#Technical Manual

[stra-tek]

Frontier Day 2401, a 400+ page manual detailing the key events of Star Trek: Picard season 3. And it's free!

Link.

[spaceshipsoutthepool]

Fireball xl5 live chat yoooooooo

[japper2]

“Now on the bridge design there is apparently a restroom on the bridge located to the right of the screen if you looked at from the captain’s chair. I suppose that is good in case someone has to go during bridge duty. I myself think you should probably go before your bridge duty but I suppose there are always emergencies. The thing is though I find this hilarious. Imagine they are engaged in a great space battle during which some poor sap who was trying to pass a turd is knocked out of the rest room as ship is rocked from being blasted. The poor guy comes flying out, pants and underwear down, and crashes into the navigation consul! In addition to that the poor crewman’s turd flies around the bridge finally hitting the captain's head! “

[mollysunder]

There is a theory that the way children play serves as a means to simulate and prepare them for the tasks they'll take on as adults. So for all the narrative weight both Jinx and the story give the boxing machine at the arcade it would never have prepared her or the kids to take on Piltover.

What are the two things that Piltovans excel at over their Zaunite counterparts to keep the hierarchy? Weapons and technological development.

When you look at the way Piltovans invest in their children, they don't prioritize hand to hand/melee combat training. Piltovans focus on giving their children experiences in handling firearms, a pursuit that is both leisure sport for the wealthy and a key offense against dissenting Zaunites.

And from the show notes even Jayce, whose family occupies the upper middle class, was sent on educational excursions across Runeterra to explore the world and learn what it had to offer. Without Jayce's education abroad he would never have been inspired to pursue the concept hextech.

It's no wonder that the two figures that are set to be Piltover's biggest threats from Zaun are Jinx and Viktor, becasue they engaged in the same kinds of games and activities as their Piltovan counterparts.

Jinx didn't have an entire forest preserved to help her practice her sharpshooting like the high houses of Piltover, but she did excel in the few games at The Rift (the arcade) that built on her talents. She's the only Zaunite thus far who's long distance offensive is a strong counter to Piltover's forces.

Viktor couldn't travel the world like Jayce did, but for better or worse he managed to stumble into an opportunity to get real opportunity in research not offered to his peers through Singed. It was through that experience that Viktor knew to turn to Singed when he was at the end of his rope, and the consequences of that will be fully realized in season 2.

Ironically, the kind of skill the boxing game champions is only good for keeping other Zaunites in line. Vander's days of fighting Piltover were way behind him when we first met him, and Vi spends season 1 primarily fighting other Zaunites. It's no surprise the Zaunites who embody the old ideal of strength in Zaun that the game portrays, Vi and Vander, are largely at the mercy of Piltover and end up collaborating with them to avoid further harm.

Zaun's future as an independent city-state couldn't happen if they stuck to their old ideals. The people who stand a chance against Piltover are the ones that not only succeed but excel at playing Piltover's games against them.

[oldschoolfrp]

Battle at the Ziggurat -- David Menehan's cover for Prime Directive: The Star Fleet Universe Role-Playing Game, by Task Force Games, designed by Timothy D Olsen and Mark Costello (1993).

Prime Directive obviously is a Star Trek RPG, but one that does not mention "Star Trek" by name. It was published under the same license as Star Fleet Battles, granted to Stephen V Cole's Amarillo Design Bureau in the late 1970s by Franz Joseph, creator of the 1975 Star Fleet Technical Manual.

Like Star Fleet Battles, Prime Directive is focused on military actions. Player characters are members of a Federation Prime Team, an elite special forces unit assigned to the most dangerous missions.

Prime Directive describes a United Federation of Planets, phasers, and Vulcans, but you won't find Kirk or the Enterprise in this book, even in its detailed Star Fleet Universe Timeline. For that you need Star Trek: The Role Playing Game by FASA (1982-89), based directly on the original series, animated series, and first movie.

From Prime Directive:

[cozylittleartblog]

small PSA: if you shop at craft shows or artist alleys, please bring more than apple pay or a virtual card - especially if you're not comfortable entering your card number manually. not all of us have fancy card readers, so please also bring your physical card or cash, even if it's only as backup 👍

[sandreeen]

Tumblr April Fools Boop with Sung Hyunjae & Han Yoojin, inspired by @transsongtaewon's post

[novella-november]

Not to harsh your joy regarding your personal project, (which does sound awesome!) the fact that you keep answering the "can I do fanfic?" questions with "technically yes, but have you considered not doing that?" does not actually *feel* very fanfic friendly. (Especially for anyone who enjoys fanfic as a hobby and isn't also an ofic writer. For example, I personally write almost exclusively character studies that are an explicit reaction to canon; there is no real way to write that sort of thing except as fanfic.)

Which is just a long-winded way of requesting that you maybe consider less of a caveat with the FAQ if you make one, please.

oh that was definitely not my intention, thanks for the ask! I think it was mostly just because I got that same question a few times in a row from various anons within the same time span (including some that were not published publicly), it just happened that I was thinking of my own project(s, plural now) in the last day when I answered those two, for those who want an extra creative challenge.

There's a reason my own original thing has been in my head for the last ten years without me actually writing it while I've written and posted tons of fanfiction, and even now some of my original works are going to be based on Arsene Lupin, so they'd technically be considered fanfiction since they're based on and use an established work for the characters and settings --

--writing completely original fic *is* harder, and that's exactly why I'm *suggesting* (not requiring!) that people consider taking 1 out of short story 4 challenges to look at their work in a new light.

90% of what I read and (until I actually start and finish my original works) 100% of what I've written in my life is fanfic. I have nothing against fanfic, otherwise I woudn't even be interested in creative writing.

But its also not a diss to say "Would you consider looking at your [fanfic] writing from a new angle and try to figure out different ways of going about it?"

Honestly, being able to even consider this option *as a fun extra challenge* is meant to help improve your writing and creative skills; it's not meant as a cheap shot at people who choose to write fanfiction because I my self write and read tons of it,

it's me saying "if you want even more practice at creative writing during these monthly challenges, try branching out a little bit from your comfort zone, you may be pleasantly surprised."

People who write and read fanfiction already have tons of creative experience, and if people like me and many other fanfic writers who one day dream of being published authors, want to broaden our horizons and seek new experiences, one of the easiest exercises is to take something we're planning on writing or already wrote, and see what we would change to make it brand new and standalone--

-- something that not only helps you come up with new ideas, but also will help when it comes time to *edit*, which can be, depending on the length and complexity of your story, can be a complicated process:

whether that means having to delete scenes entirely,

changing what a character says,

altering an aspect of the worldbuilding to fix plot holes

, re-writing your character so they're not overpowered because it was ruining the stakes and tension,

changing the POV of chapters because it was ruining the flow of the story,

etc etc etc.

I love fan fiction.

I love reading it and I love writing it, and for many people who take on monthly writing challenges, it is a way to test ourselves and gear ourselves up and prove to ourselves that not only can we write x amount of words, but it proves to ourselves that we are *capable of creating*, and for many creatives, that ultimately leads to crafting our own unique stories;

if you're already taking place in a monthly writing challenge, why not push the bounds a little bit *if you're so inclined* and test the waters? Especially when you're surrounded by a community who is cheering you on, every step of the way?

Every Nanowrimo I ever won was fanfiction. Heck, even not during November I once did 40k words in two weeks for a fic.

I always stalled out when I tried to write original works;

it is much easier to start small with a single short story than it is to try to write an entirely original novel, and my encouraging people to try baby steps by *experimenting* with one short story out of four in a month is not meant to be a diss against fanfiction,

but an *encouragement to those like me* who were so eager to write original works but floundered when I tried to jump into the deep end and felt disheartened.

Many fanfic authors aspire to write original fics, and thats who that challenge is for, for the people who want to write original works but are too afraid to fully commit; I'll still be writing and posting fanfiction even if I become a published author, even If I just have to come up with a few new pen-names to post them under.

There's absolutely no judgement on anyone who wants to write fanfiction for these challenges, my "caveat" as you say, is only there as encouragement to those like me who are afraid to take the first step, or uncertain of how to even *begin* that first step, not any kind of condemnation.

TL;DR:

I did not mean for my responses on the "can I write fanfiction" to come off as rude or looking down on fanfiction, its meant to be an encouragment to all the people like me who love fanfic and started out writing fanfiction, and dream of writing original works to take the first step, with a community of like-minded people all taking the same challenge.

Like every other challenge aspect of these events, taking a fanfic idea and turning it into an original short story is completely optional and meant as inspiration, just like following prompts for events is not mandatory, and even completing the 30k word goal is not mandatory; the goal for this month is to create, get in the habit of creating, and having fun with it!

[chernobog13]

Hey, Apple! We don't need another version of the iPhone or iPad. Get to work making these things already!

[bumpscosity]

the stanley parable merch is so funny im really gonna drop 20 bucks on a cassette tape which i dont even have a player for that tells you how to set up a copy machine that doesn't exist

[nat-20s]

i see back to school ads and a sense of smug superiority and relief washes over me as I haven't had homework in five years

[whirligig-girl]

I recently received a copy of the Cerritos Crew Handbook. This was obviously my favorite page, so here's a high resolution digital scan. (just kidding)

Image ID: A starfleet PADD tablet with a page showing basic facts about Mellanoid Slime Worms in the style of the species bio pages in the Star Trek: Lower Decks: Crew Handbook. It is heavily annotated with commentary from Mariner, Boimler, Tendi, and Eaurp Guz.

Transcript below cut:

NAME: Mellanoid Slime Worm provisional Federation member. Boimler: I've brought on our Mellanoid officer, Ensign Eaurp Guz, and our resident expert on Mellanoid biology, D'vana Tendi. Guz: full Federation member now, actually.

GREETING: Mellanoid Slime Worms react poorly to friendly insults. At first their righteous indignation might seem like a positive response, but be fair warned! You are not befriending them.

Boimler: Wait, who wrote this? Mariner: Looks like the uh, Zaldan who made first contact with them in the 30s?

TABOOS: Eating in public, uncovered skin. Abducting their children as pets. They do not take kindly to any kind of romantic advances. Guz: ... Tendi: ... Mariner: Girl. IMPORTANT BIOLOGICAL FACTS: Mellanoid Slime Worms are composed of a single amorphous cell which can shapeshift into any number of revolting forms, but which do seem to be willing to take on a bipedal appearance when dealing with aliens. Mellanoid Slimes have no sex, no gender, and reproduce asexually. Not much is known about Mellanoids. Their biology, evolution, and habitat are still a mystery.

Guz, responding to "revolting forms": Wait what? We've always been mostly humanoid! And nonhumanoid forms aren't revolting! They're beautiful! Some of my best friends have nonstandard features. Mariner: no sex? Sick burn. Guz, responding to "no gender": I am a woman. Mellanoids are assigned agender at birth but a growing movement is recognizing that some of us do experience gender. Tendi, responding to the whole section: Mellanoid Slime Worms are comprised mostly of visceral slime with a gelatin skeleton made of skeletal gelatin. Their nervous system is highly redundant and spread throughout the body, with slightly darker regions corresponding to regions of higher nerve density. All sensory cells can feel all senses, so they experience touch, taste, sight, sound, and other senses in their whole bodies, but form sensory organs to concentrate those senses. The biomolecular composition is. Mariner: ok Ada Lovelace, we don't need the footnote to be THAT big. CULTURE: The Mellanoid Slime Worms posses a highly repressed culture, lacking entertainment, interpersonal interactions, and with individuals living in even the richest and most technologically advanced nations on their planet being confined to abject poverty. Their technology is rudimentary, with steam propulsion still in common use on land, and their spaceflight manifests as small capsules incapable of even safely making the journey to the nearest gas giant without assistance. Due to their revolting appearance and archaic technology, they are not worthy of further consideration.

Guz: We don't live in poverty! We just have movie theaters instead of televisions, public kitchens instead of restaurants and dining rooms, libraries instead of personal computers. And Advanced Steam locomotives are cool, ok! They were cheaper to run than diesel engines for many years. Guz: Don't even get me STARTED on the rockets of the time. Oh globs, the things we were able to do with only chemical rockets back in the 30s and 40s! Probe missions to Glerbuh and Rabbit, crewed missions to Omen and Oldsky... and that's before the latest warp drive prototypes. When I was in the astronaut corps, they were working on a warp-2 drive! And that's transwarp-2, so that's like 26% faster than the NX-Beta. Mellanoids pride ourselves in our space exploration, which is why even now we're in the Federation we still have our own space program.

Boimler: Huh. That's it? I thought there'd be more, you know, like, something about the history, maybe native animals, why the taboos are the way they are. But it's just something about steam trains and rocket ships? Guz: No actually I think they pretty much hit the stem bolt on the autoseal. I can't think of a reason a new recruit would need to know more about my species. Besides, Tendi's medical research is pretty thorough. Mariner: Hey I just tried to access the research. Why is it flagged as "Age-Locked"? What kind of "research" are you two doing anyway? Guz: Ohhhh... oh no. Tendi: Ok we can stop talking about this now! Boimler: Eh it's probably fine. I mean, why would a minor using a starfleet database need to know critical biological details about a mellanoid slime worm? What, is some, I dunno, Brikar kid gonna stroll up to Starfleet with a slime worm baby and not know how to take care of it? Mariner: Hah! A big stony alien kid taking care of a gooey lil worm? Like that'll ever happen.

[chropyl]

@jardiiin 's stanley :]

[hedgehog-moss]

[1] `there are often translations available in other languages long before English ones` This is really interesting! I'm familiar with translation in games, where english is often a very early target (a small game might get 0-5 translations, depending on amount of text) because the size of the market is larger.

[2] Do you happen to know why this is different for books? Is it faster to come to a deal about publication rights for some other languages to get started on the translation? Is translation to english harder (at least from French) than to say, Spanish?

The literary translation situation has long been very dismal in the English-speaking world! I don’t know a lot about video games, but are localisations provided by the company that makes the game? Because if that's the case it makes sense that games would get translated into English as a priority. For literary translations which are imported rather than exported, other countries have to decide to translate a foreign author and anglo countries (US, UK and Canada at least) are not very interested in foreign literature. There's something known as the "3% rule" in translation—i.e. about 3% of all published books in the US in any given year are translations. Some recent sources say this figure is outdated and it’s now something like 5% (... god) but note that it encompasses all translations, and most of it is technical translation (instruction manuals, etc). The percentage of novels in translation published in the UK is 5-6% from what I’ve read and it’s lower in the US. In France it's 33%, and that’s not unusually high compared to other European countries.

I don't think it's only because of the global influence of English* and the higher proportion of English speakers in other countries than [insert language] speakers in the US, or poor language education in schools etc, because just consider how many people in the US speak Spanish—I just looked it up and native Spanish speakers in the US represent nearly 2/3rds of the population of France, and yet in 2014 (most recent solid stat I could find) the US published only 67 books translated from Spanish. France with a much smaller % of native Spanish speakers (and literary market) published ~370 translations from Spanish that same year. All languages combined, the total number of new translations published in France in 2014 was 11,859; in Spain it was 19,865; the same year the US published 618 new translations. France translated more books from German alone (754) than the US did from all languages combined, and German is only our 3rd most translated language (and a distant third at that!). The number of new translations I found in the US in 2018 was 632 so the 3% figure is probably still accurate enough.

* When I say it’s not just about the global influence of English—obviously that plays a huge role but I mean there’s also a factor of cultural isolationism at play. If you take English out of the equation there’s still a lot more cultural exchange (in terms of literature) between other countries. Take Olga Tokarczuk’s Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead; it was published in 2009, and (to give a few examples) translated in Swedish 1 year later, in Russian & German 2 years later, in French, Danish & Italian 3 years later, in English 10 years later—only after she won the Nobel. I’m reminded of the former secretary for the Nobel Prize who said Americans “don't really participate in the big dialogue of literature” because they don’t translate enough. I think it's a similar phenomenon as the one described in the "How US culture ate the world" article; the US is more interested in exporting its culture than in importing cultural products from the rest of the world. And sure, anglo culture is spread over most continents so there’s still a diversity of voices that write in English (from India, South Africa, etc etc) but that creates pressure for authors to adopt English as their literary language. The dearth of English translation doesn’t just mean that monolingual anglophones are cut off from a lot of great literature, but also that authors who write in minority languages are cut off from the global visibility an English translation could give them, as it could serve as a bridge to be translated in a lot more languages, and as a way to become eligible for major literary prizes including the Nobel.

Considering that women are less translated than men and represent a minority (about 1/3) of that already abysmally low 3% figure, I find the recent successes of English translations of women writers encouraging—Olga Tokarczuk, Banana Yoshimoto, Han Kang, Valeria Luiselli, Samanta Schweblin, Sayaka Murata, Leila Slimani, of course Elena Ferrante... Hopefully this is a trend that continues & increases! I remember this New Yorker article from years ago, “Do You Have to Win the Nobel Prize to Be Translated?”, in which a US small press owner said “there’s just no demand in this country” (for translated works); but the article acknowledged that it’s also a chicken-and-egg problem. Traditional publishers who have the budget to market them properly don’t release many translations as (among other things) they think US readers are reluctant to read translated foreign literature, and the indie presses who release the lion’s share of translated works (I read it was about 80%) don’t have the budget to promote them so people don’t buy them so the assumption that readers aren’t interested lives on. So maybe social media can slowly change the situation by showing that anglo readers are interested in translated books if they just get to find out about them...

[alphamecha-mkii]

Star Wars: Death Star Owner's Technical Manual - The Tarkin by Chris Trevas

[dead-twink-storage]

In depth gun channels need to go back to being ran by boring ass middle aged Tom Clancy-esque accountants who get excited about serial numbers and manufacture dates of shitty Belgian optic mounts for irrelevant Chilean contract rifles that never got adopted. I am so tired some seeing fucking 33 year old dudes knee deep in faggy groyper memes taking up all the space that used to be educational and informative with videos titled "it's da OP gun from cawadoody BLOPs but irl!!???!!" that are somehow 20 minutes long and manage to offer no insight or history beyond some 2 minute garbage meme fest take that might as well be a retarded Mastodon lyric or ripped off /k/ post.