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[vortsukoto]

This has some points but is missing a few things. Firstly is that money in the economy is not a zero-sum. People go into debt, which “creates” money out of thin air in exchange for that money being paid back later on. Having money before other people need it lets you loan it out to other people. This is where all of those profits evaporate to complicated loan and debt schemes let the wealthy finance the success of many and varied businesses and then drain it all off in interest payments. While this is good in its ability to finance growth, it leaves a horrible issue where the rich get richer and the successful get only slightly less poor. Ultimately the economy relies on the government or banks shoveling money out their doors in loans to counterbalance money accumulating in the super rich who then use that money to issue loans (or buy things that function similar to loans like stocks, bonds, or investments). While this makes sense in a world where money can’t just come into existence an has to be redistributed as debt, it make zero sense when the government controls the supply and can issue more at will. A lack of government investment simply rewards those wealthy people who have money while hurting people who need money to establish themselves in the long run.

Something my middlest brother pointed out yesterday: The wealthiest people on Earth do literally nothing with their wealth. They do an awful lot with their power, but not the hoarded wealth itself. Any spending or reinvestment is minuscule in proportion to the sheer amount that exists just to sit there and accrue. The wealth grows far faster than it can be spent, so any argument that spending is itself an efficient form of redistribution falls apart.  Under capitalism, capital races to become inert wealth. It is not a self-perpetuating dynamic system, it’s a system degrading toward a kind of heat death.

[vortsukoto]

Ikki’s characters : Ai and Vennie (claypeople, art students), and Gum (Ethereal dreamghost)

[vortsukoto]

The Normans - A Timeline

911: According to later writer Dudo of Saint-Quentin, in this year the king of the Franks, Charles the Simple, grants land around the city of Rouen to Rollo, or Rolf, leader of the Vikings who have settled the region: the duchy of Normandy is founded. In return Rollo undertakes to protect the area and to receive baptism, taking the Christian name Robert.

1002: Emma, sister of Duke Richard II of Normandy, marries Æthelred (‘the Unready’), king of England. Their son, the future Edward the Confessor, flees to Normandy 14 years later when England is conquered by King Cnut, and remains there for the next quarter of a century. This dynastic link is later used as one of the justifications for the Norman conquest.

1016: A group of Norman pilgrims en route to Jerusalem are ‘invited’ to help liberate southern Italy from Byzantine (Greek) control. Norman knights have already been operating as mercenaries here since the turn of the first millennium, selling their military services to rival Lombard, Greek and Muslim rulers.

1035: Having ruled Normandy for eight years, Duke Robert I falls ill on his return from

a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and dies at Nicaea. By prior agreement, Robert is succeeded by his illegitimate son William, the future Conqueror of England, then aged just seven or eight. A decade of violence follows as Norman nobles fight each other for control of the young duke and his duchy.

1051: Duke William visits England. His rule in Normandy now established, and newly married to Matilda of Flanders, William crosses the Channel to speak with his second cousin, King Edward the Confessor of England. The subject of their conference is unknown, but later chroniclers assert that at this time Edward promises William the English succession.

1059: Pope Nicholas II invests the Norman Robert Guiscard with the dukedoms of Apulia, Calabria and Sicily. The popes had opposed the ambitions of the Normans in Italy, but defeat in battle at Civitate in southern Italy in 1053 had caused them to reconsider. In 1060 Robert and his brother Roger embark on the conquest of Sicily, and Roger subsequently rules the island as its great count.

1066: Edward the Confessor dies on 5 January, and the throne is immediately taken by his brother-in-law Harold Godwinson, the most powerful earl in England, with strong popular backing. Harold defeats his Norwegian namesake at Stamford Bridge in September. But on 14 October William’s Norman forces defeat Harold’s army at Hastings. William is crowned as England’s king on Christmas Day.

1069: The initial years of William’s reign in England are marked by almost constant English rebellion, matched by violent Norman repression. In autumn 1069 a fresh English revolt is triggered by a Danish invasion. William responds by laying waste to the country north of the Humber, destroying crops and cattle in a campaign that becomes known as the Harrying of the North, leading to widespread famine and death.

1086: Worried by the threat of Danish invasion, at Christmas 1085 William decides to survey his kingdom – partly to assess its wealth, and partly to settle arguments about landownership created by 20 years of conquest. The results, later redacted and compiled as Domesday Book, are probably brought to him in August 1086 at Old Sarum (near Salisbury), where all landowners swear an oath to him.

1087: William retaliates against a French invasion of Normandy. While attacking Mantes he is taken ill or injured – possibly damaging his intestines on the pommel of his saddle – and retires to Rouen, where he dies on 9 September. Taken to Caen for burial, his body proves too fat for its stone sarcophagus, and bursts when monks try to force it in. His eldest surviving son, Robert Curthose, becomes duke of Normandy, while England passes to his second son, William Rufus.

1096: Following a call to arms by Pope Urban II in 1095, many Normans set out towards the Holy Land on the First Crusade, determined to recover Jerusalem. Among them are Robert Curthose, who mortgages Normandy to his younger brother, William Rufus, and William the Conqueror’s notorious half-brother, Bishop Odo of Bayeux. Odo dies en route and is buried in Palermo, but Robert goes on to win victories in Palestine and is present when Jerusalem falls.

1100: Having succeeded his father in 1087 and defeated Robert Curthose’s attempts to unseat him, the rule of William II (‘Rufus’, depicted below) seems secure. But on 2 August 1100, while hunting in the New Forest with some of his barons, William is struck by a stray arrow and killed. His body is carted to Winchester for burial, and the English throne passes to his younger brother, Henry, who is crowned in Westminster Abbey just three days later.

1101: Roger I of Sicily dies. By the end of his long rule, Count Roger has gained control over the whole of Sicily – the central Muslim town of Enna submitted in 1087, and the last emirs in the southeast surrendered in 1091. He is briefly succeeded by his eldest son, Simon, but the new count dies in 1105 and is succeeded by his younger brother, Roger II.

1120: On 25 November Henry I sets out across the Channel from Normandy to England. One of the vessels in his fleet, the White Ship, strikes a rock soon after its departure, with the loss of all but one of its passengers. One of the drowned is the king’s only legitimate son, William Ætheling. Henry responds by fixing the succession on his daughter, Matilda, and marrying her to Geoffrey Plantagenet, count of Anjou.

1130: Roger II is crowned king of Sicily, having pushed for royal status in order to assert his authority over the barons of southern Italy. A disputed papal succession in 1130 has provided an opportunity and, in return for support against a papal rival, Pope Anacletus II confers the kingship on Roger in September. He is crowned in Palermo Cathedral on Christmas Day.

1135: Henry I dies in Normandy on 1 December, reportedly after ignoring doctor’s orders and eating his favourite dish - lampreys. His body is shipped back to England for burial at the abbey he founded in Reading. Many of his barons reject the rule of his daughter, Matilda, instead backing his nephew, Stephen, who is crowned as England’s new king on 22 December.

1154: King Stephen, the last Norman king of England, dies. His death ends the vicious civil war between him and his cousin Matilda that lasted for most of his reign. As a result of the Treaty of Wallingford, which Stephen was pressured to sign in 1153, he is succeeded by Matilda’s son Henry of Anjou, who takes the throne as Henry II.

1174: King William II of Sicily begins the construction of the great church at Monreale (‘Mount Royal’), nine miles from his capital at Palermo. The building is a fusion of Byzantine, Latin and Muslim architectural styles, and is decorated throughout with gold mosaics, including the earliest depiction of Thomas Becket, martyred in 1170.

1194: Norman rule on Sicily ends. Tancred of Lecce, son of Roger III, Duke of Apulia, seizes the throne on William’s death in 1189; on his death in 1194 he is succeeded by his young son, William III. Eight months later, Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI, husband of Roger II’s daughter Constance, invades Sicily and is crowned in Palermo on Christmas Day. The following day, Constance gives birth to their son, the future Frederick II.

1204: King John loses Normandy to the French. The youngest son of Henry II, John had succeeded to England, Normandy, Anjou and Aquitaine after the death of his elder brother, Richard the Lionheart, in 1199. But in just five years he lost almost all of his continental lands to his rival King Philip Augustus of France – the end of England’s link with Normandy.

[vortsukoto]

/Clearly/ not mine, this is from some time ago on /tg/, but this is simply the best representation of humans as aliens that I’ve ever read. We’re not just the average for all the other PC-races, goddamnit, we’re berserk killing machines. Sauce if tumblr shows it too small.

[vortsukoto]

Stunning Likeness

We are known by uncountable names, given to us by uncountable races. All of them a variation on the universal concept of death, all of them inconsequential, all of them forgettable.

We exist, traversing the cosmos from galaxy to galaxy, system to system, planet to planet. We devour what we see, use it as we see fit, shape it and change it to our whims. Life is a means to our end, an infinite amount of whimpers that coalesce to a roar under our control. What it was before is irrelevant; only as part of us does it acquire meaning.

We herald our arrival into each galaxy with an electromagnetic burst, to see its inhabitants scamper and cower. How amusing they are to us! How pitiful they are in the face of our coming!

Read More

[vortsukoto]

She just batted a few dice away from her sheet in response. "That reminds me... A brand new continent..." She began examining her sheet, ignoring his chastisement. Next to him, the terror bird player brooded ignoring the various arguments that had popped up at the table. Those heathens had just crushed his brand new clade. Yes, it may have been a bit under competitive but damn it, dinosaurs were still COOL. He'd had a great story for this one and everything. He grumbled under his breath a bit as the other players took this chance to feud and belittle each other. Well if it was going to be like that, then he's damned well MAKE a competitive clade, story be damned. As the arguments settled down, The Arbiter looked down at the former terror bird player. "So, looks like you're rolling up a new clade then is it? Think you'll be finished before we wrap this up?" At the other end of the table God stood up. "No, I think I'm done for this session. I'm going to want to borrow your rule books until next session though," he said with a cold tone. *** *** *** *** *** ***

It had been a week and more hours than he could count going through every rule book he could get his hands on and cross referencing between them all. The result of this labor now lay under a light next to him. With a tired rub of his face, he leaned back toward and re-read it. Only one things was missing. Slowly and with a neat hand God filled in the name Hominidae. Well damn them but this wasn't supposed be a serious clade in any case, he followed this with the name Homo. There. He'd give them all a damned time next session, joke clade or no. Then they'd see some real wrath from God...

[vortsukoto]

Looks like: King Wu of Zhou

This is going to end SO poorly...

[vortsukoto]

Well that ends poorly.

A FUN GAME:

PRETEND YOUR ICON IS MAKING ITS CURRENT EXPRESSION WHILE GETTING A BLOWJOB

[vortsukoto]

Sometimes I wonder why people held human sacrifices to usher in the new year when spring comes every year without fail, but then I look out at it getting dark at 4PM. Cabin feaver sets in. Someone should probably stop me before I get my hands on a silver sickle and start stringing someones intestines over an oak tree and painting the trunk with their blood.

[vortsukoto]

...and outlined in the golden rays of sunset, I wondered however had I thought those ashen wings radiant and white? However had I though those hellish red flames pure and clean? What had been a shining salvation in the darkness now stood a fell shadow under the fading light of day.

[vortsukoto]

Negotiation is the interaction of greed and punishment. The greedier one side is, the more likely they will punish the other with successful negotiations. The better the other side can punish failed negotiations, the more they can counteract the greed of their opposition. Therefor, any basic demand in a negotiation can be characterized as weighing the punishment of success against the punishment of failure.

[vortsukoto]

I've been known to write overly dramatic speaches.

"I am Kerry. I am The Rune Scarred. Give your prayers to me where the gods lie silent, as my voice yet remains among their echos. Far worse than demons stalk this mortal coil when even the gods cannot be not roused for aid. The sands of time have given forth their secrets and the ethereal mists have parted to give a glimpse into the beyond. There lies in the space beyond space, a race of beings from the beginning of time. Primordial madness in their shapes and ageless malevolence in their minds, they seek the dominion of all. This host of madness seeks to bring an end to all sentient life within the planes in the reclamation of they once called their own. For time immemorial they had remained walled away from the knowable by magics as unimaginable in their power as in their scope. But time, as in all things, has brought low these magical protections which have kept them expelled. Through these weekend barriers have already come unimaginable monsters, warping the very fabric of existence around themselves and causing the land to wrack with disasters at their coming. Such vulgarities upon the real that they assault the laws of reality itself like a castle and drink the mana of the earth as a thirsty man may gulp water. All of these mere scouts and spies to such deific engines of destruction as remain trapped within the unreal by cracking walls and tumbling parapets. With each day the walls that keep these monsters at bay weaken and with each day the time of their endless undoing draws nearer. And so I wish it to be know that the 'First Ones' have returned. 'Were' might you ask, 'are your hopes of all hopes? Where are the gods?' Well beyond the mortal coil, in their divine realms, the gods have shut their doors to the destruction of all at the eve of this apocalypse. Prayers fall upon deaf ears, the calls of the faithful go unanswered, even the highest of angels and demons are left shut outside as though they mongrels in the rain. We have been abandoned by our supposedly all powerful saviors. We are alone. However we cannot allow ourselves to die alone to this implacable threat, surrounded as we are by unknowing heroes and ungathered armies, hands at our own throats in petty struggle. A future without our knowing intercession is one that will see farms burnt to ash, cities crushed to dust, our kith and kin exterminated to the last hollow skull. The age of mortals will be erased as though it never had been. As long as a single entity draws breath, this future cannot be allowed to come to be. So I open my arms to those faithless who seek hope in this time of portents to come and to the faithful who await their deity's return. To those voiceless who cannot be heard by the gods they revered and those who worship spirits that offer no answers. To the homeless who's temples have become lifeless buildings or who's return to the Outer Planes is as occluded as our own. No being, mortal or otherwise, deserves what has been left to them now. And by my rune scarred soul, I will provide where other gods have not. I am Kerry. I am The Rune Scarred. Give your prayers to me for I offer salvation."

[vortsukoto]

Due to convenient ret-cons, the use of the spellbook was delayed and it's exact effects edited slightly. New plan, get together a fuckton of Great Wyrm dragons and read that shit out loud. A flight of dragons with X3 spells per day and access to ALL wordspells? Sounds like a party to me.

[vortsukoto]

I once knew two brothers with the last name of Winchester. Both died of "suspicious" circumstances a few years after high school. And that's my fandom worthy story.

[vortsukoto]

248 spell slots is about 200 more that I'm equipped to deal with. On the up side, that means that you can always have the right spell for the job. On the down side, that means you need to figure out what those spells are going to be before hand.

[vortsukoto]

So apparently you're not supposed to read a book of ultimate magical knowledge OUT-LOUD. Because once you start reading, you can't stop, and then everyone within earshot gains Sorcerer spellcasting equal to their hit dice. So sue me, I thought it was supposed to be some kind of a party wide buff since we're all spellcasters, not something exclusively designed for my character. That said, I don't think anyone is complaining overmuch about their new-found power. Except where they don't have sufficient charisma to cast the highest levels of spells. Or where they have to learn the Words of Power system. ...Fuck.

[vortsukoto]

I once made a d20 Modern character character who's backstory was just a list misadventures. Since they always made the GM laugh, I considered the character a success even though the superhero game I was supposed to run him in never happened. In my character notes it was just a big list under “Have I ever told you about…”

That time I caught a 20’ Crocodile in my parent’s backyard pool

That time I caught Smallpox

That time I won a fishing derby in Bangkok with a 13’ bull shark

That time I got struck by lighting and blown up simultaneously

That time I caught giant piranhas in a Brazilian fishing derby

That time I was bitten to death by water moccasins

That time I went moose hunting in the Everglades

That time I set myself on fire on accident

When I got “arrested” for tent pegging in high school

When I sacked the Spanish treasure town of Portobello with an army of buccaneers

How much I hate scorpions

The holiday my grandparents drugged Christmas dinner with hallucinogens

When I got to commute to and from work for a month riding a manatee

How hard it is to find and subdue an invisible regenerating deer

Why intelligent technopathic ravens are a bad thing

When I got to experience whale illusions for the first time

Why I have NEVER boxed a kangaroo despite any video you may have seen

How I got fired from my previous job