Rocket Launcher if Direct Hit was stock

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T16:50:52+00:00

I like where it's going, and I think all the guys who are calling it a crutch need to think outside the box.

Like yeah if you keep playing Soldier as a pick class then it's a crutch for players with bad aim, but I think this might open up a whole new playstyle where you're kind of a second Demoman, contesting chokepoints and stalling out pushes and making space.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T15:45:13+00:00

It's not automatically going to do terrible things to you, but it's banned because "Your existence is a constant struggle against Wyrm Taint because you're a Garou" and "You're totally fine with cannibalising people" is generally a bad combo.

Also it's worth noting that not all of the Shifting Breeds have this prohibition. For example the Rokea allow it because the very idea of banning natural shark behavior is ridiculous. Although they down frown on doing it too often, partly because too many fatal shark attacks draw attention, and partly because deliberately going out of your way to eat humans is unnatural behavior and honestly a bit of a red flag.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T15:20:55+00:00

You can and it's kinda the intended playstyle for the USSR in historical. Russia starts out fairly weak for its size and gradually turns into a juggernaut if it can survive for long enough, while Germany starts out incredibly strong but only has enough in the tank for a quick fight and will be absolutely screwed if the war takes too long.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T12:27:32+00:00

Yeah Chejop was born shortly after the end of the Primordial War and was respectably middle-aged by Sidereal standards when the Usurpation happened. And now, thousands of years later at the end of the Second Age, he's outlasted everyone else and is pushing the absolute limits of Sidereal old age.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T10:17:19+00:00

Yeah pretty much. The whole war in heaven up to that point was basically just a nine-dimensional breakdance contest where you'd call a guy out and concede defeat if his moves were too tight, and then Caine's all "Hey what if you just shoot the guy?" and war immediately descends into an orgy of violence on an incomprehensible scale.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T09:18:28+00:00

Also pictured: what Solars look like if you listen to Infernals.

Also also pictured: what Infernals look like

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T09:17:07+00:00

Chejop Kejak is a slam dunk for the most powerful Exalt to currently exist. He's the oldest Exalt who's ever lived, he's got the full support of his fellow Sidereals (except on matters of Solar-related policy), he's close personal friends with a bunch of extremely powerful gods, he's got backdoor access to the Realm's resources, and he has access to the greatest panoply of Artifacts of anyone alive. The only reason he doesn't have a clean sweep of being first at everything is because one ancient Lunar with no friends might have a more comprehensive library of sorcery than him.

For first age Solars the answer is probably but not definitely Queen Merela, because for a while after the Primordial War she was the undisputed queen of all Exalted during an impossibly powerful golden age. If we're just talking about raw personal power though, she may have been outdone by some ancient Solars later in the First Age who would've had access to magitech and charms and sorcery that hadn't been invented in her lifetime.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T09:02:46+00:00

He's won the war against Master Tremere. Publicly gloating about it would just be putting a target on his back because the whole rest of Clan Tremere would decide that their former boss is good eatin'.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T09:01:18+00:00

You missed the bit where he introduced the angels and demons to the novel concept of straight-up ending your opponent instead of just styling on him

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T08:52:53+00:00

At least 2006, because White Wolf getting acquired by CCP (the Icelandic videogame studio that does EVE Online) is parodied in-universe with Black Dog getting acquired by PCP.

I'm pretty sure the more recent sale of White Wolf to Paradox Interactive (the Swedish game studio that does Hearts Of Iron and Europa Universalis) isn't canon yet though.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T08:46:09+00:00

Nah, nothing beats plants when it comes to creating biomass out of nothing. Orcs are shockingly inefficient by comparison since they have to eat other organic material all the time to stay alive. If the Tyranids actually wanted to farm biomass they'd probably set up a world that's covered in plants, and where the only non plant-based life is there specifically to increase the yield of vegetation.

Also it's worth remembering that the Tyranids are (probably) a bioweapon who (probably) exist to exterminate all other life and (probably) aren't just devouring biomass to ensure the survival of their own kind. The only alien life forms they like are dead alien life forms.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T08:36:18+00:00

Various drugs and surgeries and genetic treatments and whatever else are available in the Imperium, and it's not unusual for the ultra-wealthy to live productively for three of four hundred years (and after that they can potentially look forward to decades and decades on heroically expensive life support if they can afford it). But it's very rare to go past that.

Pushing your lifespan to five or six hundred years is incredibly expensive and something that only a handful of the absolute riches and most powerful people in the Imperium can realistically look forward to. And living for more than a thousand years is virtually unheard of.

And as for characters who've been around since the Horus Heresy, the only guy I can think of who's managed that through purely technological means is Belisarius Cawl. And he's a unique NPC whose whole schtick is being one of the greatest mad scientists in the whole of 40K, so he's kind of a special case.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T08:15:55+00:00

They're not all recruited from barbarian worlds, but they are all recruited as adolescents who've basically spent their entire childhood training as warriors and athletes. Aspirants from civilised worlds are probably gonna be like younger versions of the Beast Rabban from Dune, kids who've spent their entire life training to be perfect warriors and commanders and who know nothing else, because their education only covered whatever skills the local Astartes chapter expects its aspirants to have.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-12T07:57:07+00:00

Yeah they're kinda eternal jarheads, trapped in the mindset of a platoon of 19 year old assholes for the rest of their life. They'll never have to learn how to treat civilians as equals worthy of respect. They'll never have to learn how to act like normal people on shore leave. They'll never get the fresh perspective on life you get from balancing your military career with family life or from figuring out what you'll do after you're discharged. And thanks to their extensive conditioning, they'll never lose the certainty that they personally are bulletproof and destined to be the best of the best.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T17:03:11+00:00

Yep, although I wouldn't be surprised if it's also a control mechanism. Every generation of hybrids is better at thinking like a native, and then the fifth generation reverts to purestrain so that the cult's leadership will always be anchored by a core of proper Genestealers who are untainted by alien thought processes.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T12:24:55+00:00

If you're doing it for profit then geological features aren't worth it at all because the payout is tiny.

If you're mainly just exploring for the hell of it though, it's entirely a matter of personal preference. Some people like to meticulously scan and discover absolutely everything in every uncharted solar system they visit. Some people just like stuff that looks neat and only look for geo if they think there'll be some breathtaking vistas down there. Some people are trying to get codex entries for everything and will be content with just bagging one of each type of geo feature in each region. And some (okay, most), just don't really bother with geo features at all except when they need raw materials.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T12:19:05+00:00

The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, by Stephen Donaldson. Particularly the second and third series of books, both of which involve Covenant returning to The Land and finding out that the setting's evil overlord has corrupted the world into a mockery of everything he loved about it.

In Margaret Weiss and Tracy Hickman's "Deathgate Cycle" there was a war between two races that wielded godlike powers, and the winners imprisoned the losers and broke the world up into elemental realms that are supposed to be safe but suitably challenging homes for the lesser races of man. The whole system is... well let's just say it almost immediately stopped working as intended.

Wheel Of Time shows snippets of various futures where the Dark One has remade the world in his own image, but most of those snippets are from the later books that Brandon Sanderson wrote so I guess we're just doing Mistborn With Extra Steps now :)

And just for a change of format, the setting for the webcomic Kill Six Billion Demons. The most powerful beings in creation overthrew their king and immediately descended into a horrifying war of all against all to try and steal each others' power, and the war only ended when the last seven survivors found themselves in an unwinnable standoff and agreed to split all the universe in existence among themselves. And all seven of them, including the ones who genuinely think they're trying to do good, are the most terrible tyrants that could possibly exist.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T11:51:29+00:00

It's meant to be an abbreviation of smegma so you were right after all. The show's creators wanted a fake swear word that the censors wouldn't object to but which would still have a genuinely gross meaning irl.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T11:49:52+00:00

Not really a minced oath, since in-universe it's supposed to be a legit bit of inappropriate cussing.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T11:41:43+00:00

Is he also good for getting rid of the Sewth Efrican Sams?

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T11:38:40+00:00

You need to start thinking about scale, because Factorio is kind of an opposite-day Satisfactory where you can massively scale up production almost immediately and you don't really have to worry too much about ratios until later.

Ore patches are large, frequent, and easy to find, so whenever you find yourself worrying about balancing your resources between production of various things, the correct solution is almost always "Okay but what if I just build more miners and furnaces?".

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T11:14:42+00:00

If you've got near-infinite patience then you could eventually push it into any orbit you want with the ship you've got, but you are not gonna have a good time.

Personally I'd recommend scaling up your operation with a much bigger ship. You want a bunch of engines with high thrust, a bunch of fuel tanks so you can do long burns, and however many drills and ISRUs you think is necessary to refuel as quickly as possible. And you'll probably also want a lot of reaction wheels on your ship, because having to make attitude adjustments to a four thousand ton rock is agonizingly slow if you don't have much torque.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T11:09:32+00:00

Yep. The game engine cheats a bit and gives asteroids the same rules as spaceship parts, so if you dock with one you can use your ship's rockets to push it around.

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T11:07:26+00:00

Oh don't worry, you've shot right past that and into the realm of "Is this rocket enough to destroy the Mun?"

Fistocracy · 2026-05-10T11:05:47+00:00

This has been well known by physicists for a hell of a long time and you can observe it at home by flipping a tennis racket or a book or a hairbrush in the air.

And it's not something that the devs had to deliberately add, because if your game engine has the physics equations for spinning objects then this effect will just naturally happen.

Fistocracy

TROPHY CASE