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That's the most unbelievable claim in this thread.

I suppose it's remotely funny, especially considering "respectable" media hasn't changed much in 100+ years in bogus predictions.

A 3060 or 3080 ?

Ok, then he's a smug contrarian centrist or whatever. The full show is, last I watched one years ago, pretty much a talk show but with a self-important smug host instead of someone feigning intrest. Taken as a whole it's boring with a handful of comedy bits in the intro and outro. I guess if you're just watching those segments it's a lot better than the actual show. Evangelicals are just so weird that any attempts to make fun of them make them look better than what they actually believe.

I remember a couple of glaring historical inaccuracies. I’m kind of a history snob when it comes to the movies. I expect them to get it right and they seldom do. It was a beautiful movie to look at. Cinematography, the cast, all that was great. The plot was a little convoluted and sort of didn’t make a lot of sense but even that I can overlook. But when the US Army is using the wrong type of weapons, the wrong tactics, even combat taking place in the wrong freaking places I can’t get past it. actually I had the same complaint with saving Private Ryan. The Normandy Landing that they depicted was great. Very well done. Stressful just to watch it. But the whole idea of sending a squad of men led by a company commander no less in the middle of the first weeks of the invasion just would never happen. And the premise behind the last battle and the strategic importance of a bridge that was less than 20 foot long. The Wehrmacht corps of engineers could have had that river bridged in a few hours. In the airborne would not have fought to defend it. The moment the first German column was sighted they would’ve evacuated across the river and blown the bridge then set up a defense to attack any of the engineers that tried to repair/bridge the gap. hey I get it it makes for great drama and movies. But it irks me. The funny thing is the war movies I thought were the best ones were the most historically accurate and are sold him the most popular. Gettysburg and Tora Tora Tora are probably my two favorites because they were excellent and very historically accurate. But they probably don’t top anyone else’s list.

By far not the only ones who got predictions about the future wrong... 1) 1876: "The Americans have need of the telephone, but we do not. We have plenty of messenger boys." William Preece, British Post Office (After several evolutions, the introduction of the telemessage in 1982 effectively ended the need for messenger boys). 2) 1876: "This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication." William Orton, President of Western Union (Today there are estimated to be over 9 billion mobile phones in circulation, more than the number of people in the world). 3) 1889: “Fooling around with alternating current (AC) is just a waste of time. Nobody will use it, ever.” Thomas Edison (Following the ‘war of the currents’ of the 1880’s with George Westinghouse, AC is now used worldwide). 4) 1903: “The horse is here to stay but the automobile is only a novelty, a fad.” President of the Michigan Savings Bank advising Henry Ford’s lawyer, Horace Rackham, not to invest in the Ford Motor Company (Today there are estimated to be a billion cars on the roads around the world). 5) 1943: "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM (Today there are estimated to be two billion computers in use around the world). 6) 1946: "Television won't be able to hold on to any market it captures after the first six months. People will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night." Darryl Zanuck, 20th Century Fox (Today there is estimated to be at least one television set in 1.4 billion households around the world). 7) 1955: "Nuclear powered vacuum cleaners will probably be a reality within 10 years." Alex Lewyt, President of the Lewyt Vacuum Cleaner Company (While the product has become a reality, it is not used by many due to the dangers of nuclear power, highlighted by the Chernobyl disaster of 1986). 1959: "Before man reaches the moon, your mail will be delivered within hours from New York to Australia by guided missiles. We stand on the threshold of rocket mail.” Arthur Summerfield, U.S. Postmaster General (Man landed on the moon in 1969, while rocket mail has still to become a reality). 9) 1966: "Remote shopping, while entirely feasible, will flop.” Time Magazine (Amazon online has reached over $200 billion turnover over the last several years). 10) 1981: “Cellular phones will absolutely not replace local wire systems.” Marty Cooper, inventor (There are estimated to be just over a billion landlines worldwide compared to 9 billion mobile phones). 11) 1995: "I predict the Internet will soon go spectacularly supernova and in 1996 catastrophically collapse." Robert Metcalfe, founder of 3Com (In 2019 an estimated 4.13 billion people have regular internet access). 12) 1996: "Apple is a chaotic mess without a strategic vision and certainly no future."- TIME Magazine (As of 2019, Apple's net worth has been sitting around $940 billion). 13) 1997: "I'd shut Apple down and give the money back to the shareholders."- Michael Dell, founder and CEO of Dell, Inc. (As of early 2020, Apple’s share price is over $300). 14) 2004: "Two years from now, spam will be solved." Bill Gates (Today 90% of all emails sent are categorised as spam). 15) 2005: "There's just not that many videos I want to watch." Steve Chen, CTO and co-founder of YouTube expressing concerns about his company’s long term viability (The total number of hours of video watched on YouTube each month is estimated to be approx. 3.25 billion). 16) 2006: "Everyone's always asking me when Apple will come out with a cell phone. My answer is, 'Probably never.'" David Pogue, The New York Times (The first iPhone was released in 2007 and since then over 2.2 billion handsets have been sold worldwide). 17) 2007: “There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share.” Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO (Approx. more than 40% of mobile phone handsets are believed to be iPhones). Sources https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertszczerba/2015/01/05/15-worst-tech-predictions-of-all-time/#7f5456812997

Yeah, but I'd argue that is what liberals in the US mostly are as well. Like looking at the Democrats, they're mostly running on not being Republicans. Which does work as a strategy, because Republicans are absolute ghouls who seem to always find new lows to hit (like labeling pipeline protestors domestic terrorists, rallying the dip**** brigade for a putsch, and the new Jim Crow in several states because they lost an election) so just avoiding that is reason enough to convince folks to vote for the Ds, even if they are otherwise completely uninspiring and not doing a damm thing about the impending apocalyptic future we're barreling towards. I honestly wish the Dems were what Republicans said, because pro-antichrist left-wing demon is way cooler than bland centrist wonks. Give me CHAOS Biden, who will personally force patriots to go gay commie vegan halal at gunpoint, over the senile old dude that struggles to finish a sentence we actually got.

*sigh* you are doing this bass ackwards. you have reached a conclusion, and any story which confirms your bias is "evidence." wsj and nypost *snort* share not a peer reviewed study or anything close, but an opinion piece. could new evidence change the situation? sure, but at this point all the reputable scientific feedback has claimed covid-19 does not have any o' the telltale signs o' human interference. why would the opinion piece change hearts and minds? you seizing on every rando story to bolster your unsupported belief does little to alter our skepticism. however, if the goal were to give us yet another opportunity to point out your willingness to embrace bs w/o evidence, then mission accomplished. advice: the smart play is to wait. what compels dp to link every not study which supports his belief? eventual there will be a peer reviewed study and subsequent expert debate regarding methodology and data and whatnot. or there will never be such. in either case, 'til you get something legit... HA! Good Fun!

Bill Maher is not a liberal. He is also not a conservative.

Now, about that rivalry between Carthage and Rome...

Sounds like you were talking about “the patriot”. I think the only thing in that movie that was historically accurate is that there was a guy named Cornwallis and there was an American revolution. The similarities end there

It boils down to "a government that provides employment and services to it's citizens so long as your loyal vs. a country where the government bickers about petty issues and doesn't do a damn thing for the population but can actually take some degree of criticism". The grass isn't greener on the other side, it's at an angle.

US Navy, Boeing conduct first-ever aerial refueling with unmanned tanker.

Do you know the movie I hated the most? Braveheart. They didn’t even get the freaking year right. Absolutely everything about that movie was wrong. Other than the names of the characters. But the person they screwed over the most was Edward II. It’s true he was nothing like his old man but he was not a sissy. He lost the war because he was brash and couldn’t control his temper. William Wallace and Robert the Bruce never actually met each other. They were certainly never on the same field at the same time. That was Hollywood history at its absolute worst. The fact that so many people liked it and it actually won awards makes it all the worse because it encourages to lay more turds like that outlaw King on Netflix was so much better. It was in a completely historically accurate either but it’s only sin is that is compressed the timeline and skipped over a few things. But everything that is in the movie did happen.

No I haven't served in the military. I'm an immigrant to the US, so my situation didn't allow for it. I came to the US on a student visa, although In truth I was fleeing an oppressive home country. Had I grown up in the US I surely would've ended up in the navy or air force. I've long had an interest in political and military history, and WW2 history is especially interesting to me (as is Cold War history btw). I have a doctorate in international relations and my areas of research and teaching are international security and conflict, military affairs, and foreign policy. My overall professional interest is on international rivalries, from the ancient world to today. In the past my research was focused on the India-Pakistan rivalry including especially its nuclear weapons proliferation dimension, but in recent years I've swung over to the Iran-Israel, Iran-Saudi, and emerging US-China rivalries.

I agree, movies about war and battles must be accurate where reasonable. But they must be correct most of the time and these small things annoy me as well

Listu updatu desu nee

I'm with Boeroer, if you take one caster-class two times, then I would choose Priest... ...but for another reason: two priest can cast all the protecion spells and buffs your party needs in half of the time!

Finished the Smith campaign on my second try: @HurlshotYou thought 7 people in 4 days was impressive?

Yes, but outside of Icewind Dale 2 that never changes, except for single class sorcerers. Mostly because you can't make those in any other way. Depending on the version of the games you play, they might break the game. Sorcerers in IWD Enhanced Edition are definitely making the game a lot less of a hassle - that that's a good thing with all the combat in it. That doesn't mean the other classes are useless*, but there just isn't any situation in Baldur's Gate or its sequel where a multi or dual classed version of clerics, druids, thieves or mages** aren't better at virtually everything, from having more hit points, to being able to actually, you know, hit things, hit things more than once in a round, have better equipment options and a whole host of other things, and that's before going really crazy with the min-maxing possibilities. Occassionally you'll run into someone who will tell you stories of single class thieves (often swashbucklers) who supposedly are way more overpowered, but that's... people not knowing how HLAs are assigned in Baldur's Gate 2, and they mistakenly believe that they're acquired significantly faster or more often with single class thieves. Never mind the fact that Fighter/Thief combinations can take Assassination more than once (that one is fixed by various mods and the EE, I think - not 100% sure on the EE though). Then you have the other people who will tell you that single class assassins are the way to go because they can one-shot everything not immune to poison, which is quite correct, but that is a specialty use that's... well, pretty specialty***. It's biggest advantage is the rapid application of the poison dot, which causes the enemy AI to spaz out, rendering the enemy completely hapless until it dies. It's a one shot kill CC ability, but not good enough to waste a full party slot on. *What that really means is that these games are all viable to play with any combination you'd like to try. They're just a good deal easier if you just disregard the idea of having single class thieves and clerics, and act accordingly. **Mages are a slightly different story, particularily for Baldur's Gate because of the lower level cap. In IWD they're the most expendable party slot and can have their role filled by a bard which also enables some interesting interaction in Easthaven, they level much quicker and you won't be wanting for spell slots because a) there's a distinct lack of scrolls in the game and b) they can also cast up to level 8 spells in IWD, unlike the level 6 cap in BG. That's exactly what makes the inclusion of sorcerers in the Enhanced Edition so powerful. The game wasn't designed with being able to cast fireballs at every enemy horde you see the moment you unlocked your first level 3 spell slot. ***Also often people who install the "improved" THAC0 tables from various mods, giving their thieves the ability to actually hit enemies in Throne of Bhaal, which they otherwise simply wouldn't. Thief THAC0 sucks. The only reason swashbucklers can keep up is because they receive massive bonuses over the course of the game, but that's a bit silly when you think of the levels involved. You need to reach level 40 with your Swashbuckler to perform similarily to your level 20 fighter in combat, but that fighter at level 20 will still have more attacks per round, will still have better THAC0 and most likely some similar armor class, which is really the only thing the Swashbuckler has going for it. Technically, at level 40, with the best gear available and the cheesiest setup, you could make an invincible Swashbuckler. It's not very likely that you'll even reach level 40 unless you know what you're doing and it is much easier to achieve similar results with a fighter/mage tank with prebuffing, at lower levels... decent class for easily soloing the game though. Not very interesting to play, but really interesting to set up at least.

These supermodel-esque photoshop examples by other people to show what would be better... always creep me out more than the original.

Sure, they're star-crossed lovers from a different time and magically attracted to each other, so that makes everything okay, even slaps and some major douchewaffling, right? You're right, there are boundaries that Tomoyo doesn't cross, and in fact, Sakura agreed to be filmed. She might occassionally faceplant when Tomoyo reveales the extent of her obsession, but that's about it.

Yeah, it helps to get the appropriate age group for this sort of behavior, but I think it's even more than that. It's my impression that Tomoyo is not only obsessed with Sakura, but also seems to respect her and has boundaries that she won't go over. She's also pretty upfront with how she feels about certain things with Sakura - how many times has she told Sakura that she loves to film her life? Sakura knows and has made her peace with it, and both parties being aware of it and accepting it helps defuse some of the potential creepiness, especially since it just stays at that level without getting any more serious than that. I'm sure you can tell me whether Tuxedo Mask kissing and abducting Sailor Moon while she's literally unconscious was properly setup and explained, never mind all the other awful crap in Sailor Moon Crystal, . In contrast, Minako sometimes plays the obsessor in the original show, and all that usually stays pretty above board.

The term "liberal" is pretty annoying in the U.S. Actual liberalism is a theoretical centrist position in the U.S. that doesn't really exist for practical purposes anymore, usually means more right-wing-but-not-necessarily-insane abroad(?), and yet has the connotation of "pro-antichrist left-wing demon" to the right-wing here.

Indeed, more CCS!

Hannibal is one of my favorite figures from history

CCS

Sure thing. Always happy to chat about stuff in my professional areas of interest. And to add to my earlier post, I also have continuing interests in military aviation and human exploration of space. I was an engineer before i switched professions to international relations. I have a B.S., an M.S., and an unfinished PhD in Aerospace Engineering prior to completing a PhD in International Relations.

I don't know, as someone not from the US Bill Maher is fairly hilarious.

Good to know, I will throw some questions at you if you dont mind in the future. Just to get your opinion and share mine? Mostly the ME and similar conflicts so its your area of study

This is something that never bothered me until I knew better and now I often find those movies unwatchable. It's more tolerable in movies set further back in time because I have less knowledge about the details but anything (semi-)modern I can't help but nitpick

Isn’t that all he’s good for anyway? Anybody who’s going to him for actual insightful commentary has already made a mistake

Yeah. It's always been a thing and Fassina is apparently a spirit too.

I have almost missed it, but if you are subscribed to GOG newsletter, it has Tyranny - Gold Edition redeem code with 85% off. And it it ends in 14:00 CET today (6.6.2021). I got it for 7.49EUR. EDIT: I do not know how exactly works the newsletter code sendout, but I presume, all subsribers get the same one

That's oddly specific... With Smith, I've been building my negotiations deck mainly around hostility cards. I particularly like the Goon card and the Bully card. So essentially I browbeat the person I'm negotiating with while a pack of cronies eggs me on and occasionally smashes up some of their belongings. Eventually, they come around to my line of thinking.

I've been playing a ton of Low Magic Age. I finished the main quest (tutorial) a long time ago and I'm mostly taking my team from dungeon to dungeon adventuring. In more than 30 hours I only had one death. It helps that they're so high level now. I can't wait for the full release of this game though that's probably years away as there's only one guy working on it.

Ah all I have is Launch and Shield, mostly using Grip to just gun everyone down. Setting for the game's interesting, the grindy aspects with the loot does make me roll my eyes a bit but I guess it's not a deal breaker or anything.

I went to the chemist today and asked the assistant "what kills the Corona Virus?" She replied to me "Ammonia Cleaner" I said "Oh, I am sorry, I thought you worked here"

I had a similar experience yesterday. Returned to my home base close to the oak tree and discovered 1 wolf spider near my base and 2 close towards the oak tree. I have also only seen them one at a time but this one time there were 3!! It took some time to kill them all... Is this some kind of a bug? I was wondering if it happened because I tried the "Fix creature locations" option...

I removed some gifs to keep things on track. pls don't make me shift through all those quote trees again.

I realize that this is a thread necro, and I'm definitely late to the party. But this is an interesting topic, and it seems better to just thread necro than create a new thread on the same topic. I think that there are two very different ways to look at the question of favorite paladin order. There's the which order's abilities/talents do you like best. And then there's the which order's background do you like best. Being more of a role player, I prefer the second question. I'm rather old school when it comes to paladins. I personally don't like this semi-supporting leadership style of paladin. I prefer the old school "holy warrior" style of paladin. It seems a lot more fun to me. But sadly, that's not what's in PoE. Furthermore, I don't particularly like the Darcozzi or Gold Pact Knight orders, because I don't see any central concept or ideology that defines them. The Gold Pact Knights seem more like a mercenary group than an order of paladins. And fighting for whomever pays you the most hardly seems like an ideology that should define a group of paladins. As for the Darcozzi, I can't even go that far. I have no idea at all what binds them together, other than being guardians and ambassadors of the Darcozzi family, which again hardly seems like something that should define a group of paladins. In both of these cases, they seem like groups of warriors, with the GPK's being more mercs while the Darcozzi being more guardsmen. But either way, not paladins, at least as I would see "paladins". As for the Bleak Walkers, I can see them as paladins, almost certainly evil, though it's hard to see a binding ideology. Their description seems to describe more of means to their ideology than an ideology itself. But I have no idea what the ideology their brutal and merciless nature exists to support. This leaves the Kind Wayfarers and the Shieldbearers. I can see these two as old school paladins of roughly similar flavor. Protectors of the innocent, etc., etc., etc. Maybe what's really missing, at least for me, are ties to Eora's deities, since tying an order to a specific deity would pretty much define an order's philosophy. If an order was linked to Magran, a paladin would be a champion of the goddess of war and fire, and so forth, for example. Anyways, looking at the paladin orders from an talent perspective, it seems to me that they're all relative weak and unappealing. The only talent that seems at all potent is Pallegina's Wrath of the Five Suns talent. It seems to me that other than the Faith and Conviction dispositions, the 5 playable orders are all rather generic in their abilities because their talents are so lame. Oh, sure, you've got to work your dispositions during your game play, and that's a good thing. But in terms of abilities, all paladins seem like they're pretty much the same in combat. It would be nice if there was more differentiation between the orders in terms of what they bring to combat. It might also be nice if each order had specific requirements or strongly favored attributes that related to that order's special skills, talents, and/or abilities, so that paladins of different orders didn't have so much of a sameness about them.