Trust and Consequences Quotes

“The problem was, I was really good at creating good-sounding justifications for my actions. It was half of what I’d spent my time doing after Arthur had died, and it had that same feel, of grasping for some way that the thing I’d done for unclear, probably emotional reasons was actually the best possible thing that I could have done in the circumstances. Shrug away from Tiff when she’s searching for comfort? Well, Arthur was my best friend, and if she felt a fraction of what I was feeling, maybe that would help her understand the pain I was in. Attack a kid at school because they said that Arthur’s death was part of God’s plan? Well, play stupid games, win stupid prizes, people should be punished for saying things like that, for not having an ounce of empathy, for worshipping a god that inflicts pain and death on someone like Arthur as part of some fucked-up, unknowable plan.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“Looking back, it was probably more fun for him than for me, but part of being a friend was working to indulge each other’s eccentricities.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“There are cities and countries in which the police will slap every fine and penalty they can think of against someone who does not cooperate, as a way of strong-arming people into giving up names or information, or simply to fill the coffers. I don’t believe that to be sound in the long term, nor do I believe it to be Good.” He said the last word like good was some concrete, physical thing.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“the game doesn’t seem like it actively wants you to fail, it just likes to torture you.” “That doesn’t seem like it’s a good thing,” I replied. “But that’s the basic thing between the DM and the players, I thought,”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“Of course it is,” I practically shouted. “You’re making all this crap up as you go along, it’s a process of reconciling different learned lessons and feeling your way along by intuition. That’s why I think that we would be fundamentally unwise to follow along with what we think the entity, or the narrative, or whatever, wants from us. Maybe it’s rolling its eyes at this conversation.” Or maybe it was looking on in glee, though that was a less pleasant thought.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“Doing something risky and having it come to nothing was, to me, a pretty acceptable outcome.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“If I spent time focusing on every shitty thing in my life, I wouldn’t have time to get anything done,”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“I am, naturally, a strong, self-assured woman who doesn’t need her almost-boyfriend to tell her that their fledgling relationship is still intact, but maybe you should go through the motions, just to get some practice, in case you ever do date someone that pointlessly needy and insecure.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“Grak and I weren’t exactly friends, not yet, but that was how you made friends, in my opinion; you committed to the friendship.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“This was the sort of thing that I had always dreamed about seeing, not the intense displays of magical power, but someone using what was probably meant to have been a monster in a dungeon somewhere for a mundane task. One of the things that I liked about Aerb was that it was settled and lived in; the first thing that I would have thought of when I came across an ooze like that was domesticating it for use in the bone trade, and someone else had already had that thought, and done the domestication, and now it was just part of the fabric of the world.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“She pulled back from me, first to look in my eyes, then to go stand a bit further away. “Thank you for the hug.” “Anytime,” I said with a smile. So of course she moved back and wrapped her arms around me, and I wrapped my arms around her. “You are so shit at negotiation,” said Fenn. “It’s actually kind of sad.”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences

“Do you love it for the sake of the power I wield, or for the majesty of a forgotten magic?”
― Alexander Wales, Trust and Consequences