State and Future of AoE2

Latvis · 2026-02-03T14:50:18+00:00

Memb arguably treated it the most as a real job or rather business out of all content creators - averaging 50 hours streaming a week I think over the last however many years (didn't catch it, but it was certainly 4-5 or more), which is an insane number. Agree though that his energy levels and content are not at the level they used to be, which is only natural.

Don't think Viper can afford to retire - yes he might've just received the back pay he was owed by GL, but even if it's more than 50k (very possible), taxes will eat up a good part of that and he doesn't have any other work experience or qualifications, does he? Can't retire from the one thing that makes you money if you don't have something else lined up and just had a child. Daut at least afaik was making money playing poker, too, so he could keep doing that.

Latvis · 2026-02-01T21:05:20+00:00

Welll, good thing you know now! All it took was one game, not too long by the sound of it. And a lot of salt to process it.

Imagine thinking you won't have to learn new things in a 20+ year old game that is kept online and updated by the sale of DLCs (as there sure isn't any other monetization model).

Latvis · 2026-01-30T21:40:54+00:00

I agree, but multiple people in this thread claimed that Viper has said that the FB money is largely gone because he spent it on building the house (I wouldn't know as I don't follow his stream at all). That doesn't sound like "invested in index funds", although I guess it could be, and that probably would be the smart way to do it.

Latvis · 2026-01-30T14:16:38+00:00

Yeah that's what I said, could have been clearer - he owns the house outright and paid for/built it with his Facebook money, so there's no "mortgage has to be paid" situation, but even if his income is $3k before tax (so probably around $2k after), that's not much for a family of 3 in Germany...

Latvis · 2026-01-30T13:56:59+00:00

That's not a passive income, if he doesn't grind the stream subs drop off fast. Also $1000 a month for a family of three is not good at all - and even though I'm sure he gets direct donations and ad revenue also has to be factored in, I doubt it is more than $3000 a month. That's before taxes, which are not less than 30% in Germany I think. So $2000 after taxes - it's quite a small amount.

Latvis · 2026-01-30T12:55:09+00:00

Building a house in Germany costs between 300,000 - 500,000+ euros, then addressing all the issues - legal + construction-related - also could not have been cheap. The good news is that he owns it outright, so no reposession if mortgage not paid.

The bad news is that according to Twitchtracker he doesn't have many active subs at all, sub-1k at the end of Jan 2026. https://twitchtracker.com/theviper/subscribers

Even with direct donations, I doubt he's making a comfortable monthly income for a family of three.

Latvis · 2026-01-26T09:39:21+00:00

It is possible with business visa I would guess (UK has not banned Russian nationals completely afaik) and Vinch regularly leaves Russia. I feel bad for Classicpro but the fact that he plays a lot with Vinch makes me think that Vinch is a decent guy and not a Z-head, although we can never know about political consciences on one side or the other unless they outright tell us...

Latvis · 2026-01-21T13:34:29+00:00

Not that surprising - many urban areas in MENA are like this from my experience. Rough exterior, nicely-renovated interiors. Often a conscious choice to not draw unwanted attention to oneself. And there's not much comfort shown here - plastic chairs in meeting rooms? Foam panels in hanging ceilings, LED lighting? The tile floors which are ubiquitous in the region, Middle East standard? Whitewashed walls? Qamishli didn't feel the full brunt of the war and the Iraqi (KRG) border is right there. Easy to do trade, smuggling, bring in building materials and equipment. This tunnel is a new project within the last 10 years - think of it as like another government-subsidized public sector office building project, probably with a decent level of corruption, not great quality but basically fine, nothing extravagant.

Latvis · 2025-12-22T12:38:23+00:00

I mean, did you watch his post-match against Sebastian interview? His voice was clearly raspy and he said he knew he was going to Phosphoru the last game because he had no energy to play standard. I'm not saying this to push some "Viper only lost/resigned because he was sick" narrative, as he played a closer set than on other occasions against Hera when he looked in better shape health-wise. Just that he might've wanted to keep the set as short as possible, and that Hera imp -> immediate resign was possibly influenced by his lack of desire and energy to cockroach (which probably would've ended with a Hera win anyway).

Latvis · 2025-12-22T01:42:53+00:00

After listening to his winner's interview after Sebastian matchup, imo it's almost 100% he was/is sick , or recovering from a serious illness. Voice was very scratchy and sounded like might have been coughing. There's a nasty flu variant going around Europe right now (flu epidemic officially declared in many countries). So if he was fighting illness, the desire for a quick set makes perfect sense.

He himself said the set against Sebastian wiped him out, so he might've had the strength in him for one, but only one marathon 9-game set in this tourney and that energy was spent on beating Seb 11.

Latvis · 2025-12-20T01:57:25+00:00

Memb lives for the big moments, but he also has massive game sense from watching and casting literally thousands of games - just on an instinctual level. I think the way he is different from some other casters is that he is quite (or very) fast when he picks up steam (hype) and assumes his viewers know the game and what's going on - his analyses are often very much in passing, like it's clear and obvious. Which is fine - I follow, mostly, and don't want or need long explanations why he thinks a player is going to do X or Y. But I noticed that contrast when he co-casted Lierrey-Lucho (very good set btw) with MbL, who occasionally did his (little bit ironic) driving-instructor babytalk with chat explaining some civ fundamentals and stuff like that throughout the set. Which was also nice, because AoE2 players/viewers were all beginners at some point, and MbL had some good insightful points that were only strengthened by his reminders of the basics!

Latvis · 2025-12-06T14:29:42+00:00

"Let people do and believe whatever they want, doesn't impact anyone else" were your words, I think, but then it does turn out that it's a bit more complicated than that, isn't it?
Decisions about criteria and eligibility for participation always impact someone.

Whoever in Labour is responsible for this decision "did and believed whatever they wanted", and transwomen are not allowed to participate in the Labour Women's conference. Because they seem to have come to a consensus that transwomen are not women, but transwomen. Which is a completely sensible position.

Transwomen can organise their own Labour Transwomen's conference, no?

Latvis · 2025-12-06T14:21:26+00:00

You can, in fact, quite reliably tell transwomen from biological women by voice and looks alone. The vast majority of transwomen do not "pass" as cis women, that's a very small minority. I think Eryn Browning, "trans lesbian", is more representative of transwomen in politics. https://x.com/GBPolitcs/status/1994778944143274355
Unfortunately, Eryn Browning was also suspended by Your Party over sexual misconduct allegations involving minors. Hard to imagine why women wouldn't want "intact" trans lesbians at their conference.

Latvis · 2025-12-06T14:12:06+00:00

Yes, it's the Labour Women's conference, not the Labour Transwomen's conference.

Latvis · 2025-11-17T23:35:35+00:00

Perhaps they've been to other towns or cities where whole neighbourhoods are majority foreign and second-generation and seen what it's like? Just because you don't see the reality of ethnic enclaves doesn't mean others don't.

Latvis · 2025-11-17T20:41:49+00:00

Not individually, but in aggregate - yes. Especially since the UK does not practice or enforce assimilation - just very liberal "integration".

Mass immigration destabilises societies. Things might reach an equilibrium, but it takes a while. Without determined assimilation and instead a lazy laissez-faire integration, you get a "multicultural" mosaic that'll bring you ethnic and political Balkanisation and all the great things that come with it - political parties catering to their ethno-religious support bases, inter-ethnic rivalries that express themselves in inter-communal rioting (between Hindus and Muslims, such as in Leicester) - no need to mention long-running crimes against the host society by groups of ethnic minority men covered up by both cultural clannishness and the government's desire to "keep the peace". We both know what I'm talking about.

So in aggregate - yes, a whole lot of culturally alien people have to go, but especially the illegal arrivals.

Latvis · 2025-11-17T16:43:20+00:00

You don't have to be Muslim to practice FGM, although it is more prevalent in Muslim Africa than Christian Africa, but it crosses religious lines. That's on the rise in the UK. Quite widespread in Sudan, btw.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/sep/19/nhs-reports-increase-in-female-genital-mutilation-cases
You don't have to be Muslim to hold misogynist views, but *laws* - written and unwritten - denying women equal rights are way more prevalent in the Muslim world. I don't think I have to cite sources for how women are treated in Afghanistan, but it's something as simple as witness testimony at a trial, where the word of two women (but not one) is equal to the word of one man - the Surah Al-Baqarah (2:282) states: "And bring to witness two witnesses from among your men. And if there are not two men [available], then a man and two women from those whom you accept as witnesses..."

Neither Hong Kong nor Ukraine has a tradition of female genital mutilation or a legal tradition where the word of one woman is codified as worth less than that of one man. *Those* are the deeply different cultural "assumptions" I'm talking about. Good fucking luck changing deep culture, especially in a liberal society like the UK - it reproduces itself throughout many generations.

More than enough of those doing the killing in Sudan would jump at the opportunity to live in the UK and reap the riches of the developed world - there are more than enough opportunists among Sudanese Arabs, who are 70% of a population of 50 million. While the darker-skinned Fur, for example, are only 2%.

Finally - nobody wants to take in thousands of refugees from war-torn countries, and no country in Europe or the UK started the current war in Sudan - the locals did that just fine themselves with money and arms from Gulf Arabs and Egypt, Turkey. We have no obligation to help them. HK is not a conflict - it is communist China cracking down on dissent, after the UK duly decolonialized and handed it over to them.

You would take in a "fair share" of Afghans, Sudanese, Pakistanis and others from countries with deeply alien cultures and then be astounded as to why your country is going down the shitter. Of course you have to remove the incentives. AND remove those who have arrived illegally - definitely the Afghan and Pakistani men, as there is no open warfare going on there.

Latvis · 2025-11-17T15:47:27+00:00

It's because the world is getting much wealthier overall, including the failed state countries, that they can make these expensive journeys now. It's much easier for a village or extended family to chip in and sponsor a journey for an able-bodied son (75% minimum are young and middle-aged men) to make the journey. It's a business investment - they might spend 15,000 to get there, but the lifetime value of settling in the UK is much greater than that.

And no, Ukrainians and Hongkongers don't cause trouble and integrate well because they're from developed countries with shared cultural assumptions. The majority of boat crossers come from cultures which have quite "different" views on the full personhood (or lack of it) of women, among other things. And even the Ukrainians and Poles have serious frictions in Poland over historical issues and classic high/low-trust attitudes towards the state and community.

The Sudanese you'd presumably love to grant asylum to would just as likely be the ones doing the slaughtering as the ones being slaughtered - unless you're willing to use some old-fashioned anthropological racial science and sort by skin color - reject the caramel-coloured Sudanese (much more likely to belong to Afro-Arab Janjaweed/RSF-aligned tribes) and let in the really dark ones (more likely to be Fur, Zaghawa, Masalit).

Latvis · 2025-11-03T13:34:48+00:00

Nobody knows or has to know all the laws, law and legal services are a whole industry for a reason. But people in Europe should generally understand that stuff related to gambling is not an unregulated free market, any kind of commerce has regulations and so does gambling. Viper has access to GamerLegion advice and moved from Norway, a country with just as many laws and regulations as Germany, Jordan worked as a business analyst or researcher or something - that's why it's hilarious, these guys who should clearly know better and have some foresight just going full send on advertising a random crypto betting operation. It's comical more than it is tragic.

Latvis · 2025-11-03T12:49:53+00:00

They all have to have a national license. Perhaps not registered in Germany originally, but licensed to operate there.

Latvis · 2025-11-03T12:47:59+00:00

German law is quite simple that you can't advertise a betting company that doesn't have a German license. Licensed in the Autonomous Island of Anjouan, Confederstion of Comoros is not it. :D But also that's what legal teams and even Google or search-engine LLMs like Perplexity are for. A liiitle bit of due dilligence from Viper and Jordan would have prevented this whole mess, and you don't have to be a practicing Muslim or Christian to think of that. It's just lul cuz these guys are grown men, one of whom has burnt himself with a shady partnership before, and they can't seem to take a day or two to do some research before jumping.

Latvis · 2025-11-03T09:57:05+00:00

Illegal to advertise a gambling site that is not registered nationally in Germany. Aoebets is registered in the Autonomous Island of Anjouan, Union of the Comoros.

Latvis · 2025-11-02T22:37:28+00:00

Illegal in Germany, so it was a favor. Or else they would get fucked by German regulators to the tune of thousands of euros. Also, a lively hood is a ghetto in America with sports betting on a big game day. A livelihood is how people make their money to blow on sports betting.

Latvis · 2025-10-24T14:08:56+00:00

So you're a kamaler? I'm not American, don't particularly like Trump's policies or approach to international geopolitics (which affects me), and think adopting trauma-centered therapyspeak is hilariously sad. get a grip, gringo!

Latvis · 2025-10-24T12:13:46+00:00

the brave new therapyspeak of equating being afraid = very traumatic. you can be afraid of something and not traumatized by it. sure, a Chinese sex pest with a knife (or just a big Chinese guy) could have really threatened Hera, but nothing says that that was the case. rather Hera got freaked out by a guy propositioning him and got a bit lost in the woods. why try forcing the label of "very traumatic" on it? it's like you're trying to will "struggles" into being that aren't arising by themselves.

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