#boost vs vanguard

[boostcmg]

[shuttershocky]

Wouldn't I love for Carnelian to get true dmg with her delta module. Ngl, I feel like that's the only thing that can at least salvage her in the age of Lin.

I theorycrafted a delta module to Carn for fun last December where I thought up how to implement true damage into her kit, but after 6 more months of playing around with her and Lin, I don't think simply adding true damage is the way.

This might be a hot take but I don't think true damage would save Carnelian. Unless she were to get Mlynar levels of DPS which is unlikely, even a massive increase to her damage output will not help her be any more relevant vs Lin than she is now.

I believe there are two main reasons for this. Big post about Carnelian's flawed design and delta module theorycrafting below.

1.) DPS is the most replaceable role - In a tower defense game, everyone and their mother does damage. You can be at the very top by providing an absurd amount of damage, but as time goes on the competition only gets more and more fierce, until even monsters (like Ch'en the Holungday) meet even greater abominations (Wisadel) in the end.

You stand out in this game by dealing damage + doing something else. Even the three DPS gods of Mlynar, Surtr, and Chen the Holungday (whose dynamic is bound to change because of Wisadel) offer gimmicks besides raw damage: Mlynar his always active taunt, Chen her AOE slow and DEF down, and Surtr her immortality. There's a reason why Silverash's module buffed his respawn cd reduction apart from just his damage: your unique utility is your strongest selling point.

Anyone who only has damage/stats to offer needs it to be the highest in the game, or else falls on the wayside. For example, I love Siege, mine is E2L90 and M6, but she is undoubtedly the worst of the three 6 star pioneers, when her (very high) damage potential is compared to Saga's survivability talent + SP support, or Flametail's ridiculously high evasion and fast skill cycling. Sure if you're doing Vanguards only, Siege gets the niche of being the tankbuster with her high DPH, but if you don't restrict yourself like that, why not just bring a Guard?

In that same manner, Carnelian's niche is being the damage-focused Phalanx. She's got the highest arts burst among them, but without Beeswax's regen, Mint's shift, or Lin's shield, damage is ALL she offers, and given that being an Arts DPS in Arknights sucks ass when you don't have RES reduction and have to deal with Eyjafjalla/Logos/Goldenglow existing, things look really bad for Carnelian's use cases even if she did have the damage to justify her terrible weaknesses, which she doesn't.

2.) Carnelian's kit is inherently flawed - Carnelian's kit was HG playing around with the Charged mechanic, where you could double charge your skills to get extra effects. Unfortunately, the base charge time for Carnelian's skills are as long as regular skills, but aren't particularly strong without their overcharged effects. This means you always want to overcharge her talents.

This means her talents are trying to compensate for her weaknesses instead of allow her to do something new. Her first talent heals her on skill activation since she's a Phalanx and will be taking damage, but without the constant regen that Beeswax has, this makes Carnelian reliant on her skills cycling fast (which conflicts with Charged doubling her SP costs) or having a medic (making the first talent useless), while her second talent speeds up her SP gain (which is diluted since it only works once the skill is already charged).

This is why boosting her damage isn't going to save her from Lin. She's a DPS unit in a tank class making her meh at both jobs, and actually increasing the damage she deals isn't going to help how she struggles to deal it in the first place due to her Charged mechanic and lack of self-sustain.

_____

So what does Carnelian need in a delta module?

I believe Carn needs a delta module that gives her new features that let her play like a Phalanx. It should increase her damage of course, but needs a feature that lets her be placed as aggressively as Beeswax or Lin. She shouldn't be exactly like Lin, but she should at least have a different take on Lin's playstyle of taking enemy aggro while in the highground tile.

I want to propose a new mechanic. If your units can now place elemental debuffs on enemies just like enemies could place debuffs on them, I propose elemental buffs, where filling the elemental bar will apply powerful buffs on your units, powerful because it's harder to apply than a normal buff.

______

Theorycrafting

Carnelian Delta Module - When this unit takes damage, gain 100 points of Sandstorm. If an enemy dies inside its attack range, gain 200 points of Sandstorm.

Sandstorm - Triggers when 1000 points are accumulated. This unit regenerates 5% max HP/s and +1 SP/s, and deal 400 elemental damage per second. Sandstorm loses 100 points per second and ends once all points are gone, but points can still be gained from enemies dying while Sandstorm is active.

Talent Upgrade at level 3: Meal of Life - Restores 40% Max HP when skill is activated; Effect is doubled when Charged. When Sandstorm is active, slow enemy movement speed within ATK range by 30% and deal 30% of damage dealt as bonus Elemental Damage.

With this buff, even if Carnelian doesn't nullify damage the way Lin does, if she can survive taking 10 hits (a lot!), she gets a 5% Max HP regen buff and a 1 SP/s buff for 10 seconds, which helps her charge her skills faster and survive. She cannot take on powerful attacks the way Lin can, but surviving lots of minor hits helps her sustain without a medic while dealing small amounts of AOE elemental damage.

When activating her skills while Sandstorm is active, the HP regen from Sandstorm should help her survive despite removing her Phalanx buffs, while killing enemies extends the length of Sandstorm by 2 seconds each, allowing her to prey on large crowds like Lin does without cramping Lin's style. The movement speed slow and elemental damage on her talent upgrade should help Carnelian get kills on enemies while keeping them within her attack range to keep Sandstorm going.

This way, Carnelian actually wants enemies to attack her, can survive mild-aggro when she finally activates her skill, and provides utility beyond just damage in the form of her AOE slows (which would make for killer crowd control with her Bind on S2) and her self-sufficiency allowing her to finally be placed very far forward the way Lin does.

[myloveforfanfictonisendless]

Imaging TF characters as card game characters

Ok so after seeing this post

An amazing idea visualising the character as swordman and mages in a card game format.

Has anyone ever imagined how a card game can be placed by using the TF character? No?

Strangely speaking I did.(thought this concept is very much close to card fight vanguard by bushi road)

The manual or concept:

The game will be like an 1 vs 1 card game .

The board will have a (for both sides)

Deck holder

Dropzone

Damagezone (got 6 cards in there and game over)

The players will have 3 circles to represent their chosen card. The center one will be the lead, side 2 will be supporting characters.

Each player will start with the lowest level card(0) ascending to the highest(3) while staking 6 cards in each player's hand which they will draw from the top of their deck after shuffling it.

Character cards and power up cards in each level:

level 0- protoform

Level 1- bumblebee, jazz, Smokescream , Arcee, Arachnid, starscream

Level 2- Rachet, bulkhead, break down, knockout, Orion , Megatronous,

Level 3- Optimus, Megatron, ultra magnus, Predaking, SoundWave, shockwave

Etc etc( these are the few names I know)

Only your lead card can ascend by placing a character card of a higher level than before. Your supporting card will have to be below or on equal level as your lead in each turn.

In your hand you will have various elements as power up cards. Example-

Matrix of leadership

Crown of tyranny

Etc etc

which will help your lead character or supporting character in one way or another in each turn where you will attack each other

Role of side character and damage concept:

Each card will possess an attack power and a defence power. In order to lend and blow you just need to have more attack power than your opponents cards defense power( each blow will be countered as a card dropping in the damagezone if you don't wish to defend it with your character card in hand)

You can get supporting power from your supporting characters which will boose the total attack power.

Each character card will have their own special abilities which can be tactfully used.

Like example:

If you have Cleric Orion the mage as spearhead (his ability is to cast magic spells twice in the same turn) and if you slide the Matrix of leadership under him it will give you a chance to get optimus the king and his trusted scout Bumblebee as to place as supporting character from your deck

As for Megatronous the knight, if you have Orion the mage as a side character in the turn it will increase his power significantly and give him a boost (like that picture) and you will be required to have the crown of tyranny for the Megatron the tyrant and his trusted SIC SoundWave to appear in the field.

Ratchet the royal medic and knockout the cruel healer will be the healing cards which will help you to withdraw a card from your damagezone.

Card style:

The best design for the cards that I can think of would be like this

Done by @botmilf and is an absolute banger to me.

This is just a simple concept I thought after seeing that picture. Though I only scuffed the surface.

What do you think @lets-try-some-writing @spreadwardiard @theblueblazes

[rimeiii]

I'm just gonna go ahead and say it despite my fear of getring backlash:

I am not a fan with how WHB handles the usage of Solomon's Tears.

(Rant post, feel free to skip over, rest under the cut. I just needed to get this out of my chest.)

Thank god they've made a statement about the availability of Tears, but in my opinion, their way of handling this is the equivalent of slapping a bandaid on a gaping wound - it fails to address the root of the issue that's making Tears such a necessary material in the first place, it being several aspects of the game design.

There have been several design choices that confuse me when it comes to WHB, which I would chalk up to WHB being PB's very first game that purely isn't otome. But these design choices often involve game balancing issues, which for me personally directly impacts my enjoyment of the game. And it is these design choices that immediately impact the need for Tears, and why the initial update changing the availability of these Tears sparked so much controversy.

But before that, I have some menial complaints that can be chalked up to me being spoiled by other games. First of all, the large amounts of filler stages, while normal for a gacha, still doesn't make it a fun experience to play through - especially when there are barely any changes to the stage layouts. The only reason why Plants vs Zombies were able to do this is because of the way their stages are set up:

Stages 1, 3, 6, and 8 introduce a new mechanic/zombie

Stages 2, 4, 7, and 9 are harder stages that test what you knew from the previous stage

Stage 5 is a minigame stage

Stage 10 is a conveyor belt boss stage

Every stage gives you a new plant, oftentimes one that is relevant to the new mechanic/zombie at play/about to be introduced (for example, Puff Shrooms upon ending 1-10, a 0 Sun plant with shorter range that helps in earlygame because the next world is nighttime, which means no Sun from the sky)

As for the other TD games in the market? Arknights has different maps for each story stage. So does Path to Nowhere, from what I recall. If there are filler stages, they're very few and far in between. It's why Granblue Fantasy changed their story chapters to no longer have a solo battle at each segment - it hinders the storytelling.

One of the most baffling things in my opinion is the fact that the game has the same upgrade requirements for all units regardless of rarity. This is such a weird design choice for me because in most games, lower rarities are cheaper when it comes to upgrade costs.

For comparison's sake, some screenshots I took for promoting S and A+ ranks.

Belial, an S-rank Marksman, requires 22k Gold, 22k Books, 10 Tears, and 22 Fire Jellybeans.

It's the same for the A+ Healer Morax, save for the elemental jelly beans which is changed to his element, Light. And this is the same amount needed for upgrading L characters as well.

This design choice isn't particularly good, in my opinion. It bottlenecks players and puts them in a mindset position of "upgrading anything apart from Ls and some choice S/A+ ranks is a resource sink". It makes people think that building anything except the strongest of units isn't worth it, which in turn renders the existence of lower rarity/weaker units moot, especially considering the scarcity of the Tears in the first place. Because why would you raise them if you're going to gain more of an advantage from building these high-rarity units? You're going to get a more immediate and significant power boost by upgrading Ls in the first place.

This is even more pronounced in WHB specifically because in most gachas, lower rarity units tend to require less to upgrade. Take a look at the E2 requirements of three Tactician Vanguards in Arknights, in which Elite upgrades are the closest approximation to promotion in WHB.

Beanstalk is the lowest rarity of the archetype at 4*, and her E2 material requirements consist of two types of tier 3 materials (Coagulating Gel and Manganese Ore, both with blue borders), Vanguard Chip Packs, and LMD.

Then you have the 5* Blacknight, whose material requirements now include a tier 4 material (Incandescent Alloy Block, with a pink border) in addition to a tier 3 material (Loxic Kohl), Vanguard Dualchips (crafted from Vanguard Chip Packs and Chip Catalysts, both of which are farmable regardless), and more LMD.

And finally, the 6* Vigil, whose material requirements are now a tier 5 material (Crystalline Electronic Unit, with a yellow border) and a tier 4 material (Optimized Device), more Vanguard Dualchips (4 to Blacknight's 3), and even more LMD.

Yet in other games, I don't mind raising lower rarity units - for several reasons, depending on the game. In Granblue Fantasy (despite my complaints about how quickly the meta evolves and how lim-centric it is), SR units serve as the stopgap for party comps until you can fill out your roster with SSR characters, and some of these SR characters still see use like Lyria. In other games like Fire Emblem Heroes, Memento Mori, and Princess Connect: ReDive, all units gain the potential to hit the highest rarity - I have a Yukari (originally a 1* unit) ready to hit 6* in PriConne, while I have a +9 merged 5* Fallen Takumi (farmable unit at 3*/4* base) in FEH. Arknights' case is more nuanced, where it's partly the same case as GBF, but also the fact that lower rarity units can fit into niches that high rarity units don't fill.

With these other games, I never feel like raising a lower rarity unit is a waste of resources. The costs of uncapping characters in general is negligible in GBF, except for the Eternals and the Evokers - those of which are reasonably time-gated because of their sheer meta impact and how strong they are compared to all other characters. Except for particularly egregious cases like Tsukinogi, every single Arknights Operator has their uses, and they often see use in Integrated Strategies.

And let's not get into the debacle that are skill levels, because of course you need more materials for that. I don't mind having high costs for optimizing skills - Masteries in Arknights works like that, after all. Pictured below is the cost of M3-ing Bagpipe's third skill.

That's right - a tier 5 (Bipolar Nanoflake) and tier 4 (Oriron Block) material. And luckily, you can farm for all of these skill upgrade materials outside of events, crafting the higher tiers as necessary. There is less opportunity cost for me to E2 my 4* and 5* units because I can just farm the materials again anyways - and even then I some Masteries on these units are amazing. S1M3 Myrtle (4*) is probably the best DP generator in the game, while S2M3 Lappland (5*) also helps with her skill uptime.

Then you go back to WHB's skill upgrades, which mind you is also the same cost between rarities, and guess what else you need?

Yep. Tears. A ludicrous amount of it, considering its availability. And let's not even get into the Tears required for the Unholy Board, if that matters to you (and it does, because it also gives buffs for your L units).

This skews the game balance towards the L units even more. Ideally you'd be raising skill levels once your units reach high levels, because everything is percentage based and the lower your base stats, the lower effect these skill levels have on your skills. But that just means you'll still need Tears because, well, you still need to promote. And remember the opportunity cost again, because all rarities have the same skill upgrade cost, further incentivizing you building Ls and ignoring everything else.

It's ridiculous.

And the added nail in the coffin: the reduced rewards that basically halved the amount of Tears you get.

I seriously, genuinely hope they take the availability of Solomon's Tears as well as game balancing into consideration when performing the next balance patch. Because otherwise, I can't see this game being an enjoyable experience for me moving forward.

Unless, this was the intended way the game was designed, in which I just...I have no more words to say.

[rlyehtaxidermist]

arknights thoughts for new players: pioneer vanguards

someone mentioned none of the existing sites were good for this so here. statements of Numerically Derived Opinion contained within. i’m sorry vanilla fans

Pioneers: Block 2 and Give DP Please

Also called “Skill DP” vanguards, Pioneers are largely defensively oriented and produce moderate amounts of DP at regular intervals by using their skills. At higher rarities, they also dabble into being direct combatants or having nuke potential. They’re also the largest class of vanguards, having more operators than every other vanguard subclass combined.

For early players, pioneers are extremely reliable, and generally outclass all other vanguards. Their Block 2 and bulk allow them to hold early enemies while producing enough DP to help set up the board; many early-game squads will want two or three Pioneers to cover lanes, provide DP, and be general-purpose bodies on melee tiles.

While their (with some exceptions) poor offenses mean they can’t handle things on their own for the long term, they don’t really need to - that’s what the DP is for.

Yato: Low Value

Yato doesn’t have a skill, essentially making her less of a vanguard and more of a low-budget Guard. Her best asset is her slightly reduced redeployment time, which allows her to play the part of a very discount Gravel until the Fast-Redeploy tag shows up in Recruitment. Even then, you’ll never use her after Gravel shows up, and Gravel tends to show up quickly - if you spend recruitment tickets as you get them, you’ll likely have Gravel long before you need someone to cover this niche.

Fang: High Value

Likely to be your first vanguard recruit (and a guaranteed reward from TR-4), Fang is a classic low-rarity workhorse with good bulk for her DP cost. She has the standard Pioneer skill of producing a regular amount of DP at a regular interval.

Like all three stars, she’s cheap to raise, and her Lightweight talent helps offset the DP cost increase of her E1 promotion, making her a good candidate for first E1. On the other hand, she’s not a great use of skill summaries early on - she has breakpoints at 4 and 7 which increase her starting SP (and thus the return on her first drop), but SL7 vs SL1 only sees an average DP increase of 20% (6 DP/25 seconds instead of 6 DP/30 seconds).

Vanilla: Low Value

The other three star Pioneer is more of a preview of higher-rarity offensive pioneers, losing some of Fang’s bulk for a higher base ATK. They’re largely interchangeable in most roles, but she loses out to Fang for general Vanguard business because of her weaker DP generation,

Vanilla loses Fang’s automatic DP generation for a manual skill that also boosts her ATK for 10 seconds. Unfortunately, her still-low base ATK means that this still isn’t enough to compensate for her poor bulk versus Fang, and the fact that the skill is on a manual trigger and has a ten-second duration means that - even with frame-perfect activation - the absolute best that her DP generation can be at SL7 is the same as Fang SL1.

As she lacks the powerful nukes of later offensive Pioneers, she’s left languishing compared to Fang.

Courier: High Value

Courier is the anti-Vanilla, trading offense for more defense. Unlike Vanilla, where she is essentially trading a strength for a weakness, he’s trading a weakness for a strength. And since he’s available through the Credit Store, players can pick him up extremely quickly.

His first skill essentially makes him an upgrade to Fang, producing more DP and having better overall stats due to the rarity increase - though Fang’s Lightweight talent can make her preferable in situations where early DP is tight.

Courier’s second skill allows him to play budget Defender. Combined with his talent, his defense when blocking two enemies with S2L7 active is nearly double Fang’s - and comparable to same-rarity Defenders Beagle and Cardigan.

Scavenger: Mid Value

Scavenger is to Vanilla what Courier is to Fang, and has many of the same weaknesses. Her better base stats and Talent - a buff when she is not cardinally adjacent to any allies - helps shore up Vanilla’s poor bulk, and her skills have better numbers, but she still struggles with base stats that aren’t suited for the role her skills want to play.

That said, unlike Vanilla, her ATK does actually get high enough that she can rapidly clear out swarms of enemies, which can help with holding some lanes, and she regains the automatic DP gain that Vanilla lacks, making her capable of playing a more conventional Pioneer role.

Texas: Extreme Value

The problems of offense-oriented pioneers vanish when Texas arrives. Arguably the strongest of any early-game vanguard due to the sheer breadth of her skills, and still competitive with higher-rarity options even for endgame players, she brings solid offenses and access to Arts damage to the archetype. Her only weakness is relatively poor bulk for her rarity, being only slightly better than Fang.

Her talent, granting +1 DP if she’s in the squad, can be thought of as a strictly better version of Fang’s, since the benefit doesn’t care about whether or not Texas is deployed first. Her access to the gamma variation of her first skill also brings a large amount of DP generation, but the real star of the show is her second.

Sword Rain is one of the best skills of any five-star operator, dropping a wide-area, two-hit Arts nuke and two-second stun on all enemies within two tiles of her. This even hits drones, and it still generates DP. The sheer value of Sword Rain makes Texas a viable option for first E1 promotion, and her talent has a similar offset of the cost to Fang’s.

Texas’s main weakness at E1 is her poor bulk by Pioneer standards. While still adequate to handle the vast majority of use cases (and generally comparable to Fang), she will have difficulty holding lanes for long periods without support. Since you’ll want multiple Pioneers, it can be useful to put her on another job and put high-DPS lanes on Courier instead.

Zima: Mid Value

Zima is something of the complement of Texas, having slightly lower offenses and slightly better bulk. Her Talent is functionally identical to Fang’s, reducing her own DP cost by 1. Her first skill is the same as Texas’s, meaning the difference lies in their stats and their second skills.

Zima’s additional bulk, while useful for a conventional Pioneer role, puts her in an awkward spot at high rarities. Courier can out-tank her, and while she’s bulkier than Texas, Texas is still bulky enough to handle their archetype’s early-game laneholding niche.

The real problem is the gulf between their second skills. Zima’s second skill, Ursus’s Roar, gives a buff to the ATK and DEF of all of your Vanguards, as well as gaining an additional DP every time they defeat an enemy. The value of this skill depends heavily on how much your Vanguards are defeating enemies on their own - which isn’t very often in the early game.

Zima does become more valuable at E2, where her talent is improved to decrease every Vanguard’s DP cost, playing more into her Vanguard buffing niche. And of course, her buffs become more valuable as she has more powerful Vanguard teammates. Both of these things are unlikely to be reliable in the early game, though, so raising Zima can take a back seat to cheaper or stronger competitors.

Chiave: Mid Value

Chiave is basically Discount Texas. He trades Texas’s two-hit stun for a stronger single-hit attack with a RES debuff, and slightly more DP. While his ATK is (slightly) higher, his bulk is (slightly) lower. His talent is meant to provide synergy with the robot operators, but all of them are situational at best, and are unlikely to be fully developed in a new player’s roster.

Because of how Arts damage is calculated, a single attack with a high attack multiplier does not do any more damage than two attacks with half the attack multiplier, meaning his effective damage multiplier is only 10% higher than Texas’s. The RES debuff is also situational at best, since it will expire long before he can use the nuke again, and enemies with high RES are uncommon in early stages.

Still, Discount Texas is still A Decent Approximation of Texas, and while he’s expensive to raise, he offers a lot of the benefits to an early-game party. But the lack of a stun hurts, a lot.

Siege: High Value

Siege is a Vanguard who is also a Guard. While her multitasking abilities tend to see her ranked lower on tier lists, her variety of skills and solid base stats make her a valuable tool for smaller rosters. Her damage output allows her to hold many lanes without further DPS support, and the area-of-effect damage on her S2 makes her very capable of handling hordes.

Her talent provides a party-wide buff to vanguards, which is pretty small but helps her play out her role well. Once E2 becomes available, she is a strong early promotion candidate, as her second talent makes her second skill’s anti-horde power skyrocket. Her third skill, however, is more situational and produces no DP, essentially turning her from a Vanguard into a slow but hard-hitting Guard; the higher cost of raising six stars means she’s probably not a better early E2 than Texas.

Saga: High Value

Saga is an interesting mix of DPS and party support. Her Talent leaves enemies alive for a few seconds after she defeats them, and grants SP to other operators who kill them. SP support is hard to come by, and in levels with large hordes of enemies, Saga is a particularly strong source of it.

Her second skill is one of the most spammable in the game, dealing damage to a plus-shaped area centred on herself and killing any enemies her talent might’ve otherwise spared. As it can store multiple charges (similar to Siege’s S2) but is manually activated, this allows her to rapidly spam down hordes; the multiple charges also eliminates the usual use-it-or-lose-it problem with manually activated DP skills, as no DP is lost as long as it is used before reaching full charge.

Flametail: High Value

Flametail is in many ways comparable to Texas, also having an AOE stun at E1, but her early-game value mostly comes from her first skill, which produces comparable DP to other auto-charge skills, but also grants her a guaranteed dodge on the next attack.

Most of her value comes from her extremely powerful dodge buffs and burst damage at E2, which require considerable investment and are not very useful for early players. Her S2 is also directly comparable to Texas’s, dealing physical damage and providing nearby allies with a dodge bonus instead of Texas’s Arts stun. However, she retains a fair bit of value in her S1 due to the guaranteed dodge - which, with her E1 talent, also gives her a single-use double attack, increasing both her DPS and effective bulk.

While as a six-star operator she is expensive to raise, she is an extremely solid long-term investment (being arguably the strongest Pioneer for endgame players), and she lacks many of the weaknesses Chiave has compared to Texas.

[callofdutygame24]

Vanguard Campaign: Top-Tier Action and Elite Allies

Call of Duty: Vanguard, made by Sledgehammer Games and dropped by Activision, is the latest throwback after Modern Warfare, following Cold War's lead. If you’re looking to buy Xbox games, this one is a must-have for fans of the series. It's got the classic vibes: campaign, multiplayer, and zombies. I tried it out on the PS5 and OMG, the game is fire. The campaign has you rolling with a squad of top-tier allies as they snatch some super top-secret Nazi docs that even the Nazis are hiding from each other—talk about secretive! I’ve played a ton of solo FPS campaigns, and this one’s definitely top-tier. Even though folks might be tired of the whole D-Day grind, this one really stands out. The characters are dope, the graphics are straight-up gorgeous, and the action's paced just right with some chill moments thrown in. You get to switch between the elite soldiers, each with their own special skills that come into play during the mission.

Customizable Combat Pacing: Chill to Chaos at Your Fingertips

I was really wondering if the gunplay in Vanguard would vibe more with Modern Warfare or Cold War, and it turns out it’s a whole new vibe. If you’re planning to buy PS5 games, Vanguard’s distinctive approach to gunplay might make it a refreshing choice compared to the previous titles. I’m down with Modern Warfare, and Cold War grew on me after a bit, but Vanguard’s gunplay is honestly top-notch. Cold War’s was way too bouncy, like your gun was on a wild ride and no matter how much I tweaked the sensitivity, it felt kinda…loose. Modern Warfare was the opposite, with the guns feeling kinda sluggish and heavy. Vanguard hits that sweet spot. You can feel the weight of the gun, but your aim is way steadier. Is it super realistic? Nah, but it’s mad fun, and isn’t that what matters? Recoil isn’t super intense, but it does ramp up with different guns and optics, though it’s still way more controlled than Cold War. The modes are pretty standard: Team Deathmatch, Domination, Kill Confirmed, Search and Destroy, Free-For-All, and Hardpoint. But there’s this new mode called Patrol, which is like Hardpoint but with a constantly moving circle that teams have to fight over. It’s pretty chill at first but can get hella intense. Also, you’ve got different combat pacing options: Tactical for that slow-burn strategy, Assault for a balanced game, and Blitz for pure chaos and bullet hell. You can pick your fave or switch it up from match to match. I’m loving the ability to customize my gameplay experience.

Weapon Imbalance and Custom Loadouts: OP Guns and Personalized Perks

Vanguard’s operator setup is a bit of a shake-up from the usual. In past games, you’d have the classic good guys vs. bad guys setup, which always felt like it was really about the cool characters vs. the boring ones. You’d pick an operator from each faction depending on your side, making it easier to spot enemies. Vanguard switches it up with a more complex system. Now, there are four operator classes: Hellhounds, Shadow, Barbarian, and Sentinel, each with three operators. Some of these operators and their skins are locked behind challenges, so there’s a lot of grinding involved. You can also unlock quips, finishing moves, highlight intros, and MVP highlights. At the end of each match, the top play gets showcased, and then you vote for the team MVP. Voting and winning MVP rack up XP, which adds a fun twist. The guns feel great, but right now, some options like the MP-40 and STG44 seem a bit OP. The STG44 is a starting weapon depending on your class, but it's still one of the better guns. Personally, I’m rocking the MP-40 with a G16 2.5x optic, No. 3 rifle brake, VDD 285mm shrouded barrel, VDD 34m padded stock, grooved grip, and 8mm Kurz 32 round magazine. It’s got a nice boost in firepower and accuracy, though the smaller magazine can slow you down a bit.

Vanguard: The Ultimate CoD Experience with Stunning Graphics and Balanced Gameplay

Vanguard’s killstreaks got a WWII makeover, with some cool twists like a flamethrower version of the Juggernaut and attack and guard dogs. The guard dogs are a nice touch—they run around on their own and only attack the enemy, which is clutch in hardcore mode. Unlike other killstreaks that might accidentally take out your own team, the attack dogs are focused attacks that keep your squad safe. Honestly, I think Vanguard might be one of the best CoD games I’ve played. After sinking hundreds of hours into both Modern Warfare and Black Ops Cold War, Vanguard is probably my fave of the three. It takes all the best bits from the previous games and nails the balance. I had a few latency hiccups, but I’m pretty sure that was on my end, not the servers. If you vibed with Modern Warfare but weren’t into Cold War, or if you dug Cold War but weren’t feeling Modern Warfare, Vanguard’s got you covered. It looks sick, sounds amazing, and feels awesome. Vanguard could very well be the top CoD game ever, with its jaw-dropping graphics on the new systems and perfectly balanced gunplay. It brings a fresh take on the WWII and D-Day scenes, making both the solo campaign and multiplayer a blast.

[carnelianwings]

Played D-Ezel today for this week’s shop tournament (we did another fun/casual deck day), went 2-1 (won vs G4 Kairi and Zorga Masques, lost vs Unica Masques), and boy that felt like a huge shift from Majesty Lord Blaster. Sure the deck is fun, the Superior Ride up is also fun, but the deck feels like it’s missing ~something.

Cut for me rambling about Ezel, because him and I have always been on slightly awkward terms ever since I played him in Zero (vs me with Liberators, both Break Ride and Legion, we got along great). It’s like I’ve always had to actively try to make him work for me vs all of Aichi’s Blaster decks that I just pick up and immediately understand the flow of the deck without really needing to try.

EDIT: Gave it a bit more thought, realized what was missing - there’s no pressure in the Vanguard column. Nothing to help you get over a defensive, even if you boost - your G1s are 8ks, unless you somehow made room for Wayward Therapy Angel or Languedechat. I had one Vanguard swing effectively fizzle because I didn’t see Persona Ride and my opponent was like “I won’t have enough to guard the rear guard columns if I guarded Vanguard, so no guard, 1 to pass it is” after checking a defensive, and I didn’t check a trigger. So yeah definitely need the promo (for the red text skill) and/or Platina/Grand Ezel Scissors to release so we can get something for Vanguard swing, because Ezel doesn’t gain power off of the units he Superior Calls from deck off of his skill anymore, and that means a single defensive really just shuts down your entire turn if you don’t manage to check a trigger or Persona Ride.

Functionally, the deck is straightforward and plays as you’d expect for a Blond Ezel deck - Superior Ride up to put on a lot of pressure, push with a rush until your opponent Rides into G3, and then it’s full on rapid fire 5-attacks/per turn (as long as you have the CB and you should because it’s only 1 CB for the skill and you have a reasonably accessible Counter Charger in Dindrane). You don’t really deck thin though because Dindrane puts the rear guard in front of her to bottom deck to restand, but at the same time this means you don’t run the risk of decking out super fast because you’re too busy Superior Calling off Top 3-7 to multi-attack. She’s definitely the MVP of the deck as she opens up your RCs so you’re not overcalling off of Ezel’s on attack skill while also adding power to both sets of rear guard swings. (Plus she’s put any rear guard back into deck so if you really want to you can put back triggers too.)

The main problems I see with the deck is that it feels the same way it did as I when I played it in Vanguard Zero - you do the Superior Ride, you’re on G3, and then it feels like a bit of a Now What. Because the deck just sort of … does what it does, you just swing for 5 turns every turn (6 if you run Red Cray Elemental OT and drive check it) and if that means you push your opponent to 6, great, and if not, well, you sent those cards back to deck and now it’s time to Struggle Guard And Pray You See Another Turn To Do It All Over Again. The numbers are respectable (8k for Dindrane plus usually 10-13k for the rear guard in front depending on what you high rolled into sans Persona Ride, 15k if it’s Beaumains), you definitely get to Superior Call a lot more from deck to field, but it just feels like after you (Superior) Ride into G3 there’s a bit of a lull until your opponent catches up to you. It’s really easy to set up the optimal board of Ezel on VC and a Dindrane in back row of both flanking rear guard columns (you call from top 3-7 enough to make it happen unless you just get super unlucky), but it feels like there’s something missing to give the deck a little extra oomph for a winning turn, because otherwise your turn is just … Ezel start of Ride phase skill, Persona Ride (if you have it), play the Order (if you have it), go into Battle Phase, attack with both rear columns (using Dindrane to return your front row back into deck to restand), Ezel attacks and uses skill, Superior Call 2 out of Top 7, swing with both rear guard columns again (and have Dindrane send them back, because for whatever reason, she’s not a 1/Turn), rinse and repeat until you land lethal or you lose (because you don’t have that much draw power - or at least, I didn’t because I somehow see Silver Fang Witch really rarely off of my Top 3-7).

It’s like Chronojet (because you do have something of a resource loop with Dindrane/Silver Fang Witch/Sajess and/or Drilling Angel) but less reliable, because you don’t actually get to automatically see Dindrane/Silver Fang Witch consistently to keep the Soul/CB/CC loop going, so you just awkwardly loop those cards and pray. Kind of. I will say that Athaltus (the promo that just released in Japan) does fix some of the deck’s problems, especially the part where if you don’t Persona Ride you don’t really get high enough numbers for Turn 4+ and also helps you “save” your Dindranes from decks that can target back row (I did run into this issue vs Unica Masques when I had to Soul Charge both of them). But the deck just feels very … lackluster? Despite being a guaranteed 5 attack deck with ways to avoid deck out (and the ability to loop your pieces)? Especially with the state of the current meta, I feel like just “Oh I get to reset both rear guard columns” isn’t really enough to put on extra pressure for game, and if we got something like Unite In All But Name it would actually help the deck give it that extra push for more pressure late game. Like maybe if we got Platina Ezel in a future Encounter/Cray Cross Epic set, that’ll be what pushes it into “feels complete”.

In comparison, Majesty Lord Blaster is a 4 attack deck with solid pressure across all 3 columns thanks to Emmeline and Cordiela - Emmeline basically gives both of the boosted rear guard swings Bavsargra-level power, so you can poke with an unboosted attack (I like using Blaster Dark for this), and then force either a PG or a ton of shield value out of your opponent with the Vanguard swing (23k/33k, 2 crit, triple drive), and then swing again with Bavsargra-tier numbers for the follow up rear guard attacks (or more if you did a double Emmeline column - I’ve had guys at locals go “Damn Emmeline columns are scary” after facing my Majesty Lord Blaster deck). And I feel like that’s what’s missing from Ezel right now - the ability to put extra pressure on my opponent via Vanguard attack, and having enough ways to gain power late game (passively or otherwise) to give my deck the push for game (or at least make my opponent drop more cards from hand to guard).

I will say this for Ezel though - at least it’s better than how Majesty Lord Blaster was at release? That was so much praying for promos (that we did eventually get) to make it good.

[swaps55]

Mass Effect 3 Soldier Guide

Other Guides: Guide to Basic Infiltrating | Shield Gate and YOU | Adept Guide | Sentinel Guide

When playing on higher difficulties like Insanity, understanding how to effectively build Shepard can dramatically improve your experience, and a well-built Shepard can synergize with any of your squadmates. 

What's awesome about Mass Effect 3 combat is that there isn't a single best way to build Shepard. All the classes can be incredibly fun, and you can play them all a variety of different ways. But because there are a lot of under-the-hood mechanics that the average player doesn't know (including bugged skill trees), knowing how to spec Shepard to do what you want to do isn't always obvious. And now that ME:LE has added in most of the DLC/multiplayer weapons, there are a lot of guns out there people aren't familiar with that are incredible assets to various playstyles.

SO, Real Life Romance Option and I put together this build guide for the Soldier. Keep in mind that Soldiers are different from most classes in that they focus almost exclusively on guns. While Vanguards are technically a combat class, they mostly play like an aggressive adept. Likewise, infiltrators revolve around sniper rifles vs. pure gunplay. The soldier, however, is not a power kit.

A Soldier Shepard is very good at driving enemies to ruin with quite literal gunfire. The key is building your ammo powers to complement your weapons and using Adrenaline Rush to make Shepard incredible at just about every facet of combat. While you can and should use any type of gun you want, I’d recommend staying away from carrying five guns at a time, and instead focus on a couple of particularly good choices. Loadout suggestions are included below, and if you want suggestions for other weapon that synergize well, just ask!

THE BUILD

Shepard has 8 skill trees + a Bonus Power. At Rank 60, you can max out 8 skills and have enough points leftover to take the 9th to level 4. For this build, I recommend only taking Concussive Shot to rank 4, and maxing everything else. 

Prioritize speccing Incendiary Ammo, Adrenaline Rush, and Combat Mastery before everything else. There isn’t a problem that copious amounts of fiery bullets won’t solve, and Combat Mastery makes all of that better. Just make sure you turn on incendiary ammo at the beginning of the mission.

Breakdown under the cut! 

Adrenaline Rush: Aka, “hang on, one of these bullets has your name on it and I’m going to keep firing until I find it.”

Oh, Rush. This is the power for soldiers. It’s what’s unique from the other two combat classes, and does so many things to every aspect of combat. Once you go into Rush you immediately get slow motion, which means you’re time hacking to be faster and thus better than everyone else in the room. You get a 50-75% damage bonus on all your guns, extra shields, potentially extra melee damage, and to top if off, a full clip of ammo slapped into your current gun! “A free reload is kinda boring,” you might say to yourself, but in response I say, two-shot Claymore. So, Rush gives you full ammo and shields to start putting those new, more damaging bullets downrange, and the time dilation gives you the accuracy and recoil reduction to stay on target. This turns your favorite gun into a dream to handle. Every aspect you love about it is just better now for you the player. While Marksman makes it faster and more accurate, Rush makes you more accurate by eliminating most of the recoil.

Rank 4: Hardening vs. Dilation and Damage: You want Dilation & Damage, to get that magnificent 25% bonus weapon damage.

Rank 5: Duration vs. Melee Damage. Choose Duration if you’re using a slow-firing weapon. Otherwise you’ll want Melee Damage, and not because we’re hitting things, but because Duration means using Rush less often, and we want free shields and free reload more often.

Rank 6: Shield Boost vs. Power Use. Remember: you are not a power class. The only choice here is shields. This is especially great since it will give you shields even if you’re taking damage. Also, the only offensive powers you have are Concussive Shot and a potential bonus power. And Concussive shot is…well, see below.

Concussive Shot: We get this last, as it’s mostly a throwaway power. Every time you use it, you’re not using RUSH and that’s SAD. If you want to spam a power all day (which is valid), there are five other classes that do that better.

Rank 4: Take Force and Damage.

Frag Grenade: Grenades are handy in an emergency, and as they run off a grenade pool and not a cooldown, they don’t interfere with Rush!  

Rank 4: Damage vs. Radius. Both are great here. If you don’t have a rapid fire weapon or aren’t the best throw, take radius. Otherwise, take damage.

Rank 5: Max Grenades vs. Bleed Damage. Both are good. Max grenades is fun, but bleed damage is better. Do keep in mind it doesn’t work on geth, because they don’t have blood.

Rank 6: Armor Piercing vs. Shield Overload. Shields. If you are using a piercing mod (you should be using a piercing mod), most guns are amazing at armor damage already, and you have the bestest, most biggest guns as the Soldier.

Incendiary Ammo: I don’t want to set the world on fire

Incendiary ammo might be one of the most brokenly overpowered skills in the game. The explosive evolution adds a flat damage value vs. a percentage on every other shot, which is insane. On rapid fire weapons that do less damage per shot, like the Tempest or the Typhoon, you're basically doubling the amount of damage you're doing. Add the area of effect you get with the explosion? You're now inflicting this chaos on anyone else who’s nearby. Are you using a piercing mod (the answer should be yes)? You now have a shot at another roll for another explosion, because the damage call can pass through the armored target and torment the cannon fodder behind it. A piercing mod reduces the damage on your bullet, but not the explosion. This is super insane on shotguns, because you get a shot at the extra damage roll per pellet, not per shot. Shotgun blasts have multiple pellets per shot.

Have I mentioned that this is affected by increases in power damage? Any power damage increases you take in Assault Mastery make incendiary ammo better.

Rank 4 – Damage vs. Squad Bonus. Choose damage. To hell with your squad. I mean, your squad is amazing. But trust me, you want to be selfish with incendiary ammo. You can do so much more with it than your squad can.

Rank 5 – Ammo Capacity vs. Headshot Damage. Are you handy with headshots? Take Headshot damage. Would you rather have more ammo capacity? Take Ammo Capacity. Whatever makes you happy.

Rank 6 – Damage vs. Explosive Burst. Always take explosive burst. There is no universe in which you want anything other than explosive burst.

Disruptor Ammo: AKA, “Oh no, I’m fighting Geth.” (If you forget to turn off fire ammo when fighting geth, you’ll still be fine.)

Rank 4 – Damage vs. Squad Bonus: Damage. I don’t like to share. However! Life hack: you can spec for squad ammo here, turn it on at the beginning of the mission for your team-mates without ammo powers of their own, and then turn on fire bullets for just you. Then you get the best of both worlds! Personally, this is how I run the two. It’s not optimal, but it is really convenient.

Rank 5 – Ammo Capacity vs. Headshots. Choose either, but mirroring what you chose on fire ammo is a good idea.

Rank 6 – Damage vs. Stun. Look, we’re already giving up explosions. If you take stun instead, incendiary ammo actually does more damage to shields because it’s that incredible. Stunning is helpful and cool, but a dead enemy doesn’t shoot back either.

Cryo Ammo: Hard skip. You already have two great ammo powers. Don’t need to waste points on a, frankly underpowered, third option. Easily your worst power. But DEBUFFS, you say? The best debuff is killing the other guy.

Combat Mastery: AKA, “I’m going to stab you. With bullets.”

Rank 4 –Damage vs. Influence & Duration. Duration can be nice for Rush, but weapon damage makes your guns better and power damage makes your ammo better which makes your guns better twice.

Rank 5 – Squad Bonus vs. Headshots. I DON’T LIKE TO SHARE. Helping your squad is nice and all, but they shoot the walls sometimes.

Rank 6 – Weight Capacity vs. Weapon Master. I mean, you could lift and carry a platoon’s worth of guns, but then you wouldn’t be a master of battle. Really though, getting weapon damage makes your guns better, and that 40% makes your ammo better, which makes your guns better twice. AGAIN! Essentially, when it comes to ammo powers, the soldier ends up with more power damage than engineers.

Fitness:

Rank 4 – Melee Damage vs. Durability: Durability.

Rank 5 – Martial Artist vs. Shield Recharge: Shield Recharge.  

Rank 6 – Melee Synergy vs. Fitness Expert. Fitness Expert. You’re a Soldier. Just shoot them.  

Bonus Power: This is the hard choice. If you take anything with a cooldown, it’s just getting between you and the magnificence the is your birthright, Adrenaline Rush, and you already have the best ammo power right here in your class (incendiary). So, what do we take? Behold: Fortification, and damage reduction. Great! Now you can take a bigger, harder punch and get more power damage, which makes even better fire bullets, fantastic. It makes you better at everything you’re trying to do: take and deal damage. Just make sure you turn it on before you activate your ammo powers. The damage bonus from Fortification will not affect an already active ammo power.  

Rank 4 – Durability vs. Melee Damage: Durability

Rank 5 – Recharge Speed vs. Power Synergy. Power Synergy. More fire!

Rank 6 – Power Recharge vs. Durability: I prefer recharge, but more protection is also great, especially if you prefer lighter weapons and won’t notice the cooldown bonus as much.

THE LOADOUT

You’re the gun class, the Soldier, with a capital ‘S’! Every gun in the game is better in your hands with one exception: I would leave the big cannon snipers to the infiltrators (but any rapid-fire sniper is fair game). I’ll list a few favorites in every weapon class. I’d highly recommend making a save on the citadel and trying out a few at the firing range, and of course, as the soldier you can and should break out those big heavy guns that slow down the other classes too much. With your extra weight capacity, it’s tempting to load up with a weapon in each category, but I say pick two. Hopefully two that complement each other, i.e. the Indra and a Revenant, but if you take your favorites it’ll be fine. Or just pin all your hopes and dreams on one super weapon, like the Typhoon or a Hurricane.

Assault Rifles: This entire class is packed with fantastic options that are full auto, accurate, have big clips, and big damage. The AR’s only downside is weight. Use a Piercing and Extended Barrel mod on all of them, except for the Lancer & Particle Rifle.

 Revenant – A personal favorite, the big loud heavy MG with the recoil to match. While it’s tempting to use a recoil mod on this gun, I highly recommend getting used to it without one. You give up too much if you swap out a piercing or extended barrel mod in favor of managing recoil.

Lancer - the Cadillac of ARs: infinite ammo, low recoil, accurate, & fast. Instead of the extended barrel, use an extended magazine to manage the heat to go along with a piercing mod (this goes for the Particle Rifle as well), and this rifle will be a smooth ride through the entire campaign. Tip: if you overheat it, going into rush will add one round to the mag and let you skip the overheat animation!

N7 Typhoon – the Revenant 2.0! Everything about the Revenant ramped up to 11: more damage, more recoil, and more accuracy. Note: You have to give the gun time to spin up to get max damage (this is also true of the Particle Rifle). If you fire in short bursts, you aren’t getting your money’s worth. If you can handle the spin up and the recoil, this is the best gun in the game. Bonus, the face plate reduces damage you take from your front arc!

Harrier – A non-overheat Lancer. While it’s solid and easy to handle, be prepared to run out of ammo all the time.

Shotguns: Inaccuracy and low ammo counts balance out raw damage output. Few things kick like a Claymore shoved in the enemy’s mouths. Fun fact: each pellet from a shotgun gets a chance to explode with Incendiary Burst. Extended barrel and piercing mods are highly recommended for all shotguns. The ultra-heavy barrel and smart choke are also a good combo if you can rank up the heavy barrel to not absolutely kill your weight.

Claymore – Well, the maxed damage bar speaks for itself here. You can fire, use Rush, and fire again. Hilarious. This gun gets infinitely better if you learn how to ‘reload cancel,’ i.e. tap a power that’s on cooldown or tap sprint while the animation is playing, but after the ammo bar fills.

Raider – the more practical little brother to the Claymore. Less damage, but two rounds, lighter, and more accurate! Again, you can empty the gun quickly, use Rush, and fire twice again. Few things survive four Raider shots at close range.

Wraith – If you can afford this, it’s a solid alternative and gold flex on these poor not-soldiers and their weak, baby guns.

N7 Piranha – Auto Shotgun. Want to clear a room or a hallway? This is your best choice. Absolutely falls off at any further range than point blank due to its accuracy. Paired with another longer-range weapon, this can be a devastating Ace to pull out in close quarters.

Sniper Rifles: Overall I split the Snipers into two categories: Big Cannon and Rapid Fire. Leave the Big Cannons to our friend the infiltrator; she uses them better anyway. But the rapid fire rifles? Those are exactly what we need. Extended barrel and piercing mods are our friends. You can stack the time dilation from Rush with the concentration mod to nearly stop time, but I personally prefer the damage from the barrel.

Indra – It’s an assault rifle with a free scope mod! This is one of the best weapons in the game and for the low price of 10k credits!

N7 Valiant – Tied for the best sniper in the game with the Indra. Rapid fire, three round clip with a damage-per-second that rivals much bigger guns. You pair that with minimal recoil and a lightning fast reload and you have a solid, easy to use rifle for every day and formal wear.

Pistols: These have some winners and make solid back ups, but as a solider you can easily take nothing but a pistol and have a great time. As with everything, go with a barrel and piercing mod.

Talon – One of the best shotguns in the game pretending to be a pistol.

Executioner pistol – Stand out, since you can give it two shots with Rush.

SMG: The Hurricane is one of the best weapons in the game, but it has a ton of recoil and limited range. If you find you need a stability dampener to use the Hurricane, try the Hornet instead. It’s a burst weapon (so easier to control recoil), also has incredibly high DPS, and you can also get it free during the Citadel Coup. Until then, just stick with the Tempest. All of these work well on power classes but, but once you use them on the soldier with the insane buff from incendiary ammo, you may not recognize them anymore.

You can use the extended barrel and ammo heat sink mods; but without a piercing mod, remember to switch to your pistol or AR for armored targets.

HOW TO PLAY: 

The tricky part about playing a Solider is trusting your gun. There is no combat situation in the game that cannot be solved by killing it to death with bullets. There is a learning curve to master the timing of when to use Rush for that free reload, and it is slightly different with each weapon. But learning it for your favorite only takes a mission or two. When you aren’t shooting, you’re vulnerable, so throw grenades, reposition, or go into Rush and keep up the barrage. Fire ammo will carry you through the game, even against shields and geth. It’s rarely worth switching weapons when you can use Rush and just shoot harder!

There you have it! Go forth and never stop shooting! 

[bokunoheroanalysisforthefuture]

Happy New Year! I think my goal for this year for this blog will be to try to catch up to at least the beginning of the current arc, if not with the manga as a whole. I’ve got 365 days and a bit shy of 300 chapters (not counting those that will go up this year) so… we’ll see! Gotta Plus Ultra everything, right? 

(Of course, that doesn’t account for all the chapters I’m likely to break into multiple parts, like this one… alas, I will just simply see how far I can get.)

[No. 9 - Deku vs. Kacchan]

Starting this chapter off with another western-style comic book cover, with the two coming to blows in costume. Really contrasts when you think of DvK2, which happens out of costume but yet someone comes off as more intense/important to both of them… I wonder what DvK3 will look like?

The chapter itself starts with future Izuku narrating a bit of backstory - that he and Katsuki had grown up in the same neighborhood, so they were childhood friends. He considered Katsuki the fearless type who could do anything, thus becoming the leader of their small gang of friends, and that at the time he wasn’t ‘bad’ or ‘good, just confident, which Izuku admired. However, with Katsuki’s quirk came his slide towards ‘bad’, and the page (and flashback) ends with Izuku echoing the words from the very start of the manga - people are not born equal, a lesson he learned at four.

(As an aside, I really like how the flashback segments are sprinkled through the chapter and slowly add onto the context behind their relationship instead of being shown all at once. It’s better pacing and doesn’t interrupt the flow of the present fight.)

We transition back to the present, with the same moment of Katsuki claiming that Izuku’s defiance even while scared pisses him off as we ended off with in the last chapter. Also, Ochako right behind Katsuki, that was a lost opportunity to attack, even if it wouldn’t have worked. I suppose it was part of Izuku’s plan, but still…

Tenya tries to get Katsuki to give him an update, but Katsuki just tells him to shut up and keep watch while Katsuki wrecks ‘someone’ (cough Izuku). Tenya tries to warn Katsuki to not let emotions get the better of him, only to be frustrated when Katsuki cuts the transceiver, calling him a scoundrel. 

Honestly, this is really fucking hilarious considering a few dozen chapters from now is basically:

Tensei: is injured

Tenya: (✿◉‿◉)🔪

Moving on, we switch back to the viewing room, with Kirishima asking about the lack of sound from the cameras. All Might notes they’re communicating with micro-transceivers given to them along with the blueprints and capture tape - the latter of which is used to provide proof of ‘capture’ when tied around the opponent. Kirishima then goes on to ask/clarify that the heroes only have fifteen minutes but no idea where the weapon is located, which All Might confirms. Mina (finally looking as she should) notes that the heroes are at a disadvantage, and All Might tells them it’s like Aizawa said, and leads them through the school motto - Plus Ultra!

Honest to god, what support company willingly made this? Why did they not just dumpster it as an affront to God and make something normal??

Anyways, Aoyama is the one to first notice whatever Katsuki is doing, and All Might turns back to the monitors to watch as well. And so we switch back to inside the building, with Katsuki blasting himself at Izuku. Izuku tells Ochako to run ahead while blocking an explosion-boosted kick to the head. Ochako does so despite her obvious worry for Izuku, and Katsuki ignores her entirely, telling Izuku to worry about himself. Katsuki then gets a moment of shock when Izuku turns out to have used the capture tape to catch Katsuki’s leg before he could pull it away.

Notebook no. 10… we have no idea when he started them, but based on the average time of a notebook being a few months shy of a year, this would likely have been either his last year of elementary or first year of middle school (about age 11/12), so… Izuku has known Eraserhead for quite a while - perhaps in a desperate search for heroes who fought ‘quirkless’ or ‘almost quirkless’? Sadly, I can't make out the text on the page, though I know there’s translations out there that I just have no idea how to locate at the moment… alas.

But yeah, Izuku predicts Katsuki’s next move, and takes advantage of that knowledge to dodge under the next blast without injury. The rest of the class is impressed with Izuku’s ability to go toe-to-toe against the entrance exam’s top scorer without his quirk, while Katsuki keeps getting shocked at Izuku’s moves. 

All Might notes that Izuku has always excelled at making split-second decisions, and also his thorough memorization of all the hero-related things he’s been writing in his notebooks - with a short flashback to All Might reading through the notebook while Izuku had been unconscious after being attacked by the Sludge Villain!

Izuku is frustrated, thinking that he had Katsuki, but that one rope wouldn’t be enough to hold him. He thinks about how Toshinori told him he could be a hero, and that with all that support behind him, it was time to show what he was made of. 

...and then he immediately bolts around a corner, with Katsuki snapping at Izuku to get back, and then going on to shout about how it ‘must have been fun tricking Katsuki all this time’ and ‘hiding that flashy quirk of his’. Izuku’s expression at that is, according to the discord (because I can’t quite tell myself) frustration, but it might also be a bit of sadness as well? 

Katsuki finishes his complaints / telling with more explosions and shouting how Izuku should ‘bring it on’ and that he’d still crush him. With the class, Kaminari notes how angry Katsuki is and that it’s scary. All Might himself…

Wow. Why do people in this fandom think Izuku is way too nice and forgiving of Katsuki when we get moments like this?

Fanon Izuku 1: Kacchan has done nothing wrong ever in his entire life

Fanon Izuku 2: Bakugou is a horrible human being who should never have been allowed to be a hero

Canon Izuku: Kacchan is actually a bitch, but damn do I admire his confidence and skill

Also, we see you there Nerd Might:

We come back to Izuku crouched down by a corner somewhere, panting a bit as he analyses the situation. He notes how Katsuki came right for him and ignored Ochako, and that the smart play for the villain team would have been for Tenya to be the vanguard because of his superior mobility and speed. Since he bets Tenya also knows that, this is probably Katsuki rampaging on his own, so there’s no teamwork happening. We then get a lovely mental image while Izku notes that if both of them had come at the hero team from the start, it would have been really hard to win. He also notes that sticking with Ochako would have likely led to that two on two situation, with him and Ochako wasting too much time on Katsuki, but with them split up, they have a stronger chance since she can go after the weapon and capture Tenya. If he can just follow after her, it’ll be a two on one fight against him, meaning they’ll win! 

...so long as Izuku can win against Katsuki. He wipes at the small amount of blood trickling from his nose, telling himself he’ll be fine so long as he watches out for Katsuki’s palms. He thinks back on the past, where he’d told Katsuki he wasn’t trying to compete with him, and says in the present that he takes it all back. 

Since the next couple of pages are the flashback portions on Katsuki’s end, I am gonna cut it off here, because those deserve their own post.

Also, on request from the discord:

[jeebsy]

Titanfall 2 Titan Guide Part 1

I’m back again with another guide. If you are new to Titanfall, welcome! This is a somewhat extensive overview of each Titan & how to use them against other players. I am not the best player out there but I’ve played enough and have a good understanding of each titan. Hopefully at least some of you will find this guide useful. See you on the frontier pilots!

Feel free to add your own tips or correct me if you think I’ve made a mistake.

Because of just how long this got I’ve split this guide up into 3 parts. This is Part 1 which will go over the Atlas Chassis Titans ‘Ion’ and ‘Tone’ and the Vanguard Chassis Titan ‘Monarch’.

Below the cut because this is long.

First I’ll say there is no be all end all way to play the titans. Most if not all titan kits are useful in certain situations and as such you should experiment with each to find what works for you. I’ll be giving my recommendations for kits and explaining my choices at the end of each titans segment.

I’ve split each Titan up into 6 sections, going over (in order):

"Titan Name:" Quick overview & what to learn first with that Titan to get good.

Using them Against Pilots

Using them Against Titans.

Their Core.

General Tips/Tricks

My recommended Titan Kit.

Monarch: One of the more complicated titans to use, Monarch is a great pick and my personal favourite. IMO she may be the best Titan in the game. First things first, learn when to use her 'Rearm' Ability. This ability turns her from a faster baby Legion, into a power house in her own right (As well as her core but we will get to that later). By using it, you replenish her other 2 abilities & her dashes. This is amazing & so versatile, I don't even know where to begin. Use it for a burst of damage with 2 'Rocket Salvos', use it to gain 2 charges of shield with 'Energy Siphon', use it to get in close & engage, use it to disengage. Hell, use it to make a pizza & pick the kids up for after school hangouts, the thing is so darn versatile! Personally, I like to use it when I'm engaging. Dash up, 'Energy Siphon' to get some shields, 'Rocket Salvo' my target for damage, Rearm & 'Rocket Salvo' for some more damage, & then depending on the titan I'm fighting & their health, Either keep the pressure up by firing & then 'Energy Siphon' to stay alive & get the kill, or retreat with 'Energy Siphon' to stay alive & run away. 

Against pilots: Monarch has a lot of tools at her disposal. The 'X0-16 Chaingun' is an amazing pilot killer if you can land your shots, as it's 3 shots to kill a pilot. 'Rocket Salvo' is also good, as the splash damage from it is usually enough to kill any pilot in it's vicinity. Keep your distance from pilots though, as Monarch has no defensive options to mitigate damage besides building up shield. 'Energy Siphon' doesn't grant a lot of shield from pilots (Enemy Drop ships, Reapers & Titans do, however). So keep the range, & eliminate the pesky flies with your 'Chaingun'.

Against Titans: Monarch is a beast. Even without any upgrades, she is able to hold her own against most of the cast, granted she has a way out. Like Northstar, Monarch requires a lot of cover & poking tactics to deal bits of damage to the enemy. 'Energy Siphon' + 'X0-16 Chaingun' makes this tactic work well, as you can stun them & get a few shots off before the enemy titan has a chance to properly engage you. Keep an open escape route for her when she runs out of shields & let her abilities recharge before re-engaging. Her gun is good but not the strongest, so she relies on getting critical hits against other titans more often than not. Wash, Rinse & Repeat for profit. She isn't a tanky titan until you get her cores going, so keep her alive & do some damage here and there.

'Upgrade Core' is quite possibly the best core in the game. It turns a mediocre to average titan at best, to the best unit in the game in only 3 short payments of 100% Core Build Time. Not only does she get an upgrade to her abilities, but she gets a full bar of shields on top of it + Upgrades can stack with each other, leading to some sick combos! Lets break it down; each core has 3 upgrade paths possible, & depending on what you pick will affect your play style.

TIER 1 has 'Arc Rounds' & 'Missile Rack'. 'Energy Rack' isn't important unless you are playing with friends, or want to be a nice guy. 'Arc Rounds' allow a monarch to have extra ammo in her 'Chaingun' & it will drain 'Vortex Shield' & 'Heat Shield' of an Ion & Scorch respectively. BUT the best part of it? It deals more damage to shields. This may seem like a nice little effect, but Shields are more durable than most people realize at first, & this one perk basically negates that advantage completely. (It also increases damage against Particle Walls and Gun Shields. Same as vs normal Shields, +50% damage.) 'Missile Rack' is also respectable, as it doubles the amount of rockets fired from 'Rocket Salvo'. This makes 'Rocket Salvo' pack 2 punches! Very fun to use :)

TIER 2! All 3 options are good here. 'Energy Field' is situational & can stack with 'Energy Rack', so it is somewhat useful in Frontier Defense, but not as much in multiplayer. It will grant shields for every target you hit, so it is possible to gain full shields with a single Siphon. Likewise, you can shield multiple friendly titans when combined with Energy Transfer but setting up those conditions is all down to luck. It is Good for stunning groups of enemy Titans though. 'Rearm and Reload' + 'Maelstorm' are both decent upgrades. If you want a longer ranged Monarch, I recommend the former, as it will allow you to keep up Baby AGGRESSIVE SUSTAINED COUNTER-FIRE on enemies, & increase your DPS with the 'X0-16 Chaingun'. If you are more close quarters & want lots of damage quick, go with 'Maelstorm'. It will tear enemy titan health up like no other tomorrow, as well as decimate any pilot foolish enough to try & steal your battery. It's very good against Scorch & Legion as well, as their slow maneuverability doesn't let them escape. Combine 'Maelstorm' with a well timed 'Energy Siphon' to keep enemy titans stuck in the smoke.

TIER 3! This is where all of the power in Monarch lies. These abilities are fantastic in their own regards, but combine them with previous tiers & you have a monster. To start off, 'Superior Chassis' turns Monarch into the embodiment of death itself. With no weak point spots & 2 extra health bars, Monarch becomes a monster & can stay alive a lot longer. Combine this with her kit 'Energy Thief', & she is hands down the best & hardest to kill titan in game. This pairs well with 'Missile Racks' & 'Maelstorm', as your increased health allows you to play close quarters against the rest of the cast & decimate any one of them with intense damage output. The other noteworthy choice is 'X0-16 Accelerator' which turns your Chaingun into a DPS machine. This upgrade is for those who want to sit back a bit more & engage at a distance, as the upgrade increases damage & the fire rate for the Accelerator. Combined with 'Arc Rounds' & 'Rearm and Reload', & Monarch has a higher DPS output than Legions 'Predator Cannon'! Congratulations, your baby Monarch has now become a Legion! "AGGRESSIVE SUSTAINED COUNTER-FIRE!" Awe look, her first words!

TIER INFINITE! After Tier 3, Monarch can keep getting her core, but it will only replenish her shields + give you an 'Electric Smoke'. This allows her to still be able to stay in the fight & replenish her shields. A good strategy is to save a core, & when your shields run out during an engagement, pop the core & boom! Full shields once again. This can keep Monarch alive for a lot longer than intended.

General Tips:

If you are first to drop with her, or only one on the map/far away from combat, use her 'Energy Siphon' on enemy drop ships to gain some shields back.

Rocket Salvos serve 3 uses: 1) directly after melees, as the recovery time to bring X0-16 back up after one is long, 2) to get that last hit and doom or kill a titan when you ran out of bullets, or 3) to break Particle defensives.

Monarch's rapid acquisition of Electric Smoke from her repeated usage of Core Abilities, means that utilising Electric Smoke as a genuine smokescreen is a genuine potential tactic for retreating Monarchs. You can also use it offensively paired with maelstrom. Smoke also stacks so dropping 3 at once will melt a Titan.

Kit Recommendations:

Titan Kit: Overcore or Turbo Engine.

Overcore is a no brainer. Start with 20% core charge allows you to get your 1st core a lot quicker. Pair with the ‘Battery Back-up’ boost for the best effect.

Turbo Engine gives monarch 2 dash charges and paired with your rearm ability allows you to dash 4 times allowing amazing amounts of mobility.

Monarch Kit: Energy Thief or Rapid Rearm.

Energy Thief is super powerful. It allows you to gain your upgrade cores 10% faster and every time you execute a Titan you gain a battery thus increasing survivability. This is my personal pick.

Rapid Rearm reduces the cooldown of rearm so you can spam your abilities more often.

Titanfall Kit: Drop Shield

Only two choices for this and it’s more a preference thing. Drop Shield gives you a nice safety area to retreat to if you need it.

Build Suggestions:

All Purpose Build:

Core Upgrade 1: Arc Rounds/Missile Racks

Core Upgrade 2: Maelstrom

Core Upgrade 3: Superior Chassis

Healer Build:

Core Upgrade 1: Energy Transfer

Core Upgrade 2: Energy Field

Core Upgrade 3: X0-16 Accelerator

Ion: If you want to play laser baby herself, the first thing you gotta learn is how to manage her energy. It shows up as a bar to the left of the reticle, & depletes when you use her abilities + alt fire 'Splitter Rifle'. Using her 'Splitter Rifle' from the "hip" is the only one that doesn't eat energy.

Against Pilots: Fighting pilots with her is very easy. First off, her 'Laser shot' is a hitscan ability, meaning you just aim for the pilot directly & zap em. If you miss with that, her alt fire 'Splitter Rifle' will deal massive damage with the split beams to pilots, making quick work of them. 'Vortex Shield' will protect her from almost every pilot weapon, so keep it out to protect her health against enemy Anti-Titan weapons & ordinance. Once the enemy needs to reload, wait for them to appear to take them out with said methods above.

Against Titans: At first, it can be a bit difficult to learn. She doesn't have great damage output, so you have to play a bit more passive/defensive against most of the other big boys & girls. 'Splitter rifle' is far from the best gun against other Titans, due to it's low damage output. Use it to do bits of damage to your enemies when they are out of cover & not paying attention to you. Don't expect to destroy a Titan with it, your abilities will do that for you. 'Vortex Shield' is her best friend, & will catch almost everything thrown at her, from Legions army of bullets, to Northstars tether traps & so on. DON'T USE IT AS A CRUTCH THOUGH! I have killed numerous Ions & been killed as Ion for simply holding the shield up even when the enemy isn't shooting, just to protect my Titan. Don't make that mistake. Use it when you see the enemy shooting, & put it away when they are not. You will save energy in the short run, & health in the long run. 'Tripwires' are very effective against other Titans as well, yet they cost a bit of energy. However, if you are fighting a CQC Titan like Ronin &/or Scorch, place those suckers down to keep the space. 'Laser Shot' is useful IF you land crits. Otherwise, it uses precious energy which could be better used for Vortex. She doesn't struggle too much with the others until she runs out of energy. Before that happens, try to create some space & get to safety to let it safely reload. IF you do run out of energy, try to focus your 'Splitter Rifle' on the enemies critical spots for extra damage, & make a tactical retreat. You can still use 'Vortex Shield' when almost out of energy, but it will be very weak & constantly dying on you.

'Laser Core' is an amazingly strong core if your opponent is in the open. Because you slow to a snails pace, you need to catch your opponent where they have everywhere to run, but nowhere to hide. This will then proceed to destroy them to kingdom come. It has no limit on range, so you can snipe enemy Titans, Pilots, Grunts, Ticks, Etc. from anywhere on the map, as long as you have line of sight! So save it when the opportunity presents itself. You can also dash as the core starts up, so use that to position yourself properly (Like popping around a corner to stare down a hallway, jump out of cover on an enemy, etc.)

General Tips: 

Similar to Northstar the best playstyle for Ion is a more passive style, with you peeking around cover to fire a laser shot and then retreating until it is off cooldown. 

Regardless of how the animation plays the ‘laser core’ comes out of the player camera which is closer to the top of the Titan model. You can use this to shoot opponents over a lot of cover, effectively ‘head glitching’.

Even though they are called trip-wires and again regardless of how they look, your trip-wire ability act more like proximity mines with a very large blast zone. They will also do full damage regardless of whether you hit an opponent with one or all of the mines.

Kit Recommendations:

Titan Kit: Overcore

Ion doesn’t really need any of the other choices and you can’t go wrong with starting with 20% core charge.

Ion Kit: Entangled Energy or Zero-Point Tripwire

Entagled Energy can be useful to keep your energy up if you can land crits.

Zero-Point Tripwire is my personal pick as it allows you to place your tripwires without using energy, effectively giving you free damage.

Titanfall Kit: Drop Shield

Only two choices for this and it’s more a preference thing. Drop Shield gives you a nice safety area to retreat to if you need it.

Tone: The easiest Titan to use, & for good reason. She is a solid Titan all around, & can easily exceed any offensive or defensive strategies used by you. First thing to learn is her 'Tracker Cannon'. This thing will destroy pilots in one hit, & has splash damage to boot with it. Learn how to aim with it, because like Northstar, it takes some time getting used to & mastering. It will also cause a lock on to any armored enemy (Reapers, Titans & Dropships). This is very important when using her to damage opponents.

Against Pilots:  Tone is one of the best. Once you master her 'Tracker Cannon', enemy pilots will stand no chance. Don't spam the shots though, as tempting as it may be. Line them up, as Tone has a hefty reload to go through, which pilots will take advantage of. Her 'Particle Wall' is great for protecting her while she reloads, & great for keeping her safe against pilot ordinance & Anti-Titan weapons. Use her 'Sonar Lock' as well to pinpoint where pilots are. You can use her splash damage to clean up any pilot who managed to limp away behind a wall or inside a building.

Against Titans:  Tone is solid against most of the cast, but can struggle here and there. Your main damage output is going to be from your tracking rockets. So the first goal is to lock onto your opponent with 3 pings. This can be done from direct hits with the 'Tracker Cannon', splash damage from it, or a ping of the 'Sonar Lock'. If you are fighting another pesky Titan that uses a shield or wall (Scorch, Legion & Tone), you can use your 'Tracker Cannons' splash damage to still get a lock on by shooting the ground near them. This isn't really effective against Ion though, due to the size of her 'Vortex Shield'. Once you are locked on, the enemy titan will know this & have a message saying they are. Less experienced players usually don't pay attention to this during all the chaos, so you can let them rip & they will die quickly to repeated barrages of this. Experienced players can usually dodge them with dashes or other defensive options though, so you need to be a bit more ambiguous against them. Try to stay safe behind your 'Particle Wall' as you exhaust your opponents abilities + dashes until you can keep locking on & damaging with your rockets. Your rockets can also go around walls if you aim them properly, so try & hit enemies as they retreat with them to keep the pressure up. Properly placing yourself before the fight is important though, as depending on the titan you are about to fight will require you to change the distance you engage. Scorch + Ronin + Legion = Long Range. Ion + Monarch = Medium Range. Northstar = Close range. This will make life a lot easier.

'Salvo Core'  is one of the best cores in the game. You can easily fire it at an opponent & watch them die. The rockets follow your reticle to wherever you are looking, making it very useful in plenty of situations. A good strategy is to fire it directly up into the air & then bombard your enemy with them like artillery. This ensures almost every rocket will hit, & while they are still worried about you, they won't be able to focus on the death above ready to spank their cheeks in. It's quick, versatile, & deadly.

General Tips: 

More experienced players will anticipate your tracking rockets so try and mix up when you unleash them to throw off opponents who count your hits. (E.g fire them soon as you lock on your first time, then your second lock fire a few more times before unleashing the rockets, then next lock fire one extra time after lock etc).

You can lock onto more then one target before firing your targeting rockets. However even though firing off like 30+ rockets looks cool you will be locked into the animation until all rockets are fired so keep that in mind.

Kit Recommendations:

Titan Kit: Overcore.

Whilst Tone can make good use out of the dash or double smoke kits, their salvo core is ridiculously powerful. As such starting with 20% core charge is the best option.

Tone Kit: Enhanced Tracker Rounds or Reinforced Particle Wall or Pulse Echo.

If you can reliably hit crits then enhanced tracker rounds can be really useful. It applies two locks per crit allowing tracking rockets to be fired more often and will make it harder for opponents to anticipate when you fire your rockets.

Reinforced Particle Wall increases duration and the amount of damage it can take. Great all round utility and for if you find yourself out of position often.

Pulse Echo is my personal pick. After a short delay your sonar pings a second time. This allows you to get another lock if engaged with a Titan and allows you to see targets through walls which is very powerful.

Titanfall Kit: Drop Shield

Only two choices for this and it’s more a preference thing. Drop Shield gives you a nice safety area to retreat to if you need it.

[thatwarlockguy]

I watched it later than usual because I was out last night, but I just watched this week's episode of the Cardfight!! Vanguard V Series, and it was another solid one.

I'm liking the dynamic between Kamui, Nagisa and Emi in the new series better than in the original so far. And not only is Nagisa playing Granblue instead of Nova Grappler, but Kamui actually won! Which is super rare. And speaking of Granblue, Gouki proved that the new Granblue is pretty scary when it works. Setting up the drop zone for power boosts and using it like a second hand is a strong strategy.

Next week, it's Koutei vs Kai, with Great Daiyusha finally arriving!

[shuttershocky]

Is Reed really the worst of the chargers?

It's a bit of a hot take I admit because Grani puts up fierce competition, but I personally believe so.

My argument for Reed vs Grani is that while Grani has significantly worse stats (her module and her trust both buff her DEF which means her normal ATK stat is super bad compared to any other Charger) and an absolutely horrific SP cost of 70 on her S2, you are ultimately going to find more uses for Grani's defensive skillset than you are for Reed's.

See before module upgrades I would have had Reed edge out Grani simply because Reed can still generate more DP by making 2 per kill while her S2 is up vs Grani's 1, while doing way more damage. However with module upgrades Grani's physical evasion talent for all vanguards is now at a respectable 35%, and now she makes 2 SP per kill too, while Reed gets increased attack vs low HP units which is less good when Chargers are trying to make easy kills off of trash to turn into DP.

Now with Grani you can see what she's there for. It's not going to be useful for 99% of players, but hey if you want to run Vanguard only strats then Grani is actually a decent tank and a good boost to team survivability. There are use cases for her.

Reed... struggles with that. She has RES which means she wants to fight Arts-wielding enemies, but the 35% bonus damage on her S2 is Arts when most Arts enemies have high RES and lower DEF. Her module upgrades further pushed her towards fighting Arts enemies with a bizarre "+25 ASPD for 3 seconds after being hit by Arts damage" addition to her RES, but if you want to fight Arts enemies you want to deal high PHYSICAL damage, which Vigna with her massive ATK stat and crit talent is going to outperform her in. The Enemy Caster can't fight back with Arts when they're dead after all.

If there's anything Reed's S2 lets her perform in, it's attacking high DEF targets that don't have RES, since she uses Arts damage. For almost all of these enemies though, they do Physical damage, which means Reed's talent does nothing for her. Even in this use case, Vigna's incredibly high DPH still sees her competing vs heavily armored targets anyway, and at one rarity lower!

Reed wants to fight a very specific enemy to be the best around: a high DEF enemy with relatively middling HP that also deals average, slow Arts damage but doesn't come in waves. If the enemy's DEF is too high, Reed can't handle them quickly because the majority of her damage in S2 is still physical. If their Arts damage is very fast or very high, Reed either loses efficiency on her talent (her +ASPD for 3 seconds when taking Arts damage doesn't stack), or still dies despite having 20 RES because of her low max HP.

And when you get these exact kinds of enemies (these are Reunion Elite Casters and Spec Ops Casters!), you have to watch Vigna activate her omegalul +200% ATK (which gets another +110% ATK when she lands her 40% crit) and kills the enemy faster anyway.

Like I've said before, Reed's not numerically bad at all. She just really suffers from having a confused kit that doesn't help herself carve out a niche nor combos well with anyone. What's worse is that she's a 5 star, which is a high enough rarity that upgrading them is expensive enough materials-wise to make you second -guess yourself, but not a high enough rarity that you can get away with a confusing kit by having a 6 star's stats, a second talent, and a 3rd skill.

I am of the opinion that this struggle for finding a use case is such that for Reed to be considered better than Grani, Reed would have to be downgraded to a 4 star so her training costs are lower. If I could make simple changes to try to salvage her kit though, I'd let her talent stack with itself while taking a new stack extends the duration of the buff (so taking multiple Arts damage sources in a row stacks +25 ASPD on her to make her go into a flurry) or extend her RES to all Vanguard allies for an incredibly lazy but very effective buff to Vanguardknights.

[andrewdburton]

Socially Responsible Investing: Is It Also More Profitable?

Since the Dawn of Mustachianism in 2011, the same question has come up over and over again:

“MMM, I see your point that index fund investing is the best option. But when you buy the index, you’re getting oil companies, factory farm slaughterhouses and a million other dirty stories.

How can I get the benefits of investing for early retirement without contributing to the decline of humanity?”

And in these nine years since then, the movement towards socially responsible investing has only grown. Public pension funds have started to “divest” from oil company stocks, and various social issues like human rights, child labor, climate change or corporate corruption have bubbled to the surface at different times.

And all of this has led to the exploding new field of Socially Responsible Investing (SRI), and a growing array of new ways to do it.

So it seems that this is not just a passing trend – people just might be starting to care a bit more. And since capitalism is just an expression of human behavior, the nature of capitalism itself may be starting to change.

This leads us naturally to the question:

What can I do with my money to help fix the world? And even better, is there a way I can make money in the process of fixing it?

The answer is a good, solid “Probably.”

As long as you don’t get too hung up on getting every last detail perfect, because just like real life, investing is a haphazard and approximate and unpredictable thing. But by understanding the big picture, you can make slightly better decisions on average, which lead to slightly better results. And slightly better results, stacked up consistently over time, can lead to a much better life, or even a much better world.

This is true in all of the main areas we care about – personal wealth, fitness and health, even relationships and happiness. And while your money and investments are certainly not the most important thing in life, they are still worthy of a bit of easy and effective optimization.

So anyway, the first thing to understand with SRI is, “what problem am I trying to solve?”

The answer is, “You are trying to make your investing (especially index fund investing) have a better impact on the world.”

On its own, index fund investing is ridiculously simple. You just get an account at any brokerage like Vanguard, Etrade, Schwab or whatever, and dump all your money into one exchange-traded fund: VTI.

When you do this, you are buying a stake in 3500 companies at once(!), which is both impressive and overwhelming. How do you even know what you are holding?

Well, this is all public information, and easily available with a quick Google search. For example, here’s a list of the top 90 holdings in VTI (click for larger):

Top 90 holdings in Vanguard’s VTI Exchange Traded Fund

As you can see, the biggest chunk of money is allocated to today’s tech darlings, because this index fund is weighted according to market value, and these are the most valuable companies in the US today.

Through a convenient coincidence, the total value of the VTI fund happens to be just under $1 trillion dollars, which means you can just throw a decimal point after the ten billions digit of market value to get a percentage. In other words, about 4.7% of your money will go towards Apple stock, 4.4 towards Microsoft, and so on. Together, these top 90 companies are worth more than the remaining 3,540 companies combined, so these are what really drive your retirement account.

And within this list, you will see some of the usual suspects: Exxon and Chevron (oil), Philip Morris (tobacco), Raytheon and Lockheed (bombs), and so on.

But what about the less-usual suspects? For example, I happen to think that sugar, and especially sugar-packed beverages like Coke, is the biggest killer in the developed world – a major contributor to 2 million of the 2.8 million deaths each year in the US alone. Should I exclude that from my portfolio too?

And what about drug and insurance companies – aren’t they behind the political stalemate and high costs of the US healthcare system? Comcast funded some election disinformation campaigns here in my home town in the early 2010s, should I exclude them too? And if you’re part of a religion that is against charging interest on loans, or in favor of pasta and Pirate costumes, or against a spherical Earth, or any number of additional ornate rules, you may have still more preferences.

The higher your desire for perfection, the more difficult this exercise will become. However, if you are like me and you just want to get most of the desired result with minimal effort, you might simply have a look at the Vanguard fund called ESGV.

ESG stands for “Environmental, Social and Governance”, and in practice it just means “We have tried to avoid some of the shittier companies according to some fairly simple rules.”

And the result is this:

Vanguard’s ESGV Exchange traded fund (ETF) – top 90 holdings

The first thing you’ll notice is that it’s almost the same. In fact, the top five holdings – Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, Alphabet (Google) and Netflix not far behind, collectively referred to as the FAANG stocks – are completely unchanged – and this means that there will be plenty of correlation between these funds.

It’s also the reason that the stock market as a whole has recovered so quickly from this COVID-era recession: small businesses like restaurants and hair salons have been destroyed by the shutdowns, but big companies that benefit from people staying at home and using computers and phones are making more money than ever. The stock market isn’t the whole economy, it’s just the publicly traded companies, which are the big ones.

But let’s look at the biggest differences between the normal index fund versus the social version.

The following large companies listed on the left are missing in the ESGV fund, in order of size. And to make up the difference, the stake in the companies on the right have been boosted up to take their place in your portfolio.

Main differences between VTI and ESGV (source: etfrc)

The omission of Berkshire Hathaway was a bit of a shocker, as it is run with solid ethical principles by Warren Buffet, one of the worlds most generous philanthropists. And in fact the modern day nerd-saint Bill Gates is on the Berkshire board of directors, another person whose work I follow and respect greatly.

(side note: Apparently the company fails on the “independent governance” category. And Buffet disputes this category, but in his characteristic way has decided to say, “Fuck it, I’ma just keep doing my own thing with my half-trillion dollar empire over here and you can have fun with your little committee” – I’m paraphrasing a bit but he totally did say that.)

Furthermore, both funds hold the factory meat king Tyson foods, while neither holds Roundup-happy Monsanto, because it was bought by the German conglomerate Bayer AG a while back. Nextera is a giant electric utility in the Southeastern US that claims to be the world’s largest generator of renewable energy. Some do-gooders are against nuclear power, while others (including me) think it’s the Bee’s Knees and we should keep advancing it. And all this just goes to show how nobody will agree 100% on what makes a good socially responsible fund.

But What About The Performance?

In the past, some investors were nervous about giving up oil companies in their portfolio, because while it was a dirty substance, it was also what made the world go round – which meant it was a cash cow.

Now, however, oil is on its way out as renewable energy and battery storage have crossed the cost parity threshold – meaning it’s cheaper to make power (and vehicles) that don’t use oil. In its place, technology is the new cash cow, and tech is heavily represented in the ESG funds. The result:

Traditional index fund (VTI) vs Socially Responsible equivalent (ESGV)

As you can see, the performance has been similar but the ESG fund has done significantly better in the (admittedly short) time since it was introduced at Vanguard.

Of course, we have no idea if this will continue, but the point is that at least our thesis is not a ridiculous one – environmentally sustainable companies do have an advantage, if the world gradually starts to care more about these things. And if you look at the share price of Tesla and other companies that surround it in electric transportation and energy storage, you will see that there are many trillions of dollars already lining up to benefit from this transition. And the very presence of so much investment money creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, as Tesla is now building or expanding five of the world’s largest factories on three continents simultaneously.

So What Should You Do? (and what I do myself)

My latest home-brewed ebike project – this one can reach 42MPH / 67km/hr!

First of all, it helps to remember a fundamental piece of economics: your spending dollars will probably have a much bigger impact than your investment dollars. This is because you are sending a direct message to the world rather than an indirect one:

When you buy a new gasoline-powered Subaru (or a tank of gas for your existing guzzler) or a steak at the grocery store, or a plane ticket, you are telling those company directly that consumers want more of these products, so they will produce more of them immediately.

When you buy shares in Exxon, you are only subtly raising the demand for those shares, which raises the average price, making it ever-so-slightly easier for Exxon to maybe issue more shares in the future. In other words, you are making it easier for them to access capital. But capital is only useful if there is demand for their products. And with oil there is a nearly constant surplus, which is why OPEC and other cartels need to work together to artificially restrict supply, just to keep prices up.

Plus, as a shareholder you are theoretically eligible to place votes and influence the future direction of companies – even companies that you don’t like. If you look up the field of “shareholder activism”, you’ll see this is a tradition that goes way back.

So I have tried to take a few simple steps on the consumer side myself, and I find it quite satisfying: Insulating the shit out of all of my properties, building a DIY solar electric array on one of them, and buying one electric car so far to eliminate local gas burning. And a few electric bikes including a super fast one I made myself.

Each one of these steps has provided a very high economic return, percentage-wise, but that still leaves a lot of money to account for, which brings us back to stock investing.

As someone who loves simplicity, I have done this:

Bought almost entirely VTI (or similar Vanguard funds) from 2000-2015

Started experimenting with Betterment in 2015, liked it, and have been adding a percentage of my ongoing savings to that account to that since then. (Note that Betterment now also offers a socially responsible portfolio option.)

Switched the dividend re-investing of my old Vanguard VTI over to Vanguard ESGV, to avoid “wash sales” in making the most of Betterment’s tax loss harvesting feature.

Bought some shares of Berkshire Hathaway separately, and also make a few sentimental investments in local businesses, including the MMM HQ Coworking space.

But you could choose to be more hardcore in your ESG/SRI investing:

Buy your own basket of stocks based on the index, but with different weighting based on your own values

Spend more money on other things that generate or save money (a bigger solar array on your house, better insulation, electric car, an ebike to reduce car trips, etc.)

Invest in local businesses of your choice, rental real estate, community solar projects, or other things which generate passive income – publicly traded stocks are just one of many ways to fund an early retirement!

Like most areas of life, investing is not something you have to do perfectly in order to succeed – even socially responsible investing. If you apply the 80/20 rule to get the big picture right, you have probably found the Sweet Spot and you can move on to the next area of life to optimize.

In the Comments: What is your own investment strategy? Have you thought at all about this ESG / SRI stuff? Did this article bring anything new to the table?

from Finance https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2020/08/22/socially-responsible-investing/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[carnelianwings]

Everyone at locals had one brain cell today because we all entered with Fun Decks this week. I'd gone in with D-MLB, went 2-1, and that's a "wish list" item checked off for me in Vanguard - enter a tournament with Blasters, optionally doing well (and by doing well I mostly mean going positive on W/L).

Tucking the rest behind a cut because I'm just gonna take a hot second to ramble about Majesty Lord Blaster (and Blasters as a whole) like I'm just (channeling my inner) Aichi.

Games themselves were pretty standard, the one game I lost was vs Viamance Bruce - not much I could've done there, just didn't have the shield power to go up against all that power gain for Final Rush/Burst on top of the multi-attack, plus my opponent flipped OT on the drive check on the last turn so I just outright didn't have the PGs for it. But I'm not even salty about it at all - I got to play D-MLB in a tournament, had it pop off, got 2 other wins.

Shout out to Emmeline and Cordiela for being an absolute terror in the back row during all 3 games (especially during my 2 wins vs Herminia and Solrairon) - letting G2s boost and then having a G2 that just gains power every time a Blaster swings (AKA whenever you attack in D-MLB lol) is just chef's kiss. Even if I don't hit triggers off the triple drive it's just like "Wait since when did Blasters get 30k/40k+ columns I thought the entire deck is just a Nostalgia Bait 3-attack Deck that hit like a Wet Noodle". Also Cordiela being a shout out to that one shot in the OG S1 finale with (ghostly) Blaster Blade and Blaster Dark standing next to MLB is just icing on the "Omg MLB has a 4th attack now!" cake.

It's really hard for me to overstate how much I actually just enjoy playing Blasters in all flavors (Premium MLB, V-MLB, D-MLB, Premium Exceed). Even if I lose, the sheer consistency in the deck means I always get at least part of (if not all of) the combo off and it's just so satisfying to know "I built my deck well and it's working like it should". And with the Premium versions I'm just giddy with all the deck search (and deck thin by extension). Like this deck is just fun. Plus there's just the whole "Blasters have been with me since Day 1 of my Vanguard journey starting with Zero and I've been learning with them ever since" angle.

And yeah the guys at locals also know I'm basically a Blaster main ... and to fear this deck because when the stars align I have Protagonist Tier Luck with this deck. Like to the tune of "Check OT multiple games in a row during key moments", "Eats Crit At 5, Checks OT/heal And Lives, draws Persona at start of next turn", "Massively Sacks with Crit(s)/Heal(s)" ... the list goes on. Probably also helps I always bring my G-era Aichi playmat with me to locals lol.

[sebs-pev-reviews]

Boosted Dual+ (2nd-gen) - The Last Good Boosted Board

Not interested in reading the entire review? That’s alright with me! Click “keep reading” and scroll all the way down. I’ve added a “tl;dr” section that wraps up everything discussed in this writeup. Enjoy! Introduction Popularized by YouTubers like Casey Neistat back in 2015, Boosted was top dog in the early days of electric skateboarding. Riders sang praises of its good looks, comfortable ride, and general reliability. Now that Boosted -- the company -- looks to be on its way out, used boards can be found for around $700. So, should you get one?

User Experience I ordered my 2nd-gen Boosted Dual+ on June 24, 2017 and received it only four days later. I was happy to have received it so quickly, since Boosted was still recovering from its battery malfunction fiasco. Upon unboxing it, I was beyond impressed by its build quality. During the 1st- and 2nd-generations (which I will be referring to as “V1″ and “V2″ going forward), Boosted sourced much of its hardware from other companies. The V1 and V2 both used Loaded Vanguard decks and Orangatang Wheels. Both Loaded and Orangatang have been around for years, so I knew that I was in good hands.

The ride was stellar, too. My previous board was a Yuneec EGO 2. With a stiff deck, sub-par wheels, and a manufacturer-reported top speed of 12.5 mph, it was a rather uninspiring board. The Boosted was the complete opposite of that. It had a super flexible deck thanks to the Vanguard’s bamboo and fiberglass construction. The Orangatang wheels were nice and grippy. Compared to my experience with the EGO 2, I felt far more confident going over speed bumps and potholes.

The Boosted Dual+ V2 was no slouch either. According to Boosted, the two motors on the Dual+ provide a combined 2000 W of power and a top speed of 22 mph. While I have never formally tested the board in its stock configuration (see “Upgrades”), I can say that those numbers are pretty accurate. This thing is a little rocketship underneath your feet.

Like all other Boosted boards, the Dual+ V2 is a belt-driven board. In other words, there is a timing belt that connects the motor itself to the wheel pulley. That being said, I ride HARD, so I have to replace my belts about every 300 miles. Honestly, it’s a 10 minute process and isn’t that big of a deal. To date, I have logged 752.5 miles over the course of about 3 years, and belt changes are the only form of maintenance I’ve had to do.

Upgrades I have quite a few upgrades on my board. In the picture above (taken late 2017), I have the original Flatland3D bashguards and original ShredLights installed. The bashguards protected my precious bamboo-fiberglass deck while the ShredLights allowed me to be more visible to drivers. I later removed the orange bashguards and installed custom black bashguards that my father and I had created. These DIY bashguards were made from ABS, and were far more durable than the FL3D ones (although FL3D later moved to injection molded ABS for their next generation). Finally, I swapped the 80mm Orangatang Kegel wheels for 85mm Orangatang Caguamas. The larger wheels gave the board just a little more “squish” in the ride. This proved to be incredibly helpful during the BAEsk8 group rides in San Francisco. SF roads are not great, so I wanted all the squishy-ness I could get. I wouldn’t say that the Caguama upgrade made riding more comfortable (because, c’mon, it’s just an extra 5mm), but it certainly made me more confident with city riding. I knew that the likelihood of my wheels getting snagged in a pothole was lower with my Cags on than with the stock wheels, so that was a plus.

Expectations vs. Reality Manufacturer claim: 22 mph top speed Tested: 24.3 mph (on the upgraded 85mm wheels, no data for stock wheels)

Manufacturer claim: 12 mile range (XR battery) Tested: 7-8 mile range (XR battery, tested in San Francisco)

Manufacturer claim: can ride up 25% grade hills Tested: No data, but I’ve gone up the super steep bike path near Fort Mason!

Gripes The Boosted Dual+ V2 has been a very reliable board, but its expensive MSRP ($1500 + upgrades) and poor range made it a huge turn-off for many. On top of that, a small number of V2 owners were reporting damaged axles, causing their wheels to go flying off their board during a ride. I never had that sort of problem with my board.

Conclusion As you can see, it’s hard to complain about this board. It’s comfort and reliability were huge selling points for me. It was a quick board, too, but its range left much to be desired. The reports of axle failures were mildly concerning, but are ultimately a drop in the ocean when you consider that Boosted has thousands -- if not tens of thousands -- of V2s out in the wild. At the end of the day, Boosted as a company has basically fizzled out of existence. Prices of V2s and even V3s are dropping rapidly, and you can virtually scoop up any Boosted for under $1000. So should you get one? I would say no. Current-gen Chinese-produced boards like the WowGo 3X, Ownboard W2, and Exway Flex all out-perform the Dual+ V2 for around $700-800. Nowadays, nobody cares if your board is a “Boosted board.” Electric skateboards have become so commonplace in cities that just “one of those nerds with an electric board.” If you can get a Dual+ V2 for $400-500, by all means go for it. They’re bulletproof. But we’re entering into brave new world of electric boards, where performance and affordability can finally go hand in hand. The Boosted Dual+ V2 is a great board, but it’s time for the new generation of affordable belt-driven boards to take the spotlight.

tl;dr The Boosted Dual+ V2 is a comfortable, fun, and fast board. However, its range leaves much to be desired and the Boosted brand no longer has the allure as it did 3 years ago. Prices are dropping rapidly, but I would still recommend newer affordable belt-drive boards like the 3X, W2, and Flex, simply because they can outperform the Dual+ V2. Boosted has been physically and metaphorically left in the dust.

Transparency is very important to me. The Boosted Dual+ V2 and all its upgrades discussed in this review were all purchased by me. The other companies discussed in this review (Flatland3D, ShredLights, WowGo, Ownboard, and Exway) did not pay me for or advise me to write any content in this review. All opinions are my own.

[nomercyresults]

No Mercy 2017 WWE: Updated Match Card, Picks for John Cena vs. Roman Reigns

WWE's 13th installment of No Mercy arrives Sunday with a combination of hype and intrigue connected to it.

on the pinnacle stop of the cardboard, the two massive showdowns between Brock Lesnar and Braun Strowman after which between John Cena and Roman Reigns are arguably at the vanguard of WWE enthusiasts' minds.

however below that, there are different contests that ought to get fanatics excited.

the card, on the whole, illustrates simply how robust a few months it's been for uncooked, and the display is certain to supply.

here's a have a look at the final suit card as well as a few picks and analysis of the display's large bouts.

update (and final) fit Card 1 OF four

Neville vs. Enzo Amore (Cruiserweight Championship) Finn Balor vs. Bray Wyatt John Cena vs. Roman Reigns Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins vs. Sheamus and Cesaro (raw Tag crew Championships) The Miz vs. Jason Jordan (Intercontinental Championship) Alexa Bliss vs. Sasha Banks vs. Bailey vs. Nia Jax vs. Emma (uncooked ladies's Championship) Brock Lesnar vs. Braun Strowman (common Championship)

Can Jason Jordan Dethrone The Miz? 2 OF four

proper now, The Miz and Jason Jordan's paths nearly sense too extraordinary to be colliding this week.

at the same time as The Miz is rightly final out raw and generating extra momentum than most on Monday nights, Jason Jordan's push has but to sincerely get going.

And in pitting him towards such an in-shape superstar like the Miz now, it makes that push experience all of the extra manufactured and genuinely makes him appear unready for the Intercontinental Championship picture.

One saving grace for Jordan, even though, has been his in-ring ability. on the grounds that splitting from Chad Gable, Jordan has not often had a match that has disillusioned up to now.

however, does that clearly deliver him sufficient credence to get one over on the Miz and end what has been any other thoroughly fun Intercontinental Championship reign?

truly no longer. Jordan ought to almost really should paintings harder to earn his first singles name run.

Prediction: The Miz

Can the movement healthy the Preamble in John Cena vs. Roman Reigns? three OF 4

it's often believed that a healthy can best ever be as exact as its buildup.

If that is the case in terms of John Cena vs. Roman Reigns on Sunday at No Mercy, then the pressure is actually going to be on the duo to deliver.

Cena, particularly, has been electrifying in recent weeks, almost embarrassing Reigns on the mic and giving the bout a real big feel to it.

however, Reigns turned into given the privilege of the final say on Monday night, mocking Cena's capability to expose up whilst, in reality, he was on his manner returned from WWE's excursion of China.

Who wins the bout? It feels like there's a robust argument for each, however it is perhaps Reigns, as the agency's complete-time guy, who desires it more.

Ridiculing Cena for being a component-timer after which developing short does little to reinforce his picture. So it can well be The massive dog's night time.

Winner: Roman Reigns

Is Braun Strowman about to Do the Unthinkable? four OF four

The concept of Braun Strowman being over enough to face Brock Lesnar, not to mention even beat him, a year or so in the past was sincerely unthinkable.

Such has been the rise to prominence of Strowman due to the fact emerging as the black sheep of The Wyatt own family. In reality, he seemed much less of a chief event prospect than even Luke Harper and Erick Rowan, who now find themselves languishing in SmackDown stay's desolate tract.

WWE has played matters extremely well whilst reserving Strowman, offering him a squash possibility to reinforce his credentials every time viable, like in opposition to Enzo Amore on raw this past Monday. That has been mixed seamlessly with tough-earned, momentum-boosting wins against guys like Roman Reigns.

And all of it means that come Sunday night, the prospect of Strowman triumphing unexpectedly appears much more likely than ever earlier than.

put together for Braun to surprise the arena in opposition to The Beast Incarnate.

Winner: Braun Strowman