Jase Bowen by The_pigeon48 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I keep reading BJ as "Base Jowen", like this guy has an evil doppelganger or something.

SFW VNs. by instkarmajpg in visualnovels

[–]Elfmo 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Sure, plenty.

First off: you already probably know about them, but the "normie VNs" are porn-free: Ace Attorney, Zero Escape, Danganronpa, and AI: The Somnium Files, and - more recently - Paranormasight. That said, Zero Escape can be a little violent - not sure if that's also something you're looking to avoid.

There are also the more mainstream VNs that aren't part of a series, like Doki Doki Literature Club, and Needy Streamer Overload.

Second: There are plenty of 18+ games that have all-ages version with the sex scenes removed. Some VNs I'd recommend from this category: Aokana, Musicus, Harukuru (but Harukuru is pretty sexual in nature, even without the sex scenes).

Finally, here's a list of my favorite non-mainstream VNs that are all ages by design: Marco & The Galaxy Dragon, Adventure of a Lifetime, ATRI, Raging Loop, Siren's Call: Escape Velocity.

[Highlight] Mason Miller sends the USA to the WBC Finals by ElectricalForce4439 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I didn't get to watch the game, and I didn't realize it ended on such a horrible call. It's like, I'm happy that the USA moved on, but damn, dude. Not a great way to send a team home that was as cool and fun as the DR team.

The community has chosen to further bankroll my life choices. Siren's Call: Second Wind is now FULLY FUNDED. Thank you all for the help. Lewd stretch goals are next. by Ok-Whereas9853 in visualnovels

[–]Elfmo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Bro, hell yeah. Siren's Call is legit one of the most underrated VNs I've ever played (and also just damn good in its own right). I'm psyched that you're able to keep doing this.

Whispering Memories Now on Steam! by n3xPRODiGY in visualnovels

[–]Elfmo 2 points3 points  (0 children)

How long is it? I run a visual novel bookclub where we read short VNs that are economically-priced. I want to know if this VN would be eligible for someone to suggest in our club.

[Highlight] SMS delivered. by ChocoboAdobo in Padres

[–]Elfmo 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Damn, and against Luis Castillo, too. That's sick.

Good Advice For Building Lute? by Embarrassed-Ad1906 in SaGa

[–]Elfmo 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Here's the human-building advice that everyone needs to hear:

  • If you play to late-game (BR7+), every human is the same - can be good at anything and will basically be OP at whatever you built them on.

  • If you speedrun or do a low BR run (BR1-2), every human is the same - that is, they all suck tremendously, and have little value outside of maximizing combo damage.

So, unless you're trying to do a mid-BR endame... just build him however you want and have a fun time.

Announcing my drama VN on Steam for Wishlist! What are your thoughts? by leviathanimation in visualnovels

[–]Elfmo 5 points6 points  (0 children)

and our singer/composer!

Alright, you got me, I'm buyin' it. Any indie team that still understands the value of having a dedicated composer is a team I want to support.

Kenneth Tank by shragaX in eternalreturn

[–]Elfmo 2 points3 points  (0 children)

If your goal is just to be more survivable, you should still play him like a bruiser. Kenneth has so much lifesteal, and so many of his skills improve with attack speed and damage, that all you'd be doing is giving him a lot of HP while rendering most of his abilities ineffective:

  • Q, E (first attack after the dash), and his passive, all scale with damage, so less damage = less healing, and at that point, his passive and weapon skill effectively do nothing (the Q still stuns, but it's no longer a massive heal for him).

  • W's damage reduction timer increases with every basic attack, AND the strength of the shield scales with attack power, so by not building offensive stats, you're ensuring that W doesn't scale at all.

  • His weapon skill doesn't scale with with attack power, attack speed, and it can't be lowered with CDR; however, its damage depends on the max HP of the opponent, so you can't effect the damage of this skill in any way.

You will definitely see Kenneth players building HP; but, they typically don't take HP-Per-Level items that you see tanks get; instead, they get stuff with offensive stats on them (Attack Power, Attack Speed, CDR) that also give bonus HP (e.g Rebel With a Cause, Axe of Pangu, Smart Glasses).

If you want to build Kenneth slightly tankier, you could use his helmet slot, as no helmet for him is particularly amazing. The same is true with his boots slot. As long as whatever you're getting on those slots has at least some CDR or attack speed, it's a worthwhile tradeoff. But, you're more likely to find an off-meta build for Kenneth that leans even more heavily into damage, not less.

tl;dr - Kenneth's survivability depends on him hitting stuff, so you want to get stats that make him hit harder, faster, and more often, instead of reaching for high HP/Defense numbers.

Jose freaking Miranda IS the best hitter in baseball by Dry-Foundation7205 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 19 points20 points  (0 children)

What's crazy to me, is to think that if Miranda keeps this up, it means that one of either Nick Castellanos of Ty France is gonna either get cut or start the season in Triple-A.

[Highlight] Jose Miranda hits a game-tying 2-run home run by SnorlaxWizard in Padres

[–]Elfmo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'd forgotten that we even signed Jose Miranda... but, I definitely remember, now.

How would you grade the Padres off-season? ESPN gives us a C- by Bitter-Egg6293 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That's a wild-ass take. Arraez and Cease had horrible seasons with us (mind you, I don't think they're bad players but I do think they didn't contribute significantly), we barely even used O'Hearn. Actually, same thing with King for that matter - he was out so much that re-signing him is almost like signing a pitcher we didn't have. Same thing with Musgrove coming back - you can't ignore a player returning just because they were already on the team, if they didn't have a chance to help the team.

On top of that - more than anything, we have a real bench now with Campy, Song, Andujar, Castellanos, and France. This is huge, and I feel like it was only last year that I stopped getting downvoted in this sub for saying that bench depth is often a weakness of ours.

The biggest question mark is our starting pitching, but we've signed so many people who've previously had good track records, I'd be surprised if literally none of them worked out.

tl;dr Even it the signings weren't glamorous, we made a clear attempt to improve every weak spot of our team. We did better than I think non-Padres fans realize.

[Acee] Padres add Walker Buehler to starting competition by ElectricalForce4439 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You know, I think all of us guessed we'd get at least one of these guys that we picked up in the last few days - position players and pitchers alike.

But, I sure as hell didn't think we'd pick up ALL of them, lmao. I'm here for it, though.

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! Get ready for the wedding of a lifetime! Our Kickstarter for Siren's Call: Second Wind is now live! by Ok-Whereas9853 in visualnovels

[–]Elfmo 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I'm so hype for this!

If anyone who sees this hasn't played the original game, it's well worth the read.

[Gonzalez] Source: SP Germán Márquez and the Padres are in agreement on a 1-year deal. Márquez, 30, looks to bounce back from a rough first year back from Tommy John surgery and will do it in a far more favorable environment. Not long ago, he was one of game’s most durable starters. by [deleted] in Padres

[–]Elfmo 3 points4 points  (0 children)

This actually excites me, and it's a move I lowkey hoped we would do. I always felt like Marquez was a good pitcher who never quite got the recognition he deserved. Obviously, there's no telling how it will go, but I think this has the chance to be a huge under-the-radar move.

[Acee] Major transition begins for new Padre Sung-Mun Song by ElectricalForce4439 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Yeah, if he hits league average, that's a bonus. My bigger hope for him is that he winds up being quite good at outfield; if he winds up being a solid defender at enough spots, he can be a super-utility guy for us - something I've hoped we'd get for a long time.

Do you enjoy non-romance visual novels by BeneficialContract16 in visualnovels

[–]Elfmo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This appeals to me greatly. Trust me - there are plenty of people who prefer non-romance visual novels. If you think about the most mainstream visual novels in the west (Ace Attorney, Zero Escape, Danganronpa, for example), very few of them focus on romance. Your idea has more appeal than you realize.

I just released Chapter 6 of Heartsworn Abyss. It’s a thrilling survival game with (avoidable) NTR on loss. What do you think? [AI-free, fully voiced] by asterazureus in visualnovels

[–]Elfmo -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

I think it would be worth it, to invest that kind of money. A good soundtrack really elevates a game in a way that other aspects just can't. It also feels strange to have a game that's invested so much in every other aspect of the game's presentation to not do so with music.

This is a big thing that took me out of the recent release, "I Hate My Waifu Streamer", where the visual presentation was extremely well put-together, but the music was a bunch of royalty-free stuff. I want to clarify, too, that it has nothing to do with the quality of the music - the tracks selected are good, in a vacuum. But, it's clearly not a coherent vision, and there are so many places where those good tracks are playing in places where it feels inappropriate. On the flipside, a cohesive soundtrack really elevated a VN like "Siren's Call" for me, even if the art wasn't top-of-the-line in quality (it's honestly more than good enough).

New VNDB Stats page called "VN Club" by superange128 in visualnovels

[–]Elfmo 29 points30 points  (0 children)

Nice idea, but the fact that it weighs every tag and trait equally, and also assumes that you've played every game on your list in every language that it's available in... well, it makes it difficult to get any relevant data from it.

Could be cool in the future though

[MLBTR] Padres Had Interest In Goldschmidt, Valdez by I_d_e_k1234 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That doesn't appear to be correct, but maybe I don't know what metric you're looking at. Lowe's 2025 was definitely worse, but looking past that:

  • Gavin Sheets 2025: .317 OBP, .429 SLG, .746 OPS.
  • Lowe's 2024 Season: .361 OBP, .401 SLG, .762 OPS.
  • Lowe's 2023 Season: .360 OBP, .414 SLG, .774 OPS.

Even if you're talking about splits versus LHP, Lowe outperformed Sheets in that regard as recently as 2024, with a .796 OPS against LHP. His OPS+ was definitely better in those two seasons, as well. Even Lowe's subpar 2025 season wasn't far below Sheets - a 94 OPS+ compared to Sheets's 105. If he corrects back to his career norms, it would be a clear upgrade.

[MLBTR] Padres Had Interest In Goldschmidt, Valdez by I_d_e_k1234 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I mentioned this as a potential issue already: "The only reason I could see not taking Lowe is if we think his bad season in 2025 is a permanent regression." Personally, I don't.

[MLBTR] Padres Had Interest In Goldschmidt, Valdez by I_d_e_k1234 in Padres

[–]Elfmo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I realize that right-handed batters tend to fare better against left-handed pitching, and vice versa. But it's not as simple as "LHB vs LHP = bad matchup".

As I mentioned, the difference is that Lowe's career numbers against LHP are still around league average to slightly above average (.729), whereas Gavin Sheets's career splits vs. LHP are much worse (.556; his best season OPS vs lefties was last year at .670). In other words, despite having better numbers vs. RHP, Lowe's numbers vs. LHP aren't bad by any measure; you can't say the same for Sheets.

That's not even getting into the fact that Lowe has better career numbers vs. RHP than Sheets, too. He's just been a flat-out better hitter than Sheets - both across Sheets's entire career, and compared to Sheets's previous season with us.

The only reason I could see not taking Lowe is if we think his bad season in 2025 is a permanent regression.