CrushDaddyXx

  Tell me you haven’t read the wiki without telling me you haven’t read the wiki.

  Zeke. Buddy. Pal. Amigo. What the hell are you doing? Didn’t both Story and Mushroom tell you not to bend canon too much? Sure, fanfics are allowed to deviate from canon a little bit. But c’mon man. You’re taking it way too far.

  Byte-Sized

  Gotta agree with Crush. Love the imagery from the story. When you were describing the House of Seasons, chef’s kiss.

  But it’s obvious that you’re just making things up now. You added a dream pool and turned the Blooming Witch into a kind old woman who gives closure monologues and lore dumps. I half expected her to pull out a Werther’s Original and pat you on the head after all that.

  That’s not what she is at all.

  ColdDustThron

  I don’t wanna nitpick everything like all the rest of these fools. Crush is right when he says that fanfics are allowed to play loose and fast with canon if it makes the story better. But not with the House of Seasons. That dungeon matters.

  Maybe there’s a bunch of people on this forum who don’t really care about the Blooming Witch, but she was always one of my favorite fights in Frontiers. She was an absolute beast. I remember being a kid and heading into the House thinking that I was gonna dominate, and then I got my face melted off. It was great.

  Now here’s Zeke just shitting all over my childhood memories.

  GripLocked

  Binary tried warning us.

  He said that Z3ke was twisting canon to fit whatever story he wanted to write. We should have listened to him.

  I gave this fic a shot because a bunch of people were talking about the Eaters and mentioning it in a ton of different threads, but now I’m over it. Dude turned the House of Seasons into a drama about grief instead of what it actually is: a haunted mansion with a creepy ass boss.

  Liminal_Archivist

  Dayum. Don’t think I’ve ever seen so many people turn on a fic this fast before. I guess that’s what happens when people skip out on reading the lore and playing the games and instead try to write a fanfic for a fandom they’re not part of.

  If Zeke had done any actual research instead of treating screenshots from the game like his own pinterest moodboard, he’d know that the House is the Witch’s domain and she’s not about letting people leave peacefully. She doesn’t let people just traipse through her shit unless they pay her off first.

  AUs are fine, but at least call it what it is. Don’t try and pass this off as a lore-accurate fanfic if you don’t wanna do the research.

  Z3ke (Original Poster)

  I really wish there was a better way to convey that I’m sighing without typing SIGH. I’m a little hesitant to ask, but how exactly am I breaking canon?

  I get you’re all man, but nobody is explaining what I did wrong. You all complained when everyone thought I’d fought someone called the Blooming Witch. I just told you the complete story of my trip through that House of Seasons, and nowhere in it did I fight anyone. I figured you’d all be happy.

  But now you’re all complaining that I made it out of the House without trading or fighting and I have no clue why everyone is pissed.

  This isn’t a fanfic. I keep saying that, hoping that maybe one of these times you will all believe me. Maybe if I keep dropping the fact that this is all actually happening to me, some of you will believe I’m telling the truth.

  I’M NOT WRITING A FANFIC.

  Now, you guys can all either decide that I’m lying (which I’m not) and give up on this story. Or you can realize I’m telling the truth and all this “canon” that you’re complaining I’m breaking isn’t as true as you think.

  Start going over what I’m saying and realize that you’re missing something.

  Z3ke (Original Poster)

  You know what…I’m hungry as shit. I’ve been writing since this morning and my stomach is about to mutiny and my wrists are aching. I’m taking a break and heading out for some food.

  The Roaring Drake is the only real restaurant around that I know, so I’m heading there for something to eat and drink. While I’m gone, all of you can feel free to post about lore and canon and everything that I’m supposedly breaking and screwing up. Let me know how what happened to me isn’t true.

  When I get back, I’ll post the rest of what happened out in the Deadlands. I still have to tell how I made it from the ruins out to The MIZ. But I will say this: if you want the rest of the story, you all better be ready to pay the tax.

  I’ve written a shit ton for everyone, and now it’s y’alls turn to hold up your end of the bargain. I’m talking about needing answers to all my questions and advice on where to go from here.

  Byte-Sized

  You wanna know all the canon you’re breaking? It’s a long ass list.

  This forum already told you about the House of Seasons and what’s wrong with what you wrote. I know a bunch of people explained how you can’t get out of it without either trading something to the Witch or fighting her. Now you’re saying that she just, what, turned into a nice old lady and let you walk out of there?

  That’s some bosheet. That’s a retcon, and fanfics aren’t allowed to retcon pieces of the lore.

  Also, there’s the fact that your OC just casually pulled a dimensional storage space out his ass which is an even bigger failure on your part in this story. Anyone who has ever played Frontiers knows that a big part of the gameplay loop is INVENTORY MANAGEMENT.

  The entire gameplay loop of Frontiers is about balancing your loadout and hauling gear to a safe zone, then making hard decisions about what you wanna keep and what you wanna toss away. Getting a dimensional storage space would trivialize giant sections of the game.

  PixelBaron

  Eh, small correction: not all of Frontiers is about inventory management. Some classes you can earn give you a bunch more bag space than you need. Plus, if you find the Wanderers you can boost your carry limit a ton.

  That said, I do agree that a straight-up dimensional storage space wouldn’t be a thing.

  My biggest gripe though is about Zeke turning the House of Seasons into a cozy little memory museum. That’s so not what the place is. I remember it as being proper horror game nuts. But Zeke’s fanfic is trying to turn it into tea time with ghosts. That’s my problem with what he wrote.

  SignalLoss

  You know what…I’ll defend Zeke a little here. I get why everyone is so salty about the dimensional storage space. On the surface, that’s a hard no in Frontiers. But that being said, context is king.

  The Blooming Witch has always been associated with non-Euclidian realities and weird space-folding magic. It’s even implied in the lore that she built the first Vault Garden. So, folding space is kinda her thing.

  Side note here, I know everyone is pissed about Zeke retconning shit and changing lore and adding a bunch of random shit to his story, but I’m kinda liking it. At least a little bit.

  I like that he added to the Blooming Witch by giving her a family. He introduced a sister character and talked about how she was trying to master the hardest discipline of magic and she had an accident. We all know that the hardest discipline has got to be space magic, something that the Witch is ridiculously good at. Her being so good at space magic because of her sister’s death is a nice little tie in.

  What I’m trying to say is that, if Zeke is gonna get some sort of dimensional storage space, it would stand to reason that the Blooming Witch is the one who gave it to him. I think that he at least got that right. If he tried saying that he found a bag of holding or something for sale in The MIZ, then yea…be pissed about that. But at least he chose one of the few entities in Frontiers who could manipulate space magic enough to give him dimensional storage.

  DeconstructedAntlers

  I’m just happy that this fic isn’t rehashing the same six zones we’ve all seen written about in every fanfic since 2021. It’s a breath of fresh air.

  Also, Zeke is focusing on things that we don’t have a bunch of lore on. Sure, there is lore about the Eaters…but it’s not a lot. They really only show up in that Argo quest walkthrough. Zeke is fleshing them out a little and I like that.

  The Blooming Witch and the House of Seasons are well known and famous, but there’s only a little bit of agreed upon lore there. Outside of the fighting and the trading, I always felt that the House wasn’t really expanded on enough. Plus, both the House and the Witch are absent in all the other games.

  Zeke is choosing interesting locales and entities and adding them to his fic. It might not be 100% canon compliant, but at least he’s trying new stuff and not writing the same story everyone else is.

  What I’m trying to say is that at least he means well with this fic. I say let him cook.

  ClickWhirr

  Nah. I don’t care if the fic is well written or not. I don’t care that it focuses on areas not normally covered in fics. I don’t care about any of that.

  You DON’T turn the Blooming Witch into some kind of benevolent grandma. She’s a villain. End of story. She’s not some rando who’s grieving her family.

  And what’s with this whole trapping her “friends and family” in the House? That’s some bosheet. She traps VICTIMS. She traps anyone who stumbles their way into her House and makes it so they can’t leave.

  Giving the echoes in the House a tragic backstory in an attempt to humanize her and make her sympathetic completely disregards the tone that the game was going for with her.

  StoryLeech

  You know…at first I thought that Binary was onto something with Zeke. Not his whole “rawrr, this fic is garbage and Zeke sucks” thing that he’s got going on. No. I thought he was right in that this fic was written by someone who hadn’t studied the lore or played the games before.

  Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

  But now…I’m actually impressed by what I’m seeing in this thread. When someone normally writes a fic that breaks canon, it’s because they don’t understand the source material. We’ve seen that before. But that’s not what’s going on here. I think Zeke does know the lore. I think he’s a fan just like all of us.

  Sure, you could say that he’s twisting some of the lore, but that’s what makes it all so interesting. Fanfics are supposed to bend canon. They’re supposed to be their own thing. That’s what makes the good ones stick with you.

  Look at Witchglass Reversal. That fic was a total AU that turned the Ruinborn into protectors instead of parasites. Canon-breaking? Yes. Beloved? Also yes.

  And how about Through the Emberlight? It literally rewrote the Menders as some sort of secret rebel faction and everybody loved it. Not half as many people complained about that fanfic as are complaining about this one.

  Hell, step outside the Fracture-verse fandom and you can find a bunch of examples of what I’m talking about.

  Think about Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. For those of you here who don’t know about it, the entire premise of that fanfic is: what if Harry Potter was a scientist?

  Soooo many bits of canon were changed in that fic including putting Hermoine in Ravenclaw, making Harry and Draco friends, turning Dumbledore kinda evil, and boosting the competency of Quirrel. Yet it’s still one of the most talked about fanfics in that fandom. (For good or ill.)

  I think that Z3ke is strategically breaking canon to get us all to talk about his fic. The only way he can do that, and do it well, is if he were a fan of the games.

  Ch3micalBurst78

  Yea, but the difference is that all those fics declared themselves to be AU. None of them were trying to pretend they were transcripts of an actual adventurer isekai’d into that world.

  The reason everyone is dogpiling Z3ke isn’t because he’s adding a shit ton of random stuff to the lore. It’s because he keeps insisting that this is actually happening to him. In short, he’s trying to say that he’s the decider of what is true or not in canon.

  Look, I’m all for tweaking canon to fit your fanfic. But you gotta let everyone know that’s what you’re doing. The second you try and declare yourself the authority on what is real and what’s not, that’s where you lose me.

  If he simply stated at the beginning of his fic that “hey, this is a stylized AU,” I don’t think nearly as many people would be as up in arms about it.

  NullSigil

  He’s going the full Andy Kaufmann. That’s the only answer that makes sense.

  He drops into the forum saying that he got isekai’d and that this isn’t a fanfic. He breaks canon but sticks close enough to it that we’re all arguing and it’s driving engagement. He only responds in-character and he doesn’t drop any author notes or anything like that.

  Either he’s an unparalleled genius, or he’s completely lost the plot. Either way I’m sticking around.

  ThreeThumbsDeep

  I like it.

  Whether you think it’s canon-breaking or not, at least he’s doing something that a bunch of fanfics don’t. He’s got us feeling like the world is real.

  I don’t agree with everything he’s doing with this fic, but when I read his posts I’m happy that he’s writing what he’s writing. How many of us would/have written fanfics where we spend an entire chapter on a train with nothing happening? I think most of us would have just skipped that part. We’d be like: and then the train pulled away and the people were angry at me so they kicked me off at the next stop.

  Instead, this dood spent 1000 words talking about his anger at the injustice of everything.

  MushroomCleric

  While Z3ke is away “getting food” how about we all do something useful instead of just yelling in circles.

  Let’s compile all the canon inconsistencies about this fanfic. If he’s really trying to do this faithfully, maybe we can help him adjust the story so it all lines up. We can point out the plotholes and instead of yelling “lol wrong” every time something hits a nerve, we offer up some advice.

  CrushDaddyXx

  Here’s one: don’t fuck up the Blooming Witch.

  When the Witch visited him during that whole “memory pool” thing he made her all soft-spoken and everything. That was the most egregious thing he’s done so far.

  If he ever actually fought the Witch in the game, he’d know that she’s TERRIFYING. Her audio design alone made my hair stand on end. That whisper loop thing she’s got going? I almost pissed myself the first time I heard it.

  She’s not some guardian of the House trying to help family and friends. She’s a predator. Her whole thing is luring prey into the House and killing them because of her greed.

  DON’T CHANGE THAT!

  ClickWhirr

  Yep. That’s probably the biggest disconnect for me. I don’t view her as evil in a cartoony way like some people might, but she’s definitely not kind. Making her into a ghost grandma whose entire goal is to help people “move on” misses the point of her character.

  I remember the first time I fought her. I prepped for it. Took a couple hours to buy supplies and get some gear and hire a squad of mercs to help me out, and she still wiped me twice. That mechanic she’s got where she summons illusions of your character from different moments in your playthrough? That alone makes her not only one of the most brutal encounters in Frontiers, but one of the most amazing boss fights in the entire Fracture-verse.

  TalontheHammerer

  Another thing he got wrong and that he needs to change: he was able to get into the House of Seasons without a gilder.

  I know we’ve all been harping on it, but…c’mon. It’s just not possible to get there otherwise. You either use the gilder to buy your way in or you don’t get in.

  SignalLoss

  There might be a semi-plausible explanation for that. He can argue that he’s got another artifact that would let him into the House.

  The Blooming Witch does collect other things than just the gilders. There’s a list floating around somewhere of all the objects you can use to get into the house of Seasons, it’s just that a gilder is the easiest one to get.

  Maybe Z3ke can write that he picked up an object in the offering pile in Harbor Glen. He can list out a bunch of the offerings he grabbed and mention that one of them is from that list. That could close that particular loophole.

  K1LLPR1EST

  The only offering he wrote about that seemed out of place was that doll. But that isn’t on the list. He’d either have to change the doll a bit, or try to come up with some kind of explanation for what all the items that let you access the House have in common. Then he’d need to compare those items to the doll.

  FaultFrame

  If he’s really trying to make this a grounded fic, he needs to avoid stacking all the contradictions he’s getting into.

  He got into the House without a gilder. He met the Blooming Witch and was able to escape the House without either fighting her or trading. At some point, all these missteps with the lore start to feel deliberate. Either he’s writing a grounded fanfic or he’s writing an AU. And if it’s an AU, he needs to tag it as such.

  RainOnAshes

  What if this is a performance art piece? Here me out, he’s not just breaking canon. He’s breaking canon in very strategic ways.

  Story brought up a good point in that he thinks Zeke is a fan. I’m gonna go one further and say that Zeke is writing this fic to make us look at all the plotholes in canon and how we aren’t focusing enough on them as a fandom.

  This forum has seemingly stopped trying to decipher lore in large aspects of the game. It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while, and I’m sure many of you agree with me. We all just focus on the same few things in the game.

  Before Zeke and this fanfic, how many of us asked questions about the Eaters? They’re such a minor thing in the lore and we completely disregard them. But then Zeke comes along and brings them front and center.

  Same thing with the Blooming Witch. Sure, she’s a powerful elite in the Deadlands and everyone has run through the House of Seasons at least once. But outside of guides on the best strat to counter her, how many of us have ever talked about her backstory or why she’s stuck in that House? For that matter, how many of us have ever wondered what the House actually is?

  We’re all proud to be part of a fandom that dissects the lore, but the problem is we’ve grown complacent. We’ve just started accepting gaps in canon as gospel. No one has tried to find new lore in a while. Maybe that’s Zeke’s point with this fic. He writes it to get us all talking.

  10161066

  You’re saying that the entire point of this whole “not a fanfic” thing is to highlight all the inconsistencies we’ve been glossing over for years?

  Yea…not buying it.

  ChiselDusk

  Am I the only one who’s been replaying the House of Seasons mission because of this fanfic?

  Say what you will about Z3ke playing fast and loose with the lore, he’s good at the descriptions. I went into the Winter Wing and just wandered around the place and was like “ooo, it would seem like a storm is slapping you in the face.”

  SignalLoss

  Not buying the whole “performance art” theory, but his writing does show that he knows the world. At least more than a non-fan would.

  And, yea Chisel. I actually booted up Frontiers an hour ago and sent my character into the House to go and check out all the echoes. This fic got me playing Frontiers again so that’s something.

  VeneratedWitchHunter

  No.

  Sorry, but no. This whole “he’s trying to highlight holes in the lore” theory is just damage control done by people who don’t want to admit that the guy hasn’t even read the damn wiki.

  Binary was right. This entire fic went off the rails as soon as he stepped into the House of Seasons. It’s just laziness at this point.

  READ THE DAMN WIKI.

  VeneratedWitchHunter

  And before you all start yelling that I’m being too harsh, let me say that I don’t hate the idea of new people coming into our community and writing fics. I really don’t. But if you’re gonna write in a fandom that is this deep and meticulous, you need to do the research. Bare minimum at least.

  Read the logs. Crosscheck the wiki. Play the games. Don’t just run in with your OC and rewrite a game that people have spent literal years dissecting and then have the gall to claim “it’s what is really happening.”

  You want your fic to be taken seriously? Show the work. Do the research.

  GripLocked

  Venerated’s got a point. There’s a ton of love in this fandom and I think we all do a pretty good job at welcoming new players. The lore is delicate and we take it all seriously, but I don’t think we’re gatekeeping it. Just put in some effort before you start posting. You don’t get to overwrite foundational stuff and get away with it.

  MushroomCleric

  I’m just gonna pop in and say this before everything spirals again: I’m still here for the ride.

  I don’t know if Zeke is a fan or if he’s just some rando. I don’t know if he’s trying to rewrite canon or poke holes in it or shine a light on all the gaps we don’t talk about. All I know is that I’m enjoying the story so far. He’s not just dumping text and then ignoring us. He’s actually interacting with the people who are reading this fic.

  When we gave him advice and told him what he’d find out in Harbor Glen, he wove all that into the fic. He’s trying to bring his audience into the fold. It feels like we’re part of it. Kinda like we’re characters in his story. That’s pretty rare for a fanfic.

  So yea, I’m sticking around. I wanna see where this fic goes.

  ShivSpindle

  [comment deleted by moderator]

  GravemindLegacy (MOD)

  Reminder: personal attacks on other forum members will not be tolerated.

  ShivSpindle, your comment has been removed. Since this is your first offense, this will serve as a warning. Any further infractions will result in your temporary suspension and possible account deletion. Stay on topic, keep it respectful, and please review the Community Guidelines.

  CrushDaddyXx

  OOO. Someone couldn’t handle the discussion. Naughty boy got clapped.

  DrindleSprinkles

  Get’em Grave!

  Mod with the ban hammer. Love to see it.

  FarFieldVanishes

  GUYS

  GUYS

  GUYS

  HOLY. ACTUAL. SHIT

  SOUND THE ALARM

  FarFieldVanishes

  So I caved and booted up Frontiers again for the first time in years. Between Zeke’s fanfic and a bunch of you talking about the House of Seasons, it got stuck in my head and I wanted to see it again for myself.

  For context, I was using a character that was around mid-game and I had to do a shit ton of prep work before I could even think about entering the House of Seasons. I was doing all sorts of gear upgrades and running through some farms and it took me forever to get a gilder drop from an elite. Yes, I know that’s a plothole in Zeke’s version, but shut up for a sec.

  Once I had everything I needed, I went in and tried to retrace his steps as closely as possible. My first stop was the Spring Wing and the echo there. I saw all the overgrowth and the vines and the nature that was covering everything. (Gotta say, his descriptions were good.) After that I made my way to the study he mentioned.

  There’s a busted bookcase that’s wedged under a bunch of rubble over by the north wall of the study. I’d seen it before and never thought twice about it. I mean…why would I? After the first time playing the House I never bothered checking out the echoes because you couldn’t interact with them.

  But I headed over to the bookcase and started poking around. You can’t lock onto it. You can’t target it with spells. You can’t even manually swing a weapon and hit it. There’s no damage ticks or hit sparks or anything like that. I even tried some AOEs and nothing happened.

  Now this is where it gets weird. Zeke didn’t have any gear or weapons or anything, so I figured “hey, let’s be as Zeke as possible.” So I unequipped everything until all I had was my starter clothes. Sword, off-hand, armor, charms, it all went into my pack. I was completely bare. Then I walked up and punched the bookcase.

  AND IT FUCKING BROKE!!

  I FOUND A FUCKING JOURNAL!!!1

  [uploads: springwing_journal1.png, springwing_journal2.png, gps_springloc.png]

  BrokenCompass93

  Wait. Wait. Wait wait wait.

  Is that MODDED?? Tell me it’s modded. Don’t be fucking with us right now.

  FarFieldVanishes

  I swear on all that is holy that this is 100% real. I’ve got a clean install and everything. No mods. Nothing that isn’t vanilla. I’m not even running texture packs.

  I’ve played the House of Seasons before. Like…a lot. Frontiers is my favorite game in the Fracture-verse and I’ve run seven different builds and completed the House in every single one of them. And it never occurred to me to smack a random ass bookcase in some random ass study in the Spring Wing.

  Here’s the thing though. I tried running through it on an older save where my character had already cleared the House. I went back to the House and headed to the Spring Wing and tried punching the bookcase and nothing happened.

  I unequipped everything, requipped it, then unequipped it again. Tried punching and nothing. Tried leaving the House, fast traveling somewhere else and then coming back, but still couldn’t punch the bookcase. The interaction is gone.

  I think it only works on the first visit to the House for your character.

  MushroomCleric

  Okay…uh…what?!?

  FarField, if you’re not screwing with us, this just escalated from fun fanfic drama to possible real lore drop.

  Document EVERYTHING. Every frame, every GPS marker, every object you grab. Hell, take note of the music tracks that play.

  RelicAetherbound

  OOO.

  I was replaying the House too and was just about to pop up to the second floor. Good thing I decided to check if there was anything new on the forums before I did though. Would have had to reload and lose hours of gameplay.

  I’ll turn on my camera and get some screen grabs.

  DeconstructedAntlers

  Have you all noticed that the pics that FarField sent us of the diary have the exact same quote that Zeke used in his fanfic?

  You’re telling me that he actually stumbled across real lore and this is how he’s getting it out?

  He’s a fan and he’s not making up canon. I’m literally shaking right now.

  SignalLoss

  Document everything. Everyone that is doing a runthrough of House of Seasons, turn on your cameras.

  Write out which patch version of the game you’re using, and any mods that you got installed. Then go zone by zone. Take full video capture if you can, not just screenshots. Make sure you include how you approached the bookcase and how many hits it took to clear it and what you had equipped on you.

  You also need to confirm if FarField is right and it’s only a first visit to the House that lets you break the bookcase. Log what you have equipped and when you unequip it.

  I’m gonna start my own walkthrough. If this is replicable, we can probably guide other people through our steps. In fact, I think everyone should try the same thing. Try to retrace Z3ke’s run exactly as he described it.

  And this does confirm something that a bunch of us suspected. He’s been pretending to be all clueless, but the way he just discovered new lore (if it’s replicable) proves that he’s a fan.

  MushroomCleric

  We accept her. We accept her. One of us. One of us.

  DeconstructedAntlers

  Gooble Gobble Gooble Gobble.

  One of us. One of us.