#pairings study

I started looking up at fics and fanarts about my most recent obsession, aka Ismark Kolyanovich, the sad and man that I love with all of my heart and that can't do anything bad, and I noticed how - not taking the player characters into account - he is usually shipped with what I can only identify as "twinks".

The two most shipped characters with Ismark I saw around are Doru and Escher, and I want to talk about thks for a bit.

Doru

Doru I can kinda see it. It's canon that Ismark and Ireena are good friends with Father Donavich, so it makes sense that the two of them are also somehow connected to Doru. Personally, when DMing my own CoS campaing and they met the Kolyan siblings for the first time, I made so Father Donavich and Kolyan, Ireena and Ismark's dad, are friends, making so Ismark, Ireena and Doru are childhood friends. So, you have that "Friends to lovers" connection between the two of them, and by making Ismark older than Doru you can also have that big brother/younger brother kind of dynamic that makes the whole thing much sweeter... and tragic because of Doru's ending in canon. Because be it the party kill him or they don't, Doru is still a spawn, there is no "cure" or happiness for him.

My feelings about the ship: I do see it, I can get behind it, but it's not my favourite ship with Ismark. That is mainly do to the fact that I appreciate the platonic older brother/younger brother dynamic they can have more, and let Ismark shine as a role of guide for his peers and caretaker much more. Plus, the idea of having already lost sla sibling with Doru and not wanting the same to happen with Ireena is just perfect for me. Good ship, but not my OTP.

Escher

This one, I noticed, was a ship much more well known and shipped in the fandom a couple of years ago. If you look on ao3 the fics about Ismark and you go to the first ones, you can see that, when Ismark is not a side character - which is not that often, unfortunately T_T - he is mainly shipped with Escher. At first I was confused by this, then I thought about it for a bit and... I can kinda see it. Escher is the odd one out among the consorts (yes, he is a consort just like the other three, Wizard of the Coast are cowards for not addressing him as one of them, fight me) being the youngest and the only male one. I also personally add to this the fact that he is not from Barovia, but an adventure that ended up here and that got seduced by Strahd (and I made him also an elf, deal with it). So, among everyone else in the castle, he is the most, quote unquote, "redeemable" of the consorts and the one most likely to being shipped with another NPC. But then, why Ismark? Ismark is, all in all, one of the few actually good characters. He has his flaws and negative opinion (like his canonically disdain for the Vistani) but he is a positive presence for the players, topped only by Ireena. So, having him as this sort of "saving grace" for Escher, someone who can actually make him better, help him "escape the grasps" of the villain that is Strahd, making him feel human again, it works more than him being paired with other characters.

My feelings about the ship: Can I be frank? Even if I get it and the dynamic would be interesting, I think, out of this two I would prefer Doru rather than Escher. Maybe it's because I still have to play Escher as a DM, so he does not have an actual fixed personality as of yet for me, but the two are too distant for me to think about them as a pairings, and they don't have enough common ground to be one for me. Good ship, good narrative potential, but once again out of the two I will chose Doru over Escher.

*****

Once again, this is only my opinion and how I see them, but it's really curious that the two main ships I saw of other NPCs with Ismark have him being paired with a twink. It's funny. Ismark the twinks collectors.

That being said now I'm curious

Which NPC do you ship with our boy Ismark? Is it Doru or Escher? Or is it someone new entirely?

And

What is your Ismark crack ship? Or in general your funnier and most out of the field Curse of Strahd NPC x NPC ship? If you want you can tell them to me and I will tell you what I think about them XP