Sharktic Posts - Blog Posts

I just had a silly Genshin thought regarding the citizens of mondstadt.

What if they as a whole were weirdly competent at escaping. Like we know that windtrace was made with the intention of recreating rebels escaping from hunting tyrants but what if a bunch of their games were also meant for practicing escaping. Imagine if the adventurers guild practicing their puzzle solving, or archery was made with the intent of cracking locks , or spotting and dodging guards. What if their poetry practice is a way to practice weaving words to run circles around captors or find loopholes in contracts. Mond is the nation of poetry and freedom, and no cage physical or otherwise can hold them.

Picture this, someone managed to kidnap a mondstadter then they get annoyed with them and close their eyes for a few seconds, then they open them and they’re captive is just gone, manacles or binds just lying on the floor of an open cell. Nobody even heard them leave and you’re certain you would have heard the door open with that way it’s been squeaking for months. (You could say they doubled down their training after the dottore incident from the comics if you wanted to be really nitpicky and stay lore accurate)

Or another one, a Liyuen businessman or a Fontainian scam artist think they’re about to trap some poor bum from Mondstadt who doesn’t know any better just to have the tables turned cause the Mindstadter had some open ended flowery words that allowed a specific loophole giving them an out and trapping the offender at the same time.

Expanding on this thought to the other nations, I can’t decide if it’d be funnier if it was just mondstadt who had this develop due to their separation from the divine, or if each country had their own specialized developed skills.

So if anybody wants to take this concept and run, feel free, I’d love to hear other ideas regarding what the other nations would be good at.

Some short ideas for the other nations if anybody wants to try expanding on it: Obviously there’s liyue being a nation of contracts, commerce, and business, as well as natlan’s people having a significantly higher degree of combat proficiency to the average NPC. Fontainians I would imagine have more legal knowledge that they can use for good or bad, but breaking/skirting laws seems like it would give the average Fontainian hives. Sumeru is interesting because they have the literal split between untouched Traditions (eremites and the Sand), and propagandized traditions (scholars and the Green), as well as a second ideological split between knowledge (average Akademiyan scholar) vs wisdom (Nahida, the average citizen with common sense, and the coup troupe). Like the old saying “knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit, wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad.” For both Inazuma and Snezhnaya I’m not sure what they could be good at since their ideals are eternity and love, as well as the fact Snezhnaya is not out at the time of making this post, but if you can come up with something feel free to add on.

Continuing where this post left off

And as if they didn’t just write an excellent ending they added one final panel showing off that even though the australium that has powered Australians like Saxton Hale to keep them healthy, strong, and smart far beyond a normal human life span and range is gone, he’s still kickin with Mags living his life to the very end giving us this final send off

“What’s the matter, Mags… You wanna live forever?”

Saxton understands that living forever is pointless because eventually you get bored and reach a point of apathetic stagnation. There will be nothing left for you, so go out and live to the end. Hunt your new trophies and always find new things worth doing.

I believe this is Team Fortress 2 Team telling us all that we’ve had a good run, and made unforgettable memories on this journey, but we need to acknowledge that Team Fortress 2 will someday shut down. But it’s not about what could happen in the future and when it might come about. It’s about the here and now, and the past we’ve experienced together. Whether it lives for another 17 years or shuts down next week, we have seen this ride to the end and we’ll remember it fondly. Because at the end of the day, “What’s the matter… You wanna live forever?”

Just absolute peak fiction.

TEAM FORTRESS 2 COMIC 7 IS OUT THIS IS NOT A DRILL. I REPEAT, THIS IS NOT A DRILL

Spoilers below

Fair warning, long post here, I’m basically going to be summarizing my interpretations and thoughts on the comic.

After a seven year hiatus I love the closure that this comic brings, sure we don’t have all the answers to some storylines but I’m glad everybody got some semblance of closure and some decent world building for the finale.

Rick May got a dedication at the front, we got to see what the purpose of RED vs BLU has been this whole time as well as who the Administrator was and her goals.

Speaking of her goals, heres my own interpretations on the Administrators goals and motives.

My interpretation is based on hints from the covers.

The little girl is presumably the Administrator as a child, and the couple are likely her parents or guardians and are most likely a part of the Mann family based on the variety of stacked hats the patriarchs all seem to have worn. After her presumed parents get shot I assume she gets taken in by another Mann couple she's related to, then those ones end up being thrown in a frozen lake and die leaving her alone again. Then once more she is taken in by another Mann couple who end up dying to poison as shown from the spilled drinks and bulging veins on the couple.

This shows a motive. Who knows how many people she’s lived with that have died around her. And based on the visible cause of deaths, they seems to be orchestrated making them murders, not suicides or accidents.

Jumping forward to the flashbacks of the administrators past when she approaches the Mann manor, we meet Zepheniah Mann who within a few basic lines tells us a few facts. He is vain, stupid, and has no sense of social grace. When we watch as he gives the Administrator the tour through the graveyard absolutely filled with Mann family members, we learn that Zephaniah has an obsession with survival of the fittest regarding his children and ancestors.

This is where i begin to speculate on Zepheniah’s involvement with the deaths of the Administrators family. Zepheniah likely orchestrated the deaths of every other Mann family member leaving only himself and his two sons Redmond and Blutarch (missing Grey due to being presumed dead, as well as the Administrator herself.) as the only branch of Mann blood. By the Administrators own words, her original plan was to get close to Zephaniah with the intent to harm him in the same way she was harmed, by killing his family. However, after meeting him and hearing his speech about how he wants the weak blood of his family to die anyway she quickly figures out he doesn't care at all about his family. So she needs to hit him where it hurts, her goal changes, she needs to destroy any chance of his greatest ambition coming to fruition. She needs to guarantee his life’s purpose is a grand failure, she needs to keep his sons fighting for dominance eternally. Once she ensures that they will keep fighting without ever killing each other she reveals her hand to Zepheniah and shows that he was manipulated this whole time and its from the consequences of his own actions coming back to haunt him.

From here I'm guessing the Administrator’s thought process and mindset after the death of Zephaniah.

Because Zephaniah died (and was ironically buried in the same tiny barely marked grave he prepared for to be used by the weaker riff-raff of his blood) while the Administrator lives, she eventually realized her life was so dedicated to eviscerating Zephaniah’s mind body and soul, that now that she succeeded, she had nothing left to do. Because of this lack of goal and continued burning hatred, she is left in apathy to the point that she commits suicide. When she wakes back up from Grey using australium, she realizes the potential of what the Mann family has mined and stockpiled and goes to dig up Zephaniah. Her ambition returned, she contracts Engie’s grandfather to build the life extender machine to keep herself alive and resurrect Zephaniah. She continues to torture Zephaniah by forcing him to watch his sons fight the gravel wars for decades with the multiple generations of mercs to continue feeding her bitter rage towards him for killing her entire family. Over the years she also contracts Engineer’s father and soon Engie himself to handle maintenance and to improve the fuel efficiency on the machine as she slowly starts running out of Australium. This eventually leads to the missions she gives Ms. Pauling and presumably everyone else in her employ to find more australium.

As she finally approaches the end of her supply after centuries she decides to watch Zephaniah’s suffering to the end as they both die, admitting to the Team and Ms. Pauling that even she forgot her motive in her actions towards Zephaniah. But she keeps going anyway, because although she’s forgotten much over the centuries, she only needs to know a few incontestable facts. She hates Zepheniah, and Australium can make him suffer more.

Now leaving that mess behind, I liked the twist where they showed that as dogmatic as Ms. Pauling is and how she could easily become the next Administrator she chooses to heed Engie’s words and leaves it all behind.

We get to see everybody move on Saxton let’s Olivia go live her life how she wants, free from expectations, and even sets up a trust for her to do it and then leaves himself to truly live again like he used to. Scout turns out to be a good father (and we learn his last name), spy still stays close to scout and his family and officially unmasks himself. We don’t actually know if Spy has officially told Scout about their connection but Spy seems genuinely content about the situations they have arrived at. I loved the picture of Spy looking at Scouts mom. Soldier and Zhana have a nice family, and based on their son’s eyepatch, Demo is probably a fun uncle for the family. Medic raised the baby baboon that was born from TFC heavy and Pyro apparently still has the Dalmatian from the vet when they sewed soldiers hand back on. Ms. Pauling still stays in contact which is nice. I loved seeing Demo’s mom doting on Soldiers family in the final shot.

And then when the final shots happened of Scout opening the door, I expected it to be someone else from the comics like Ms. Pauling or another character that maybe I forgot about. But as they start down the hallway I slowly start realizing that Scout is talking to us, the readers, thanking us for sticking around with this game that came out 17 years ago and the stories that were started from the shorts to the update comics to finally the official start of the comics in 2013. And finally they close the story of the mercenaries of Teufort, happy, together, and (mostly) alive.

TEAM FORTRESS 2 COMIC 7 IS OUT THIS IS NOT A DRILL. I REPEAT, THIS IS NOT A DRILL

Spoilers below

Fair warning, long post here, I’m basically going to be summarizing my interpretations and thoughts on the comic.

After a seven year hiatus I love the closure that this comic brings, sure we don’t have all the answers to some storylines but I’m glad everybody got some semblance of closure and some decent world building for the finale.

Rick May got a dedication at the front, we got to see what the purpose of RED vs BLU has been this whole time as well as who the Administrator was and her goals.

Speaking of her goals, heres my own interpretations on the Administrators goals and motives.

My interpretation is based on hints from the covers.

The little girl is presumably the Administrator as a child, and the couple are likely her parents or guardians and are most likely a part of the Mann family based on the variety of stacked hats the patriarchs all seem to have worn. After her presumed parents get shot I assume she gets taken in by another Mann couple she's related to, then those ones end up being thrown in a frozen lake and die leaving her alone again. Then once more she is taken in by another Mann couple who end up dying to poison as shown from the spilled drinks and bulging veins on the couple.

This shows a motive. Who knows how many people she’s lived with that have died around her. And based on the visible cause of deaths, they seems to be orchestrated making them murders, not suicides or accidents.

Jumping forward to the flashbacks of the administrators past when she approaches the Mann manor, we meet Zepheniah Mann who within a few basic lines tells us a few facts. He is vain, stupid, and has no sense of social grace. When we watch as he gives the Administrator the tour through the graveyard absolutely filled with Mann family members, we learn that Zephaniah has an obsession with survival of the fittest regarding his children and ancestors.

This is where i begin to speculate on Zepheniah’s involvement with the deaths of the Administrators family. Zepheniah likely orchestrated the deaths of every other Mann family member leaving only himself and his two sons Redmond and Blutarch (missing Grey due to being presumed dead, as well as the Administrator herself.) as the only branch of Mann blood. By the Administrators own words, her original plan was to get close to Zephaniah with the intent to harm him in the same way she was harmed, by killing his family. However, after meeting him and hearing his speech about how he wants the weak blood of his family to die anyway she quickly figures out he doesn't care at all about his family. So she needs to hit him where it hurts, her goal changes, she needs to destroy any chance of his greatest ambition coming to fruition. She needs to guarantee his life’s purpose is a grand failure, she needs to keep his sons fighting for dominance eternally. Once she ensures that they will keep fighting without ever killing each other she reveals her hand to Zepheniah and shows that he was manipulated this whole time and its from the consequences of his own actions coming back to haunt him.

From here I'm guessing the Administrator’s thought process and mindset after the death of Zephaniah.

Because Zephaniah died (and was ironically buried in the same tiny barely marked grave he prepared for to be used by the weaker riff-raff of his blood) while the Administrator lives, she eventually realized her life was so dedicated to eviscerating Zephaniah’s mind body and soul, that now that she succeeded, she had nothing left to do. Because of this lack of goal and continued burning hatred, she is left in apathy to the point that she commits suicide. When she wakes back up from Grey using australium, she realizes the potential of what the Mann family has mined and stockpiled and goes to dig up Zephaniah. Her ambition returned, she contracts Engie’s grandfather to build the life extender machine to keep herself alive and resurrect Zephaniah. She continues to torture Zephaniah by forcing him to watch his sons fight the gravel wars for decades with the multiple generations of mercs to continue feeding her bitter rage towards him for killing her entire family. Over the years she also contracts Engineer’s father and soon Engie himself to handle maintenance and to improve the fuel efficiency on the machine as she slowly starts running out of Australium. This eventually leads to the missions she gives Ms. Pauling and presumably everyone else in her employ to find more australium.

As she finally approaches the end of her supply after centuries she decides to watch Zephaniah’s suffering to the end as they both die, admitting to the Team and Ms. Pauling that even she forgot her motive in her actions towards Zephaniah. But she keeps going anyway, because although she’s forgotten much over the centuries, she only needs to know a few incontestable facts. She hates Zepheniah, and Australium can make him suffer more.

Now leaving that mess behind, I liked the twist where they showed that as dogmatic as Ms. Pauling is and how she could easily become the next Administrator she chooses to heed Engie’s words and leaves it all behind.

We get to see everybody move on Saxton let’s Olivia go live her life how she wants, free from expectations, and even sets up a trust for her to do it and then leaves himself to truly live again like he used to. Scout turns out to be a good father (and we learn his last name), spy still stays close to scout and his family and officially unmasks himself. We don’t actually know if Spy has officially told Scout about their connection but Spy seems genuinely content about the situations they have arrived at. I loved the picture of Spy looking at Scouts mom. Soldier and Zhana have a nice family, and based on their son’s eyepatch, Demo is probably a fun uncle for the family. Medic raised the baby baboon that was born from TFC heavy and Pyro apparently still has the Dalmatian from the vet when they sewed soldiers hand back on. Ms. Pauling still stays in contact which is nice. I loved seeing Demo’s mom doting on Soldiers family in the final shot.

And then when the final shots happened of Scout opening the door, I expected it to be someone else from the comics like Ms. Pauling or another character that maybe I forgot about. But as they start down the hallway I slowly start realizing that Scout is talking to us, the readers, thanking us for sticking around with this game that came out 17 years ago and the stories that were started from the shorts to the update comics to finally the official start of the comics in 2013. And finally they close the story of the mercenaries of Teufort, happy, together, and (mostly) alive.

TOP 0.01% LETS FUCKING GOOOOOO

I got the Top 4.47% on this English Vocabulary test

It’s so Joever, we lost the Ellen 50/50 yesterday

Got Koleda at 76 pulls and am now working to speedrun as many pulls as I can before the banner ends. I’ve stocked up 30 more pulls and don’t know how many more I can stockpile before it’s joever for good

Meanwhile I got sharkboo at 30 pulls so here’s hoping Ellen decides to feel the same this time.

I did manage to c6 Soukaku for nine total soukakus pulled so far

If Nerfs are supposed to be the Star Wars equivalent for cows, do they have a profession called nerfboy that every other child thinks would be rad or does bounty hunter and outlaw just fill that niche

Got Von Lycaon from the standard banner at 50 pulls, now I just need to get Ellen to come home like that

Just started playing ZZZ, and somehow I’m the only one of all my friends who’s going to be playing it so I guess I might be a ZZZ blog for a bit so I can talk about it. I love the animation style, the squash and stretch is really funny, the Cunning Hares are epic girlfailures and a lot of the expressions remind me of Girls band cry. I’ve got some grinding to do it f2p but here’s hoping my fellow shark, Ellen, comes home.

Just remembered that Samus Aran has genetic modifications, and then thought about her saying “Scott Steiner math” and now I’m surprised nobody ever uses that for incorrect quote memes cause like, “I’m a genetic freak, I’m not normal…” and “I got 141 2/3 chance of winning” are some insane quotes. Especially in full quotation

I’ve been going nuts listening to HalaCG’s “Gambler” song, if anyone has any recommendations for similar sounding pseudo-operatic songs. I need to hear them.

Alright new Brucie Wayne headcanon time.

We all know the classic “airheaded Brucie Wayne doesn’t understand the prices of everyday objects because of his wealth” take. We also generally know that even as Bruce Wayne he probably still has a fairly skewed understanding of what counts as affordable due to being in the rich part of the city. Realistically even as Batman he probably objectively knows what the economy of Gotham looks like for the most part but is still a little out of touch due to basically never going into a supermarket.

Now for the twist, what if during those years away training and basically becoming Ryu from Streets, he did end up learning the price of commodities like food and clothes, BUT he only knows it for other countries currency.

Imagine if that knowledge casually translated to Brucie, where he’s giving an interview or he’s on a tv show like jeopardy or family feud, and they ask him some question like “How much do you think it costs to buy 8 apples?” And Brucie Wayne just pulls out some random currency to approximate it. Almost nobody knows what the current exchange rate is between these different currencies off the top of their head and Brucie doesn’t seem to be able to convert it either.

It becomes a whole thing, where anytime someone asks Brucie how much something cheap costs he’ll answer in any other currency besides the U.S. Dollar.

Now imagine if someone decided to specify that his answer needs to be in USD, he just takes a moment stares off into the distance and when they decide to finally ask if he’s alright he just goes “oh no sorry, I just needed to convert it. It’d be about x amount of money USD.” Just completely blowing the concept that yes, Brucie Wayne is capable of converting between these random currency exchange rates off the top of his head, yes he can do math mentally, and yes he knows what the price of these everyday goods are, but only in other countries, thereby proving previous claims, that he was just getting lucky pulling random numbers off the top of his head, were false.

Even more remarkable is sometimes when it’s looked into, the only places with prices as low as Brucie suggests in that particular currency are basically slums which brings up a whole new slew of questions, like “WHY DOES BRUCIE WAYNE SEEM INTIMATELY FAMILIAR WITH THE SLUM PRICES OF THIS TINY TOWN IN ANOTHER COUNTRY”

Just adds a whole new dimension of lore to Brucie Wayne that Gothamites could go nuts over.

THIS BOOTHILL WANTER BECAME A BOOTHILL HAVER IN THE MOST BOOTHILL WAY POSSIBLE, MADE OFF LIKE A BANDIT, WE GOT BOOTHILL AT 32 PULLS.

Then I decided since it was so early I’d go for his light cone.

Bad news I lost the 50/50

Good news, I lost the 50/50 at 24 pity so I went again

Better news I got his lightcone at 20 pity.

Final results:

3 Five stars

- 1 Character at 32 pity: 40 pulls total

- 2 Weapons at 24 Pity and 20 Pity Respectively: 50 pulls total

Just to top it off, an absurd number of four stars

15 Four stars

- 2 Landaus Choice, 5 Secret Vow, 1 Subscribe for more, 1 Resolution

- 1 Pela, 1 Guinaifen, 1 Hook, 1 Tingyun, 1 Luka, 1 Qingque

The sky is blue.

A minute passes

The sky is blue,

The sun is yellow.

A minute passes

The sky is blue,

The sun is yellow,

The clouds are white.

A minute passes

The sky is blue,

The sun is yellow,

The clouds are white,

The dogs are barking.

A minute passes

The sky is blue,

The sun is yellow,

The clouds are white,

The dogs are barking,

A couple is embracing.

A minute passes

The sky is blue,

The sun is yellow,

The clouds are white,

The dogs are barking,

A couple is embracing,

A couple is crying.

A minute passes

The sky is blue,

The sun is yellow,

The clouds are white,

The dogs are barking,

A couple is embracing,

A couple is crying,

A tv is talking.

A minute passes

The sky is blue,

The sun is yellow,

The clouds are white,

The dogs are barking,

A couple is embracing,

A couple is crying,

A tv is talking,

The weather is nice.

A minute passes

The sky is black,

The sun is gone,

The clouds are black,

The dogs are whining,

A couple holds each other,

A couple cries together,

The tv is quiet.

A minute passes

It’s getting cold.

- 8 Minutes

Zach, SharkticWaters

I’m seeing the Dani Dami combo gremlin duo, and I gotta say, great take, love the energy. Same to be said for the Jon Dami Dani trio, but I really feel like they’re missing a perfect opportunity considering the amount of times people write them as going to the same school. Because instead of Damian needing to go “Oh no, there’s two of them” about Jon and Dani. He should really be reserving that for the unprecedented combo of Dani and Maps “I will crawl through the secret tunnels of my school and meet Killer Croc in the sewer and make him an uncle” Mizoguchi. We could be having Damian looking at Maps, turn to Jon, and turn back around and now there’s Dani standing by and definitely enabling whatever insane plan Maps has come up with this time.

I think we should have the Batfamily treat the batarangs like business cards. For both branding and comedic purposes. I’ve only really seen the bats having personal batarangs a few times. Like yeah, they all usually use the company provided stock batarangs, but they also have their own personal ones that they use if they really need to send a message of who threw it. (Or pass the blame for throwing it by using someone else’s).

Imagine a league member meeting some random Batfamily member for the first time and asking for an autograph and then they pull out a business card holder filled with batarangs. I’d imagine Steph doing that (they’re pre-signed and have an professional looking address that leads to a Waffle House), and when questioned she’d just say “It’s important to make a good impression when making connections and a good business card can help keep you in people’s mind” just quoting something Bruce probably told her once.

Here’s some ideas on how I think they could look. Obviously Batman has the stock batarangs along with all the evolutions it’s gone through over the years, nightwing has his Wingdings, but the one that can drive personalized rangs home are the Robin disks, because it feels like it’s really back and forth whether robins have their own designed rangs or just use the bat ones. Spoiler and signal could use purple and yellow ones, and I imagine red hood uses the red bat emblem on his chest. Orphan’s could look like stock batarangs at first glance but upon close inspection you’d find the stitched mouth design embossed or engraved in it. Red Robin I feel like would either keep using Robin disks but red or he’d redesign them using his “double R” logo.

I got nothing for the extended Batfamily since I haven’t read pretty much anything with them but off the top of my head I’d imagine Kate using batarangs that are outlined with red like her hair.

Legal trouble Ra’s dcxdp AU

Because of how the dcxdp phandom treats Constantine, I feel like there’s a true untapped market for Ra’s too. To start with as far as I’m aware people don’t clown on Ra’s enough for basically being the Batman of DC’s immortal cast. Homie practically has a paid checkmark for immortality. No healing factor or actual youth abilities just skill and a pit that makes him younger. Anyway that’s to say this random self proclaimed immortal who in all of his wisdom named himself the demons head centuries ago, probably wasn’t super original. And whatever demons he likely named himself after probably aren’t too fond of the guy just like Constantine. But what’s this? A new High King of the infinite realms? With free access to the realm of the living? Well sounds like it’s time to give Ra’s the Constantine treatment; and give him a subpoena or a cease and desist.

Ra’s probably doesn’t believe it to be real, I mean don’t demons have better things to do than legal work? (“It’s probably just Tim, the detectives best child soldier.”) Probably not, because if any fic with Constantine is any indication, it seems that they are contract wielders, gossipers, and whiners. An excellent combination to spring on Mr diet immortal.

Now apparently failing to show up when served a subpoena can result in fines (and in extreme cases imprisonment) and because these guys are sneaky the fine print clearly states such fines or consequences exist, but the finer print says he doesn’t need to be informed so slowly his coffers get drained periodically. Alternatively, while he might not notice his coffers draining for a good while, he would definitely notice his pits draining. That’s one of the points where it could go a few ways.

Ra’s is not allowed to dodge the summons and Walker being Walker shows up to bring him to court, leaving everyone wondering where he went.

Ra’s dodging and thinking the prank is done with doesn’t notice for a while that either his coffers or his pits are slowly decreasing.

Situation One or Two happens and then while making his way to Ra’s, Danny realizes that while Constantine has the most overall paperwork, Ra’s has been the most consistent, making the two of them the sources of his greatest annoyance. Upon realizing that fact and discovering the pit exists he decides on some petty revenge giving him a second legal notice on the repossession of property of the infinite realms and while he’s the one who’s draining the pits, the others are draining his coffers.

Imagine Batman just going “The league of assassins has been quiet lately” with Dick saying “Yeah they’re always quiet it’s kind of their job” just for Talia to show up saying Ra’s is missing and the only clue they could find was a subpoena that they get Constantine to look at and confirm authenticity.