The Blessed Unrest

art by @tazmynburt

Summary:

9:30 Dragon. The nation of Ferelden is on the brink of war, with the machinations of those with ulterior motives setting the stage for all out conflict as the Blight looms on the edge of the Korcari Wilds.

Transported into Thedas, one woman is found by a group of Avvar and brought to their hold, where she is given a chance to live under the name of Heda Snow-Walker. Any plans she had on staying uninvolved with the Fifth Blight are shattered when tragedy strikes, and now her only chance at survival lies within the armies at Ostagar.

Too bad she already knows how that will go.

Excerpt:

“Forgive us, Asleif.” Tova might have bowed, if not for the burden she carried. “I would not have come if–”

“–If it were not vital,” Asleif finished. “Very well, bring her inside before the chill takes us all.”

The heat of the fire in the center of the room was a welcome relief. Tova carefully laid the lowlander as close as she dared to the fire pit. “We found her stumbling around in the snow,” she explained, watching Asleif kneel next to her. “We tried to keep her warm, but I did not think we could make it to the hold in time if she has been bitten by frost.”

Undoing the druffalo pelts, Asleif looked over the woman’s frame. Tova wondered if she saw the same thing she did: the strange clothes, the pale skin that had started to change color from being exposed to the snow. She had not known a lowlander to be so foolish as to be walking this far into the mountains without the proper protection.

“You did well to bring her to me.” Asleif brushed a strand of the lowlander’s dark hair away from her face. “She needed to be away from the cold. And now we must do our best to warm her up. Come, help me remove these garments from her.”

Why do you only give WOC representation with MCs when they’re tied to criminal activity?

GiL MC–WoC

VN MC–WoC

and now QoT MC–WoC

Would it have been so tough to have the MC be a WoC in another story? You’re all about trying to play with tropes and expectations, but right now you’re leaning way too far into stereotypes without doing anything new.

Sure you could argue that the MCs end up involved in morally grey situations, but those situations are still ultimately illegal. When you have a white MC get transported to a magical land where she could potentially end up a queen but make the Latina MC get involved with a crime ring, it sends a very bad message to the people reading the app.

Just because character ancestry isn’t referenced doesn’t mean it’s not there. VN MC’s heritage wasn’t referenced in Duke’s route but it was in Andi’s route. It shouldn’t make a difference.

I get what you’re saying and I mostly agree with you, I’m not happy about the representation either but the way I see it, we have to start some where. I’m not going to get into moral greys because I’m not arguing with you.

You raise excellent points and they gave me pause to think. While I’d love to agree that someone’s ancestry shouldn’t have to be brought up in order for them to be considered PoC, sometimes it is important. And given how Lovestruck usually goes out of their way with addressing representation, such as mentioning how any of the MCs are into girls no matter who’s route she’s on, it struck me as jarring that they wouldn’t mention the L&L MC having asian ancestry. I don’t feel they had to do it in Duke’s route ‘cause the MC is very obvious a WoC there, but that’s my personal feelings.

At the end of the day I just want a more diverse representation for everyone. Thank you for your contributions to my post

Why do you only give WOC representation with MCs when they’re tied to criminal activity?

GiL MC–WoC

VN MC–WoC

and now QoT MC–WoC

Would it have been so tough to have the MC be a WoC in another story? You’re all about trying to play with tropes and expectations, but right now you’re leaning way too far into stereotypes without doing anything new.

Sure you could argue that the MCs end up involved in morally grey situations, but those situations are still ultimately illegal. When you have a white MC get transported to a magical land where she could potentially end up a queen but make the Latina MC get involved with a crime ring, it sends a very bad message to the people reading the app.

And even if the L&L mc is of asian heritage, I still wouldn’t really count it as a example of an undisputably morally GOOD woc mc given that she is the Witch Queen reborn/WQ’s vessel/”reverted back to her innocent self pre-WQ”/etc. depending on which route you play. That’d mean that the one woc mc that isn’t on the morally ambigious side STILL can count as the biggest fucking villain through ALL of Lovestruck’s stories (with her as the Witch Queen commiting genocide really only being the tip of the ice berg).

Why do you only give WOC representation with MCs when they’re tied to criminal activity?

GiL MC–WoC

VN MC–WoC

and now QoT MC–WoC

Would it have been so tough to have the MC be a WoC in another story? You’re all about trying to play with tropes and expectations, but right now you’re leaning way too far into stereotypes without doing anything new.

Sure you could argue that the MCs end up involved in morally grey situations, but those situations are still ultimately illegal. When you have a white MC get transported to a magical land where she could potentially end up a queen but make the Latina MC get involved with a crime ring, it sends a very bad message to the people reading the app.

And even if the L&L mc is of asian heritage, I still wouldn’t really count it as a example of an undisputably morally GOOD woc mc given that she is the Witch Queen reborn/WQ’s vessel/”reverted back to her innocent self pre-WQ”/etc. depending on which route you play. That’d mean that the one woc mc that isn’t on the morally ambigious side STILL can count as the biggest fucking villain through ALL of Lovestruck’s stories (with her as the Witch Queen commiting genocide really only being the tip of the ice berg).

And even with her it doesn’t look good ‘cause she does have no trouble actually being a pirate in Joaquin’s route. Sure she tries to temper the pirates from hurting people, but she has no qualms robbing people.

edit: I should clarify, this is not a post intending to villify Lovestruck. But they do need to be aware of how some of their decisions come across, especially because people get excited when someone looks like them and is the star of the story.