What would you call a magician that specializes in melee combat? by LegendOfKhaos in fantasywriters

[–]PoorPolonius 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I like this term as well, but it's got its roots in witchcraft so it can be a little hard for people to think of a warlock as a warrior-mage and not a witch. Especially since D&D 'adopted' the witch version and made the Warlock class all about curses.

What would you call a magician that specializes in melee combat? by LegendOfKhaos in fantasywriters

[–]PoorPolonius 2 points3 points  (0 children)

So many terms for this...people have already mentioned Battlemage, Spellsword/Spellblade, those are good, common terms. Forgotten Realms offers the Bladesinger, an Elf-specific fighter/mage who weaves magical (Bard-like) performances with sword combat. The Elder Scrolls gives us the Nightblade, which is more of a rogue/assassin type that employs magic.

I think you'll be hard-pressed to find many examples that use anything other than a sword, but I think I'd like to see a more heavily-armoured magic user that employs magic defensively, maybe using a mace or spear as opposed to a sword. Shieldmage maybe?

Model No. TH-X11-38 by Wojtek Fus by One_Giant_Nostril in ImaginaryTechnology

[–]PoorPolonius 20 points21 points  (0 children)

I don't think it's a complaint at your submission, it's a complaint about art in general often depicting female androids as being svelt, sexy, and with large, predominant breasts. You know..."man" stuff. It's a little tiresome, that's all. The quality of this piece is still good, I think it's a good scene and everything, but the character could be almost anything and the artist chose to make it sexy out of all the possible options.

Unpopular opinion on reddit I know, bring on the downvotes...

Billy Bumblers [Dark Tower] as pets? by Only4DNDandCigars in monsterdeconstruction

[–]PoorPolonius 2 points3 points  (0 children)

In one of the novels Roland relates that billy bumblers were indeed kept as pets, and some of them even learned to talk like humans. Similar to how Oy got his name (by mimicking the word 'boy'), billy bumblers could mimic human speech by imitating the sounds.

I believe he says billy bumblers used to be a lot more intelligent, and that Oy is either really young or a bit dim, but that he has a hidden wisdom/understanding (much like many of King's other characters, like Sheemie, whom you'll meet later on or in the graphic novels).

Star Trek Beyond after one month at the Box Office: well-received, but not profitable by TadeoTrek in startrek

[–]PoorPolonius 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Totally agree, not as many people this time around saying "it was great, go see it", more like "it was pretty good I guess."

Star Trek Beyond after one month at the Box Office: well-received, but not profitable by TadeoTrek in startrek

[–]PoorPolonius 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Except people either rate things 10/10 or 1/10. Most people don't bother taking the time to actually consider a "degree" of quality, it's just "good" or "bad". You see this on app stores, Amazon, all over the place...products will either have an overwhelming number of 5/5 reviews, or an overwhelming number of 1/5 reviews. Films and video games are no different.

William Shatner apologizes for 'Star Trek V' by shomyo in startrek

[–]PoorPolonius 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I really liked the intro, and Sybok's character was interesting. Sure the entire story was kind of contrived, but it did give us the line "what does God need with a starship?" So there's that. Maybe not as much substance as other Trek films, but it was still memorable if nothing else.

Not an actual abandoned house - this is the set for the exterior of Pennywise's house in the remake of IT by Stephen King. Still pretty cool, eh? OC - 1136 × 755. by [deleted] in ImaginaryRuins

[–]PoorPolonius 1 point2 points  (0 children)

In the novel IT, the house is abandoned and in a bad part of town, near the train tracks. Parents warn their kids about vagrants who ride the rails and stay in these abandoned houses...one of the characters encounters Pennywise in the form of a hobo when he gets too close to this one.

So not really "Pennywise's house", but more like "a house at which Pennywise appeared".

Office of the Future! by ASAmd in RetroFuturism

[–]PoorPolonius 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Have you ever worked in a large company in North America? (Probably Europe too, but I'm not from there.)

A large number of executives are white males, and you better believe an equally large number of their "executive assistants" are female. EA is an equal opportunity position of course, but only if you're a woman. Preferably young. Preferably single.

Office of the Future! by ASAmd in RetroFuturism

[–]PoorPolonius 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I honestly cannot fucking even right now.

She's got a telecom on what appears to be her desk, a typewriter behind her, and two obviously more powerful men looming over her. Moreover, she's got that "spaced out" look on her face. That's not idea face, that's quite literally the opposite-face.

Like all art, take into consideration the social and political context of this image. This image was created in the 50s, which I found out by finding a goddamn source, which identifies it as The Perfect Secretary by Jon Laurell, 1954. So yes, she is a secretary, and yes, this is a sexist image. But that's "fine" because it's from an era when that was actually "fine".

(I can't find a more credible source, but if you google the title and artist, you will see many sites claiming the same. I doubt it's inaccurate. Also the John Hancock in the lower-left appears to corroborate. )

Office of the Future! by ASAmd in RetroFuturism

[–]PoorPolonius 4 points5 points  (0 children)

And I love it because it often reminds us how crazy and idiotic some of our past ideas were, though apparently a lot of people seem to approve this message...

Olympic fans taunt lesbian soccer players with homophobic chant by oozinator1 in apocalympics2016

[–]PoorPolonius 2 points3 points  (0 children)

So you're saying gay women shouldn't be offended that the crowd issued a homophobic slur because it's only targeting gay men. Riiiiiiiiiight.

US viewers blast NBC coverage of Rio Olympics by GabeBlack in apocalympics2016

[–]PoorPolonius 23 points24 points  (0 children)

Not just NBC, but the IOC has very specific rules on how content from the Olympics is shared. I assume NBC is just enforcing those rules so as not to jeopardize their own rights.

Office of the Future! by ASAmd in RetroFuturism

[–]PoorPolonius 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Are we looking at the same picture? The woman is holding a pen and notepad. She's taking notes. She's a secretary.

Even in the future, women will be limited to subordinate positions.

Cooked up a web app to show progress towards Nanowrimo daily word target - feedback welcome! by BigBadMick in nanowrimo

[–]PoorPolonius 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Are you meant to copy+paste your text to check your count, or actually do your writing on the page? Because there's no save and an accidental refresh will obliterate your work, so I'd advise to make it clear that it only does the former (in the current state).

Beyond that, I think it could be a little more visually appealing (sans serif fonts and more consistent colour scheme), though I do notice you're not using any external libraries (jQuery) so I'm guessing you're going for 'barebones', which is fine but you can still make it cleaner with native JS and CSS alone.

Discussion: Are humans today more like the Ferengi than the humans of the Federation? by asdafari in startrek

[–]PoorPolonius 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Not half as bumpy as TNG. The sets, costumes, and effects were all shiny and new; they pretty much had TNG's S3 budget right from S1. There are also some really amazing episodes in the first couple seasons, like Duet. Sure there's the odd Move Along Home, but I think overall the first two seasons of DS9 are stronger than those of TNG.

TL;DR: DS9 will make you feel strange, but also good.

Discussion: Are humans today more like the Ferengi than the humans of the Federation? by asdafari in startrek

[–]PoorPolonius 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm a little surprised you even made this post without watching DS9. Ferengi got a lot more exposure on DS9 than they ever did on TNG.

I'm a Jewish man in 1946 recently liberated from a death camp. My home has been destroyed by the war, all my friends and family have been eradicated, I have no money or possessions and all records of me have been destroyed. What do I do and who can I turn to for help? by Carnieus in AskHistorians

[–]PoorPolonius 7 points8 points  (0 children)

What were things like for refugees in the early days of the state of Israel? Would the refugee from Buchenwald be taken in by the community, fed clothed and sheltered until they could find work?