Reasonably Productive Monday

I got a good chunk of stuff done today, as my write-up should attest to:

Tumblr: Just had Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler) to worry about today, and I’m pleased to say that I had a very productive time of it over there –

A) First, I managed to finish my draft of my “VITD Timeline” post! Complete with getting the first 12 stories in order (and coming up with titles for a couple that didn’t have any before – “Welcome To The Sanctuary” for the “facing off against Kelman” story, and “This Settlement DEFINITELY Needs Your Help” for the “helping out Preston” story); talking about in which order some of the OTHER stories should be in (for example, the Christmas Carol parody “A...Gratitude...Carol?” will have to come at the end of their first year as the Three Pillars, and be immediately followed by the story based on Taskmaster); and discussing how I should post all the one-shot fic I’ve written for this verse (as I would like to get it all up onto AO3 sooner rather than later). Good to have that done!

B) And second, I put a new “Not-Incorrect Quote” scene idea into the draft of my latest collection of those for VITD – one where the gang is robbing Adelaide Kingsleigh’s house, and she spots Victor from behind and starts going on about how she’s always wanted to be seduced by a gentleman thief; cue Victor turning around and being like “even me?” while she’s just like “…?!” XD Still need to write it out properly, but at least the basic premise is in there!

So that’s all great – though it would be better if all that wasn’t followed up by tumblr rolling out a new update that completely breaks reblogs and makes it so no one can actually see how many notes any of their posts have. *heavy sigh* Fucking hellsite...we can only pray everyone’s anger at the change is loud enough that they roll it back!

Writing: Well, Newt never did get back to me about what he wanted in a birthday fic, and I suspect that if I tried poking him, he’d just tell me “oh, don’t worry about writing me anything, it’s fine” – so, lacking any firm direction, I decided to just write what I know and did a follow-up fic to the story I wrote him for Christmas back in 2024, where the Dead Boy Detectives, Charles and Edwin, ended up in Duskwall thanks to some mirror hopping gone wrong and met my Three Pillars! Because, as you might have guessed, I’ve been in a very “Valicer In The Dark” mood as of late. :p Anyway, the story started off with me INTENDING to do a fun piece with Victor being intrigued by Charles’s “bigger on the inside” backpack and trying to figure out how it works...

But in the writing, it ended up being more a story about the Three Pillars having to tell Charles and Edwin that ghosts have to be destroyed on the regular in their world, because they almost inevitably go mad from the desire to be alive again or to have vengeance for the deaths. And when Charles and Edwin asked “why not just get them to move on?” having to admit that their world doesn’t have an accessible afterlife anymore. And hasn’t for over 800 years. I ended it with Charles going “next you’ll tell us you don’t have a sun,” followed by a very awkward silence from the trio, followed by Charles going “well, we’d better hope the Cat King doesn’t end up here, he’d go bananas without sunbeams to lounge in.” XD It’s pretty rough at the moment, but – well, it’s a rough draft, so it’s supposed to be. I’ll clean it up properly next Sunday – and hopefully tumblr will have stopped screwing itself over by the time I need to queue it up for Newt’s birthday on the 26th!

Portal 2: I took another quick jaunt to Aperture Science this afternoon (as I previously indicated I would) and completed another two test chambers for our favorite robotic overlord GLaDOS – one quite simple, and one much more complicated:

A) I picked up right where I left off last time, with Chell being forced to walk through part of the inner workings of Aperture to the next test chamber (having been unable to access the elevator at the end of the previous chamber thanks to debris blocking the path), all while having to listen to GLaDOS coolly informing her that “oh, you probably didn’t notice thanks to me simulating eternal daytime down here, but yesterday was your birthday. Thought you’d want to know.” Not exactly the best situation for poor old Chell! Fortunately, her stroll through the bowels of the facility was brief – a few steps, and she was underneath the chamber she needed to get to, watching the robotic arms all around her hastily assemble the floor. Once it was all done, a platform was lowered for her to use as a makeshift lift –

And once she hopped on, she and I were brought up into Chamber 14! A very simple chamber that featured a laser, a redirection cube, and three spinner things that needed to be activated via the laser to open the exit door, set in a narrow triangle on the floor – two closer to each other in a straight line, with one farther away forming the top point. The starting situation had the cube redirecting the laser through one of the spinners (the bottom right point, to be specific), but not the other two – after examining the set-up (and confirming what chamber she was in), I had Chell pick up the cube and redirect the laser so it would be easier to get around to the other side of it, then hop over the beam so she was behind the cube and could point the laser in the right direction. From there, I had her reposition the cube so the laser was going through two spinners at once instead of just one – the top point of the triangle and the lower right point. From there, it was just a matter of putting some portals on the walls to direct the laser through the final spinner, and the puzzle was solved. Chell thus exited to the elevator as GLaDOS informed her that she was working on belated birthday present for her – well more a belated birthday medical experiment. But still a present! Yaaay…

( Much More Complicated Chamber Below )

Workout: I hopped back on the bike again today and pedaled my way through another half-hour or so of “D&D But... Everyone Has Amnesia Again | Oxventure | D&D with Scratch Card Character Sheets!” The Hangover-esque shenanigans with Ms. Blue the dwarf (Jane), Mr. White the Goliath (Mike), and Mr. Brown the human (Andy) continued this eve, with today’s chunklet featuring:

A) The group getting the attention of a random street urchin, and – after the obligatory “you there, boy, what day is it?” “Why it’s Christmas Day!” joke – asking if he knew where “Fuzzbug’s Fast Gold Exchange” (the place where, according to the receipt they got out of the landlord’s safe, a diamond ring was pawned for 58 gold) was. The kid did indeed, but when asked to point the way by Ms. Blue, started going on about how he was hungry and much too weak to point. Mr. Brown, annoyed, asked him how he intended to eat without any teeth; the kid, not liking being threatened, pulled out a penknife and asked Mr. Brown if he wanted to go –

And Mr. White, on a natural 20, easily slapped the knife out of his hand and sent it flying onto a nearby roof. The terrified kid quickly led them over to where they needed to go, and the whole incident triggered a memory for Mr. White – a dinner with “the only family he’d ever known” (implied to be a gang), where the leader raised a toast to his good work at roughing up some guards during some sort of operation. Apparently Mr. White is quite the scary bastard! Mike seemed rather pleased. XD

B) The group following the kid to Fuzzbug’s, which was apparently on the second floor of two-story building – but not getting an answer when they tried to buzz him to let them in. Fortunately, the woman who owned the downstairs shop, a haberdasher’s (a shop that sells various small items that can be used in sewing or other such crafts – think fancy ribbons, zippers, things like that), opened the door to see what was going on –

Unfortunately, she informed them that Fuzzbug’s was closed. On account of it being Christmas. XD She said that he’d be open the next day, but the group definitely didn’t want to wait that long – so Blue and White insisted on coming in to see her wares as a distraction while Brown stayed behind to see if he could get in the door that led up to Fuzzbug’s. The lady was initially suspicious of their sudden interest, but Blue and White managed to persuade her to let them in – and she got rather friendlier when she learned that White had 58 gold to spend, taking him in the back to see the GOOD items. XD Brown, meanwhile, examined the bolted and locked door, then reached inside himself to see if he could pull out any useful abilities (aka, Andy scratched off one on his character sheet) –

And ended up accidentally releasing a big and horrible cloud of pure disgusting STENCH as he discovered he had the spell Stinking Cloud. XD The haberdasher lady was absolutely horrified and hurried Blue and White out, screaming that she was ruined as the stink settled into her items, while Brown tried to apologize and play it off as “this always happens when I have radishes!” XD Oh dear – you gotta love when you get exactly the wrong spell for the situation!

C) The group deciding that their best way in now was to use White’s Shadow Portal spell to create a door in (after confirming that the spell did not need line-of-sight and okaying it with Luke) and heading into an alley, where White conjured a door and stood guard in front of it, maintaining it while Blue and Brown slipped inside. The two Bs found themselves in what they eventually realized was the storeroom of the shop, behind the main counter, looking at shelves and shelves and SHELVES of various items – lutes, weapons, jewelry, some houseplants funnily enough. The pair thus started scanning around, trying to find the ring – with Mr. Brown actually triggering a memory of being a little boy hunting rats in a rich man’s attic, and getting an extra silver piece for a good day’s work, with a decent Perception check –

Only for Blue to get distracted by a mysterious whirring that seemed to be coming from a fern mixed in with the other plants. And when she approached it (“CAREFULLY,” as Jane repeatedly reminded Luke), she discovered it wasn’t a plant at all – it was an animated armor disguised as a fern, ready to defend its master’s business! It was quickly joined by an enchanted halberd from the racks of weapons, and a battle began between security and intruders! Which, uh, didn’t go GREAT for our heroes –

I. The halberd got to go first, and managed to stab poor Brown in the side with its pointy top, causing him 7 points of damage – which fortunately wasn’t too much, given according to the scratch-off character sheet Brown started with 33. But it still hurt!

II. Brown attempted to retaliate on his turn by snatching up a rapier – unfortunately, he proved to be unused to holding a sword, and the halberd easily parried his blow. He then decided to get White’s attention and pull him into the fight by throwing the sword through the portal at him –

And, well, he got White’s attention all right, as White’s AC was revealed to be a mere 10, meaning the sword stabbed itself into his back. Fortunately this revealed that White had the ability to automatically reduce all damage by 1D12+1 – unfortunately, Mike rolled a 2, meaning the HP loss only went down from 11 to an 8. At least White knew now there was trouble afoot?

III. The animated armor went next and shot a strange bubble of magical force at Blue – who, thanks to a failed save, was thus encased within! On the plus side, she no longer needed to eat, sleep, or breathe within the bubble, and would not age as long as she was within (Jane was like “sweet, this is my character’s win condition”) – on the minus side, she couldn’t actually do anything.

IV. ...Or rather, she could do one thing, since it was her turn next – she could reach down inside herself and try to find a useful ability! She thus did so, and found –

Spectral Steed. The ability to summon a spectral horse of an appearance of her choosing, complete with saddle, bit, and bridle. XD Fortunately, Luke allowed her to summon it BEFORE the bubble finished forming, meaning that there was enough room for her to sit astride her horse within the bubble. Neither of them could do anything, but I suppose she looked relatively majestic! And it did score her a memory too – of being in school, and being told by her teacher that her father had insisted her magical training – at which she was excelling – be limited to spells useful to the career he’d picked out for her. Allowing her to realize that she was very smart and very magically powerful – and that her dad was a dick. XD Okay then!

V. This brought things around to the halberd again, who started the next round by trying another attack on Brown – fortunately, this time it rolled too low to beat his AC, and he was able to dodge out of the way, wise to its tricks

VI. White entered the fray then, coming in through his Shadow Portal door – however, being a Strength guy, he discarded the rapier that Brown had flung into him in favor of grabbing and grappling the halberd. He succeeded the contested roll, and indicated his desire to use the halberd to take out the animated fern armor –

And when told by Luke, “You’ll have to wait until your next turn to do that – unless you want to throw it,” went ahead and threw it. And a lovely nat 20 meant that the halberd ended up buried in the animated armor, essentially knocking the halberd “prone” (meaning it would have to spend its next turn wiggling itself free) and taking a good chunk of HP off the animated armor. *nods* It pays to have a strong guy in your fight!

VII. This brought things around to Brown again, who decided to once again see if he had any special abilities – and this time, when he reached inside himself, he found a USEFUL spell – Thunderwave! He promptly released a wave of thunderous force, which did indeed absolutely wreck the animated armor and the halberd with 24 points of damage –

But which also wrecked the shop, and caused another 12 points of damage to poor Mr. White, along with throwing him back through his own Shadow Portal door. The only reason Blue and her horse were spared was because they were bubbled at the time of impact. XD Poor Mr. White – barely involved in the fight, and he arguably took the most damage from it! Hopefully he can pay Brown back for all of these indignities at some point. :p

D) Brown recalling another memory in the wake of the Thunderwave – one featuring him watching a group of “recruits” running from the guard on thundering feet, and snatching a bag of gold one of them tossed up to him before running off himself, swearing to buy the recruits’ way out of jail should they survive the beating the guard gave them. Brown realized that he must be a professional thief –

And angrily declared that that should make finding this stupid ring EASIER, darn it. XD He and Blue (who remained astride her horse, the Sapphire Prince – so named because it was blue all over, with a red saddle and bridle for contrast) thus searched the shop for either the ledger or the ring itself –

And on a nat 20, despite the damage to the shop, Brown easily found the latter. Interestingly, though, it proved not to be a wedding ring, but a signet ring, displaying the image of a fox with bared diamond teeth. One that fit perfectly onto Brown’s finger, sliding onto an indent he hadn’t noticed before. Intrigued by this (and wondering if Brown was the one getting married), Blue wondered if Brown might be the author of the letter and had him write something to compare his handwriting to the missive they’d found…

Aaand it wasn’t a match. And neither was Blue’s or White’s handwriting. Darn. Ah well, they tried. I left it off about there, with the group agreeing they needed to skedaddle before anyone showed up to investigate the commotion – tomorrow, we’ll see where the trio goes from here! Perhaps to The Quenching Tub, whatever that is? Only time will tell...

YouTube: I carved out some time this evening to finish off the second half of “Fallout New Vegas: You Only Live Once Remastered - Part 34 - Radio Silence” (because it would have been silly to leave it unfinished) – the latter half of P. D.’s adventures picking up her various partners for the heist Elijah wanted to send them on featured:

A) P. D., wanting to avoid a confrontation with the Ghost People who’d wandered in her direction when she was desperately trying to avoid one of them, using the power of Implant GRX to activate super speed and rush past them and the two radios in the plazas beyond, making it all the way back to the main door of the Medical Villa before swinging around behind the Ghost Person there and hitting him with a cross punch. Unfortunately, this did NOT immediately kill him, unlike the last few times she tried this – fortunately, the Turbo from Implant GRX lasted long enough for her to punch him a couple more times, downing him and allowing her to take off a limb to make sure he died before he could attack her back. Very close call there, but she made it!

B) P. D. then exiting the Villa (with Christine running on ahead of her) and darting behind a pillar in third person to keep an eye on the one final Ghost Person who’d spawned to the side of the doors...and then having to wait ages for him to turn away from her so she could sneak up on him and try to kill him. And, once again, her cross punch let her down, forcing her to have to hit him multiple times as well. Again, she managed to get the kill before he could retaliate, meaning she didn’t lose any more precious health, but bloody hell. Bear Trap Fist, you are not doing the good work, I must say! >(

C) P. D. then heading back to the fountain in the big entrance plaza and – after gathering all the chips in it – going to have a “chat” with Christine about the vending machines around the place. Christine “asked” to see one of the Sierra Madre chips she had on her, then – after examining it thoroughly – indicated that she could “scrounge” more. Or, rather, MAKE more – and thanks to P. D.’s solid SPECIAL stats, she was able to perfectly understand her new friend when she mimed the recipe: a fission battery and scrap metal! P. D. thus headed over to the workbench in the side closet a little ways away from the main plaza and used the fission battery and scrap metal she had on her to make 50 Sierra Madre “Slugs” – fake chips that would perfectly fool the vending machines and allow her to buy more stuff. And believe you me, as proved later in the episode, she wanted to buy more stuff!

D) P. D. then grabbing some turpentine from that side closet and proceeding around past the hologram vendor’s store to the little apartment with the cookpot she could use to make useful items and using that and her gathered Abraxo and Cloud Residue to make more doses of Cloud Kiss poison! Specifically, one dose of Lethal poison (which did the most damage per second over the most amount of time) and three doses of Weak poison (which, naturally, did the least damage per second over the least amount of time). Never hurts to have an easy way to down enemies faster, especially when you’re limited to melee-only strikes!

E) P. D. then going back to the hologram vendor and trading him some C-4 explosives for some pre-War money (as caps aren’t really used as a currency in “Dead Money,” so all trade has to be in the form of barter), then around back to the central plaza to hit up a vending machine and use her new codes to return all the clothes and cigarettes she picked up for chips, before then spending those chips on mentats and Med-X (splurging to get 15 doses of the latter – look, it’s a great way for her to make sure she never takes more damage than she needs to!). *nods* Told you she wanted to buy more stuff.

F) P. D. then braving the Residential District to go fetch the final member of the team, one Dean Domino – and using the fact that she could crack Hard locks to open up a shortcut to the left of the main entrance that would allow her to bypass most of the traps, enemies, and instances of the Cloud in the area. She did still need to face off against one Ghost Person in her way, though, as well as figure out how to deal with one bit of Cloud. Her original plan was to use some more Implant GRX to Turbo herself up, sprint past the Ghost Person, and through the one bit of deadly Cloud in her way (taking advantage of the fact that you get a one-second grace period before the poison hits you, which was stretched out to three with Turbo) –

But, unfortunately, she was detected by the Ghost Person, and he ended up chasing her to the stairs leading up to Dean Domino’s apartment. Fortunately, this actually ended up working out for P. D., as – after an annoyingly long time spent jumping around trying to find her – he eventually got bored and turned around to go back to his original position. Allowing her to sneak up on him and punch one of his limbs off. It was another close call, mostly because it looked like he was going to reach the Cloud before she could get him, but at least she managed to kill him and get him out of the way!

G) P. D. then heading up to Dean Domino’s place and sitting down beside him to have a nice chat that would hopefully lead to him joining the heist – only for said nice chat to be quickly derailed by the reveal that he’d put a bomb in her chair, and planned to set it off if she got up before he allowed it, or didn’t do as he asked. Fortunately, P. D. was a smart girl, and was only too happy to assure him that she was willing to play ball with his desire to get out of his “contract” (presumably the collar Elijah had forced on him) and take whatever was in the Madre for himself. Carefully avoiding being rude or attempting to barter with him all the while, because he takes offense to those actions, and you don’t want Dean taking offense to you. She then suggested that he go wait for her by the fountain –

Only for Dean to be like, “Hell no, I know what’s waiting out there. That’s why I trapped the hell out of this place. We leave together or not at all.” Meaning P. D. had no choice but to take him on as a companion if she wanted to get back to the main plaza alive! She thus said “Fine, follow me” –

And once she’d gotten his companion perk (“Unclean Living,” which increased the grace period for not getting poisoned by the Cloud from 1 second to 5 and reduced the damage taken from it by 25%), and he’d stood up and told her about the shortcut she’d just used, she stood up and basically nyooomed ahead of him to get the hell out of there, with the help of a bit more Implant GRX because she would have HAD to burn it if she hadn’t gotten Dean’s companion perk and Jon wanted to keep things fair. The game may force her to have a companion, but that does not mean she needs to stick around and stay with said companion! XD

H) And P. D. then leaving the Residential Villa and preparing to bring Dean back to the main fountain and finally advance the main quest...only for there to be a Ghost Person right around the corner from the main doors. A Ghost Person who, thanks to his positioning, IMMEDIATELY spotted P. D. and made to attack. Forcing P. D. to burn her last dose of Implant GRX for the day so she could slice him up with her squeaky clean Cosmic Knife. Fortunately for her, Dean proved to be a decent distraction, keeping the guy occupied by shooting at him, and she was able to bring the guy down and flee to the fountain with Dean in tow. *shakehead* Whew! This really was the episode of close calls with Ghost People! And now P. D. has no more Turbo unless she finds a spot where she can actually wait until midnight for her next five doses…

And so the episode ended with her and her companions hanging around the fountain, ready to get their instructions from Father Elijah! Next week – well, next week things get REALLY nasty, because this part of the map? This was the TUTORIAL area. Now P. D. and company are heading into the “you’re expected to know how to play” area, and Jon – Jon is not looking forward to it. We’ll see if he manages to deal with all the hazards P. D. will now be facing, or if she ends up going pop, next Sunday! We’re rooting for you, Jon!

Whew -- lot crammed into one day! But now it is definitely time for me to head to bed, because I unfortunately do have work tomorrow. Meh. Night all!