat, so he could get that too! And wine is alright, but Usopp is more fond of sweet cocktails rather than wine, so maybe buying something for that would be great. Usopp doesn't like chocolate either, but there are millions of sweets they can try to find. Also candles. So many candles. And perhaps a handwritten note! Because Usopp always leaves drawings around the ship for him, so he should do something like that too. Maybe gloves for his precious hands-

Sanji ends up forgetting about Yasopp, actually, and turns out he's been dragging his father around shops the whole day talking and talking and talking about Usopp. He snaps out of it when Zeff drops the "You care about him a lot, don't you, kid?"

And Sanji doesn't hesitate when he responds laughing at him. "Care about him?" Because to him, that's such simple wording. "I'm in love with him. I don't know about you, old man, but he's the one to me. Saying I care about him is not enough, but you do you."

"Huh. With how much shit you're getting him I hope he feels the same."

"What? Usopp doesn't want all of this."

"The hell are you talking about?"

"I mean- He does want it. And he does enjoy the gifts. But he doesn't care about them? It's not like he's with me for all of this. He always drops some sappy things like 'the only gift I need is being with you'. He doesn't need to get me anything, either."

"And you're okay with that?"

"Are you hearing yourself? Of course I am. The only gift I need is being with him."

"And all of this bullshit, then?"

"I don't expect you to understand since you're a rancid, old, bitter man who somehow managed to date the complete opposite of himself. But... Guess it just feels right to get him things, since he never asks for anything? The first time we did this he thought I wouldn't get him anything, can you believe it?"

"Reminds me of someone."

"Shut up. We need more shopping to do and you still haven't chosen your present."

"What about the whole 'the only gift is being together' shit?"

"Pfft. Do you really think you can pull that off? And on your first Valentine's Day? To a man who was married and had a kid? You haven't been dating that long, even. That is not working for you."

"And what if it did?"

"Then you need to get him a present anyway. I was happy enough being your kid and yet you still got me stuff, didn't you? It's a nice gesture."

Zeff chooses to make Yasopp dinner and have a whole romantic date planned when the Baratie is closed (decorated by Sanji, of course, because who else would've turned the restaurant into a romantic paradise?) and Sanji runs away as quickly as he can from there because he's been thinking about Usopp too much and now he misses him like crazy. And he also needs to get ready for their own Valentine's Day.

I think it would be sweet if Yasopp called Usopp to ask him about Zeff too and ended up doing the same thing as Sanji, except that he only gets him something small and Yasopp starts asking him how is it possible that he (storyteller. Superhero. Extremely over the top all the time) doesn't buy Sanji something more spectacular. Usopp only says that the last time he did something like that for Sanji he ended up having a whole breakdown from how overwhelmed with love he was, so now they choose simpler stuff. But! But Yasopp should not do that and he should definitely do something magnificent instead.

It would be cute if they ended up being extremely exhausted from running around all day long and didn't even want to celebrate Valentine's Day. I think Sanji would try to force himself to be extremely romantic and energetic but Usopp would just drag him to bed with him and go "No. Not today. Me tired. Sleep with you." / "But- But what about-" / "You're a pillow now. Shhh." / "Was it really that tiring?" / "I don't know how my mom married him, my father is awful at this." / "The old man is shitty at romance too. I had to explain to him why not getting Yasopp anything was a bad idea." / "Idiot. The 'you're everything I need' thing only works when-" / "When it's true. Yeah. I still got you something, though." / "Mmm. Me too. But now, sleep." / "It's alright, we'll just eat the fish tomorrow. And the cake. And drink the cocktails. And-" / "Now I'm hungry. Let's go. I hate you." / "But sleeping?" / "Eat first, then sleep." / "You're the love of my life."

And then both couples have very cute and romantic Valentine's dates 🫶

#when usopp says 'eat first then sleep' sanji falls again for him #honestly this whole thing with zeff and yasopp casually being a thing is really sweet. loving the asks every time #always making it more about sanuso for obvious reasons #i think sanji and usopp would be extremely cheesy on valentine's day but also... thinking about them just getting used to being together #sanji likes to do romantic stuff and usopp does the same but sometimes they just like being together and that's fine #one piece #black leg sanji #red leg zeff #usopp #yasopp #sanuso

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