Happy Birthday, TPmanW! I hope you have a suitably excellent one.

It's been pretty good. Going back to work today after two weeks off, which had been very nice. We took a little trip to visit friends in Germany.

We are also preparing for my twins' sixth birthday on Friday, so that's something.

Also, I just realized that I don't think I have mentioned here (and apologies if I have) that we're having another kid! If all goes to plan, my son will be born this winter.

So yeah,a lot of good stuff. There is of course plenty of things that are not so good, but I want to focus on the positive right now.

Congratulations! It seems so crazy to me that your twins are almost six. Time seems to go by so quickly for me these days. I know I'm the resident old man around here, but it really doesn't seem like long ago when you first told us about them.

I know that, ultimately, we're all a bunch of strangers on the Internet, but I really do consider you folks friends, and for what it's worth, I am really happy for you, Aaarrrgh!

Congratz, man! It's awesome to hear such good news :3

Thanks! I hope you had an excellent my birthday too.


Oh, wow the time does fly. I heard kids make it go faster and that seems to be true. It really doesn't seem like it's been 6 years. Congrats, man.


But now it's time for my true purpose in coming here. Bad anime names.
I have a real thing for old anime. Anime from a time when mangakas had to rely on the English they remember from high school. A time when there was no expectation that their products would ever leave Japan. A time when international distributors just had their nephews handle translation because "He spends his summers with his mother in Japan". A time when executives were terrified American audiences wouldn't understand what a rice ball was. I don't actually know anything about this time in anime, but I am in love with the idea of it.
So now I challenge you all to pick out the one name below that is not a fake anime name I made up because I thought it sounded ridiculous. Weirdly, the one genuine name isn't even from an anime- I already used up Jacuzzi Splot.

• Vinny The Mood
• Hanny Cowbird
• Cuba Frylunch
• Yeets Bigly
• Skinny Crimes
• Kettle Blackman

Feel free to discuss. Good day and good luck.

Ha! I was indeed drawn to the right answer, but the one just below had such a nice ring to it, a bit like a Jojo character (reading Giorno's part was a fkin trip, being italian ) Tho I'd argue that after that introduction using a source so distant from the japanese media for the real answer is a bit misleading y'know

Yeah, I need to brush up on my cheesey anime.

So, I was struck by a piece of minor inspiration for a character, but he's more a framing device for snippets and notes that let's me do silly things with creature types. Now that I think about it, kind of like a flavor text character.
Huh...

Anyways, I thought up a Planeswalker card for him and I'm curious how resonant the concept can be as a top down design to see if anyone can guess.

Essant Quint, Dishonored Biomagus
Planeswalker - Quint
: Sacrifice a creature, then create a number of blood tokens equal to that creature's mana cost.
: Sacrifice a blood token and put a +1/+1 counter on target creature you control. Proliferate.
: Sacrifice a blood token and create a token copy of a creature from target player's graveyard, except it is a chimera in addition to its other types.

Obviously, there is not a lot to go on here, but I like the idea well enough. My first impression is that of a cross between a Ravnican Simic and an Innistrad Stitcher, which is an interesting if frightening sort of soup. There is some potential overlap here with Isaac Charles Carmine, Tevish's mad scientist character, but I think the areas of focus and interest are a bit different.

Yeah, nobody beats Jojo for weird names. Dragonball had a "Sorbet" too, but they weren't in a relationship with a Gelato. And presumably "Sorbet" is just a made-up word in the world of Dragonball, whereas in Italy... yeah.

Here's a list of mostly fake anime names that share a religious theme. This time, 2 of them are real.

• Xristos Godlaw
• Benjamin Amen
• Chrollo Lucilfer
• Mephisto Judges
• Hercule Satan
• Lincolm Tabernacle II

There are no spelling mistakes. That's just how these names are spelled.

Well, I wouldn't be averse to experimental pieces based on a series of flavor snippets from cards

The card I like a lot. I also get the stitcher feel from it, I love proliferate in general and blood tokens look like a great flavor mechanic to lean on... (before them, the Clues could also have been an option, and not just because they come from Innistrad) I have no idea about the card being balanced, not having played with blood tokens which are the limitation for the final, table-turning ability (which I appreciate not being an ultimate requiring 3+ turns to grind for)

So all in all, there are a lot of things for me to like, but I wouldn't have any idea to balance it

Okay, good info to have, thanks Raven & Huey.
It seems like the top down design did strike around the area I was working conceptually. Hewing closely to space evocative of Dr. Moreua, though less focused on the humanity and more the perfection of biology or hybridization purely for the speculative sciences. (Though the story I've now a third written does kind of give lie to that).

One of the ideas I did want to avoid was leaning too heavily into the Simic wheelhouse, so the fact the stitcher aspect comes through is good.

Beyond that, choosing the colors was a tricky wicket for a moment, because green does care so much about Apex predation and evolution, but it made him too reminiscent of the Simic and nothing in the magic offered was anything that I felt actually helped
His actual magic portfolio is in Sangromancy (rb), Flesh crafting (ub), and Cloning (u). That last I'm actually surprisingly happy with.

The card is maybe a little weak since it's dependent on having outside resources, but I do think it's potentially fairly balanced.

Once again, but not for the last time,
Which of these objects-as-names is really from an anime?

• Rev Pedal
• Helm Compass
• Silky Hemskirt
• Rod Trigger
• Lucky Roulette

Hehe, got it this time! I'd never had guessed the other one you mention, though

Which of these sexy-sih names did I not make up right now on the spot? Trick question! I wrote them all out beforehand. One however, is not of my own invention.

• Passion Lip
• Spanky Bliss
• Pricey Friday
• Suzy Cute

The rest of y'all feel free to join in if you want.

Passionlip (all one word) is the sister-clone of Meltryllis and King Protea. 2 others, but they aren't all that popular.

The Sandman is such a great adaptation it's kinda unreal, wtf. If anybody needed any recommendation to watch it, here's one

Nice, I figured it would've been pretty hard to adapt so I stayed clear.

I second this motion. Just finished it a few days ago, and loved every moment of it (well, I looked away from a few scenes because I'm sensitive). An absolutely stunning adaptation of one of the greatest pieces of fiction I've ever experienced.

Hmm, I might be more of a Gaiman fanboy than I realized.

I was skeptical as well at first, but once I gave it a chance I absolutely loved it. There are tweaks, of course, warranted by the medium change as well as the times (Dream gets free three decades later) and DC IP, but for every nitpick I had there were at least as many things I feel improve the overall narrative. I can go more in-depth, if you want