Wynn's Blog

It's MY blog and I get to choose the topic

2026-05-28T00:00:00Z

Fanfiction ahoy!

I have a confession to make.
My favourite fanfiction on Archive of Our Own is a Genshin fanfiction.
A Neuvillette/Wriothesely fanfiction.

... I haven't even played Genshin up to that point. I think I stopped somewhere in Sumeru.
However! That matters... well a little bit. I am probably missing quite a lot of context that the main story would probably provide and I would get to sit here and go 'oh its just like the thing in the thing'.
This does not deter me in the slightest however.
On the Corpse of Justice is well worth the read. Do not let the unfinished status or last published date scare you.
I cannot claim this is objectively the best fanfic ever written. I can however claim that subjectively I think it's neat.
Disclaimer: I found it and first read it when my mental health was circling the gutter (and thus this translates into 'looking for genshin fanfiction'), and it all kind of took off from there. At some point I think I accounted for 1% of all the views the fic recieved (im so sorry).
Definite recommend, and if you're actually more than passing acquaintances with canon this might wring a little more juice out for you.

My experience with Linux

2026-05-03T00:00:00Z

Or, Some minor OS evangelism

Shock horror, I unveil myself as a member of the penguin legion.

To get the (lack of) nerd credibility out of the way,
Distributions I am currently using:

Fedora
- Workstation
- Bazzite
Alpine (container)
Ubuntu (Server)

Distributions I have used:

Debian
Ubuntu (Desktop)
Linux Mint
OpenSUSE

Why switch at all?

I personally stopped using Windows entirely because of the Windows 10 EOL, but I had been using Linux for some time before that. I prefer systems that work out of the box that require almost no maintenance to continue using - hence the absence of Arch on the list. Arch users are Linus' strongest soldiers but I do not have the time or inclination to do All That. Absolutely fantastic wiki however.
Currently, the Fedora base and Fedora Atomic derivatives are my daily drivers because they just work.

How?

Most distributions have fairly comprehensive installation guides that will walk you through the process of actually getting Linux onto your PC. They will all, invariably, involve using a special method to burn an .iso file to a usb stick. It is important to use this method as copying the .iso normally does not result in a usb stick you can boot from.

Which distribution?

This depends largely on what you need out of it and how close to the bleeding-edge of software you want to be. A computer that will be used to run a web server will probably want different distribution to a computer for an advanced user's personal use. Don't just take my word for it, have a look around!

Some suggestions:

Server:
- Debian (headless)
- Ubuntu Server
Linux desktop beginner:
- Linux Mint
- Ubuntu Desktop
- Zorin OS
Something that's not those and/or Something that isn't Ubuntu Again:
- Have a gander at DistroWatch
  - The Search page is one of the most important pages on the site, make use of it's filters.

Which desktop environment?

Desktop envrionments (DEs) are the largest contributors to how any given install looks and behaves. Which one you end up using depends on 1.) what you are running your system on, and 2.) what you are using it for.
Servers are recommended to use no desktop environment to reduce system overhead (why spend precious memory on desktop when you can spend it on what you're serving?).
For a personal computer, the major factor is available memory and user preference. Most DEs will run just fine on anything with RAM.
Some options:

High Memory - These Desktop Environments use more resources but have more comprehensive features:
- KDE
- Gnome
- Cinnamon
Low Memory - If you're really struggling for memory or prefer your DE to use as little as possible, these do that in exchange for fewer features:
- XFCE
- LXQt

My Personal Experience - How the hell did I get here anyway?:

I have two primary devices (we do not speak of The Box in it's tragic nonfunctionality), which for the purposes of this post I shall call Junk and Not Junk. Junk came into my possession for the purposes of note-taking and sports a sleek 8th gen i5, 8gb of ram and after two years in my possession, nonfunctional keyboard and trackpad. Not-Junk is my gaming PC, with the lofty specs of a RTX 2060, 16gb of ram, coupled with a 9th gen i7.

Junk was obtained second-hand for the express purpose of playing around with Linux and being slightly more functional than the tablet I had been using for note-taking at university.
So the first thing I threw on Junk was a fresh copy of Debian 12 and pretty much used that through the entire academic year.
Debian certainly is functional, sometimes I hit snags with packages, but I'd had specific issues with the battery on Junk and sent it under warranty to be repaired (always get at least a year of warranty when dealing with used devices). Naturally it came back entirely wiped (I had forseen this) but I didn't have a Debian ISO on hand and didn't want to spend the extra half hour flashing a new stick. Thus, Junk was re-christened as an openSUSE device.
When I tell you I wish I had spent the extra half hour downloading and flashing another boot stick.

There is nothing wrong, on the surface-level, with openSUSE. It is, indeed, an extremely functional linux distro.
The kicker with openSUSE was not any one thing, but a thousand little things that just got in my way. Updating the system with zypper would fail on large downloads; because I have notoriously bad internet, thus the package downloads would fail and time-out
This would mean I would have to babysit system upgrades, or pre-download THEN apply the update; and I have very little patience for babysitting a machine when I could be using it instead.
Thusly came the day I downloaded Fedora Workstation.
For Junk, specifically, what has come to be the most comfortable has been Fedora with Xfce as a tradeoff between functionality and memory footprint.

Thusly emboldened by my adventures in not irrevocably breaking Junk (software-wise), I installed Linux Mint on Not Junk.
The end of Windows 10 support was fast approaching, and I had very little interest in 'upgrading' to Windows 11 with... the everything about Windows 11 going around. This installation was a disaster, whether due to graphics driver issues or something else, I could not get what I actually wanted to use Not Junk for to work (starts with f, ends with inal fantasy fourteen). Thus disheartened I returned to Windows 10 for a short time because I am not running down my sub like that.
Now, a casual reader may ask why I didn't test it on Junk. This is because Junk is, well, take a guess why it's dubbed that. Running FFXIV on that would be torturing the poor thing.
And very possibly may have set it alight.

However, I later figured that as Fedora Workstation had worked so well for me on Junk, using it in an immutable form with tweaks specifically for gaming would suit my uses for Not Junk rather well. And save for a few teething issues, I haven't had to do anything with Not Junk and I am still able to play pretty much all my favourite games.
The sole dealbreaker for any installation was the ability to play Final Fantasy XIV, which has been satisfied (though it performs much better in fullscreen nowadays).

Alpine gets to run as a container on Not Junk for the sole purpose of building this website, because sometimes you do just need something that can Install Package™. I love Bazzite but I am not touching rpm-ostree or brew with a barge pole, and not for something this trivial.

"But where does Ubuntu (Server) come into it?"
For that, I have the unique ~~displeasure~~ duty of running the guild Minecraft server. This utilises a cloud server that I barely managed to scrape together, with a custom URL pointing at the server so I don't have to memorise or double-check an IP address when people inevitably type it in wrong.
The majority of the costs come from paying for the URL annually, which still comes in leagues cheaper than the previous (and similar) minecraft hosting services that were explored.
For the low, low cost of my sanity, I now have a minecraft server for (functionally) free! If you are the type to value your mental wellbeing as worth the $5~ a month, then a hosting service will probably suit you better and you will never have to learn how to expose ports or what a docker is.

Wynn recaps -
FFXIV 7.5 MSQ Part 1

2026-05-03T00:00:00Z

Skipped MSQ cutscenes? Can't be bothered to go back and rewatch? Already watched it but just want to read some guy summarising? Look no further! For I have crudely boiled down the events of 7.5 part 1 already!

We begin where we left off in 7.4, studying the macguffin goblet with Shale & Y'shtola. Shale has the machine remove the actual key from the goblet, during which Y'shtola actually Sees the key for the first time, which is depicted as an overwhelming golden light (put a pin in that we'll get back to it).
However we cannot 'ooh' and 'aah' over the key for very long as we are summoned back to the Baldesion Annex in Old Sharlayan as Tataru has arrived and has some very bad news. We return, and Tataru reveals that there has been an invasion of voidsent sighted across the star, with minimal casualties in the nation states of Eorzea. However, Garlemald has a much stronger connection to the void and has been absolutely deluged.
We travel to Garlemald with Krile and G'raha in tow and reunite with the twins, Thancred, and Urianger.
We clear out Dungeon: The Clyteum of voidsent and send the boss voidsent back home with the promise to join the voidsent group lead by Zero. Everyone relaxes for a moment until Urianger, in possession of The Braincell, remembers there is a Giant Voidgate on the moon and thus we should PROBABLY get there as soon as humanly possible.
On the moon the Loporrits are in shambles, and we help Livingway to activate the brands surrounding the crater to prevent weak voidsent from overrunning the moon. However a stronger voidsent could break through, and here we use the key combined with the Azem crystal which forms a shining golden walkway to the Thirteenth that nobody else can see (we can take that pin out now).
We arrive on the Thirteenth's moon just in time to back up Zero and Golbez against the powerful voidsent Enuo who has emerged in order to take advantage of the freshly opened portal.
We confront Enuo in Trial: The Unmaking and win, with Zero and Golbez coming to our aid. Zero turns Enuo into a memoriate crystal to end Enuo's reign for good, and her and Golbez take a moment to discuss what they've been doing. The crystal of Zeromus has been sent to the First to aid in the restoration of darkness there, and they consider mailing Enuo's crystal across too. We stop by Zero's domain to transfer a little more light from the First, which also serves as a beacon for like-minded voidsent to find Zero. The dungeon boss voidsent returns here, and pledges their service to restoring the Thirteenth.
We return to the moon having accidentally caused The Scions to mount a search-and-rescue because we did disappear into thin air, and we finally meet Halmarut, who introduces herself and brings forward Calyx in his new mascot-costume form.
Halmarut tells us that Hydaelyn, as the will of the star, had sustained (consciously or not) the separation between the shards as individual worlds; but courtesy of our little escapades in Endwalker we now have neither Hydaelyn or Zodiark acting as the will of the star, and now the star is starting to merge once again. Halmarut then lays her stake in this: if we do nothing to halt it, then all life on every shard and the source will die in the impending rejoining. Halmarut seeks to avoid this by triggering premature rejoinings of the shards, recruiting individuals across the shards known as 'Winterers' to achive this, and tells us that our plan of outright opposing her aims will just doom everyone.
The Scions reconvene in Mor Dhona, and recall the B-team minus Estinien (who has not answered anyone's calls and has probably put his linkpearl somewhere he can't hear it) to share what we know. Nobody has a solution to Halmarut's dilemma just yet, and Tataru suggests we get a good night's sleep in order to clear our heads.
On the balcony outside, we meet with Calyx. He reveals that his aim is ultimately to save those he can, and that Halmarut and himself will be travelling to the Fourth next in order to oversee the plans of another Winterer. He then reveals that while the Winterers are united in purpose, Calyx holds a personal distate for the methods of the other Winterers and insinuates that our heroism at this point has to be self-serving because there is literally nothing for us to gain here.
If only we had a plan that would preserve the life of the Fourth AND the other reflections...

First post, blog teething.

2026-04-23T00:00:00Z

First attempt at proper blog construction using a frankly esoteric method of using eleventy. Don't ask.

Blog theming is a work in progress.