Folks are saying that? A has been consistent actually, before the game released I replayed both books.They didn’t really change much. Eh, In my defense, I enjoy a difficult romances as long as it’s entertaining, I’m a skank for em, sue me.
It’s just the rinse and repeat everyone been talking about that irks me. Wayhaven is character driven, we’re driving to a location, not putting the damn car in reverse.
how is his way of playing better than the content…Urgh. 
Yep, a good way to sum up my issues with it!
Because when we play his characters, we go off script. In a huge way. Adding in character thoughts, etc. And it makes it hilariously fun.
And his F-mancer has now given Farah the pet name of “mistress”. And still doesn’t recognize his own nickname of Sparky (“Who the fuck is Sparky??”). We’re gonna play more tonight, and I can’t wait to see Sparky meet the agency chamber. That should be awesome.
Honestly? Considering that the entirety of the M3 progress is the result of their bakery outburst, it might be just what M needs.
Do you think the bakery incident is what triggered M’s progress? I hadn’t thought about it from that angle.
I figure, with M, everything is instinct, so they just go with whatever they feel like doing. The bakery thing had them questioning their own motives, but they quickly dismissed that and the MC showing up interrupted it, anyway.
As far as F goes, every time F opens their mouth about the M/MC thing, M gets pissed off and shuts off their thoughts about the MC. Pushing M doesn’t work. That’s why A’s bff route had a happier, more open M with regard to the MC. Whereas the F bff route had M rolling their eyes, giving a small smile and shoving it down so they could join F. F is not a help for M and the MC… they’re a hindrance.
Unrelated, but I’m replaying M’s route from book 1 because I want to change some things and I have to say one of my favorite scenes about them in book 2 is that one where MC has to exit the office for reasons cough love interest shenanigans cough and M is like: I have to lean against this piece of furniture as sexily as possible to entice MC or else.
I had completely forgotten about it and now I’m sdfhjs M you stupid, stupid bastard I love you so much (bonus points if you pick the genuine reaction and they go uhhh wait no I uhh)
Edit: Regarding M’s progress in B3, I always saw it as something instinctive and organic rather than the consequence of a vibe check.
Like I’m sure a friendly comment helps, but among all the ROs M is the most fuck it we ball out of everyone. They do things because they want to, voicing their thoughts even when it could go against the majority (even if they care about Unit Bravo and are loyal to a cause when it comes to A.)
I do. I have a bit of free time right now, so here’s my half-depth analysis of that scene, plus the apology scene, which is indisociable from it.
The Detective’s behaviour hasn’t been an especially novel experience for M. Plenty of in-world people are into M. Some of them, no doubt, would be interested in a relationship before sex. Caught feelings AFTER you had sex? That’s just Alima all over again (Alima is particularly important for this, we’ll get to that in a jiffy). And we know vampires change biologically as time passes, so it would not be beyond possibility that their senses mellowing out when the Detective is around is just a manifestation of that.
BUT
When M says that your relationship is just about sex, while being absolutely tactless (among the Bravos, tact is an N-exclusive), it’s also not an unreasonable stance. “This is just about sex” is what M has been telling you since all the way back in B1. Internal POV scenes aside, “just about sex” is, indeed, what the Detective has signed up for (or refused to sign up for, as the case may be). M is, basically, telling the truth (sort of, you know what I mean). The game emphasises it here:
Alternatively, I’ve put waaaaaaay too much thought into this. 
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk. 
*not related to this discussion, but bonus points for M for not checking you out until the very end of the apology scene, and checking on you instead
Except unwanted feelings. I’m picturing him and A doing their damnest to not be attracted to each other and that stupid soul bond getting in the way. It’s hilarious. And kinda tragic.
(I’m also picturing the whole series as a romantic farce, but eh.)
I can enjoy a love triangle in a 19th century setting where the MC is in love with someone but is forced to marry someone else (who is a colossal jerk)… is that a love triangle? …anyway, it’s not what’s happening here, so that’s irrelevat.
This is more a “rescue the damsel” thing than a “true” love triangle (presuming the colossal jerk isn’t actually also in love with the vertix, and if they’re consistently a colossal jerk to them, they’re not).
But a very thought-provoking response, so well worth it. My response got long, too, lol. Big freaking surprise…
Right, and I’ve never taken issue with that. What I have taken issue with in M’s route is the A-mini-me crap, where M says one thing and behaves in a completely contradictory way. But I hadn’t thought of the bakery scene from the frame of reference you’re using here…
Dezh didn’t get that scene (the thought of her asking “what does this mean for us” is side-rippingly hilarious, even if she really wants to know!), but she understood the apology to be “sorry I bitchslapped you verbally in public, but we really are just fuckbuddies” so it still works.
I hadn’t really thought about that. I think I got it in my head that M treated the MC just like every other team member, just one they’re fucking or want to fuck, but that isn’t necessarily true. M knew saying that to F would cause them pain, but they did it to defend the MC (which I wrote off because they do it in the bff route, too). And with N, they say what they did without thinking, and back off if the MC points it out.
So, basically, M metaphorically touched a hot iron in the bakery scene. They hurt the MC and, in turn, it hurt M. Going forward, they don’t “touch the hot iron” and have instinctively learned not to do stuff they know will hurt the MC, even if it’s “typical” behavior for them.
Instinct guides their actions and, once they stop doing/saying things they have learned will hurt the MC, all that’s left is their instinct to be close to the MC, help them, make things better for them. Where they hit a wall is when they get into things that are so antithetical to their past behavior that they don’t consider the reasoning for it (like sleeping most of the night with the MC), just that, “huh, that’s different”.
From that perspective, another “fuckup” is entirely possible and, in fact, probable without backtracking from what happened in b3. If M encounters a situation that is new to them, and they don’t bother to consider whether their actions/words will hurt the MC, then they’ll go with what they’ve always done. Metaphorically, M knows not to touch a hot iron, but certainly a hot stove isn’t the same thing, right? And this bear trap over here doesn’t look too harmful…
In essence, if this is how it’s gonna go, they’re learning as they go along how to be in an actual relationship without realizing they’re in an actual relationship until they finally do the math. And M sucks at math.
Better than that was M being able to be in the shower with a naked MC without one innuendo or thought about their own discomfort. That scene was so damned good it brought tears to my eyes.
Thanks for the Ted talk, @JBento. It was a good one!
Sera actually said in an ask that M may start understand feelings quicker on one bff route, because that bff doesn’t push. After playing, it’s obvious that it’s A to whom she was referring, and I’d actually love it if the bff helps determine the speed at which M gets it. It would be very fitting.
I try not to, but sometimes I just stumble into one by complete accident. 
I need an AU version of that scene to find out if they still apologise if it’s anybody else pointing it out, or if they’re apologising for I-upset-N-and-that-upset-you.
M: It’s not like the Detective is a bear, anyway
Detective: Fuuuuuuuuuuuck, my legggggggg!
M: Crap
Indeed. I just pointed out the wet pyjamas scene because we can compare their reaction in it to the other Bravos’.
What I really want to see is M’s POV in the “Rebecca doesn’t go” path when the MC gets captured. I need to see that freakout. Someone on Sera’s tumblr should request that for patreon.
I’m wondering if being forced to deal with Alima may be the bear trap. Some M-mancers may not care if it’s just a discussion, but if it’s something more, it may affect all MCs.
Valid point. Even A was trying to hide their, uhh, excitement over it. While M is just like, “You’re gonna catch a cold. Go change clothes.”
Dezh: what
I can’t find it right now, but there’s an ask that, well, that might as well have been written by you (maybe it was?), where someone tells Sera they don’t like it when the unromanced ROs see other people, and since she had said that in the non-M routes M continues to, ahem, “see other people”, how in your face that would be. Sera answered that she didn’t like it either, so it wouldn’t actually pop up (exact wording eludes me).
Considering that, I highly doubt it that anything physical will happen between M and Alima (or anyone other than the Detective) when you’re in their actual route.
This is why we’re in this route and loving it.
That was, indeed, me. I’m full of questions, lol. But I can no longer send any to her tumblr, so… I’m hoping someone else hits them.
I didn’t mean M would do something with Alima. I rather meant that Alima will do or say something that M brushes off in M’s eye-rolling way but that only serves to upset to the MC, and M doesn’t realize it until it’s too late. Prompting another, “I didn’t mean it like that!” scene.
Yep, I swear b3!M was exactly what I had imagined for a M romance. All too perfect.
And I have now been in a meeting for over four hours without a break. Someone kill me…
I imagined already some scenario between Alina and M that would cause issues 
Alima asks M about MC - like are dating or something.
M trying being “smart” tells her MC is just fuckbuddy so Alima won’t bother Mc or whatever.
Of course MC overhears it or Alima tells them. And boom, another argument!
Apparently there’s a snippet where Alina is involved and she’s super jealous of MC?
My only hope is that we’ll get the chance to either speak up or try to deescalate things, whichever the reader prefers, because if the only canonical route is going to be her being jealous and you suffering through drama because of it I’ll have to prepare myself mentally starting now. I can dig some drama, but jealousy subplots are not my thing…
You’d be surprised of the stuff my research on romance books would want to make you believe. (Or maybe you wouldn’t, I don’t know how well read you are. In any event, 75% of it is either boring or gross. Or both.)
I technically CAN send them, but I already sent two and none of them got answered, so, y’know, same difference. XD
You got a preferred method, or is it a seller’s choice kind of thing?
The Christmas special from 2021. And yeah, Alima is super jealous.
I know it wouldn’t happen because Alima is apparently a favorite of Mishka’s, but I’d love for Alima to go full-on “boil your bunny” Fatal Attraction, with her ire directed at the MC. That’d be a fucking blast.
Pretty much. Given how many asks she gets, and how many are repeated questions (that you see a lot on her tumblr, actually), it’s no wonder a lot of them fall by the wayside.
That’s like, if I could find one of the $50 tier patrons, I’d give them twice that to get them to get her to do a scenario for me. But they hide like roaches in the walls.
As long as it’s quick, take your pick. Otherwise, I’m dying by slow torture today. Meeting is still going on…
At this point I’m going to have to agree, cause as much as I don’t want to go there it would be more fun to read than her simply throwing nasty looks at you from the sidelines. Also the fact that she might be a favorite is extra oh no on my end because then I guess it means she’s sticking around? Will her plotline drag along multiple books or…? Much to think about
