#System Utilities

[lanpartyx]

Introducing Start11 v2, the industry’s most advanced Start menu

[filehulk]

Unlocker

Unlocker is a free software designed to help you unlock and delete files that your Windows system won’t let you remove. It can also terminate processes that contribute to the issue. Additionally, the program allows users to delete index.dat files, modify locked folder statuses, and unload specific DLLs. It has a straightforward interface with a minimal set of functions. What is…

[submastrain]

Emmet's having a rough day--

[carsthatnevermadeitetc]

30 years ago the future looked like this Mitsubishi Gaus Concept, 1995. Presented at the 31 Tokyo Motor Show, the "Global Adventure Utility System" was a cross between an SUV and a minivan with giant gullwing doors. Inside the front seats swivelled to face the rear

[sereneabyyss]

I see so many things where like SY is the sweet innocent one who shows SJ how to love and be loved and fixes him blah blah blah. But oh come on now, this is Peerless Cucumber we're talking about. Number one hater extraordinaire. He is so bitchy. He would not fix SJ if anything he would make him worse.

I need more content that's just SY and SJ standing with their twin fans unfolded, viciously tearing their opponents (the other peak lords) apart with their barbed insults. I need them casting vicious mockery within every battle, whether it be against demon, peak lord, or random civilian who just happened to spill tea on them.

[big-important-nothing]

My hypothetical future Clive design with adult Luke.

Their fashion choices are questionable in equally abhorrent but opposing ways.

[possessable]

and another rough character design ! it's my bedtime i'm so sleepy so i hope to refine this more in the morning but here's one of the other characters , she is an immortal with Alternate Universe Accessing Powers , older sister of our protagonist immortal guy with the Time Warping Powers . she's not present in the story that much because the whole point is that the siblings had a fight and she sealed herself away in a chrysalis (don't worry about it) and now the brother is trying to reunite with her etc. etc. i'll explain more later once i design all the characters

[nordfjording]

there's a new carbon footprint calculator out adjusted for the nordics and its great and all (lists me as about half of the average norwegian) but it also pinpoints how hard it is to make these accurate because the "best tips for how YOU can improve!" are very much along the lines of "take the train!" no trains in my region. "stay at your vacation destinations longer and fly less!" i don't go on vacations. "eat less meat!" i buy 1 pack of salami per month. "buy fewer eggs!" i haven't bought an egg in several years. "take the bus to activities!" i don't have regular activities.

[kariachi]

I've said it before, I say it a lot honestly, but I love the reasonable assumptions we can make about firelizards breeding and social habits based on what we see in primarily DragonsDawn.

Like, we've got the basic 'greens Rise a lot and don't tend their nests while golds Rise more rarely and fiercely tend their nests'. That's great, we love us some behavioral morphs in species. But then you also have to consider what would lead to such a thing, namely that both of these behaviors have to be successful, and successful in comparison to each other, in order for one to not completely take over from the other. Meaning that each option has benefits over the other.

For instance, in years or seasons where there's a large predator population, gold clutches are probably the most successful as they're the best guarded. But if you're dealing with horrible weather, or gods forbid a Pass, the fact green clutches are spread out far and wide means it's more likely one or more will survive, while a gold needs just one bad storm or Fall to wipe her whole year's breeding opportunities off the map.

But like, the most obvious one is a pure numbers game. If you don't invest in your eggs post-laying, that frees you up to get back into laying condition sooner and make more eggs. For instance in emus you'll see a female lay 5+ eggs in a single nest, but then she leaves that business to the male and runs off to eat well and find another guy to foist eggs on, ending up with sometimes even five nests in a season. But if you do invest in your eggs post-laying, you get more security in-so-far as assuring your eggs hatch. In emus the males do that, they get the best of both worlds there, but even more effective is to have multiple individuals looking out for the eggs.

Which is where their eusocial-style behavior comes in! By having the rest of the group dedicated to supporting the gold as she guards and tends her nest, the cost of nest tending is spread out, reducing the load on any one member of the group. The same thing happens with youngcare, which seems to be wholly communal, again reducing the cost for any individual member of the group. But eusocial behaviors are most efficient when members of a group are related, you don't want to waste your life raising young that don't share your genes.

Then you remember that firelizards form mental bonds at birth, bonds that they can break with no issue but that they can and do maintain throughout their lives. Taking this and the last paragraph into account, most likely collections of wild firelizards are mostly formed of sibling groups. Even if your bronze brother didn't catch the gold this year, helping with the clutch improves the odds he'll catch next year, and in the meantime you have plenty of opportunity with the greens.

This also probably plays into the fact they hum for all allied births. A green's nest doesn't get tended, but the young still need feeding at hatching. If you're a male then coming when you get the psychic 'birth here now' signals is an easy choice because there's the real chance these are your brother's offspring and his reproductive success is second only to your own. If you're a female, this nest is likely a sister's, in which case same deal, their success is only second to yours. On either side, having more babies around means a higher chance of any individual baby not being eaten by a predator, increasing the survival odds of your own children.

And then all this likely plays into the various male morphs and the color and size differences between ranks. I've mentioned elsewhere- the various male morphs are likely optimized to chase different female morphs. Blues can keep up with the quicker, more agile greens, bronzes with the slower, longer flying golds, and browns are a 'jack-of-all-trades' rank that doesn't specialize but instead can successfully chase either female morph, just with lower odds than the specialized males.

As far as size differences go, it's again all on the females to start. Golds lay larger clutches and defend them from things like wherries, they need to be larger to fit more eggs, to better defend their nests, and to drive off rival golds. Bronzes have to be large to keep up with the golds when they Rise. Greens specialize in laying more clutches and so likely smaller clutches, so they don't need to get as big and can instead focus on evading predators and even being able to lure predators from a freshly laid clutch without getting snatched up, small size is useful there. Blues are also small because it allows them the speed and maneuverability to chase greens. Presumably the reason they're larger than greens are is due for some reason to their being male, likely related to the complex genetics likely tied to rank*. Browns are in the middle because it allows them enough speed and maneuverability to go for greens, but also enough stamina to try for golds.

Color, meanwhile, is likely a camouflage thing. Blues, greens, and browns are all natural colors, perfect for making it harder for predators to notice you. According to the DLG firelizards come in a variety of shades, I wouldn't be surprised if there was even a degree of midtones between the various ranks. Golds and bronzes, meanwhile, I think are more likely a matter of reflective camouflage. A gold on a nest may be hard to look at in bright light, or at a glance appear to just be a patch of wet sand. If a gold has to leave the nest, more likely the sire would be left to guard it, and similar camouflage would fill a similar role. It might even, for some bronzes, give the impression that the larger gold is still on the nest, deterring predators that don't want to tangle with one. Since the smaller ranks are far less likely to be on a nest, more matte tones to mack dirt, wood, sky, foliage would be most effective.

It's all just fascinating and not quite like anything we have on Earth, though you can make parallels between several different Earth species. Absolutely love it.

[seaglassmelody]

Here's another Veilguard Critique:

I wish there were more opportunities for approval/disapproval, but not in the sense of like "I want to be rude to my companions!"

I like approval/disapproval systems in the sense that they're an additional level of character-building. I think this is something BG3 did very well- small actions, dialogue options, and ways you interact with the world (even when not plot-relevant) trigger minor amounts of approval/disapproval, which very much informed you of the type of people your companions are and what they value.

It doesn't always land- for example, in DAO, Morrigan disapproves if you reject the Tevinter magister's deal to use blood magic to empower you at the cost of the elven slaves he's captured. When you're playing a Tabris Warden, that disapproval strikes a very odd chord because it makes it feel like Morrigan is disapproving of you literally saving your friends, neighbors and FATHER over empowering yourself. Given her line of dialogue beforehand, it's clear she thinks it's interesting from a magical perspective and we know blood magic isn't like. Inherently evil? But the disapproval still feels extra off-putting in that situation.

That's one of the approve/disapprove system shortcomings- it can't always take into account the nuances of player character decisions/backstory and how each player roleplays their MC. This is one of the reasons I think BG3 manages ok- the MASSIVE amount of choices gives it many opportunities to come up, which I think allows for more space for nuance because of the sheer variety of things people are reacting to.

And this is something that I wish Veilguard had a little more of. Not in the same sense as BG3- I don't need my companions having an opinion on every minor decision I make ALL the time or anything- but like. The only thing I can think of off the top of my head that's a major chance for companion disapproval is how you decide to deal with the First Warden. I've run into a few small dialogue options that trigger disapproval (one where you joke about Lucanis during the funeral arrangements with Teia, and one in the Taash-Emmrich squabble) but otherwise there's not a lot in there.

I get why the game is the way that it is- it's a hard line to walk with "are there consequences for too much disapproval" and "we need all of the companions to trust Rook as a leader in order for the story to work" and I think they did the best that they could.

It's not a "the game is overly positive" problem for me so much as it is I wish we got a little more insight into what the companions like and dislike with it. It's an extra dimension of character building that I'm not sure the game utilized to its fullest.

[biblically-accurate-dca]

daycare sign in the basement you will always be famous

[foursaints]

genuinely my inability to do any coursework the entire semester (& then instantly, all of it, within the span of 3 days) (power of stimulants) has to be studied like this can't just be my life

[scorched-cipher]

I’d like to see the Tulpar crew try and live one day in the shoes of the Mouthwash Space Tragedy crew, they’ll cave 2 hours in

Big true. Mental breakdowns all around. Also I think Swansea would have a heart attack looking at all the rusty pipes and stuff that certainly would make anyone with OSHA training nervous.

Swansea looking at all the unsafely-wired generators and how they’re right next to the cockpit, ensuring that if anything happened to them that the cockpit would be completely destroyed, rendering the ship unable to be piloted:

[cinnamoncianna]

so back and forth on this but that chemistry master’s before med school is such a siren’s call rn

[candytuft-whimsing]

Based on previous WIP

Yea it took me to the next morning to decide to finish it

[itshomobirb]

they should let me explode things with my mind. for enrichment.