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I think it boils down to publisher priority. I think a lot of these live service games that have been spectacular, high-profile disasters (not necessarily financially, but definitely in reception and what they have done to the reputations of their developers) come down to the monetization model being the initial focus of the project and then the developer does what they can to make a game to fit said monetization model, which, from a creative standpoint, is completely bass ackwards. It should be make a good game AND THEN figure out how to best monetize it. But business gonna business, I guess. Maybe these businesses should look at Capcom who is selling games like gangbusters, their stock value has something like quadrupled over the last 5 years. How did Capcom do it? By releasing great games. Their success has largely been built on the strength of single player games, the types of games that ***holes in suits keep telling us are no longer profitable and live service is the future. Games like the Resi games (remakes and new) and most recently Dragon's Dogma 2, which, for all its technical problems, and believe me, as a guy who has 36.5 hours in the game according to Steam, I have experienced said technical problems more times than I'd like to admit and they are frustrating, is an AWESOME game and it has sold quite well. I'm nominating that last sentence for Run-on Sentence of the Week. I'm sure that's not the whole story. I don't know Capcom's company structure, culture, etc. However, the fact that the company has been HIGHLY profitable and successful for a sustained period of time tells me that they are well managed and efficient. The flip side... It would be easy for me to $#!+ on Ubisoft here, and Lord knows they deserve it, but I $#!+ on Ubisoft enough as it is, time for WB to take one on the chin. WB had the biggest hit of the year in 2023 with Hogwarts Legacy (coincidentally a single player game) and by a WIDE margin. That game has sold well over 20 million copies so far and was well received, a HUMONGOUS success by any measure. An yet, the entire rest of 2023 was such a disaster for WB that they STILL are bleeding money and needing to restructure their business. How ****ed up is your company when you have a MASSIVE GIGANTIC SMASHING success and still can't have even a decent year overall? Every person in upper management at that company should be fired immediately.

I guess I'm just saying I care less about the label they give it and more about the intention and economics of it. Developers gotta eat. Funcom has continued to develop Conan Exiles and I've found the stuff they put out has been well worth my money. Stellaris (or Paradox as a developer), on the other hand, keeps putting out expansions and they rarely seem worth the full price. But that's very much an opinion. Honestly most of the games I'm playing now are indie developers, and they have to put out little add ons to keep the lights on. I had no problem dropping money on the Wartales expansion because I ant them to keep working on the game. Same thing with Battle Brothers. Whether it is live service or not, I'm just trying to support the content that I like to see more of. But as I said, I'm sure we will continue to see big publishers try and milk the system.

I didn't really think of Conan Exiles as a live service game. I suppose it might qualify, I don't know, the definitions get kind of muddled at some point. For example, would you consider The Witcher 3 to be live service? I wouldn't, but it has multiple expansions, the game was sort of a living thing for a few years. Then again, Conan Exiles did eventually add a battle pass and microtransactions, so I guess it is live service now? Back when I played it the game didn't have some of that stuff, I played it briefly since then but didn't really engage with the battle pass or the microtransactions at all, I would just collect the freebies from the battle pass whenever I got a freebie and then forgot about it until I got another freebie.

Imagine you bought a piano for full price and when it arrived at your home parts were missing. About 40 of the keys are missing, the door on top that covers all the machinery is missing, one of the pedals is missing, the little stand for your sheet music is missing, and so on. The piano is technically functional, you can play music on it, but you are severely limited in what songs you can play on account of all the missing parts. But don't worry, those missing parts will get added later in piano expansion packs that will cost you more money and eventually, after a couple of years and spending an additional double what you paid for the piano in the first place, you might have a complete piano, assuming the piano company doesn't abandon the piano before all the planned piano expansions are actually made and shipped. Who would buy a piano like that? I sure wouldn't. I don't buy video games like that either.

I remember seeing a quote of one of the higher up suggesting that all WB learned from that was: “dang, we should have monetized Hogward’s legacy more”. I don’t hope that Capcom will stay its current awesome self forever. Line must go up and at some point continuing to release great games will stop doing a trick and they will start cashing in. Really, a line between good and bad Capcom is them being more forceful about current monetisation.

Feel like that's not really going to be a thing, since the audience that fell in love with a show like K-On is obviously not going to want the animation that they already like to suddenly look look ye olde cels. So it's not something companies would be interested in trying to make/sell, and it's not something even fans would probably be very interested in making themselves. Though I'd be very curious to see what that would actually look like, especially given that there are obviously so many other art style differences as well - I'd imagine it'd be a rather bewildering hybrid. It's possible that the tools and training data could be made available for most anyone to use on anything someday, though... In fact, I have already seen one fan-made AI upscale doing a similar thing as the above Dragon Ball images. Mickey's Christmas Carol (1992), compare the images at full size: One of these is the official Disney blu-ray, one of these is a fan-made PAL DVD upscale. Unfortunately, the first column is the official Disney source. Yikes. I'd love to be able to apply this process to something like Steven Universe and see what results...

Yes. But they're not showing me combat footage, or if they do I only watch it if its not going to be some gory stuff. These days I don't even bother, although watching ERA work is always interesting to see so I look for that.

What possessed you to read YouTube comments? That's a descent into madness.

Ukraine's Devastating Thermobaric Drone Wipes Out Russian Target (newsweek.com)

Well, no. Live-service doesn't equal post launch content/support. Live-service model sees games and platform, rather than a title. It's a game meant to be played endlessly and continuasly with a regular trickle of limited time content. There are of course games that blur the lines. Are new Hitman's live services? I would say they definitely try, but there is a great, selfcontained game there with live-service stink all over it. For a while now even non-live service games implement live-service like monatizations (Street Fighter6 battlepass for example). I can't speak of Conan Exiles, but I am pretty sure MMO was were a lot of live-service concepts were first born - than publishers became interesting in having same long term "engagement" through habit and ongoing revenue through microtransactions in other titles. I think that if a game releases post release content, and you are not pressure to log in play it/buy it right now, it is not following live-service design. It has less to do with how much post launch content it gets (god knows, a lot of services tend to die rather quickly) and more with how it tries to "engage" its players.

You probably could. Not much insight in knowing some FPV drone blew a guy apart somewhere. Equipment losses can give you a sense of priorities or potential pushes I guess. While people are dying there not that gory. Some people really seem to want to watch snuff films and truck out some excuse that they don't want to flinch from reality or some other edgy nonsense. Good test of that is how they react to their team getting killed, heh.

A tiny bit of pointing out the obvious there, in that the relevant technology has either been non-existent or not in use in nearly all previous conflicts. You can expect there to be even more coverage of that kind in future wars. (This reminds me of how the sculpting of the finish line photo of the 100 meters dash in the 40BC Olympics was only finished in 37BC, so the two fastest guys really had to wait to find out who won.)

Do you like the idea of having great defense and healing, and the knowledge that time is on your side? Do you like having like, all the auras, and selecting like all the defensive talents? Then this guide is for you. This is a setup that I keep playing; I've easily done it over a dozen times by now. Every time I do it, I try to find a way to squeeze more offense out of it, while staying true to time-is-on-my-side. So while this composition can always fall back on whittling enemies down, there is often the option to race towards the inevitable by blowing them up. Context I play in No Rest mode. I build my characters to pass nearly all skill checks, without having to change equipment or use consumables (because I'm lazy). I run all of Berath's Blessings. I like tall races. I like two digit stats, even if they're not useful. The entirety of the guide is based on these sometimes rational, sometimes aesthetic reasonings of mine. If any of this is not to your taste, you can still draw inspiration from this post. The following mods that I use are also relevant: No Forced Rests Deadly Deadfire (Hardcore) Out With The Good (no balance impact, I just super recommend it for No Rest) Waukeen's Berth Binary Opposed Dispositions (and Vindictive Ship Battles, but I can't find it) Meet The Party IMPORTANT: All five are multiclassed paladins of the Shieldbearers of St. Elcga order. The listed classes are their second class. Heals: Chanter (Troubadour) - this should be your Watcher. Skill point suggestions assume this is the case. Sabres: Chanter (Troubadour) Tank: Fighter (Tactician) Staff: Fighter (Devoted) - second best choice for Watcher Brilliance: Cipher (Psion) Pillars 1 Background You want Aloth to have become the Leaden Key Grandmaster, so you can get this hat. You want Devil of Caroc to have spared Harmke, so you can get this armor, though you won't be wearing it forever. You want to have pledged to Hylea and followed through on that, because we do not play No Rest without by far the best dish in the game. Having sacrificed someone to the Skaen Blood Pool is fine as long as it's not Aloth/DoC. Having absorbed the souls at Heritage Hill is fine too. General Build Info As Shieldbearers, everyone gets Lay on Hands for free. We do not take Inspired Defenses because it doesn't stack with Stoic Steel. If you want to take it early and then go through the respec hassle, you can. Base stats do not include racial/background bonuses, so you'll have more points at character creation. Skill point assignments assume you're following the rest of the guide strictly. It also means doing Cignath Mor Galawain's way for everything to add up. If heeding the skill point suggestions, go for Stealth -> Athletics first on Heals and Tank. This is so they can Party Assist the others. Sleight of Hand is just for some late game checks unless you want to run around pickpocketing. Heals Heals is your typical Herald providing large amounts of passive healing. She is also an off tank and she wears enemies down with Brand Enemy. Race: Wood Elf Culture: Old Vailia - Aristocrat Food: Hylea's Bounty Base stats (endgame stats in parentheses): 18 (26) Might 11 (19) Constitution 4 (13) Dexterity 6 (13) Perception 18 (27) Intellect 18 (24) Resolve Skills (as the Watcher you have lot of "fill the gaps" duties) Alchemy 3 Athletics 8 Sleight of Hand 3 Stealth 5 Diplomacy 3 Insight 6 Intimidate 2 Metaphysics 5 Survival 3 Talents by level 1: Sworn Enemy, Blessed Was Wengridh, Not Felled 2: Deep Faith 3: Free pick 4: Weapon and Shield Style, Zealous Aura (use Endurance) 5: Divine Purpose 6: Free pick 7: Ancient Memory, Brand Enemy 8: Bull's Will 9: Bear's Fortitude 10: ...Nor Flame, Exalted Endurance 11: Mental Fortress 12: Iron Gut 13: The Bride Caught, Righteous Soul 14: Practiced Healer 15: Snake's Reflexes 16: Tough, Uncanny Luck 17: Clear Head 18: Free pick - I suggest Reviving Exhortation 19: Set to Their Purpose, Stoic Steel 20: Mercy and Kindness Proficiencies Dagger, Medium Shield, Sabre, then whatever. Equipment Helm: Blackened Plate Helm Cloak: Cloak of Greater Protection Necklace: Baubles of the Fin (can also wear Bone Setter's Torc and give this to Brilliance) Chest: Furrante's Breastplate (Love of Life, Vigorous Protector). You can trade armor with Brilliance. Before you get this, you can use Devil of Caroc Breastplate. Gloves: Gauntlets of Ogre Might Ring 1: Ring of Minor Protection Ring 2: Chameleon's Touch Boots: Footprints of Ahu Taka Belt: Physicker's Belt Pet: Nikki - I like accuracy. You can use another pet without breaking anything. Weapon Set 1 Sasha's Singing Scimitar with Refreshing Finale and Companion's Prelude. Start with a dagger for the parry modal. Lethandria's Devotion with Sheltering Light Weapon Set 2 Sasha's Singing Scimitar from set 1 The Weyc's Oracular Focus with Lasting Channeled Shield Playstyle Until you get Ancient Memory, chant Blessed Was Wengridh with Brisk Recitation. Then chant those two without it. Lategame, replace Blessed Was Wengridh with Mercy and Kindness. When you get Brand Enemy, DoT up important enemies, and then less important ones. Keep 1 or 2 Zeal in case you're needed for an emergency Lay on Hands. Keep up Not Felled by the Axe. Later, keep up The Bride Caught Their Ruse. If you judge it's too annoying to do these, that's usually ok. If you're at max phrases, your scimitar aura is at max strength. Sabres Because one chanter just can't get the job done. She also helps bring down bosses by debuffing them. Race: Wood Elf Culture: The White that Wends - Explorer Food: Hylea's Bounty Base stats (endgame stats in parentheses): 10 (10) Might 11 (15) Constitution 16 (21) Dexterity 9 (11) Perception 18 (19) Intellect 11 (11) Resolve Skills Athletics 19 (for the armor) Bluff 6 Metaphysics 4 Survival 9 (do this first) Talents by level 1: Flames of Devotion, At the Sight, And Hel-Hyraf 2: Deep Faith 3: Sworn Enemy 4: Two Weapon Style, Zealous Aura (use Focus) 5: Divine Purpose 6: Weapon and Shield Style 7: The Shield Cracks, Shared Flames 8: Bull's Will 9: Bear's Fortitude 10: The Bridesman Slew, Exalted Focus 11: Silver Knights' Shields (anyone using a dagger can replace it now - dagger modal doesn't stack with this) 12: Mental Fortress 13: Snake's Reflexes, Righteous Soul 14: Iron Gut 15: Clear Head 16: ...Each Kill Fed, Tough 17: Sworn Rival (you might take this earlier - this is needed so that Sabres and Staff can be angry with the same target) 18: Free pick - I suggest Reviving Exhortation 19: Uncanny Luck, Stoic Steel 20: Free pick - Spell Resistance if you want to stay defensive Proficiencies Sabre, Medium Shield, then whatever. Equipment Helm: Thaos' Headdress Cloak: Cloak of Greater Protection Necklace: Cog of Cohh Chest: Contender's Armor (Heavy Mobility). Iridescent Scale is okay before you get that. Gloves: Aegor's Swift Touch Ring 1: Ring of Minor Protection Ring 2: Ring of Minor Protection Boots: Pathfinder's Boots (can trade with Tank if you want Might affliction resistance, but then she has to spend a free pick to compensate) Belt: The Undying Burden Weapon Set 1 Scordeo's Edge with Adaptive and Blade Cascade (before you get this you can just steal yourself Grave Calling) Tarn's Respite with Brittle Frost Weapon Set 2 Tarn's Respite from set 1 Any medium shield you want (I use Mundane Shell) Playstyle Until you get Silver Knights' Shields, chant At The Sight with Brisk Recitation. Then chant those two without it. Turn on Brisk Recitation to keep trying to land The Shield Cracks on tough opponents. If shields don't need to crack, use the Brideman/upgraded version invocation. Keep swinging - you lower enemy deflection, that's fun for everyone! Shared Flames will not only help your party's regular attacks, it'll also help Staff do more damage with her scrolls. This will probably feel like your squishiest character, because she is in melee but doesn't wear a shield by default. Sometimes you'll just have to suck it up, swap to weapon set 2 and endure it. Tank Tank is your tank, but she is not entirely dedicated to that task. Resist the temptation of making her a slightly ambulatory brick. If you make an immortal tank, well that's nice and you will love it early game, but later on two things will happen: you'll fight bosses who just attack other party members instead while she stands there looking stupid (and if Heals dies, you'll notice Tank is not immortal), and you'll be tough enough from gear/levels that you won't need every bit of tankiness you can get from other sources. What we need for Tank is for her to be tough enough to tank groups of monsters, and for her to still be useful when bosses decide to just attack someone else. Race: Pale Elf Background: The White that Wends - Explorer Food: Mohora Wraps (up for discussion what you feed her, but don't you dare spend a Hylea's Bounty on her) Base stats (endgame stats in parentheses): 10 (16) Might 15 (17) Constitution 13 (17) Dexterity 13 (15) Perception 10 (11) Intellect 14 (15) Resolve Skills Athletics 6 Sleight of Hand 6 Stealth 7 History 19 (for the cloak) Talents by level 1: Flames of Devotion, Disciplined Barrage 2: Deep Faith 3: Knock Down 4: Fighter Stances, Weapon and Shield Style 5: Determination 6: Divine Purpose 7: Bull's Will, Bear's Fortitude 8: Snake's Reflexes 9: Disciplined Strikes 10: Fearless, Mental Fortress (now we have negated both Tactician debuffs from her getting flanked) 11: Iron Gut 12: Unstoppable 13: Conquerer Stance, Righteous Soul (she is usually in Defender Stance, but Guardian Stance isn't much of an upgrade to it) 14: Clear Head 15: Mule Kick 16: Tough, Uncanny Luck 17: Vigorous Defense 18: Free pick - I recommend Armored Grace 19: Free pick (Spell Resistance, Superior Deflection, Unbending, One-Handed Style, Body Control so you can give away your boots...), Stoic Steel 20: Free pick Proficiencies Dagger, Medium Shield, Club, Rapier, then whatever. Equipment Helm: Pearlescent Rhomboid Helstone (not important) Cloak: The Giftbearer's Cloth Necklace: Wise Teeth Necklace Chest: Blackened Plate Armor (Death in Life, Usher's Visage). Start by stealing her a Patinated Plate Gloves: Woedica's Strangling Grasp Ring 1: Entonia Signet Ring Ring 2: Ring of Minor Protection Boots: Boots of the Stone (can take the Body Control talent and give these to Sabres) Belt: Free pick, can be Blunting Belt or Nature's Embrace for example Weapon Set 1 Kapana Taga with All Comers and Lone Champion - wear any dagger before you get this Nerian's Ward with Father's Masterwork Weapon Set 2 Shattered Vengeance, nothing in the offhand Weapon Set 3 (the third set comes from the cloak) Rännig's Wrath, nothing in the offhand Playstyle You're the tank. Stand in front with your first weapon set and Defender Stance. If you're fighting a boss and you've killed all its goons, swap to Warrior/Conquerer Stance and spam (because as a Tactician you're Brilliant when flanking all targets - do you still want her to be Unbroken? ) Mule Kick/Flames of Devotion with Shattered Vengeance if you haven't stacked the debuff yet or you want the club modal, otherwise with Rännig's Wrath for the crazy accuracy you get with the rapier modal. Club modal is good for helping Brilliance (the Psion) contribute offensively. I strongly suggest you stick to the recommended enchantments for Kapana Taga. You're the tank and you use that weapon to survive. Staff will deal five times your damage, and the only reason you get that close is because your armor radiates damage, not because your attacks are powerful or would be powerful with different enchantments on Kapana Taga. Staff Here's the dam! While the Brand Enemy spam from Heals is good for wearing down multiple enemies, Staff can focus down a single enemy, or destroy groups by using scrolls. Race: Wood Elf Background: The White that Wends - Explorer Food: Hylea's Bounty Base stats (endgame stats in parentheses): 11 (11) Might 9 (11) Constitution 16 (22) Dexterity 18 (21) Perception 10 (11) Intellect 10 (11) Resolve Skills Arcana 19 (and you will love it) Metaphysics 19 (for the staff) Talents by level 1: Flames of Devotion, Disciplined Barrage 2: Deep Faith 3: Sworn Enemy 4: Fighter Stances, Two-Handed Style 5: Determination 6: Divine Purpose 7: Disciplined Strikes, Bull's Will 8: Bear's Fortitude 9: Snake's Reflexes 10: Fearless, Mental Fortress 11: Iron Gut 12: Clear Head 13: Conquerer Stance, Righteous Soul 14: Weapon Specialization 15: Knock Down 16: Tough, Uncanny Luck 17: Mule Kick 18: Armored Grace 19: Weapon Mastery (this does really little so you could consider it a free pick - take Vigorous Defense here and then whatever at 20), Stoic Steel 20: Vigorous Defense Proficiencies Quarterstaff - who wudda thunk? Equipment Helm: Cowl of the Piercing Gaze (mostly because I'm obsessing about high perception) Cloak: Cloak of Greater Protection Necklace: Strand of Favor Chest: Gipon Prudensco (No Fool, I) - can start with Benweth's armor Gloves: Firethrower's Gloves (possibly The Left Hand of the Obscured later) Ring 1: Ring of Prosperity's Fortune Ring 2: Ring of Focused Flame Boots: Boots of the Stone Belt: Free pick Weapon Set 1 Chromoprismatic Quarterstaff with Enthralled Blights and Entropy Shield - start with The Spine of Thicket Green or Superb Xaurip Quarterstaff Weapon Set 2 Sungrazer (empty offhand) for bosses, or a non-crushing weapon for bog oozes Playstyle Use Warrior/Conquerer stance unless you're playing at a low difficulty. Prefer to attack from the safety provided by your extra reach. Sometimes you and Sabres will hunt down enemies who don't want to be on Tank. In those cases, remember to move closer so you can flank your victim together. When fighting a boss, use Sungrazer until you land a crit for the debuff. Staff has great accuracy; it won't take long. If you get in trouble, turn on the quarterstaff modal and/or Defender Stance. Shields are taboo; you don't even have the modal. This character is supposed to pump Arcana, so you also have the option to obliterate hordes of enemies with Scrolls of Great Maelstrom and such. And the higher level you get, the less the party will mind if they "accidentally" get caught in those. Fun fact: Because of high Dexterity, Perception and her armor Gipon Prudensco, she will have the highest Reflex save and you can use that if you want to make AI cast spells on her (I use it to make Brilliance give her Ancestor's Memory). Brilliance Here is the final ingredient for all the longevity you'll ever need. Lategame she has two jobs - Pain Block and Ancestor's Memory, and being reluctant to spend her own Zeal because she's the only one who can't replenish it. If you can get her to 24 int, she'll have 29 with a Smart buff from Heals, and this will make Ancestor's Memory tick 4 times instead of 3. You can achieve this with less, but then you need a Potion of Ascension. Race: Pale Elf Background: Old Vailia - Artist (yes, she is on mechanics duty) Food: Shark Soup (which is why we're not taking Iron Gut) Base stats (endgame stats in parentheses): 15 (17) Might (for Robust healing from Pain Block, not for damage) 13 (17) Constitution 8 (12) Dexterity 9 (11) Perception 18 (24) Intellect 12 (13) Resolve Skills Athletics 3 Mechanics 13 (might not need that much) Stealth 3 Diplomacy 2 Insight 12 Intimidate 5 Talents by level 1: Flames of Devotion (she won't really use it), Whisper of Treason or Eyestrike 2: Deep Faith 3: Iron Will 4: Psychovampiric Shield, Zealous Aura (use Charge) 5: Weapon and Shield Style 6: Divine Purpose (due to her food, only the Resolve boost matters) 7: Bear's Fortitude, Bull's Will 8: Snake's Reflexes 9: Free pick - Recall Agony has some lategame relevance, but Puppet Master can be pretty fun 10: Pain Block, Exalted Charge 11: Mental Fortress 12: Clear Head 13: Borrowed Instinct, Righteous Soul 14: Practiced Healer 15: Farcasting 16: The Empty Soul, Tough 17: Uncanny Luck 18: Free pick - recommend Lingering Echoes 19: Ancestor's Memory, Stoic Steel 20: Free pick - recommend Greater Focus Proficiencies Wand, Large Shield, then whatever. She will be using a flail, but the modal won't really matter. Equipment Helm: Heaven's Cacaphony Cloak: Cloak of Greater Protection Necklace: Charm of Bones Chest: Magnera's Chain (Magnera's Commitment, Outlaw's Instincts). This gives +10 to all saves; if you don't love this, how did you get this far in the guide Gloves: Burglar's Gloves Ring 1: Kuaru's Prize Ring 2: Ring of Minor Protection Boots: Boots of the White (rather whatever) Belt: Free pick, I have Girdle of Mortal Protection Weapon Set 1 Keeper of the Flame with Sweet Aroma - this is a really late game item and assumes you just stand around providing the aura. If you attack, you invite enemies to attack you back; also, no one needs the reflex debuff from the modal. Any wand you like before that. Shining Bulwark Weapon Set 2 Anything without a shield - this is your "no accuracy penalty" set for spellcasting. Dual wands for example. Playstyle You are a Psion. You generate focus as long as you're not taking damage, so don't make yourself an attractive target. Stand in the back with a large shield, possibly with the modal on (especially in ship battles). You will get harassed by enemies who are scripted to just go for the farthest target. It's up to Sabres and Staff to convince them of the error of their ways. When trying to facilitate longevity in lategame battles, use Pain Block and Ancestor's Memory (on party members who need it to cast defensive spells like Lay on Hands) only. Note how you need no accuracy for this. When trying to help bring down tough enemies, Psychovampiric Shield followed by Psychovampiric Shield again is a good opener. They have less Resolve after it's landed once, so the second one will last longer and land easier. Follow it up with Recall Agony. Borrowed Instinct can be used on goons, sigils, barrels... any pointless target can boost your accuracy so you can land the good stuff on the boss. Or if the boss has a low will defense, you can of course go for it directly. If you picked Eyestrike at level 1, note that blinded enemies are considered flanked, and if all enemies are flanked, Tank becomes Brilliant. This will probably never happen in a situation where it makes a difference, but it's a cute synergy. Whisper of Treason has more uses, but requires you to get closer. General Strategy You are Shieldbearers, so remember to pick Honest/Diplomatic dialogue options to boost your Faith and Conviction, while avoiding Aggressive/Cruel. If you want to kill someone but starting the fight requires Aggressive behavior, you can either provoke them into starting it or, ahem, diplomatically manually attack them outside of conversation. Or let's call it an honest display of hostility? Lay on Hands makes the target briefly unkillable when cast by a Shieldbearer on someone else, so try to have your party members cast it on each other and not themselves. The best one to cast it is whoever can do it the soonest, not the one who has the most +healing. Remember that LoH lasts longer than the unkillable buff, so you're not immortal in the last 2-or-so seconds. Lay on Hands is usually a far better use of Zeal than Flames of Devotion. Use FoD to remove regeneration from trolls, or because it's a trivial encounter, or because you really need your target to die fast, or because you know you won't need the Zeal to heal. A disproportionate amount of enemies are immune to fire damage or even heal from it, so Brand Enemy can't win every battle. You are a powerhouse of auras, chants and invocations. Stick together so everyone benefits! Combat Example - Boarding Battles Boarding battles really bring out the essence of this party. Lately, my strategy has been to wait until level 10, then clear the seas of bounties. Level 10 means Exalted Endurance and Pain Block, both significant for your outlast capacity. So how do we do them? First of all, we ignore anyone not in the party. They will run off on a silly adventure and get knocked out, at best buying us time. We can't even cast Lay on Hands or Pain Block on them. We don't take inspiration from their ideas to go after some easy targets either. No, we get in this formation: Note how it's playing to our party's strengths: Heals is in range to cast a lot of Brand Enemy, while also presenting her tanky self as a target. Tank is slightly in front so that only one enemy each can elect to melee Heals or Sabres. Staff and Brilliance are tucked away nicely in the back, with Staff still being able to hit people on the stair (or just in front of the tanks) due to her reach. A bunch of enemies aren't doing anything but waiting for those in front to die. Everyone is enjoying all the auras and all the chants! The downside is that enemy gunners (who tend to be a bit glass cannon-y) get to keep shooting you for free, since you have no way of reaching them until you've cleared out the throng in front of you. Sometimes they'll be in range for Brand Enemy, but Brand Enemy is not a fast killer. Brand Enemy is what we will use here anyway, on the captain and on any "tough" target we can find. Avoid using it on casters like druids; by the time it kills them, they will have run out of spells anyway. Chanters, ciphers, pistoleers and anything with a lot of skulls make good targets. It's very much possible to have enough Arcana for Great Maelstrom at level 10 (this guide has enough at 9), which means if you can afford the scrolls (Waukeen's Berth will let you buy the ingredients en masse without camping any merchants) you can make ship battles a lot faster and easier. Or just exchange cannon salvos, but I think if you want to make this kind of party, you want these kinds of battles too, with or without the scrolls. No Rest - Getting Started An easy way to get the ball rolling. Upon reaching Neketaka, purchase the food for Tank and Brilliance, or the ingredients. With my recommended Waukeen's Berth mod, you can buy them in Queen's Berth, otherwise you may have to sail to Sayuka. Now, with all five dishes ready, leave Neketaka (by land or sea). At this point, HARD SAVE. There is no starting over with No Rest. You aren't getting more Hylea's Bounty. If you mess up, you have to make a new character or use the console. Okay, so you hard saved. Now let's go. Rest, with everyone eating their assigned dishes - Hylea's Bounty for Heals, Sabres and Staff, Mohora Wraps for Tank and Shark Soup for Brilliance. Return to Neketaka, enter the mill in Queen's Berth steal all the dust and crates (these will get you an easy Tarn's Respite). Make everyone a Luminous Adra Potion and drink it. You can buy Reagent/Solution in Queen's Berth with the mod (hell, you can even buy the dust itself there), otherwise in Periki's Overlook. With the mod (I hope at this point you've given up and installed it) you can also buy wardstones in Queen's Berth. Get one of each and use them right away. No mod? Go to the orlan merchant in the Brass Citadel, take your crew off duty and wait. A lot. Until she has sold you all five. Or postpone this part - you generally find wardstones in the same areas where they are actually needed. Take a bath at the Luminous Bathhouse in Periki's Overlook. While you're here anyway, steal (uh, I mean, diplomatically steal) all the things from the Dark Cupboard, Marihi's Metalworks and the Iolfr's Raiments, and buy gloves from the last shop. You still want to get Dawnstar Blessing from Port Maje and Nature's Resolve from outside Tikawara. A bit of a trip, but no fighting involved unless you get attacked by enemy ships. You needn't rush this step or the next ones. You want Ngati's Blessing (+2 con) from Te Hika Fishing Pools (let the creature pass) and Amira's Blessing (+2 dex) from the burning house random Neketaka event (enter the house and flee it). The first one you can grab right away, the other you have to wait until it happens. You also want a buff from a courtesan. This guide assumes Irwena in Dunnage. You don't have to rush there; with 3x Hylea's Bounty and 5x Luminous Adra Potion, you're not about to fail any skill checks. And later later later on, you want Alchemic Brawn/Guile/Wits from the northwesternmost island... and Magran's Blessing from Ashen Maw... that'll be all the No Rest benefits, I think. Okay, you're an official No Rester. Remember if we get injuries, we can't rest them away without losing our one-time goodies, so what do we do? We drink Luminous Adra Potions. The End I was going to format it harder and use more links, but damn am I exhausted right now. And mildly terrified of losing all this work. So, enjoy! Might add more.

This looks like a fun party, @omgFIREBALLS! Thanks for sharing this, and also for your excellent Waukeen's Berth mod, which made the game much less frustrating.

Funny you should write that because some live service games can be accused of exactly that. I mean, they have an ending; every game technically has an ending, there is a point at which you can't keep playing further or a conclusion to the main story if it's a game that you can keep playing after finishing to do side content or grind for gear or whatever. Whether that ending is satisfying is a different matter entirely and live service games can, and have been accused of having weak "endings", and this is by design, because it's not really an ending but but an end to a chapter of a story that, in theory, will keep going for many years to come. Granted, unsatisfying endings are hardly exclusive to live service games. The lie that we are fed is that we get a full-featured, complete game and then in addition we will get more game periodically. The reality is that we get a stripped down, bare minimum shell of a game and maybe that shell will be filled out over time. Obviously I'm generalizing. The Division 2 was relatively well received so it is possible to have a good live service game. I played The Crew many years ago, I didn't buy it, it was part of PS Plus or something, but I quite liked that game and it had TONS of content. Of course, I played it some 3 years after release so it had 3 years of content added to it, I can't speak to how the game was at launch. I think that's the move with live service. Wait like 2 years after launch and, assuming the game is still alive at that point, buy it then and you'll get it cheaper as a bonus.

I don't think the analogy works. I mean, unless the game is missing the ending, or like you can't move forward unless you buy an expansion. It's more like "here is a piano, but if you want to play it, you need to pay for lessons and sheet music and maybe a bench to sit on. Also it will sound like crap after awhile if you don't get it tuned. Also it's heavy and no one wants to help you move it up to your 3rd floor apartment with no lift. Why are are you even buying a piano when you live in a studio apartment? You need to buy a bigger place."

I'm going to post this here for lack of a better place to put it and because it doesn't warrant its own thread. Here's the link in case it didn't embed correctly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swoIPD7EvEw As someone who previously didn't give any thought to the nitty-gritty of how media encoding and decoding work, I found this fascinating. I still don't fully know how they work, I didn't completely understand everything in this video, but I certainly have a much better idea of the process of encoding and decoding now.

@dgray62 thanks a lot, this is exactly the build I had in mind and also probably will make him the Watcher. Although 4 is quite open still. Would be quite nice to have an SC character to benefit from quicker progression. SC pally was originally the idea for the skeleton abuse and maybe I will come with some ideas for kamikaze tactics, such as these self-immolation abilities + Effort effect in case of knockout. Yet, Valiant Demise looks underwhelming, but aren't there more items like that? The more I think about it, the more I lean towards chanter - less gimmicky, more sustainable and I realized I can get class resources for OTHERS with His Heart instead of drowning in my own skelly-indeuced Zeal. Then extra PEN with lvl 9 chant and lvl 8 invo to top it off. EDIT: Now I realized I end up with 4 chanters and 2 pallies. Well, that would probably mean swapping Herald for Inquisitor, which may be even better, more interesting. Then SC Chanter will go sword and board in place of the Herald and this fellow will get the pike and high PER. But first I will check "tanky inquisitor build" I've seen here.

Now that you've quoted them, you will be targeted for assimilation.

I remember hearing fantasies if how AI/automation would free us from tedious work and allow creativity/leisure, I see countless panels featuring some soulless tech dip****s giddy at the idea of AI making all the art so we can do tedium even harder, but the truth is that all AI is spam or scam.

Israel really, really, really does not want the world to become any more aware of its horrendous brutality than it already is. I am not all that well aware of the history of Hamas, in terms of its publicity policies, but I would assume that it does not agree with the idea that any publicity is good publicity, quite the contrary.

I think I should point out that my wife is a huge basketball fan, a data scientist/analyst, and has an obsessive personality. Somehow Palpatine returned and she kept winning with 3 of her best 5 players out.

I'm losing ...and her best player, Embiid, is back