#cool looking rails

[majunju]

wao.... sunday

[coffee-cait]

May this world never have need for a D̶̛̛͉͎̋͒̈́̓̈́̓͊̾̎͐̿͐̃ē̴̛̼̥̤̠͍̝͑̊͝l̵̥̺͎̯̼̺̏̍̒̉͗͋͂̍̂͛̍̒̏͝ͅi̶̲̞̖̝̣̍̔̔̏̐̐̎̓̾̊̕̚v̸̨̘͚̹͇̦̠̣͓̑̋̈́̆̀́̇̎̅ȩ̵̛̥̣̱̥̥̖̣̪͕́̈̾̿̓̈́̅̂̍̚ȑ̴̨͈̜̝͍̗̺̯͌̌̀̈́̊̀̕͝ȩ̷̟̱͙͉̝̮̫͕͉̭̰̻́̈́̍̊̐̔̎͛̓ͅř̵̡̈́́͠.̵̧̞͈͉͈̘̻̭̩̞̦̳̪͚̗̈̋͑

[scottpilgvrim]

Backyard - Contemporary Deck An illustration of a sizable, modern backyard deck design

[b1adie]

The air… it’s cold. My sword is even colder.

[ddragonqueenn]

Aventurine wants you to think his love language is gift giving, considering he's constantly giving you gifts and doing things for you. He's a bold spender, 15,000 on a ring, 100,000 for a new, custom designed coat, and whatever other jaw-dropping amounts of credits he can spend on you, he will. It seems to anyone else that Aventurine really loves giving gifts, he showers you in presents more than anyone else- and he's a pretty big spender for anyone.

But, really, his love language is physical touch and quality time. Just having you near, being in your company, it's enough to make his heart skip a beat. Actually being able to touch you, have a hand against your shoulder- or waist- pulling you close enough that you're practically squished against him, whatever annoyingly couple-y stuff he can do, he will do so.

[yniennn]

[lowkeyren]

hsr 3.0 livestream

[roxirinart]

even what you don’t want

[i-bring-crack]

Oh my fucking god do the 8 leaves symbolize the 8 doctoral degrees that he's got?

[121231212i]

Honkai: Star rail | Version 3.4

[network-rail]

A very long complaint about the trains in Stardew Valley

So there is this indie farming game called Stardew Valley that you may have heard of (although knowledge of the game is not essential to understand this post), and there is a railroad with the occasional train in it. The point of the train is that it sometimes drops items (not especially rare ones either), but that's not what this is about. You see, I have many problems with the train from a rail enthusiast perspective rather than a gameplay one (although it could use some improvement in that regard as well) so I'm here to complain about those instead.

Anyway, intro over, time to rant about this stupid train.

So, first of all, let's start by taking a look at the railroad (this image is from the wiki, and shows the station):

Looks mostly normal, right? Sure, there might not be any station buildings –just a platform and a shelter– but this is a small rural town, so that's not too surprising. And it is a little odd how the spacing between the sleepers/ties is inconsistent, but maybe it's just old. Not to mention, there isn't any ballast or track bed, but that does sometimes happen on less-used rural lines. However, if we zoom and enhance, we discover several problems that, once spotted, will bother you forever.

Firstly, if we look at the level crossing sign (the actual crossing is just to the left, out of the image, but it's not important right now) we can see that the image is clearly one of an electric train, with a pantograph more or less the only feature visible (other than the window) at this scale. But when we look at the tracks, do we see any overhead wires? No, we don't, and later on we will discover that it gets worse in regards to what sort of traction is used (no, not battery electric, it's not that bad). Of course, while promising us electric trains and then immediately disappointing us through a lack of wires (and a subsequent lack of electric trains) is not a good look, it isn't too bad – after all, some level crossing signs in real life promise steam trains and then fail to deliver as well. But the problems with the Stardew Valley Railroad (or SVRR, if you will) go beyond misleading signage, as we will see.

Second, if we look at the tracks themselves, we notice something unusual going on: the rails appear to have had nails driven through them to attach them to the sleepers/ties, which would make the ride much more bumpy, and if the heads of the nails were worn through by the trains, then the rails could easily be knocked out of alignment. This is why rails are attached at the sides, so that the surface for trains to travel on is smooth and the trains do not wear away the things connecting the rails to the sleepers/ties (and therefore disconnect the rails from the track).

While this might seem bad, it's the sort of thing you would expect from someone who isn't a train enthusiast and has only rudimentary experience sticking things together (perhaps the occasional piece of IKEA furniture). The thing is, once the train shows up, it somehow gets even worse.

Before we get to the epitome of this mess that is the train locomotive, we must first look at the train carriages themselves, of which there are two basic types (by appearance, anyways; there are ): passenger cars and hopper cars.

Now, there are several things wrong in this image, but we'll go over them car by car, so as to not overwhelm the reader.

First, all but one of the cars in this image are hopper cars, of which one is not covered. We'll start with that one: it seems to be filled with cupboards of some sort, which is quite frankly baffling; as furniture would never be transported in aggregate hoppers (The SVRR aren't british rail, though they may be taking inspiration from them). This is a problem with several of the open hopper cars (although none of them are visible in this image), as these hopper cars can drop items for the player, and the contents can be seen from outside. Some of these items, such as coal, stone, iron ore, and copper ore are normal things to put in hopper cars (although the stone drops from hopper cars carrying bricks, which is a whole different can of worms we won't go into), but some items – such as wood – would never be transported in a hopper car (it makes no sense, hopper cars are for loose material, wood goes on a flatcar).

Now moving on to the covered hoppers, there isn't anything really wrong with these, as they appear to be perfectly normal modern hopper cars. Except for when they have livestock inside. (see here, again) HOWEVER, as we will see in the next paragraph (stop reading ahead, learn some patience) this modern appearance is itself a problem.

We're in the next paragraph now (aren't you glad you waited?) and we're going to talk about the passenger cars. First of all, the passenger cars have open platforms at both ends, and generally resemble earlier North American passenger cars, where passengers would leave through doors at the ends of the carriage and disembark from an open vestibule. However, the passenger cars also have side doors, which is very strange, and don't really fit with the style of the car. Next, we have something to consider: these passenger cars appear to be modeled after earlier North American passenger cars, what with their wooden appearance and open vestibules (side doors notwithstanding); but the freight cars appear to be modern hopper cars. Not only that, but the hopper cars and passenger cars are often found ON THE SAME TRAIN, which is a safety nightmare, especially for wooden carriages. If that train derails, those passenger cars will be turned to splinters (and the passengers into tomato sauce) by heavy hopper cars filled with lumber, gold ore, and cabinets. There do also seem to be venetian blinds over one of the windows, although that's not really much of a problem compared to everything else.

You may have noticed that up to this point, there is one part of the train that we have avoided mentioning (except for a passing reference to it not being electric), and that's the locomotive. In case you hadn't figured it out. Why? Well, I'm saving the best for last, and by best I mean worst.

So, without any more nonsense, here's the absolute travesty that is the SVRR locomotive!

This locomotive – a 4-6-0 steam engine – just keeps getting worse the longer you look at it, especially if you know anything about trains (which I do).

There's a lot to unpack here, so for this we'll be using bullet points to keep things concise:

There's a massive gap between the rear drive wheel and the front ones

The middle drive wheel is not attached to the coupling rod

The coupling rod is only connected to the wheels, not to the piston (how is it moving?!)

The leading wheels are incredibly small (WHY?!)

The leading wheels are stuck to a large metal box that I can only assume is meant to be a bogie (what else could it be?) that has very little clearance with the track

There is no coal tender or attached coal bunker (where is the fuel?!)

There's some sort of pipe sticking out of the cab (what is it for? is it a radio antenna?)

What's that box at the front? Is that where the side rods are meant to connect to the pistons? Because they aren't, so it could be a transformer box or a cabinet for all I know.

It's a steam train pulling modern hopper cars (the passenger cars do fit with steam trains though), and in a setting which has the internet, robots, buses, electricity (very anachronistic, especially since it doesn't seem to be a heritage railroad)

It's a steam train that travels through some rather long tunnels. How long? We don't know, but since the railroad doesn't appear anywhere else on the map they've gotta be long (if you don't know why this is a problem, you try breathing in smoke inside a tunnel for several minutes)

And more! Why don't you try to find something else that's wrong with the locomotive so I don't go insane?

One thing that annoys me specifically is that it's a steam train, rather than electric. This would normally be forgivable since steam trains are very iconic and good-looking, but this rather ugly locomotive looks like someone with a limited knowledge of trains attempting to draw a steam train entirely from memory. I would not advise attempting this even if you do know a thing or two about trains, since steam trains are rather complicated creatures. If you don't have a reference of some sort, you should stick to drawing electrics and diesels; since those have far fewer complicated external mechanisms to be messed up in such a spectacular fashion. Of course, since the internet exists, finding a reference should be easy. Should be.

Indeed, the complete shambles that is the entire Stardew Valley Railroad seems to be summed up by the locomotive: a railroad drawn apparently from memory by someone who isn't familiar enough with trains to pull it off convincingly. Of course, this is from the guy who brought us the famous Grandpa's Bed, so I'm not that surprised.

Anyway, this concludes my rant about the train in Stardew Valley. Fortunately, the train is fairly out of the way, and not that important in gameplay, so you don't regularly encounter it while playing the game. If the train actually looked good and made sense, I'd probably complain about how rarely you get to see it, but in its current state, it's fine that it doesn't show up that often.

[moeblob]

A lil guy !

[feroluce]

I love the fact that the Silvermane Guards are essentially just a very devoted "We Love Gepard Landau" fanclub, and I desperately need for all of them to get into ship wars about it behind their Captain's back. The soldiers are all split into several factions:

Some of them ship him with Sampo 🛡💣 (enemies to lovers/hateship enjoyers; this does not necessarily mean they like Sampo- in fact it's more like most of them want to sic their Captain on him skzjsmdm)

Some of them ship him with Bronya 👑🛡 (knight and princess trope enjoyers and also a sorta-kinda "that is our mom and dad" type of deal; this faction gets riled up and ridiculously hypes Gepard up to Bronya every time she comes down to the frontlines mskdkxmd)

Some of them ship him with the trailblazer 🛡💫 (the smallest and newest faction, but steadily gaining!)

Some of them ship him with Pela ❄🛡 (workplace romance enjoyers; Gepard once charged out into the Fragmentum alone to save Pela from an expedition gone horribly wrong, and when this faction saw Gepard carrying Pela back princess style they threw a whole party)

Some of them ship him with Dunn 🛡🗡 (also workplace romance; Dunn is very flattered by this because yeah wrong Landau, but wow, the troops really think he's good enough to woo the Captain, what an honor)

And some of them ship themselves with the Captain 🛡❤ (yumejoshi enjoyers; this faction throws a massive group effort every Valentine's Day and are also all very supportive of each other)

The final faction is an odd one, because they're defined not by who they ship their beloved Captain Gepard with, but rather by who they don't ship him with. Their name is generally shortened to the A.B.S. Group- Anybody BUT Sampo 🚫💣 DKSZJJSMSOZ

[struggling-jpg]

Random thoughts but

imagine Boothill going to the Luofu and meeting Jing Yuan and by extension Yanqing and it's like "Wow! You guys are motherfudging cool!"

But it occurs to him how young Yanqing is and he can't help but think that maybe his daughter could have grown and made friends with him. It's somewhat concerning that this little guy is in the constant face of danger. Boothill gets it, the kid's strong, but the dad in him worries just a bit.

Then maybe Boothill and Jing Yuan talk while eating (well, Boothill chewing on a bullet probably), and he brings it up casually, smoothly but the General knows what he's trying to get at.

Jing Yuan talks about how he's also feels worry, that he had thought about what it meant to raise Yanqing as a son, retainer, and a soldier. It takes some moments but Boothill finally openly talks about his daughter and how he wishes that he got to see beyond her first steps. That she could have had the chance to play guitar or ride horses or even learn to drive a spaceship. He feels afraid for Yanqing because isn't that boy still so small?

And Jing Yuan agrees with a thin, close-eyed smile that Boothill recognizes but can't put a name to. They reach a mutual understanding yet unanswered questions hang in the air.

[wonboos]

slowly and surely your senses will cease to resist

[drcnias]

mydei !! ❤️