Welp, wish me luck (or not).
***
An Introduction I Suppose
Circa 15,000 years BCE, humans made landfall on Kerguelen.
These people were related to the South African indigenous complex sometimes called "KhoiSan". These seperated from the rest of humanity relatively early on, around 260-150 thousand years ago, and enjoyed once dominion over the birthlands of mankind until the much latter Bantu expansions. One of the now gone cultures within this co...
2022-06-16 15:01:30 +0000 UTC
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Magic: The Gathering is pretty unique in that its game mechanics produced an exceptionally useful writing tool.
The color pie essentially breaks down the core components of character motivations and methods and explicitly frames these features as not necessarily good or evil. For example an antagonist can be motivated by peace or use order; this would make them White aligned w...
2022-06-14 15:44:48 +0000 UTC
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Oligocene map (adapted from Ron Blakey). Red marks the Pan-Arctic/Laurasian faunal unit, dominated by microcosmodontids, eucosmodontids, lambdopsalids, adalatheriids, and sudamericids, with relictual flightless kogaionids and ptilodontoideans and perhaps meniscoessids; lime marks the Afro-Arabian faunal unit, dominated by galulatheriids, boffiids, afroptilodontoideans and kogaionids; green marks the Malagasy faunal unit, dominated by kogaionids, afroptilodontoideans, boffiids, sudamericid...
2022-06-13 21:46:35 +0000 UTC
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Eocene map (adapted from Ron Blakey). Red marks the North American faunal province, dominated by ptilodontoideans, microcosmodontids, eucosmodontids, ferugliotheriids, taeniolabidids, lambdopsalids and adalatheriids; orange marks the European faunal province, dominated by taeniolabidids, ferugliotheriids, boffiids, ptilodontoideans, eucosmodontids, microcosmodontids and galulatheriids; burgundy marks the Balkanatolian faunal province, dominated by kogaionids, meniscoessids and galulatheri...
2022-06-13 21:26:17 +0000 UTC
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Palaeocene map (adapted from Ron Blakey). Red marks the North American faunal province, dominated by ptilodontoideans, microcosmodontids, eucosmodontids, taeniolabidids, meniscoessids, ferugliotheriids and relictual therians; gold marks the Antarctic faunal province dominated by dryolestoids, sudamericids, greniodontids, ferugliotheriids, monotremes and a few northern immigrants like ptilodontoideans; yellow marks the Afro-Arabian faunal province dominated by galulatheriids and kogaionids...
2022-06-13 21:03:50 +0000 UTC
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So Prehistoric Planet is out and about. As predicted, it is the most scientifically accurate and visually stunning dinosaur documentary done to date. There’s honestly not much to add that hasn’t been said before, though I will note how I like how the animals are “perfect but not perfect”. They’re not skinwrapped, but not embubbled as some pop paleoart depictions go ...
2022-05-27 13:21:33 +0000 UTC
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Pterosaur wing diagram by Federico Benzan. This was on Wikipedia’s pterosaur page for the longest time… until someone noted them paddle-shaped wingtips….</figure>
Recently 2022-05-25 21:53:03 +0000 UTC
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The world exists in a continuum, from past to present and beyond.
My roots are plunged into the past, into the land, into the flesh, into the blood and into the soul.
So many have come before me, be them people, great beasts or ancient trees, their marks shaping the soil where my roots ground themselves.
I want my roots to be blood vessels, to touch and connect to all those to came before.
Knowledge leads to love, and my love for those who came before is sparked whenev...
2022-05-25 08:09:07 +0000 UTC
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In which I exercise more of the post-mending Ulgroth worldbuilding.
***
Laira was a simple faerie.
A bit of sunshine, a warm welcome and the sound of rivulet waters echoing across the creek was enough to please her. Many of her kin lost themselves in Court politics, and that was fine. She wasn't a good argumentator nor ambitious enough to even try. She'd much rather do her duty out in the fields, watching over farmers and their chi...
2022-05-15 18:56:51 +0000 UTC
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Remember how old canon had interesting things to say like how mana apparently travels from the base of the skull? Good times.
Also the Ulgrotha guide said the minotaurs were based on Aboriginal Australian cultures so have some Kamilaroi-inspired things.
***
Guway sat at the tavern, patiently watching the drops from his mug slide down.
His mind tended to wander off to weird places when he was bored. As a child he sometimes mixed ingredients within s...
2022-05-08 23:59:34 +0000 UTC
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The cages rattled, wood hitting wood a sound more unsettling than the lightning roaring in the night sky, the pitiless splashes the carriage's collective hooves as they punched and marred the bog expanse, the murderous howls echoing through the hills all the way to the snowy peaks of the Koskun. The captives wailed and cried, begging still for Serra and her angels to set them free, a cacaphony almost as blood curling as the rattling.
With each stop, one voice was removed from the choir,...
2022-05-02 23:29:00 +0000 UTC
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I've been thinking about a hypothetical return to my favourite MTG set, and I think I'm going to commit to it.
I'll write a story that WOTC has confidently stated they will never write.
I hope to eventually convert this into a visual novel, I already have an artist potentially interested in doing the sprites. But I'm nothing if not impatient, and I want a trial run, so while I accumulate resources this will be my first take.
The Homelands awa...
2022-05-02 21:49:50 +0000 UTC
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<figure>Borealestes serendipitus by Panciroli et al 2021.
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I always think about Mesozoic synapsids. If you don’t then fuck off to a Spinosaurus video or something. Anyways, three things in particular have been in my mind for a while:
- Apparently the traditional layout of...
2022-04-21 11:37:36 +0000 UTC
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<figure>List of multie skulls by Adams et al 2019.
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You might have figured something is happening, something evil. So allow me to distract you with this article not at all related to that.
Why multituberculates were not replaced by rodents:
- The last unambiguous multies, ...
2022-04-13 19:15:06 +0000 UTC
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A bird girl's story at Echo's edge, centuries before the mines were opened. (Note's: Jenna ending allusion that most of Echo was underwater. Also MC's name is Zapotec because indigenous peoples in the southwest traded with Mesoamericans)
***
Xena stared at the water, black with orange tinges as the sun set.
She wasn't supposed to be here. It was an awful place, covered by water as to contain the evil within. The mountains looked like jagged spines and claws, as it...
2022-04-04 13:00:46 +0000 UTC
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Due to the extremely erratic and unpredictable Enantiornithes phylogeny a full project probably ain't gonna be possible in the immediate future. Still, here's some ideas I decided to go with:
- Basic layout similar to that of The Speculative Dinosaur Project, with Avisauridae, a clade analogous to the Enabaptiformes (descending from Lectavis), a clade analogous to the Gondwanaviformes (descending from Elsornis), a clade analogous to the Twitiaviformes (descending...
2022-03-13 15:59:35 +0000 UTC
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<figure>Adamantina Formation enantiornithean jaw from Wu et al 2021.
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I still remember the Mirarce paper and its authors’ decisions to depict the eponymous bird with a toothless beak. This decision was based on an...
2022-03-12 14:00:43 +0000 UTC
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Lots of “what if Pokemon were real animals” speculative essays, might as well do one for temtem.
Tuwai itself
Given its small size and long tail, I’m overall assuming an ecology similar to its real life inspiration, the toucans and the closely related barbets. Perhaps a bit more of a ground-foraging granivore given its more parrot-like beak and seeming lack of perching digits in its feet.
Tukai
With long wings adapted for soaring...
2022-03-09 11:49:33 +0000 UTC
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Thus did the invaders come, tearing through the wind with marrow lights. The Aurora passed like a tide, but cut it was, and oblivious it was to them as well.
Flame burst like a flaring sun, leaving ashes like burnt corpses. This happened outside of him, but also on the inside, for the tides were fickle and maddening. One moment the warmth of the hearth made him loving, one moment the emptiness made him weep and the only cure was warm blood in the near-fireless husk, whispering to him p...
2022-02-09 00:47:25 +0000 UTC
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In the Flynn route we get a tiny tidbit on Echo's indigenous history, and how little Sydney thought they had treasures. Here we explore this.
***
Sydney looked at Jenna, across their lunchtable. He felt nervous; nominally friends, she had rejected any attempts in the past to be besties, and while she had less venom to say when he hooked up with TJ she still was only courteous in a passive-aggressive way. No "shoot the shit with the boys" with her. Overall, she was rather private p...
2022-01-24 05:39:06 +0000 UTC
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"Oh my goodness, what happened?" TJ's mom asked, half-concerned and half-amused.
As the two stood i the porch, its clear by the ruffled fur and scent that they had a tryst in the car, though at least they were presentable. TJ looked pretty embarassed but happy; it was Sydney who seemed atypically meek, since standing like that if front of your bf's mother is bound to be mortifying.
"Well, by your silence I guess it goes without saying you should be more careful" TJ's mother said, ...
2022-01-18 22:34:53 +0000 UTC
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People have done it for Pokemon types so why not?
Since there are twelve types I like to think that each color (plus colorless) has a type. You're free to disagree, particularly since the types don't always match the elements in MTG colors.
Neutral
Seeing as it is the closest thing to a type-less temtem I think it fits in Colorless just fine. You can also...
2022-01-10 12:58:22 +0000 UTC
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