majestic

There is a leaked Geekbench result. The score is pretty much the same as that of any 155H geekbench results, well, the single thread score is better than most, but Geekbench has notorious variances between runs. Now there's of course the issue that Keyrock mentioned, the results would indicate a laptop level TDP, which in a handheld device is going to be a bit of a challenge. Most comments about The Claw I read online are silly debates about the placement of the analogue sticks - mostly started by Playstation Layout Theists, a group of humans who should be burned as heretics they are (eh, I might have played a little too much Rogue Trader recently ). Well, CES is around the corner anyway. If this is really powered by a regular 155H, it'll probably be able to run most games in 720p at 30 fps (if they run, that is), and it'll probably be pretty expensive and really hot (in both the figurative and literal sense), but the rumor mill has it that Intel's been selling CPUs at cost recently while they play node catchup, so who knows. Intel might just be looking for entry into the market to put some pressure on AMD.

Huh, that was unexpected.

If you're dogmatic just hand him over to Heinrix. Good source of dogmatic points and you get an achievement if you turn in all the heretics and xenos in your retinue.

Camellia is an amateur compared to the Dark Eldar, on the other hand, that is completely lore appropriate. They feed on the suffering of others. He also has a romance that basically begins by Edit: Anyway, my game is a state of complete breakdown. Lines repeat during dialogue, rumors are finished but still active, there's some sequence breaking in the dialogue too as people talk about events that have not happened yet and lastly for some reason the game keeps referring to my character as both male and female. In other words, chapter four has been the original Owlcat experience so far. Edit 2: The dialogue also has a bunch of missing prepositions, missing articles and, even weirder, missing verbs. One can infer the meaning of what is going on, but this is a step back from Wrath. Not as bad as it was in Kingmaker though.

It might also be a custom 155H, that is entirely possible, so... yeah. Idle musings at this point.

Eh, somehow I forgot to reply. That is - was, with XeSS 1.2 out now - only true if you used XeSS with AMD or nVidia cards, as Intel is using an entirely different AI model for XeSS on ARC. XeSS 1.2 is looking rather good on non-ARC cards too, although performance is generally less than DLSS or FSR at the same quality settings, but XeSS with a lower rendering resolution can sometimes still beat FSR in terms of image quality (i.e. XeSS Balanced is as fast as FSR Quality while having the same if not better visual fidelity). Depends on the game of course. Yeah, that is going to be interesting. The regular Intel Core Ultra 7 155H would be enough for 1080p with Medium settings, or at least it was on pre-production sample notebooks from Acer, which makes sense as the Meteor Lake CPUs have (up to) 128 Execution Units, i.e. as much as an ARC A380. Still seems kind of risky, I mean, Intel's drivers improved a lot, but there's the odd game or two here and there that won't run at all, or just run terribly. Not going to buy a handheld either way. I mean, one that isn't the Nintendo Switch 2, or whatever it is going to be called. Still hoping they'll call it Super Nintendo Switch. That would be hilarious.

Argenta is using a heavy bolter. You find pieces of equipment here and there that increase the rate of fire, and under the effect of Firearm Mastery and Rapid Fire, she now has a rate of fire of 20 with a burst. With all the damage bonuses applied she kills groups of mooks or even bosses in a single burst, and her damage stacks to truly ludicrous levels with each shot. Anyway, I just equipped the Halo Device. Fun fact, the crap is bugged as hell, if you want to use it you need to go to an area alone - some external area, not your voidship - otherwise companions will interfere and it will not be equipped but still take up an inventory slot.

Chapter three is basically chapter four of Wrath of the Righteous. I just hope the rest of the game doesn't come apart at the seams as much as the content after Alushinyrra did. Anyway, my Argenta has Camaraderie now and it certainly does not work as anyone would reasonably expect it to. The bonus definitely does not go away one she no longer has any adjacent allies, meaning you can really just start with her surrounded by your party and then do whatever else you want. Also gave her Discipline which adds another stack of Versatility whenever she gets an extra turn. Which is fairly often. It kind of takes the fun out of the Space Marine companion you can find in chapter three. He's nice and all that, but he can really only use his Space Marine gear, and between his 3 shot burst and Argenta's 9 (18 with rapid fire), that's just... yeah, no. Argenta can also other heavy weaponry, and he can't.

Achievements are seriously bugged, at least for the GOG version. Two did not trigger so far even though I qualified for them, and there are four or five of them that unlocked without me fulfilling the requirements. I strongly dislike the former, while I don't mind the latter, all the affected achievements were for silly busy stuff like scoring 500 critical hits or dodging 500 attacks, but eh, could have saved those poor gladiators if I had known the achievement for letting them die is bugged.

Well, it's not anime, but animated. David Firth released another Salad Fingers episode a couple of months back, and... uhm... Yeah even for Salad Fingers, that one is a headscratcher.

There are some really strange interactions in combat. It is an Owlcat game, so I expect half of the talents do not work as described. Mastery of Time, for instance, seems to trigger at the damndest occasions. Cassia basically starts combat with three stacks of it, and I do not know why. Seize the Initiative proccs, and I suppose that counts, but why does it count as three stacks? The willpower bonus she gives out with Reveal the Light starts hyperscaling immediately. Not that I am complaining, but it affects everything else, especially Idira and her psyker buffs, which in turn leads to high resolve and exceptional momentum. I found that I am having a little trouble keeping her close to anyone for the effect to be worth it. The heavy bolter's effective range is not great enough, and she's constantly scooting across the battlefield firing at enemies. Focusing all my extra turns on Argenta makes her clear the battlefield, but she does so without being adjacent to anyone just after the first few shots fired.

The one thing I do not like about my current Argenta build is the ramp up time. It takes a bit to get really going. I thought battles would last a little longer than they actually do. Well, takes a bit is probably overstated. My Argenta stacks critical hit damage with every attack (and every stack of Arch-Militant's Versatility), and shooting 30+ bullets in one of her turns while having guaranteed crits means that after the first round even the measly Heavy Bolter base damage deals 50+ damage per hit, and it fires up to 18 times per attack. Still pales in comparison to Mastery of Time, which Cassia should probably pick up really early. Between Mastery of Time and Reveal the Light, Cassia's Lidless Stare can deal 100+ damage to each enemy in its considerable range. If you give her Finest Hour! from the second officer (everyone should have two officers in the group ) everything else becomes slightly irrelevant. Well, almost everything. Argenta was still the MVP against that one Hellbrute I found on a planet accessible in Chapter 2 (although in all fairness, not having a route there and having to create one with Navigator's Insight should have been a hint). I thought about giving her Camaraderie too, but right now, the way I play, she just does not stand next to other people all too much.

Jae's Inspire! is fun, unless the fight is going badly she stacks 50 or so Tactical Superiority per round. I also switched Argenta to the Heavy Bolter sold by the Drusians now that I could... it takes a turn to produce higher overall damage numbers than you would get with the regular bolter because the per shot damage is smaller, but afterwards it just takes off and becomes completely ludicrous, especially with Arch-Militant's Steady Superiority upgrade that allows her to use both archetypes' Heroic Acts in a single combat. Screenshot taken from a very short fight against a Chaos Marine and four Bloodletters. Firearm Mastery's rate of fire bonus seems to be calculated off the weapon's base rate of fire and added afterwards. It does not get doubled by Rapid Fire which makes me a sad majestic, but it's not like it is necessary. Needless to say that this, combined with all the extra attacks, stacks Argenta's Fired Up to ludicrous degrees. Add Critical Versatility and Daring Approach's 100% crit rate, and... yeah. Woof. Blessed Bolter Casing makes her a better sniper than any of the snipers. I've gotten used to the silly zone placing and it has become quite fun. The Rear zone buffs weapons that would normally not have overpenetration, doubly fun with Locust Stratagem. Using Cassia as Grand Strategist is quite fun, designating zones on the map and moving enemies into groupings with her Navigator powers (Mastery of Time stacks her Willpower to infinity) and then just fire into the group with an 18 shot burst capable of overpenetration.

https://www.euronews.com/2023/12/27/legendary-german-politician-wolfgang-schaeuble-dies-at-81 'tis the season. Good riddance.

You do realize you're talking to someone who liked The Rings of Power? Ooh, wait. Never mind. Anyway. Watched What Lies Beneath (2000) with my wife. She wanted to watch the film, and it was fine. It ended up being too slow for its own good. It was sadly far too easy to predict what was going to happen, and therefore the attempts of the film at slowly building suspense fell a little flat for me. Still, as far as horror films go, this one does not rely on an overabundance of jump scares and the pacing is very deliberate. It is well made, and if by any chance you're either unaware of rote horror stories or have never seen a horror film before, it is an easy recommendation. Feels like I am unreasonably hard on the movie just because I figured it out what is going on after a third of its runtime. It probably beats more modern horror films by virtue of being mostly free of CGI and having decent performances by its lead actors, particularily Michelle Pfeiffer.

Help, Chaos is animating my weapons.

Daring. As far as reloading goes: I am also very, very far away from dealing 50 damage per shot with any weapon outside of critical hits. Only Idira's souped up psychic scream comes close after getting every willpower buff available. On the other hand, I'm 10 profit factor away from being able to afford that bolter you carry. So, yeah, was probably a bit later in your game than in mine.

I had Cassia as Grand Strategist for a while, but zone management is so incredibly janky I just respecced. Dunno, I kinda stumble around where I am not supposed to, I guess. Just came out of Footfall and ran into a voidship full of insane tech priests and servitors. A fight with 12 enemies, 10 of which had 150+ HP and insane armor and deflection who basically one-shot my melee characters. Only pulled through because there was enough full cover and it was possible to abuse Steady Superiority's 0 AP attacks. Guess I should follow the main quest for a while. Not sure my 60HP characters should be in an area with enemies dealing 50 damage per regular hit, but you never really know with Owlcat.

Haven't read the thread for fear of spoilers, so sorry if that is a bit reduntant as information, but extra turn abilities have a funky (bugged, I guess) interaction with Steady Superiority, the Arch-Militant heoric ability. Even if you just get extra movement points through something like, say, Jae's Move, Move, Move! ability Steady Superiority allows for an attack. Turned my fighting force into Arch-Militants now (i.e. Heinrix, my main character, Abelard and Argenta). Between Heinrix' and Idira's resolve stacking, everyone's rocking Steady Superiority within a turn or two, that's just too good to pass up. The extra momentum from stacking Word of the Emperor is also really crazy with Jae's Inspire, stacking +damage like there's no tomorrow. Basically that allows my party to stack dodge and parry to crazy levels on my melee characters and extra damage to the point where Argenta kills 200HP enemies in a single turn with one burst, and it stacks up really quickly too. It's a pity that leaves Abelard a bit in the dust for the time being. I love the ol' bootlicker to bits, but Heinrix has Word of the Emperor, and he's cleansing everything with fire, including himself. Like, uh, literally.

Kill Aurora quickly enough and you can save all the shuttles except the one destroyed right at the beginning in the cutscene. It takes some doing, but it is possible.

No. I mean...

That is more or less my Heinrix build. Uses an extra turn from Cassia to light himself on fire and then goes to town. Stacks Arch-Militant's Versatility up the wazoo too. Well, buffing is a little different in Rogue Trader insofar as that it is simply part of the combat mechanics. Some classes (erm, archetypes) are just there to buff others or give others extra turns. That does not take any longer than shooting or using an offensive power, so it is fine. Certainly night and day compared to the ludicrous pre-buffing orgies of their Pathfinder games, but no less necessary, enemies are just going to trounce you without good buff management. The game also has the typical and very hilarious difficulty spikes Owlcat games are known for. You all but faceroll through the prologue and chapter one just to face a 400 HP Chaos Marine with a heavy bolter at the end of chapter one. Fairly hilarious if you're underprepared to enemies that on a lucky roll can reduce your frontliners to a pile of goo in one round. Had to reload twice for the achievement of the fight. Pfff.

Happy nondenominational holidays! /woke

Fun anecdote: in ye olden days poppy seeds were cooked in milk and then wrapped in cloth for babies to suck on. The practice was discontinued after it was suspected to be one of the causes of sudden infant death syndrome. No conclusive evidence that I would know of, but it certainly sounds plausible enough, overdosing on opiates would be much easier for babies. On the other hand, it apparently worked really well to keep the little buggers quiet for the night. Win some, lose some, ey?

To be brutally blunt, we in the West - or at least our politicians - would not have to fear our elections either if our elected officials were not as incompetent, corrupt and contemptible as the very same autocrats they love to criticise. Recently, our chancellor was filmed stating that he is sick of people complaining about rising food prices and not being able to afford a decent hot meal for their children when a burger with fries at McDonald's is 3.5€. Instead of apologizing and doing something about the (still) overpriced food in Austria, he doubled down. There was an investigation if there's been illegal price fixing between the large players of the grocery market, and it predictably found no evidence thereof. But what evidence would exist in this day and age? Price fixing no longer requires the active participation of employees of a company: they just set their price finding algorithms to the desired gross margins and to not undercut the competition, and if everyone does that, prices will rise in relative unison. In reality, grocery prices in Austria are 30% higher than in Germany, in spite of having similar labor costs, energy costs and, well, virtually the same product lineups. The actual difference between Austria and Germany is that in Germany, there are more than two companies (Rewe and Spar) competing in the regular grocery market and more than two companies (Hofer/Aldi and Lidl) competing in the discount market. What else is needed as evidence? It is painfully obvious that we have an oligopoly problem, and even steadfast believers in the virtues of the free market know that this leads to rising prices and a loss of quality through complacency. We do have a legal means of recourse for that. It would be entirely possible to forcibly break up the REWE group, or if that is deemed too radical, simply make them have to give up half their stores to competing chains. Instead, the companies involved explain the difference in pricing on the number of stores and the generally higher cost of transportation, and nobody questions that, there even have been interviews in the large newspapers with the CEOs of Spar and Rewe where they detailed that their net earnings did not go up in the past two years, while conveniently forgetting to add that their investments of said profit (they have begun building more energy efficient stores now that energy prices spiked) more than doubled in the same time. In the case of Spar that meant an increase in profit of almost 50%, in spite of higher energy, supply and labor costs. Claiming that their margins did not increase unduly is just ludicrous, and a competent journalist would have questioned that immediately. You can guess once if they did. Spoiler: no, they did not. Of course not. Newspapers earn a pretty penny from including grocery ads, and they do not bite the hand that feeds them. When politiicans of the opposing parties suggested that the government create a price comparison and statistics portal so consumers would at least realize how much they are being gouged, they replied that it would be too difficult to implement. Yes, so difficult to implement that the first price scraping website made by one person went up a week later, detailing the price differences and just how much prices rise in unison between "competitors" in Austria. Now people can look at the price gouging and realize that the government is not doing its job, which in this case would be to simply apply existing antitrust legislation. Instead, we are staring at a possible Freedom Party lead government, headed by Herbert Kickl, someone who publically calls himself the upcoming Volkskanzler, which is what the national socialists of yore called the Führer. Great. Just... great. While I have never been an optimist, it does not look like the future is going to be better tomorrow.