#rvnasks

So this one is part of the rich canon of "Rae gets an idea and realises the optimal medium for it is one he has like zero familiarity in working in, So That's Fun." When I went on my Madoka Magica deep dive last year, I remembered an old "me and my mates' OCs in Situations" fic I wrote which was a Mature-rated PMMM AU, except I did a bunch of weird divergent worldbuilding for it and kept thinking about how I kinda cooked with it. Since the worldbuilding and general Situation was the most interesting thing, it lent itself to "maybe do a TTRPG about it?".

So Stellar Flare is a game about Celestial Warriors, individuals who wish upon a star and are empowered by it, who must journey into supernatural spaces known as Event Horizons to vanquish the monsters within and prevent them from consuming everything. They must balance this with their mundane lives, keeping their secret double life hidden, and the fact that their powers seem to take a toll on their body and the best way to recover vitality seems to be through physical, passionate, direct contact with others. Or, to put it another way, "you wished upon the star that your soul became; to be snuffed out prematurely is to snuff out your wish; your body is naught but fragile meat puppetted by that distant star, and it will waste and rot unless others carve their passions into your waiting flesh."

...from the fact that this is a blatantly Madoka Magica-inspired premise and the fact that the title in my notes is "Sicko Pervert TTRPG" (and my earliest thoughts were, indeed, "could I just write this out as some kind of module for Praise The Hawkmoth King?" before realising it's got focuses in different directions), obviously this is very much intended as an exploration of some very uncomfortable topics around labour exploitation, sexuality, and the thrills AND horrors of being locked into an inescapable and chronic Fuck Or Die scenario whilst slowly being psychologically and emotionally ground down by the new state of your life.

I tend to say it as RAV (with a short a, as in cat) - ner (as in nerve) - vuhn (schwa between the v and n as opposed to a defined vowel). The ner+vuhn flow together, like a weird verb. We're nerv'n.

Technically, I'm actually saying my own URL "wrong", because it's actually ravne + rvn, both of which I also use as handles as well. Despite both being derived from "raven", I pronounce those constituent parts as "RAV (as before) - nuh (schwa)" and, uh, exactly what it sounds like trying to pronounce the consonants "rvn" as a word (stress on the R, unvoiced vowels). Saying it as RAV-nuh-RR(uh)-v(uh)n has a fun flow, I just don't default to it.

I don't want to conflate the many and varied types of corvid, I know ravens aren't the same as crows, but.

do I need to be worried about my bike gear the next time I come and see you? 'cause like quite a lot of the PPE there is made of various kinds of purpose-specialised plastic.

Never thought that would happen

It would be @himejoshi you'd want to direct your wonder at there, I'm just her noble squire. Her court jester. Etc etc.

Alas, I don't! If anything, I'm trying to expand my knowledge of various "bugs" (here used in the broad and colloquial sense), not least to try and overcome some lifelong entomophobia.

and that's why I had to reblog the witch with the missing cat in the suspiciously familiar art style.