Tsukumogami, specifically karakase obake.
First appeared in UFO (#12, 2009), other notable appearances in TD, WaHH, and SFW.
Official Profiles:
https://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Strange_Creators_of_Outer_World/Who%27s_Who_of_Humans_%26_Youkai_in_Gensokyo/Kogasa_Tatara
https://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Symposium_of_Post-mysticism/Kogasa_Tatara

Just want to chime in and show support for this thread.

That said, I don't particularly have many thoughts on Kogasa. She's a very GeGeGe no Kitaro kind of goofy youkai who's very 'pure' in the sense that she does exactly what you'd expect: try to spook humies because 'that's just what you do'. Yeah, there's the technical connection with blacksmithing because ippon-datara, but I feel like that's such an incidental and minor aspect of her character as to not especially matter; it's relevant for a single chapter in Wild and Horned Hermit. Really, I just think of her as a bit character and wouldn't go out of my way to focus on her.

But, dunno, I guess people who are more opinionated can say more and maybe I'll accordingly have more thoughts.

Kogasa's interesting. Just about everything about her would imply she's just a pity magnet- abandoned as an object, terrible at doing the thing she needs to do to eat, half of her relevant appearances are her showing up to try and be helpful and then getting beaten up, and she's working multiple jobs just to try and make ends meet.

But despite all that, she's not a downer in the slightest. She might run off crying, but she'll always be back with a big umbrella grin the next time she shows up. It's charming. She's not too troubled with her life at the moment, and being a fairly weak tsukumogami not tied to any faction opens her up for a lot of potential character exchanges, which is always a big one. She's pathetic, but only kitten-pathetic, not worm-pathetic.


Also, she seems to think Byakuren has a secret network of assassins, which is great no matter how you spin that situation.

I've always had a soft spot for Kogasa. She's depressed by her inability to scare people but still seems to keep at it and even seems to be a skilled blacksmith as shown in her chapter in WaHH. Being abandoned, failing to achieve her original purpose, cycling between unsuccessful jobs, coping with depression, and still trying to carry on living and develop another skill in the meanwhile... Truly, she is just like me frfr, no cap.

I'm not sure what kind of relationships she has with other characters. I see some fanart depicting her as friends or acquaintances with Sekibanki and sometimes the grassroots trio as well, though I don't recall any canon basis for it. Regardless, I think she would get along with them.

I'm not sure if anyone from the Myouren temple has any particular relationship with her. Byakuren might have mentioned something in symposium about Kogasa's presence, but I don't feel like hunting for that right now. I'm not sure if there's much connection beyond her appearance in TD.

The idea of Mamizou hanging out with Kogasa is interesting to me. I guess the relationship I imagine occurring between them is pretty similar to the one Mamizou has with Kosuzu. Mamizou also seems to make use of baby tsukumogami, so maybe her relationship with Kogasa would follow that dynamic.

The relationships I think mostly about involve other tsukumogami. I feel like tsukumogami have a different relationship to humanity than other youkai, perhaps as a result of them originating directly from human tools. Medicine was abandoned and hates humanity, Raiko was treated well and holds no ill-will, and Kokoro seeks a human audience but otherwise doesn't seem to care. Benben and Yatsuhashi... I think they mostly follow Raiko's vision of tsukumogami living independently.

Compared to the above, I think Kogasa is unique in her desire to, well, not quite 'fit in' with humans, but at least coexist in a relatively benign way for a youkai. In a certain way, I think she seeks some kind of validation from humans, whether that is through startling them or being useful to them. I wonder how Raiko would think of this. Would she see Kogasa's desires as unbecoming, and argue that Kogasa should exist for her own sake?

I'm not sure of what the day to day aspects of Kogasa's life are like. I think some people have depicted her as having a forge in the village proper, though I'm not sure if that is necessarily the case. I do like the idea of Kogasa being one of the few characters in touhou with gainful employment (being someone's pet and/or retainer doesn't count). From her official descriptions, it seems like she's been active in the human village or immediate vicinity, and the villagers only see her as a nuisance instead of a threat.

I don't think Kogasa could live clandestinely among villagers like shapeshifting foxes or sekibanki, as she doesn't strike me as careful enough to avoid blowing her cover. In general, I imagine it would be difficult to pass as human if you have to constantly lug around your object body as well, and Kogasa's purple umbrella must be pretty easy to identify even without the tongue.

I haven't made serious use of her in my previous stories despite my fondness for her. She showed up for a scene in Lost Bees. I think more about using her in my idea of a story for Medicine Melancholy. Maybe it would make more narrative sense for Medicine to be taken in by a fellow tsukumogami than a human. Kogasa would certainly have to develop her childcare skills in a hurry.

Overall, I think she's a pretty versatile character who could fit into a lot of stories. She's got some emotional complexity, she has a history of trying to interact with the village with varying success, and she seems to have enough spontaneity that she could end up in all sorts of situations. She seems like a fun enough character to use as a writer.

Apart from Unchanging days by Kiz, I can't recall any stories that prominently feature her. A quick search of the story list returns a number of them, so I think I'll report back after reading some.

>>17158
>stories prominently featuring Kogasa
Well, it died fairly quickly and is... well, a touch fanon, but there is If You Spook the Buddha a story I sort of helped write

I tried re-reading it and didn't think it held up very well, but that's to be expected when you've been around long enough for your tastes to have changed drastically.

>>17158
>She's depressed by her inability to scare people
I don't remember any real depictions of this. Her SoPM entry basically says she gets disheartened by people not being scared, but that's more in the sense of a disappointed child sulking than an existential statement, I feel. Granted, I guess you could extrapolate that from her need to fit a singular 'purpose'.

>Myouren Temple
She hangs out in the graveyard, something that the residents may be aware of; at least, I'm pretty sure her presence was acknowledged by Byakuren or someone in Detective Satori. Whether that extends to any acquaintance with anyone is still unclear, but I personally doubt it; I think she probably just hangs around like some nuisance of neighbourhood kid.

>Mamizou
In all honesty, I doubt Mamizou would have the time for someone like Kogasa. She mostly hangs around 'noteable' people — especially if she can get something out of them. Sure, you've got the tsukumogami angle, mostly from Forbidden Scrollery, but I still think it's kind of a stretch. I guess, personally, it would take a pretty compelling reason for me to buy it.

>village forge
Pretty sure that's not the case, otherwise I think it probably would have been remarked on at this point. Blacksmithing is, again, something that's only been relevant to her as a character once.

>other characters
I guess you could connect them somehow, given all named are very minor presences, so their connection or lack of connection to anyone isn't of much concern to ZUN. Overall, tsukumogami seem to me to be very heterogeneous and unlikely to relate that much to each other; they're generally fixated on their particular 'purpose', so that seems like it would probably preclude taking much interest in that of others.

I don't know about Sekibanki. She's active somewhere in/around the village, but who knows if she would even interact with someone like Kogasa. There's so little to go off of that anything is an extrapolation.

>use in stories
At the end of the day, I don't think she'd ever be more than an incidental presence if I wrote her into anything. It's easy to project a lot of pathos onto her, but it doesn't do that much for me.

I once had an idea that Kogasa's cheerful nature is a result of her growing tired of her failures in scaring others, considering that is basically her bread and butter. And as far as I can remember, fear (or emotions in general) is Youkai's main source of food. Kogasa isn't just depressed, she's dead hungry. So her deliberately pitiful (and cute) attempt in "scaring" people is done fully intentional by her, in an attempt to find other alternative emotions for fear, like pity.

>>17162
That's pretty interesting. I must confess that I haven't read much into the 'fear ecology' of youkai in touhou, mostly because I wasn't that interested in the conflicts it could create for the stories I was interested in writing. Thinking about what you said, though, I feel like if it was viable for youkai to switch to different emotions to sustain themselves, there might be less reason to create gensokyo. Then again, maybe the problem with the outside world isn't that youkai aren't feared, but that they simply aren't thought of at all, and you can't get nutrition from nothing at all.

>>17161
Yeah, there's a lot that I and other fans have extrapolated from what little has been shown. As far as I know, she hasn't been shown to have any significant relationship with any other character. In SFW, for example, I find it difficult to read much familiarity in Minamitsu's interaction with Kogasa. Maybe she's someone whom many people know in passing but doesn't have many friends.

The 'depression' part may also be an exaggeration. Personally, I imagine that she gets sad or cries easily, but doesn't really hit depression or despair.

Not sure if I should trip or not for threads like this. Whatever.

I have read Kogasa's character as being outright clinically depressed. It's a stretch to go that far, I know, and it's likely headcannon to that extent, but there are quite a few points that make Kogasa a very odd individual in the series.

First and foremost, she's a character with the very singular goal to surprise humans. Akyuu seems to misspeak that all tsukumogami in general exist to do this in SoPM even though we know about more tsukumogami that act differently, as mentioned in previous posts here, but Kogasa has a genuine standing reason for the assertion. Her ability is listed as 'being able to surprise humans,' so we can safely assume it's an important part of her character. We hear that she's unable to do this with any success at all, though. Village adults think she's a nuisance and kids like her. Akyuu straight up calls her attempts child's play. In WaHH's chapter 27 we see Reimu, Marisa, and even Kasen hardly consider her worth their time.

Secondly, Kogasa took up attributes of a different Youkai altogether, to which characters think she's an idiot for. She's not an Ippon-datara, let's be clear on that. Akyuu makes note that she stuck on parts to her umbrella to make it closer resemble the smithing Youkai, and she can smith, but she doesn't do anything else that this other Youkai does, as mentioned in previous posts as well. It's a strange thing to me that people in universe choose to not take her word at face value, since there's nothing to say it can't be true, and so it only calls more attention to the fact that she might be lying entirely.

It's all so disparate that she can't do her only goal in life and even chooses to run around with extra character traits that don't do anything to add to her ability. I've seen plenty of doujin works run the idea that she does add to her ability by being an excellent jack of all trades, usually copping the line 'wow, you can do this?' But that all feels so odd, as if sidestepping some kind of underlying issue. That's why I've read her character as having some kind of existential issue, which would in turn cause some level of psychological impairment.

I'm sure it's easy enough to counterpoint much of what I've said, but I wanted to give some establishment on the pity party Youkai.

>>17162
>>17163
Unless I've missed a direct statement somewhere on the matter, I'm doubtful it works like that. That is: it's not that youkai have to be feared (or what have you) to 'eat'. They 'are obliged to' 'attack' humans in order to assert their existence; consider, though, that a statement is made in passing by... I want to say Mamizou in Lotus Eaters that some youkai don't even care all that much about that. What it amounts to is that 'the rules' say that youkai have to 'attack' humans, and humans have to 'exterminate' youkai. It's a relationship that is established and has to maintained on at least some pro-forma level, because it's a cute way of justifying why the games are the way they are. But, well, 'the rules' don't seem like metaphysical absolutes by any stretch of the imagination, regardless of the whole load of blah-blah-blah that's often said about the Hakurei Barrier, Gensokyo, and so on.

I mean, don't get me wrong, interpret it however you want in your work. I'm just saying there's not that strong of an imperative link between youkai and particular emotions.

I don't really have much in the way of ideas when it comes to Kogasa. To me, she's just a generic minor youkai without any real relationships to other characters, locations, or groups and with nothing particularly unique about her abilities or noteworthy about her characterization. I agree with others regarding the incidental nature of the ippon-datara angle and how it doesn't really seem particularly relevant and more-or-less one-off.

I suppose she's okay in a role where you have to have a youkai and it doesn't really matter which one it is. In that sense, she's like, say, a grassroots member. Arguably cuter, depending on your preferences, but that doesn't do much for me. As others have said, not the kind of character that would get noticed by other characters or that they would have much reason to interact with her, for better or worse; when she peddled her needles to Reimu, the latter just acted as she usually does with youkai, finding her a nuisance and was lucky she wasn't beaten up; if she became too noticeable at the village she'd probably become a target of extermination.

Kinda hard to say how Kogasa could be more interesting. She's too goofy to really lend that much pathos to her situation without being ham-fisted. The easy route would be some kind of comedic story, but I don't care for that sort of thing myself. Most people's idea of comedy is not for me.

I guess something like a light-hearted exploration of Kogasa incidentally being a friend to humans and unintentionally helping people in the village would be funny, perhaps with a side of running afoul of more influential figures. Otherwise, I got nothin'.

Yeah, Kogasa is really a "So what?" character for me. While I've seen a comic relief depiction of her I've enjoyed (playing up her inability to scare kids), as a serious character, I'm not really sure what you'd do with her. To exasperate the problem, she has pretty much nothing in terms of meaningful connections. Her "relationships" section on the touhou wiki is almost empty, with the only non-minor connection being... a neutral relationship with Myouren temple. Outside of the one blacksmithing chapter in WaHH, pretty much the only thing I've seen her do (in canon) is be a random encounter for a protagonist to quickly smack down.

If I did want to use Kogasa in a story... well, the easy way out would be the comic relief route, as I mentioned before. Her cheerfulness and general ineffectiveness could also make her a potential cute-bait moe character, if you play up the friendliness and life being unfairly mean to poor Kogasa.

For a more serious take, you could look at the one blacksmithing chapter; how does her repairing Reimu's needles affect her reputation among local youkai? (Or perhaps her offering to work on Youmu's swords or Sakuya's knives could be a quick short.) Alternatively, a story about Kogasa trying to fit in as a youkai could be meaningful. Her defined role as a youkai seems significantly weaker than most, which means that her trying to "find herself" by trying to fit in among various groups, whether Myouren Temple or the Grassroots Youkai Network could be an interesting prompt.

Ultimately, the trouble with using Kogasa is that she really doesn't bring much to the table to use. She's cheerful, she's bad at scaring people, she can be a blacksmith, and that's it. Her ability is "scaring people", which she is canonically bad at. She has no meaningful established relationships to build off of. What role in a story does she fill that can't be filled just as easily (and perhaps more naturally) by someone else? This is made worse by the fact that the "not-really scary but good-natured and cute low powered youkai" role has plenty of competition in Gensokyo. Rumia, Cirno, Mystia, Wriggle, the three fairies of light, Chen, Kyouko, and I'm sure there's a few more in the newer games as well. Many of these are more popular than poor Kogasa, and have other points of interest, such as useful abilities, or connections to other characters that could draw them into plots.

Which is all to say, sure, you could use Kogasa in a story. And as a random encounter or comic relief, it's not that hard to do. But I think to use her in a more major role, you'd have to set out to write something with Kogasa. As such, I'm not surprised that the forgotten umbrella is largely forgotten from a writing standpoint as well. Despite her wanting to be taken seriously and wanting to be useful, in the vast majority of plots, she just isn't.

>>17154
>consider new ways to write them
Reading over this thread, I feel like this is something getting lost in the mix here, but it's kind of understandable.

A lot of people don't seem to have strong feelings about Kogasa or much in the way of thoughts that diverge from presented information. That makes it a little hard to consider new perspectives. So, maybe OP can provide some examples of what he means? Otherwise, I think we're probably all just going to reiterate a lot of the same points.

To be clear, I like the idea of being a sort of think tank of Touhou stuff while keeping things free of fandom cruft. But it's hard for people to spontaneously develop new trains of thought, I think.

Just remembered the story about Kogasa finding her life purpose and its really good too, not from thp though.
The Right Tools For The Job by freshlybakedspiderbread.
Here's the AO3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43380529/chapters/109049695

>>17171
The kind of thinking I want to encourage is that even if someone doesn't currently have any ideas for how to use a character, they would be willing to consider ways to make them interesting even if that entails taking a lot of creative liberties. To be clear, while I do have a fondness for Kogasa as a character, but I'm not interested in trying to market her as a waifu or something. I like just about every touhou character. She's the current example because some character needed to be the first one.

So what if Kogasa seems one-note and there's only so far you can extrapolate based on the brief glimpses you get in the games or the comics? That's going to be true for the majority of touhou characters. I think we should extrapolate because this is a fan fiction community and worrying too much about canon compliance leaves too little conceptual space to explore. As for personal interest, I believe that dismissing a character is wasting their potential.

>>17168
>>17170
>She's cheerful, she's bad at scaring people, she can be a blacksmith, and that's it.
>the "not-really scary but good-natured and cute low powered youkai" role has plenty of competition
I think that's enough information to get a basic idea of her character. Cheerful, bad at scaring, blacksmithing, various other bits of info like the brief babysitting stint - those are ingredients that you can use in various ways. Do you think she dwells on her failures? Is she oblivious, resigned, or delusional? Why does it matter that there are other youkai who are broadly similar? Does it make sense to lump all the 'powerful and ambitious incident-causers' together and treat them as interchangeable? So there's no conclusive evidence to show that she has significant relationships with other characters; do you think she has nobody at all to talk to, or are you willing to entertain the idea that she might hang out with someone 'offscreen'?

>>/shorts/res/1971
Kogasa is mischievous but compassionate and reasonably clever.
>>/shrine/res/41060
Kogasa is somewhat airheaded but also good-natured.
https://archiveofourown.org/works/2183565
Kogasa is the titular crybaby but takes a look at her desire to be helpful.

Each story takes more or less the same basic elements of Kogasa and travels in different directions with them. Their writers used her as a main character because they felt like there was something worth exploring with her. These are not generic plots that you could keep intelligible with a one to one substitution for some random character. In any case, a character doesn't need to be powerful or important to gensokyo itself to tell a good story.

>>17165
I think that's an interesting thing to read in her character. I don't personally remember doujins depicting what you describe, but I think I can understand the sort of sidestep you mention. The depression angle is a common reading, but I mostly see it used for pity as per >>17157 and >>17157. When it's brought up, it's quickly resolved or made the butt of a joke, and you don't get to see the writer's idea of how she actually manages it. Maybe it's because many writers aren't willing or able to depict mental issues in that way, or maybe because authentic depression is frequently difficult to depict in an interesting way to most audiences.

I think it would also be a good idea going forward to link to any story, comic, drawing, or other art of the character being discussed that inspires you or demonstrates a point.

I'll pick a new character for discussion on Friday. The current method I have in mind is randomly picking a windows era game (decimal games get added to the most recent mainline), then randomly picking a character who appeared for the first time in it. I'm not sure yet how to include characters like Akyuu or Kosuzu who only appear in print works but I figure it's not important right now. I'm also excluding characters like koakuma, daiyousei, and kisume who have extremely little information to work with.

>>17174
>>/shorts/1971
>>/shrine/41060
Fixed your links.

>worrying too much about canon compliance
For me, it's not about compliance with literal textual matter. It's about feeling like Touhou, which is a hard thing to define, and it's a line that's easy to stray out of because it's so vague. And it's hard to know how to stay in those lines without ultimately trying to understand everything that's there and the greater context. It's different to obsessing over 'lore' like some people do, but sometimes it's just as unwieldy and difficult to work around.

>failures
I don't think she does for very long. She wouldn't be as persistent a presence as she is if she did, I think. Whether that's a product of obliviousness or just Polyanna thinking, I have no clue. If she was delusional, what would she even be delusional about? Being scarier than she is? Being stronger? More important? I guess, if I'm entertaining that line, then it's probably more a matter of her being like an overgrown child; all of her shenanigans are as much play as asserting her raison d'être.

>hanging out
No idea here. It's a pretty broad space of possibility. She could be almost anywhere, bugging anyone and everyone. Or maybe she truly is alone most of the time. In a writing context, it'd depend on the story being told.

>handling mental health in writing
As someone who suffers from poor mental health, as both a reader and a writer, I prefer not to encounter/address it as an element of stories because, frankly, why do I need yet another reminder of my daily reality? Besides that, do youkai even work that way? I guess it's possible, but it's just as possible that they don't. But that's almost getting into issues of meta-physics, which I don't care to engage with.

>>17176
You address very good points (especially the last one).
Expanding on that last point, I would argue that Touhou as a series is a way for us to escape reality itself (that is why we create fanworks to begin with).
Of course, this isn't really my idea to begin with (Check out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZSIirBfCs4).
But overall, I would argue that stories involving depression aren't written that much as it invokes the "destruction" of immersion (as small as it may be) since it is a real-world issue that can be easily related to in real life.
(No person is perpetually happy; there will be points where they may be shocked, depressed, angry, etc.
However, no person is perpetually sad; there will be points where they may be joyful, tranquil, excited, etc.)

>>17177
I don't really know about any of that. Speaking for myself, I don't 'immerse' in anything I read, so I don't care about 'breaking immersion'. It's more about not trusting others to not be twee or insultingly caricatured in their treatment of mental illness; I've never encountered any attempts at such, but I also don't go out of my way to find them.

Also, just as an aside, depression (in the clinical sense) isn't about being 'sad'. It's often as much about feeling nothing as feeling anything. It's an inability to engage with anything. It's an inability to perceive anything as being worthwhile. It's a feeling of merely 'existing' when you could be doing much more than that. That people conflate that with sadness is an error that is rather irritating to people who suffer from depression.

So, you know, I generally feel the premise of Kogasa being 'depressed' is probably beside the point. It could be the case, but so many other things could be the case at the same time.

Some generic questions I'm thinking about using going forward:
- What do you consider to be the character's defining traits? What do you think the character's personality, thought processes, and interests are?
- What depictions of the character in stories, drawings, or comics have you enjoyed, and what about the work made it stand out to you?
- How do you imagine the character's presence in Gensokyo in terms of relationships with other characters and lifestyle? What do you think their niche is?
- What situations do you think would be interesting for the character to be in? What conflicts do you think they are likely to encounter? What kind of roles could they serve in a story? How might they accept change or resist it?

In general, try to think about what about the character that strikes your fancy, with less emphasis on what canon describes them as being and more on what you think they might possibly be. If you haven't already given them much consideration, pleaes try doing a little of that now. Try to find something about them that evokes some emotion besides apathy. Note that these questions aren't mandatory to answer, but merely intended to promote thinking that could lead to new ideas for using the character in a story. I'm not your high school literature teacher, just another writer.

Rolling 1d15 => 2

>>17181
The next character will be from PCB/IaMP.

Rolling 1d9 => 3
1: Letty Whiterock
2: Chen
3: Alice Margatroid
4: Prismriver Sisters
5: Youmu Konpaku
6: Yuyuko Saigyouji
7: Ran Yakumo
8: Yukari Yakumo
9: Suika Ibuki

Prisimriver sisters have been consolidated into one entry. Lily White has been excluded.

Ayy, it's the girl. Chen is a fun one, and strangely not one we see often. She's described in PMiSS as being a very typical Youkai, enjoying scaring people and highly independent in her activities.

What I enjoy, though, is the utility she can serve as a general purpose miscreant, but I don't often see it. I mean, she's a menacing cat Youkai for crying out loud, why does she not get used as a trouble maker?

I know the answer to that is the fandom has coveted the cutesy Chen that Ran is smitten with, but it still feels silly that she gets pegged as a needy child while what can be read from her articles is a very independent Youkai asserting themselves and attempting to further their power. Not that she'll ever really be able to make a cat her shikigami.

>>17184
Psst, Chen was 2. The dice rolled a 3, so it's Alice this time.

Magician, known to reside in the Forest of Magic.
First appeared in PCB (#2, 2003) and had notable appearances in IaMP, IN, SWR, SA, and Hisouten.
Official Profiles:
https://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Perfect_Memento_in_Strict_Sense/Alice_Margatroid
https://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Strange_Creators_of_Outer_World/Who%27s_Who_of_Humans_%26_Youkai_in_Gensokyo/Alice_Margatroid

I imagine Alice to be meticulous, fussy, polite, and studious. Her use of dolls makes me think that she painstakingly handcrafts them or has some kind of fine-tuned process for manufacturing them, both of which imply a lot f attention to detail. She also seems like the sort to keep her home and work space well organized. She feels more like a 'proper' magician than Marisa but is also more approachable than Patchouli. She seems to be well known and tolerated by the human villagers, and offers hospitality and guidance to lost people similarly to Mokou. I picture her as being willing to help lost travelers and traveling across Gensokyo to collect interesting items or expand her knowledge, but also likes to immerse herself in research at home. Overall, I think she's a pretty well-adjusted person by Gensokyo's standards. She might prefer spending time with her dolls to dealing with other people and their idiosyncrasies, but I don't think she's necessarily bad at it.

Stopping for now due to brainpain but will continue later.

I'm going to take a shortcut to typing out my thoughts on Alice all over again and simply point to somewhere where I already have:

https://www.alicemargatroid.moe/

I'll get back to you later about depictions I've enjoyed and the other, more specific, things not covered there. The image I'm posting is one that I enjoy, I think she's confident about her puppetry and her more playful side comes out when she's showing off. It's true in fights, though in a different way, and likely true in the village performances she puts on. Here in the image ... I guess ... it feels more like a one-on-one kind of thing, a rare circumstance for her to display her flair and virtuosity.

What I notice first about Alice is probably what most notice first: her dolls. They make up the majority of her interest in things, though perhaps not to the exclusion of everything else, as with some magicians like Patchouli. At the same time, it is certainly something of a (I'll continually recycle this word because I like it) raison d'être for her, something that she clearly spends a great deal of time on. After all, when the majority of her magic seems to be based around manipulating dolls, is she just going to magically produce more dolls? I doubt it. Really, when you consider how she does things like eating and sleeping despite not strictly needing to, that points to the sort of personality that likes to do things the 'hard' way. To me, the idea that she spends a lot of her time in her workshop, carefully crafting each doll by hand, seems pretty sound. And it was probably something she enjoyed for a long time before abandoning humanity; I'm pretty sure the 'unnatural' part of her interest in dolls — and her character in general — is the degree of fixation, the willingness to exert (notionally) unlimited effort and focus on them. This is, of course, because magicians are basically ZUN's stand-in for otaku, a thing he made a fair bit of commentary on, directly and indirectly, earlier in the life of the Touhou Project.

Not to linger on the point too long, but I suppose it is interesting to consider that it's difficult to talk about Alice and not include some degree of comparison to other magicians. Whereas others like Marisa, Patchouli, and Byakuren are dedicated to magic that largely has a 'function' or is otherwise meant to emphasise the 'supernatural/superhuman/esoteric' element, Alice's own magic is largely based on a sense of the artistic. She wants to show off her skill in manipulating her dolls to mimic life. There's even her once-stated goal of creating an autonomous doll, though that's never been explored further as far as official works go. Even when it comes to combat, she prefer employing her dolls at significant risk to herself and even holds back so as not to engage in brutish displays of overwhelming force — or so she claims. Taking that for what it is, it's hard not to think of Alice as someone who has an appreciation for aesthetics. I mean, look at her outfit. Look at the lace, the ribbon, all the little details. If she were simply focused on the mundane and functional, she would look much more plain, I think. Which isn't to say that I take her for vain or overly obsessed with notions of 'beauty', but I do think she has a certain ability, perhaps more than many others in Gensokyo, to look at and perceive the effort and craft put into things done with a purpose. She can probably look at a house, a chisel, a basket, a plate... anything imaginable that was made by someone's hands and have a sense of its maker's skill, pride, and dedication (or lack thereof). Perhaps she really enjoys art, too. Perhaps she curls up with a book and really digests it, taking in any intricacies of prose. Perhaps she stares at drawings or paintings and finds herself drawn into the various details. Perhaps, even, she looks at a Japanese tea bowl and sees the natural world reflected in its imperfections.

As far as where Alice is situated in Gensokyo, I think she's not anyone particularly influential or likely to lend gravitas to a situation. She's certainly no hermit-like presence, cloistering herself away from the mundane concerns of life outside her immediate sphere of influence or interest, considering she's not unknown to go out to perform puppet shows in the village, but she doesn't strike me as especially likely to go out of her way to be present anywhere. I take her as the sort to enjoy living a quiet life engaged in doing what she loves, not wanting to be bothered much by anyone. Which isn't to say she's necessarily aloof, just that I'm not certain she would do much more than keep a pleasant, polite distance from people she doesn't take a particular interest in, never especially trying to interact with anyone more than necessary. Whether that would be due to an inherent introversion or perhaps a sense of maintaining a mystique, or any other notion of the sort, would be an interesting exercise for a writer, I suppose.

I suppose one particular bit of opinion to inject here is that I don't think Miss Margatroid has any particularly strong ties to other magicians; I also think magicians are, in general, not drawn to others and most likely, continuing the otaku allegory, bound to stick to their own particular fields of interest, not viewing each other as 'peers' or 'competitors' especially. She has had interactions with Marisa, but none of them are that friendly, and it's clear that she generally views the witchlet as a nuisance. I don't recall any actual interactions with other magicians, but I get the feeling she wouldn't really be drawn to them. Perhaps even the opposite. I think it's likely she would give the others a wide berth, or at the very least she might be cautious around them, not wanting to stray onto the topic of magic lest she ends up trapped in a conversation on something she has utterly no knowledge of. And, really, I think that's the bane of all magicians, but I think Alice would certainly hate to be perceived as dull or lacking a certain refinement, both of character and knowledge.

As to how she might be used in a story or particular situations of interest, I'm not very sure. Alice is certainly the type of character who could be present most places in Gensokyo, but I can't say off-hand what 'role' she might serve. A story that focuses on her as the principle character is very difficult for me to conceive, so I guess my instinctive answer is that she's largely a 'side' character, someone who comes in for a part of a story to support it. Beyond that, I'd need a lot more time to really consider it, and perhaps more exposure to some other people's opinions.

I haven't come across many stories prominently featuring Alice, and I honestly feel like the tendency among many writers is to depict Alice as either a madwoman or a lazy tsundere archetype, usually with a side of being romantically (or otherwise) obsessed with Marisa. Honestly, the only stand-out portrayal to me is, to the surprise of those who know, the resident Alice expert Teruyo's depiction in Theater of Youth (>>/others/44424); I'm afraid I haven't read DEFT yet, so I can't speak to that one. Despite the notional 'alternate universe' conceit of the setting, the Alice that appears in that story just feels like Alice. She doesn't take shit from anyone, especially from the main character, but she's also a caring figure in her own way, steady and levelheaded, always present despite having been snubbed in many ways, yet not without her own depth of feeling. She doesn't always completely speak her mind, but she somehow still comes off as direct when she needs to be. There's a level of human warmth there that's sorely missing from other portrayals I've seen whilst also retaining some of the mystique and strangeness of her more 'inhuman' side.

>>17189
>to the surprise of those who know
Pfft. Figures I'd screw up and say the opposite of what I meant.

That should be:
>to the surprise of no one in the know

Also, I guess the cross-board link didn't work because it's an archived story? Well, whatever, have the full link below. Seriously, read it.

https://www.thp.moe/others/res/44424.html

You know, despite having actually written Alice, I feel like I never truly got a good grasp of her character at the time. On the surface, she's got something of a stilted formality going. While she's not unfriendly, exactly, she's not really sociable either. She has serious power of her own, but plays to her opponents' level when fighting. She's at home when by herself and surrounded by her dolls, but put her anywhere else, and she doesn't quite fit.

It reminds me somewhat of Orianna from League of Legends (and wouldn't that be quite the crossover?) in that there's an uncanny valley aspect to Alice. In some ways she's the closest to human a youkai can get: A formerly-human magician who still looks human, is friendly with humans, and still eats and sleeps as humans do. But at the same time, that similarity makes the unsettling side of her (semi-autonomous dolls, doll army) that much worse. It doesn't really affect any of Gensokyo's major characters (given that they've all faced and seen much worse), but I could see this throwing minor characters and humans for a loop. This was used to spectacular effect with Duke's overnight stay in Alice's house in "A Wizard is You".

Really though, not quite fitting in is a good summary of Alice's status in Gensokyo, as there's not really any larger group she can be said to belong to. And honestly, I don't think that bothers her. Her behavior pattern strikes me as that of an introvert with a passion, hers being her dolls and her magic. She's not unwilling to associate with others, and goes through the correct motions to be polite and sociable, when need be, but at the same time, that's not really what she wants to do. It's an obligation that she will meet because there's such a thing as good manners, but she doesn't seek other people out and is perfectly fine on her own. A quiet evening with her dolls and a spellbook is how she would prefer to spend her time, and something that would actually recharge her after a busy day.

This would be the difference between her character and Satori's to me. Both act aloof, both treat the majority of people with polite disinterest. But while Satori (or at least, my Satori) is being cautious due to her experience, fearful of being burned, and secretly (on a level she can barely even admit to herself) desiring that closeness... Alice honestly just isn't interested. Sure, it's great that you want to spend time with her, but if she applies the runes from this spellbook to Shanghai's danmaku deflection array, it'll let her absorb an additional 3% of the energy from amulet-type bullets! Oh, sorry, did you want some more tea?

I think this is part of why Marisa and Alice as friends makes so much sense. Marisa might not be focused on dolls, but she's interested in any magic she comes across, whether she can steal it or not. That's close enough to be a common shared interest, and Marisa is also friendly and outspoken enough to bulldoze through any introversion or awkwardness. And the thing about people who are passionate about one specific topic is that if you share that interest with them, if you agree it's important and are willing to talk about it at length with them, it makes you fun to be around, someone who gets it. If you can actually make relevant contributions of your own to the discussion, (something that Marisa is more than qualified to do w.r.t. magic), that makes you someone to treasure. I think Alice being friends with Patchouli would make sense for much the same reason, though the double-introvert combination makes it less likely for the two to interact frequently.

But for your average person, the combination of not-the-best social skills, a bit of weirdness, and a passion where most people simply won't get it would make it hard for them to relate to Alice. To be clear, I wouldn't write her as autistic or anything, I think she can hold standard conversations perfectly fine, but I don't think her heart would be in it. The vast majority of people might be perfectly nice in their own way, but they're really just... not that interesting. Not worth her time. And Alice doesn't strike me as the type to fake interest in things, let alone fake it convincingly.

But that's okay. More than just making peace with being alone, I think Alice outright chose it. Nothing's stopping her from just living in the human village if she wished, but she has a cottage in the Forest of Magic instead. And while some of that is certainly convenience for doll experiments (and perhaps magical supplies), I think Alice is also self-sufficient in a way that most people simply aren't. I'm not sure if she'd be my first pick for "Character best equipped to deal with being completely isolated for a century", but she's probably in the top five. She might not fit in all that well in any other group, but she also created her own place that fits her like a glove.

As an aside, I wish I'd done this exercise before I'd started to write Alice. I feel like I understand what I want to do with the character much better now than I did back when I actually wrote her. Admittedly, the characterization isn't that different from what I actually did, but I think I could have highlighted it a little better.

>>17189
I've thought a little on it, and I suppose there's a couple of strands of matter that might make for interesting stories involving Alice.

This was already touched on in some fashion by >>17188 on their fan shrine, but the thing with Alice and the dream pills is something that seems very ripe for exploration. I don't necessarily mean exploring Alice's dreams as such, though that could also be interesting in its own way. Rather, I guess I'd personally like to see a look into the psychology of Alice and her retreat into fantasies with the help of the little pills. Why would she want them? Curiosity? Boredom? Ennui? An ever-present dissatisfaction with life? What would she have to be dissatisfied with? How would that colour her everyday? How would that seep into her work on her dolls? I think it raises a lot of questions from the very beginning that lead to others.

Slightly more superficial but still of interest to me is the fact that Alice sometimes lodges people at least for the night. I can't help wondering, what might Alice do if a one-night lodger became a long-term one? How would her life change? Would it change at all? How would she interact with them? How would they change because of her? How would she handle the inevitable degrees of friction that come with sharing a space with someone? And though it's easy for some to immediately jump to a romantic/sexual context for such a situation, I don't necessarily mean that; really, I don't mind it, but I also think it's a little... meh as a first-resort. I've no doubt it's ground that's been covered in some form elsewhere, but I'm not aware of anything of personal interest.

There's also just the very fertile ground of Alice's former humanity and the way she perceives the world as someone who abandoned it. What does that do to someone on a psychological and spiritual level? What does everyday life feel like to them? How do they really perceive things that were already familiar to them? How do they see things in a new way? What remains? What fades away? How about as time really goes on and things have changed greatly from what they knew before? I think these are things that can be explored even without getting into actual details of Alice's background and trying to 'square the circle' of everything regarding her past. Sure, that could be covered, too, but I'm not as interested in that, personally.

I don't really know, though. These are all kind of very broad, general sorts of thoughts. For anything more particular... I'm not sure I'd be able to come up with much. Perhaps with a great deal of time.

>>17188
I do just want to stop and remark that I love your little fan shrine and appreciate that you took the time to make it. It really takes me back to an earlier age, even if its intent wasn't necessarily nostalgia. Just seeing little independent websites like that outside of giant content silos always gives me a warm feeling, and this one is no exception. Keep being your fabulous Alice-loving self.

I think story with maternity as its central theme would really fit Alice. Her skills with her dolls might have been explained through her motive to be a good mother. Or perhaps the fan theory of her relationship with mama Shinki could be explored to make something profound.

One of my favourites fanfic as of now is Tradition's End, and coencidentally, the author also implemented this idea into Alice's character. Here's the AO3 link:
https://archiveofourown.org/works/47739919/chapters/120342058

>>17188 here, I was waiting to see what other people said and if there was any sort of debate before jumping in again. But I guess it’s almost Friday again and no one else is going to say anything, so I might as well jump back in.

I think that some of the assumptions and, indeed, the typical depictions of Alice with other characters are misguided at best. Like, for example, treating Marisa and Alice as friends is something of a stretch if you actually look at their interactions; they’re more like acquaintances. IN has a somewhat tense working relationship between them where Alice basically badgers and entices (with grimoires) Marisa to take an active role because the latter had previous experience with incidents, Alice didn’t, and no one else was doing anything about the imperishable night. Alice very much didn’t ask for a favor and their exchanges during the game isn’t exactly warm, veering towards contentious on occasion. And, well, IaMP’s dialogue between them in their scenarios reinforces that sort of distance between them. I wouldn’t say it’s outright hostile (and it is a fighting game, after all) but it isn’t the way friends would greet one another (contrast Marisa interacting with Reimu.) While it’s less antagonistic in SA, that whole scenario comes off as a sort of joke, with Marisa treating it like some sort of dungeon crawler and using video game jargon (… which is of a meta joke by ZUN in my opinion, since it’s unlikely that she spent any time playing Dragon Quest or whatever it, even charitably imagining that a famicom had found its way into Kourindou.) And those moments are really the only basis for their relationship, with the characters not really directly interacting in the various print works otherwise.

The link with Shinki is even more tenuous. PC-98 as a whole is suspect insofar canon is concerned. But, even putting that aside, there doesn’t seem to be any sort of reference made by either character to one another or the merest hint of a relationship. Which, perhaps a little noteworthy given that other characters (mainly Yumeko) do refer to Shinki and Alice appears again, in the extra stage.

All you can reasonably say about her relations with others is that she isn’t shy, talks to people no with no issue when either she wants something or they want something (would-be lodgers for a night, the fairies of light, Eirin(/Reisen?), Marisa, other characters in the fightan’), but there’s not much else as she lives an isolated existence in the forest of magic…. That and she can have a sharp tongue and be rather assertive on occasion.

As for depictions I’ve enjoyed: for the most part the stories I’ve seen on THP haven’t really captured what I feel her character is actually like. Most are outright bad, falling back onto tropes and very fandom meme takes. Some were okay, but their titles don’t come readily to mind as I read them years ago. It’s a shame, as I think she’s an interesting character and has a lot of potential, especially with regards to her magical interests, her affinity for artisan creation of dolls, sense of aesthetics, and her own mostly isolated life. It feels a little awkward to say, but I think the best depiction I’ve encountered on THP is one I wrote myself many years ago (and I have plenty of complaints about it too!) Feels a little gauche to recommend it unprompted, so I’ll leave that there for now.

Like all magicians, she’s a weirdo and I like it when artists and writers lean into that. Even when she’s being nice, playful or otherwise pleasant I think that some sort of tension—or perhaps distance would be a better term for it—between her and others. The attached image is sort of what I mean and makes me a little curious to find out what awaits if you hang out with her long enough.

>>17204
Lurker here. I appreciate and have read through all the posts but this really caught my eye.
>Like all magicians, she's a weirdo
>All magicians
Why do you say that? I can see the argument that Patchouli, Alice and even Sumireko are weirdos but others like Marisa and Byakuren are perfectly normal people. They go outside, have a life outside of their exclusive magical interest and in Byakuren's case, doesn't even use magic much beyond keeping herself young. I don't have an exhaustive list of touhou magicians off the top of my head but I'm pretty sure #notallmagicians.

>>17205

Marisa is a kleptomaniac, used to be an avid liar (Zun forgot at some point, lol), and chose to study magic on (most likely) her lonesome in the forest of magic since she was young. She's basically a couple of spells away from being a true magician by species, for which we could see her do those spells in an afternoon if she was so inclined (she made a botched Hourai elixir after IN with no guidance, which is pretty good for passing interest). She's a weirdo.

Byakuren is as much a Youkai as the rest of her staff, using magic to prolong her life and what she learned in Makai for combat. Both of those things are supposedly pretty bad in Buddhist teachings. She also turns out to be somewhat slothful and hypocritical to her own teachings if we take her dream self to reflect truths that she doesn't want to tell. She's also kind of a weirdo. And a cult leader, cause ain't no way she's teaching Buddhism to Youkai by the book.

And before you counterpoint Narumi, who is the latest magician we have (sans her identity as a Youkai of a Jizo statue), I actually don't have much. She stands out in the woods, I guess? She strikes me as kindly, but there's little to no evidence to make that claim. She's... alright, I guess.

Anyway, yeah, magicians are generally weirdos, even if they're not magic crazy.

>>17205 I'm the guy you replied to but >>17206 got most of it and would add that Marisa also is a pack rack and her home (which is also a "shop") is a mess. Plus, on a most basic level: she has dealings with youkai, which is pretty weird thing for a human.

Without further getting into Byakuren's inadequacies as a Buddhist (arguably doesn't *really* matter because some esoteric beliefs are pretty out there), she also hangs out with youkai. And, well, there's something fundamentally weird about operating a temple and maintaining a front for the sake for her own selfish desires and fear of death.

Magicians all seem to have a particular strange way of thinking and behaving and tend to be obsessive in their own distinct ways.

... Also, Sumireko isn't a magician.

Don't just lurk, say stuff more freely. That's the point of this thread.

>>17207
That particular work wouldn't happen to be Glass Half Empty, would it?

That aside, your post above does raise points that I hadn't considered before. For instance, the question mark about Reisen makes me wonder if there isn't some ground there for a story involving them interacting in some way. Maybe Alice would encounter her at Eientei when she's buying little dream pills. Maybe she'd be out in the village doing a puppet show and recognise the 'incognito' medicine peddler as a fellow youkai. Maybe they'd encounter each other at a function at the Hakurei Shrine. Maybe Alice would attend an exhibition — impurity optional — at Eientei? Considering Alice's relative range, there are actually a fair amount of opportunities for the two to meet, even incidentally.

In all honesty, I also wish people would explore Alice's weirdness and the sort of unbridgeable(?) distance that comes from someone like her. The images chosen for >>17188 and >>17204 are both pretty good in conveying some of that sense, the former giving her a look in her eyes that seems distant and inhuman, whilst the latter gives her an expression that seems inviting at first, or at the least neutral, but then the little smirk makes it harder to read, almost sinister in a way. They both activate my almonds.

I've picked out an image of my own. I'm not sure I've got much of a point with mine other than liking the vibe of it and generally getting the sense of a scene/story of Alice looking out into the forest on a rainy day or night in quiet contemplation.

>>17206
>Narumi
She's kind of a jerk-ass. She suggests to Rinnosuke that he ought to sell Sumireko as youkai feed in one of the earlier chapters of the new CoLA. All in response to having her cheek poked.

Understandable, of course. I wouldn't want to be touched by a terrible character, either.

>>17208
Yes, that's the story. Rather naughty to pierce my pseudo-anonymity using an unfair advantage of yours.

More to the point, would be nice to see more Alice written up outside basic takes. Though, I suppose, I feel that way about most of the cast.

>>17210
The only unfair advantage is my enthusiasm.

Sorry, though.

But, well, I do agree that I've not seen many who can capture that certain sharpness and assertiveness of Alice's. It's a damn shame, too, because it's more interesting than Alice being 'just' a magician or 'just' a weirdo. Though, honestly, few even capture her weirdness in a way that feels true. Your above point about magicians generally being obsessive rings very true, and it's a thing I don't think I've seen much in depictions of any of them, much less Alice.

I think this was a pretty good discussion of Alice. I got busy and couldn't say more myself, but I think everyone else was able to continue the discussion just fine. Let's keep up the good work.

Rolling 1d14 => 14
1: EoSD
2: PCB + IaMP
3: IN
4: PoFV
5: MoF + SWR
6: SA
7: UFO + Hisouten + DS + FW
8: TD + HM
9: DDC
10: LoLK + AoCF
11: HSiFS
12: WBaWC +SFW
13: UM
14: UDoALG

Unfinished Dream of All Living Ghost

Rolling 1d5 => 4

1: Son Biten
2: Enoko Mitsugashira
3: Chiyari Tenkajin
4: Hisami Yomotsu
5: Zanmu Nipaku

>>17217
Not sure there's going to be that much to say about any of the newesthus, but I guess we can try.

Incidentally, do you want us to get talking as soon as a new character is rolled, or should we wait until you make a header post like >>17186?

>>17219
I don't think it's necessary to wait for me. I do think it might be a good idea to reroll and exclude the newest game.

>>17220
I'd second the notion. Hisami is fairly one dimensional in her current portrayal. While not bad, necessarily, it does make it fairly open and shut for how much there is to unpack for this discussion. Were it a character such as Biten or Enoko I might feel different, though, but that's just me.

>>17220
I mean, I wasn't necessarily saying we shouldn't discuss Hisami; I think there's stuff to speculate on, as little time as the newest cast has had to breathe. Just... tempering expectations? I dunno.

But, well, if you wanna re-roll, go for it.

Up to you guys, but I'll admit I've got nothing to say on Hisami. I'd need to look up her wiki page to even remember who she is.

Rolling 1d13 => 3
1: EoSD
2: PCB + IaMP
3: IN
4: PoFV
5: MoF + SWR
6: SA
7: UFO + Hisouten + DS + FW
8: TD + HM
9: DDC
10: LoLK + AoCF
11: HSiFS
12: WBaWC +SFW
13: UM

Rolling 1d8 => 4
1: Wriggle Nightbug
2: Mystia Lorelei
3: Keine Kamishirasawa
4: Tewi Inaba
5: Reisen Udongein Inaba
6: Eirin Yagokoro
7: Kaguya Houraisan
8: Fujiwara no Mokou

Youkai rabbit, known to reside at Eientei in the Bamboo Forest.
First appeared in IN (2004) and had a notable appearance in PoFV. I guess PoFV was technically her 'real' appearance as a character in the games.

>>17217
I'll do my quick Hisami bit first: I think that ZUN would really need to focus on her as a character in order for us to really get anything out of her without taking some leaps of faith in regards to her characterization. She's obsessed with Zanmu, covets being punished by her, and when she's not busy doing that, she's convincing people to go to Hell with her by offering them Yu-Gi-Oh! cards or something. I can't see anyone writing a story that prominently features her unless it's very securely in her role as Zanmu's lackey, and therefore more of a Zanmu story that happens to also feature Hisami. I had to trawl AO3 to even find any fics with her, and obviously most of these were just yuri fics, with the only real exception being one where she tries to run a pyramid scheme pitch on a bunch of characters that, while fairly enjoyable to read, wasn't really doing much.

So, yeah. Not much to say on that front. She's the weakest of the UDoALG cast because she's a character who entirely revolves around another. I'd have rather talked about any of the others.

>>17225
As for Tewi, there's a lot more to say. She's a prankster character, and I think that a lot of people get caught up on that when they write her, resulting in her being little more than a prankster character. She's got a lot more depth that only really comes out in the printwork appearances and some of her PoFV dialogue, like how she runs that rabbit selling scheme to recruit more earth rabbits when their owners abandon them.

I've always thought that people try and push the Eientei lot into the same box as some of the other groups in the series of making them all close and friendly, but with Eientei specifically, all of their personalities seem to clash more. Reisen's generally quite a stiff character who follows Eirin's orders, making her conflict with Tewi's carefree playing. Eirin's a fairly serious character, but she trusts that Tewi has a reason for disappearing when she does in CiLR, and thinks that Tewi gives off the impression of a wise hermit who has achieved enlightenment.

I think that there's some merit in making her a bit sharper in the dialogue department and letting her be a more serious character than most writers consider doing. She knows a lot of things and she's seen a lot more, so even though she's carefree, she's always got thoughts about whatever is currently happening. I think she would have some more interesting perspectives on events. She is a reliable character, unless it's something she can push off on Reisen.

Essentially, I'd like people to play a bit smarter with Tewi. Have her be the carefree fun bun all you want, like when she tries to trick Marisa into giving her food at the Shrine and gets fed Devil's Trumpet, but don't forget that she can be a manipulator who's excellent at it until the final hurdle where she gets a little too into the game and gives it away, much like she does in her mythological origin. She greatly enjoys getting people off-balance, since Eirin points out in CiLR that Tewi has a habit of popping up behind people when they aren't expecting it, but she is always around when you really need her.

I think people tend to forget the other parts of her character and just use her for funny jokes a lot of the time.

>>17217
Hisami is a fairly flat character to talk about in isolation, but having a character that acts largely in response to another isn't an inherently bad thing.

The biggest thing I think that's worth looking into on her is the dissonance between her life with and without Zanmu. By what we have, her behaviour around other people without Zanmu in the picture is fairly well-adjusted, even quite kind. If I wanted to see a hisami story without Zanmu in it, it'd be about the souls she leads to hell, and her treatment of them.

But it's not a bad thing to have a character revolve around another. She's great as a foil to the mastermind Zanmu - the spanner in the works too much for her to fully control, and one she must instead work around, rather than work on.

Speaking of masterminds and manipulators...

>>17225

This feels... timely?

Tewi is a fun character, but like >>17227 says, there's more to her than just 'little prankster'. She's a leader in her own right, and she should get her own respect.

And while being just the consistent prankster is one thing in a 4koma or something, she can bring a lot to bear in a more serious story. She's got a herd of rabbits at her beck and call, she's clever, but she's not undefeatable.

Touhou has a bit of a trend of introducing manipulators in one game or story (tewi, tsukasa, Yachie) and then humbling them a bit in the next. Even Yukari goes from being this grand mastermind in th7, to trying to go the exact opposite direction to reimu and bickering with her the whole way (and when they were pointing opposite directions, Yukari's choice was even worse than reimu's). Tewi's example is in PoFV, where she goes off just to go flower-viewing and gets herself effectively poisoned

And... no trickster is invincible, or always has the right foot in proceedings. Tewi's prone to getting overeager on the prize, and I think that speaks to a certain arrogance that's very common in manipulators. Every manipulator does so by pulling on certain... handles, and character traits of their prey. The trick to getting around them is knowing which handles they use, and why they use them - the pull can go both ways, and a manipulator that THINKS they have you is one you have instead.

And obviously, in the story I've been writing, Tewi's tricks are a bit of a way to establish control. She manipulates and tricks continually, because it means she's the one in control.

>>17217
Not a lot to say about Hisami that everyone else hasn't said. I think it's a shame that she has a one-track personality. I think her ability might be interesting for a certain type of story like a manhunt. The "ability to never let anything slip from her grasp" would be a fun thing to write because the mechanics of the ability don't seem to be fleshed out, giving the writer more room to make it up.
>>17226
I'm really surprised with how many people characterise Tewi as a jerk on THP. I'd assume that because of her age, she'd be a lot more chill and calm compared to the rest of Eientei, especially Reisen whom I always saw as someone who gets worried and paranoid very easily. Not that I dislike those interpretations of the character, but to me it seems like Tewi acts like a jerk for the sake of it.
>>17229 provides a probable explanation for her troublemaking ways. However, if her pranks are just a means for her to think that she's in control, would that logic not work for less respectable characters like Seija? What makes Tewi's pranking acceptable but Seija's antics unacceptable?

Luck would be a good theme to discover revolving Tewi's overall concept. Put her under a situation that involves luck like gambling and make her preach her view about luck being something one can grasp or something. Idk i never really saw her as a serious character, especially in fanworks.
Regarding Hisami, a theme that would fit her just right would be about codependency, well I have nothing else to say regarding this character other than the things that've been said by previous posts.

I have nothing more to add about Hisami, previous posts already said practically everything about Hisami & her characterization rn.
>>17231
To be fair, I think >>17229 has a point on regards of Tewi wanting control being valid, which also indirectly explains why Seija's antics are unacceptable.
It could be due to her past, as rabbits aren't exactly the strongest of creatures and are consequently viewed as prey. Tewi could've had a bitter beginning, faced with the prospect of death at any moment as a rabbit, which may have created & amplified the necessity of "control" in Tewi's mind. Combine this with thousands of years and you can see why Tewi can be portrayed as such.
Tewi's pranking is considered "acceptable" because she's old (which may have resulted in a bit of boredom) and because it never leads to a high possibility of serious harm/death for her victims (in my opinion). Now to be fair, some writers may exaggerate the pranking that Tewi does, which may lower the "acceptability" bar of such actions by a bit. But, I would ultimately consider Tewi's pranking as "acceptable" because of the reasons stated earlier.

Now Seija is an amanojaku, which is a very powerful youkai.
Due to Seija's involvement in DDC & ISC and the fact that she basically betrayed Shinmyoumaru's trust, we can all see why her antics are considered unacceptable, right?
(I still like Seija as a character though)

So, I'm going to flip the question on its head a bit. Just why should Tewi's antics be acceptable? I'll admit people generally treat them that way, like she's a comic relief character and that Reisen (or insert protagonist here) suffering is funny, but quite frankly, I don't see why anyone in-universe would want to associate with her. She seems to pull pranks and lie for no reason beyond feeling like it. Whether that's from a controlling nature or mischief or just knowing she won't face any real consequences from it, from the perspective of the person being pranked, what does it matter? Unless you're one of the few who can make Tewi instantly regret attempting a prank, spending time around her is pretty much asking to get conned in some form.

My personal read on her character is that she's the kind of person who just keeps pushing to see what she can get away with. And the combination of her association with Eientei's powerhouses, living in the very-hard-to-navigate Bamboo Forest of the Lost, and her own ability to manipulate good luck means that she can get away with a lot. She's smart enough to toe the line with people who can actually punish her (Kaguya/Eirin), but for those who can't? Just see her relationship with Reisen... which is mostly her ignoring the moon bunny to do whatever she feels like and pranking her six ways to Sunday.

Frankly, I think Tewi's a menace. A petty level of menace, to be sure, as she's smart enough not to get herself in any serious trouble, but any time she ends up actually facing consequences feels richly deserved.

This doesn't make her a bad character, to be clear. Stories need their villains, both for major incidents and for day-to-day, and Tewi's mischievous streak makes her an excellent instigator for those slice-of-life level schemes. That said, I do consider her to be a troublemaker first and foremost.

>>17234

I feel like the line being drawn between Tewi and Seija is a very, very false equivalency. Tewi is not a malicious character inherently. Tewi has not caused an incident, all she's done is defend her friends when they started a defensive incident. Tewi does not actively go out of her way to be hated, or to cause chaos - she either just does things for a bit of fun, or for a larger goal of keeping her family and friends safe (e.g. her selling rabbits). She's mischievous, not malicious.

Seija is an inherently destructive individual. She outright and actively seeks to be hated and scorned. She has actively caused an incident, by pitting multiple groups against each other. If Tewi got the feeling she was pushing someone to the brink, she'd back off a bit and let them recover. If Seija got that sense, she'd push even harder and try to get a selfie with them in anguish.

>>17235
Did I mention Seija anywhere in my post? Sure, Tewi is chaotic neutral instead of chaotic evil. But at the same time, “not being Seija” is a pretty low bar. While I agree that Tewi’s not out to ruin anyone, I don’t think she’s exactly riddled with guilt over the people she tricks. Malicious might be the wrong word, but I think there’s a reasonable argument for selfish and uncaring.

The guy who tricks you to see you suffer might be worse than the guy who tricks you to get your wallet. But neither one is a pleasant encounter, and while Tewi might have limits, that doesn’t excuse her constant unrepentant mischief.

I'd like to preface with a disagreement I find with >>17235 in that Tewi's direct relationship with Eientei residents is very give and take oriented (cit. CiLR, Eirin's chapter), and so I would personally not assume that she's outwardly friends with them. That isn't to say it's not possible she's their friend, but Tewi is business minded enough that I double take the thought.

Something I'd like to expand on is Tewi's extremely self serving nature. It's very apparent that she tricks people to have things her way, but the more difficult part is to say why she goes through the trouble. Why does she swindle money as if they were shrine donations? Why does she accrue deals with Eirin to get into her good graces (her conversation with Medicine in 9)? Why does she sell rabbits? That last one we actually know a lot about, but it still doesn't ever tell us what she actually wants out of these activities.

It could be her attempting to keep up with the tenuous power struggle in Gensokyo, as the wiki pulls out from the void, or as some kind of means to control as >>17229 mentions for narrative structure. It could be neither of those things and instead she gets a kick out of performing these acts so much that even Eiki tells her off for her tricks in 9.

Let me restate that one: she tricks people so much that the yama tells her she'll probably go to hell for it. Not any specific con, nor their severity. She just fools around that much. This is the same yama who calls Reisen a selfish defector, and these don't sound entirely equivalent. It just makes me wonder.

All in all she's one of those characters who has a lot of mystery in how her mind works, despite being so outgoing and dopey at times.

>>17242
I love this image.
8/8

Saying Seija is evil for intentionally causing destruction, animosity, and strife is like saying a lion is evil for Hunting, killing, and eating gazelle. It is in a lions nature to prey on lesser animals. It's how they survive. It's how they grow. It's how they thrive. You can't say a creature is evil because it's following it's nature.

>>17242

Rationalizing Tewi's actions as an attempt to keep up with the constant power struggle in Gensokyo is kinda an interesting threadline to think about. Being several thousand years old, she would theoretically be in the same faith weight class Yuuka and the other ancient youkai. But, with Tewi's power being the ability to cause luck in humans...that's kinda muscling in on the territory of the gods, right? Imagine getting a divine "Cease and Decist" order handed down to you from the heavens.

What you see as an annoying, trickster rabbit, might very well be the desperate struggle of a faith starved youkai trying to change it's image just to survive.

This is why I wish we had more godly characters in our THP stories. Seeing things from a perspective wholly inhuman is absolutly fascinating to me.

>>17246
You can absolutely call someone or something evil for acting according to their nature. Take the orcs in Lord of the Rings, or any always-chaotic-evil race in a fantasy setting. Raiding, pillaging, and murdering is 100% their nature, and what they do is absolutely evil. Or take a genocidal terminator-style robot. It’s perfectly possible that it was just programmed that way, that exterminating all life is just its nature. But if you excuse it from being evil on those grounds, then you’ve taken away pretty much all meaning from good and evil as concepts.

There is a conversation to be had about to what degree someone’s nature or upbringing might mitigate their responsibility for evil acts they perform, but it does not change the fact that their acts are evil, and that if they do them gleefully and unrepentantly, so are they.

Since the character was re-rolled, despite having a few things I could say, I’ll decline to say anything about Hisami and leave that matter for another day, perhaps if a second roll turns her up again, instead focusing on Tewi.

If I had a few weeks, I think I could draw out an in-depth profile of Tewi’s character and psychology, but I don’t have that luxury, sadly. To grossly oversimplify, I think her biggest defining traits are a) her mischievousness and b) her status as an ‘elder’ youkai. She’s a character who is crafty in her own way, at least believing herself to be smarter than most people she meets, taking advantage of people she believes are fools and trying to placate or temporarily outwit those who match or exceed her. As a notably long-lived example of her species, she has a sway over other rabbits and commands them as underlings, and that probably gives her a sense of self-importance. She’s also closely associated with luck and fortune, and her very presence implies a degree of good luck, meaning she’s nearly impossible to even get a fleeting glimpse of for many. Despite these rather amazing aspects, she’s a very minor presence compared to others she associates with or who also live in the Bamboo Forest. In that respect, I find her more interesting than a lot of the Imperishible Night cast or many others besides.

There have been at least a couple of depictions of Tewi I’ve liked, but one that most immediately stands out to me is her appearance in Moral’s Hakurou story. The Tewi in that story may have her cutesy moments, but I feel like Moral has captured a bit of the idea of her as something of an ‘elder’ youkai. She shares history with the titular Hakurou and, despite his contrarian ways that frustrate even someone like her, tries to dissuade him from his most self-destructive tendencies, having witnessed much of the history that made him who he is. Even when she’s a bit mischievous, there’s none of the sort of juvenile ‘prankster’ character common in fan conception. Instead, she’s someone who’s been around a long while to see a lot happen and thus has a fair bit of insight into things, giving out precious little of what she knows to anyone beyond people who are closer to being her contemporaries.

In that sense, an even more stand-out depiction is in Teruyo’s Clever, Audacious and Wise, though she didn’t appear for very long in that story. As with many of the youkai characters in the story, her viewpoint is first presented as deceptively simple, yet it quickly becomes apparent that she knows much more than she lets on and has pretty nuanced views on things. She starts off being the cute and coquettish rabbit with Hide, the protagonist, and acting like she’s innocently sussing out his reasons for being around Eientei, only to start pushing him onto Reisen in such a way that he’s all but obliged to play along. Just the brief bits of interaction give Hide the idea that she’s easily as sharp as your average elder tengu and perhaps even wilier, feeling constantly that she’s playing with him and looking down on him as a young upstart, though she does give indication that she thinks he has promise as a ruler — assuming that’s a completely genuine sentiment.

The most immediately interesting of Tewi’s relationships to me is the one she has with Eirin. Many of the practicalities of Eientei’s operations rely on the efforts of the youkai rabbits under Tewi’s command. That would technically give Tewi a lot of pull, considering she could pull the equivalent of a trucker strike and upend things, and one might expect her to want to be something of an equal to Eirin in the command structure. Yet, Tewi instead seems to voluntarily subordinate herself to Eirin. Of course, we don’t really get much in the way of direct interactions between Tewi and Eirin. I’d like to think that, given all else, Tewi does have some degree of actual respect for her Lunarian boss, perhaps recognising how outclassed she is in relation and bowing down to the superior intellect. Conceiving of them interacting as complete equals is a bit difficult, so it seems likely that any conversation between them would be pretty one-sided, Tewi largely bemused by the degree of unintelligible one-sided mess coming from Eirin. Then again, there could be a little bit of a recognition on Eirin’s part that her high-minded, far-sighted view is often incompatible with others’ understanding, and thus she might view Tewi as a relative equal, someone who can be trusted to finesse the fiddlier, less intellectual elements of matters.

Beyond very small glimpses, we also don’t get any true idea of how Reisen and Tewi relate to each other. My own sense is that Tewi sees Reisen as an object of amusement, a strange presence that is a rabbit in the most technical sense and who has the pride of someone like Eirin yet none of the brain-power to back it up. Whatever notional authority the moon rabbit wields over her, the earth rabbit can always run circles around her, conveniently interpret her words, and generally make a fool of her, all for the sake of amusement. When it comes to her primary motivations regarding Reisen, I’d guess Tewi mostly wants to force-feed the young upstart some humble pie, her counterpart likely reluctantly accepting the sass whilst silently being exasperated that the filthy earthling isn’t apt to just do as she’s told. At the same time, I don’t think Tewi has any ill-will toward Reisen, possibly having a degree of near-kinship no matter how either might feel the other doesn’t reflect the idea of a ‘rabbit’ in her respective view.

If anything can be ascribed to Tewi as a ‘niche’, I suppose the closest would be as a steward of the Bamboo Forest and representative of a much more ancient Gensokyo. The former mostly pertains to her de facto leadership of the youkai rabbits and longtime presence in the forest. It’s not hard to imagine that there is some investment on her part in maintaining much of the nature of the forest, both ecologically and metaphysically. Of course, that might be partly simple opposition to, say, human hunting of rabbits because she is also a rabbit. On the other hand, there’s likely other elements like trying to prevent excessive encroachment upon the flora in order to keep the forest healthy and able to block ready access to Eientei by hostile parties. The latter seems like it’d probably be a rare thing to manifest, given her fleeting presence before others not involved with Eientei, but it’s not unimaginable that Tewi could speak with the experience of having seen Gensokyo in the preceding centuries. In her view, many who are there now probably strike her as upstarts, and it doesn’t seem too out of character for someone like her to voice such opinions at times, feeling that others are ignorant of what came before them.

When it comes to situations that I think would be interesting regarding Tewi, most of them would probably have to do with seeing how she relates to others, particularly characters who aren’t Eirin or Reisen. First and foremost, how in the heck does she relate to Kaguya? You’d think that they have some degree of interaction, both being around Eientei. Given that Kaguya tends to not really distinguish the rabbits too much, is it possible for the two to have any real relationship? How would someone of her very distant-from-everything nature view someone like Tewi? How would Tewi view an undying princess from the moon, banished and fugitive from her own home? Would she take issue with the princess’s view of the rabbits? There’s plenty of ground to speculate on right there.

Of course, Tewi’s nature as an ‘elder’ youkai also makes me wonder how she might interact with other older youkai. Would she exchange barbs with Yukari? Could she needle Yuuka and get away with it? Would she relate to Mamizou and her mischievous ways with humans, or would they butt heads over differences in opinion on the same subject? Could she laugh and be merry with someone as rowdy as Suika? What sort of disaster might the mountain meet if she were sat down to talk with someone like Megumu? Youkai aside, the mythological Inaba also has a connection to certain gods, so it might be interesting to see how Tewi and various Gensokyo gods interact. As fellow Gensokyan natives, would Tewi and the Akis have things to say to each other? Maybe she and Misumaru could share reminiscences and deep insights about the Hakurei Shrine? Perhaps Tewi might end up as an unwilling sympathetic ear to a milksop Chimata, fresh off another failure at marketeering? Could she find a fellow spirit in someone like Suwako, who also leads a relatively carefree existence as an ancient presence?

There’s a lot more that could be said, but I think I’m coming to the limits of what I can put down in words at the moment, and the character limit means I’d have to break anything further into parts. Basically, I think Tewi’s got the potential to be a lot deeper of a character than many would give her credit for being. It doesn’t hurt that she’s cute, too. The image I chose feels to me like a pretty good representative of her daily existence: taking it easy in the Bamboo Forest, surrounded by fellow rabbits.

Firstly, I want to apologize because I missed this thread for the longest time, and I don't know how strict the topic of discussion will be, but Kogasa is a character I really enjoy and there were some things not mentioned about here that I think should be.

Firstly, it's so easy to see why Kogasa is a very popular character with many people. She's one of the few characters in Gensokyo that's unabashedly friendly. While there's not really many Touhou characters I'd call outright evil (though I admitedly have a more SoL-viewpoint of the setting) most Touhou characters are willing to be jerks and kinda rude to people. Kogasa conversely just comes off as someone who's eager to please, friendly, and wanting to always help. This combined with her status as an eternal underdog makes her fairly unique amongst Touhou's cast. Cirno also comes to mind when I think of underdog, but Cirno is more of a comedic character thanks to her overbearing ego. Conversely, Kogasa is almost tragic. She needs to scare people, yet she's just not scary. She wants to help people, yet she was an abandoned umbrella. And she's never really depicted as wallowing in her misery. Crying and getting sad easily, yes, but she's not a character who is always wallowing in self-pity. She's depicted as trying new pursuits and seeking ways to improve her. I can understand if other people find other Touhou characters more interesting, but I've never met anyone who disliked her (even people who dislike newhus), her personality pulls on all the right strings.

In terms of stories, a Kogasa and Medicine team up is bizarrely underused, I can't even think of a single story with them together. They seem so obvious together, since they let you explore two different youkai of similar origins. Both abandoned by humanity, but one seeking its attention still, while the other wallowing in hate. They should be as prominent a team up as Kasen and Seiga are. Additionally, several people mentioned that it can be difficult to find a place to use Kogasa in stories, but I have to disagree. I think her character is perfect for anything set in the human village. You can use Kogasa as a great way to explore more amicable human and youkai interactions on a day-to-day basis. Kogasa is a youkai who is out in the open and doesn't hide (like Sekibanki), is actually interested in interacting with humans (and needs to) unlike characters such as Cirno or Wriggle, and unlike someone like Byakuren she doesn't really have power, either institutionalized or literal, so humans can treat her as they see fit.

>>17225
Tewi, for me, has always been a much more comedic supporting-role character. That's not to say you can't write a more serious story with her, but she's often portrayed as a shifty small rabbit, who's much older than she lets on. She's arguably among Gensokyo's oldest residents, but few stories seem to utilize this fact outside of a passing mention, and she doesn't come off as a character who would be interested in this fact either. Unlike someone like Tsukasa, Tewi usually doesn't come off as outright malicious or if large overarching schemes in the works. Tsukasa as a character seems a lot like a Tewi 2.0. Both work under someone, though Tewi is a leader in her own right while Tsukasa is pretty much Wormtongue. Tewi is a jerk but probably wouldn't kill someone, or deliver more than they could handle, while Tsukasa was pretty down for killing Reimu. Tsukasa is basically the negative version of Tewi, with said negative traits pumped up to 11.

Despite usually being portrayed in many stories with a more mature demeanor she hides under her pranks, Inaba of Earth and Moon portrays Tewi in a far more genuine and simple manner. Not idiotic, but her cute antics are shown as just that, and her pranks being fairly light. It's hard to describe, but the 4koma just gives Tewi more of an aura of innocence compared to how she's usually depicted. It's pretty interesting.

https://danbooru.donmai.us/pools/5587
This is a doujin comic that I think is a neat depiction of Tewi. She's shown as a leader among the rabbits and something of jokester, but also someone who does care and will make a significant effort to express it. Another depiction of Tewi I like that I haven't seen mentioned yet is from Animating Gensokyo.

In general, I think that Tewi's most defining traits are being a mischievous and old youkai who is closely associated with Eientei. I think her mindset is that of someone who has lived long enough to get enough perspective to simply not care about most things anymore and go with the flow, especially since she's got something to do with good luck. Personality-wise, I think she's cunning and mischievous on the surface, but also very wise when she needs to be. She wouldn't want to get serious often though, especially since she has Eirin to do that for her. If she heard the truth about what the lunarians did to Daikokouten, though, I feel like you would see a chillingly serious expression on her face before she could hide it.

I see her mischief as similar to bugs bunny, though I don't think she's digging lots of pitfall traps in the bamboo forest all the time. It wouldn't be something that she makes an effort to set up but rather something that she does as the mood strikes her.

I remember in WaHH she told Kasen about her scheme to sell pet rabbits in the village so that they would eventually become youkai. I think it suggested that she had an interest in vying for influence in the village against other youkai. Personally, I don't think she would be terribly interested in trying to affect what goes on outside the bamboo forest and certainly not Gensokyo as a whole. Essentially, I think she acts without malice and without ambition. She doesn't screw with people to hurt them or to profit from it, she does it because it's funny - for the love of the game. In that way, I think she's distinct from similar 'tricksters' like Mamizou or Tsukasa.

I think Tewi's major relationships are with Eirin and Reisen. I don't have a clear idea on how she might interact directly with Kaguya.

With Eirin, I like the idea that Tewi is surprisingly capable of interacting with the genius lunarian with a degree of parity that few can match. I forget the source, but I remember reading that Tewi approached Eirin and Kaguya after they hid in the bamboo forest and built Eientei to offer the service of herself and her rabbits in exchange for their... knowledge? Basically, Eirin and Kaguya need Tewi more than Tewi needs them. Both parties could survive on their own, but the terms favor Tewi. I think there's a lot of mutual trust and respect in this relationship.

With Reisen, I imagine that Reisen is a de-facto subordinate to Tewi, who is far older and wiser even if she refuses to act like it most of the time. Reisen would disagree with this notion due to Tewi's antics and her own lunarian prejudice, but I think that one of Tewi's goals would be to gradually get Reisen to ease up a bit and unlearn her worse habits in a roundabout way of welcoming her as a new earth rabbit, which would be reflected in Reisen's LoLK dialogue. Basically, Tewi is an annoying trickster mentor who nonetheless does have her long term best interests at heart.

I think she would get along okay with Mamizou but would hold some scorn for Tsukasa and might outfox her if provoked to prove a point. Ringo and Seiran seem like Tewi might take an interest in them as defectors from the moon like Reisen. If they're more active in the village as dango sellers then maybe they're not really in Tewi's sphere of influence, though. Kagerou lives in the bamboo forest but I doubt she's got a real relationship with Tewi. I picture Kagerou feeling a bit embarrassed at being a werewolf who's outclassed by a rabbit.

I like the idea of Tewi having a relationship with Mokou. I imagine the two of them gradually going from cautious glimpses between the bamboo to something like drinking buddies, where one occasionally strolls through the forest to find the other so they can shoot the shit.

In terms of use in a story, I think Tewi makes more sense to me as a supporting character rather than a protagonist. I think she's generally kind of aloof and whimsical in a way that would make it difficult for her to be a good PoV character. I see her as someone who might take an interest in another character who seems sufficiently entertaining and sort of follow them around to help or hinder them from a distance to amuse herself.

I wish I could write more but I have bad time management and worse brain pain. I'm glad you guys are still here, though.

>>17271
>I remember in WaHH she told Kasen about her scheme to sell pet rabbits in the village so that they would eventually become youkai. I think it suggested that she had an interest in vying for influence in the village against other youkai.
Tbh, I feel like I've caught discussion following this line, but it doesn't really follow from the actual chapter. I went back and read it to check, and Tewi never really says anything to indicate any interest in anything beyond, well, making money and maybe more youkai rabbits. Really, I feel like Kasen would have had more to say if there was any apparent interest in 'the balance of power', but that's straying off-topic to really get into.

>I imagine [Tewi and Mokou] gradually going from cautious glimpses between the bamboo to something like drinking buddies, where one occasionally strolls through the forest to find the other so they can shoot the shit.
You know, I never really considered that one, but I guess I kind of like it. I think Mokou doesn't have many attachments to, well, much of anything, but I guess someone as long-lived as Tewi might be as close a match to her as anyone. She'd probably pale in importance to Kaguya in Mokou's eye, but maybe they could have a casual acquaintance of a sort.

>I see her as someone who might take an interest in another character who seems sufficiently entertaining and sort of follow them around to help or hinder them from a distance to amuse herself.
Honestly, now that I'm reminded of Kagerou, this is what I'd see as any basis for any sort of acquaintance between the two. Kagerou is normally a shy, withdrawn sort of character who keeps to herself — the sort Tewi might like to mess with. Maybe it'd be for the pure fun of needling the big, bad wolf, or maybe it'd be an attempt at drawing the poor girl out of her shell. Or maybe there could be some other obscure motivation only Tewi would know. That'd be an exercise for the writer.

>>17250
I think I'll use Kogasa as the protagonist if I ever revisit my Medicine idea.

>>17278
I see your point about Tewi's aims. It looks like that would better fit the characterization I had in mind. Regarding Tewi and Kagerou, now I'm wondering if Tewi has ever invited herself to a youkai grassroots network meeting despite absolutely not being one of the small fry the group might be intended for.

>>17281
>youkai grassroots network
Possible, I guess, depending on whereabouts they move. I feel like it's generally implied to be more than just Becky 'banki, Feesh, and Kagewoo, so maybe Tewi's had some underlings involved? Or maybe they've got involved without her direction? Maybe some rabbits don't unquestioningly like Tewi? Always possibilities.

Rolling 1d13 => 12
1: EoSD
2: PCB + IaMP
3: IN
4: PoFV
5: MoF + SWR
6: SA
7: UFO + Hisouten + DS + FW
8: TD + HM
9: DDC
10: LoLK + AoCF
11: HSiFS
12: WBaWC +SFW
13: UM

Rolling 1d8 => 3
1: Eika Ebisu
2: Urumi Ushizaki
3: Kutaka Niwatari
4: Yachie Kicchou
5: Mayumi Joutouguu
6: Keiki Haniyasushin
7: Saki Kurokoma
8: Yuuma Toutetsu

One of the myriad gods, based on Niwatarijin. According to her entry on the touhou wiki, "Niwatarijin is typically depicted as a god of agriculture, fertility, irrigation and/or safe passage, and is at times associated with chickens (niwatori) and the sacrifice thereof. One of the god's notable blessings is to cure children's whooping cough, which was associated with birds and locally referred to as tori-shabiki". This lacked a citation, so I don't know how accurate it is.

She works for the ministry of right and wrong as a guard and appears to report to Eiki.

Chimken!

Metric 1: 2.5
Metric 2: 2

I think Kutaka is a character that is interesting because she's a late addition to a largely static duo, and one that augments the existing pair in an interesting way.

For example, she's a second worker with Issues that's under Eiki's employ. It's a nice bit of testament to Eiki's actually kind nature (as opposed to the cranky midget characterisation) that a lot of her employees are allowed to be imperfect, in one way or another.

She also provides an interesting contrast to Komachi; where Komachi is talented but lazy, Kutaka is motivated but a little dense. I tend to imagine Eiki is probably happier with Kutaka's earnestness than with Komachi's talented laziness. KutaEiki is a better ship than KomaEiki, I will NOT concede this point.

And you can expand those connections to the extended yama connections as well, and usually draw interesting connections. Between Akyuu, who has perfect memory, and the forgetful kutaka, and a meeting between her and Yuyuko practically writes itself.

And then there's the fact that despite being a god of chickens, of all things, she still opposes the attacks of the animal realm on the surface world - in fact, she's the face of Eiki's interference in it. That alone is a massive untapped dynamic to play at.

I mainly wish people would incorporate her more wholeheartedly into Eiki's bureau. She tends to end up entirely vestigial when she's added into existing fanons/stories featuring Eiki and Komachi, and it's just a bit of a shame she doesn't get more prominence.

If only the dice chose Mayumi... Oh well.

I see Kutaka as a character who is tender and motherly, considering the nature of mother hens and all.

There's a line in her official profile that piques my interest.
>Her true identity is that of Niwatarijin, the god of wild chickens from before they were domesticated.

Just for your information, even though there is no exact date for when were chickens first domesticated, it was estimated that they were domesticated 8,000 years ago in Southeast Asia (Wikipedia). This could very much imply that Kutaka already exists waaaaay before Gensokyo was even a concept. Considering her status as a goddess, this theory might actually be plausible.

Ceramic Boy Third gave its own spin on her forgetful nature using this theory, implying that she has lived that long to the point that her brain has difficulty remembering due to it being overfilled with her past memories, and thus she can't be bothered to remember her recent ones.

She's a goddess who values equality and altruism above all, as said in her profile, and she's quietly considering a way to raise the status of chickens who've been reduced to livestock for humans. It's also said that, despite her work, she mostly resides at the top of a waterfall on the Youkai Mountain.

We still have no official statements regarding how her ability to cure throat illnesses works, but I remember a conversation in the old Danmaku Kagura that shows her using her ability in the form of tea. Don't question me about the legitimacy of this, though, as I've only seen screenshots of it in a YouTube video.

Though her character is quite prominent in AO3, I've only read a few stories that involved Kutaka as the main lead. There's this one story where Kutaka obliviously rizzed Satori when doing duty. It's a fun read, but there's only two chapters of it...
https://archiveofourown.org/works/42323253/chapters/106277928

Kutaka isn’t a character I’d normally give a lot of thought to, so I’m not sure I’ll have too much to add, but I’ll give it a go.

Things like her dialogue in Gouyoku Ibun make her come off a bit to me like Nagisa, the leading girl from Clannad. She seems a little spacy and prone to missing the greater point of a conversation, but overall she means well. The last thing she wants is for people to come to harm because of hazards like blazing hells or sudden waterfalls, so she does her best to inform people of the hazards, even trying to drive them off if necessary. Of course, she does have a way of jumping to conclusions sometimes about who may or may not have messed something up, and that’s what brings her into conflict for most of Gouyoku Ibun. Then there’s also the business with Hell and being sort of a gatekeeper into it. Her whole role in Wily Beast and Weakest Creature was to test the player character and see if they were strong enough to survive Hell. Overall, she comes off as someone who is concerned with people’s safety and upholding some sense of order.

A connection I don’t recall seeing any remark on is Kutaka and the Mountain. Most of her associations seem to be with Hell and the machinery of the Gensokyan afterlife, but she lives somewhere around the top of a waterfall on the Youkai Mountain. That raises some interesting questions as to how she might relate to the tengu. Does she ever encounter Aya? Maybe they’ve talked once or twice? Maybe she’s been interviewed for the paper? Or maybe they go drinking together sometimes after-hours. Or maybe they dislike each other. It’s hard to say when there’s been no comment either way, but it’s not like there’s a zero chance either has encountered the other in some way. The same could go for Hatate, Momiji, or even Megumu. Someone like a great-tengu might occasionally get dispatches from Hell about some business or another that regards the Mountain. Who better to convey them in some fashion than someone who lives there already and is connected with Hell? In general, who knows what kind of view into tengu society she has and what sorts of opinions she might have of it.

Given her general basis on a class of gods of safe passage, among other things, the most direct (active) role she could play in a story is acting as an escort somewhere. Whether it’s to Hell or one of the peaks of Youkai Mountain, her job requires her to guarantee some degree of safe travel — even though that usually means driving people off who aren’t strong enough to be safe. What that means practically would probably depend on whom she’s dealing with. Maybe she can shield a harried office oni ferrying a message from Hell to Tenma from harrassment by the tengu authorities. Maybe she can guide a monkey from a cave leading underground to the foothills and back as a courtesy when dealing with some vengeful spirit business. Or perhaps she might accompany someone who has serious business to see to in the Beast Realm?

Of course, there’s also the association between the folk practises of Niwatari-jin and curing coughs and throat illnesses. How she accomplishes this is entirely left to the writer as an exercise. Does she use lozenges? Tea? Crystals? Hot baths? Healing hands? Surgery? Accupuncture? Being hung upside-down and dowsed with water? Well, even if it’s the most faithful to folk practise, I doubt it’s that last one. However she manages, there’s always the idea of her being a healer of a sort. Maybe it’s a bit of a side business. Maybe it’s just a kindness she does to people when she spots someone suffering whooping cough. I’m sure there’s other possibilities, but I don’t have much for that.

I’d guess the sorts of conflicts Kutaka would be likely to encounter would largely be either related to her work or her need for things to be fair and just in a world that is often anything but. How can she sit by when she sees people who suffer needlessly? How can she reconcile a want to help people like humans with her want to better the lot of poultry? What kind of orders might come down the pipe from on high that she wouldn’t want to follow? Could there ever be a situation where she puts aside the rules and her own ethics to help someone? How would she feel if someone took advantage of her kindness and manipulated her into breaking the rules for them? What about if she couldn’t prevent harm to others, even if that’s her job? Those are examples of the sorts of questions that would need to be answered, I think.

I haven’t seen any actual depictions of Kutaka as far as writing. I know there was a post on /shorts/, but yuri isn’t my thing so I can’t speak to its quality or lack thereof. Other than that, there’s nothing I’m aware of.

No new roll this week?
RIP

Rolling 1d13 => 1
1: EoSD
2: PCB + IaMP
3: IN
4: PoFV
5: MoF + SWR
6: SA
7: UFO + Hisouten + DS + FW
8: TD + HM
9: DDC
10: LoLK + AoCF
11: HSiFS
12: WBaWC +SFW
13: UM

Reimu and Marisa have been excluded. I feel like it could be worth having a separate category for them.

Daiyousei and Koakuma have been excluded.

Rolling 1d7 => 6
1: Rumia
2: Cirno
3: Hong Meiling
4: Patchouli Knowledge
5: Sakuya Izayoi
6: Remilia Scarlet
7: Flandre Scarlet

Vampire, resides in the Scarlet Devil Mansion adjacent to Misty Lake.

First appeared in EoSD (2002), with notable appearances in IN, IaMP, SWR, and SSiB.

My bad for not rolling a new character yesterday. It's been a rough week. I also wish I could have come up with something to say about Kutaka, but you guys beat me to it.

>>17292
>separate category
Maybe shove them in the same category with the characters from the print works?

Remilia's a fun character. She gets as much or as little respect as you want. Can be set into a serious or comedic role. Can be a force for or against the protagonist. She's got a lot of variability in her characterization even in canon. This leads to one part of why it's so easy to slot the SDM crew into a lot of scenarios, Remilia likes to do things on a whim.

The entire plot of SSiB revolved around Remilia being so predictably whimsical that Yukari knew she would go to the moon only by suggestion. Her servants (and Patche) were able to shore up her general dependability in that plan and so she was able to strut around in the story in a very fun way. To me it's the mixture of serious maturity and childish habits that makes up Remilia. It allows her to act irrationally without it seeming out of place, and that can be both useful and fun for writing.

As for specific scenarios, she seems to lean into the more absurd the better. If it's absurd, then it's in her personality to be a part of it. If it's boring and mundane, she wouldn't care to make an appearance. That's also why when a mundane situation arises she drops any airs of sophistication (I'm looking at you, highchair in the rocket).

There's too many depictions of Remilia to go over, and she's treated with a very wide spectrum to her personality (see Imizu's Udongein vs Remilia and compare it to Moyazou's various comic depictions). One of the most notable examples, though, would be Touhouvania, mixing the dark and serious tone Remilia always uses with her undermining immaturity.

I'll leave out character interactions for now, since for Remilia it could take ages to go over everything.