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We all knew this from the beginning, didn't we? How does anyone continue to believe anything any Russian official says on any issue? https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/07/20/world/ukraine-russia-war#russia-ukraine-territory-expansion-lavrov https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-62231936

When I read the WP piece, I was reminded of an angler... no good just yanking at the line when something's nibbling at the hook. Let it dangle for a bit and let it wear itself out.

Meh, this game died for me the second I read that they are removing content that was made by Chris Avellone.

Happy New Year Deadfire Enthusiasts, Elric inspired me to finally do this exercise with his very interesting class tiers ranking. While there seems to be already a pretty good consensus regarding the top classes for Solo in the base (vanilla) game, I thought it would be interesting to look at how BPM might change certain dynamics, with the critical nerf brought to the cheesiest of abilities. So for full clarity I'll try to do first a recap of top Solo classes without BPM, then my interpretation of the changes brought by the full BPM complement (buffs, nerfs, summon rework). Additional notes before starting: This is assuming usage of the Community Patch. This is valid for Real Time With Pause, I don't know about Turn Based. This is for Soloing on PotD (Upscaled) Difficulty, the full game and DLCs and some (in some cases all) megabosses - but not considering The Ultimate which is its own animal. This is not excluding cheese (though BPM will de facto exclude some). I consider some level of cheese to be fair game in Solo HOWEVER, I'm not considering builds that require Strand of Favor to be viable. Because then it would be easier to list the few classes that cannot become Solo beasts with SoF abuse. I'm blending Single Classes and Multiclasses altogether because here there is no consideration about party synergy, saving a party slot etc. Just pure Solo effectiveness. Also, I'm not mentioning every single class combo, just focusing on the most salient. Most importantly, this is really not pretending to be a perfectly exhaustive, objective and accurate class ranking in such a complex game system... So please don't take this as me trying to impose my limited understanding of the game on you, but rather trying to engage in a good discussion with the below blurb as a starting point. ----- TOP SOLO CLASSES IN BASE GAME WITHOUT BPM ----- 1) SC WIZARD (BLOODMAGE) Unsurprisingly, it is the strongest of all by a huge margin, because it has so many mind-blowing tricks available from beginning to end. The true god of cheese in the Deadfire if there ever was one. Infinite spells potential from level 1 with Blood Sacrifice. Has a tool for every situation with Grimoire Switching, concentrating some of the best offensive and defensive spells in the game... ...even more so with Grimoire Imprint spells, giving the opportunity to permanently cheesy-steal any and all Tier 1-7 Wizard, Priest and Druid spell - each stolen spell becoming usable indefinitely. I realize using this simple and hugely powerful bug might be very controversial but its existence is undeniable - and Wizard remains hands down the best class even without it. Can prolong any positive effect indefinitely with Wall of Draining or stealing Salvation of Time from a Priest. Can become immortal with Barring Death Door and of course straight-up untargetable (invulnerable) forever with Constentin's Temporal Cocoon trick. 2) SC ROGUE (ASSASSIN) AND SC MONK (NALPAZCA, FORBIDDEN FIST, HELWALKER) I put them on an equal footing because Assassin is OP from the very beginning until very late but requires additional tricks (Arcana / Alchemy / Brilliant) towards the end-game in certain SSS, FS and a few BoW fights. On the other hand, Monk starts rough unless playing a max RES Forbidden Fist (for instance Helwalker will have to start with a lot of sneaking around). But as you gain Power Levels - especially the last few Tiers - and gather critical items, Monk will become a self-sufficient killing machine. Both SC Assassin and SC Monk also bring unique playstyles and game experiences. SC ASSASSIN: Invisibility lets you reset 99% of fights (without Berath's challenge activated), to pick enemies as you please and set your own pace. Vanishing Strike gives invisibility that doesn't break (OP on its own, insane with Brilliant and total godhood with SoF). Incredibly potent offensive abilities, with special mention to Gouging Strike that can trivialize the vast majority of encounters from level 5 on, including some of the hardest foes. SC MONK: Very powerful and synergistic abilities, creating even stronger synergies with specific weapons and items. Whispers of the Wind + Resonant Touch = "I Win" button. Infinite supply of resources (including infinite summons). 3) THE MANY FACES OF SOLO MULTICLASSING AWESOMENESS They are in no particular order, all being very strong. Not elaborating too much on each otherwise this post would be turning into a book. BLOODMAGE/TACTICIAN - On-demand Brilliant with Chillfog, unkillable Battlemage with Unbending + WoD, play bowling with enemies' faces with Spirit Lance + Clear Out. ASSASSIN/TACTICIAN - Kaylon's Glimmer Man Sniper Build. Never stop neverstopping & sniping. Invisibility + Brilliant Tactician interaction. BLOODMAGE/PRIEST - Unkillable with BDD, SoT, WoD, can self-buff to oblivion while still packing a serious punch. BLOODMAGE/PALADIN - The Lord of Defense, getting every defense past 220 and AR in the 20s. While having tons of heal and all the Bloodmage offense. ASSASSIN/BLOODMAGE - The most offensive Bloodmage out there, using invisibility to rinse & repeat, and the Assassin's stellar ACC to land critical spells. BLOODMAGE/HELWALKER - Helwalker gives big bonuses to everything a Bloodmage loves. And then there is Spirit Lance + Stunning Surge. BLOODMAGE/DRUID - Drown the battlefield in waves of overlapping pulsing AoEs, cast Combusting Wounds + Infestation of Maggots; watch reality melt around you. BLOODMAGE/TROUBADOUR - Use summons as distraction to cast in peace. Animated Weapons are immune to cold damage, and Wizard has the best AoE cold damage spells. BLOODMAGE/PSION - Beautiful action economy: cast some wizard stuff while generating focus, dump focus on an impactful cipher power, repeat until things are dead. PALADIN/TROUBADOUR - Loads of permanent healing, high defenses, summons, brand enemy... sit back and relax. It will take a while, but the outcome is inevitable. ASSASSIN/CIPHER - The Megaboss Killer. As an arquebus build, has an answer to almost every tough situation. A bit of Arcana is required later on. HELWALKER/TROUBADOUR - Start fight from stealth, summon stuff to keep the enemy busy then stun them all with Mortar Stunning Surge + Invocations. You can do that (and other things) forever. TROUBADOUR/PSION - Awesome action economy and interaction between infinite summons from stealth and Pain Link. Constantly regenerating resource pools. PRIEST/BELLOWER - Kaylon's suggested build, coming to full fruition pretty late (Least Unstable Coil + Her Revenge/Her Tears + SoT) but with amazing benefits. BERSERKER/BECKONER or TACTICIAN/BECKONER - Grave Calling's Chilling Grave + Grave Bound + Confusion abusing build. Can be done with other Chanter/xx combos... in any case if your GPU allows it. FORBIDDEN FIST/SOUL BLADE: As DGray62 pointed out below, FF subclass adds a lot to the survivability of the character, with its powerful enfeebling attack that can be infinitely spammed that also heals you and generates resources. OTHER NOTABLE BUILDS THAT I DON'T KNOW THE FULL SOLO POTENTIAL OF: Kaylon's Berserker/Devoted with Lord Darryn's Voulge, Powerotti's FF/Steel Garrote, Boeroer's Bloodmage/Ranger. Probably many others that I don't know about or have forgotten about. Happy to edit the list if you have other thoughts. 4) SC CHANTER (TROUBADOUR) I want to mention it here because I'll talk about it with BPM and because it's still a viable, if only a bit boring, way of Soloing the game. Requires Berath's challenge enabled - using traps or the double Alt key trick to start the encounter in stealth and keep it going is huge for a SC Chanter. Possibly supplement with high Arcana to go faster in tough fights. There is just no real reason in Vanilla to chose SC Chanter for soloing over all the awesome multiclassing opportunities available, as Chanter really peaks at Tier 7. 5) OTHER SINGLE CLASSES AND MULTICLASSES Many other classes can do fairly well at soloing most of the game, but they will need extensive save scumming, arcana, metagaming to have a chance at hard fights as you hit DLC content. Cruising solo through the "easy" parts of the game can give a false sense of power, and then you hit something like Trial of the Nagas in FFF or basically any big fight in FS and the seemingly strong solo build is... humbled. ----- SO WHAT CHANGES WITH BPM? ----- Among other things, the nerf component of Elric's BPM aims at preventing abuse of Blood Sacrifice, Brilliant, SoT, SoF, WoD, Unbending and BDD for a more balanced (less cheesy) game experience. So anything Priest is going to take a big hit, Tactician and Bloodmage are going to take a hit as well (Bloodmage/Priest = ouch). On the other hand, resource regen classes (and Chanters in particular) become more appealing. Here are the most notable points according to me: SC BLOODMAGE/WIZARD NO SUBCLASS: It was already so far up that it remains the absolute strongest class, notably because it can continue to cheesy-steal all kinds of spells for permanent use - so WoD/SoT/BDD nerf don't really matter with a bit of adjustment. It's easier in a semi-solo run (i.e. where you can temporarily hire companions in the tavern to steal their spells) but it is very viable in a full solo run too. Just requires more metagaming. You can have unlimited summons that are remarkably good at level 7 (Minor Grimoire Imprint on Ancient Druid for Summon Sporeling) in particular thanks to BPM's Summon revamp. You can still have unlimited buffs, Shadowflame, Freezing Pillar, Crushing Doom etc. and still some nice Priest and Druid stuff up to Tier 7 spells. You can still use the Temporal Cocoon trick to become untargetable, just not forever. Minor point, BPM also buffs Tier 9 Llengrath's Reflection which becomes very very useful in certain fights thanks to targeted spells reflection and AoE spell resistance (the Spell Resistance passive is also buffed). Finally a great defensive tool for mage fencing. The truly interesting thing is that No Subclass becomes much more competitive than before at high level, because of the Blood Sacrifice nerf and the rework of Empowerment passives. It might be even on equal footing with Bloodmage - unless you truly want to replenish often Tier 8 and 9 spells (which is now more risky to do). SC ASSASSIN/ROGUE: Is comparatively better than before (again, excluding SoF) because invisibility abilities are now less expensive, Great Soul gives +1 Guile and Wall of Flashing Steel can give partial resource regen. SC MONK: Stays basically as strong as in Vanilla. SC TROUBADOUR: I think it becomes comparatively a lot more appealing for Soloing because of: The change to Great Soul (giving a -15% phrase duration buff) while Brisk Recitation without Great Soul is put at 4s. The buffs to Empowerment passives (empower = staple of any chanter) making them really good investments. Also, the buffing of summons including the Dragon and to a lower extent the rework of Boil their Flesh give more arguments to go SC. STRONG SOLO MULTICLASSES: In general, multiclasses involving resource regen - Chanter, Monk or Cipher - become comparatively even more appealing than in Vanilla. Chanter gets a really good bump because certain "cheap" summons become really great (upgraded Wurms, Drake). Troubadour takes a little hit with Brisk Recitation at 4s now vs. 3s, but I think it's still the best Solo pick in most cases (if only for added flexibility). Multi with Bloodmage/No Subclass Wizard remains very good especially if you want to build around using mostly infinite Tier 1-3 spells and cheesy Minor Grimoire Imprint. As said before, Tactician (if relying on Unbending) and Priest builds take a hit; especially Priest. ---- That's all for now! Looking forward to hearing thoughts and reactions. I hope I won't get insulted too much.

I usually go with only mediocre MIG, DEX and CON. Most important to me in this case are RES and then INT.

I'm getting a certain panto vibe...

we lived williston, nd for a bit. arid winters, relative speaking. less than a couple feet o' snow all winter. ... is tough to explain how much difference wind chill makes to folks who are unaware. -20F lows is cold, but when wind chill makes -70F and when such conditions last for weeks on end... am guessing is all relative. HA! Good Fun!

If I were to choose between Trump and DeSantis, I'd say DeSantis is the more rational choice. Trump would just be more of the same garbage time, and DeSantis has at least had military service. I can't say though that I find most of the available candidates particularly appealing from either party, with the possible exception of Amy Klobuchar and Nikki Haley.

We got very little snow recently and the temps haven't been as cold either but after living in both NY and CO, I much prefer the dry cold to the wet cold.

socialism is indeed glorified in public schools, but am thinking much as with democracy, too many students don't learn what is socialism. what US kid ain't taught 'bout fdr's new deal? ordinary high school/middle school teaches rather shallow, but kids still get new deal glorification, which is actual misleading given how much new deal were abject failure. and who didn't learn triangle shirtwaist factory fire? more than a few schools still has upton sinclair's the jungle as required reading, though is probable advanced class stuff nowadays. regardless, the evils o' capitalism and free market profiteering is taught in schools and necessarily you get the socialist contrast. is plenty o' socialist glorification, and some o' it is even deserved. 'course is all too rare for kids to actual learn, so too few recognize how the laws which ended company mining towns were socialism, which explains why adults fail to see farm subsidies as socialism neither. our education o' kids is having holes which don't disappear once school kids become adults. somehows, if is a government action which red state people see as positive then then it can't be socialism. is hardly a conservative-only problem as have had similar difficulties explaining democracy more than once. HA! Good Fun!

have repeated more than once, but democrats are bad at voting, with young democrats being even more terrible at exercising the franchise. one o' the down sides o' the january 6 hearings is the committee is painting numerous not-trump republicans as heroic because they did not choose to overthrow US democracy. we are told mike pence were a hero on january 6, which ignores how for months pence fully embraced the bs regarding a stolen election, not to mention how he supported every other trump excess for four years. those doj icons o' justice who marched into the oval office to confront powell, flynn and giuliani's madness were quiet when bill barr and trump sent stormtroopers to oregon to kidnap protesters off the streets o' portland, throwing 'people into unmarked white vans and whisking 'em away to... wherever. same guys didn't rage when bill barr tried to prevent an ig from reporting to Congress 'bout trump's ukraine call. where were these folks during four years o' illegal and excessive trump actions? trump were improbable in 2016, but trumpism is now part o' gop dogma. appeals to outrage and grievance and attacks on education and those with education is gonna continue. unfortunate, as long as trump is portrayed as the villain, individuals such as desantis is gonna be able to advance trumpism and am unconvinced democrats vote in the kinda numbers they mustered 2020 to prevent a possible desantis administration. HA! Good Fun!

DeSantis seems like a pretty abhorrent dude with the abhorrent policies to match, with a strategy specifically designed to appeal to rabid trumpers. So, politically, it is like you are asking people if they prefer Trump with more or less orange smear.

Don't care much about Avellone, but the moment they removed Brian is where it died for me.

Tallinn is nice, I've been a few times. I thought about moving a long time ago but it's too cold during the cold months

Bruce, it I can recognize Putin's attempt at mind games, I sincerely hope whatshisname Scholz(?) recognizes it too. Question is, what is he going to do about it? Like the fish in my observation, getting obsessed with the lure (some gas is better than no gas) or make a clean cut and decide he doesn't want to play mind games and let the angler (Putin) end up disappointed and empty handed (edit: even if the immediate cost to the economy may be disastrous) Disclaimer: Read that as you will...

I stopped believing anything from any Russian official since 2014 after the Crimean " referendum "

I miss the ME game world and characters, its good hearing your stories

I have finally started on BG1 EE with a good selection of mods but I decided not to use Sword Coast Stratagems or Tweaks because those mods really enhance the ruleset for hardcore fans and Im not going to play this game multiple times, like all games, so the standard EE ruleset is fine. I have just left Candlekeep and Im on my way to the Friendly Arm Inn with my 3 x companions that include Imoen, Xzar and Montaron. Imoen is already annoying me with her naïve banter but she is cute and means well. I am looking forwarding to meeting up with Viconia and hearing some adult views of the world I must say its great knowing a wolf can kill you, being 1st level makes the early journey exciting and risky but worth it

Actually, first time I played I romacned no one. Maybe I'll romance Liara just for how rapidly it moves in ME1 I've tried them all as I've really played the trilogy far too much - I think 4 times or so ? Ah still remember the first ME2 run, I got Jacob killed, thought to myself "Sure, the black guy dies first". Granted, I continue to kill him off in later playthroughs. I usually kill everyone in ME2 that I can get away with, leaving me with Samara and Garrus most of the time.

Obviously we need to institute loyalty tests.

Yes, it take only 2h to go from Helsinki to Tallinn with ship and it cost 20-40€.

Tallinn's Old Town is not only medieval looking it is medieval. It is part of Tallinn that existed already during Hanseatic League era in 1400s It is common that Estonians speak English. Estonia is part of EU's eastern block, so they will have different views of things than western European countries. Although it is probably most western of east block countries. Their education system is decent in western standards. There is divide between Estonian speaking population and Russian speaking population and current world situation probably has not made things better. Taxation in Estonia favors rich. Estonia's consumer price increase is highest in EU, which is important factor to take account if you want to do business there. https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/prc_hicp_manr/default/table?lang=en current situation has not made things easier

That depend to how you orient your build : if you plan to do a crowd-control/dps (in this order), then a FF subclass should be really great. The thing to know about Enfeebled is the effect cant stack (when it is applied, the duration of the affliction is refreshed) but when the enfeebled effect is over, reapplying it give another +50% duration for current effects but for their total duration since they began. So, a good way to paralyse or stun an enemy for a long time is to, in first, Forbidden first him, in second, at the end of the FF effect, CC spell, in third, when the FF effect is over, re-FF, etc. In the case when the duration to the debuff effect to prolong is inferior to FF effect, reapplying the CC spell will refresh the duration too, but with some FF effects on this last, the debuff can get a really high duration, so that give you the time to kill him or other freely. Helwalker might bonus give also a bonus to health received, since that come from your monk. Chanter have some chants that give health, and some weapons return health (Aldris Blade of Captain Crow by exemple) and some items too. But without healthy stuff, as Chanter, you can stop enemies before the drame. It is a DPS/crowd control build (in this order). Troubadour is nice since the phrase duration can be reduced, actually is really nice with energized inspiration that the chanter can have. That mean, by 3s, an general interrupt when the chant crit around you. Also, chant loose their persistence, so damaging shield or affliction downgrade chants car be reapplyed by 3s, and skeleton from Many lives chant spawn every 3s too. Bellower, in DPS purpose, is a good option(also in debuffing way, but the AoE of chants is really short around you) : low PL invocations like Her revenge or others gain a potential great boost and, with a priest in the party, the PL bonus can be prolonged for some time, that can be useful to recast low PL invocation with a huge boost to reduce quickly the number of enemies by exemple. This is only from my game experience, probably you will see some relevant points others than mines, so the better thing is to test some combinaisons in a tavern with an old save when you hesitate strongly imo

Please Dark, no more ZH predictions. I get so anxious because I always believe you and then its not true My blood pressure cant handle it

Nord Stream gas flow resumes at reduced rate. Seems Russia is not ready for the cut-off. Or at least not yet.

read some of the manga all the trope was nothing new isekai are so overdone even parody of parody are decade old trope now but execution was decent

Thank you for the thoughts and ideas, Boeroer and thelee I started a new run, and played through Port Maje without hiring anyone, and without disarming any traps (I think). Then I went straight to Sandswept Ruins, and got the correct 280 exp per trap As it turns out, dismissed companions at the Inn actually "consume" exp. To test this, I reloaded my save before entering the ruins, sailed back to Port Maje, hired Aloth and dismissed him at the Inn. Back at the ruins, I now only got 144 exp per trap. So at least for disarm exp, you get less if you have dismissed companions. But here's the funny part. I reloaded, hired Aloth and this time, did NOT dismiss him. Went to the ruins together with Aloth, and now I got 226 exp per trap. More than when he is dismissed So to summarize: Solo (never hired any companion): 280 exp With Aloth in party: 226 exp With Aloth dismissed at the Inn: 144 exp I know this is super specific (obsessive?), but I thought I'd share these results in case someone else is confused by this. Due to the number of traps in the ruins, the total exp difference is actually pretty large. @Boeroer: That's nice, I hope you enjoy your trip. They are interesting cities (as is Berlin, of course). By the way, this is off-topic but I'm trying to play a Steel Garrote/Blood Mage with Offensive Parry from mostly your ideas in this forum. But I'm unsure about attributes; if it needs high INT, DEX, PER, RES and decent MIG (maybe 15?), then CON ends up very low. If you could share advice on this, or give an example of a good attribute spread, I would appreciate it I'm pretty unexperienced with the game mechanics, by the way ^^

That looks so terrible, yikes. Eh, she also gave Komi another chocolate, one shaped like her naked body and yelled "LICK YOUR FAVORITE PART OF ME!" at Komi for everyone to hear. If anyone doesn't know by now, they're willfully obtuse. Jasper's on Neptune! Technically, Sailor Moon had a softball episode. Hey don't look at me, I don't know the difference. I'm sure there are some, but it both looks like someone's batting a thrown ball, a lot of people are just standing around and the games take ages and nothing much happens. Now for a more serious reply, the Steven Universe episode had more character development as it advanced and closed off a certain chapter in Garnet's, well, life, while the Sailor Moon one is mostly pure hilarity. Well, Usagi does catch a ball in the end, but that's nowhere near the same. My quality is pretty bad, but please, click me! Najimi is, like @KP wants Blue Velvet already said, pretty much there to serve as an impetus for Komi and Tadano to leave their comfort zone. The biggest problem is that the show never does anything worthwhile with that, as everything that feels like character and relationship development doesn't spring from their antics, but from Komi and Tadano being in der comfort zone and edging out of it. Just the two of them. Najimi is just there for the "plot" of Komi wanting to find one hundred friends. Tadano's sister, who is only in the show for like one and a half episodes, does more for that than Najimi, who is in pretty much everything. Aside from that, yeah, Najimi is a bit of a Minako style character. Except not really good. Like everything else in Komi can't communicate. Voice acting from hell rounds it off (particularily Najimi). Like nails on chalkboard style. Ugh.

Russia's war crime (and possible genocide) in abducting hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians: https://www.geopoliticalmonitor.com/russias-mass-abduction-of-ukrainians-explained/ https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/07/13/world/russia-ukraine-war-news

Maybe Romero'll finally make his vision of Quake. Reminder to everyone to read Masters of Doom, as well.

I liked that the Keyword package had a clear purpose; adding Keywords to stuff that clearly should have had them in the first place. Seamless and does what it says on the tin: Adding whole new keywords and breaking vanilla behavior (not to mention causing regressions) goes way beyond that. The new keywords adds a bit more bloat to the system and how they are/aren't intertwined with the old keywords decreases comprehensibility. It feels too intrusive of a solution, at least for the Community Patch. I think respecting vanilla behavior is preferable here and imo these changes should be reverted for now.

Troubadour/Berserker with Amra: min RES, max INT and 25 MIG, add AoE size gear and a pet that adds 20 health per kill. You will kill Ancient Brittle Bones and Many Lives Pass By skeletons "accidentially" via Carnage and Amra's Riven Gore which gives 20 health, Bloodlust, Blood Thirst and so on. Do not remove Confusion! Once you get Blood Thirst never turn off Battle Axe modal and just melt everything. Streetfighter/Berserker with Amiina's Legacy (great if you are a Dwarf): Unse Hunting Bow modal to fire at high speed. Use Berserker Frenzy to get to Blooded quickly which triggers Streetfighter's "Heating Up". Now shoot with awesome speed and pile up Blood Frenzy DoT, Deep Wounds, Arterial Strike and whatnot. Finish with Barbaric Smash. Use all the shooting gear. Pro: insane attack speed, great dmg modifiers (high Sneak Attack + Deathblows + Blooded) + good PEN (Tenacious + Crippling Strike). Con: accuracy could be better. But great at taking out high prio targets such as enemy casters. Makes the early game pretty easy because all the main components for insane speed are there from lvl 1. Berserker/Skald with Blightheart. Summon Ancient Brittle Bones and later Many Lives Pass By and then use Berserker Frenzy for confusion and cast Her Revenge onto enemies while skeletons get in the way. Every kill (skeletons included) will give you 1 phrase (see Blightheart's Hymn of Decay). Since Skald's Her Revenge only costs 2 phrases you will be able to cast it in very quick succession. Skald or Troubadour/Furyshaper with Willbreaker. Kind of self explanatory. Use Willbreaker + modal + Spirit Frenzy (NOT Spirit Tornado) + Ben Fidel's Neck + The Long Night's Drink to lower enemies' Will and Fortitude into the ground. Use Brute Force to gain significant virtual ACC by attacking the superlow Fortitude instead of deflection. Great for the rest of the party while crushing bones. Also works very well with Ngati's Tusk instead of Willbreaker, but you need maxed Survival + the enchantment "Lord of the Hunt". Berserker/Monk (better not Shattered Pillar or Forbidden Fist): use Saru Sichr + Swift Flurry. It does multiple attack rolls because its DoT does a hit roll which seems to trigger Swift Flurry (and Heartbeat Drumming). Use modal and Enervating Blows + Spirit Frenzy + Stunning Surge + Brute Force and attack enemies with low starting fortitude. The chance to crit will be very high and the multiple hit rolls of Saru Sichr will lead to a lot of crit chains (both target fortitude). Also the DoT works like Bleeding Cuts: they stack and pile up. PRO: Saru Sichr is early stuff. CON: doesn't work as well against poison-immune foes.

I recently made this point to a news interview I did on this issue. The benefit to Iran of having nuclear weapons would be exactly the benefit Russia now has with its nukes with respect to their war in Ukraine. Look at what Russia is doing. It blatantly invaded a neighboring state with no provocation or justification, and has done truly outrageous things to that country. And yet Russia's position is that neither Ukraine nor any Ukrainian ally can retaliate for what Russia is doing to Ukraine by striking any targets in Russia. So, Russia can attack Ukraine. But Ukraine cannot retaliate by attacking Russia. Why? Why does this clearly obvious double-standard work? It is entirely because Russia has nukes, and can (and does) threaten nuclear escalation if their territory is attacked (known as "escalation dominance" in international security literature). This is the true, practical benefit of a state like Iran having nukes. Escalation dominance is awesome for a state to have. But it is in practical terms very difficult and very costly to achieve. Possessing nukes is a quick and dirty way to try and gain escalation dominance (though you would need to have a reasonably large arsenal of nukes AND a very reliable and survivable delivery option for your nukes). It may allow Iran to believe it can do whatever it wants to and in states all over the Middle East while threatening nuclear escalation if anyone dares to retaliate against Iranian territory. Iranian air defences have in recent years been considerably strengthened, ironically because of sanctions-relief following the JCPOA in 2015 and as predicted by critics of the JCPOA. But that doesn't matter. If the Israelis see Iran possessing nukes as an existential threat, they will strike no matter the cost to them (and yes, the cost to them will be tremendous, including post-strike Iranian retaliation and fallout with other states in the world). Also, Trump was no true friend of Israel. Like everyone else, Israel too was useful to him so long as he gained some personal political benefit from presenting himself as a champion of Israel. It is known that on at least one occasion as president he personally blocked a covert Israeli op against Iran. He is also known to have told Netanyahu he would not support an Israeli airstrike on Iran.

One of my favs.

was planning on getting a motorcycle when we went away to college. given the parking situation in berkeley, our 78 jeep cherokee were gonna be problematic. we thought a motorcycle were a decent alternative and we already had experience (limited) riding. our aunt, an er nurse, advised us not to wear a helmet if we rode a motorcycle. said the people who wore helmets tended to survive, "poor bastards." motorcycle injuries, being on the horrific end o' the spectrum, our aunt saw death as the more enviable alternative. decided we would get a nice bicycle and use bart as much as possible. HA! Good Fun!

https://www.yahoo.com/news/russia-says-losing-because-ukraine-104546288.html Now we know the irrefutable truth, the truth is out !!! The Ukrainians are creating mutant soldiers, thats why the Russian military campaign has been so ineffective. No one can fight mutants

BEST. GAME. EVAH.

Good news for people afraid of The Winter Draghi signed new energy deal with Algeria already, and von der Leyen has visited Baku to propose new energy deals with Azerbaijan. Few more small steps, and Russia will lose a big chunk of the market, and will have no more opportunities to even try to blackmail EU...

A Russian's TV propaganda new low. Just sent your son to get killed in Ukraine, and you can get new car

If a child can access cancer treatment should they have cancer, they must be able to access puberty blockers if they have gender dysphoria. For the reference, 12 year olds get neither surgeries nor HRT. Blockers only prevent the default hormones, which trigger the default puberty when the person stops taking the blockers. For younger kids only social transition, i.e. clothes, hairstyle, pronouns, is available, which obviously have 0 physical consequences. Thus, the only people threatened by trans youth having access to healthcare are transphobes (who'd rather force the children to commit suicide), not just cisgenders who are not affected by it anyhow. On another note, cis people do have their gender-affirming healthcare, TRT/HRT for the people with low hormone levels and implants for breast cancer survivors.

https://polishfooddirect.com/ is our second favorite source for sausage. highly recommend these guys HA! Good Fun!

I posted this class build a little while back that you might find of interest. One of my favourite characters for sure, maybe the favourite. Monks get a good accuracy boost from Dance of Death/Enduring Dance. My build uses speed, crowd control, and tanking support from companions to avoid getting hit. Worked great. The vast majority of your damage with this class combo will come from Her Revenge Swept Across the Land. It's going to be a caster first and foremost if you play it to its strengths. If you're keen on focusing on weapon damage instead, a Rogue multi might be better.

There's a 90% chance that's porn.

A bit of film music... an adaptation from The Fifth Element (depending on the day, it's either that or Galaxy Quest that takes the place as my favourite space comedy)

I'm summoned! But.... A lot of good info has been posted here during that last 1 hour that... I can't really add that much. Usually I prefer Turn Based as well. Deadfire is kinda an exception. Too many important mechanics have been... truncated. Dex and attack speed (therefore also weapon speed) has very little importance. Stuff like wearing heavy armor or using slow attack mode stances (like axe Bleeding Cuts, arquebus aimed shots, shield stances and such), which have very serious trade-offs in RTwP, are basically free no-brainers in Turn Based. Also using 10 Free Action powers, while the enemies stay frozen, waiting for their turn... So I really prefer RTwP here, the mechanics are way more... intricate, balanced and make more sense. Really shows how lazy this side project has been. The devs COULD HAVE went for individual rounds based on personal initiative and time cost of each action and have a GREAT TB system on their hands. Instead they sticked to the "1 action per round" paradigm - for some weird reason (except for the FA - again, unlimited for some weird reason). Well, there is one use case where I find TB, well, fun at least (if not balanced at all). That is playing a dedicated caster. Wizard certainly fits the bill, although it could also be a Druid or a Priest. TB action economy is VERY generous for those. Particularly for a Wizard, who has all those Free Action buffs. Ciphers would be much worse, although Boeroer already provided some suggestions how to circumvent this and what builds could work well. Ultimate TB build? Must be some kind of wizard. I like Blood Mages. The fact that Blood Sacrifice is a Free Action is neat. Can buff himself to the max in a single round... and still have all his spell slots back in round 1. Pure would be strong. I played a Spellblade Bloodmage/Assassin multiclass and that was neat too, due to the massive bonuses to Accuracy, PEN and Critical damage he gets from stealth (works for aoe spells). Also despite the seeming frailty, was often in stealth/untargettable before finishing his cast (Shadowing Beyond is a Free Action too), so not that easy to kill in regular fights too. For nuking I certainly recommend Deltro's Cage helm (and hitting yourself with Chain Lightning, earlier Jolting Touch), its quite the game changer. Even moreso with an Assasination self-crit for a 130% shock lash on your spells. Avoid the rare spell multiplication effects then, though (like from silk shoes.. or Evoker subclass). Self afflicting yourself with 2 of those then... ouch. Died a few times like this. For a Bloodmage do max your Con, it will be handy. Also Per and high Int. No need to push Might high. And play human, you can control when you're Blooded (which should usually happen on round 1). Dex plays a minor role. It does reduce the time between you initiating a cast and finishing (so reduces then window when you can be interrupted), but you can still only cast 1 normal spell every round. And enemy Initiative seems to be very close to each other most of the time, with very little variation in most enemy groups (all move one after another, usually), so its of limited help. They will all execute their Standard actions anyway between your start of cast and before you finish your cast. So could be good to start casting AFTER they move. Note you CANNOT change your aoe target in TB mode for some reason. So enemies might (and will) move out of range after you start the cast - unless you start it after their movement. Single attacks are generally a waste of time in TB IMO. Either play a caster OR maybe a riposte specialist (probably with the Community Patch and chance to Riposte on Graze). Normal martials just don't do enough per action IMO. I guess a monk with Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming spamming 5+ attacks per round could still work... No idea about the console release.