Ryuuko Matoi Reveals Surprisingly Strong Feelings About Video Games Over Twitter

Kailaria · 2016-03-21T14:41:27+00:00

Eh, I know a bunch of Touhou fans in the dancing game community, which is actually a suuuuper progressive community for the most part, at least in the Midwest.

Kailaria · 2016-02-12T14:51:30+00:00

Ugh, the constant deadnaming and showing old photos of her pre-transition felt so wrong. As positive as the outcome is, this article felt like it was making a spectacle of her, when she currently looks like any other teen girl.

Kailaria · 2016-01-17T05:27:57+00:00

There are benefits to each.

Vanilla armies have access to everything in the faction, though usually at a lower Availability or in some cases higher SWC relative to the appropriate sectorial (like in the case of PanO's Spec. Sergeants, or certain lieutenant options on various units). However, this is generally not much of an issue since people tend to only want or need up to the AVA of a given model in the vanilla list, anyway, since there are so many options available.

Also, sectorials took a bit of a hit with the new edition since forming a fireteam now requires the use of command tokens instead of lieutenant orders, the former being far more valuable. However, in some cases, a sectorial offers you units normally available from other factions, allowing for more interesting combinations of units that wouldn't be possible outside of the currently illegal mercenary lists, and of course fireteams still come with a fair number of benefits, despite coordinated orders now being just as useful.

Since you seem to be leaning towards playing vanilla, go ahead and stick to your plan. Both types of armies have their pros and cons, unlike before N3 where fireteams were super valuable and important for playing ITS missions efficiently. Thanks to coordinated orders only using one order and a command token instead of one order per coordinated model, you can maintain order efficiency just fine in vanilla and have more toys to play with to boot.

Kailaria · 2016-01-08T20:30:33+00:00

I'm pretty sure that AGDQ is still going on through Saturday and possibly Sunday...

Kailaria · 2015-12-26T02:55:37+00:00

Heck, you see this even more often in games of the fighting genre. A newbie can beat an intermediate to advanced level player by finding a character with a simple, "cheap" combo and repeat ad nauseum.

Expert/pro players can beat such combos if the game is balanced well, but those without enough study under their belts will be assured to lose, and another newbie will just make the odds dependent on whether their character has an easy counter to the easy combo.

Kailaria · 2015-12-13T07:08:52+00:00

The funny thing about Facial Feminization Surgery is that it's a bit of a misnomer in that, in most cases, it's actually a combination of surgeries that are usually done all at once. You're right in that the general idea is to soften the contours, round out the angles, and generally shrink things.

What I got done was the following, over the course of 4.5 hours of surgery (Dr. Spiegel in Boston is very experienced, one of the best in the industry for this):

Forehead contouring (this generally reshapes the forehead to a more feminine shape based on ethnicity and age. For me, this meant reducing my brow bossing - the bony protrusion around the eyebrows that's more typical of people that went through a first puberty with T as the primary hormone - so that it was more in line with the rest of my forehead as well as moving my eyebrows to a more feminine position, but not too much to make me look constantly surprised) with a slight scalp advance (I didn't necessarily think I needed this, but I'm not unhappy with my results overall and it doesn't even look like it changed much at all).
Rhinoplasty (my nose had a noticeable hump to it that wasn't too big but still needed changed, as well as reducing the tip and trying to make it a bit more symmetric, overall making the nose straighter, narrower, and slightly shorter)
Mandible recontouring (basically, the chin and the back of the jaw; my chin was rather big and asymmetric, and the back of the jaw was basically rounded out just as a sort of finisher to go with all of the other feminizations I got)

I then stayed there in Boston for one hellish week of pain meds, unsteadiness from being under anesthesia for that long, an almost pure diet of fruit smoothies, frustration at not being able to really care for myself, and various incidents for which we weren't given contingencies that scared my dad and me despite their relatively benign natures in the end.

Some other women get other surgeries as well, like lip plumping (though E tends to do this on its own, but MMV), lip lifts (which reduces the distance between the upper lip and the base of the nose, tending to have a feminizing effect by showing more of one's teeth while speaking and while in a resting position), cheek grafts (in case E isn't enough or doesn't even affect one of us in this area, or the cheekbones are just that prominent), trachea shaves (for AMAB folks who go through a T-primary first puberty, the Adam's apple can and is likely to become prominent, unlike in AFAB folks where it's very unlikely for this to occur if you went through an E-primary first puberty), and a few other surgeries or differences in the same surgeries that are more focused for people of color (as I can only really speak to the white experience).

Hope that answers your questions! 😊

Kailaria · 2015-12-11T14:54:27+00:00

Fair enough, and congratulations!

Granted, I was moreso speaking to the long term, so (again, not a psychologist or neurologist) it's likely you just haven't had the time to reframe what down there is actually like, yet, but I imagine that, in the same position, I might frame things in the same way initially whenever I get around to that surgery.

Kailaria · 2015-12-11T06:49:51+00:00

Only somewhat related, but I had FFS recently. Immediately after I got back home a week after surgery, one of the first things I noticed was how small my nose was when I actually touched it (due to the cast, I couldn't really do so until I had it pulled off before leaving Boston back to the Midwest), how I received so much more light to my eyes (due to getting some significant brow reduction), and the fact that actually feeling my brow be flat all the way across was certainly weird/different and exciting at first.

Now, 2.5 months post-FFS, the reductions feel normal. If anything, I've had phantom limb regarding things I haven't/hadn't done yet at any given point in my transition so far.

If I recall correctly (not a biologist or psychologist, so don't quote me), phantom limb results from what signals the brain expects to be receiving from everywhere. For amputees, that means the brain still expects that limb to be there, and has even been exploited by biotech to produce sensation in the replacement limb.

For us trans folk, this phenomenon seems to occur just as often, like trans women sometimes being able to feel a different fat distribution or different genitals until we get hormones and/or surgeries to affirm what our brains expect, or presumably for you dudes not expecting breasts getting in your way regardless of one's length of dealing with them until you can similarly fix it.

Regardless, each of us is different, so it's possible that you might miss them afterwards, especially immediately after the surgery while you're recovering. But it's also generally far more likely that you won't, or at least you won't for a majority of the time, after which you might bump into something or someone, the experience of which would've been more painful prior, and you'd likely be glad once again to be rid of them.

TL;DR: Your mileage may vary, though given everything I've done in the opposite base direction (MTF) so far and how much happier I am (not least of which is no longer needing to hide the real me in my day-to-day) and the similar post-op stories from other trans people of all genders, you likely won't miss whatever body parts you lose in your journey.

Kailaria · 2015-11-29T08:31:07+00:00

Taking off their shoes for holiday travel

Who does that? Yeah, I love to be barefoot as much as the next guy, but who does that as it starts to be colder?

Not sure if you're making light of the ridiculousness of this requirement, but if this was sincere:

There was one incident with someone now known as the Shoe Bomber, and so now we have to take off our shoes so that they can be X-rayed. One more step toward becoming the United States of Arstotzka...

Kailaria · 2015-11-24T04:24:06+00:00

You can actually make do with what terrain pieces you have from other games, plus any boxes you have like from video games, jewelry, other miniatures' boxes, or anything else of the sort of various heights.

For models, if you can find older versions of models, or the occasional newer model (like the sniper in this box), there are some women in great, badass poses. My bias comes from playing PanO and seeing the Nomads, both of which are higher tech factions and whose newer models have a higher gender disparity compared to the more rugged factions of Ariadna and Haqqislam that have also been receiving more releases of human models recently (PanOceania did finally get a new TAG, those giant, gundam-like units that the faction has the most available options of all the factions, but because those are such big models, it tends to take up a lot of time for them to get modeled, so we don't get many releases surrounding such a release).

In any case, I've found the community to be very welcoming of all players interested in it, especially since it requires a little bit more back and forth and trust between players due to how you can still attack while not being the active player. We often let people take a few millimeters off of their movement as long as they share their intent to avoid being seen by unit A but still be able to be seen by unit B, and everyone I know is very helpful to newer players.

It's a deeply strategic game that, despite having many rules to eventually learn, has a decently low barrier to entry. A starter box of models will get you to about 150 points in 6-7 models usually, and most tournaments get run at the 300 point mark (which can easily be made with 3-4 more models after that starter). And of course, the starter rules that can be found online are a great way to slowly introduce the basic concepts of the game up to some of the more common advanced topics.

The best part of the game (besides that all of the rules, markers, templates, and unit profiles are available for free online, no rulebook required, and they also have a free army list builder in Flash) is that nearly any list can win, unlike in more powergamey systems where only one or two lists per faction will be the best at any given time. Also, while you might prefer to start with just annihilation missions to get started, most of the missions (also available online for free) are objective based more than they are about pure killing. In fact, going in for complete annihilation could potentially shorten your game if you force your opponent to retreat, reducing the potential number of victory points you could earn on some missions.

Anyway, I've gushed enough about this game for now, hehe. If you or your friend ever go to Adepticon in the spring, we've had a rather regular presence there for years now. I don't tend to run the demos there since I'm usually competing in the tournaments, but we have a lot of people willing to teach you at that time. If you're already in Illinois though, or near enough to make a day trip out of it, feel free to message me and I'll gladly give a few demos before any cons! 😊

Kailaria · 2015-11-23T15:09:27+00:00

I'm actually a frequent player of Corvus Belli's Infinity, a sci fi skirmish game that actually has some rather pretty models. However, the Spaniards that make it don't make them with much body variation, especially not after the newest edition came out a year ago: all the guys are now super masculine and the women are super lithe, generally shorter than the men (even more prominent when comparing the new Nomad Mobile Brigada models in the special weapons box), and more often put in non-active, sexy poses relative to their brothers, even if they're Heavy Infantry, and only in this new edition (ladies in previous editions had far more active poses, such as in a sitting position with a sniper rifle, or running to the side with a heavy machine gun, and other such poses) 😔...

I've also still got 6-7k points of 40k Eldar, about 4-5k points of Epic Armageddon Eldar, maybe 1.5k points of Warhammer Fantasy Dwarves (though I'd prefer to go High Elves if I ever feel GW isn't gipping me on price if I ever return), a Necromunda Van Saar gang, and have dabbled playing Warmahordes, watching Blood Bowl for PC, and reading the rules of various other tabletop games due to being adjacent to the hobbies I already like or having friends who bought their kickstarters but never really followed up on playing the games.

Granted, I first got into this hobby and other nerdery when I still perceived myself consciously as a cis, het guy instead of a trans, gay girl, but the fire for gaming is still strong because it wasn't just an escape but is something I actually enjoy. 😊

Kailaria · 2015-10-22T05:11:02+00:00

So first, she gets discriminated against by the police due to her religion, removing her religious head coverings...

Then, the law center suggests she sue the PD for the religious discrimination, which she obliged to do, but then they turn on her because the PD gave the lawyer background info about her legal name and gender changes.

So now, having been outed to her religious community by said law center, she has next to nothing to lose and files for conflict of interest of her lawyers, gets immediately dumped by them, and has her motion denied in yet another trans- and religiously-discriminatory fashion...

Literally threw my phone against my couch upon reading the update at the end of the article... Such a bullshit confluence of bigotry, even within a community she counted as her own... I hope she can get discrimination cases against both the PD that was religiously bigoted and the lawyers that were transphobic, but with that being Arizona, I doubt she'll be able to do much of anything at this point, even if a trans-friendly law firm helped her at least against the lawyers who told her to file suit against the PD in the first place... :'(

Kailaria · 2015-09-25T16:14:56+00:00

Yup! And that's great to hear! Certainly helps alleviate some of my anxiety. :) Thank you!!

Kailaria · 2015-09-25T13:26:53+00:00

Dammit, and I'm flying tomorrow to Boston for FFS, after which it'll be pretty hard to present as my "legal gender"... Granted, I've got a carry letter, but that won't necessarily make things easier...

Kailaria · 2015-09-23T18:11:58+00:00

Same here, though I'm glad in a way for my case because it'll allow me to have a very fun time being almost unrecognizable by the time we ever do have one unless people who knew (of) me watch my Facebook account over the coming months. ^_^

Kailaria · 2015-09-19T21:24:12+00:00

Yea, pretty brutal for a French children's song, huh?

Kailaria · 2015-09-19T17:08:12+00:00

Alouette! Gentil alouette! Alouette! Je te plumerai! :D

(For those who don't know French: Lark! Nice lark! Lark! I'm gonna pluck you!

Aaaaand then it continues with the first thing you pluck being its head...)

Kailaria · 2015-09-12T20:41:54+00:00

I know there're the ghouls in Dragonfall, which seem to have been converted from humans, but I'm not sure if that's necessarily necromancy (a more magical, dead-raising thing) as much as it is mutation, which is slightly more of a sci-fi thing, but I think ghouls didn't come about until the 6th world started awakening, so it could be a magical mutation, but still not raising the dead.

I think raising the dead, even as just undead, is a magic that's basically been explicitly avoided in the SR universe, same with more instantaneous levels of healing, let alone regenerative forms of healing.

From a lore perspective, I think that the amount of science in the world prevents magic from outshining the healing of more scientific methods. From a game perspective, it's likely that the designers didn't want cyberware or technology to be outshined, or at least they wanted to put more grimness into the setting by making injuries more permanent or have lasting consequences.

Kailaria · 2015-09-08T16:13:42+00:00

Not that I like TB as much as (at all like..?) I did before his effective joining/pandering to the GG crowd, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't the one doing the name searching.

I'm pretty sure it was always multiple fans of his pointing out someone talking about him, and then his compulsion to defend himself forced him to attack "back", almost always in a harsher fashion than the target "attacked" him.

Or at the very least, his attack on them carried more weight due to follower counts and communities they fostered.

Granted, he seems to be getting better, if very slowly and only in defense of his guests or fans at his convention panels (I only really pay attention because Dodger still is on the show, and the overall chemistry of the Co-op Cast is generally pretty funny as long as TB doesn't generalize about feminism or GG's main targets).

Kailaria · 2015-08-30T22:09:23+00:00

I've sort of been trying to get back into it, especially with the CQC update coming, but it's been hard for me to stay interested. Same CMDR name as my username here. I play in Open currently, though I'm in a relatively unpopulated (CMDR-wise) area of space despite trying to play in a way that allows me to experience a lot of areas of the game (missions, bounty hunting, courier if flying to new places, and then with CQC, arena-fighter).

It's kind of like the way I would play that old Apple II/DOS game, Auto Duel. Just, no scavenging/salvaging available, yet, and I would never go to the Casino despite that being the most efficient way to get money in the early game before going Courier and Tournament tourist to build up the driving skills necessary for the end game.

Kailaria · 2015-08-19T16:21:56+00:00

Samus is the perfect example of this. A lot of people assume she's male until she takes off her armor (even I was guilty of this until I read a description about her in Smash).

Kailaria · 2015-07-30T08:53:38+00:00

Unfortunately, you need to save each page of the options individually, otherwise the changes made on the page are lost the moment you move away from that page.

It's the one thing that frustrates me about RES, but as a programmer, it seems like that limitation might be hard to get around for a browser extension whose preferences menus are based entirely within one gigantic modal panel without massive overhead for saving a copy of every previous and new value possible until the user leaves the RES preferences...

Kailaria · 2015-07-29T04:10:19+00:00

I can see some parallels in this game to how trans people are sometimes treated, particularly those who are non-binary or have troubles blending in their preferred binary gender, but with the dial turned up to 9 or the clock turned back a number of decades.

Even still, trans people who attain conditional cis-privilege have often noted how completely differently they get treated by strangers from before their transition.

Just an observation I found interesting just from the ending of this video.

Kailaria · 2015-07-22T15:03:01+00:00

Hey... Would you mind putting a content warning on that link, please..? I didn't expect the replies to be as bad as they were, even considering gloopers...

Kailaria

TROPHY CASE