I'd like to read more physical books (rather than my current ebooks and audiobooks) and spend more time in libraries next year. Maybe make myself a nice comfy reading spot at home. My living situation has made it difficult - it's not convenient to go to libraries, I have no where to store books I buy and I'm so desperate for space I only really have my bed for anywhere comfortable - but I'm hoping to move soon.
I just happened to be in the room when my recruiter got a call from someone looking to fill a vacancy. I have no experience in the industry or anything like it, let alone the qualifications, but have the really basic general skills required. They put me forward anyway. I got the job - it's basically stress free, great people, decent pay, clear advancement track, extremely low employee turn over and the commute is really short.
I once joined a random pick up game online. Had a session zero, vibe seem alright.
On the day we actually go to play it turns out the DM invited a bunch more people and the group was going to be 8 people. Two of these people show up late, don't even have character sheets ready. Game was advertised as queer friendly, one of them I think makes their character a transphobic joke but the guy was so awkward it was hard to make out what he was doing. Vibe is now fucked. One person quits the group on the spot.
I spend like three hours of the least inspired, boring D&D of my life. There is no hint that's it's wrapping up anytime soon. All we've done is spin our wheels trying to grab on to the quest hook, being strung along to talk to the next random generic NPC to inch us closer to actually starting the adventure and had a single combat encounter with one creature where I'm not sure anyone even took any damage.
I have to stress, I think the DM was a nice guy even if he kind of sucked at it. I liked the original group of people.
But I break when he guides us to start shopping. We haven't even started the adventure and it's about to turn into a shopping episode. I panic, I have to leave this fucking moment because I can't take it anymore. I'm desperate for an excuse to leave that wont hurt the DM's self-esteem and ruin the game for anyone who was having fun. The best thing I can come up with?
I disconnect mid sentence and act as if the internet dropped out like a bad sit-com phone gag. This wasn't even well acted, my brain died when I went to disconnect and I just trailed off awkwardly. It's still so painfully embarrassing to remember. Yet I maintain it was worth it.
I hate this shit the most. All the stat tracking bullshit plays right into my neuroses. If I play "for fun", the experience is always hampered by the nagging voice in my head going "this will lower your W/L and you might get judged". Ugh, fuck off.
It's been what, twenty years? Still just being reminded of the theme song makes me relive it in the kind of detail reserved only for experiences that I hold especially dear. Except the show itself never made any impression on me for good or ill. All that is left is this stupid song which has been seared into my brain.
I'd love an umbrella term that included "Sparkling Animation". Couldn't give a fuck where a show is from but there isn't a reliable way to find stuff made outside Japan that isn't "Cartoons" or "Adult Animation". I know some people try to expand the definition of anime but try going on an anime discussion hub and talking about Primal.
Lemmygrad I can't comment on. As far as I can tell they basically just talk politics and I'm not interested in microwaving my brain by obsessing about politics online. Haven't seen them out in any of the threads I've been on.
Hexbear I've enjoyed honestly. They've got nice hobby communities and it's all I'm here for. Quality of discussion is usually pretty good. My take on people hating Hexbear is people have made their personality getting mad about politics and Hexbear don't share their views. People screaming "tankie!" just seemed deranged to me, literally who cares what a handful of nerds in the US think of China. Neither of you have any influence on what China does at all.
I didn't finish the video, so my apologies if this is actually addressed later, but the central thrust that Astarion is not threatening, particularly in terms of sexual violence, and that this is his appeal just seems to be completely false. I couldn't get further because it seemed so detached from reality.
If he dislikes you, he can get aggressive. More so than most of the other companions, even. If you fail the rolls in the scene where he drinks your blood it is quite intentionally using the cinematic language of sexual assault. You beg him to stop, he doesn't. You try to push him off, he pins you down. He kills you. If you have your party resurrect you afterwards, he shows no remorse. He tries to excuse it by saying he lost control and acts like it wasn't a big deal. He is literally introduced putting a knife to your throat.
He is controlling and manipulative. If he likes you, if you do what he wants, you just get the harmless fop. If he doesn't then that mask quickly drops.
So I got the exact opposite read on him. That he was dangerous, potentially sexually violent. He reminds me of a type of guy who uses trauma, even genuine trauma, as a shield for their own abuse. The "I'm just a sad boy" routine.
I've even talked for awhile with a friend who was really into Astarion about it when we played BG3 together. For her, the danger was part of what she liked. That's kind of the norm with vampire romance fiction and I don't think Astarion breaks the mold. The idea that a dangerous monster will change for you.
The Expanse is an interesting example because even knowing there were two authors while reading it I couldn't tell when it shifted from one author to the other. In fact, it had a remarkably consistent style throughout the series. I wonder if they've ever spoken about how they split the labor.
The first season is an extremely well executed version of the classic underdog in sport story. I can see how some people wrote it off here, because it's pretty well trodden ground. But spending a season on it makes Nomad hit so hard with my favorite depiction of the fall from former glory, the toll it takes on your body and regret.
I almost always start digital, either ebook or audiobook then buy a physical copy later if I liked it. It's just a lot less friction for starting something new, no needing to go out of my way to a library/bookstore or wait for something to be delivered. Sometimes I'll just take a gamble on something physical if I'm looking for a new travel book or I'm killing time in a library/bookstore though.
I sometimes tell people to try the network troubleshooter if they're having issues because it's idiot proof. All it'll do is occasionally disable and enable a network adapter which can fix some common problems. If you're even the slightest bit tech savvy though, ignore it.
Startup Repair has been useful when I've actually gone to use it, but I can count on one hand how many times I've gotten to that point.
Technically you can join the pirates without every becoming an undercover cop but they suck anyway and somehow it makes the plot line even stupider. To do this, you need to tell the spook to get fucked. They'll fade to black, tell you in a placeholder text box that you were in jail and a nameless NPC compliments you on "how you handled them" before telling you the german guy has the next quest.
It's all extreme lazy and like... what the fuck is the logic here? How much do they know about what happened? If they just know the spooks dropped you off in jail, you should be radioactive and they should avoid you. If they know for exactly what happened, then how do they not know you're a narc if you go down the other path? Clearly they've got their own spies in there.
Also, you can double cross the cops at the end if you agreed to be a narc. But the pirates capture their flagship and the senior officers. They're going to know you were a narc, how stupid does you character have to be to do this? You're going to get keelhauled.
Triggered a wild flashback for me, The Escapist forums were actually the first time I talked to an openly trans person online. I remember asking an embarrassing number of questions, I'd never even realized it was like an option before then. Was kind of a big moment for me looking back on it.
There is a running theme in culture right now and it’s that large, long-standing franchises are starting to eat shit. They can no longer push the needle. GTA will join them.
Can you define what you mean by this? Still seems to me like culture is dominated by large franchises that have been stagnant for a long time. Especially when it comes to gaming, I can't really think of many examples of them 'eating shit'. Some are critical failures but they're still making an ungodly amount of money. Even Mass Effect Andromeda was supposedly a financial success.
I don't really see a future where GTA 6 flops in any meaningful way. GTA 5 is still wildly profitable and has a massive player base and viewership. People were depressingly desperate for this announcement. It's target audience seems perfect for just shoveling more slop.
Like I wont be into it, and I assume most people here wont be either, but that's been the case for the vast majority of best sellers for like a decade at least.
There are companies that still sell new machines of archaic operating systems for this reason. I'd really recommend anyone in the situation of justletmeremember to look into it, all that stuff could be backed up and given redundancies pretty inexpensively considering the risk.
And yeah, it's really common. There is way more horrifying applications than research that rely on legacy machines. Everyone has heard that nuclear weapons required floppy disks until very recently, but it wasn't some isolated case. Stuff like that is all over the military despite the insane amount of money it steals.
Nah, this isn't comparable to stealing something while the PCs are sleeping or sacking a stronghold offscreen. The OP's example clearly has the player there so they had agency to do something here, but failed to save it. It's never your stronghold until you've successfully defended it.
the cartoon about a neurodivergent elf is pretty chill 👍