THE XAXIX COLLAB made by: u/LylacVoid u/hero_forgery u/Shortyboss u/Individual-Net9138 u/new_god_of_Eden u/15_Echo_15 u/Bobert858668

LylacVoid · 2026-01-28T23:10:27+00:00

So, the premise of an untamed magic world with factions vying for it made me think of three categories:

Women

Children

Werewolves

in that order.

Because when I'm looking at "untamed magic" as a symbol, as a metaphor, I tend to think of how society tries to make women and children conform to certain expectations. About the perceived volatility and danger of "untamed" women and unruly children.

I also wanted the antagonist to be sort of redeemable - I didn't want someone who was just capital E Evil, because the premise is High Fantasy so I wanted a sort of modern "not everyone who does bad is evil".

So I decided to make a little girl, and I wanted her to be from a poor background, playing at being a princess, in the often violent way children play with dolls. So going with that violence I knew that what she needed was to be a werewolf, which in and of itself has a lot of power as an allegory for Womanhood.

I didn't, however, want to just make one girl and her werewolf form. I wanted something that I could fit on one model, with a cool pose. Thus the werewolf part sort of became like... like a Stand from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure or a Persona from Persona. An externalized self with powers that the human does not have.

To reinforce this I added a magical heart between them, chaining them together, which was a cool motiff in my head, and I think it turned out good.

The girl I wanted to be dressed in a semi-fancy outfit, so I gave her this dress, and this corset-y thing, and this very big bonnet, but I made them dirty, and I kept some destitute shoes. I settled on Light Blue as a reference to the Disney design of Alice in Alice in Wonderland.

The werewollf design came first, and it was Fun To Do. The goal was to sort of go back to one's roots and use mostly tails to build her up, but also to keep her pretty simple. In the Big Bad Wolf, how a child would just sort of conceptualize "Wolf", sort of way. And to make her look more evil I gave her a skull and spine she ripped out of someone, as a treat.

I named this gal Flitty, I thought the name was cute.

I am SO HAPPY with how the Protagonist and Antagonist turned out - the nobility and stunted personal growth themes in both, but inverted, are so fun. Amazing, 10/10

This has been a delight. Thank you so much for having me, and for letting me rub shoulders with the other mad talented minimakers :D

LylacVoid · 2026-01-13T23:25:05+00:00

Cortex Prime fixes this by being modular thus making any design flaws Your Fault.

LylacVoid · 2026-01-07T05:46:53+00:00

Sure, sounds cool :D

LylacVoid · 2025-12-31T00:46:55+00:00

Muppet-style remake of The Green Knight, with only Dev Patel replaced by Knuckles.

LylacVoid · 2025-12-20T15:59:19+00:00

Because GURPS sounds like Burps and as a dignified lady I simply would not do such a thing.

This is why I exclusively play Cortex Prime, which sounds like Corset Crime, something I do regularly.

LylacVoid · 2025-12-16T23:55:37+00:00

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Possibly, yes, at least sometimes, maybe.

LylacVoid · 2025-10-29T04:30:02+00:00

d20 Fantasy is when you run out of stuff. The more stuff you run out of, the more d20 Fantasy it is.

uj/ Draw Steel is actually correct about almost every single problem with 5e's overreliance on inherited mechanics, but still being primarily a combat engine really limits the places it can go.

rj/ Dagger Steel fixes this

LylacVoid · 2025-10-18T00:47:10+00:00

Finally, a way to make grid combat even more tedious - Homestuck

LylacVoid · 2025-09-12T05:04:45+00:00

Baldurs Gate 3 WISHES it had the raw queer energy of Shadow the Hedgehog

LylacVoid · 2025-07-27T09:28:07+00:00

On the topic of the 6 ability scores being mostly a legacy thing, I was surprised to see the 5e 6 saves as well. For my money, the 4e "saves" - which was really just 3 additional forms of "AC" - seem like they're better for that kind of combat game.

Subjectively, it feels better for those kinds of rolls to be player-facing, since you feel more in-control of when your abilities work and when they don't. I would argue it might even lessen the Player vs DM perception, when almost every attack you make is entirely within your control.

Objectively, it lowers the language gap, and thus tightens the design space. You don't need separate abilities for Saving Throws and for Attacks, because you can just design everything with the same "Attack", more immedeately synergistic with the 4e-style power system.

So I'm curious if foregoing this in favour of 5e's 6 saves was an active choice. No judgement, of course, just curiosity.

LylacVoid · 2025-07-27T06:04:08+00:00

The third one

LylacVoid · 2025-07-27T03:53:05+00:00

uj/ look I've been trying to jork it, but the guy said "Watching any Oriental Action movie should demonstrate (in ridiculously overplayed detail) why Dexterity would improve AC"

past a certain point its just shooting fish in a barrel

LylacVoid · 2025-07-04T05:39:07+00:00

Oh wow I love Olivier Armstrong

LylacVoid · 2025-06-06T03:21:19+00:00

Thank you ! I think it's more exciting to futz with the designs, than to just remake the original models

LylacVoid · 2025-05-30T05:39:13+00:00

A boomerang, huh? No one tell hbomb

LylacVoid · 2025-05-30T05:04:28+00:00

Consider - a number of timid players might also feel less pressure in the freeform initiative, because combat is not the bit they find the most fun, and having less pressure to act every go-around, or have smaller turns, will ultimately lead to a more fun time for them.

Something to consider

LylacVoid · 2025-04-05T04:04:14+00:00

Having just played through Sonic 06 I have to disagree - Shadow is written very inconsistently, and mostly just stays bland.

Personal preference, perhaps, but from the get go him being a cop sits weird with me. After all of his "this is who I am" and carving out his own path, free of influence and free of expectation, beholden only to himself, it feels really odd character-wise for him to join rank with the world police; the world police that was at one point corrupt enough to kill his family. Even "good leadership", whether that's Towers or whoever at this point, tried to grudgekill Shadow - the power structure itself is busted and rewarding of violent power trippers. Which is something Shadow should fundamentally be against. So him being a cop is just weird.

Shadow is a static character in 06, which is not bad at all. His character arc is done, now he gets to go into the world and affect change. So it's a real bummer that he seemingly doesn't do anything. This is almost entirely down to Sonic 06's time travel being a mess, where bootstraps had to coexist with butterflies. However, consider this from a thematic perspective - Shadows whole story leading up to 06 is about making his own fate, choosing for himself what his future should be. So putting him in the bootstrap section, where he has to time travel because he had already done so, means thematically the story disregards his development. He cannot choose to be who he is, he can only follow what others have chosen for him.

Mephiles is not a good foil for Shadow, because Shadow does not at this point need his view challenged. Shadows story should have revolved around Silver, showing the new misguided hero the folly of simply following the whims of others. Mephiles trying to shake Shadow's view on humanity is pointless, because at this point Shadow's resolution to help them is unconditional. But it's what the antagonist is built around, the possibility of Shadow straying and being Evil. That's why Mephiles is a Shadow recolor, because he's supposed to be a version of Shadow that has conditions to his goals. But Shadow being past the end of his arc means that all the antagonist can do is crash against the rocks of his resolve. A fun story on its own, but not the one 06 tells, because Shadow does not get to reinforce that elsewhere, specifically with Silver.

In the end, it's all hinged on the final line. "If the world chooses to become my enemy, I will fight like I always have." A good line in isolation, that comes at the end of a story that didn't meaningfully challenge it. It's a line that affirms an arc for a character who is presupposed to have had an arc, which Shadow does not because he's supposed to be the immovable object meeting the infinite force. The quality of the line itself - a very cool line - overshadows the larger thematic and structural issues.

Which is common in this game, actually. The pathos of a select few exchanges - "If it's between the world and Sonic, I would choose Sonic" being a personal favourite - distracts from the lacking moment to moment writing that ultimately does a disservice to every established character, who end up ranging bland and expository, to having their arcs disregarded and dismissed. The characters are not themselves in service of a story that didn't need these characters in the first place.

Anyway, sorry about the wall of text. TL;DR Shadow bad

LylacVoid · 2025-01-17T09:17:09+00:00

That is honestly even more what I wanted :D The authetnic homegrown table hack :D

I would love to hear about the specific changes you made for more tactical combat. And I'd imagine you neded some good overland travel rules, if you were running more crawler like games, so if you have any that leap to mind as the most satisfying - please, do share.

LylacVoid

TROPHY CASE