#can't just get it at the grocery store cause 1) they have no options and 2) mom checks the receipts lol

[softgrungeprophet]

trying to think of an excuse i could give my mom as to why exactly i, known hermit, would possibly need to go somewhere so's i can go to the place where they make the chocolate and avoid paying $10 shipping on $12 worth of chocolate

*for mother's day lol

[a-little-revolution]

Hi lovely, I hope you are well?

I saw the ask about the bathroom accommodations and it got me really interested in two things.

1) what are accommodations that are hLepful (trying to 'help' without actually considering the needs of the individual, for example the step not enabling independence and I imagine from prior posts that it would also cause strain on your joints? (Plus the whole hygiene side, run into that one myself with suggested accommodations) )

2) what accommodations would you want to see in public spaces (doesn't have to be bathroom related, this just showed me a gap in my awareness and I'd like to work on it so I can include more awareness whenever I'm partaking in conversations around accessibility. If you have prior posts do link them, the only one that's coming to my mind right now was discussing the lack of accessibility in hospitals)

Hope you have a good pain/energy day, and I really love your style!

Hello! Indeed, I spoke about some ways to make public spaces more accessible for little people here - particularly when it comes to public washrooms. Here's some more accommodations I'd love to see!

I would love to see more information/reception desks with varying heights! This is an excellent piece of infrastructure that allows little people (and wheelchair users) full access to the counter and a place to speak to an attendant.

In the realm of public counter tops - a huge point of inaccess for me is grocery store conveyor belts. They come to about my chest, which makes loading and packing very difficult. And the "accessible" lane is no different! Plus every grocery store I've been to makes the "accessible" lane also the express lane - so while I'm buying my load of groceries, there's always a disgruntled customer behind me - I've even been denied access for having too many groceries!

The self check out is even worse - in a world where we're now being ushered to interact with these robots instead of real people, I can't reach the screen or the debit machine! So either way I need to ask for help, which completely defeats it's purpose. I would love to see a more accessible option that is lower to the ground.

A second, lower handrail on public stairs is a must! I've seen these in children's hospitals and schools, and would love them to be common place. Average handrails often land at shoulder height or higher - they provide little to no stability or safety for little people.

An access issue that often gets overlooked is the height of public seating - this includes doctor's office chairs, modern theatre seating, bar stools, booths, and office swivel chairs. The irony of a disabled person not being able to sit down is one I come across on the regular. The number of times I've showed up for an interview and not been able to sit without assistance is absurd.

Having a variety of seating options, or providing public step stools (or a combination of the two) could be easy fixes to this issue. In hospitals I am seeing a slow shift towards even lower chairs and beds since this issue is not always unique to little people - anyone who has difficulty bending, sitting, or transferring from a wheelchair has this issue. Modern design needs to account for diversity, instead of steering towards minimalism.

Step stools are of course the easiest means of making public spaces more accessible for little people, but I want to point out that they're not always the be-all-end-all solution, and can actually just be a band aid to some problems. While stools are incredibly versatile, not everyone has the ability to use them and they can pose a hazard in certain situations. In points of high traffic, built-in steps are far safer and could even be designed to fold up when not in use - they can also account for weight and wear.

Additionally, when stools are option in public, it's vital that they be easily accessed and borrowed by patrons without the need for a special request. I've said it before, "If I have to ask for help, it's not accessible". In order for stools to be a viable accommodation, they should be as freely obtained as toilet paper.

[mitigatedchaos]

"Writing? In 2024?"

Monday, April 29, 2024

(~2,400 words, 12 minutes)

@northshorewave Re: this publishing post:

I've read through the post that was linked, and an earlier related post by the same author that preceded it.

Her position is that the traditional publishing industry is essentially buying books as lottery tickets, paying for most of them using the few big winners they can't predict.

NorthShoreWave - The personal qualities of NSW specifically.

LLMs - Is AI a threat right now? Mostly as spam.

How Many Readers? - One famous book had 3,000 readers on an email list before its Amazon e-book debut, and went on to traditional publishing.

Funding Options - Many authors and artists are currently using subscription services. Some reasoning and numbers are provided.

Illustrations - Should you use illustrations? This lengthy section does a bit of fundamentals analysis of posting to suggest that maybe, you should.

Interaction - Reader replies are one method by which a post will spread.

Search - The people who want to read your story can't read it if they don't know about it. Writing a good book is essential, but only half the battle.

Some thoughts for you:

1 - NorthShoreWave

You implicitly asked if we had discussed your story in detail before, but the answer is that we hadn't. I have a sense of what you're trying to accomplish based on what I've observed of your character. While you think of yourself as seething, I think you're actually wise, compassionate, self-aware, and able to view things from multiple perspectives. A significant number of people are much worse at practicing at least one of these virtues. On its own, that's not enough to write a best-seller, but I think it does provide you with an advantage.

2 - LLMs

Based on my experiments (see @mitigatedai for some logs), I wouldn't worry about competition from AI. For you, the chief issue caused by AI will be spam. AI moves sideways (different text) and downwards (less meaning). I may tell LLMs to "combine Inspector Gadget and Death Note," but...

Do I actually use the information provided? No.

3 - How many readers do you need?

From one of those publishing posts, to get a sense of the number of readers you need...

Andy Weir first published The Martian as a serial for his own blog, then as a self-published novel on Amazon, then as a traditionally published novel with Random House. “I had an email list with about 3,000 people on it, so, initially, the audience was roughly that much,” he tells me. “When I first posted it to Amazon, I didn’t do anything to market or publicize it. All I did was tell my readers it was available there.” The book was on Amazon for five months, at a price point of 99 cents, and he sold 35,000 copies before Random House bought the rights in February of 2014.

Note that being a provocative firebrand doesn't necessarily mean you'll sell copies. Some politicians with tremendous name recognition failed to move copies of their books.

4 - Funding Options

I don't recommend using a Kickstarter to publish your book at this time or in the near future. You just don't have the name recognition, but also, Slashdotter Caimlas (who I don't know, so I don't know how trustworthy he is) wrote:

I'm personal friends with a number of authors who publish books in one of several subgenres. Mostly, they rely on Amazon's Kindle Unlimited: some of them are prolific enough that their book sales account for most of their income, simply based on peoples' reading of their works. Mostly, unless people want a piece of history or something they can reference, folks seem to hate having clutter. Fiction that sells isn't usually, primarily sold as a hardcopy book anymore, I don't believe - short of the kinds of books that end up at the end of the grocery store isle or in an airport novelty store.

A lot of publishing is done online these days, often through subscription services such as Substack (for essays) or Patreon. (Kindle Unlimited is also a subscription service, costing $12/mo.) As an example, the webcomic Spinnerette has a Patreon (bringing down $3.3k/mo), and then runs Kickstarter campaigns for print runs (volume 8 raised $27k).

To give you an estimate, Spinnerette's Patreon has only 536 subscribers, and pulls down $3.3k/mo, but you probably haven't heard of it. El Goonish Shive, which I'm confident you have heard of, brings in $3.6k/mo on 2.4k subscribers. The famous Kill Six Billion Demons has ~5.4k subscribers, bringing down ~$8.4k.

In Patreon terms, a good foothold to try for might be 100 subscribers at $3/mo each, with an initial focus on getting to 50.

5 - Illustrations

You've posted some drawings. They have some character, showing that you have the basic aptitude to develop the skill if you applied yourself to regular practice. However, the proportions are too far off to attract much attention (except as a stylistic choice, which, I can tell, it is not).

This blog tends to break things down into their abstract fundamentals for analysis. I promised myself I wasn't going to do that here, but eh, we'll do just a bit.

To quote one of the publishing articles...

“People tend to buy the books that are already really popular,” Deahl says. “They look at the bestseller list to see what they want to buy and that reinforces this tiny amount of books at the top. It’s a very top-heavy system. The tricky thing in publishing is success begets success. But it’s really hard to create that spark.”

Let's stop to think about this.

a. Banter - Fame

There is one layer to this that you can't do much of anything about, which is that people will watch the same shows their friends watch in order to have something to talk about with their friends.

b. Investment - Background

However, there is another layer over which you have more influence. It's very easy to make a quick judgment of a movie based on its visuals, or a short trailer. It's also relatively easy to judge short songs, since they're only a few minutes long (but I don't find myself doing this often).

In order to judge a book, you have to read the text and process it. You can't make a snap judgment off a single picture, because you have to read the text first to produce the mental picture.

This website does have viral text posts, but they're like...

You seem to have fundamentally misunderstood me, Anon.  Go read all 5,640 posts again.

Some of these posts can get a bit long, but it's usually a back-and-forth where each individual post is short. Often, they'll mix in images, or memes.

People supposedly read at 200 words per minute. Based on that estimate, this blog's most viral post of all time can be read in 5 seconds. That's about the same amount of time someone would spend looking at a jpeg.

That doesn't mean people don't enjoy effortposts. They will follow a blog upon encountering a good effortpost! They just don't like or reblog them.

I think you already know this part, but for "acceptable" length for reblogging, it's usually best to keep it under one "Tumblr page," meaning around one screen length on desktop, or around 200-300 words. I've talked about this part before, but if the reader can see the end of the post, it feels like less of an investment to read the post, and reblogging it won't fill up a friend's Tumblr dash.

Obviously that's tough for long-form fiction, because it has to load more context about the characters in order to establish the stakes. (Unless it's fan fiction, where the audience already knows the characters.)

c. Investment - Strategy

As you know, this blog will sometimes post political cartoons and other illustrations as part of its general stream of content.

The obvious strategy is just to have some nice-looking character images or images of scenes from the story. It can be "read" faster, so it's more shareable.

I think that strategy suffers from a weakness in that it's easy to just look at the image and disregard the text. This would reduce your fiction blog to an art blog - and it is not an art blog.

Therefore, I would like to gently suggest - and keep in mind, I do not have any published novels - a different potential approach. This proposal is speculative, and this technique is not widely used.

Do you know that famous Rockwell painting, Breaking Home Ties? Rockwell is a master of telling a story with just a single still-frame painting.

Rockwell has to tell the whole story in one picture, because that's the medium he's got to work with. This limits how much story he can tell. As an author, you don't have to limit yourself to what can be told in just one image, because you have the text.

This strategy would involve a two-step maneuver.

First, the image at the top of the post communicates the essentials that the reader needs to know about the characters through the composition of the scene (so that they don't need to read background material), as well as various subtle details, while raising questions, also through the use of details/etc, to increase the viewer's curiosity.

Fortunately for the viewer, second, the questions raised by the image are answered in the text right below it.

The post would form an entry point into a network of related posts; tags for particular characters could be linked at the bottom, or links to other posts in the sequence.

Secondary characters would be ideal for this, because you can manipulate their scenarios/context/character to fit the short format, while your overall project will focus on the main characters and thus have a greater, long-term narrative investment for appropriately larger payoff.

As I wrote in my post on 'text wall memes,' people will read text in an image, and they'll even reblog it, but it's contextual. So again, this is speculative, but it should be feasible. It's a matter of creating the appropriate context.

d. Investment - AI Art

I don't think you should use AI-generated art. Yes, people will be able to tell, but the even bigger problem...

Compare this AI knockoff to Norman Rockwell's original Girl with Black Eye.

The expression is wrong. The pose is different. This is a completely different story from the one Rockwell was telling! The prompteur 'borrows' the right 25% of the image from Norman's original because he can't reproduce it. And what is that random white cloth on the left side of the image?

There is a significant reduction in the amount of intention in the image. Putting it back in involves working over the image, repeatedly, usually with inpainting, and often working against what's in the AI's training data, forcing it to pull from more and more improbable parts of the distribution (until eventually, there's no matching data in the training at all; you have to get out and draw it yourself).

I'm going to borrow a post of my own here from 2019.

This isn't oriented towards the strategy I've described, and it only got 21 notes, but note the teacup with steam and tea bag tag, the obscured flag in the background, and the Youtube-style video tracker on the bottom. The combination of the special effect, text that looks like a subtitle, and video tracker imply that the image is a screenshot from a streaming anime.

The character is casually (as indicated by the cup of tea) sitting at a computer desk (as indicated by the faintly sketched keyboard and hand position for a mouse). What's that flag in the background? It certainly doesn't belong to any extant country. (In fact, as the artist, I'll tell you - it's based on an O'Neill Cylinder.)

Obviously this art is very much just a sketch in quality terms. An AI rendering usually looks much fancier. However, an AI would not put that detail in.

e. Investment - Technical Skills

However, I will suggest the use of software if you go this route. (Or the hiring of an artist, but that could get expensive.)

Your issue is with proportions. Lots of people have trouble with proportions. (You also have trouble with hands. Lots of people have trouble with hands.)

One way to deal with this is to just train. You'd be surprised at how fast you improve if you draw from realistic sources such as photographs an hour a day for a year, even if it's just a quick sketch. You probably aren't willing to do so. You have other things to worry about, including writing.

However, you could use posing software. You could save the proportions of several characters and position them throughout the scene, as well as having a grid for the ground and potentially other props to help with positioning of items like lamp posts or the edges of buildings. (I've experimented with posing software a bit myself.)

Dan Shive (of El Goonish Shive) does not use posing software as far as I know, but he has used 3D software. Although his style is cartoonish, one thing people like about him is that he does put effort in at improvement, and the quality of his work has improved substantially. (That was actually the inspiration for the second part of the "in 2028, Hollywood runs out of ideas and adapts El Goonish Shive" post.)

6 - Interaction

Though shorter posts tend to go more viral, I find that posts which someone can reblog and share their opinion tend to show up a lot in my top posts (as long as they're only about one tumblr page long). The MOON PRISON poll is a good example of something that's approachable and neutral, but fits heavily with the themes of my blog, but other posts may take a political position that invites disagreement, resulting in discourse, and get reblogged that way. (You may also remember the silly Swift Pill poll.)

I don't recommend courting disagreement on purpose. Not only is this bad for the social environment, but it tends to make people go crazy.

7 - Search

I think you've probably noticed some of this already and are working with it (posting short excerpts, initial art). Most of this is, again, speculative. This is all just information for your consideration.

Writing a good book is the first problem. Getting the readers who would enjoy the book to find it in such a noisy environment is the second problem. I think you can do it, but if your trajectory isn't currently looking as good as you want (e.g. # followers on your story's sideblog), I would recommend expanding your strategy so that you're in a good position when the book itself is ready to launch.

[aceofwhump]

Hello! Do you by chance have any recs for blood thinner side effect fics (for Buck), or just generally long-term effects of any of his injuries/lingering conditions?

Like (can I post links? Idunno, the title is “a hundred little pieces” by renecdote)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28948266

is absolutely incredible (highly recommend!) and I’m on the lookout. Thanks!

Hi! I've def got a few fics for you. Hope you enjoy!

These are all blood thinner related:

death by blood thinners by carefulren: Buck cuts his arm during a rescue, but he doesn't realize until Eddie walks in on him half-naked in the locker room and covered in blood.

Let That Lonely Feeling Wash Away by 221BSunsetTowers: After the fight with Eddie in the grocery store, Buck drops a glass jar and cuts his hand. Buck's just too tired, thinks he's just too tiring, to do anything but buy some gauze and plan on bandaging himself up at home. Buck's not really thinking about the blood thinners he's still on when the blood loss makes him collapse outside the store, right in front of Eddie.

Bleeding Isn't Optional for Most of Us by actually18pigeons Summary: In the midst of recovering from the leg injury, Buck relapses with self-harm, but the blood thinners make that a bit more of a problem than he anticipated. So what does he do as he's bleeding out on his bathroom floor? Call Eddie of course. Major self-harm trigger warning. Be careful please.

Shaving Gone Wrong by DawnNimbus Summary: Buck not paying attention at work before shift and cuts himself shaving. Eddie freaks out because of the blood thinners. Buck had forgotten to tell the team had been off them for a while.

---------------------

These are all Buck having chronic leg pain after being crushed under a firetruck:

Flare Up by actually18pigeons Summary: Off of a chronic pain prompt - Buck has a flareup sometime between healing from the accident and being reinstated. Pre-lawsuit, pre-Buddie (but there's definitely mutual feelings).

Attack from Behind by Shearmouth Summary: For Whumptober Day 6: "Stop, please." Most days, it's nothing. A twinge if he lands on it wrong, an ache during rainstorms. Other days, Buck can't breathe.

featherlight by rogerzsteven Summary: "Can you come over?" Buck asks over the phone— he pleas, and the tremble in his voice clenches Eddie's heart. "Where are you?" Eddie springs to his feet, grabbing his coat and keys in a rush, his brows knitted and face suddenly burning up. "Are you okay?" Eddie hears another choked out mewl over the line. "I'm— I'm home." "Are you okay?" "I'm—" Buck's words get cut off by a pained groan. "God, my—my leg— I c-can't get up." 1 time Buck tends to Eddie's shoulder pain and 1 time Eddie tends to Buck's leg pain. Bad Things Happen Bingo: Chronic Pain

eddie diaz saves the day by buckaroobuddie Summary: Buck's leg acts up as he's trying to rescue someone. Eddie's there to save the day. ---- Written for the prompt "Chronic pain"

cause i will be your safety by rogerzsteven Summary: "Is it your leg?" Eddie whispers as he gives Buck's shoulder blade a gentle squeeze. Buck nods his head without even lifting his face from the pillow and whimpers quietly. Eddie sits on the edge of the couch, wraps his fingers around Buck's leg and scoots closer so he can rest Buck's leg on his lap. "Hey." Eddie says when Buck tries to get his leg free from Eddie's touch. "Let me see." Buck has a leg cramp. Eddie helps him as he can. bad things happen bingo: crying into chest

---------------------

These are all post tsunami nightmares and panic attacks:

Fall On Me by lionheartedghost Summary: “You never used to go this way,” Eddie said. “It’s quicker to take a left back on Pine and go along by the ocean.” “This way’s quicker,” Buck said absently. “Cuts out the traffic.” “No it doesn’t.” Eddie looked at him carefully. “It just cuts out the beach.” Written for the promptabuddie prompt, "Eddie helps Buck deal with his fear of water following the tsunami."

Bring Me Back by Stennerd Summary: It's been months since the tsunami and Buck had been doing just fine. All it took was walking through water to bring it all crashing back.

Bucky bear by wolfypuppypiles Summary: Buck is still struggling with nightmares after the tsunami and Eddie and Christopher come up with a plan to help him feel safe at night.

Ghost in the night by wolfypuppypiles Summary: So, apparently one of the side effects of trauma can be sleepwalking. Yeah. Buck thought it was pretty weird too. Queue worry, angst, baby gates and pep talks :)

[aquaproplumbingcoaz]

5 Plumbing Tips to Keep Your Home Safe and Running Smoothly

So you ran a load of laundry, and when you went to get the clothes out, they were a soggy mess. Or maybe you've had a drain that's been backing up for days and just can't seem to clear itself. Or maybe your sink has been draining slowly for weeks now—and not only is it unsightly, but it's starting to smell! If any of these scenarios sound familiar, then chances are good that there's something going on with your plumbing system. Luckily, we've got some tips on how to avoid these situations altogether:

1. Check your water heater.

Don't forget to check your water heater. Check the pilot light, the temperature setting, and the thermostat. You should also check the pressure relief valve (located on top of most tanks) to make sure that it's in good working order.

2. Prevent frozen pipes.

Get some heat. Frozen pipes can be a major problem during the winter. To keep this from happening, you’ll want to take some steps to prevent it as soon as possible.

Use a heat tape or lamp. You can purchase a heating device that will attach to your pipes, or install an under-sink water heater if you have room for one in your home's layout.

Place bowls of hot water in the affected areas and open cabinet doors so warm air can circulate more easily through those rooms and out into other parts of the house where it will do good work keeping other things warm too!

Run faucets at least halfway open for even more heat-generating moisture in those areas where water is running regularly (i recommend not doing this immediately after cooking since there could be grease build up on kitchen surfaces that could clog drains).

3. Mind your hoses and faucets.

Use the right size hose for the job.

Don't leave hoses lying on the ground where they can be stepped on or damaged by vehicles driving over them.

Don't let hoses freeze during cold weather, as this could cause a burst in your plumbing system when you turn on water later in springtime (and yes, it will happen).

Don't use garden hoses to wash cars or other vehicles—they're meant only for watering plants! And certainly don't use them to wash the house either; they're not strong enough for that kind of work!

4. Keep drains free and clear of clogs.

When it comes to your drains and pipes, it's important that you take the time to keep them clear of clogs. This will ensure that your home is safe and running smoothly.

If you're looking for a quick and easy way to handle this task at home, try using drain cleaner. You can buy this product at most grocery stores or hardware stores. Just pour it into the drain, wait 10 minutes, then flush water through the drain as normal.

If these methods don't work, try using a plunger instead! Plungers are especially useful in toilets because they quickly break up any blockages that might be causing problems with the water flow there.

Another option is using a snake: simply insert one end into the pipe opening where there's an issue and then twist back and forth until whatever caused the problem comes loose (this may take several attempts). It's worth noting that this method isn't always effective since some clogs are too large for any tools at hand; if you're not sure whether yours will work or not before trying out this method yourself then we would recommend trying one of these other options first just in case!

5. Be careful with household chemicals and medications.

Don't mix chemicals with each other.

Don't mix chemicals with water.

Don't mix chemicals in a container that could leak and cause damage or injury to you or someone else.

Don't put cleaning products down the drain, especially on a regular basis. If you use them daily, consider buying an inexpensive plastic bucket to pour them into so they don’t get mixed up in your pipes and cause damage or leakage instead of just being flushed away (and causing problems further down the line). *Don't put medications down the drain unless they specifically say that it's okay for flushing them down there.*

Nothing is worse than dealing with a plumbing problem!

Nothing is worse than dealing with a plumbing problem! They can be expensive, dangerous, and cause all sorts of other problems. Plumbing problems can cause mold and structural damage to your home. They can also cause health issues such as waterborne illnesses (such as Legionnaires disease) if the water supply isn’t properly maintained. Here are some tips to help you avoid these costly issues:

Make sure you have an annual maintenance plan in place for your plumbing system by hiring a plumber phoenix who is qualified to diagnose any problems before they become too big to fix on your own. You shouldn’t wait until something breaks before finding out what needs fixing because it will cost more once there is actual damage done! The best way to protect yourself from unplanned expenses is by having preventative maintenance done every year so that when something does break down there are no surprises from hidden leaks or pipe corrosion caused by improper use over time without regular cleaning & flushing out clogs etc..

We hope these tips will help you prevent and deal with plumbing issues in your home. Remember, the best way to avoid plumbing problems is to take care of the basics: check your water heater, prevent frozen pipes, mind your hoses and faucets, keep drains free and clear of clogs, be careful with household chemicals and medications. If you do have a problem with your plumbing system then don’t try anything on your own unless it involves calling a licensed plumber!

Aqua Pro Plumbing Co. is a family owned and operated business that has been serving the Phoenix area for over many years. Specializing in residential plumbing and drain cleaning, we have a wide range of services available to help you get the job done right.

Aqua Pro Plumbing Co Phoenix, AZ 85014 (480) 613-2243 https://aquaproplumbing.co/

[iceglade]

long thoughts i had while listening to dreams 🤓podcast🤓

obsessed with the idea of saving time like with the wayback machine and traveling to select saved/marked/preserved moments like that

get me in the ring coach i wanna talk to dream about it. gonna hit em with the "yeah we can but Should we" just to see what he does

im a big advocate for putting together an ethics committee cause we're only gonna need one More as time goes on and hardware/SOFTWARE advances.. especially software

cApItAlIsM LeAdS tO iNnOvAtIoN yeah when they want to empty the clouds before a big sports event, but the simultaneously dumbest and most important question here is whos gonna pay for using it where people Need it not that they Need that when there are simpler tech options to fix stuff like world hunger and global warming literally we could solve every single problem listed right NOWWWWW its just that NOBDOY WANTS TO FUCKING PAY FOR ITTT CAPITALISM IS SO GOOOOOOD .. OBVIOUS SARCASM ...

hes talking about technically everything being useless except for your brain.. yeah dream the only reason thats the case is we dont understand how the brain works. if we understand how the brain works we wont even need the biomass there too

im allowed to say dreams dumb because im smarter than him and i also love all these topics

"DIE EARLY I DONT CARE"

hfjgj hes just wow'ed by the possibilities open to us huh... hes also totally stuck at step 1 bc chat is so so miserably stupid

well. having muscles and spending the energy to move around helps regulate our system. its like when you go onto space and 0 gravity ..

i mean yeah you can drug yourself with endorphins too. is that as valid a way to live as any?

why do we need all this? it CAN be made but there are so many more things to consider than just innovation innovation innovation fast fast fast. a genuine question to consider is, when does convenience start cutting out things that can't be calculated? but yknow what AI struggling with soft sciences is like the whole big question right now so im gonna move on

"METEORITES"

that seems so painful to have to crack open meteorites to fulfill future water demands. why cant we just maintain the cycles instead? i mean like yeah i can think "ai does the math automated controlled detonation system" but thats doing too much. i'd just occams razor that bitch. earth has its own system why do we have to make our own less efficient system other than just to just be able to say we did it. like its cool but inefficient you might as well program your grocery delivery bot to perform a musical number before it lets you touch your food. its dumb

climate change fixing, actually i was on tiktok and someone made a video about how they fixed the acid rain from the 60s i think. which was deincentivizing companies by putting a cap on pollution levels, giving them buyable passes, allowing them to buy them from Each Other, and then making it more monetarily profitable to invest in green energy and sell off their pollution passes. like. thats FUNNY. and that WORKED.

trueeee change and development takes time but it also takes money. time for the people below, money for the people above 🤓🥸

i personally want horses to come back.

like yas i hate gas cars

bring back the horse

its true that prices lower as tech gets less and less expensive to make and mass produced, all ethics on THAT topic aside, but this makes me think of going to the store and seeing massive, beautiful tvs that would have been thousands in 2010, selling for 400 just sitting on the floor. the opulence of this fucking era occasionally hits me when im in a grocery store surrounded by food just sitting there...

empathy huh.. off topic tangent, but i'm a firm believer in that hereditary inherited trauma/genetic memories, i completely believe thats an actual thing, and when i have to think about humanity i think about how we're all beings made up of layers upon layers of ideas that Worked. if it didnt Work we would not have Been here. thats how evolution works, yeah? if we were to program a robot to feel empathy and to have consciousness, would we follow that same process to have it generate its humanity? how else would we create consciousness? or maybe we could follow the octopus format of having multiple computation centers that communicate.. is that any less or any more valid a form of consciousness than anything else ... i wonder what dream would say on these topic. and yet ALL OF THIS is totally moot once ai develop to think faster and bigger than us because i cant

i think ai would have as many limits as humans do. its a hardware vs software situation just like everything else

i wanna be like "living as a robot is just another way to live, chase your happiness" but do i really wanna get into the social when dreams already moved on in the podcast okay

ROBOT REPRODUCTION.. ELIMINATE BABIES ENTIRELY .. though i agree, there's still developing to do even if you could download worldly knowledge and experience directly into a newborn's head.

oh he circled back around to it, but i also really appreciate having the option to do it even if i dont. or to Not do it even if i Do. just on principle. but that's MY view on the world

life purpose and meaning huh ...

i like that dream optimistic, though. its one of the things that makes him matter so much to me.

the people who are causing climate change can be MADE to care, though. it's possible.

well. asking this question to the universe but do we really have to hit rock bottom before anything gets done? why does everything have to be a tragedy? cant we just solve the problem before its the World End? why does it always have to be this way?

i hope dream is enjoying his ice 🥺

i agree. humans are cockroach-like. we really are the biggest threat to ourselves.

disaster events always gets everyones priorities in order. but i really wish it didnt have to be so dire for that to occur. why does this always have to be the case

OH HERE WE GO AGAIN. GHOSTS ARE SCIENCE

THATS THE PROBLEM DREAM BELIEVES IN HEART BUT HE DOESNT BELIEVE IN SPIRIT. "they could. anything's technically possible i dont think my view is the only right view but based on my worldview i dont believe in ghosts because theres no evidence pointing to it whatsoever so i dont have any reason to believe it" YOU'LL SEE. YOU'LL ALL SEE

"so whats up" nothin much man whats up with you

the fucking word hunt sounds im crying

okay post over thanks for reading guys

put me in the ring coach id love to talk with you!!!!!!

[canttalktumbling]

New Post has been published on Can't Talk

New Post has been published on http://www.cant-talk.com/2017/01/death-sprues-dead-winter/

Death to Sprues: Dead of Winter

We are so thrilled to welcome back guest writer Anton and his board game review series Death to Sprues! Hooray!

It has come to the point when a zombie theme in a product is actually a negative. Zombies have become an ironic trope of self-reflection on consumer culture, yet the banal writing and theme keep on shambling. All that being said, I really think the Dead of Winter board games by Plaid Hat Games are worth your time.

The first game in the series is titled Dead of Winter: A Crossroads Game. Plaid Hat apparently intends to have more Crossroads games in the future with varying themes and perhaps game types. At this point the only other Crossroads game is Dead of Winter: The Long Night. The Long Night is a standalone expansion, meaning it can be combined with the original game to give it more content but everything needed to play is included if you don’t have the first game on hand. I’ll compare the two games later, but know that the core mechanics are identical.

Players take on the roles of survivor bands, usually controlling one to four unique people throughout the course of the game. At the start of the game you set the colony’s mission (some kind of game-long objective you’re all working towards). This usually involves pooling resources of one kind or another a small scenario such as how many rounds you have to complete it, and how the morale of the camp is at the outset. You will use your small cadre to cooperatively collect supplies, construct fortifications, keep the colony clean, and of course, kill zombies. Each playable survivor has a few simple statistics, but the focus is on one unique ability that they do much better than anyone else. Some survivors can move around easily, some are good at killing zombies without risk, and others are good at searching for loot, or helping others achieve their tasks faster. The survivors are easy to keep track of, and having to control more than one does not lead to keeping track of oodles of numbers and traits.

The gameplay area is dominated by the survivor colony and six main locations in the surrounding town. These areas represent resource hubs such as the school, the hospital, the police station, etc. Each location offers varying amounts of game resources, but logically tends to contain more of thematically linked items. The grocery store, for example, is a pretty good place to get food for the colony or yourself, whereas the police station has guns, the gas station has fuel, and so on. Each location has four to five resource types, but tends to offer one more abundantly than any other location. Players will likely spend the majority of the game sifting through the item decks for much needed supplies.

The game plays out in rounds, starting with introducing a crisis demanding the colony’s immediate attention. This can be something like a cold snap requiring extra fuel to keep the colony warm or medicine to cure food poisoning. The result is some kind of resource demand and the potential for all players to contribute. Helping the crisis requires players to submit their contribution by playing resource cards face down so no one else can see what’s going into the pile. Playing the appropriate resource helps the cause, while playing unrelated or junk cards into this pile can disastrously sabotage the effort as each unrelated card is a -1 to the total, negating a helpful card in the process. This means players often have to help, say they can’t help and hope their mitt full of cards isn’t suspicious, or maybe wrecking the team effort is what they want?

On top of the colony’s mission, each player is dealt their own secret objective. This is a win condition that is unique to the player, and is in addition to the successful completion of the mission. This means you want to help the colony, but you’ve got your own agenda to fulfill as well and you can’t tell anyone else what it is! Usually the secret objectives are to have a small supply of a resource hoarded to yourself, or it might be to have every survivor you control armed with a weapon. The variety here is quite broad, so the replay value is great. It also leads to some seriously tough decisions for players. Should you help the current crisis by delving into your personal cache of fuel that you need to win? Is it acceptable to fail the crisis this round and suffer the penalty, knowing you might not be able to replace the fuel if you contribute? The secret objectives inject a bit of suspicion and quirky behavior into the game—and then you have betrayers.

The betrayer is the player who was dealt a specific secret objective that labels them as a hidden villain. Their win condition always involves having the colony fail its mission, while they fulfill some hidden requirements of their own. Like regular secret objectives, betrayers usually have to hoard a resource, but often at a larger scale since they likely don’t have to care about some of the crises failing. The main challenge of a betrayer is staying hidden. Everyone has their own secret objective, and may be prone to questionable choices that hamper team efforts, but you’ve got to avoid being labeled as outright sabotaging the team. If you’re too obvious and flippant with your subterfuge, you’ll likely be exiled from the colony and forced to scavenge for supplies without any helpful teammates. There are a few really nasty tricks players can do to each other that I’ll leave you to discover on your own but, needless to say, once you don’t care about another player’s survival you can really throw them to the wolves.

Just moving around the town proves to be one of the more dangerous actions in the game, as it introduces one of the game’s main components: the exposure die. This die represents the risk of coming in contact with zombies, and is absolutely merciless. The best outcome from this die is for “nothing” to happen; otherwise, you find yourself getting wounded, catching frostbite, or straight-up dying instantly. Getting the fatal “bite” result on the die sets off a cascade of tension. If a survivor is bitten, they put every other survivor in their location at risk. The next survivor in their location must then make a choice: kill themselves to prevent further infection, or take their own chance with the exposure die. When rolling the die to resolve infection spreading, any result other than a blank side is instant death and passes the torch on to yet another survivor at the same location.

Fighting zombies also causes players to roll the exposure die to see if the alternatively dead person caused any return harm when attacked. The ghouls are naturally attracted to where humans are but are also drawn by the noises generated when you thoroughly search the resource deck at a town location. You can take the top card when searching or noisily sift through additional cards at the price of possibly attracting hostile attention.

The last important mechanic of Dead of Winter is the Crossroads deck. This is a pile of narrative cards drawn on every player’s turn. Each Crossroads card has a trigger condition such as, “If the player searches at the School this turn” that then leads to a scenario playing out, and a decision for the players to make. Most of the Crossroads cards are bad, and you’re forced to choose the lesser of two evils, but some yield positive results depending on how you look at them. The active player is never privy to the triggering conditions for their Crossroads card, so tension is often the result. Some cards are very easy to trigger, while others call upon very specific circumstances yet are thematically linked to specific survivors and often provide an interesting flavor. If the card is not triggered, it’s simply discarded and the next turn progresses.

Dead of Winter, if nothing else, provides players with a variety of decisions that are meaningful. The game is all about resource management, and worker placement. With the limited actions I could take each turn, I never felt like any turn was a ”dead turn” with nothing to play, or minute choices that didn’t matter. Dead of Winter seems to revel in giving players enough freedom to do a multitude of actions, yet not enough time to do them all. You often find yourself with two to three things that need immediate attention, and you’re only able to do half of one. That’s where the teamwork and smart movement of your survivors comes in. Dead of Winter is a tense and challenging experience but is enjoyable the whole way through.

One of the best strengths of the Dead of Winter games is how modular they are. When your play group decides on the mission your colony will go after, it gives you an approximate game length of short/medium/long allowing you to tailor your time commitment. If having a betrayer in the colony doesn’t suit you, just don’t play with those objectives shuffled into the deck. You can even remove the secret objectives entirely and play a purely cooperative game where everyone is working towards the mission undistracted.

The Long Night expansion adds even more modular options to extend gameplay variety. You can add in the Raxxon pharmaceuticals lab where scientific experiments have gone awry and spawned super zombies. The Raxxon lab also offers some really powerful weapons to those who rummage through its resource deck, and you could even find mysterious pills that offer powerful bonuses or crippling detriments. You can also add in bandits coming from a competing colony. The bandits will attack just like zombies, but also steal resources from the town and hoard them in their own depot. Will you wage war on the bandits and steal resources back, or will you be exiled and become their leader?

The versatility of Dead of Winter really has to be applauded, and that’s why I mentioned the theme at the outset. If you aren’t a fan of zombies, Dead of Winter may still interest you for its smart narrative elements that come from secret objectives and Crossroads cards. If you are a huge zombie fan, Dead of Winter can really spark your imagination with its risk-reward dynamic of racing against the game rounds as zombies pile up against the colony doors and need to be culled here and there.

The best part about Dead of Winter is that the survivors and their struggle is what the game is all about; the zombies are in the background. This makes for a game where the survival and teamwork is center stage, and the necro-challenged are a MacGuffin. The alt-blight movement could just as easily be a sandstorm, rising flood waters, or a pack of rampaging space ibex. They simply fill the role of a hostile environment that the humans must work around.

I highly recommend either Dead of Winter or The Long Night standalone expansion. If you have both, you can really expand the experience. The Long Night adds resource cards that are a little more versatile than the original game, you’ll often have cards that can do two or more actions instead of acting as a single resource. The supply decks of each location are locked at 20 cards though. Do you want to replace them, mix them and get 20 random cards from the pool of 40 for each location knowing you might get the junk from both halves? The Long Night also has tighter thematic elements. As you add or subtract modules to the game, there are Crossroads cards and even specific survivors that come into play at the same time. A couple of Crossroads cards are only in play if the bandits are, for example, and one survivor’s unique power is tied to the Raxxon lab. The Long Night also replaces some components in the original game with more sturdy cardboard pieces.

Between the two games, I’d favor The Long Night. It has better components, and more modules to add to the game on top of the basic experience. The resources in The Long Night tend to serve multiple purposes, and the survivor powers are a bit more unique. The smaller Crossroads deck in The Long Night is also a bit more heavy on theme, and there is even a small 9 card envelope of particularly horrific Crossroads cards that Plaid Hat warns will explore the darker side of humanity in crisis. The thicker Crossroads deck from the original game is a good selling point, but the fact that it costs as much as the whole game to get it makes it an inefficient purchase if you get The Long Night first. Both are excellent games, just be aware that the expansion makes going back to the original a bit thin on a few fronts.