My Dream As A Fanfic Writer Is For One Day, One Of My Fics To Be Someones Comfort Fic. Like The Fic That

happy bg3 final patch day to those who celebrate

notes and thoughts on the Nine-Fingers Keene tag dive

First, the unpretty Sheets chart:

For a deeper explanation of how I break down the roles, you can see this post here; and here is a comparison of NF's tag accuracy (percentage of main + side works) vs the rest I've done:

Raphael: 75% | Nocturne: 71% | Nine-Fingers Keene: 62% | Aylin/Isobel: 56% | Minthara: 54% | Alfira: 44% | Jaheira: 36% | Araj: ~27%

Please note that at this point, Minthara's is ~9 months out of date, the rest between then and now. Take these as a general baseline versus a hard truth.

Similarly to Nocturne, Act 3 easy-ish-to-miss Nine-Fingers Keene steps neatly out of the broader fandom spotlight and into the hands of people who actually like her.

Actually - I believe a lot of people genuinely like the women of BG3. But I also believe people do not care about them, which becomes really obvious with the amount of reverse-thought-criming in some characters' tags (Jaheiraaaa). AO3 users writing about Astele Keene, especially in her more recent works, like her and they care about her.

The minor role tags were in large part due to: a character, usually Tav, has a connection to the seedy underbelly of the city, and they need to call in a favor from NF. They will meet with her and/or discuss her and/or think about her for a few paragraphs.

Nine-Fingers' main ship was, predictably, with Jaheira. Her second largest fic-status was no tagged ship at all. The other ship-fics were individual one-shots with various characters (no repeat ships).

Regardless of relationship status, she's a girl's girl for sure:

This is subdivided, so works tagged both 'gen' and 'f/f' for example are counted as one of each; 76% of her works are not only ff, 76% of her works include the ff category.

And if we change this to only include works that actively ship Nine-Fingers:

Something else interesting is that Nine-Finger's tag is small enough that I could screenshot the entirety of my Roles column:

(rotated so it's oldest -> newest by post date. main, side, minor, mistag)

We can see her early tags were all side, background, a few mistags; the most recent works being on the other end of the spectrum, almost entirely fics truly about Nine-Fingers; and a pretty smooth gradient in the middle.

I am not going to lie, at first I was like yay looks like people are finally learning to tag :-) but, what this more likely indicates is just the fading popularity of a two-year-old game -- especially with newer shinier fandoms pulling audience from the bg3 pool. Users posting more recent BG3 fanfic are primarily those still standing in the now-settled dust, writing about favorite characters/settings/lore, with a drop in the general kind of 'this is my Tav's epic love story from beginning to end (with every NPC mentioned tagged as well)!' written and posted on a new-fandom high. I imagine that brand of enthusiastic-cum-careless writers are probably posting the same but with Rook now? Sympathy to my Veilguard mutuals.

Like I mentioned above, it's been almost a year since I posted my first Minthara infographic. It will be interesting to go back this summer and see what's changed for her as well, and if the above holds up for an unavoidable Act 1 character like her versus a more missable, late-game char like Nine-Fingers.

you have a disgusting "true love" fetish

Headcanon!

Bowling headcanon that no one asked for (in addition to the one I did about hockey)

Tav: arranges every single game because they’re the only responsible one; is very good at bowling and owns their own ball, shoes, bag, and towel; somehow never gets a turkey but can hit a 7-10 split

Durge: tries to stab someone when they roll a gutter ball; has to rent shoes; spends the night pretending to sacrifice the pins to Bhaal

Karlach: very good at bowling, but doesn’t take it seriously; tends to order pitchers of beer and gets too drunk to throw the ball down her own lane

Lae’zel: also very good at bowling, but takes the game way too seriously; has her own ball, shoes, bag, towel, and embroidered bowling shirt (Shadowheart embroidered it for her)

Shadowheart (Selûnite): doesn’t bowl, but does like the little claw machine game in the arcade area where she can win owlbear stuffies; cheers on Lae’zel from the spectator area when she’s done playing in the arcade

Shadowheart (Dark Justiciar): what is bowling and who the fuck are these people?

Astarion: much like with hockey, won’t play because he might break a nail (also because even the children’s balls are too heavy for him); spends the whole time gossiping with Jaheira, Shadowheart, and Isobel in the spectator area; tries to convince them to leave and get tacos and margaritas instead because bowling is “droll”

Wyll: very good at bowling and takes it only an inch less serious than Lae’zel; also has his own towel, shirt, bag, shoes, and ball

Gale: spends the entire time “educating” everyone on the historical beginnings of the game and how it has evolved over time; uses magic to cheat because he usually spins gutter balls

Halsin: excellent at bowling; brought the game to the Emerald Grove; is as serious as Wyll and loves it when he gets a turkey (he makes a gobble-gobble noise every time)

Minthara: “IN MENZOBERRANZAN THE MALES RESET THE PINS” (she’s yelling because she and Karlach are having a drinking contest that only Minthara knows about); is surprisingly good at bowling when she’s not sloshed; owns her own ball and shoes, but NOT because she likes the game (she does, but would rather die than admit it)

Jaheira: very good at bowling, but doesn’t play anymore because of arthritis; hangs out with Shadowheart in the spectator area above the pit and cheers on everyone

Minsc: Boo has to remind Minsc how to bowl, but once Minsc understands, he dominates; he also gets very drunk with Karlach

Dame Aylin: same with hockey, she was there when it was created and helped design the lanes; “HARK! THY LANES HATH MARKINGS UPON THEM THAT RESEMBLE MOON MOTES IN HONOR OF MY DIVINE MOTHER” (they’re just arrows and range markers, but don’t tell Aylin that); absolutely amazing at bowling; has her own gear that matches her armor perfectly

Isobel: doesn’t bowl, but comes to every single game to cheer on Dame Aylin and Dame Aylin only; sometimes sneaks off to the arcade with Shadowheart

Bonus -

Mizora: thinks the whole game is idiotic, but wants to be included; doesn’t bowl; spends the whole time making bets on who will get the highest score (but the bet is someone’s soul, cuz, yanno, Mizora)

Ketheric Thorm: very good at bowling - was on a league before his wife and Isobel died; spends the night trying to reconnect with Isobel by telling her “back in my day” stories (it doesn’t go well)

Orin: same as Durge, really, but with a dash more chaos; she also rents shoes but doesn’t wear socks

Gortash: greasy ass fry cook (I will not apologize)

A lil Minthara doodle

LINK: tinyurl.com/oldgaySF

I'd like to share with y'all a project I've poured my heart and soul into over the last couple of years: a database cataloguing every single older queer science fiction book I've managed to track down, consisting of just over 200 titles with LGBT characters/themes & by LGBT authors, spanning over a century (1880-2000) 🚀

The database can be filtered by representation, subgenre, whether the book is currently in print, and more; additionally, it includes my own ratings & brief thoughts on the ones i have read, if anyone needs a suggestion on places to start! (or feel free to shoot me an ask for a more personalized recommendation)

reblog if you’re okay with people writing fanfics of your fanfics and/or fanfics inspired by your fanfics

Et tu, Minthy?

Celebrating Ides of March drow style 😎

(don't remember where I found this screenshot, hope OP - whoever they are - doesn't mind. Reach out if it's you and it shall be acknowledged)

Yeehaw I’m a redneck 🤠 😣

Beach day! Beach day!

they are so cute 😔❤️ cr FLampsy