Juniorig Reblog - Blog Posts
Zeus Cabin from Percy Jackson and the Olympians in The Sim 4
I'm used to making lots mostly for myself, but seeing the lack of PJO content available, I felt obliged to share one of my creations.
Based off text descriptions from the books and images from the graphic novels, I aimed to be as accurate as possible to the source material (this means Cabin One is mostly empty inside, except for Zeus' statue, the bird sculptures, and Thalia's stuff that she left behind at the end of the saga)
Download from Google Drive https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pJ_7XRZqQ0bjKw9rj42rGR049Uz3E5MO/view?usp=sharing Soon to be available at The Sims Resources. Feel free to use and modify! ~ by Sol
"Zeus's Cabin is described as looking like a white marble box, with heavy, white columns in the front. This cabin is the biggest and bulkiest of all the cabins. It has polished bronze doors that shimmer like a hologram, and have lightning bolts streaked down them. The dome-shaped ceiling is decorated with moving mosaics of a cloudy sky and thunderbolts. It also thunders all the time. The cabin has no furniture inside at all, described as looking like a bank. It only has alcoves with golden eagle statues and one intimidating statue of Zeus in the middle."
this is how I envisioned Annabeth when my fic will end. she'll have shorter hair and a more pale/goshtly complexion after Tartarus
Fandom: God there’s like NO content anymore. I wish we could get more art and fanfics :(((
Someone: Hey, I can’t draw anything digitally, because I can’t afford a tablet, but here’s a pen on paper drawing that I spent a lot of time and hard work on. Also, I took a shot at my first fanfic and I’d really like some feedback or at least some kudos if you enjoyed it :)
Fandom: Oh... yeah sorry no... not you. We actually meant writers that are already well known and popular to produce MORE content... I mean, if a popular blog shares your work then maybe. And we don’t really like pen to paper art. We just don’t think it’s professional or even looks good :/
Inspired by this post by @ruegarding
The adults of New Rome are so lucky that Rick didn’t write Percy, Reyna, and Jason in Heroes of Olympus with the same care and effort he previously put into his PJO characterizations, because otherwise the combination of Reyna Avila-My-childhood-got-ruined-because-of-the-effects-war -PTSD-can-have-on-a-person- Ramirez-Arellano, Jason-I-have-been-part-of-the-military-since-my-early-childhood-Grace and Percy-pay-your-child-support- Jackson, would have immediately caused a revolution and shamed every grown ass adult, who hides behind a child army to death.
What do you think Ares/Mars was talking about in SoN when he told frank to stop percy from acting on his fatal flaw??
anon, i love talking abt loyalty as a flaw
so, disclaimer: the “percy needs to learn to step back/let other ppl be the hero” narrative sucks. this was rick’s intention, but it sucks. the way rick set up the initial conflict is his main problem and why this foreshadowing fell flat.
here’s what mars said:
cool story, but…this isn’t a flaw percy has. at least, not the way it’s used. rick doesn’t establish any character of the seven to be willing to ignore one of their friends if they’re in danger, so there’s no way to make that a unique conflict (altho this would be a viable option if the other characters were rewritten). that leaves what rick wrote, which is percy not wanting to let the lost trio fight gaea alone, and that…doesn’t work without bastardizing pjo.
we’ll get back to that.
here's the big scene:
which. lmao. lmfao even.
and here’s the scene in boo where rick tries to spell out what the problem is for ~foreshadowing~ :
this doesn't work. rick tries to conflate “i don’t run when my friends need me” w “being unable to step away” or allow someone else to be the hero. those are not the same thing! percy’s whole thing in the previous series is that he isn’t the hero! he knows this. it's one of the most obvious themes in the previous series. which is part of what i mean by bastardizing pjo, but it's not all. again, we'll get back to that.
percy doesn’t ignore cries for help, but that’s not the same as being unable to step back.
and, going back to what i first said, name one character who would be like yeah! i’ll pack it all up w my gf! the closest any character gets to this is piper, but that’s a tangent i won’t go on bc it’s not done well enough for it to be worth adding tension. the point is this isn't a trait any character is established to have, including frank, who is the one chastising percy! it doesn’t make sense for percy’s character anyway bc he’s loyal to more than just annabeth (shocking, i know), so this wouldn’t be a good ending for him regardless. he’s not actually being offered something he wants.
the scene percy references w juno actually does a better job of highlighting the conflict w percy’s loyalty: either percy can run to the sea—where “no monster would bother [him]. [he] could begin a new life, live to a ripe old age, and escape a great deal of pain and misery”—or he could go to camp jupiter where pain and misery awaits him. and percy genuinely considers his options. if percy can't give his friends up for anything, what does that mean for him?
bc it’s percy’s freedom that’s at odds w his loyalty. his loyalty is not controlling or possessive of other ppl. which brings me back to bastardizing pjo.
an important, but more subtle, theme throughout all of pjo is autonomy (it goes hand-in-hand w the constant theme of yielding, which again i talk abt here). this theme is especially important bc pjo is abt disability (that’s why all of the demigods are disabled). one of the first things ppl try to take away from u when ur disabled is ur autonomy. the fact that percy vehemently defends it not just for himself but for others is essential to the narrative. it's why he's the leader, it's why he's the protagonist, it's why there is a callback to it in every pjo book. trying to act like he wouldn't respect someone's autonomy and would try to shoehorn his way into their fight and need to be chastised into respecting their autonomy in a heavily foreshadowed moment that is supposed to be the penultimate conflict of percy's character is a bastardization of this entire theme.
this conflict doesn’t work.
(percy art cred)
anyway. let’s keep the concept but make it actually work for percy’s character. i already talked abt percy's freedom vs loyalty, but another good place to start is w how percy becomes loyal to someone. there’s two main ways.
the first is empathy. if percy empathizes w someone, he’s loyal to them. percy can empathize w almost anyone, including but not limited to clarisse, the girl who bullied him, polyphemus, a cyclops that tried to kill him and his friends, and luke, someone who betrayed him.
this loyalty means that percy will defend them (even if it means fighting w someone else he’s loyal to eg tyson and annabeth), have a difficult time fighting them (especially in regards to harming them eg polyphemus), and consider their feelings in his plans (which is why he’s a good mediator, but it also causes indecision and infighting eg point one). this is already good set up for conflict for self-explanatory reasons, but i’ll give some elaboration later.
the second is kindness. if someone is kind to him, percy is loyal to them. there’s many examples of this, but i think the best is quintus.
percy feels bad abt being suspicious—despite having plenty of reasons to be (the similarities to luke as he says here, the fact that juniper says quintus was poking around the labyrinth, etc)—bc quintus was being kind to him. and if that wasn’t enough, percy says that he won’t use the whistle quintus gives him, but later makes an entire escape plan revolving around it.
percy tries to override his loyalty w reason and it literally doesn’t work (it goes hand-in-hand w percy being unable to see betrayal, even when it’s spelled out). if quintus had ulterior motives, percy would’ve been fucked.
side note, something i find interesting abt this is that percy is aware enough that he doesn't tell other ppl abt the whistle. it's like suspecting/trusting quintus is something shameful percy is trying to hide, which is interesting to think abt for potential conflict bc nobody can help percy if he doesn't tell them anything.
another pertinent example is percy’s first interactions w frank. percy takes frank helping him against the gorgons as an act of kindness and, bc of that, percy assumes the best of frank:
the thing is, percy is wrong abt frank.
frank wasn’t thinking of percy when he pocketed those vials. and if percy hadn’t seen frank pocket the vials, would frank have even told percy they existed?
this is a great example of how to use different povs to build tension,—hoo does not use this well or often despite having nine povs—but it could also be used as a red herring for percy’s loyalty. in this case, percy’s optimistic perspective inspired frank. percy’s loyalty doesn’t come off as a threat, so when the reverse happens, ie percy’s optimism fucks him over, it comes as a surprise despite being foreshadowed.
essentially, there’s a lot of room for conflict. percy’s loyalty includes a wide breadth of ppl and can grow very quickly, which leaves a lot of room for contradicting needs. the person percy chooses isn’t a given. the answer is not annabeth (like hoo keeps insisting it is). even in tlt, when percy has to leave his mother behind, it’s a difficult choice for him. he described his heart as “being ripped in two” bc everyone in the situation had his loyalty, his mother, grover, annabeth, even his father. ultimately, the deciding factor was what he thought his mother would want him to do (which is interesting bc it’s not what sally would do given her reaction to percy in tlo, but bc sally is kind and selfless towards percy, he thinks she’s universally kind and selfless. *points to the section on kindness* another side effect of this). and it’s also bolstered by the fact that percy knows he can get sally back. he’s not losing her forever, he’s losing her for right now.
so what happens when the stakes are higher? what happens when percy isn’t sure which side he’s on? nico says percy is dangerous to his enemies. what makes someone percy’s enemy? let’s use this, let’s make this conflict bigger, let’s encase the narrative in it.
really easy ways to do this include grover and/or calypso. the series is based on fighting gaea, mother earth, and grover is a satyr who is named lord of the wild by pan right before pan fades. furthermore, percy and grover have a soul bond that’s in part bc of percy’s own connection to nature. and even more than that, nature spirits were among the highest casualties in the previous war. that’s a series of wild connections to have unexplored in the series.
also, gaea has a vested interest in percy. she kills one of her own men to save percy's life, she tries to kidnap him twice, juno says part of the reason she puts percy in a coma is bc it would've been too difficult to hide him from gaea's forces otherwise, and the reason is...so that percy can have a bloody nose? ok.
w calypso, rick writes this entire plotline where she’s still trapped on her island (for some reason), but this is only relevant so that leo can get a gf. how abt gaea gets her off the island and she fights for gaea? what then? what does percy do? how do calypso’s motivations change how percy sees the other side?
these are sacrifices percy wouldn’t want to make. he doesn’t want to kill either of these ppl, so what would he do instead? what does that mean for everyone else?
another option is a cry for help. while percy’s loyalty has never manifested as is refusing to let someone make decisions for themselves—even if that includes self sacrifice—percy does stick up for the underdogs.
a perfect example of foreshadowing using this flaw could’ve been the creatures in phorcy’s aquarium. instead, some random fish-centaurs solve the problem. boo! lame! where is percy’s inner torment as he tries to juggle his responsibilities w his feelings! where is percy tearing the group apart as he tries to fix a problem no one else cares abt! there is a ship full of ppl who are supposed to believe in the greater good, where is the conflict as percy fights for the common man!!
like,
what an interesting thing to say in a story that has a prophecy w the line "an oath to keep w a final breath." too bad this means nothing.
(also these quotes, for good measure
percy swearing to protect hazel and frank from the gods and percy swearing on his life bc he has that much faith in annabeth, someone he's loyal to, despite knowing almost nothing abt the other ppl on the quest or how they're arriving. interesting. good thing rick doesn't explore this. <- sarcasm btw)
this would be a perfect way to introduce a sacrifice percy wouldn’t be able to make. just like w percy jeopardizing his mission in tlo by warning the kids on the boat and making it harder on himself by trying to incapacitate but not kill other demigods. he almost dies to ethan bc he doesn’t kill ethan at any of the opportunities he’s given! despite ethan chastising him for it! this is already an established flaw percy has, and the only reason it hasn’t bit him in the ass is bc it’s a red herring in pjo.
and again (bc i have personal beef w this scene), the whole nico-in-a-jar thing. while percy vows to save nico, he doesn't say anything when leo and jason argue against it. percy ripped hera a new one for excluding nico, and nico wasn’t even in danger at the time. why is percy so calm abt jason and leo talking abt leaving nico to die?! this is exactly the sort of situation percy loses his cool abt and starts yelling and getting himself in trouble. why is he calm??? where is his anger????? it really should’ve come down to “we’re saving nico with or without y’all” in a true showing of tearing the group apart.
how many traps is percy willing to walk into bc someone needs help? how much can he jeopardize the quest before someone else has to intervene? when does loyalty cross the line from something admirable into a flaw?
ofc all of these potential conflicts would hold more weight if percy was in character and written as the glue of the argo ii. these moments happen at the beginning of their quest, when they’re supposed to be bonding and building trust. what happens when ur mediator loses their cool? nothing good!
similarly, there should’ve been way more internal fighting on the argo ii, especially after percy fell into tartarus. i want the blame game, the instability over nico (and what having 8 people for a 7 person quest means), the greek vs roman, lack of sleep, stress, guilt, all of it to come to a head and jeopardize the entire quest. if the greeks and romans had to be separated bc it was too dangerous for them to be together, i want to see why. i want to know why juno thought it was so important that percy be the glue. i want to foreshadow why percy making the wrong choice can tear the world apart. it also helps frank and hazel’s plotlines, as well, bc their stepping up feels more important and has a bigger pay off.
as it's written, there's barely any conflict, frank feels comfortable confiding in annabeth for no reason, the girls are all friends bc #girl power, there's random love triangles everywhere, annabeth and jason are said to have a rivalry but never actually shown to have one, and the biggest fight is when percy and jason are possessed.
this complete lack of foreshadowing amalgamates in boo’s failure. rick failed to use percy’s actual flaws to establish the threat of this choice but still needed the conflict, so percy has to be out of character and the conflict has to be contrived.
Pov Thalia when she comes back to consciousness and the guy who was supposed to be her best friend turned to Kronos, committed numerous crimes (including POISONING HER TREE)
i want to coin a phrase that's the opposite of writer's block. call it the muse's fire hydrant. thirty thousand story ideas are being beamed directly into your brain and if you don't write them all at once you will die.
Demigods and Domains
I'm pretty sure this is like pure fanfic stuff but I like the idea of it a lot. The idea that the reason Percy can control things like blood and poison is because while he was in Tartarus his domains evolved and expanded out of the ones his father gave him.
And basically its one of the reasons demigods are so powerful, because they can cross and seep into another God's domain (not easily of course) but they aren't restricted by being a god because they have mortal blood within them.
So that had me thinking a little bit. If Percy (and by extension other characters but it would be a little bit tricker to apply it to) falling into Tartarus where he is pushed to such extremes that the capabilities of his domains shift, then what the hell could he be capable of?
Not to mention possible blessings from the gods and Primordials. (Yeah this is lowkey apart of my Tartarus AU because I think I want to write that one first. Maybe I'll just switch and swap until I finish one lol).
Because I'm not gonna lie I could lowkey see Percy being offered blessings from multiple and I have a few ideas.
But just as a normal demigod what could he domains expand to? Would it be a stretch for fire to become apart of his domain due to the exposure and use of the phlegethon?
I've already thought about the basic things people usually do, pulling magma from the earth, ice manipulation, poison, blood, pulling water from thin air, etc etc.
But I want to do something different because I do want to incorporate "dark!percy" into it somehow.
But not like super op, edgy. dark Percy because realistically he wouldn't be like that. I just see him as more of "falling for you" type if you've ever read that.
So like if you have any ideas PLEASE comment I have none. I really just want to explore his powers out of the basics. (Maybe to can tap into different epithets from Poseidon and from other pantheons because syncretism??