Thinking About Narratives Where The Setting Is A Mirror Of The Main Character Almost As Though They're

I can't handle Astarion in his little robe.

He looks so cozy.

Now that I've emotionally processed my first playthrough (maybe), I started another as Dark Urge (basically just my last Tav, but now with concerning memory loss and a thirst for blood that sickens her). Romancing Astarion again, to nobody's surprise. I've heard that the dynamic between him and Durge is something really special and reveals a lot about him as a character, and I want to see it for myself. I am ready to lose my mind all over again. Expect to see more Astarion analysis in the future.

“Sometimes being offered tenderness feels like the very proof that you've been ruined.”

― Ocean Vuong, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

I heard this quote a while ago, and can't stop thinking about it in regards to Astarion. I also saw a post a while ago that I cannot find now (should have reblogged it) of headcanons on how Astarion's trauma might manifest in a relationship. Specifically, how being showered in love and praise can be triggering and overwhelming. To summarize a complex feeling, it could make one fear that their partner is idealizing them.

This becomes a prevalent theme in the fic I'm working on, as my Tav treats Astarion very gently and with care, even from the beginning, as an unconditional baseline. He doesn't know how to handle it. It agitates him because he feels like her gentle handling is due to her thinking he's breakable, or because she pities him (she doesn't, and treats him with more respect and agency than most others, but Astarion's mind works against him). He hates feeling that way, because it highlights just how much he's only ever known harshness before her, but more importantly, how he fears others might see him as being weak. He has to learn to take her genuine compassion and love for what it is, and moreover accept that he deserves to be treated this well. River has to learn that she doesn't need to be so careful around everyone all the time — to be perfect and please them. That's not how genuine, equal relationships work, but she's just not used to having that. Astarion will feel more secure when she trusts him to speak up about his comfort and needs himself, rather than her walking on eggshells to avoid ever ever making him feel bad in any way. They work through this together and have a stronger bond for it.

I love writing characters struggling to be better people when their current traits aren't necessarily "bad", just that there's room for growth in challenging their behaviors and beliefs.

He's such a silly goose 💚

[From the game's datamined dialogues, described as "voice barks for Astarion as the player interacts with the screen"]

I think that romancing Astarion should break your oath if you play as OotA paladin, purely because it would be really funny if the Oathbreaker Knight jumpscared you in the middle of the act 1 intimacy scene

It will never not be funny to me that Withers, who barely goes out of his way to say anything the entire game, takes time out of his day to say "I know you think this is a dating sim, but please, we do in fact have to save the world"

Etriel Analelle Ancunin and the young Astarion Ancunin

my ko-fi

Whichever Copotype you get the first time you play Disco Elysium should be some sort of diagnostic criteria. Why yes, I did get Sorry Cop.

fanfic writing culture isn’t “oh dang! I wanted to write about this prompt with this character but someone else already wrote it, so now I can’t”.

fanfic writing culture is always “two cakes is better than one. the more the merrier. there can ever be enough fics of this character with this prompt!”

Delicious in Baldur’s Gate

Nyachooh