[Q&A] MORTIS RANDOM QUESTION HOUR [mature edition]

[skinstealer]

mature rating edition 

we will open and close this thread for questions in sessions and whatever you give us, we have to answer, and it Will go in the wiki and be canon (if applicable)and we can't forget about it later like we do on discord

sessions opening and closing will be announced here and on discord, they will occasionally be themed, and there is a nonzero chance we will draw for them because 1) como is encouraging us (especially me, rin) to draw for fun more and 2) i need some incentive and reason to warrant actually pinging people for this

so here we go:

now that ashtray is finished, all bets are off, give us your questions about this project, the story, and the cast of the comic, no holds barred (though if you have NSFW shit go put it in the discord or something)
 

ASKING: RIN (+ COMO AS GUEST)
THEME: ASHTRAY (+ASHTRAY CAST QUESTIONS)
LIMITS: pls remember to spoiler triggering content

[Lilium Mortem]

did you ever consider featuring more members of the smiles system(think that's the name for Chelsea and company)? why is Bucket named Bucket? What was mr bad dog trying to do with all that dream maniuplation nonsense?

[skinstealer]

did you ever consider featuring more members of the smiles system(think that's the name for Chelsea and company)? why is Bucket named Bucket? What was mr bad dog trying to do with all that dream maniuplation nonsense?

so this comic actually went through three goddamn drafts and in the first one, lina, amber and the system snakes were actually supposed to show up as well- they got cut for time because it was just Too Many Characters. we actually have outfits for them! these outfits are generally used as their Default Looks™ now, but they were originally designed with the special in mind. 



as for bucket's name- meta reason is that como asked me for a dog name and i said "uhhhh, bucket", and he actually fucking used it. in universe reason, unexplained and probably never will be. 

re: dream manipulation nonsense...

matthias is a nosy bastard and is the kind of person who emotionally gets off on making people suffer, especially when he can dig into people secrets (which he effectively can through dreams, see: using peoples' deadnames and names of system members directly) and use them to make people squirm in public conversations. the deeper he can dig and twist people up, the more glee he gets out of it, and the more you fight back against him, the harder he's going to want to go against you and really mess you up. part of being a spit cultist means delighting in that pain and really relishing giving into those impulses to hurt, and matthias does so with no remorse. tldr, he's a fucking asshole who wanted to see bucket + the smiles suffer, and when challenged on it, he wanted to see how far he could push things. that, and he wants the smiles' job as spit's demon real bad, and by digging in and finding out about bucket and chelsea's Sordid Relationship™, he had a potential in on getting her and bucket in trouble and in his eyes, getting that job. whether this actually would have worked out for him, who knows, but he might have gotten away with it if he had actually kept his fucking mouth shut about knowing about it.

[Shifter55]

What would have happened if the dream hadn't gone wrong and Bucket and the Smiles system were unable to break out of it?

[skinstealer]

What would have happened if the dream hadn't gone wrong and Bucket and the Smiles system were unable to break out of it?
spoilers: unreality, ableism, victim blaming

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Spoilerthe dream would have gotten progressively more suffocating for each of the parties in different ways- como and i determined that matthias probably would have tried to provoke an existential/unreality focused crisis in the smiles, possibly attacking the idea of them being a system and even digging into what caused them to split if he could get deep enough, and into bucket's relationship with ali- and how they left erica to train with her instead, and what that meant to them and their new life, attacking their choices and decisions, claiming that they abandoned their own mother and all they got out of it was a life of suffocation and in the end, a life with rein.

[Lilium Mortem]

oh wait just thought of something. why did bucket and the smiles share a dream? was that a side effect of Matpatthias' weird dream powers?

[skinstealer]

matthias' cigarettes contain nightmare scraps, which when burned with tend to amplify the effects of his dreams and allow him deeper access to one's head. this was originally intended to see if he could get access to multiple system members at once (success), but bucket attempting to heal the burn backfired and dragged bucket into the dream as well.

[MarxzVulpez]

Bucket's other Dream involved a uh
firing range accident

Was the result of that based on a real thing that happened to Bucket or was that a nightmare amplification?

[skinstealer]

como says:

"both.

loosely based on a real incident, massively exaggerated by matthias' influence"

fun fact: that scene was written almost entirely by como instead of us going back and forth with characters, with como writing in chunks and me suggesting how matthias would choose to influence the dream- for instance, him deciding to distort erica's face and have her become angrier with bucket in the dream than in actuality

[Shifter55]

What was the area the truck convoy was travelling through? From the looks of it they were going through foothills, to Consumption if my assumption of those plants is correct...

[skinstealer]

started in solitude, moved on through to consumption and eventually ended up in hearth.

[BlueCrowned]

How did Matthias gain the ability to manipulate dreams to begin with? (apologies if this is already answered somewhere)

[cosmo]

okay so matthias obviously is aware of how awfully spit treats chelsea and co. and also we know he’s vying for their position as her demon so... does he like? think she’s going to treat him better (like he’ll be “the exception” or something) or is he just even more of a grade-A weirdo freak than i thought. like what is his expectation for what would happen if he got what he wanted is my question i guess. (sorry for how cursed this is but i guess matthias is kind of inherently cursed huh)

[Shifter55]

I wonder if he thinks he could use the position as authority to pull in more advantages, either existing stuff Chelsea won't use, or graft from others that think he would have the ability to sway decisions as Spit's demon...

[skinstealer]

How did Matthias gain the ability to manipulate dreams to begin with? (apologies if this is already answered somewhere)

matthias has a nightmare scrap affinity and has trained in that with the cult, so i'd imagine he figured that as part of his cult training- that, and i imagine he's kind of a dark magic nerd

okay so matthias obviously is aware of how awfully spit treats chelsea and co. and also we know he’s vying for their position as her demon so... does he like? think she’s going to treat him better (like he’ll be “the exception” or something) or is he just even more of a grade-A weirdo freak than i thought. like what is his expectation for what would happen if he got what he wanted is my question i guess. (sorry for how cursed this is but i guess matthias is kind of inherently cursed huh)

hoo boy
cw: SA/victim blaming/really awful but Thats Matthias

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Spoiler okay so matthias' logic for The Spit Simping is pretty fucked and i was honestly not sure if i was ever going to go into this but i figured if anyone asked, i would. he is ABSOLUTELY down for spit's horrible deal and not only thinks that spit is cool for it but thinks that chelsea + co should be Fucking Grateful for being in the position they're in. he's fucking terrible and has zero issue with this shit.

so yeah, he absolutely deserves what he got and then some.

[cosmo]

g-d i fucking hate him. not a surprising answer though just >=( What Is Wrong With You (you being matthias)

[skinstealer]

i never technically closed the first one but i want to think about this new project and tumble around ideas in my head about it, especially on how i'm going to handle the sexuality aspects in a way that fits the mature content rating while remaining honest to the subject material 

so let's go 

ASKING: RIN
THEME: UNNAMED WILSON/CONCEPT PROJECT
LIMITS: keep in mind that this project will have sexuality and psych horror as Big Themes but try not to get like, Actually NSFW here, if youve got legit explicit questions save em for nsfw chat on discord pls

[King-Clod]

Does Wilson smoke or is the picture of him smoking just for the meme?

[Shifter55]

What information can you give use about the city/district Wilson lives/works in?

[skinstealer]

Does Wilson smoke or is the picture of him smoking just for the meme?

wilson is a smoker and thankfully does not have lungs for it to really cause any actual harm to him, he mostly just likes the feeling and smell of it (though to be fair he gets fucking, vanilla flavored cigarettes when he can afford it so go figure he likes the goddamn smell) 

it helps him calm down and is a good way for him to ground himself from a crying episode, though it's probably still not the Best for his internals even if its not causing any lasting damage to what's essentially a big sack of regenerating tears (though honestly, it's hard to tell how much drugs/alcohol even affect concepts...like, it affects them for sure, but they don't exactly have organs for it to Get To- placebo effect through collective assumption towards what drugs/alcohol are Supposed to do, maybe?)

What information can you give use about the city/district Wilson lives/works in?

wilson lives in a city that's actually fairly "standard" compared to the rest of the zone concepts come from, and while there's still a lot of things in place that are Basic Fucking "Human" Decency (such as being able to get standardized/low income housing relatively quickly and without the bullshit waitlists we have here in hell world, along with basic income, etc), it still has a decent amount of capitalism happening and wilson very much feels like a cog in the machine even when working in a public service such as social work for something as important as metamorphosis care. he currently """lives""" in a really Not Great part of the city in a motel post-danielle kicking his ass out, though i'm thinking of starting the project a bit prior to that.