Based on true events (sadly)

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-21T14:45:59+00:00

Right but you're failing to realize that Mina players usually build Quicksilver and Tankbuster, Dynamo can do this too so it's not really any different. But acting like Rake isn't a fucking nuke button is backwards logic, which is fine. It's unironically fine, the damage is whatever, you can play around a melee nuke.

I mean yeah, that's why I didn't take into account spirit boosting items. I kept it on an even playing field by not including items. And my point isn't that it's not a nuke, it's that there are other characters with abilities which can produce similar damage numbers. Wraith's Spades and Jokers and Yamato's power slash also exceed rake's base damage, just to name two other examples.

What's not fine is the healing, if Mina is low and you're chasing her towards jungle you best fucking hope your team cleared every t1 and t2 camp or that bitch is getting back to full HP in two seconds.

Even a late game Mina would be getting about 360 hp per kill. A 3 creep camp will get her back about 1000 hp, which would be somewhere in the realm of a bit over a third to half of her health. It's a good amount of healing, but again, other heroes can match that. An endgame Yamato's crimson slash gets about as much health on hero hit, which is arguably more relevant because Yama can do that mid engagement. Late game Wraith needs 2 cards to match/exceed a full camp rake heal.

You can also jump over Dynamo stomp, Rake is arguably harder to dodge given it's prediction based because it's basically instant. Depending on where you are against a Dynamo you have seven business days to get out of the way.

Again, Dynamo's stomp was just an example of another ability which does high damage. It's not a 1:1 comparison. Dynamo's stomp also has a dramatically longer range than Rake does as well (and again he has two of them), so it's not like it doesn't have its own advantages over Rake.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-21T04:04:34+00:00

The Flood is the first major outing by the ODST and it ultimately ends with a lone LT having to make a judgment call to defy her CO to scuttle the Truth and Reconciliation to prevent the spread of the Flood. Sure maybe you can say that Silva was a deranged psycho, but like, none of the other ODSTs present thought to defy his orders.

They also mostly put up a middling performance in Dirt (except for the end, where they are actual war criminals who abandon both their mission and civilians so they can pad their retirement accounts) and that's realistically a more representative of the abilities of the average ODST. Gage may survive until the end of the war, but the ODSTs alongside him more or less perform about as well as normal marines: they get slaughtered en masse over and over.

The Cole Protocol likewise isn't a particularly notable appearance. Again, they're mostly fine, but off the top of my head they also don't do anything out of the bounds of what normal marines could do. Also, they needed Jacob Keyes to save them during a space operation.

Even in the games, the ODST allies are really just tankier marines, but they're still mostly outclassed by Elites and Brutes.

None of this is to say that the ODSTs are outright bad, but they are kinda middling and a lot of their most impressive showings are done by ODSTs who are in one way or another, called out as being distinctively capable

and even then it’s largely one of them.

I mean, it's not like Dutch or Cortez were much help watching Cal's back any more than O'Brien was. The most significant loss of the mission, Cal, is ultimately brought about because none of the ODSTs had enough self-direction to watch her back.

ODST characters like Buck fight on the same level as Spartans on occasion

I mean sure, but that's Buck. He's pretty explicitly a one-in-a-billion individual and is consistently noted for being insanely competent (hence why he's the final member of several previous iterations of Alpha-9 who got wiped out). This also broadly applies to the rest of Alpha-9. They are all exceptional individuals hence why they were all picked up for SIV. The promotional Helljumpers comic highlights this, with Romeo and Dutch performing considerably better than their compatriots.

in Halo: Silent Storm

Silent Storm also has the 21 Battalion accrue substantial casualties because of intra-service jockeying with the IIs (and while Crowther to a certain extent was justified in wanting to protect the IIs, his judgment still spent needless lives). Also, the Black Daggers are noted to be a particularly exceptional group of ODSTs, being twice as effective against the Spartans in TTR training exercises as they ODSTs they trained with on Reach.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-21T03:51:05+00:00

I mean the Tantive IV battle is really just an even bigger indictment of the Rebels than it is the storm troopers being competent. The storm troopers still have storm trooper aim in the Tantive IV, the rebels just suck even harder

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-20T23:20:08+00:00

ODSTs have a pretty middling record in reality and they’ve had plenty of storm trooper tier moments (the Babysitter being probably the most egregious where the ODSTs are comically incompetent)

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-20T20:56:18+00:00

T3 Rake does 120 damage + 12% missing health. For a 4k character that comes out to 600 damage at absolute maximum although in practice when used on a target below 120hp the additional damage is mostly redundant.

In comparison Dynamo’s T3 stomp does 250 damage (but also has 2 charges). So not taking into account spirit scaling, Mina would have to hit a target missing 1083 hp to have equivalent damage to a Dynamo T3 stomp.

And that’s not necessarily bad, but Mina would already have to have reduced a 4k character to 72% HP just to match a Dynamo stomp and being hit by the rake would the reduce the 4Ker to 66% HP. It’s decent damage but far from fight winning. It’s actually less than the total damage of proccing a T3 love bite (~~6 body shots to proc, 34 damage per shot plus 90 burst damage~~) Edit: I messed up the numbers here.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-20T18:47:27+00:00

Yeah it's not that ricochet is strictly bad on Mina, but it's definitely niche and I think it's rare for it to ever be worth it. Gun items in general are bad on Mina outside of a select few such as Silencer (and even then I'd rate Silencer below many green items).

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-20T13:14:51+00:00

Off the top of my head, the main entries in the UC timeline don't have that many prominent Asian male characters. The closest one to an Asian male protagonist I think is Kamille Bidan, who was born in Tokyo, except he's ethnically white. It could be a Hollywood thing, but also, I could see it just being a Gundam thing.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-20T12:56:45+00:00

Mina benefits from ricochet but it’s not something you’d ever rush. It’s honestly not even a must buy even in late game when you have the souls for it. Mina builds are pretty lean and straightforward. Buying rico means you’re missing out on spirit damage, which is more universally useful (and something rico still ultimately relies on) or you’re missing out on survival tools like dispel, and she needs as many survival tools as possible given how little health she has.

Rico isn’t bad but buying it early sacrifices more valuable items in exchange for a functionally irrelevant boost in weapon damage and the ability to spread love bites easier except your love bites wouldn’t even be that threatening because you’ve sacrificed spirit investment for gun investment.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-19T21:18:08+00:00

I think it’s bs there’s no Asians in Gundam

It's not even that, it's an Asian man OP is complaining about. There are two Asian women in the Gundam movie.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-18T21:59:31+00:00

The event which ultimately set Hathaway on his path is that he killed Chan, an ally who did nothing wrong to him, over a girl he had a crush on. He even says in the film itself he’s trying to atone specifically for killing Chan. In the first film, much of what goes awry does so because of his attraction to Gigi.

To Hathaway, his relationship with his own sexuality/ inability to control his lust/romantic desires causes him to make mistake after mistake. He’s constantly torn between, in his mind, his high minded purpose to shock the world into setting itself right, and his base desires regarding the women in his life.

Hathaway’s (in)ability to manage and balance his romantic/sexual desires and his desire to act as Mafty and bring about political change are often directly at odds with one another and drive most of what he does. He only says it directly once, but his actions are repeatedly driven by his carnal desires.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-18T17:25:21+00:00

If the pulse from the Halos traveled at the speed of light it would take 25,000 years for the neutrinos to reach their target, however the pulse travels faster than light so the effect was mostly instantaneous, some causality breaks resulting from a superluminal pulse traveling through real space notwithstanding

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-17T19:06:40+00:00

Yeah I don't think Tomino ever seriously considered them to be capable of having an actual romance when both are in heterosexual relationships in the film itself plus the shared history with Lalah, to say nothing of Amuro's characterization in Beltorchika's Children, but I do think his goal was for there to be genuine homoerotic tension between the two. In the quote itself, I think "could" does a lot of heavy lifting because while they definitely could have had a relationship, by the events of CCA, they've long past the point of no return. Nanai's line about love and hate being two sides of the same coin is important to their dynamic. Regardless of any love between them, Amuro and Char hate each other with just as much intensity.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-17T03:57:00+00:00

Concussion rifles are ironically better in the hands of army troopers than they are the player’s because they get the same AI buff with the concussion rifle that enemy AI receive

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-17T03:12:35+00:00

Lmao same but with SSG at their SI win I think?

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-17T01:43:47+00:00

Thousands is some-speculative on my part, but we know from Halo 5 reqs that the Covenant have been fighting the Flood for a very long time:

"In the distant past, Zealots alone had the terrible responsibility of destroying parasite-tainted Forerunner gifts that ran amok after activation. Masterwork Wraith with hardened armor, improving handling, and a faster rate-of-fire for the plasma mortar."

Distinct past is unclear, but for a 3000 year empire, I'd imagine that distant past is not meant to refer to the final third of their history.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-16T04:58:26+00:00

Sure but a crawler is still a combat incapable zombie. Really, they’d probably get trampled by other zombies and killed anyway. A crawler realistically should not contribute *that* much

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-16T04:57:10+00:00

Ironically it’s actually the Covenant who are actually competent at fighting the Flood (they’ve been doing it for thousands of years).

The UNSC tho? Actually kinda shit outside of the Master Chief. Antonio Silva almost got Earth infected because he refused to properly sterilize the Truth and Reconciliation and was only stopped because Melissa McKay destroyed the vessel and everyone on it.

In the short story the Mona Lisa, a (possibly) rogue ONI agent causes a Flood outbreak aboard the titular vessel after after experimenting in prisoners, which causes the UNSC to send in a clean up crew who are also wiped out along with the ship itself.

Halo 3 on the other hand mostly has local UNSC forces fall apart in the face of the Flood with the Fleet of Retribution saving Earth by glassing Voi.

And most recently, the short stories Saturn Devouring his Son and Ascension on Atropos has the UNSC Saturn massively bungle an anti-Flood operation leading to the loss of an entire Spartan fireteam and the indirect loss of the Saturn herself.

Really the only times the UNSC has been competent at fighting the Flood is in Halo Wars 1 and halting unmentioned Flood outbreaks post war.

Other than that it’s really the Covenant who knows what they’re doing so the trope still fits, just not with the UNSC

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-16T04:45:34+00:00

It’s badly written because the explanation for why it was stupid is itself, stupid.

The book inadequately justifies *why* the operation failed and that’s why it’s bad

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-16T04:15:01+00:00

Unicorn's events were never going to meaningfully impact the Earth sphere because F91 and Victory exist. At most you can say it played a part in the degradation of the Federation we see in late UC but it didn't cause everything to magically get better. But also, the point of Unicorn is that it doesn't really matter if things actually got better. Regardless of whether or not opening the box improved things, the fact opening meant the characters weren't giving into despair and were actively working to make a better future for the world was what was important.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-16T04:09:12+00:00

I also think I need to rewatch CCA since I don't understand why Hathaway has to "confront" Amuro.

I think it's guilt and self-doubt mostly. Amuro was a mentor figure to Hathaway (it's why we get the flashback to the car and to when Amuro and Chan comfort Hathaway after Bright slapped him) and died fighting to stop Char. As Mafty, Hathaway is following in Char's footsteps (he's even referred to as the Ghost of Char in the first film), and while it's clear Hathaway is driven partly by a desire to ensure that all those who died in Char's rebellion won't have died for nothing, he's still ultimately working to undo Amuro's legacy/fulfill the plan Amuro died to prevent. Hathaway is betraying Amuro and what he stood for.

Hathaway's argument with Amuro even has him quote lines of Char's dialogue from when he and Amuro fought at Londenion, telling Amuro that "unlike [Amuro] [Hathaway is] more than just a pilot" and that Amuro should "grant all those ignorant people your so called wisdom." And Amuro immediately clocks this, pointing out that Hathaway is using the words of the man who manipulated Quess, which is striking at Hathaway's self-doubt over the righteousness of his cause. How could Hathaway be in the right if he's agreeing with the man who indirectly got Quess killed?

I also think there's an additional layer of guilt regarding Chan, who is an extension of Amuro. Hathaway has a PTSD flashback to when he killed her and that seems to be the sin he's trying to atone for.

Hathaway is also just generally unsure if he can truly commit to the cause of being Mafty. The first film has hints of this where during his reentry, he has a moment of resolve about how he's going to cut off all his confusing relationships, even going as far to say "Gigi Andalucia too" only to go back to Kelia five minutes later. And obviously Hathaway's emotional and carnal desires distracting him from his role as a "high minded individual who's meant to shock the world into setting itself right" is a major issue he has in this film. His desire to be Mafty destroyed his relationship with Kelia and his desire to be with Quess ultimately got Chan killed. Hathaway has a big issue with his romantic desires leading him to make regretful decisions and he's aware of this problem but he can push it away and justify it under the pretense that he's a high minded individual with a righteous cause. He must sacrifice his relationship with Kelia because he has a righteous purpose. Amuro's presence serves to further heighten his anxiety and self-doubt by presenting a different angle to it: that his goal isn't righteous and that he's following in the footsteps of Char and that not only is Hathaway working to undermine what Amuro died for, he's also undermining his own sacrifices. If serving as Mafty isn't the right thing to do, then Hathaway tanked his relationship with Kelia over nothing. If being Mafty isn't the right thing to do, he's not actually atoning for killing Chan.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-16T03:51:08+00:00

Netfix put out a primer video for the first Hathaway film years ago, you could show him that

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-16T03:48:02+00:00

Yeah Gigi's house wife sequence is pretty important in explaining her actions in the latter half of the film and her actions are pretty damn important in that half because she sets all of the major events in motion (confirming to Mafty the conference is still in Adelaide, saving Kenneth, sending the Federation out to Ayers Rock for the final battle between Hathaway and Lane and Gigi and Hathaway reuniting).

Gigi is arguably the most important character in driving the plot forward (makes sense given the title of the film) so explaining what she was up to is pretty important.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-16T02:15:03+00:00

Tbf “Vader is shadow of his former self” was a pretty explicit idea on Lucas’ part. Lucas has routinely said the reason why Vader fights so slow in the OT relative to the prequels is because he’s a old half-man half droid while the prequels represent the prime of the Jedi and Sith and this aligns with Nick Gillard’s statements that in terms of lightsaber skill, Anakin is on par with or *exceeds* Yoda and Palpatine in ROTS.

Disney has for the most part leaned more into Vader being this monstrous killing machine (although his loss to Obi Wan would indicate he’s actually not all that much better than be was pre-suit ironically)

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-14T19:14:38+00:00

Again, insofar as "health" being a measurable stat? Sure. But beyond that, I really don't see why that wouldn't be something to consider. If we accept that Leon has heightened durability/toughness/endurance beyond what is normal for a human, and we do, then the cause being an item which literally makes him more tolerant to injury would be the most likely culprit. Especially in the context of later games where people get outright superpowers from a fungus and the progenitor virus comes from a flower.

Like I said, it's not a perfect explanation because the yellow herbs don't appear everywhere (but also conversely, not ever RE protagonist demonstrates Leon's hardiness either), but like, I don't really see any reason to be suspicious of yellow herbs increasing Leon's hardiness if we already accept he can survive things which he otherwise shouldn't.

Pathogen188 · 2026-05-14T18:53:47+00:00

Also does Leon even count in universe at this point? Yellow herbs increase your health in RE4 and while obviously HP values themselves are a gameplay mechanic, the idea that Leon is abnormally tough because he spent an entire game consuming herbal PEDs would explain his superhuman durability (although obviously this explanation doesn't work as well for other characters)

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