A Painful Update
Jan. 16th, 2026 11:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
crossover_chickWell, not long after I posted yesterday's update and started preparing to go to bed, I got interrupted by Dad stumbling around in the kitchen in a massive amount of pain -- so much that he and Mom ended up going to the emergency room again. I managed to go to sleep after they left around 12:40 AM, but woke up this morning to find only Mom had come back -- and that Dad had had to go to a different hospital because the first didn't have the doctors he needed, and that things are looking even worse than they were a few days ago after his initial scans. I'll spare you all the gritty details, but suffice it to say the mass on his liver appears to be way bigger than the original scans indicated, and there's some concern that the colon cancer that got taken out of him in 2024 may be back, which would be -- bad. The problem is, we won't know for sure what's going on until Tuesday, because that's the soonest they can do any biopsies. So he's stuck in the hospital (where at least they can do something about the pain) until at least then, and -- yeah. Suffice to say I didn't go into work today, both so Mom could use my car to get around, and because -- well. Who fucking wants to go to WORK with that hanging over them? So instead I stayed at home and did my best to keep myself distracted with various "day off" activities in between getting texts from Mom about how things were going at the hospital. Because if I'm going to be stuck at home in a situation like this, I'm going to damn well try to do stuff that makes me happy for even a little bit. *nods* So, with that said, here's the write-up:
Tumblr: While I didn’t spend a lot of actual time on Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler) or Valice Multiverse today (apart from catching up on dashboards), I did do something that will eventually go in a tumblr post on VLA(NS) – specifically, I spent roughly from 11 AM (might have been 10:30 AM, I forget exactly when I started) to 2:15 PM making “text post memes” of Victor, Alice, and Smiler. If you’re wondering what the fuck those are, it’s when you take a twitter or tumblr post (or, sometimes, an Onion headline) and paste it onto a screenshot of a character who you think fits the post – you can see a set that I posted back in July of 2025 here for examples of what I’m talking about. I ended up doing this because I saw a Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency set on my dash today courtesy of my friend Newt, looked at a couple, and thought “yeah, the text on that one would fit Smiler...and that one Victor...and that one Alice...hang on, let me save these images and then go find the screenshots I need.” And then I just kept going because it was something to do that wasn’t sitting around staring at the wall and feeling miserable. I ended up making twelve images in total, after plunging into my friend Squid’s “#text post meme” tag and gathering up some posts from that as well – I was making them even while eating lunch (when I wasn’t texting Mom, anyway). What can I say – my OT3 makes me happy, and I fucking needed the happy today. And trying to find just the right picture for some of them (especially for the Smiler ones) WAS a good distraction. Might make more later – we’ll see. (Though what I really need to do tomorrow is answer the two asks I couldn’t get to on Valice Multiverse tonight...)
Baldur’s Gate III: Was in the mood to visit Faerun today after I finished making all my “text post meme” pictures, so I loaded up the Emerald Grove for about an hour and had Smiler and company continue on their adventures there! Which involved mainly saving a little girl, seeing what an asshole the current leader of the local druids is, and indulging a tall-tale-teller’s questions, as you will see below –
A) First, though, the game decided to give me a scare when I first tried to launch it, with a pop-up appearing warning me of a “data mismatch” in the game. Startled (and about ready to unleash a torrent of fury basically amounting to “oh, of COURSE one of my damn files would corrupt, not like I don’t have enough going on today” with much more swearing), I clicked on the “more information” button, read through the FAQ page for the error on Larian’s site, then followed its advice to see the “altered files” it was so worried about –
And found a long list of .wem files. Which, after a moment of “???”, I remembered were from my manual install of the mod that makes sure all of Wyll’s voice lines are Theo’s instead of a mix of Theo’s and Lanre’s. Cue me being like, “Well, if there’s a data mismatch THERE, it’s your own fucking fault Larian – maybe you should have made sure all of Theo’s voice lines made into the game yourselves!” *sigh* Now, granted, there might be another issue in the background with a different mod that I’m not aware of, but from what I can see it really does seem to be a case of the Larian launcher getting pissy about me making sure Wyll always sounds like Wyll. So I went ahead and dove into the game anyway. Worst case scenario, thanks to the backup I made at the end of December, if something more serious pops up, I’ll only lose about two play sessions or so. Which will be annoying to replay, granted, but not unduly agonizing.
B) Enough about Larian being bitchy about my mods – let’s get into the gameplay itself! I picked up with Smiler and friends hanging out in front of Mattis’s little shop past the oxen “pen,” having just successfully avoided being pickpocketed by his sister Silfy – and noticed some sort of kerfluffle happening at the bottom of the stone steps just in front of them between some tieflings and some druids. I took one moment to swap to Lae’zel and have her grab and equip the Metallic Gloves from the nearby wagon (they give +1 on Strength saving throws and look good with her armor, and they’re marked as an item you can just take, so...), then another to swap back to Smiler and make sure that Silfy hadn’t taken any of their stuff (just in case I was wrong about how successful they’d been in catching her) – then, once that was ascertained and the new Feywild’s Kiss ring they’d picked up at the end of the last session was equipped (the one that makes it easier to succeed death saving throws and adds +1 to spell save DC), they led the way down the steps and over to the argument! It proved to be a tiefling couple, Locke and Komira, yelling at a group of druids, Jeorna, Maggran, and Mino. Specifically, it proved to be Komira furiously demanding that the druids let her daughter go now; Jeorna shooting back that said daughter was “a thief, hellspawn” and delcaring they would have to wait for Kagha’s judgment; Komira spitting what I presume to be a hellish swear word at her (“mragreshem,” whatever that means) and demanding to be let through or she’d “rip your damned throat out” –
And Maggran forcing Komira to back off by wildshaping into a big old bear and roaring at her. O.O Komira and Locke retreated up the steps a bit (along with a few other tieflings who’d been watching and giving their support), and once they were close enough, Smiler went over to see what was what. Komira insisted to Locke that they had to get Arabella out of there now, but Locke reminded her that they had to wait for Kagha to give word. Komira replied, “I’d sooner trek through the Nine Hells than trust that snake. Argh.” Smiler stepped in then and said they’d seen what had happened, and asked why the druids were holding their daughter. Locke explained that Arabella had tried to steal their idol, and that the druids “lost their damn minds about it” as the idol was vital for their ritual. Komira admitted it was all her fault, as she’d told her before that she “wished the wretched thing would just disappear – or better yet, explode.” Locke added that now poor Arabella was being judged by the druids, who hated the tieflings, and that it wasn’t right. Lae’zel’s opinion on the matter was “She was caught? Foolish child – let them judge her,” showing her priorities in life –
But Smiler agreed with Locke, saying, “She’s just a child – the druids are overreacting. I’ll talk to them.” Locke thanked them, saying the druids wouldn’t give them the time of day, and Komira urged them to hurry, as she was “at the end of my tether as is – can’t take this waiting.” ...You know what, Komira? Given the situation my family’s currently in – FUCKING MOOD.
C) Anyway – the gang officially had a quest to complete now: “Save Arabella!” Smiler and company thus headed down to talk to the druid guards, leaving Komira to mutter about how she “could have taken those guards” and Locke to respond how he would rather she not get herself eaten by a bear, before assuring her that he was positive Arabella was giving the druids hell, as she was their daughter, after all, behind them. They spotted another tiefling nearby on the way down the remaining stairs, and Smiler stopped to talk to her just in case she had anything important to say – however, she just offered up, “Lives are at stake, and the cowards only care about their bloody rituals!” Smiler thus continued down, to the entrance of the Sacred Pool –
Where they were promptly roared at by the still-bearified Maggran blocking the way. Jeorna told him, “Calm, Maggran. Give them a chance” before promptly ordering Smiler to get back. Smiler responded, “Why? What’s so special down here?” only for Jeorna to inform them that the pool was “forbidden to outsiders – Kagha’s orders.” Smiler assured her that they weren’t looking for trouble and asked if they couldn’t just be let by, but Jeorna insisted she couldn’t, and that they’d find trouble if they didn’t get out of her sight –
And then the third member of their group, Mino, said, “A moment, Jeorna,” and whispered in her ear. A surprised and grumpy Jeorna then told Smiler that Kagha actually wanted to see them and they could go ahead. XD Perks of being the protagonist – no place is TRULY barred to you! Smiler thus cheerfully led their party past the guards into the pool, where to their right they saw some of the druids weaving their magic around the previously-mentioned idol that Arabella tried to steal, chanting Latin to cast the Rite of Thorns –
D) And to their left, they saw a man interviewing a bear, talking about how it was a shame he’d never learned how to understand ursine kind and transcribing the bear’s roars. Now, you may be wondering, what kind of man interviews a BEAR in the middle of a druid grove? Well, I can tell you what kind of man it is –
The kind of man who writes a book about nymphs that is apparently so raunchy the wizard Elminster just tells him “no.” XD Yes, it was indeed Volo the ridiculous, apparently trying to get the skinny on what was going on in the Grove from one of its less-talkative members. :p I had to have Smiler go over and say hi, just to figure out what the hell the guy was doing –
And Volo greeted them with intense enthusiasm, confirming with them that they were at the gates and saw the goblins up close when they arrived, and requesting the chance to ask them some questions – “there’s no overstating my interest.” Smiler, sensing it would be easier to just give him what he wanted, replied, “Fine, ask your questions” – Volo was delighted and asked how they would describe the goblins – their size, nature, distinguishing qualities, all of that. Smiler passed a Wisdom (Insight) check to recall all the information they’d learned about goblin behavior, but chose to go with the more Bardic “A classic raid gang, complete with lasher and smattering of booyahgs.” Volo was impressed and declared Smiler “a scholar after my own heart” before asking if they’d spent a lot of time around goblins – I had Smiler reply “I’m not unfamiliar with their kind, certainly,” as I would imagine that if any non-hostile ones had come to their wagon asking for potions, they’d sell to them. Volo noted they were “shocking little creatures” before saying there was “quite a bit more to them than most accounts allow” and admitting that he planned to write “the world’s most extensive catalogue of their means and habits. A blue ocean of information, I daresay.” Hopefully Elminster won’t have to red pen that one quite as much. XD Anyway, he continued with his questions after that –
Asking Smiler about the dragon that was marching in the rear, and if it was brass or silver. As a reminder, the goblins definitely did not have a dragon on their side – if they’d had, that fight at the gate would have done VERY differently! Smiler, however, could not resist the chance to go along with Volo’s bullshit, and proceeded to one-up him by saying “Neither! It was a gold dragon, scales glittering and wings gleaming.” Volo happily latched onto this and thanked Smiler for being there to specify, “or I might have recorded a boldfaced life!” XD He then asked his final question –
“Did the attackers rally to ‘the Absolute’ when they fell upon the gates?” Now, I didn’t remember if they did or not during the actual fight, but Smiler’s answers indicated they had indeed (well, two of them did, the other was, essentially, “don’t know, too busy trying not to die” XD). I had them go with the more Bardic “Quite so. They sang the phrase like a battle-hymn,” and Volo agreed and commented that it was quite curious, before revealing that he’d actually interrogated a goblin about it – a captive somewhere in the camp. And she’d told him that they (the local goblins at least) had abandoned their usual god, Maglubiyet, in favor of this “Absolute” – “The scandal!” Smiler noted that was dramatic and wondered how Maglubiyet felt about it – Volo was certain he was most displeased, as one might expect. Anyway, Volo had noticed that the goblins who’d changed their allegiance were “informed by a kind of strategy anathema to their kind” and indicated he planned to get to the bottom of it –
By going to their camp. In fact, he planned to leave as soon as possible. Smiler warned him to “Be careful. Goblins aren’t known for mercy,” but Volo assured them that he didn’t need mercy – he had a quick tongue and a potion of invisibility in his back pocket. He then bid them adieu –
Before going back to interviewing the bear, because NPC idle animations wait for no man. XD Oh Volo...I look forward to seeing you again, once we discover how much trouble your “quick tongue” has gotten you into…
E) Having met everyone’s favorite Ridiculous Wizard (and yes, as I understand it, Volo IS a wizard, despite the bard get-up), it was time to get a move on and find Arabella! Smiler and company thus circled the grove, going past Tuffet the bear sleeping at the bottom of a ladder, and a druid speaking to a blue jay on a perch, before spotting a stone door that seemed to lead inside. The group thus proceeded through it –
And was rewarded with the sounds of a woman clearly menacing a child and declaring that she would make her an example to the others. Yup, found Kagha and Arabella! Smiler led everyone forward, to see Kagha standing with the terrified little Arabella and another druid, Rath, in the center of the room, with her venomous snake, Teela, slithering around the central altar, menacing poor Arabella with her fangs. Arabella was tearfully saying she was sorry, while Rath furiously said that what Kagha was doing was madness, and that Arabella was just a – only for Kagha to cut him off with “A what, Rath? A thief? A poison? A threat?” before declaring that she would “imprison the devil” –
And “cast out every stranger,” added as she saw the party walking up. Smiler, unintimidated, pointed out again that Arabella was just a child, only for Kagha to snap back that she was a parasite, noting that Arabella had eaten their food and drunk their water, only to steal their idol as “thanks.” She then demanded that Rath lock her up, before warning a terrified Arabella that she should keep still, as Teela was restless, as Teela continued baring her fangs. Rath again tried to reason with Kagha, noting they’d gotten the idol, but she coldly told him to “Do it” –
Leaving changing her mind up to Smiler! Fortunately, they had a nice bit of Bardic Persuasion up their sleeve to try: “Silvanus was more concerned with ‘nobly sown seeds’ than punishing children, was He not?” The DC for it was 15, but Smiler was not only willing to get Shadowheart to cast Guidance, but also to cast Friends upon Kagha for advantage on the roll –
And that paid off, as one of said rolls was a 19, boosted to 28 with all their bonuses! Kagha thus bowed to “the words of the Treefather, spoken plain” and called off Teela, before telling Arabella, “Out, thief. My grace has its limits.” Arabella promptly scarpered, out past the party back to her parents –
Just in time for Shadowheart to wince and mutter “Ngh...it hurts…” Hmmmm. Interesting. Anyway, Rath thanked Kagha, and tried to say something about what “Master Halsin” would have done, but Kagha replied that Halsin wasn’t there and that Rath had better keep his name off his tongue, “lest Teela pierce it.” ...yeah, I can see why Komira isn’t fond of this woman!
F) Having successfully rescued Arabella, it was time to see why Kagha had wanted to see Smiler and their team in the first place – but before I could start that conversation, I noticed that both Shadowheart AND Gale had exclamation points over their head. Sensing plot-important conversations, and only too happy to make the First Bitch wait, Smiler turned to Shadowheart –
Who said “I know that look – you’re wondering why I was in pain before” and that she wanted to “clear the air” about it now, before telling them that it was just “an old wound that hurts me from time to time.” Nothing to worry about, and certainly nothing to do with the tadpoles – just something she had to live with. Smiler, concerned, asked how badly it hurt, and Shadowheart confessed that it was “quite a bit,” but promised that it always passed quickly, so she could manage. Smiler sensed that she might not be telling them the whole truth, but decided not to pry – not really their business, after all. Instead, they turned to Gale to see what he wanted to say!
Gale: “That woman has more venom in her heart and a snake in its fangs, but at least the child is safe.” Everyone really wants to drag Kagha and compare her to that awful snake of hers, huh? Anyway, he pointed out that youth was a time to be forgiven for one’s transgressions – Smiler replied that “Putting a child on display like that was monstrous. I’m glad we intervened.” Gale assured them that hey “couldn’t agree more” and said that, even if Arabella wasn’t innocent (as she did try to steal the idol), that didn’t mean she was guilty. *nods* Very true – kids deserve talking-tos, not to be threatened with murder!
And, unfortunately, the last bit of this has to wait until tomorrow, as it's nearly 2 AM and I need to get some sleep. Short version for now is Kagha tasked Smiler and company with leading the tieflings out of the grove or less "the viper will strike;" Smiler agreed to look for Halsin for Rath; and Locke and Komira were appropriately grateful Smiler saved their daughter. Full version tomorrow!
Writing: Edited another chunk of Chapter 3 of “The Van Dort Vacancy” before my workout this afternoon – having decided to pursue the mystery man from yesterday (who did NOT seem like an actual Van Dort employee), Alice opened the double doors Cheshire had directed her toward today to find herself in the extremely busy kitchen, with everyone running around trying to do five things at once to keep up with Nell Van Dort’s demands for food. Alice was particularly baffled by the sight of a servant filling little wooden shoes with caviar – Smiler informed her it was the newest trend among the Brightstone set, going “whatever makes them happy.” :p They then noted that their mystery man chose a good place to hide, and Alice agreed, trying to pick out the guy’s distinctive beard among the various servants rushing around nearby (and admitting it was quite possible he’d taken one look at this mess and scarpered) –
Only to be interrupted by the head cook, Mrs. Pemberly, finding them and demanding to know who they were (as her initial assumption, hungry guests, was not borne out by their clothes). Smiler immediately stepped in and tried to pass themselves off as new hires “Simon” and “Allison,” who were late reporting to duty thanks to a lack of gondolas going in the direction of the Van Dort residence – unfortunately, Mrs. Pemberly spotted something fishy in their storyas they only got a three on their Sway roll and pointed out that, if Nell had hired new kitchen staff, she would have been there at the interview. Smiler rallied, claiming they were just general dogsbodies and that they’d come here as the kitchen seemed to need the most help, but Mrs. Pemberly wasn’t quite buying it –
And then one of the servants knocked a cheese platter another had just finished over, forcing Mrs. Pemberly to break up a potential screaming match before it could start and then go “you know what, we could use the help, so for the next ten minutes, you get the benefit of the doubt – go get some uniforms on and help us, and we’ll come back to this later.” Smiler and Alice were only too happy to comply, and I left it with them fleeing the kitchen for the changing room across the hall. Next time, we’ll pick up with them changing, and Alice noting this is not how she expected to be spending her day...but then again, she’s been spending a lot of her days doing unexpected things lately, so maybe she should have. :P
Workout: I did get on the bike this evening, and thus I did manage to finish “Fallout 3: Jon & Claire Are Still Sick So We're Speedrunning Fallout Live Special!” And the final half-hour of the J & C FO3 Sickness Speedrun was a doozy, featuring:
A) Jon waiting out the final conversations between various members of the BOS while audibly hoping that Liberty Prime worked because the giant robot often does not function correctly; coughing some more; and finally apologizing again for no F:NV YOLO Remastered that week because he couldn’t record the video sounding like he was. Hence the livestream, which was just some goofy fun to guarantee that there would be some Fallout on Sunday, as he didn’t want to have a week without some sort of Fallout content. Awww.
B) Jon speeding through his character’s convo with Sarah Lyons right before Liberty Prime was unleashed, then talking about how this was going to be a very easy section (as the goal was to just follow Prime and let him kill everything), wondering offhand if you run faster than Liberty Prime by default or not; explaining (presumably to a super-chatter) that the issue with YOLO wasn’t that he couldn’t USE his voice, it was that his voice was weird thanks to how stuffed up he was and how he kept having to cough, which made him go all squeaky in the aftermath; and taking a moment to talk about how Fallout 4’s power armor was, at least aesthetically, an improvement on the previous generation, as it’s properly big and chunky and looks like something you drive around – Fallout 3 (and presumably New Vegas) power armor looks weedy by comparison now. (Having started with FO4, I can confirm that this is the case – it doesn’t look like “power” armor so much as “armor with giant shoulders for some reason.” Bethesda occasionally got things right in that game!)
C) Claire arriving back from her pee right as Jon leveled up to Level 8 from completing another main quest, prompting him to accidentally put one skill point into Barter of all things. XD The rest went into Medicine, and he took the perk “Daddy’s Boy” to get an extra five points for that skill. Reason? The Medicine skill helps determine just how effective stimpacks are, and while Liberty Prime was going to be taking care of most of the enemies, Player Name was still going to have to get past a few – and he was almost out of healing items. So he had to make those final few ones count!
D) Jon following Liberty Prime on the big “victory march” to the purifier – praying the big-old robot didn’t get stuck on the slope of the highway like MacCready got stuck on the stairs back in Little Lamplight (fortunately he didn’t); declaring that they were going to do this in “sub-two” (aka under two hours) and that that would be his PB and then he would have a PB&J sandwich – before recanting that because apparently he hates peanut butter (he loathes the smell specifically – who knew?); getting very excited at picking up an actual GOOD weapon (a Ripper mini-chainsaw) off a dead Enclave soldier, right at the very end of his speedrun –
And getting hurt by an explosion which crippled P. N.’s leg...only to discover that he was out of stimpacks. Meaning he couldn’t actually heal his leg, and all that Medicine skill boosting was for nothing. He did finally realize he had some Rad-Away when he noted that he really couldn’t take any more radiation damage or he’d die from radiation poisoning, and promptly chugged it to get that down from “Deadly Rad Poisoning” to “Critical Rad Poisoning,” but – yeah. No stimpacks in his inventory, and no stimpacks on any enemy corpses they passed either – the best he could get was a few bits of food to help keep P. N. alive. And, of course, people kept shooting at poor P. N. as they proceeded, leading to –
E) Jon finally finishing the “victory march” with Liberty Prime, making it into the Jefferson Memorial, and making it up to the point where you actually activate everything for Project Purity with not only a crippled leg – but two crippled legs, a crippled torso, and a crippled head (the latter two courtesy of the Enclave in the Memorial). Jon considered this hilariously funny, especially whenever he swapped to third person to see how his character walked – and to be fair, the double-crippled-leg hobble was very amusing. XD Oh, poor Player Name…
F) Jon making it to Project Purity and nearly screwing up the final confrontation with Autumn by accidentally picking the conversation option that triggers him to start fighting, instead of the one that allows you to win via speech checks – fortunately he was able to reload from the moment P. N. entered the room and pick the correct option, which caused Autumn to walk away and allowed P. N. to hobble his way up to the control panel for the final bit of waiting around to listen to Dr. Li talk about building pressure and whatnot…
G) Jon agreeing to enter the purifier, slotting the modified FEV virus into the filtration system, and then keying in 216 on the big activation keypad in the rad-filled room, trigger the activation of Project Purity and the official end of the run – at one hour, fifty-five minutes, and fifty-two seconds. *pumps fist* Sub two, everybody! Let’s, uh, not think about how Jon was saying he could do it in under an hour when the livestream started – oh, no, he just brought it up. XD
H) Jon and Claire doing super-chat shout-outs while the base-game ending slides played (covering the Lone Wanderer’s travels and triumphs, such as they were) and the “Broken Steel” post-game started (with P. N. waking up in the Brotherhood Citadel after their “noble sacrifice all healed up and promptly saying “so long, losers,” and Jon talking about how playing Baldur’s Gate III HAS turned him onto the idea of playing actual tabletop D&D a little bit...though it would have to be with the exact right group, and finding the time to do it would be – troublesome, to say the least), then deciding to properly end the run with P. N. going to the Jefferson Memorial one last time to drink the FEV-poisoned water and die XD
I) And Jon and Claire talking about how the livestream actually bought them a few days to recover, as Monday was their regular day off anyway and Tuesday was the next episode of the pre-recorded BG3 LP, so they didn’t have to worry about anything until Wednesday, and telling their viewers “so you can definitely expect four new episodes of BG3, but we don’t want to make any promises for videos other than that” (though Jon DESPERATELY hoped he’d be well enough to make a proper video by Wednesday). And getting an interesting suggestion from a super-chatter about playing a game (presumably a Fallout), but deliberately limiting yourself to much more realistic carry capacity rules (two weapons and whatever a person could reasonably carry in a backpack), with Jon saying that would be a very high-effort but potentially fascinating roleplay situation and maybe they’d workshop it. *shrug* So we’ll see if that pops up for a future video (or, more probably, a one-off stream of some kind).
So yeah – that’s Jon’s attempt at speedrunning while sick over with! I’m glad I got to finish it – I really needed that bit of funny in my life right at the moment. Don’t know what I’m doing for next week yet, given I have no idea how it’s going to go, but – at least I had this for this week.
And now I absolutely have to hit the hay, as it is getting VERY late and, as usual, the BG3 write-up took longer than expected. Though, to be fair, dinner was delayed as Mom got lost trying to leave the hospital (you can't go out the way you go in), and there were a lot of emotions this evening, so... Tomorrow is a Cleaning Saturday, followed by a visit to Dad in the hospital -- we'll see what gets done around that. Wouldn't mind playing Little Corners if I can, but -- we'll see. *shrug* Night all.
Tumblr: While I didn’t spend a lot of actual time on Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler) or Valice Multiverse today (apart from catching up on dashboards), I did do something that will eventually go in a tumblr post on VLA(NS) – specifically, I spent roughly from 11 AM (might have been 10:30 AM, I forget exactly when I started) to 2:15 PM making “text post memes” of Victor, Alice, and Smiler. If you’re wondering what the fuck those are, it’s when you take a twitter or tumblr post (or, sometimes, an Onion headline) and paste it onto a screenshot of a character who you think fits the post – you can see a set that I posted back in July of 2025 here for examples of what I’m talking about. I ended up doing this because I saw a Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency set on my dash today courtesy of my friend Newt, looked at a couple, and thought “yeah, the text on that one would fit Smiler...and that one Victor...and that one Alice...hang on, let me save these images and then go find the screenshots I need.” And then I just kept going because it was something to do that wasn’t sitting around staring at the wall and feeling miserable. I ended up making twelve images in total, after plunging into my friend Squid’s “#text post meme” tag and gathering up some posts from that as well – I was making them even while eating lunch (when I wasn’t texting Mom, anyway). What can I say – my OT3 makes me happy, and I fucking needed the happy today. And trying to find just the right picture for some of them (especially for the Smiler ones) WAS a good distraction. Might make more later – we’ll see. (Though what I really need to do tomorrow is answer the two asks I couldn’t get to on Valice Multiverse tonight...)
Baldur’s Gate III: Was in the mood to visit Faerun today after I finished making all my “text post meme” pictures, so I loaded up the Emerald Grove for about an hour and had Smiler and company continue on their adventures there! Which involved mainly saving a little girl, seeing what an asshole the current leader of the local druids is, and indulging a tall-tale-teller’s questions, as you will see below –
A) First, though, the game decided to give me a scare when I first tried to launch it, with a pop-up appearing warning me of a “data mismatch” in the game. Startled (and about ready to unleash a torrent of fury basically amounting to “oh, of COURSE one of my damn files would corrupt, not like I don’t have enough going on today” with much more swearing), I clicked on the “more information” button, read through the FAQ page for the error on Larian’s site, then followed its advice to see the “altered files” it was so worried about –
And found a long list of .wem files. Which, after a moment of “???”, I remembered were from my manual install of the mod that makes sure all of Wyll’s voice lines are Theo’s instead of a mix of Theo’s and Lanre’s. Cue me being like, “Well, if there’s a data mismatch THERE, it’s your own fucking fault Larian – maybe you should have made sure all of Theo’s voice lines made into the game yourselves!” *sigh* Now, granted, there might be another issue in the background with a different mod that I’m not aware of, but from what I can see it really does seem to be a case of the Larian launcher getting pissy about me making sure Wyll always sounds like Wyll. So I went ahead and dove into the game anyway. Worst case scenario, thanks to the backup I made at the end of December, if something more serious pops up, I’ll only lose about two play sessions or so. Which will be annoying to replay, granted, but not unduly agonizing.
B) Enough about Larian being bitchy about my mods – let’s get into the gameplay itself! I picked up with Smiler and friends hanging out in front of Mattis’s little shop past the oxen “pen,” having just successfully avoided being pickpocketed by his sister Silfy – and noticed some sort of kerfluffle happening at the bottom of the stone steps just in front of them between some tieflings and some druids. I took one moment to swap to Lae’zel and have her grab and equip the Metallic Gloves from the nearby wagon (they give +1 on Strength saving throws and look good with her armor, and they’re marked as an item you can just take, so...), then another to swap back to Smiler and make sure that Silfy hadn’t taken any of their stuff (just in case I was wrong about how successful they’d been in catching her) – then, once that was ascertained and the new Feywild’s Kiss ring they’d picked up at the end of the last session was equipped (the one that makes it easier to succeed death saving throws and adds +1 to spell save DC), they led the way down the steps and over to the argument! It proved to be a tiefling couple, Locke and Komira, yelling at a group of druids, Jeorna, Maggran, and Mino. Specifically, it proved to be Komira furiously demanding that the druids let her daughter go now; Jeorna shooting back that said daughter was “a thief, hellspawn” and delcaring they would have to wait for Kagha’s judgment; Komira spitting what I presume to be a hellish swear word at her (“mragreshem,” whatever that means) and demanding to be let through or she’d “rip your damned throat out” –
And Maggran forcing Komira to back off by wildshaping into a big old bear and roaring at her. O.O Komira and Locke retreated up the steps a bit (along with a few other tieflings who’d been watching and giving their support), and once they were close enough, Smiler went over to see what was what. Komira insisted to Locke that they had to get Arabella out of there now, but Locke reminded her that they had to wait for Kagha to give word. Komira replied, “I’d sooner trek through the Nine Hells than trust that snake. Argh.” Smiler stepped in then and said they’d seen what had happened, and asked why the druids were holding their daughter. Locke explained that Arabella had tried to steal their idol, and that the druids “lost their damn minds about it” as the idol was vital for their ritual. Komira admitted it was all her fault, as she’d told her before that she “wished the wretched thing would just disappear – or better yet, explode.” Locke added that now poor Arabella was being judged by the druids, who hated the tieflings, and that it wasn’t right. Lae’zel’s opinion on the matter was “She was caught? Foolish child – let them judge her,” showing her priorities in life –
But Smiler agreed with Locke, saying, “She’s just a child – the druids are overreacting. I’ll talk to them.” Locke thanked them, saying the druids wouldn’t give them the time of day, and Komira urged them to hurry, as she was “at the end of my tether as is – can’t take this waiting.” ...You know what, Komira? Given the situation my family’s currently in – FUCKING MOOD.
C) Anyway – the gang officially had a quest to complete now: “Save Arabella!” Smiler and company thus headed down to talk to the druid guards, leaving Komira to mutter about how she “could have taken those guards” and Locke to respond how he would rather she not get herself eaten by a bear, before assuring her that he was positive Arabella was giving the druids hell, as she was their daughter, after all, behind them. They spotted another tiefling nearby on the way down the remaining stairs, and Smiler stopped to talk to her just in case she had anything important to say – however, she just offered up, “Lives are at stake, and the cowards only care about their bloody rituals!” Smiler thus continued down, to the entrance of the Sacred Pool –
Where they were promptly roared at by the still-bearified Maggran blocking the way. Jeorna told him, “Calm, Maggran. Give them a chance” before promptly ordering Smiler to get back. Smiler responded, “Why? What’s so special down here?” only for Jeorna to inform them that the pool was “forbidden to outsiders – Kagha’s orders.” Smiler assured her that they weren’t looking for trouble and asked if they couldn’t just be let by, but Jeorna insisted she couldn’t, and that they’d find trouble if they didn’t get out of her sight –
And then the third member of their group, Mino, said, “A moment, Jeorna,” and whispered in her ear. A surprised and grumpy Jeorna then told Smiler that Kagha actually wanted to see them and they could go ahead. XD Perks of being the protagonist – no place is TRULY barred to you! Smiler thus cheerfully led their party past the guards into the pool, where to their right they saw some of the druids weaving their magic around the previously-mentioned idol that Arabella tried to steal, chanting Latin to cast the Rite of Thorns –
D) And to their left, they saw a man interviewing a bear, talking about how it was a shame he’d never learned how to understand ursine kind and transcribing the bear’s roars. Now, you may be wondering, what kind of man interviews a BEAR in the middle of a druid grove? Well, I can tell you what kind of man it is –
The kind of man who writes a book about nymphs that is apparently so raunchy the wizard Elminster just tells him “no.” XD Yes, it was indeed Volo the ridiculous, apparently trying to get the skinny on what was going on in the Grove from one of its less-talkative members. :p I had to have Smiler go over and say hi, just to figure out what the hell the guy was doing –
And Volo greeted them with intense enthusiasm, confirming with them that they were at the gates and saw the goblins up close when they arrived, and requesting the chance to ask them some questions – “there’s no overstating my interest.” Smiler, sensing it would be easier to just give him what he wanted, replied, “Fine, ask your questions” – Volo was delighted and asked how they would describe the goblins – their size, nature, distinguishing qualities, all of that. Smiler passed a Wisdom (Insight) check to recall all the information they’d learned about goblin behavior, but chose to go with the more Bardic “A classic raid gang, complete with lasher and smattering of booyahgs.” Volo was impressed and declared Smiler “a scholar after my own heart” before asking if they’d spent a lot of time around goblins – I had Smiler reply “I’m not unfamiliar with their kind, certainly,” as I would imagine that if any non-hostile ones had come to their wagon asking for potions, they’d sell to them. Volo noted they were “shocking little creatures” before saying there was “quite a bit more to them than most accounts allow” and admitting that he planned to write “the world’s most extensive catalogue of their means and habits. A blue ocean of information, I daresay.” Hopefully Elminster won’t have to red pen that one quite as much. XD Anyway, he continued with his questions after that –
Asking Smiler about the dragon that was marching in the rear, and if it was brass or silver. As a reminder, the goblins definitely did not have a dragon on their side – if they’d had, that fight at the gate would have done VERY differently! Smiler, however, could not resist the chance to go along with Volo’s bullshit, and proceeded to one-up him by saying “Neither! It was a gold dragon, scales glittering and wings gleaming.” Volo happily latched onto this and thanked Smiler for being there to specify, “or I might have recorded a boldfaced life!” XD He then asked his final question –
“Did the attackers rally to ‘the Absolute’ when they fell upon the gates?” Now, I didn’t remember if they did or not during the actual fight, but Smiler’s answers indicated they had indeed (well, two of them did, the other was, essentially, “don’t know, too busy trying not to die” XD). I had them go with the more Bardic “Quite so. They sang the phrase like a battle-hymn,” and Volo agreed and commented that it was quite curious, before revealing that he’d actually interrogated a goblin about it – a captive somewhere in the camp. And she’d told him that they (the local goblins at least) had abandoned their usual god, Maglubiyet, in favor of this “Absolute” – “The scandal!” Smiler noted that was dramatic and wondered how Maglubiyet felt about it – Volo was certain he was most displeased, as one might expect. Anyway, Volo had noticed that the goblins who’d changed their allegiance were “informed by a kind of strategy anathema to their kind” and indicated he planned to get to the bottom of it –
By going to their camp. In fact, he planned to leave as soon as possible. Smiler warned him to “Be careful. Goblins aren’t known for mercy,” but Volo assured them that he didn’t need mercy – he had a quick tongue and a potion of invisibility in his back pocket. He then bid them adieu –
Before going back to interviewing the bear, because NPC idle animations wait for no man. XD Oh Volo...I look forward to seeing you again, once we discover how much trouble your “quick tongue” has gotten you into…
E) Having met everyone’s favorite Ridiculous Wizard (and yes, as I understand it, Volo IS a wizard, despite the bard get-up), it was time to get a move on and find Arabella! Smiler and company thus circled the grove, going past Tuffet the bear sleeping at the bottom of a ladder, and a druid speaking to a blue jay on a perch, before spotting a stone door that seemed to lead inside. The group thus proceeded through it –
And was rewarded with the sounds of a woman clearly menacing a child and declaring that she would make her an example to the others. Yup, found Kagha and Arabella! Smiler led everyone forward, to see Kagha standing with the terrified little Arabella and another druid, Rath, in the center of the room, with her venomous snake, Teela, slithering around the central altar, menacing poor Arabella with her fangs. Arabella was tearfully saying she was sorry, while Rath furiously said that what Kagha was doing was madness, and that Arabella was just a – only for Kagha to cut him off with “A what, Rath? A thief? A poison? A threat?” before declaring that she would “imprison the devil” –
And “cast out every stranger,” added as she saw the party walking up. Smiler, unintimidated, pointed out again that Arabella was just a child, only for Kagha to snap back that she was a parasite, noting that Arabella had eaten their food and drunk their water, only to steal their idol as “thanks.” She then demanded that Rath lock her up, before warning a terrified Arabella that she should keep still, as Teela was restless, as Teela continued baring her fangs. Rath again tried to reason with Kagha, noting they’d gotten the idol, but she coldly told him to “Do it” –
Leaving changing her mind up to Smiler! Fortunately, they had a nice bit of Bardic Persuasion up their sleeve to try: “Silvanus was more concerned with ‘nobly sown seeds’ than punishing children, was He not?” The DC for it was 15, but Smiler was not only willing to get Shadowheart to cast Guidance, but also to cast Friends upon Kagha for advantage on the roll –
And that paid off, as one of said rolls was a 19, boosted to 28 with all their bonuses! Kagha thus bowed to “the words of the Treefather, spoken plain” and called off Teela, before telling Arabella, “Out, thief. My grace has its limits.” Arabella promptly scarpered, out past the party back to her parents –
Just in time for Shadowheart to wince and mutter “Ngh...it hurts…” Hmmmm. Interesting. Anyway, Rath thanked Kagha, and tried to say something about what “Master Halsin” would have done, but Kagha replied that Halsin wasn’t there and that Rath had better keep his name off his tongue, “lest Teela pierce it.” ...yeah, I can see why Komira isn’t fond of this woman!
F) Having successfully rescued Arabella, it was time to see why Kagha had wanted to see Smiler and their team in the first place – but before I could start that conversation, I noticed that both Shadowheart AND Gale had exclamation points over their head. Sensing plot-important conversations, and only too happy to make the First Bitch wait, Smiler turned to Shadowheart –
Who said “I know that look – you’re wondering why I was in pain before” and that she wanted to “clear the air” about it now, before telling them that it was just “an old wound that hurts me from time to time.” Nothing to worry about, and certainly nothing to do with the tadpoles – just something she had to live with. Smiler, concerned, asked how badly it hurt, and Shadowheart confessed that it was “quite a bit,” but promised that it always passed quickly, so she could manage. Smiler sensed that she might not be telling them the whole truth, but decided not to pry – not really their business, after all. Instead, they turned to Gale to see what he wanted to say!
Gale: “That woman has more venom in her heart and a snake in its fangs, but at least the child is safe.” Everyone really wants to drag Kagha and compare her to that awful snake of hers, huh? Anyway, he pointed out that youth was a time to be forgiven for one’s transgressions – Smiler replied that “Putting a child on display like that was monstrous. I’m glad we intervened.” Gale assured them that hey “couldn’t agree more” and said that, even if Arabella wasn’t innocent (as she did try to steal the idol), that didn’t mean she was guilty. *nods* Very true – kids deserve talking-tos, not to be threatened with murder!
And, unfortunately, the last bit of this has to wait until tomorrow, as it's nearly 2 AM and I need to get some sleep. Short version for now is Kagha tasked Smiler and company with leading the tieflings out of the grove or less "the viper will strike;" Smiler agreed to look for Halsin for Rath; and Locke and Komira were appropriately grateful Smiler saved their daughter. Full version tomorrow!
Writing: Edited another chunk of Chapter 3 of “The Van Dort Vacancy” before my workout this afternoon – having decided to pursue the mystery man from yesterday (who did NOT seem like an actual Van Dort employee), Alice opened the double doors Cheshire had directed her toward today to find herself in the extremely busy kitchen, with everyone running around trying to do five things at once to keep up with Nell Van Dort’s demands for food. Alice was particularly baffled by the sight of a servant filling little wooden shoes with caviar – Smiler informed her it was the newest trend among the Brightstone set, going “whatever makes them happy.” :p They then noted that their mystery man chose a good place to hide, and Alice agreed, trying to pick out the guy’s distinctive beard among the various servants rushing around nearby (and admitting it was quite possible he’d taken one look at this mess and scarpered) –
Only to be interrupted by the head cook, Mrs. Pemberly, finding them and demanding to know who they were (as her initial assumption, hungry guests, was not borne out by their clothes). Smiler immediately stepped in and tried to pass themselves off as new hires “Simon” and “Allison,” who were late reporting to duty thanks to a lack of gondolas going in the direction of the Van Dort residence – unfortunately, Mrs. Pemberly spotted something fishy in their story
And then one of the servants knocked a cheese platter another had just finished over, forcing Mrs. Pemberly to break up a potential screaming match before it could start and then go “you know what, we could use the help, so for the next ten minutes, you get the benefit of the doubt – go get some uniforms on and help us, and we’ll come back to this later.” Smiler and Alice were only too happy to comply, and I left it with them fleeing the kitchen for the changing room across the hall. Next time, we’ll pick up with them changing, and Alice noting this is not how she expected to be spending her day...but then again, she’s been spending a lot of her days doing unexpected things lately, so maybe she should have. :P
Workout: I did get on the bike this evening, and thus I did manage to finish “Fallout 3: Jon & Claire Are Still Sick So We're Speedrunning Fallout Live Special!” And the final half-hour of the J & C FO3 Sickness Speedrun was a doozy, featuring:
A) Jon waiting out the final conversations between various members of the BOS while audibly hoping that Liberty Prime worked because the giant robot often does not function correctly; coughing some more; and finally apologizing again for no F:NV YOLO Remastered that week because he couldn’t record the video sounding like he was. Hence the livestream, which was just some goofy fun to guarantee that there would be some Fallout on Sunday, as he didn’t want to have a week without some sort of Fallout content. Awww.
B) Jon speeding through his character’s convo with Sarah Lyons right before Liberty Prime was unleashed, then talking about how this was going to be a very easy section (as the goal was to just follow Prime and let him kill everything), wondering offhand if you run faster than Liberty Prime by default or not; explaining (presumably to a super-chatter) that the issue with YOLO wasn’t that he couldn’t USE his voice, it was that his voice was weird thanks to how stuffed up he was and how he kept having to cough, which made him go all squeaky in the aftermath; and taking a moment to talk about how Fallout 4’s power armor was, at least aesthetically, an improvement on the previous generation, as it’s properly big and chunky and looks like something you drive around – Fallout 3 (and presumably New Vegas) power armor looks weedy by comparison now. (Having started with FO4, I can confirm that this is the case – it doesn’t look like “power” armor so much as “armor with giant shoulders for some reason.” Bethesda occasionally got things right in that game!)
C) Claire arriving back from her pee right as Jon leveled up to Level 8 from completing another main quest, prompting him to accidentally put one skill point into Barter of all things. XD The rest went into Medicine, and he took the perk “Daddy’s Boy” to get an extra five points for that skill. Reason? The Medicine skill helps determine just how effective stimpacks are, and while Liberty Prime was going to be taking care of most of the enemies, Player Name was still going to have to get past a few – and he was almost out of healing items. So he had to make those final few ones count!
D) Jon following Liberty Prime on the big “victory march” to the purifier – praying the big-old robot didn’t get stuck on the slope of the highway like MacCready got stuck on the stairs back in Little Lamplight (fortunately he didn’t); declaring that they were going to do this in “sub-two” (aka under two hours) and that that would be his PB and then he would have a PB&J sandwich – before recanting that because apparently he hates peanut butter (he loathes the smell specifically – who knew?); getting very excited at picking up an actual GOOD weapon (a Ripper mini-chainsaw) off a dead Enclave soldier, right at the very end of his speedrun –
And getting hurt by an explosion which crippled P. N.’s leg...only to discover that he was out of stimpacks. Meaning he couldn’t actually heal his leg, and all that Medicine skill boosting was for nothing. He did finally realize he had some Rad-Away when he noted that he really couldn’t take any more radiation damage or he’d die from radiation poisoning, and promptly chugged it to get that down from “Deadly Rad Poisoning” to “Critical Rad Poisoning,” but – yeah. No stimpacks in his inventory, and no stimpacks on any enemy corpses they passed either – the best he could get was a few bits of food to help keep P. N. alive. And, of course, people kept shooting at poor P. N. as they proceeded, leading to –
E) Jon finally finishing the “victory march” with Liberty Prime, making it into the Jefferson Memorial, and making it up to the point where you actually activate everything for Project Purity with not only a crippled leg – but two crippled legs, a crippled torso, and a crippled head (the latter two courtesy of the Enclave in the Memorial). Jon considered this hilariously funny, especially whenever he swapped to third person to see how his character walked – and to be fair, the double-crippled-leg hobble was very amusing. XD Oh, poor Player Name…
F) Jon making it to Project Purity and nearly screwing up the final confrontation with Autumn by accidentally picking the conversation option that triggers him to start fighting, instead of the one that allows you to win via speech checks – fortunately he was able to reload from the moment P. N. entered the room and pick the correct option, which caused Autumn to walk away and allowed P. N. to hobble his way up to the control panel for the final bit of waiting around to listen to Dr. Li talk about building pressure and whatnot…
G) Jon agreeing to enter the purifier, slotting the modified FEV virus into the filtration system, and then keying in 216 on the big activation keypad in the rad-filled room, trigger the activation of Project Purity and the official end of the run – at one hour, fifty-five minutes, and fifty-two seconds. *pumps fist* Sub two, everybody! Let’s, uh, not think about how Jon was saying he could do it in under an hour when the livestream started – oh, no, he just brought it up. XD
H) Jon and Claire doing super-chat shout-outs while the base-game ending slides played (covering the Lone Wanderer’s travels and triumphs, such as they were) and the “Broken Steel” post-game started (with P. N. waking up in the Brotherhood Citadel after their “noble sacrifice all healed up and promptly saying “so long, losers,” and Jon talking about how playing Baldur’s Gate III HAS turned him onto the idea of playing actual tabletop D&D a little bit...though it would have to be with the exact right group, and finding the time to do it would be – troublesome, to say the least), then deciding to properly end the run with P. N. going to the Jefferson Memorial one last time to drink the FEV-poisoned water and die XD
I) And Jon and Claire talking about how the livestream actually bought them a few days to recover, as Monday was their regular day off anyway and Tuesday was the next episode of the pre-recorded BG3 LP, so they didn’t have to worry about anything until Wednesday, and telling their viewers “so you can definitely expect four new episodes of BG3, but we don’t want to make any promises for videos other than that” (though Jon DESPERATELY hoped he’d be well enough to make a proper video by Wednesday). And getting an interesting suggestion from a super-chatter about playing a game (presumably a Fallout), but deliberately limiting yourself to much more realistic carry capacity rules (two weapons and whatever a person could reasonably carry in a backpack), with Jon saying that would be a very high-effort but potentially fascinating roleplay situation and maybe they’d workshop it. *shrug* So we’ll see if that pops up for a future video (or, more probably, a one-off stream of some kind).
So yeah – that’s Jon’s attempt at speedrunning while sick over with! I’m glad I got to finish it – I really needed that bit of funny in my life right at the moment. Don’t know what I’m doing for next week yet, given I have no idea how it’s going to go, but – at least I had this for this week.
And now I absolutely have to hit the hay, as it is getting VERY late and, as usual, the BG3 write-up took longer than expected. Though, to be fair, dinner was delayed as Mom got lost trying to leave the hospital (you can't go out the way you go in), and there were a lot of emotions this evening, so... Tomorrow is a Cleaning Saturday, followed by a visit to Dad in the hospital -- we'll see what gets done around that. Wouldn't mind playing Little Corners if I can, but -- we'll see. *shrug* Night all.
