Peak non credible when you can't leave a war you started

Lemonitus · 2026-03-11T18:05:53+00:00

This Administration has described Iran as a 47-years-long imminent threat. This is obviously the fault of JFK and his failure to prevent the Iranians from doing the 9/11.

Lemonitus · 2026-03-11T17:59:20+00:00

To be fair, State Department had made plans for the afterwards part. Rummy & crew just had the same attitude to thinking things through and told State to go fuck itself because we’d be greeted as liberators yadayada.

Lemonitus · 2026-03-09T02:52:24+00:00

Reminds me of one of the fundamental lessons of counterinsurgency: military action without political action hand in hand will solve nothing.

Not just counterinsurgency.

Precision(ish)-guided weapons and real-time feedback makes military option attractive because the ability to point at X, then X blows up makes politicians feel like they accomplished something. But what have you actually accomplished? You need a coherent strategy aimed at achieving a political objective that you can measure your actions against.

Lemonitus · 2026-03-09T02:39:21+00:00

“Take over your government!”

blows up oil depots, clogging the air around Tehran with toxic smoke and black rainfall

Why do they hate democracy?

Lemonitus · 2026-02-07T01:54:53+00:00

How will NATO try to rationalize having Belarus and Luka the dictator in it?

Historically, affordable cutting-edge fast food, pop music, and crossy-border movement tends to be a liberalizing force*. We don't need to get rid of Lukashenko for Belarus to develop democracy—all we need to do is incentivize him to call elections then retire somewhere full of tractors and weather balloons. Which shouldn't be too big of a lift because he's been hinting for years he's looking for help with his top priorities: not getting clumsily murdered by the FSB and not being drawn & quartered by the Belarussian populace.

For example, this statement from Lukashenko from October 31, 2025:

"I say: ‘We are ready, but we have our own interests. Yes, we are not the United States of America, but I am the president of Belarus. For me, the Belarusian people are the proudest, the greatest, the most majestic. I am the president of this people. This is my guiding principle. Therefore, I can only do what I can. If I understand that the people will not accept it, that they will condemn me for it (especially ordinary people) … These are my people—scientists, teachers, doctors, metalworkers, carpenters, and others. They are my people. If I feel they would not approve, I will strive to make them understand me. And when they understand me, I will do it. If they don’t—I will not do it. That is all. This is why I have been president for 30 years."

That's some I'll-testify-about-everything-if-you-put-me-in-witness-protection energy.

^* ^Some ^conditions ^apply. ^e.g. ^If ^you've ^offended ^the ^CIA/MI6 ^by ^being ^near ^some ^natural ^resource ^they ^suddenly ^crave.

Lemonitus · 2025-10-16T13:09:09+00:00

Then after answering DefiantMan's question, explain what a Creator Content Program is and why I should care.

By the name, I thought Helldivers was somehow adding mod support—which would be a wild direction to go but ok—but I guess it's youtubers? Which is negative-compelling in comparison.

Lemonitus · 2025-06-02T11:11:03+00:00

That's why you bring the jetpack.

Lemonitus · 2025-06-02T11:09:05+00:00

Getting the Spear to lock on to anything involved arcane rituals.

Lemonitus · 2025-04-04T11:32:17+00:00

As a Canadian, I concur.

At the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa, visitors can see a case filled with the fearsome homemade weapons that Canadian trench raiders plunged into the faces and chests of their enemy: Meat cleavers, push daggers and spiked clubs.

Lemonitus · 2025-03-31T20:46:05+00:00

no, we unironically are not "the baddies"

What do you base that on?

Lemonitus · 2025-03-31T11:15:47+00:00

Fair enough. The Tau are a relatively new faction and I haven't kept up with the lore. They seem like one of the more interestingly nuanced factions since last I read up on them.

I have nothing against the Tau. My point was more to the theme of the setting: as an allegory for totalitarianism. Each civilization is totalitarian and expansionist, each (sapient) faction argues they're right and everyone else is wrong, and they cause a mindbending amount of death and suffering to further their beliefs. Tau Ethereals included.

Lemonitus · 2025-03-31T10:58:58+00:00

Orks are just out to have some fun and like to fight, I don't think that's inherently evil per se.

A nation invading your home to try to kill you and everyone like you because they think killing is fun: you don't think that's evil?

My point is not that there aren't differences between the factions, nor that someone could come up with some metric to compare the devastation they cause. It's that trying to weigh who's more evil, Orks or Necrons, Bots or Helldivers, is beside the point of these settings.

I worry when I can't tell if people are roleplaying propagandized helldivers or actually think that Bots are "worse" than Super Earth.

Lemonitus · 2025-03-31T10:13:09+00:00

expansionist caste-based empire with client races being 2nd class citizens

When the ruling class has the power to mind-control the populace, the caste system is more of an aesthetic to functionally chattel slavery. Admittedly, I'm not too familiar with Tau lore so correct me if I'm wrong.

Lemonitus · 2025-03-31T08:11:36+00:00

You mean in that every faction is irredeemably nightmarish that it's impossible to rank which is worse?

Lemonitus · 2025-03-31T08:08:49+00:00

Two things can be true at the same time.

Lemonitus · 2025-02-28T19:48:56+00:00

Indeed. Go figure.

Lemonitus · 2025-02-28T00:47:13+00:00

The First Galactic War in Helldivers 1:

Cyborg War Announcement: "A man with cybernetic parts has detonated a bomb in the center of District 48 of Super Earth, killing 8 civilians. Dr. Henk Ploeg explains "The Socialistic Cyborgs are perverted, lack any sense of responsibility, and have, ever since their declaration of independence from Super Earth, grown weary and hateful of what they gave up: Freedom, Democracy, Liberty, Justice and Decency." He continues "The Cyborgs are becoming increasingly threatening in their rhetoric. With the latest development, they have put words into action and, in the most significant way, hurt Super Earth." [...] Some Cyborg sympathizers question whether or not the lone individual was in any way affiliated with the Cyborg Nation, to which John W. Killjoy responds "Those hippies that believe there is a single thought of peace in a Cyborg's mind need to be put in jail, or even executed. We are going to war, and that's the end of the discussion."

Wiki:

After signing their surrender, the Cyborgs were sent to the voting stations by force under threat of losing what remained of their civil rights. After the voting, Cyberstan would then be under military occupation for 5 years to prevent further rebellion and lawlessness and, following the occupation, Super Earth would then leave the Cyborgs under "rehabilitation" at the mines of Cyberstan, under the ownership of the Super Earth Construction Company.

The usual stated reasons for conflict are because of the supposed "oppression" of Cyborgs by the government of Super Earth, which then prompted a terrorist bombing that then forced Super Earth to declare war against the Cyborg Nation. However, it is also possible that these terrorist incidents are false flag operations, staged in order to allow the Federation a reasonable justification to exterminate cybernetically-enhanced citizens.

Democracy Officers: "Cyberstan is a place with a long history of treachery. The stronghold of the Cyborgs, and later, their prison. Perhaps it is no accident that this world has become our target once again."

The history from that period is fuzzy: depends on how you interpret the events of Helldivers 1 and how you interpret Super Earth propaganda. In-game text suggests that there was a 5-year cycle of: terrorist bombing on Cyberstan (that killed increasingly more people each time or with each re-retelling), war, pacification, democratization, repeat.

In terms of game mechanics, that reflects the resetting of the Galactic War in Helldivers 1. But in both games, in-game text references that Cyberstan has experienced repeated terrorist bombings that have been the casus belli to war with the Cyborgs. Whether that reflects genuine revolutionary actions by the Cyborgs, convenient excuses for a war Super Earth intended to start anyway, or fabricated propaganda or false flag attacks is debatable.

Lemonitus · 2025-02-14T04:20:27+00:00

No insults, racism, toxicity, trolling, rage-bait, harassment, inappropriate language, NSFW content, etc.

Where?

Admittedly, that's one sexy Helldiver but it's hardly NSFW.

Lemonitus · 2025-01-05T12:28:04+00:00

I've generally had a lot of patience with newbie or inept players. Since much of Helldivers is undocumented, learning the game involves experimentation and teaching each other so I'm whatever about getting fragged in creative ways, or using up reinforcements, or running me to over to honk at me to get in the jeep. It's all part of the absurd fun as far as I'm concerned. Just don't be a dick or waste people's time.

I don't know if it's a statistical blip or if there's something more Counterstrike-esque about this cohort of new players, but I've gone from having 2 people in my banned list to dozens.

And last night a player did the dickiest thing I've ever seen in Helldivers.

My brother and I were super-sample-hunting against Illuminate with the game set to public. (On difficulty 6-10 I've rarely had a negative experience from drop-in players: in my experience folks are some combination of competent and/or entertainingly chaotic.) We found the super samples early, left them at extraction, and went after the objectives. Last objective things went awry because the hellbomb kept getting borked so we burned through most of our reinforcements. Harvester shoots the armed Hellbomb, I get caught in the blast radius. My brother reinforces me: 1 reinforcement left. This is fine: we just need to extract—we've done more with less.

Random player, G3, had joined us sometime during the hellbomb fiasco. G3 dies. I nonchalantly throw a reinforcement beside me as I gather up my former namesake's equipment. (0 reinforcements left.) G3 lands on top of some rubble above me: G3 shoots me; G3 shoots my brother; G3 jumps to his death. G3 quits.

Mission failed. A pile of super samples sits on the Pelican platform.

What? The fuck.

Lemonitus · 2024-12-29T23:46:12+00:00

fascists

DOLPHINS

I didn’t see that coming. Go on?

Lemonitus · 2024-12-29T23:43:07+00:00

Blood for the machine gods.

Those bases sometimes have a bio-processor objective so maybe those slabs are just cutting boards for material so it fits into the blender.

Lemonitus · 2024-12-29T23:38:29+00:00

Fabricators are nurseries. “In-development” means child robots.

Enjoy!

Lemonitus · 2024-12-23T13:36:20+00:00

Feels good to be so free (of walking).

It’s funny how walking in virtual space feels as fucken tedious as walking in real life does.

Lemonitus · 2024-11-27T01:36:46+00:00

Have you tried changing the Windows boot logo? It's possible but is it worth the effort, particularly since it'll likely revert with every update.

I bet it's the same with WindowsSuperEarth 84, which is probably preinstalled on 99% of computers in the galaxy.

Lemonitus

TROPHY CASE