The Grouch's Trash Pile [Baldur's Gate 3]

Episodes Gladio and Prompto should be done right after they get back, but Episode Ignis contains spoilers for the whole game and should be done after you beat it. Episode Ardyn should be done when very inebriated.

 

Thank you!

lmao oh no... I'm already super tired of him (I already know he's the antagonist so his whole schtick is grating as fuuuuuuck) so I'd probably need to be especially inebriated... but unfortunately I can barely tolerate alcohol. :')

 

Cindy is so energetic that her breasts have climbed her ribs like a ladder.

 

Did the Gladio dlc! I'm glad I did it now rather than save it for after I finished the game since it's pretty lightweight and I'd rather know where Gladio fucked off to now rather than later. I'm glad it's framed around him actually telling his friends what happened rather than it being 'lol you should see the other guy' and nothing more.

I'm not usually big on I MUST GET STRONGER story arcs but I do appreciate that it ended up with him telling Gilgamesh that yeah, actually, he is scared of not being able to do his job, but all he can do is protect Noctis as best he can, so he's just going to go on with doing that. He reminds me a lot of one of my most beloved OCs -- and it's hilarious that they not only have similar personalities, are the same age, are both big and burly, and both dress like bikers, but they have the same eye color and a scar going down their face and 'through' their eye on the same side. The two major differences are that my OC is a woman and comes from much gritter origins. (She's also dark-skinned and considerably more scarred.)

 

*thinking* Well, they have similar personalities, but Gladio is a polite young man who can keep his temper, while Maddox has rough manners (or none at all, depending on who she's dealing with) and, while she's learned to moderate her temper, is still incredibly hotheaded (sometimes literally; because of Reasons she's a pyrokinetic).

I think they'd get along, though. Very brother-from-another vibes, there.

 

A very kind benefactor gifted me with the funds to get a switch lite and AC but... AC is out of stock.

Everywhere.

For at least another week.

I know it's because everyone is like "Hey let's play Animal Crossing!" suddenly but uuuugh I WANNA PLAY WITH FRIENDS AND CROSS SOME ANIMALS ; ;

(The kicker is that if I hadn't dithered about it for as long as I did I could have snagged one just before everywhere ran out. UUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH.)

 

And yeah I know I can get a digital only version...BUT trying to figure out how to actually acquire one in my region gave me a headache. (No, I can't get one from Amazon -- aside from the fact that I won't buy anything from Amazon, codes are only available to customers in the country of any particular branch.) It gave J a headache trying to glean anything from Nintendo's Finnish website. I don't want to deal with that bullshit so I'm just going to wait, sadly unable to cross animals, and hope my friends aren't totally bored of it by the time I actually get it.

 

(Psst at least VPD and Puolenkuunpelit seems to have it in stock as of right now.)

 

:O!!!

MY HERO

It somehow never occurs to me to check for smaller retailers when I'm looking for something and can't find it at chain stores. Not that I know of many smaller retailers, BUT... Anyway, time to wrangle Verkkokauppa into canceling the game part of my order so I can get it elsewhere and get my Switch sooner rather than later~

 

I'm a sucker for avatar makers; this one is really fun -- although it now has a mandatory watermark because people weren't following the creator's ToS, and also unfortunately they also loaded up the 'default' avatar with a ton of junk you have to laboriously remove. That seems like an act of petty spite, which is not a good look.

ANYway, I first made one of me and my FFXIV main:



I get a kick out of how little Iolis resembles me. Our features in common are pale skin and eyebags (not pictured on mine because they didn't rly show under the glasses anyway).

 

and after frittering away time on making and photomanipping the rest of them

Spoiler: My WoL crew

Yisun (he's glowing with Big Bahamut Energy)(he should also be lavender skinned but that was waaay more effort than I wanted to make)



Mimir (it's not a gunblade but it'll do)



Fawn (who couldn't be any cuter if he tried)

 

Back to FFXV--

I'm in Chapter 8 and doing everything I can stand to do before I get on that boat. I'm finally starting to run out -- aside from hunts, I've only got two dungeons (Costlemark and Cresthom Channels -- and I think I'm going to skip Crestholm, getting the headlights out of there was annoying enough) the garrison, the fishing quests, and that level 99 Melusine quest.

I've noticed the days getting shorter and none of the characters commenting on it, which lead me to think that maybe it's a season thing and look it up, and whoops, minor spoiler? Maybe? (iirc Starscourge is mentioned in one of the archive documents but is otherwise not touched upon in in-game dialogue to this point.) Not a big deal, but I wish the characters would actually remark on it. Maybe they do later and I'd find out sooner if I wasn't sitting around in Chapter 8 doing all the things first.

I am wondering what kind of payoff I'll see with all the night and sleep themes, if any, or if it'll all be left as vague allegory. (It's a little weird that Ignis and Gladio keep scolding him for staying up too late when I keep seeing him dozed off at campers and campsites, though. Are they just assuming, or...)

On a lighter note, I just got the camp quest where I have to help Ignis get his glasses back from a black chocobo. I wonder how it 'sidled up' and stole them right off his face -- was he perhaps actually trying to feed it treats? (He may not be as gung-ho about them as dear sweet precious Prompto, but I can tell he's fond of them.)

 

HEY ABOUT ANIMAL CROSSING

lmk if you ever need anything i have like 28mil bells and nothing to do w any of them. so.

 

*gets text messages from Posti*

!!!!!!!!

PAKIDGE

 

Oh goodness! Thank you, I will keep that in mind :3

I got my switch charged and set up; my friend code is SW-8382-3969-2298 if anyone wants to add me!

 

As an experienced player, I'd rec skipping/coming back to Costlemark as well (you can come back to this section of the game in endgame), because it's a FUCKER of a dungeon. It's the hardest of the non-NG+ dungeons that are actually combat.

As for the sleep thing, Noctis has chronic pain problems (pay attention to his walk cycle when you run out of stamina after sprinting, it's when his limp is most obvious). I'm sure I don't need to tell you how much that can heck with your ability to sleep like a normal human.

 

Thanks for the info! I'll poke my nose into Costlemark and see what I think (since I'm pretty overleveled and play on Easy), with the expectation that I'll eventually nope out and probably reload a save. (Sorry about the gemstones Dino, but not that sorry...)

I wrote out a bunch of headcanons on Tumblr. I'm really enjoying these characters and this world; even though the story is not told very well (even allowing for environmental storytelling in the form of notes, overhearing conversations, and listening to the radio, too many important details have been left up to finding them out by chance) the other parts of the game were clearly made with a lot of care and attention.

 

I know the "story spread out around like four diff mediums" thing is obnoxious but if you're into watching at all the anime should still be free and is basic, but mostly cute stuff about the boys. Legend goes Tabata had it done bc people weren't loving Prompto enough after the demo and he needed them to love him more. There was also a King's Knight collab (yes, the game was real, yes they took it down bc it wasn't enough of a money maker) which I used to have all the pictures of (just little text convos between the boys) but that died when my phone died, I'll try and find them bc I want to read them again too.

 

Of course, someone on reddit had them

 

You know, I can't exactly fault him for that. Prompto is a good kid. I'll have to watch that sometime.

OH MY GOD. THESE FUCKIN' NERDS.

Even though the slang has a strong "How do you do, fellow kids" vibe to it (unironically using 'LEET'??) and I question having Ignis use u and ur even in the interests of saving space, that was SO much fun to read. (Who is Prompto hoping to show his pictures to.... :thinking:)