Dear AU Exchange 2022 Creator Letter

[yellowmagicalgirl]

Dear Creator,

For some of the tags I chose for the exchange, I have added commentary and more specific prompts, as well as possibly which characters I thought would work best with each prompt. These are merely suggestions; feel free to think outside the boxes I have left for you. That being said: just because I haven't singled out an AU for commentary (or I haven't spent as much time talking about a ship) does not mean I'm less interested in it than the other AU's (or ships) I've selected for the exchange. It just means that I don't have any specific ideas.

If you decide to write/draw for Arcane, The Legend of Vox Machina, Ragnarok, RWBY, Star Trek: Picard, or Tales of Arcadia, I have also illustrated things I like in this letter I wrote for the 2022 Fairy Tale Exchange. If you have decided to write/draw for Leverage, Ragnarok, RWBY, or Tales of Arcadia, I also wrote a letter for the 2022 Chocolate Box Exchange that illustrates some things I like.

Whatever you choose to write or draw for me for this exchange, I hope you have fun with it.

General DNW's

• Adult/minor with a large age gap - if they are close enough in age that they could have attended high school together (or they could have if they were both humans in a setting that has high schools) I'm cool with it, but any larger it squicks me.
• Bashing of characters/ships
• Birth/Labor
• Brain/skull trauma
• Break-up fics, especially between the requested pairing. If you need to break up a canon pairing to get them together, then fine, but don't focus on the break-up.
• Cannibalism
• Cheating
• Drug Use (as in, party drugs, smoking, and stuff like that; I'm cool with painkillers and similar medicinal drugs being involved in whump and hurt/comfort.)
• Incest (including adoption/step-family)
• Issues involving hormones/hormonal glands (if you choose to have a trans character taking/wanting to take hormones, please keep it vague. Do not reference any medical issues that could be caused by a hormone imbalance, damage to a hormonal gland, or any similar issues.)
• MRI machines
• Nerve damage
• Neurosurgery
• Non-canonical death of requested character that does not end in the character being resurrected by the end of the fic
• Queerphobia, including aphobia and enbyphobia
• Sexual content of any kind
• Suicide
• Time travel in fandoms that don't already have canon time travel.
• Tumors/cysts/similar medical problems
• Unrequested crossovers
• Unrequested major original characters (if you need to quickly add in an original character with a few lines just to act as a background character/get the requested characters from Point A to Point B, that's one thing, but please don't have the original characters take a major portion of the plot/dialogue)

Fanart-specific DNW

• Gore in fanart (blood is fine, mild injury is fine, but no gore)

Likes

• Angst with a happy ending
• Hurt/comfort
• Aspec character coming out to allo love interest(s) and receiving support from their love interest(s)
• Aspec character coming out to seemingly-allo love interest(s), only for said seemingly-allo love interest(s) to also be aspec
• Proposal/Engagement

Fanart Likes

• Colored lighting
• Multiple light sources
• Glowing Eyes
• Characters dancing together (especially for romantic/queerplatonic ships, but also for cute friendships)
• Flowing ballgowns (if you need inspiration, the vast majority of the fashion tag on my tumblr is ballgowns and other dresses)
• Billowing capes, cloaks, and trenchcoat

Arcane-specific DNW's

• Ableism towards Jinx/Powder. Please portray her as more than "I'm crazy XD". Also, while happy endings where she gets therapy are appreciated, I'd rather her not be given an insta-cure for her mental illness.
• Excessive references to the video game. I have never played League of Legends and don't intend to, so if your plot is dependent on video game references I will not understand it.
• If Jinx is in a romantic relationship, consider it a NOTP for me.

Arcane Waived DNW

• Drug Use. I waive this DNW for canon-typical uses of Shimmer.

Arcane Likes

• Queerplatonic Jayce & Viktor

Arcane Art Likes

• People playing with Jinx's braids/braiding her hair>

All: Arranged marriage to bring peace between two countries/species on the verge of a war

• Suggested relationships: CaitVi, Jayce & Viktor
• This would probably need some tweaking of canon so that Zaun is a separate nation from Piltover before the events of the show (or at least before Act II)

ALL: Bakery | ALL: Café AU | ALL: In-Universe Coffeeshop AU

• Suggested relationship: CaitVi
• Give me all the cupcake puns your heart desires
• For the in-universe prompt, maybe The Last Drop is now a coffeeshop instead of (or in addition to) a bar?

ALL: Canon has licensed therapists

• Suggested relationships: Jinx & Vi, Ekko & Jinx
• To be more specific about the prompt, what if Zaun has licensed therapists? I feel like it could’ve done everyone, but especially Powder, a load of good.

ALL: Fae

• Suggested relationship: CaitVi
• While I don't want any smut, the vibes from the brothel scene (especially when Caitlyn was talking to the masked girl about gardens) gave off these vibes.

ALL: finds out they're betrothed to the heir of a small country when the old ruler dies

• Suggested relationship: CaitVi
• I could see this as the two of them having a whirlwind romance, Vi not realizing that Caitlyn is the heir to House Kirraman and therefore the heir to (one of) the hereditary rulers of Piltover, and then Jinx blowing up the city council before Caitlyn can tell her (or alternatively before Vi can figure out that Caitlyn is one of those Kirramans).

ALL: Gideon the Ninth Necromancer/Cavalier Dynamics

• Suggested relationships: CaitVi, Jinx & Vi, Viktor & Jayce
• Vi and Jayce feel like they’d probably be better as cavaliers, but I will not say no to Viktor, Caitlyn, or Jinx with a sword

ALL: Soulmarks - mark can be the name of your greatest love or your worst enemy

• Suggested relationships: CaitVi, Jinx & Vi, Ekko & Jinx
• For CaitVi, the first thought that comes to mind is that Vi thinks Caitlyn Kirraman (aka the daughter of a Piltover councilor) is supposed to be her worst enemy and it’s the opposite
• For the latter two pairs of soulmates, I could see this going either way. Maybe Jinx really is Vi and/or Ekko’s worst enemy. Maybe, in the end, the powers of love and friendship win and Jinx gets redeemed. Maybe the lines are blurred into a mess.

ALL: Winter Soldier Storyline

• Suggested relationships: Jinx & Vi, Ekko & Jinx, Jayce & Viktor
• For the first two, I could see Jinx as the Winter Soldier with Silco and Sevika taking on the role of Hydra
• For Jayce & Viktor, I don’t play League of Legends so I have no idea what I’m talking about, but I’ve seen theories that Viktor is becoming something called the “Machine Herald”? Maybe that could play a role given the whole mechanical arm thing. Then again, Viktor could also work as the sickly friend who gets Captain America-fied, while Jayce is the friend who was always more physically abled who falls off a train.

 

Dragon Prince DNW’s

• Ableism towards Amaya. Please don’t portray any ableism towards her. Also please don’t make her no longer deaf for the sake of your AU

Dragon Prince Cartoon: Callum is Half Elf

• Suggested relationships: Callum & Ezran & Rayla, Callum & Ezran, Callum/Rayla
• Prior to season 2, I really enjoyed this theory. While I think it’s for the best if this doesn’t become Callum, I would still love to see an au where Callum is half skywing elf. Feel free to make his half-elf traits as easy or as difficult to hide as you want to

ALL: Characters are Magnus Archives Avatars

• I feel like Callum slots pretty well into Vast, Soren into Slaughter, and Claudia into End. Viren I could see as either Desolation or End. I could see Rayla having been raised to become an avatar of the Hunt or Slaughter but being unable to dedicate herself enough to become an avatar of one of these two, mirroring how in canon she’s an assassin who cannot kill.

All: Characters participate in fandom

• Suggested relationship: Amaya/Janai
• I could see the two of them as having been in fandom for decades, and as online friends who each secretly wouldn’t mind meeting IRL but also would never suggest it. However, IRL they’re rivals and don’t think they’d have anything in common until someone leaves their laptop/phone open and on AO3 or something.

ALL: Characters play Dungeons & Dragons

• Suggested relationships: Claudia & Soren, Callum & Ezran & Rayla, Callum & Ezran, Callum/Rayla
• I could see Claudia as a wizard, warlock, or alchemist artificer; Soren as a fighter or paladin, Callum as a wizard, sorcerer, or maybe some weird sort of drawing-or-calligraphy-based bard or artificer; Ezran as a ranger; and Rayla as a rogue or fighter.

ALL: Gideon the Ninth Necromancer/Cavalier Dynamics

• Suggested relationships: Claudia & Soren, Callum/Rayla
• Claudia and Soren fit in easily to a necor/cav dynamic. I think whether or not Rayla’s a cavalier would depend on whether or not elves treat necromancy the way they do dark magic in canon, and if the latter, then whether or not she’s willing to accept and support this from Callum being a necromancer.

ALL: In-universe coffeeshop AU

• Suggested relationships: Claudia & Soren, Claudia & Soren & Viren
• Hot brown morning potion, anyone?

TLOVM-specifc DNW

• Spoilers for the rest of Critical Role, especially the Vox Machina arc. I've tried to get into the actual play many times, but between the large cast, length of episodes, and playstyle the actual play just isn't for me. However, I'd rather avoid spoilers and instead naturally find out what happens through watching the cartoon.

ALL: Characters are Magnus Archives Avatars

• Suggested relationships: Percy & Vox Machina, Keyleth & Pike, Keyleth & Vex, Keyleth/Cassandra
• I could see Keyleth as Desolation or Hunt, Vex as Hunt, Pike as Desolation, and Percy and Vax as Slaughter

ALL: Gideon the Ninth Necromancer/Cavalier Dynamics

• Suggested relationship: Cassandra/Keyleth
• Cassandra’s skill with a rapier screams cavalier. Maybe Keyleth is a necromancer who specializes in animal skeletons?

ALL: Hades and Persephone AU

• Suggested relationship: Cassandra & Keyleth
• What can I say, they have goth x flower princess vibes

ALL: Negotiations about which family member will enter the promised arranged marriage

• Suggested relationships: Cassandra & Percy, Cassandra/Keyleth
• I’m thinking that maybe there’s some sort of arrangement between the de Rolo’s and the Air Ashari, and both Cassandra and Percy are candidates for who will marry Keyleth (with endgame Cassandra/Keyleth, of course). I could see this being an AU where the Briarwoods never attacked Whitestone, an AU where the Briarwoods did escape Whitestone but Percy and Cassandra’s plan for revenge is more political alliances than demonic alliances, an AU where the negotiations go through but Whitestone falls before the marriage, or probably several other ways.

ALL: Soulmarks - Mark is damaged before soulmates meet

• Suggested relationships: Percy & Vox Machina, Cassandra/Keyleth
• For both cases, I could see Dr. Ripley’s experiments possibly damaging the soulmarks of the de Rolo siblings
• For the former, I could also see Orthax being the one who damaged Percy’s soulmark instead of Dr. Ripley. The former would also imply that Vox Machina is one giant BROT7 of platonic soulmates, which I love

ALL: Soulmates - Bond Suddenly Activated If Someone Is Gravely Injured

• Suggested relationships: Cassandra/Keyleth, Percy & Cassandra, Keyleth & Vex’ahalia, Keyleth & Pike
• For the first one: let me say that I started shipping them when Keyleth healed Cassandra – maybe their bond activated around this time as well?
• For the second one: I feel like this could activate when Anders cut Cassandra’s throat, but I also feel like their bond could have activated when Cassandra got shot with those arrows. I feel like this could be doubling Percy’s grief for his sister since she was also his soulmate, or it could make Percy seek out Whitestone sooner since he knows his sister is still alive.
• For the last two: I feel like the bond could activate when Delilah cursed Keyleth with that one spell

ALL: Winter Soldier storyline

• Suggested relationships: Percy & Cassandra, Vox Machina & Percy, Percy & Orthax, Vox Machina & Orthax
• For the first relationship listed, I’m imagining that Cassandra takes on the role of the Winter Soldier with the Briarwoods taking on the role of Hydra
• For the latter relationships, I’m imagining that Percy seemingly dies in the final battle against Delilah, but instead Orthax keeps him alive and now everyone needs to get through to him before Orthax can fully take over for good

Leverage-Specifci DNW: Breanna/older members of Team Leverage

Leverage Waived DNW: If you’re doing a heist fic, I will waive my “Major Original Character(s)” DNW for the client and the mark.

General Leverage Likes

• Post-orignal Leverage Mastermind!Parker: The lack of this is the biggest thing I disliked about Leverage: Redemption. Parker was my favorite character in the original series (though in Redemption she's now tied with Breanna), and I was super excited to see Parker being the mastermind, only to be saddened by how Sophie ended up falling into the mastermind role throughout the season.
• Autistic!Parker
• Fake dating (or engagement/marriage) for any of the requested ships. It just works so well when they could pretend to be a couple as part of a con.

ALL: Character is a foreign princess on the run

• Suggested relationships: Breanna & Sophie & Parker & Elliot & Harry, Sophie & Nate & Hardison & Parker & Eliot, Breanna & Sophie & Hardison & Parker & Elliot & Harry, Sophie/Nate, Tara & Sophie, and Solo: Sophie Devereaux
• TBH, I’m not entirely sure if this isn’t somewhat canon, except Sophie isn’t nowhere near in line for the throne of England. But, in AU land, she could now be the runaway princess for real.

ALL: Coffee Shop AU | ALL: Bakery | ALL: Café AU | ALL: Bartender AU

• Suggested relationships: Breanna & Sophie & Parker & Elliot & Harry, Sophie & Nate & Hardison & Parker & Eliot, Breanna & Sophie & Hardison & Parker & Elliot & Harry, and Hardion/Parker/Elliot
• Let Elliot’s kitchen skills shine (and possibly be very annoyed by Hardison’s excitement to use lasers in the kitchen)

ALL: Changeling AU

• Suggested relationships: Breanna & Sophie & Parker & Elliot & Harry, Sophie & Nate & Hardison & Parker & Eliot, Breanna & Sophie & Hardison & Parker & Elliot & Harry, Hardion/Parker/Elliot, and Solo Parker
• Maybe it’s because the changeling myth is speculated to explain autism, but out of everyone on the cast Parker gives off the most “if anyone’s a changeling, it’s you” vibes

ALL: Dungeons & Dragons setting

• If I were to make the team as D&D 5E classes, I'd class them as follows
  • Nate: Paladin, Oath of Vengeance, maybe a 3-level dip into Rogue to pick up Thief or Mastermind
  • Hardison: Wizard, School of Divination, Scribes, or Illusion
  • Eliot: Fighter, Champion, Battle Master, or Cavalier Archetype (perhaps dressed as Glenn Savage?)
  • Parker: Rogue, Thief or Mastermind Archetype
  • Sophie: Bard, College of Eloquence, Glamour, or Whispers (perhaps dressed as Milana the Poetry Mistress?)
  • Tara: Bard, College of Eloquence or Whispers
  • Harry: Warlock, Fiend Patron
  • Breanna: Artificer... tbh any Specialzation other than Alchemist

ALL: Percy Jackson Half-Bloods AU

While all the requested characters could fit into the Hermes cabin, I can also see Sophie as an Aphrodite kid, Eliot as an Ares kid, and Hardison and Breanna as either Athena or Hephaestus kids

The Locked Tomb-Waived DNW's

• Non-graphic references to Harrow's lobotomy. Any and all other neurosurgery is still a DNW.
• Non-graphic skull trauma for skeletons only

ALL: Bakery | ALL: Café AU | ALL: In-Universe Coffeeshop AU | ALL: Food Critic AU

• My favorite of the three AU’s we saw in HtN was the BARI Star AU, so naturally I’d be interested in a coffee shop/bakery AU. This could be a continuation of the canon AU, an AU of the canon AU, or something entirely different.

ALL: Percy Jackson Half-Bloods AU

• Harrow feels like she could easily be a Hades kid, though if you’d rather not anyone be a Big Three kid then Hecate is probably another good choice. Gideon, meanwhile, feels more like an Apollo kid who spent years thinking she was an Ares kid, if only because John-as-Apollo feels like he’d leave her unclaimed for years at Camp Half-Blood.

ALL: Soulmarks - mark can be the name of your greatest love or your worst enemy

• I could see these two getting matching soulmarks, immediately thinking they’re each other’s worst enemy, and then years later (probably during or post-Canaan House if it’s a canonverse soulmate AU) realizing that nope, they’re in love

ALL: Winter Soldier Storyline

• I feel like the most obvious choice would be Gideon (or maybe Harrow in Gideon’s body) becomes a Winter Soldier-type character working for Blood of Eden and working against the Nine Houses, and poor Harrow (or Gideon in Harrow’s body) is trying to break through the brainwashing

The Magnus Archives

ALL: Café AU

• Suggested relationships: Jonmartin, Martin & Jon & Sasha & Tim
• Martin’s tea would probably have some sort of focus

ALL: Food Critic AU

• Suggested relationships: Jonmartin, Jon & Melanie
• Bring on season 1!Jon’s snark

ALL: Gideon the Ninth Necromancer/Cavalier Dynamics

• Suggested relationships: Jon & Melanie, Melsasha, Daisy & Jon
• Melanie and Daisy both how cavalier vibes

All: Met while captured together

• Suggested relationships: Jonmartin, Martin & Jon & Sasha & Tim, Jon & Daisy, Melanie & Jon
• Given all the times Jon got kidnapped, as well as when he was technically captive of the Buried, there’s a plethora of times for the characters to meet later than they did in canon

ALL: Soulmate AU - both soulmates were convinced their soulmate was dead

• Suggested relationship: Jonmartin
• My suggestion for this AU isn’t so much an AU as a potential post-canon where Somewhere Else, soulmates exist, and Jon and Martin are soulmates. However, Jon and Martin landed in two very different parts of Somewhere Else, and therefore each of them thinks the other is dead

ALL: Winter Soldier Storyline

• Suggested relationships: Timsasha, Tim & Sasha, Melsasha
• I'm imagining that Sasha wasn't killed by the Not Them, but rather transported away and somehow turned into a Winter Soldier devoted to the Stranger. (For the last one, maybe the two of them had a couple conversations before Sasha got taken by the Not Them?)

Ragnarok-specific DNW's

• Isolde/male character
• Heavy focus on Saxa/Magne. I will accept references to their canon sexual interactions, but otherwise keep it to a minimum. I am fine with platonic interactions between the two of them.

Ragnarok Waived DNW

• Incest. I waive this DNW only for cases involving a combination of Fjor, Ran, Saxa, and/or Vidar if the fanwork takes place in a canon/canon-esque universe, since in canon (if I interpreted it correctly) the four Jutuls are not biologically related, but are rather merely pretending to be such. However, I would prefer if you keep any Saxa/other Jutul ships to the background. (Or alternatively, keep it to an evil romantic rival, if the fairy tale you're basing your fanwork off of requires an evil romantic rival.) Incest in universes where the Jutul's are related by blood, or universes where they see each other as siblings or parent/child, is still a DNW. Likewise, incest involving any characters outside of those four is still a DNW.

Ragnarok: Isolde is a Valkyrie

• Suggested relationship: Saxolde
• I’ve written a fic for this AU, and I give you my blessing to make something based on it

ALL: Character comes into an inheritance with strange conditions

• I feel like Vidar could force weird conditions on Laurits’s or Saxa’s inheritance

RWBY-specific DNW's

• References to Penny's suicide. References to her first death are allowed.
• White Rose, Circuit Breaker, and poly ships involving Ruby/Weiss or Jaune/Penny.
• Qrow being Ruby's biological father

ALL: Bakery | ALL: Café AU | ALL: In-universe coffeeshop AU

• Suggested relationships: Ruby/Penny, Ruby/Ilia
• Indulge Ruby’s sweet tooth for me, please

ALL: Character is a foreign princess on the run

• Suggested relationships: Ilia/Blake, Ilia/Blake/Weiss, Ruby/Penny
• I know the first two are basically canon (doubly so in the case of Ilia/Blake/Weiss), but it can’t hurt to fully make it canon. As for the third, maybe Penny is princess with Ironwood as her regent, but she has no power and is running so Ironwood can’t claim he has her approval?

ALL: Fae

• Suggested relationship: Ruby/Penny
• I fully give you my blessing to make something based on my fairy!Penny AU

RWBY: Human Character is a Faunus

• Suggested relationships: Ilia/Blake/Weiss, Ilia/Ruby, Ruby/Penny
• I personally enjoy Weiss as either an artic fox or swan faunus, and Ruby as a wolf faunus

All: Maximum Ride Fusion

• Suggested relationships: Ilia/Blake, Ilia/Blake/Weiss, Ilia/Ruby
• I’m thinking that instead of being a naturally occurring thing, faunus were made by Itex

RWBY: Mercury Black has Silver Eyes | RWBY: Ilia Amitola has Silver Eyes

• Suggested Relationships: Mercury & Emerald, Ilia/Blake, Ilia/Blake/Weiss, Ilia/Ruby
• While it was later confirmed that these two have grey, not silver eyes, I enjoyed all the theories that one or both of these two was a silver eyed warrior

RWBY: Penny Survives Volume 8 as a Robot | RWBY: Penny Survives Volume 8 as a Human

• Suggested relationship: Penny/Ruby
• I’ll accept “Penny survives, but she falls alongside Team RWBY and Jaune”, “Penny survives, and no named characters fell from the bridge”, and “Penny survives and safely gets to Vacuo, later reuniting with Ruby&co. who fell from the bridge”. What I won’t consider filling this prompt is “Penny survives because a third robot body is built after she died on the bridge.”

Star Trek: Picard DNW's

• Agnes being completely lost to merging with the Borg Queen. Even if, to an outsider, the two of them have merged I'd rather if their consciousness's still remain at least partly individual and can interact with each other.

ALL: Ballet Dancer AU | ALL: Ballroom Dance AU

• Maybe it’s Kestra teaching Soji or Raffi teaching Elnor to dance. Or maybe it’s Agnes dancing with the Borg Queen – when it comes to ballet, I’ve imagined them doing the Princess Tutu pas de deux together, while for ballroom dancing if you’re an artist I’d love to see a redraw of this picture from Annie Wersching (Borg Queen from season 2 of Picard)'s twitter

ALL: Character is a foreign princess on the run

• Suggested relationships: Kestra and Soji, Raffi and Elnor
• I feel like respectively to each relationship pair, the princess or prince is Soji or Elnor. (Yes, I know the prompt says princess, but feel free to tweak it for gender.)

ALL: Hades and Persephone AU

• Suggested relationship: Agnes/Borg Queen
• Specifically, I’m thinking Agnes as Persephone and the Borg Queen as Hades

All: Met while captured together | Star Trek Picard: Confederation AU

• For Kestra and Soji, this could be easily justified by neither being (fully) human. For the other two requested relationships, maybe the human was discovered to be a spy with nonhuman sympathies?

ALL: Soulmates - Soulmate Mark Appears At First Touch

• Requested relationship: Agnes/Borg Queen
• You know how the place where the Borg Queen touched Agnes’s cheek glowed while Agnes was being assimilated? Maybe the mark remains because it’s a soulmark.

Tales of Arcadia-Specific DNW's

• I'd rather the entirety of RotT being ignored, especially the kissing-induced pregnancy.
• I have several NOTP's for this series (as listed below), but many of them are canon. With canon NOTP's they can be mentioned but should be kept to the background, if you need a fair; noncanon NOTP's shouldn't be mentioned at all. That being said, if you need a villain for the fairy tale in the form of an evil romantic rival to the requested ship, then the ships marked with a * I will accept as the evil romantic rival. That being said, if you choose to go this route, DO NOT bash people who like my NOTP, and do something in the tags, summary, or beginning author's note to alert readers that this is a fic or fanart for my requested pairing and thus this fic will be portraying my NOTP negatively.
  • Canon NOTP's: stricklake*, dromura, nanavex, and any het ship for Mary
  • Noncanon NOTP's: ajim, kreamus/space camp*, and any het ship for Douxie, Krel, Shannon, or Zoe
• Douxie being explicitly referred to as 919, especially if using the events of Wizards without any changes. I did the math, and, assuming he stopped aging at 19, and that he turned 19 around the time of the amulet's creation, it is impossible for him to be any older than 856 years old, given that the First Battle of Killahead Bridge occured sometime in the late 12th century (between 1180 and 1199) and Trollhunters takes place during the 2016-2017 school year.
• I know that in canon it's described as breaking the laws of physics, but Krel's wormhole does not break the laws of physics. The faster-than-light travel and communcation that Akiridions already had does break the laws of physics. Please avoid stating that Krel broke the laws of physics; it's a pet peeve for me as a physicist.
• Please avoid stating anything about changing the past; according to current physics theories on time travel the past cannot be changed, and Wizards also implies that the past wasn't actually changed despite characters fearing it would be. Claiming that the past can be changed via time travel is a pet peeve for me
• Given how Jim's named after his dad, I don't want Jim to be a trans boy. Other trans headcanons (including trans girl!Jim and AMAB nonbinary!Jim) are fine.

Tales of Arcadia Waived DNW(s)

• Feel free to kill of Morgana in whatever way you want (as long as it doesn't run against my other DNW's, such as the DNW for brain/skull trauma), but I would prefer if her death occured for one of these two reasons
  
  • Claire kills Morgana
  • Morgana sacrifices herself to save Claire

General ToA Likes

• Several of the ships I’ve picked have a character in common (as an example, Claire/Darci and Darci/Toby). Feel free to turn these into an OT3 (to continue the example, Claire/Darci/Toby), but I ask that you keep Mary’s relationships with male characters and Aja and Jim’s relationship either platonic or queerplatonic.
• Because of all the retcons from later portions of the series, my stance on canon is such: Trollhunters and 3Below are canon, Rise of the Titans and the social media of Aaron Waltke other writers/artists is not, and Wizards and the side novels/comics are all on thin ice. If you're ever unsure of which lore should have preference in the fanwork you're making for this round of the AU Exchange, please refer to the above.
• I have written over 100 Tales of Arcadia fics. 40 of them are tagged Alternate Universe, and many others have become AU’s due to canon going a different direction than I expected. You have my blessing to make a fic or art based off of my works, as long as it also fulfills a relationship/AU I requested. I will point out a few specific fanworks that I think would be especially fitting for certain AU’s

ALL: Beauty and the Beast AU

• Suggested relationships: Jlaire, Darby, Steli, Krexie, Ajaire
• For Jlaire and Ajaire, Claire is canonically a monsterfucker, even if I can’t see Jim and Aja being enough of jerks to get themselves cursed by an enchantress
• For Darby, this is definitely more crack-y but perhaps the Mole is Darci’s beast form?
• For Steli, even though Steve Palchuk doesn’t have a canon nonhuman form (and I forget how well-described his book counterpart’s form was), he definitely would have been a jerk to an enchantress in disguise pre-Creepslayerz
• For Krexie, I can see Krel being a jerk to a disguised enchantress… but I can also see Douxie just not taking the Beast seriously if you use Krel’s Akiridion form as his beast form. After all, Krel’s about Douxie’s height and has a baby face.

ALL: Bakery

• Suggested relationship: Jlaire
• Please make as many “Jim Bake Jr” puns as your heart desires

All: Character is secretly not (entirely) human

• Suggested relationships: Jlaire, Darby, Clarci, Clairy
• Prior to season 3, I was a huge fan of the theory that Jim or Toby was part changeling (Jim on his dad’s side, Toby from either or maybe even both parents). Afterwards, I’ve become a fan of changeling!Darci and alien!Mary AU’s

ALL: Characters are Magnus Archives Avatars

• Suggested relationships: Claire & Morgana, Krexie
• I’d match up Claire and Morgana with Dark, Krel with Extinction, and Douxie with Vast. If you would like to know more about my reasoning for the last two, I have written it up here

ToA: Claire Joins Morgana's Side Willingly | ToA: Claire Joins Morgana's Side Semi-Willingly

• Suggested relationship: Claire & Morgana
• As much as I loved the possession arc, prior to season three I was really hoping for Claire to have more of a corruption arc. For the sake of these AU’s, I define “Willingly” as Claire knowing that working with Morgana means betraying her friends, Morgana has made no direct threats to Claire or any of Claire’s loved ones, and that Morgana hasn’t done any magical coercion to make Claire more compliant with Morgana’s demands

ALL: Cyberpunk AU

• Suggested relationships: Jlaire, Ajaire, Krexie
• Aja and Krel both have perfect cyberpunk hacker vibes (Krel more so than Aja, but back when the two of them first showed up in Trollhunters I thought Aja would be a Luna Lovegood-esque hacker as opposed to her canon warrior self)
• Imagine human Jim but with prosthetic horns

ToA: Douxie is Mordred Pendragon

• Suggested relationship: Krexie
• For those who haven’t read up on Arthurian literature, Mordred Pendragon is Arthur’s bastard son who kills him. I feel like there are some ways this could work in the canonverse, but I also was a huge proponent of this theory prior to Wizards airing. My thoughts on it can be found both in this tumblr tag (that, admittedly, also includes OC!Mordred’s) as well as in these fics that have been collected into a series because they all refer to the Mordred!Douxie theory and were started pre-Wizards.

ALL: Fae

• Suggested relationships: All Claire relationships
• I’ve been a huge fan of fairy!Claire AU’s and theories for a long time. I have a tag for it on my tumblr. I’ve also written a few fics for that AU which you can find in the tag.

ToA: Jim Lake Jr. is not the Trollhunter During the Trilogy

• I specify “During the Trilogy” because this is not an excuse to write something set post-RotT in the second timeline where Jim isn’t the trollhunter. Rather, I’m looking for AU’s where Jim isn’t the Trollhunter and no time travel is involved (beyond Wizards and “D’Aja Vu”, I guess). Trollhunter!Toby is welcome, by the way.

ToA: Krel Tarron Merges with Gaylen's Core

• Suggested relationships: Krexie
• I’m a huge fan of the theory that Krel has (or at least was supposed to) have a connection to Gaylen’s core. If you’d like to see my headcanon for how he’d look after merging, please refer to these two pieces of art

All: Met while captured together

• Suggested relationships: Krexie, Ajaire, Jlaire, Morgana & Claire
• The first three could possibly work as them being captured by Area 49-B. If you’re looking for inspiration, I have a krexie AU that’s exactly that (though is also very dark).
• For the latter two relationships, I could see an AU where Jim and Claire were born in the Camelot era and were thrown in the dungeon for being a troll and a wizard. I can also see Morgana pissing off Arthur enough that she, too, got thrown in the dungeon.

All in all, I hope you enjoy making the piece as much as I will enjoy reading it come September.

~YellowMagicalGirl