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Sure why not, I'll do this too. Dunno who might actually care about my hot takes but we'll see. Gonna keep these short Ainz Ooal Gown I like what I saw, but I didn't see much. I don't know much about Overlord, but I felt like you played the character well from what I know. The game was... well, obviously rushed. I felt like there was a good concept there, but ultimately was too simple and short. Overall a monster with potential that wasn't met, but not the worst. 3/5 Box Ghost Definitely lived up to the ghost part of your name with the overall lack of activity, although I guess Box Ghost being subdue is rather in-character. Still, what was there was funny enough that I did like it. 2/5. Dullahan I don't want to deter you from joining these types of things in the future but... you didn't really post much, if at all. Don't be shy - we don't bite! ? 0/5 Kurumi Ebisuzawa Basically the host of the event, seeing as the actual event monster you were controlling basically didn't exist. Which I guess is fair, and work out in the end. While what you did was fun, including the game and the interactions with Larry, I felt like the actual character of Kurumi was... extremely bland. I blame it on her being an anime character. If it weren't for her basically hosting the game, she'd probably get a 3/5 from me. 4/5 Larry the Cucumber 0/5 stole my lighting you fruity bastard. Being serious, Larry was by far my favorite monster this time around. Fun, interactive, and got into some shenanigans at the end with an interesting sub-plot game thing. Shame your game kind of died, although I guess that's also partially on me. 5/5 Post-Crisis Carlos Really close to my favorite monster, with the terrible jokes and crippling depression. Main issue was a lack of activity overall, but when you did post I had a good time. 4/5 Segata Sanshiro Actually really enjoyed this monster, although you did drop off as the days went on. Fun gimmick, and it was fun working on a commercial with you. Ultimately, a bit one note. 3/5 Sou Hiyori Well, you uh... existed, for a couple of days. Even in the low activity, I don't actually know what was up with the monster. I was waiting for a big reveal, and then I got nothing. Literally. Granted, I am somewhat aware of the reason behind your lack of activity, but that doesn't change my grade. 1/5 Spooky I think you did a good job, although at the half-way point you sort of defaulted to doing what you normally do but with a spooky theme. I don't think this is particularly a bad thing mind you - it's just kind of a symptom of you being super active in Misc as it is. Game also suffered from lack of posting. 4/5 Uncle Death 0/5 Garbage monster. Next time plan out your stupid game, idiot. I am very upset with my lack of preparation as a whole. Fun fact - I basically winged the whole game day by day, and I think it not only showed but also suffered from it. Especially the radical difficulty spike that came in Day 6 from my frustration at the survival rates. I think I could have done more interesting rule sets with the days, especially the earlier ones. It also hampered my overall monster I think, as I spent so much time thinking of stupid rules that it started draining my will to post as Uncle Death, which can be seen by the lack of interaction during the mid to late point. If I had to give myself a score, I'd probably give me a 3/5 just because, while I am overall pleased with my game, I am also very frustrated at it's wasted potential. This is also the longest review because I love talking about myself - whoopsie. Yami Bakura Not the worst, but not super stellar either. The overall feel of the monster was... well I'm not actually sure what you were going for to be honest, and I felt like you didn't do much outside of your game and a few statuses. The game itself was not bad, although your lack of activity in it hampered it quite a bit. I still stand that it was better than Ainz game, no matter what Yui says. 2/5 Bram Stroker You technically existed. 1/5 Ivan Ooze Spent more time telling us why he couldn't post than actually posting. Started off really strong too. 2/5 Pepsi Man Wish you could post more, but ultimately you still had that Pepsi Man charm. 4/5 DANGANRONPA I forgot you were a host until I saw Yui's review. 0/5 Hades You also technically existed. 1/5 Mettaton NEO Well, you were there to start everything, and to end it. But, ironically, in an event where the theme was rebirth, you were just completely replaced by a zombie killing loli. Whoops! 1/5 Overall Event Pretty solid, had a lot of fun. Too much time where nothing was happening though, from both the monster side of things and the non-monster side of things. Also I felt like the ball was dropped during the mid-point of the event, although we did a good job of picking it right up for the finale. 3/5

Was going to wait until more showed up, but decided to go right on ahead... IT WAS ME!!! I WAS IVAN OO- ....yeah, won't continue on that one, not this time. Now, lemme just start by saying this: THIS actually surprises me. I honestly thought Segata would've been someone else, so kudos to you on keeping me guessing. I actually enjoyed you donning the role of SEGA Saturn's spokesperson. >Uncle Death and Kurumi These were two that...well, the first one I guessed almost immediately (along with one other). That reason being because I've seen the one avatar that Uncle Death used one other time...and that's when REP used it. And mind you, this was a LONG while ago, surprisingly I remembered it. As for Kurumi...sorta figured it would be Yui. It just screams something he'd use. >Carlos ...yo, Thar, that was pretty weird...like I dunno what even that was. So no, I didn't expect you. (More to come in another post when others reveal)

 Yet again, Randy found himself in this predicament. Sounds of different movements and shifting were enhanced as he laid there on the ground. He wanted to move, but couldn't. This happened when he fought Yveltal...yet again, this was the outcome. BGM "I have let loose the bonds of earth, to sail on the wings of the wind...alola 'oe." The young Torracat Randy stood there, beside his mother, a blubbering mess of a gijinka. He stood there, wishing that this whole thing here was a nightmare that he could wake up from, but alas he couldn't. It was real and he had to face this reality: his father passed. Something so small but yet impacted him greatly, the heart being such a fragile part of the body. As the funeral ended, the attendees and his mother began to walk off...but Randy stayed, staring at the place that he was buried. Once more, he felt himself start to cry. He felt his whole world crashing down around him. The week before, Sol Mask was forced into retirement...and then his father passing. He began to shake his head, sobbing and growling slightly. "I-It's not fair...it's not fair! Dad...I needed you here." he muttered, wiping tears out of his eyes. "...I-I'm not strong enough...t-t-to do this..." "...not sure he was expecting ya to be, kid." Randy stopped suddenly, tears still streaming down his face, looking up to see Charlie. He approached the Torracat and placed a hand on his head. "Your father, he was one of the good ones. ...the best friend I've had since we were young. Always aspired to be a fighter, but never had the drive to go all the way through." "H-How come...?" Charlie chuckled, crouching down into a sitting position. "Surprisingly, it was because me and him couldn't beat one another. As terrible as a reason that is, that was what he said was holding him back. Ya see, when he fought and lost in something, he always took it as a learning experience. For instance, he fought a Mr. Mime before. Yeah, he was part Dark and the opponent was a Fairy, that match up wasn't grand. He lost miserably." Randy sat down beside Charlie, sniffling slightly as he wiped a few tears off his face. "...d-did he fight him again?" "Of course. But when he did the second time, he was much wiser." Charlie nodded, crossing his arms slightly. "He figured out during the first battle that the Mr. Mime tended to trash talk along with messing and getting in your father's head. Let's say, it worked. But during the second bout, your father learned a bit more discipline and was able to tune out the crap his opponent spewed out...plus, he was actually able to strike at him with a move that was effective against the Mr. Mime." "...s-so he adapted?" "Exactly. In this case, he both adapted physically with learning Shadow Claw and mentally by blocking out the distractions." Charlie nodded with a smile. Then he began to sigh. "Randy, I know I'm not him, believe me I wish I do. And I also wish I could bring him back...but right now, this is a situation you need to use and take a lesson from him. It's a learning experience now and you have to attempt to adapt to this new outcome." BGM Randy sat there in silence, looking at Charlie before his gaze hit the grave. Then he lifted up his eyes and watched the setting sun begin it's descent into the ocean's horizon. Finally he stood up, having one last tear fall to the ground, before he had his fists clench tightly at his sides. "Hmmm? What's up kid?" The Torracat finally turned around and looked at the Primeape with a serious determination in his eyes. "Charlie...please...I want you to help me become a fighter...a wrestler." he said, looking back towards the setting sun. "...I want to be like my dad...strong, courageous, and more importantly...I want to continue his hoʻoilina hoʻoilina...his legacy. And I want to fulfill my dream in the process." Charlie looked at Randy, scoffing slightly but only shook his head. "Become a fighter just like your old man? And in the process, take a stand against what happened against your hero?" he asked, seeing Randy's face in shock. "Yeah, the old man told me about that little ambition of yours. Still, if you want to go down this path, it ain't going to be easy. I'll be tough on you and your training, you still in?" Randy only nodded firmly, exhaling deeply. "Yes sir. I'm not turning back now. Sol Mask said...it's about going with your gut...even if it's not akamai...the smart thing to do. Dad...believed in me, so whether or not me fighting and becoming a wrestler isn't the smartest thing, my gut is saying that's the path I should go." The Primeape laughed before standing up. With that, he turned and walked off with Randy tailing behind him, looking to continue his father's legacy and to adapt to this new situation. "I...battle. Now...execution. Recover...strength. Next time...fight...me. Meet...death...quickly..." That voice broke through to Randy yet again, the Lucario's. He began to stir and shift again, finally opening his eyes a bit and seeing that this Lucario was now gone. He let out a deep groan, slowly sitting up. Unfortunately, so many of them were badly wounded...clinging onto life. He sat up and began to groan and huff, his eyes looking up at the sky at this point. ...adapt...take the loses...try and adapt...a winning solution... Randy thought, before muttering something. "...go with your gut...even if it's not a-akamai..."

Happy Halloween everyone. This was something I had in mind to make for a while but I finally buckled down and got them done in time for the holiday. Took a long time to get them all drawn, but I'm glad I went through with it. I always liked Jiangshi in Chinese folklore and I was interested in adding something to the Vampire archetype. Coincidentally, as many Vampire monsters are styled after Castlevania characters, and there happens to be a Jiangshi boss in one of the games, I was able to use its color scheme for my Hopping Vampire. First time I've made a LV Monster. It's another older feature of the game I remember fondly so I wanted to make one of my own. The Hopping Vampires would be unique as the only Zombie-type LV Monsters and the only LV Monsters (unless I'm blind and wasn't paying attention in my research) that summon each other from the graveyard instead of the hand or deck. A bit of a hurdle, but if you can get the LV7 version out on the field you can potentially lock down your opponent's ability to remove cards from their own graveyard. If you see anything that could be improved upon in any of these cards, give me a holler, and I'll see what I can do. In the meantime I'll post the card images in the art gallery, you guys are free to use them for your own cards if you want. Thanks for any feedback and have a Happy Halloween.

Compressed Heated Diamond Dragon LIGHT Level 3 [Dragon/Effect] 800/2200 (This card is always treated as a Normal Monster). All monsters your opponent controls are treated as FIRE Pyro monsters, in addition to their original Type and Attribute. If this card is Summoned by the effect of "Carboneddon": You can add up to 1 "Hydrogeddon", 1 "Oxigeddon", and 1 "Duoterion" from your Deck to your hand. If this card is sent to the GY: You can send any number of "Water Dragon" or "Water Dragon Cluster" from your hand or Deck to the GY. Then, draw 1 card for each monster sent from your hand this way. - - - - - Even Fossil Dig and Souleating Oviraptor aren't quite proving to be enough to support the consistency of Bastion's chemical archetype. "Bonding DHO" not pulling the Water Dragons form anywhere, as if having Dragons and Sea Serpents in an otherwise Dinosaur deck wasn't complicated enough. Said Trap also restocks the materials into the Deck so it's a bit hard to recur after enough Clusters have dropped. This makes regular Water Dragons permanent weakeners for the opponent's field, and does both Type and Attribute as a double lock. If they run Zombie World, their Zombies are still FIRE. If they run the DARK field Spell, their DARKs are still Pyro. Soooo yeah xD Carboneddon having a reason to be ran with the other chemicals should open up the possibilities to finally mix with them as the missing element needed for that Fire Dragon from the GX opening that we never got to see in action.

Fire Dragon FIRE Level 8 [Pyro/Effect] 2800/2600 Cannot be Normal Summoned/Set. Must be Special Summoned with "Bonding CON". If this card is Special Summoned: You can activate this effect; Spell/Traps and Effects your opponent currently controls have their effects negated. Also, banish all monsters your opponent controls with 0 ATK. When this card is destroyed and sent to the GY: You can target 1 "Carboneddon", 1 "Oxygeddon" and 1 "Nitrogeddon" banished or in your GY; Special Summon them. Nitrogeddon WATER Level 4 [Dinosaur/Effect] 1900/700 If your Dinosaur monster battles a monster: You can Special Summon this card from your hand; your opponent's battling monster has its ATK and DEF halved and effect negated, and if your opponent's monster is a FIRE or Pyro monster, it's ATK and DEF become 0. Bonding CON [Trap Card] Tribute 1 "Carboneddon", 1 "Oxygeddon" and 1 "Nitrogeddon" from your hand or field; Special Summon 1 "Fire Dragon" from your hand, Deck, or GY. If your opponent controls a monster Special Summoned from the Extra Deck, you can Tribute any of these monsters from your Deck instead. You can banish this card from your GY to target 1 monster on the field; It becomes a FIRE Pyro until next turn's End Phase. - - - - - - I did not intend for this to be more than one card, but it somehow happened... huh....

A deep sigh sounded to accompany shuffled steps. A girl with long white locks bouncing about behind her as she moved was walking around Skrelp Harbor, her head angled ever so slightly down. Not that there was anything interesting on the ground. She simply couldn't be bothered to lift it any higher at the moment. In her arms was a Sneasel who seemed content to be there, at least so long as no one was directly looking at him. He would wriggle and fuss whenever he could notice someone looking at the duo but the girl's arms held on well enough. She wandered about without any real aim before sitting down at a bench. Her shoulders slumped and her grip on her friend loosened, allowing him to move about more. Despite this he did little more than sit on her lap, looking up at her face. There were no tears as yet. How long that would last was anyone's guess. But what mattered was she definitely looked down in the dumps. "Well Rondo... It's just us now. And Sonata of course..." she said softly while raising a hand to pet her Pokemon's head. This was Milla Reuter, one of many beginning trainers that had come to tackle the new region. But now she found herself without a team. Getting by with two other trainers to help had already been somewhat challenging at points. But they'd had some experience by now. Surely the teams were just to help everyone starting out she thought. "Maybe we can do it by ourselves?" she asked with doubt clear in own voice. Whatever thought process she ran through in her own mind couldn't get rid of what she already knew. She was going to need a team. And that would require some other team or teams falling apart like hers. Rondo as she called the Sneasel turned about to look her in the face. He seemed more than confident and tried brandishing his claws as if to say he could handle it all himself. This elicited a small laugh but ultimately didn't lift Milla's spirits. This troubled Rondo who began looking around the area. The two sat for some time like this, Milla not knowing what to do, Rondo looking for anything to help his trainer. "I should probably call Mom and Dad... Going home might be for the best..." Milla spoke after a lengthy pause while sounding even more dejected. Giving up was something Rondo couldn't allow and the weasel popped up from her lap. With swiftness he hopped down to the ground and began running off to who knows where. "R-rondo wait for me!" Milla called out in a panic as she took to her own feet and began trying to follow her partner. He was a lot faster than she was so she'd need him to stop running if she ever wanted to catch him. But still, he never did anything like this. What had gotten into him?

I was the Box Ghost. I set up a monster duel that only one person tried. This was the Deck: I probably should've tried doing more things.

It's going to take me a bit to get used to the non-Halloween logo

I was Sou. The plan for the character was to be sweet and docile for the first half, then super suspicious and antagonistic of the popular monsters in the second half. Insisting they were up to no good, that people shouldn’t trust them. buuuuut I was supposed to be done moving before the event started, but complications came up and my move started about halfway through. I left on Tuesday, but I didn’t have a computer at all on Monday, after finishing up some RP posts. This doesn’t really forgive Sou being a failure, but I’m sorry I wasn’t able to fulfill my role.

Not a monster but feeling like dropping my thoughts, if I am allowed. Overall it was an ejoyable event for me. Nothing too crazy like other years, but by all means entertaining. Uncle Death, Kurumi and Spooky were my leading favorites at the beginning, but the latter 2 gradually lost their appeal while Uncle consistently remained on top. Carlos and Bakura were doing well IMO, and Pepsiman and Ainz could have been just as good if only they had been more active. As a NCM resident I tried to do my part by joining most of the games and be active in them as much as possible in order to support the event and the monsters in their antics, and I did have fun with them, but sadly some of the games didn't really pick up in activity, especifically Spooky's and Larry's, while Ainz' started late, and I didn't find chance for dueling otherwise I would have challenged the Box Ghost and Spooky as those 2 were open for monster duels. Maybe next year monster duels can be supported more, going as far as giving monsters 1~3 custom cards now that DB has them implemented for extra kicks. However, I did miss Kurum's incident, and frankly didn't feel like joining the cipher game of Larry. Speaking of Larry, I for one wasn't a big fan, as I'm not familiar with his source series and I'm not too fond of taking religion too lightly, as in for jokes or games, and thus I found it mostly as a silly character. Makes me think it's something northwestern citizens get in a different way. I was not expecting to be as active as I was during this event, otherwise I would have applied for a monster position. I even toyed with the idea of being a returning monster, but in the end I wasn't sure if I would have been active enough. Part of me feels that had I been approached by the staff to join as a returning monster, it would have motivated me to do so, but alas, such thing didn't happen. Perhaps next year now that I know I can make time for NCM even when I expected myself to be busy. I didn't feel like playing the guessing game, and didn't even pay much attention to the list of participating members, but in the last days I got better ideas of who could be behind the monsters' masks. For instance, I suspected Nyx being Spooky since in the last days her behavior became similar to his. And I wasn't even sure if Yui was participating as a monster, otherwise him being Kurumi would have been an easy guess for me. And I figured Forgotten Home was Dullahan, confirmed just now, because both were both equally inactive during the past week.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand cut! That's 2019's Masquerade wrapped up. In my reviews thread for last year, I said the following, and I quote: "I'd say I hope we can do better next year, but honestly, I'd be concerned if we couldn't." And with that in mind, I'm quite pleased this year! This wasn't the wildest (that'd be 2016) or most successful (2017) Masquerade, but people seemed to enjoy it! And that's all I really cared about this year, for multiple reasons I'll get into when I review the event itself at the end of this thread. For right now, let's dip right into those monsters! For the sake of being thorough, I'll be reviewing everyone, but let's start with 2019's newcomers. Ainz Ooal Gown: My one and only gripe with Ainz was his activity level, being quite on the lower end for monsters that were active this year. He was a good choice of monster, he was portrayed excellently, and while his game was a bit last-second, it wasn't all that bad. If he'd been consistently active throughout the entire event, he'd easily be in the upper echelons of monsters for this year, but alas, that wasn't the case. 7/10. Box Ghost: Felt kinda... subdued? Was quite active near the start of the event, but wasted no time falling off and only occasionally asking for duels or posting box-themed songs in my music thread. A pity, tbh. While he was kinda one-note, this was a pretty entertaining monster to watch. 5/10. Dullahan: Aight, brutal honesty time. I'm rather disappointed, because I did have some hope for this monster. After being excited to see a new forum member interested in the Masquerade and hoping it could even give them some RP street cred, I was met with a monster who was so inactive that I actually forgot they existed while reading the monster list they were in. I can only hope this isn't indicative of your potential performance in future Masquerades. 0/10. Kurumi Ebisuzawa: My own monster, and the one I put the most prep work into out of any monster I've played so far... only to have no idea how to Kurumi once the event started, even though I went to the trouble of reading the entire Gakkou Gurashi manga (would recommend!) right before the event. Despite choking like that, I like to think I did a pretty decent job. I'd be upset that this wasn't some magnum opus monster of mine, but I didn't want that to be the case this year. I'll give myself a 7/10 and be happy with it. Larry the Cucumber: Oh, boy! In the first half of the event, Uncle Death was my favorite monster, with Larry threatening to take the spot as the event went on. By the end of things, he did indeed take that place, becoming my favorite monster of 2019. This was a monster that was executed on incredibly well, and you went above and beyond what I expected of you. Quite an accomplishment! The real icing on the cake here was factoring in all manner of things from the show that I actually forgot about entirely, despite having watched quite a bit of VeggieTales as a wee Christian lad. (I'm agnostic these days.) 10/10! Post-Crisis Carlos: You shouldn't sell yourself short on your performance. Every year, we get a monster that I'm initially skeptical about, but I realize I was gravely mistaken and they're actually great. Last year it was M. Bersback, in 2016 it was Pepsiman, and this time around, it was you. The combination of shitty puns and existential depression were a real treat, and my only real regret with Carlos is I won't see him again. 8/10. Segata Sanshiro: You've probably heard this one before, but it felt a lot like you were trying to fill the shoes Pepsiman left behind in 2016. This is not an easy task, so don't take it personally when I tell you this was a pursuit you failed in. It felt to me like you funneled too hard on the one thing and neglected everything else. 5/10. Sou Hiyori: If there's one thing I hate, it's squandered potential, and Sou basically bleeds the stuff. I was in the know on this monster's eventual gimmick and looked quite forward to it, but much like Ember did last year, you succumbed to the ghost bug before you had a chance to see it through. Quite disappointing, since you were doing rather well before that point. Although I can pardon this for I know you were moving and there were some complications, my score will not. 3/10. Spooky: Speaking of ghosts, let's talk about actual ghosts. As a concept, Spooky was pretty neat. But... it didn't really feel like it was Spooky. It felt like it was just the same member doing the same shit, but wearing Spooky as a mask. This isn't squandered potential like with Sou, but that doesn't make it any less disappointing. 4/10. Uncle Death: Now this was a cool dude! From the moment you locked this monster in, I was super excited about seeing him in action, and the wait paid off even more than I expected! This also had the most unique forum game I've ever seen, and I've seen quite a few of them. I'd have absolutely no complaints if Tower of Barbs 2 (3?) became a more permanent fixture in the Games section. The one and only thing I didn't like is you started to become a bit more withdrawn as the event went on, but it looks like you noticed near the end. 10/10. Yami Bakura: Moderately disappointing. You did a pretty good job portraying the character, but your activity was lackluster, which was a hindrance to your game that I honestly liked Ainz's more. Better luck next year. 4/10. And with them all sorted away, let's talk about our returning monsters for the year! I was expecting the veteran monsters to be the real stars of this event, but it may be for the better that I was mistaken. Bram Stoker: You were technically active, but might as well have not been. Quite a shame, since I remember Bram being one of the better monsters during his year. 1/10. Ivan Ooze: The Ooze... is... back! Quite pleased that Ivan's portrayal was still the winning performance I saw in 2017, but you dropped the ball very hard at the end there. Very, very hard. Had you simply not posted further content as Ivan, you'd likely have scored higher than you're going to. The talk about "my host and his FGO" and such was so... not good. Quite upsetting after you were starting off so strong. 2/10. Pepsi Man: The Halloween hero of 2017 makes a comeback! Albeit, with far less activity than in his award-winning debut. Despite the lower activity and the two years since playing Pepsiman, he's still 100% the man I remember regretting ever having doubts about. The fact that you can ghost the event and still score as high as you are speaks strongly of how well you performed when you did. 9/10. Last and not least, the host monsters. All three - yes, three - of them. Starting with the one that you probably forgot about. DANGANRONPA: This was something I said not to do. And you did it anyway. And then posted a single status once and that was literally it. After the great job this monster did in their debut, and with all other factors considered, this is an even worse case of squandered potential than Sou was. And I already said how I feel about that. -2/10. Hades: I'm rather disappointed in you. Had I known you'd be as inactive as you were, I'd have ditched the Mettaton NEO pitch, went with Baron Samedi like I initially planned, and done all the host monster work myself. Especially after Hades was one of the more well-received monsters in his year. I'd say it makes me sad, but I'm not sad. Just very disappointed. 1/10. Mettaton NEO: A weird case. Frankly, there was no way I'd be able to juggle myself, Mettaton, and Kurumi, so I shoved all the host work from Mettaton onto my main account so I wouldn't have to. Quite inactive, but still the flamboyantly fabulous ghost in the machine I played last year. Meh. 6/10 at best. And with all the monsters talked about, let's talk about the event itself. As with last year, I'm going to start this off with a story about the development of the Halloween Masquerade, which will double as a behind-the-scenes look at how this shit went down. In early September I DM'd Blake on Discord with a stupid pun because it fit with the Year of Rebirth that was announced as the theme for this year's events earlier in 2019. The conversation that ensued from that ended with me learning that nobody had actually thought of what to do for the event, but we both liked the idea of returning monsters. With Blake prepping for a big important move, I was put in charge of creating this year's Halloween Masquerade with about a month and a half to do it. I later added the undeath theme for new monsters after being given the Event Planner role a couple days later, to which I said: "This is just an idea I've only loosely toyed with the notion of here and there, but an alternative approach that keeps the monster hunt intact while still keeping in the "Year of Revival" theme and also being appropriately Halloween-y, would be to theme the monsters around undeath. This has the added benefit of allowing some rather good monsters (Hades, Achmed the Dead Terrorist, Shiki, to name a few) to reprise their role if they really want to, and is a lot more open-ended than last year's entertainment theme. There are far more vampires, liches, gods of death/undeath, etc, than there are actors or singers. I'd like to think of something else to put into the Masquerade this year, but it may just as easily be the case that it'd be best to keep things simple for this year's event." At some point, I later changed the event rules so that instead of being forced like last year's entertainer theme, the undeath/recurring monster themes were simply encouraged, after getting some input from CowCow. In doing so, I learned that last year's forced theme was a much bigger part in Halloween 2018's failure than I thought, as this year's monsters were having a great time. As the event drew closer, I got the okay from Torm to allow point rewards and Blake's advice to keep them modest, and the final details for Halloween 2019 were set in stone, eventually followed by my posting the event thread as Mettaton to officially get things started. And frankly, I feel like the work paid off! My only goal for this year was to have a fun Masquerade that was better than last year's flop, and in that regard, the event was very much a success! The monsters had fun, and the people had fun, and although the event wasn't perfect, I was able to learn things from its shortcomings. Overall, an event that accomplished everything I was hoping it would accomplish. I'm quite relieved, since this was the first Masquerade I was in charge of, as well as the first one on the new website, so I wanted this to succeed more than anything else. Enough so that I even threw my usual RP hobbies to the side to keep an eye on this event. Final Score: 7/10. Good job, everybody!

Greetings mortals, to the surprise of no one, I was Bakura. It was fun going back to watching the English dub of YGO to get a feel for him before the event. I thought the Dark Sanctuary idea was a fun one for a monster game though to be fair.

Well, here I am! The one and only Hyde playing as the one and only Lich Lord you love! With my late entrance, and lollygagging, I suppose you might have realized that I was indeed the Great Ainz Ooal Gown. (I conquered NCM by the by. Y'all didn't even win my little game :/)

>Saying Larry's game "kind of died" >as if it was ever really alive to begin with >greentext on the wrong website, idiot Like Larry said, I don't mind; yours kind of stole the spotlight anyway, so the fact that people engaged at all with some silly pictures I pulled off of Google is good enough for me.

Hihi cause clearly my opinion is important or something. Here I shall list my thoughts on the monsters of Halloween 2019. I usually would also rate based on difficulty but tbh none of them were really "hard" to figure out. Which isn't a bad thing! It's just a thing. Some of the best were some of the easiest. Also note that 7 and above I would consider quite good. Anyway.... Monsters Ainz Ooal Gown Box Ghost Dullahan Kurumi Ebisuzawa Larry the Cucumber Post-Crisis Carlos Segata Sanshiro Sou Hiyori Spooky Uncle Death Yami Bakura And now...Boss Monsters! Bram Stoker Ivan Ooze Pepsi Man Hosts and overall event. Mettaton Hades Overall

I'm no good at greetings... Qwerty? Greet one another with a kiss of love. Peace to all of you who are in Christ. -1 Peter 5:14 (NIV) I was Larry the Cucumber. Surprise! Except not a surprise, I'm sure, given that I play a similar character in the Yugioh Skies RP so I'm sure my fellow RPers figured it out right away. They're both Christians and they both get the long posts. It probably didn't take long. Yeah, basically the idea was, hey, I've got experience playing Christian characters, I was raised pretty hard as a Lutheran (up to and including, like, a decade of an Outdoorsy Bible-y Summer Camp (it wasn't an indoctrination. I'm fine. I'm fine)), and most importantly, I'm long-winded enough online to at least look like I know what I'm talking about when people inevitably ask "the tough questions" in the inevitable Larry AMA. And all that worked! And what didn't (specifically: the game thread and maybe the second half of "Rescuing Larry"), I can pretty easily identify where it happened and if anything needs fixed for next time. But I had a lot of fun finding silly things and answering questions and wondering if vegetables have souls (they don't, according to Veggietales' creators. Weak Source But Still A Source Larry wouldn't lie about that) and generally being cheery and upbeat. It was difficult when schoolwork got in the way but I tried to keep myself to one status post, one update to the game thread, and one Miscellaneous post a day. As long as I did that (and managed to keep my AMA running when people asked something), I'd be fine. I probably could have interacted with other monsters more. Sorry about that! Those that were posting seemed like they were doing pretty great. So about those specifics: The game thread was kind of cobbled together at the last minute, like "Oh, I have all these points and nothing to use them on, what do?" so the fact that people engaged at all was gratifying to me. I'm not going to promise that I'll try harder in that regard next time, but everyone else did a lot of things that I'll take into consideration. By the way, the last day didn't get an image (it was probably going to be the "Allow us to introduce ourselves" template) because I was... otherwise engaged. I didn't mean for Larry to get posessed. I was brainstorming status ideas and remembered that Cowcow had given Larry the Necronomicon, and I figured I'd engage with that. People seemed to respond pretty well, so I did a follow-up that night which blossomed into the first Miscellaneous post a few hours later (I may be blurring the timeline a bit but :shrug emoji:). That also got a good response and I noticed Kurumi engaging with it, so Yui and I got together on Discord to form the cryptograms. I think it overall went pretty well, though I did have to laugh when Mr Spaz commented something like "I was raised Catholic and I like cryptograms." My only weakness! There was an engagement dropoff in the final meta-puzzle, which I'm not super sure how I could have handled better. The first hints, in retrospect, were probably kind of garbage, but the last one also felt too obvious? If there's anything I'd like feedback on, it's probably that. A couple final remarks. First: I see this, and I agree with you. If you want my opinion, there should probably be a rule against using Zalgo in post titles? Like, not in the bodies of posts, but I can see how it could get out of hand if more people did it. Second, because I insist on citing sources for these things, the first cryptogram was Matthew 6:9-13 (NIV), the second was Luke 4:34-35 (NIV), and the last was Psalm 23:4 (NIV). Larry's first "posessed" post came from Caleb's dying speech at the climax of The VVitch (written and directed by Robert Eggers), and his second was, as pointed out, most of the final paragraph from Thomas De Quincy's Levana and Our Ladies of Sorrow, which you can read here if you're curious. It's not too long. Anyway, I've probably rambled on long enough. Glad you all seemed to enjoy it, and if you didn't, well, I still love you.

Yeah I did start not doing as much near the middle of the event, and even at the end despite my attempts at not fading away into nothingness. Kinda the same problem I had last year, although obviously not as bad. Next time I'll try not to fall off!

Makyura the Mild Destructor DARK Level 4 [Warrior/Effect] 1600/1200 During the turn this card was sent to the GY, you can activate Traps from your hand. Also, this turn, cards drawn or added to your hand by the effect of a Trap must remain revealed this turn. Traps revealed this way cannot be activated from your hand by this effect. - - - - - - - We know that Makyura's original effect leads to infinite loops. Yet the easy and mostly universal answer of adding a hard OPT clause to it is way too tame to make the card playable for the most part (unless you are going for one of those Fusion Gate plays I guess). So here I offer the idea that you can do it so long as your Legacy of Yatas, Jar of Greeds, and Reckless Greed plays cannot lead into drawing extras for usage right away.

And the real person behind Post-Crisis Carlos is... Me. Wasn't really sure how I would pull this one off, but it was just something I thought of, chuckled at, and was like "alright, this should be interesting" and just went with. In the end, I guess I could've done something a bit more... I dunno, upbeat? Fun? More involved? *shrugs* Either way, it was pretty fun to do, albeit a bit dark and depressing, but eh. Overall, pretty fun Masquerade this year. Good job to those involved, including staff.

Hai hai, Kurumi de~su! ...I'm never doing that again. Anyway yeah, I was Kurumi, likely to the surprise of absolutely nobody who has had any meaningful interaction with me ever. Honestly, playing her was pretty tough since there's a lot of shit that goes on in the Gakkou Gurashi manga and I wasn't sure what to take from early parts and later parts. I'd totally suggest reading it though! It's good stuff! My favorite monster was Uncle Death at first, but Larry has since taken that spot. More on this a bit later when I post my annual monster reviews thread.

It's me - Uncle Death! This event has been a blast, good work all round. I hope you all enjoyed my performance! I'm looking forward to looking at the reviews that people tend to do. Also so glad I got everyone on my second try - maybe next time I can get first ?

I was Segata, but really. Is anyone surprised by that? I'll admit that my performance was lackluster at best and I'm not gonna make any excuses for it (but the ad with Uncle Death was fun to write). All I can do is promise to do better next year. As for my favorite, it was Uncle Death at the start, but after a while, I grew a soft spot for Kurumi. I don't know. I just liked her better.

And the day is coming to its end. It's been a blast; you're all radical dudes! ... You know, I was going to do something awful here You see, I've been running out of... subjects, for Senpai to run around with in the Tower of Barbs. The actual one, not the Tower of Barbs 2: Origins And hey, I figured there were many bodies around, so... ... Well, I decided against it. You're all too radical to die! Especially @radio414 And everyone else that gave my silly little game a run. You might not have gotten any points, but you do have my undying respect for putting up with my shit! ... Honestly, I'd love to say that I will be coming back But I have no idea if I will or not! Hell, I don't even know how I got here I thought I was playing a game the whole time, but then it turned out I was just here. Whoops! But its ok, I found a way back home. And, wouldn't you know it, it's the same subway where I did that commercial with @Segata Sanshiro! How convenient! ... I've never been good with goodbyes. ... I think I have an hour on this phone thing before I lose all connection. But this is basically goodbye. Catch y'all on the flip side, bros!

Team Showdown - Temple of Time and Space Taiga was panting, trying her best not to show it. Instead, she wore her big toothy grin. She watched as the others were being dragged off of the stage. Her confusion had since left. Now she could actually think straight. She'd taken some damage in that last fight though, and it was starting to show. "Good, good!" The king said, draining his goblet and holding it out for a servant to get them more. "You're very impressive! But you're not done yet! I want to see more!" "Oh yeah!? Then why don't you get your ugly mug in the ring. You can see real close that way! Fufufufu..." Taiga's frustration was starting to seethe through her calm wrestling persona. However, two more opponents entered the ring, prompting her to spit at the ground. These two looked like they had some pretty thick skulls on them. They looked tougher than the last, that was for sure. When the second one entered, the first had shot off at Isole with blinding speed, crashing his head into her. "Isole!" Taiga turned around to see her attacker swing around with a mighty tail. "You aren't all that tough, are you?" The other made her head forcefully snap around. She grit her teeth, knowing she had to attack. "I'm gonna save Isole. You deal with the lug!" Taiga ran towards the other opponent, sliding on a trail of water under her feet. She then bent closer to the ground, jutting her heel out in an attempt to sweep the Dragon off of his feet. "Get up Isole! We can take this guy together!" While Taiga had knocked her opponent down, she didn't expect his tail to sweep her up as well. She crashed to the ground alongside him. "Why you!" Taiga's jaws became icicles, as she went to chomp on the appendage causing the two so much trouble. However, the Gijinka had reared his head back, and slammed his forehead into hers. The force was enough to stun her for a second, as she rolled away from the sheer impact. She staggered as she got back to her feet, her head throbbing. "If that leaves a mark...you're double dead you asshole." She chomped on each word. "Isole, a little assistance?" Taiga pleaded, as she clasped her hands together above her head. A giant pillar of water erupted from them like a sword, the top of the geyser sending small droplets of water down to the ground. "Right, right." Isole said, as she got to her feet. The opponent then took a deep breath, before charging Taiga. Isole then sent a swirling blizzard from behind them, as the attack reached all the way to Taiga. It stung a bit, but the freezing winds were enough to turn Taiga's geyser into a tall pillar of ice, frozen to Taiga's wrists. She smiled at her charger, letting of a smug retort. "Let's see how hard that skull really is!" Taiga roared, as she brought down the giant ice-sword down onto the dragon. The tower of ice crashed down on him, sending him straight to the mat. Taiga smiled, but was bewildered when the opponent launched themselves towards Taiga, headfirst. "Apparently it's pretty har-" Taiga was interrupted as the attack crashed right into her abdomen, knocking the wind out of her. Turns out, getting all frosty due to the blizzard had made her a tad lethargic. However, with the hard-head within biting range, Taiga's fangs became encased in ice once more, as she brought her jaws down upon the Rampardos' shoulder.

Got my copy of Pokemon Shield pre-ordered. According to Amazon it should be here on the day of release. Feels good to not be the poor kid who's months-years behind on every release anymore.

I like the concept and intent. IMO with the 2nd effect you can get away with either adding the monster to the hand, or SSing it. The latter would allow for combos with their effects and further reward you for running vanillas of matching typings.

I like this one! A more balanced Makyura so to speak but can still enable many shenanigans. Revealing the added and drawn cards is a good call for disabling the use of Traps you get after activating this effect. Was thinking an effect that only let you activate Traps currently in your hand would be more compact text-wise but it's prone to misplays, cheating, etc. You could improve it by reducing its ATK by at least 100 so it gets more support by becoming searchable by Sangan, Tomato, etc. and you want to send it to GY so the ATK matters less anyway, but it doesn't really need the change. Also I find amusing how the effect doesn't activate so it should be able to go off when you search it with Isolde, taking advantage of its Warrior Type, and get it in the GY later in the same turn.

Raijin shot out of his bed as the loud screaming filled the room. "WHAT THE FUCK?" He shouted, falling out of his bed. "Why?" He grumbled, struggling to kick off the sheets on him. Clearly annoyed, he eventually managed to pick himself up, rubbing his eyes as he let out a loud yawn. He made his way towards the bathroom, leaving the sheets on the ground as he got himself ready. He seemed oblivious to anything else in the room at the moment - the only thing in his mind was how pissed he was. He was having a good dream for once too. Eventually, he made his way towards where the rest of the people. Despite having taken a bit of time to get ready, he still looked like he had just gotten out of bed. From what he gathered, he was being sent to Hearthhome with a group while the other group was going to Tubro City. The other three girls of his group started chatting about the mission while Raijin simply sat there, scratching the side of his head. This was a good assemble of teammate to have - two of them had personal investment in Hearthhome, and the other one was Kiyoko. This was going to be an easy ride, where he wouldn't have to do much. Perfect. Right on queue, Kiyoko spoke up to answer Octavia's doubts. Raijin crossed his arms. "Hell, if we're lucky this Dread Knight guy is probably already hunting down our cult." He said, placing his hands behind his head as he slouched down more in his chair. "I mean, if they're causing a ruckus he should be on their case, right?"

"I am supposed to undergo this procedure, right?" Florence looked at Kansuke blankly. "You were the one who told me...weren't you? Well, we're here now, so why don't you lie down and we can stick this thing inside of you." The nurse looked at the two with concern. "Could someone explain what's happening? Are you sick?" She approached Kansuke. "Did something happen that is affecting your short term memory perhaps?" Kelsey smirked at the unusual interaction with the stranger. Her smirk grew even more as both of them answered her in such a series manner. It was clear the woman was just off her rocker. Usually those types you wanted to avoid but since these two had already engaged she figured she'd just stand back and watch. Though she made sure to keep near Stella just in case. Though it seemed that there wasn't much to worry about. The woman stared at the two of them with wide eyes. "Paaapeeeeer!" She moaned, and her mouth foamed up and she collapsed to the ground, fainting. An employee seemed to notice the ruckus and came over. Sighing he reached for what looked like a push broom. "Sorry about that folks she does that from time to time. Come on, boss, it's time for your nap." He said and started to push the woman along the ground with the broom. "Sooo....did anyone expect to see this when we decided on a lovely little trip to the store?" She laughed and nudged Stella. "Nice lesson teach, maybe you should be teaching our class instead of being a student." She then nodded at Vivian. "Isn't your planet made of trees? You'd think there'd be more paper there." As Sammi wandered aimlessly she would come across a young boy looking around with a nervous expression. "H-h-hey you're the one...one of the ones...who left by foot e-earlier right?" He said, stumbling over his words. "U-um, are you lost? I'm kind of...kind of lost too. Some other guys told me to f-find something for them but I don't know where it is. T-they said that the s-security officer had it but I don't know where...sorry. I shouldn't bother you. Sorry!" She winced and looked down, as though expecting to get yelled at. "Truth be told, I thought it might've been for your roommate, since ya know...a lot of people don't seem to like him all that much." The girl looked at him with a baffled look. "You think that one of the most popular teen actors is disliked...in a school full of teens?" She started to say something further but held back. "If you must know, though, this was probably set up by his fans." "By the way, I didn't introduce myself earlier. Chase Weller, mecha pilot as well as designer of mech...well, soon to be official designer of mech. For now it's just sketches and notes." "A designer, I see..." She paused in her cleaning then sighed. "My name is Aya Tolah. As with most I'm here to be a pilot...You're not attempting to start a 'relationship' are you?" She said it with a strange accent, as though unsure if she was saying the proper word. "Because I am not interested. I am only here to learn." "But, as for the sleeping spirit of this planet? It means that it is settled. That the world itself is in no danger, and that it has no rivals for space. For us? It means that this is a safe place to build and to live. It also means that we are unlikely to receive intercession from this greater spirit, which is why my tribe would never settle in such a place." For a moment Xa'tok would notice a troubled expression on the boy's face. But it soon faded as he focused in on what the shaman had asked. "How did you recognize what tribe I am from? You are the first hornless one to do so." He gave a warm smile. "Ah, that's simple. My people had some run ins with yours from time to time. It's to be expected. Space may seem vast but really there are only so many places to go. I myself never met them but I have heard descriptions. I suppose you could say I'm pretty good at picking up on things like that." He hesitated. "About this spirit. What do you think would happen if someone were to wake it up?"

Stella couldn't help but pout as Kelsey poked fun at her enthusiasm on the pens, saying, "it's important to always have a good idea what all of your resources are. But," the girl looked away sheepishly and said, "we can also stop by a candy shop on the way back." To punctuate it, the girl gave the supplies she was holding to Kelsey before beginning to look more in the shop. Her spree was cut short, however, as another girl had run up and started to rant about how amazing it was that there was paper here. As Vivian also seemed to be in awe, Stella walked up to the two and cleared her throat. "Well, you see ever since the age of space exploration began paper has been of a difficult resource to come across. In fact, from what I've read, tablets were already on the upswing and paper itself was just being seen as a relic and was slowly getting phased out. Of course, this didn't last long and people started to realize how important paper was. Studies show that people retain more knowledge writing down something on paper then just typing it into a tablet. And even more so there's a practicality part of it to explorers and businesses and the like. After all, tablets don't really work that well in planets with limited to no readily available electricity and - well, in fact, I think it was a case of where a few people got into a ship crash and got stranded for weeks on end that they realized the importance of - " as Stella continued to rant about this topic she realized that she was starting to get off topic and simply cleared her throat again, clearly flustered by this. "Well, um, anyhow. Getting a steady supply of paper has always been an issue but in the past century there's been movements to reinstate and standardize the use of paper again. People have thought up of all kinds of solutions but the most successful one that has just started to come into being in the past two decades is the creation of paper tree farm space colonies." Looking to the others, the girls she said, "giant artificial green house stations that grow trees for the express purpose of having them turned to paper." Gesturing around, the girl said, "this is the closest we've gotten to reinstating paper into the standardized universe and Clips here has been very vocal about their support of spreading paper across the universe. And they sell it for cheap too!" With a stern and passionate look Stella waved her finger saying, "so it's doubly important that we buy from here to show our support for the cause as well!" Walking closer to the rather strange girl who had brought this up, Stella seemed much calmer as she said, "oh and um, yes using it like a stylus on a tablet to write with is generally correct. You'll want to make sure to account for how much more force you'll need when you need to press down on the paper, as it won't just slide around with ease like it would on a tablet. As with all things it might not come out correctly on your first try, but keep trying and I'm sure you'll understand how wonderful it is to write on paper too."