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They assign you a randomly determined bug every few minutes.

Finished Pentiment. I have to say it was a bit of a letdown in the end. There was so much reading that I had to do, and apparently so little I had any control over, so by the third act I was thinking that I'd much rather just read a well-written novel, because while this game is nicely enough written, it's not written well enough to really justify my time spent on it (because there was so little I could do). After seeing how things turned out in the end, I actually started to wonder whether it's in any way possible to come to the right conclusions in either the first or the second act. I have no idea.

Yeah! I suppose that ending is hard-coded and will happen no matter what, i.e. we're talking about the same ending. Was a big surprise for me, too. Also, the way I tried to play the character, he'd never have done that.

okay, that one made us chuckle. HA! Good Fun!

anti-establishment? the guy is one o' the 5g + bill gates + covid vaccine microchip kooks, and he continues to promote that bit o' crazy. shared such with rogan in fact. am not saying rfk jr. is a bad person. already mentioned him overcoming his addiction is a plus in our book. additional, he has championed the causes o' more than a few indigenous peoples, and if you told us he had saved a puppy from drowning by risking his life, swimming into dangerous cold waters, we wouldn't be surprised; we would cheer his humanity. seems like he means well. unfortunate, we wouldn't want a person so divorced from reality as rfk jr. to be President... anymore than we would champion joe rogan for the office. tinfoil hat legionnaires, regardless if they is anti-establishment or even if they have a meaningful and practical plan to address income disparity and national debt problems (he doesn't,) should not be serious considered as President. a lack o' shared belief in facts and reality is an increasing problem in this nation and to have somebody who believes school shootings is the result o' the invention and prescribing o' prozac is literal dangerous to have sitting behind the resolute desk in the oval office. as to age... am recognizing how different people age... different. however, am having noticed old people is often the last to admit they need help even if most people around them see how the aged person is increasing incapable o' driving safe, handling a gas stove, or being a US Congressmen, SCOTUS Justice or POTUS. biden did recent take speaker mccarthy's lunch money during the debt ceiling negotiations, so score one for the octogenarians, but another four years? ... not to be morbid, but perhaps an upside to biden being elected to another four years is am suspecting such would lead to support for the passing o' an amendment xxviii calling for age limits for those serving in specific enumerated article i, ii or iii offices. HA! Good Fun! ps 'pon reflection, is no reason to not speak the silent part. "anti-establishment" insofar as rfk jr. is camouflage. the vast majority o' rfk jr. fans is people who thought covid were a hoax, that vaccines were/are a hoax, that fauci were selling a hoax and that lock downs and mask wearing (which americans never actual supported enough to be as effective as were the case in south korea, taiwan, new zealand or elsewhere)were authoritarian tactics used to promote the hoax. don't just buy the anti-establishment claims without considering the source.

Well, of course, any good time traveling story works with closed loops. In an interactive medium time traveling could allow for some neat cause and effect scenarios, assuming the player will actually have any agency. Dishonored2 and Titanfall2 had a very effective time traveling levels where you could hop between two different time periods at will. As far as story goes, I am not too concerned about it in an inXile game - I enjoyed their titles, but I didn't get particularly invested in their narratives.

Pentiment, Act II: managed the time much better now and I was a lot more confident about choosing the culprit. Still, The end of act II caught me by surprise. I definitely didn't see that coming.

Seeker's Fang is a great weapon for any melee cipher, as you noted. Keeper of the Flame is also good for ciphers, especially if you max religion, since the flame AOEs it procs build focus, and the its will debuffing aura is great for landing cipher powers like Borrowed Instinct and Secret Horrors.

Meme answer: Bhutan. So awesome Bioware ran a marketing campaign around it. Actual Answer: also Bhutan (It's not that I don't respect Europe or the US anyway, it's more that I get more than a little tired of western exceptionalism. Everybody indulges in a bit of "you're aggressive, I'm assertive; you're argumentative, I like a good discussion etc" but you get a lot more of it from the loudest voices and you don't get any louder than the west. Nor do you get as many people believing any other voice preaching moral authority, nor as many who are insistent they're right even when provided with evidence they aren't) Heh, you should read the accounts of people who have had Israeli soldiers squatting in their houses and the state of them afterwards. That's one of those things people just don't think about when it comes to soldiers because it's kind of icky. The one which gets me is people always seem to be surprised at the near literal mountains of empty water bottles in any Saudi position the Houthis overrun and use that (rather than, well, their terrible performance) as an indicator that they're 'bad soldiers'. It's 40 degrees and the soldiers aren't going to pop down to the local recycling centre to drop off their empties...

One particularly obvious example of this is the end of the second act. If it's hard coded and will happen no matter what, then I can't see how it can make sense if you decide to play a hedonist. Oh well. I wouldn't be asking for my money back, but I am somewhat disappointed and I already uninstalled the game. While the comparison is unfair in many ways, I would say that Disco Elysium was an awful lot better when it comes to games that a) involve a lot of reading and b) essentially have no classical "encounters" at all (although DE famously has that one). Some of the mini-games I found particularly irritating. Like, if this is supposed to be a fairly high-brow game with plenty of reading to do and plenty of emphasis on European history (good!), then what the heck am I doing making these Christmas cookies and getting criticized for not bothering to be thorough enough so that there's plenty for everyone. I mean, yeah, in real life I would of course use the dough so that as little is left over as possible, but am I going to tinker with it in a game like this? Come on.

"From the creators of Game of Thrones" - funny how they don't mention the names.

Also finished Pentiment. I enjoyed the game, but I agree with the criticisms made in this thread by @Hawke64 and @xzar_monty. Based on what I read, here and on Steam and Reddit, there are many things you can't influence and that may not make sense depending on how you play the characters. Not sure how to implement it, but I think there should be a way to be more successful in your investigation, even if it meant ending the game in act I. As for the ending: Spot on. I was playing yesterday past midnight and was getting tired of all the reading in the end. As for the conclusions in the first two acts,

No orks? 0/10 Would not buy.

Thanks! I will see how to create one, probably using a PDF or Google drive which contains a full bestiary and ability list.

Maybe of interest to you: https://gamerant.com/bioshock-infinite-similarities-clockwork-revolution-trailer-brian-fargo/ https://www.ign.com/articles/microsoft-responds-to-clockwork-revolution-bioshock-infinite-similarities

Is this just in regards to the pistol modal? If so with it on, if i understand what you mean, the -50% cuts the total time in half and every other bonus is then applied to the remainder? I took this into account, the cipher spells im choosing are eye strike, mental binding, puppet master, ectopsychic echo, pain block, borrowed instinct, tactical meld, disintegrate, ancestors memory They dont all have the 0.5 cast / 4.0 recovery times, but the ones that dont are important i think, tbf the other ones are too, not much room to pick non essentials on this multi, missing out on secret horrors kinda stings but i figure between eye strike, mental binding and puppet master ill have enemies controlled enough Thats a bummer, didnt think it worked that way, kinda weird considering its other option is a stat stick I was gonna give this to xoti but yeah maybe, the build is a bit squishy This actually sounds like it does what i wanted to do with griffins but better, kinda weird that it triggers universally instead of just off dagger attacks Religion kinda goes against my RP with this character but good to know for another one, ive been thinking about making a relgious character recently actually

This is, again, interesting. I have referenced to this in an earlier iteration of this thread, but it's fascinating enough (in my view) to bring up again: there appears to something oddly scatological in the Russian way of living -- or at least in the way Russian (soldiers) conduct themselves (abroad). In the early 2000s, I worked in a project dealing with the aftermath of the war in Chechnya, and one of the big surprises for me was the extent to which the presence of Russian soldiers was marked by, yes, shít. In tremendous abundance and in places you wouldn't ordinarily expect to find it in your average household. There have been numerous reports of the same in Ukraine: messages written on walls with someone's hefty number two as the writing material, piles of big businesses in kitchens, living rooms, etc., you name it. I find it very odd: it is almost impossible that all of the soiling could happen right before the troops leave, so do the soldiers just happily live in a dunged-up house? Do soldiers gather together for a good ol' group-cráp, or does the fouling of a room take place incrementally, and if so, what does the provider of the 15th pile of ordure in a living room think while on the job with the 14 already there? I'd like to, and wouldn't like to, know the answers to some of the questions like this. It's very strange. I have sometimes wondered if there's an unspeakably nasty hidden side to the bodily cleanliness (in many respects) of the Arab culture, and I suppose I must also wonder whether there's a remarkably well hidden clean side to this aspect of the Russian culture.

Just out of curiosity, but also completely in earnest: is there an entity (a country, a major organization, whatever) on the international political scene that matters at least a bit and that you do respect? Incidentally, this is in no way to deny the self-contradictory positions that Europe does indeed often take. But it's a bit like the history I have with one of the major critics over here; he often writes remarkably well, but he's also spiky almost to the point of being savage, and I sometimes think it would be marvelous to see him like something for a change.

I know it's a bit nitpicky, but it's -x% recovery/reload time instead of +x% recovery/reload speed. Mechanically that's quite a difference and -50% reload time is much better than a +50% reload speed buff would be. But yes, the shortened recovery time from Scordeo's Trophy is very nice to have when reaching the ascended state. It is benefical to then pick spells with short casting time but longer recovery time - because Scordeo's recovery time buff only applies to the latter. Stuff like Mind Lance or so... lances go pew pew pew! Griffin's Blade only applies its recovery buff to the attacks made with the Blade itself - so it's not really helpful for shooting. I don't think you need that anyway because you most likely will hit the reload animation floor (can't speed up reloading anymore beyond that) with all the reduced reload time buffs you already have. Still works for +10% spell damage though, so not a bad pick. You could also think about Tuotilo's Palm in order to keep the shooting speed high while having better defenses. Or use Lover's Embrace + dagger modal for +10 melee deflection without any drawback - and the Frenzy effect is universal, meaning it also procs off of your pistol shots. It would stack with Scordeo's Trophy's recovery buff so you could cast even faster while ascended. And since Frenzy is an action speed bonus it also speeds up the casting animations (unlike recovery buffs). Xoti's Sickle with maxed Religion and Urgent Harvest is also a great speed buff for casting if you stand near a slain enemy. And it also provides melee deflection. The Soul Reaper dmg bonus only applies to the sickle itself - but it doesn't matter how you kill enemies to get the stacks for it. It is possible to gain up to 30 Religion for a max bonus of +80% dmg with the sickle (killed 4 enemies while ascended for example) - and that can come in handy once you get attacked in melee. Pretty nasty dmg from the sickle then and pretty good focus gain then, too.

And now, some news from Mordor. This is from recent "international" (LOL) economics forum of St. Peterburg or some such. Black-yellow-white is old flag of russian empire, until now used mostly by ultra-nationalist radical trash, but here it officially is, right next to the soviet empire's flag. Very symbolic and would be funny if not for deaths of hundreds of thousands Ukrainians caused by ambitions of those imbeciles dreaming of imperial glory.

Yeah monk fists have good penetration and damage so you'll be fine going unarmed. Also crush is the least resisted physical damage type. Best thing about the lance is it will distribute monk abilities like stunning surge, skyward kick, force of anguish, whatever. So if you have decent accuracy you can spam stunning surge. You'll stun everyone in the AOE (if you make the roll) and if you crit even one you get back the mortification. I believe you can actually get back more than 2 mortification if you crit multiple enemies but I haven't tested this recently. Helwalker will do the most damage but is a bit squishy. Still, with the pike you can attack from behind your tank, and wizards have tons of defenses so helwalker / blood mage is my favorite sage combo (blood mage for replenishable spells but also to get wounds). With helwalker you can dump MIG a bit so personally I'd do a stat spread something like this MIG/CON/DEX/PER/INT/RES - 8/13/15/19/18/3 You could lower DEX if you want more MIG or CON. Take Turning Wheel for max stun duration and lance AOE. If you want a tanky sage though I probably wouldn't take helwalker at all so the stats would be pretty different. Can take nalpazca or generic monk, nalpazca is better but takes a lot of micromanagement to feed him drugs. In either case I'd do something like MIG/CON/DEX/PER/INT/RES - 10/10/7/14/18/18, and probably take iron wheel Should be noted iron wheel armor bonus doesn't stack with llengrath's safeguard, but it does protect you until you're bloodied so you might want it anyway If you want to focus on unarmed entirely then forbidden fist / blood mage is the best and you'd just stick with forbidden fist attacks, using distro something like 18/3/9/18/10/19 with iron wheel, wear helm of the white void when you get it

Definitely bear. Does almost as much damage as wolf but has much better armor. Ghost heart summon has a long duration and you can't heal companion so you want your meat shield to last longer to conserve resources. I'd probably use a bow or just go melee but it really depends on your party, you can make that work I'm sure. But you'd build focus faster with frostseeker or essence interrupter. For melee I like stalker's patience. And check out this post for some ghost heart scripting. I haven't made a complete seer script but this tries to keep your companion active and that you're attacking the same enemy, also a block for targeting the pet with ectopsychic echo (can duplicate it and adjust to target with pain block or whatever). Can also script to cast psychovampiric shield on whatever your animal companion is attacking.

and HA! Good Fun!

Not just security staff. Apparently there also have been 12 crates of weapons. No clue wtf they were trying to do with all the "security guards"(?) and extra weapons.

You are correct - the water sound does lead to the right door, and I have never noticed it between the characters' comments and the music. The reboot is fine (the controls are a bit unresponsive due to the animations), though the semi-open-world format hurts it - you know that nothing horrible will happen mid-area and that you have to clear all the areas and possibly backtrack to gather the light blobs. But it looks gorgeous and the companion is likable. The Forgotten Sands would be better if it was a stand-alone game (the trilogy has 1 theme and it has concluded; it also does not have HP pickups falling out of vases) without any online components. I think, at different points I've encountered 2 progress-stopping bugs (a handhold not appearing mid-game and a door not opening somewhere late-game). Also, the Steam version might not work at all due to the DRM issues. --- Installed Fable III. After downloading external patches, it agreed to run, but I could not access my saves, because the DRM player's ID was different.

that is the remnant of great man history every movement every problem every war every era narrow down to a few big personality clashing with eachother people like to give problem marketable faces disaster already exist and will only get worse move a few faces around change very little

Not sure how long the finished game is going to be but the beta ends in/at the end of chapter 3 and that look me like 20 hours, it was also like my third time playing through the first 2 chapters. There's a lot of text to read so depending on how fast you read or how much you skip it can probably vary a lot. Some other things maybe light spoiler

You also have Feinstein as a good example of that. We've got at least a few senators who predate the invention of chocolate chip cookies, many more of the politicians have been in some kind of power for decades, and you've got several positions that are for life without regards for health or competency. The present US is already a stark Gerontocracy tbh, and it's not working out particularly well. I just hope retirement still exists for working class folks in 20, 30, 40 years. Between skyrocketing rents and such I get the gut feeling old man KP will have to sell his organs while working at Wal-Mart to afford a small closet bedroom in the apocalyptic hellscape of the former gulf coast.

Believe me, the irony of the idea that a man with the last name "Kennedy" is anti-establishment is not lost on me. Is Buttigieg running? I had not heard anything about that. I had heard that Gavin Newsom might run, but I think he's going to wait until 28. You live in Cali, so you probably have a much better idea of what type of governor Newsom is than I do.

Any chance of a reconciliation with MCA?

That is not a bad thing.

That's fair. As a truck driver, long form conversations are perfect to listen to. I start the podcast before I begin driving and I'm all set for 3 hours. People have different situations and I can understand 3 hours being a bit much to listen to.

I never saw one.

That's an awfully blanket statement. Podcasts exist in all manner of forms and lengths. I disagree but you have a right to your own opinion. The fact that his reach is several orders of magnitude higher than any "mainstream" media source speaks volumes to his overall popularity, but I value your choice to pick your own media sources.

Since incorporating the steel mace into my workout routine (already featuring dumbbells, barbells, and kettlebells) I managed to push past a plateau and I feel invigorated. I'm at roughly my peak strength level last achieved decades ago in my 20s. I feel fantastic and swinging that mace around is not only effective but legitimately fun. I have to stop myself to keep from overdoing it with 360 swings and overhead chops (bicep curls into hunters are less fun but I still do them). I'm already considering picking up a Bulgarian Bag to further expand my exercise repertoire. Anyway, to anyone considering getting a steel mace (macebell), I very much recommend it. A tip from my experience: When you start out choke up on the grip a lot then slide your hands closer and closer to the end of the handle to find the sweet spot where you can do the exercise but just barely. As you get stronger and more comfortable with the mace you will grip it closer and closer to the end of the handle. I've moved my hands from 1/3 of the way up the handle to nearly all the way at the end in less than a month on 360 swings.

It's Eastern Europe any non-white person entering their country is a national emergency

Going to Spiderman tonight with a friend. Should be good. Roommate should be earning decent money starting next week so hopefully she will be able to start paying rent (Just having her here without rent is great for my mental health). Also another friend is gonna help me figure out how to take better care of my great grandfathers 1900ish foot Artillery sword.

Do you think you could please continue to release PC games on GOG?

It was somehow low on interactions, and the ones present were rather uncomfortable, from the slow exploration to the mini-games to the very low interactivity of the story. Speaking of, the first MC becomes severely unrelatable, as a major story event happens off-screen, and (end-game spoilers):

None of the DLCs are absolutely required, and there are a lot of them, but some of them add really good and/or important functionality and extra stories. Some add extra layers to the alliance systems, or espionage systems, etc, or entire story lines. Others just add extra species packs (in some cases 100% cosmetic, or 99% cosmetic but with an extra trait or two you can pick for your empire, which is pretty minor). That said, even the basic game (without DLCs) has a lot to it, and it probably makes sense to just buy the basic game, play that, and decide if you like it. My first game of Stellaris took about 150 hours. Since then I've played dozens of games of Stellaris, ranging from some I've completed in a long weekend, to others that have taken 50+ hours. The first game was the most magical because I was figuring stuff out, and a lot of events that happened - some very random, others scripted - felt just incredible (and that was just the base game with a couple of DLCs that were bundled together on sale). With Stellaris, I would always recommend buying the DLCs on sale as they go on sale a lot. The DLCs that I think are the most important are: Nemesis, Apocalypse, Horizon Signal, Utopia, Megacorp, Synthetic Dawn, Federations. (I haven't bought Galactic Paragons yet so I can't comment on that one). The following are either entirely cosmetic, or mostly cosmetic with the option to play a few new species which isn't so important for your first game or two: Aquatics, Plantoids, Humanoids Species pack, Lithoids Species Pack (actually this one is pretty good, offering some unique Lithoid traits that are a bit more than just cosmetic), Necroids (same comment as for Lithoids), Toxoids (I haven't bought this one so I don't know much about it but probably mostly cosmetic). If you like it, you'll probably get a good 50-100 hours out of the base game before you feel you need to start buying DLCs, so maybe just buy the game without DLCs when its next on sale to see what you think. Note: the AI is not great, and it is a game about micromanagement (IMHO) as much as it is about grand strategy and emergent stories. It's also RTwP rather than TB!

Hubby's back no better. He's been trying to get into Kaiser for a check - to make sure it's not something unexpected (organ disease, spine bone spurs that need surgery, whatever), and/or just to get confirmation that it's simply a matter of hoping re: physical therapy routines etc - but since he's not actually dying or even urgent-care they keep telling him they have "nothing (appointment times) available, we'll get back to you." And so far they have not gotten back to him. He's put his sit-stand-motored KB/mouse table to standing height and we raisedf his big TV/100lb stand to max, so he works most of the time standing. Does an hour of yoga stretches and other exercises in the morning, and shorter bursts off and on the rest of the day. I am now the strong one in our 2-person family. Don't you dare touch that box/bag/chair, I will move/lift everything! And wrench all the low lying thingies that need wrenching! Easier for me anyway, I am closer to the ground to begin with. *flexes a bicep*