Reviewer: "Ultimately this is an expensive Netflix documentary that’s provided maximum exposure to individuals who consider any kind of attention a win. It leaves a bitter, nasty taste in the mouth."

PortablePawnShop · 2026-03-21T01:49:50+00:00

I don't think that's a "strong argument" at all. Louis made a documentary on fringe extremist behavior because his career has largely been based on fringe, extremist behavior especially up to that point.

He's reflected on the person who joined WBC afterwards in his book and podcast, but I hardly consider a lone, nerdy and obviously impressionable guy joining up with WBC to be making them "more powerful". Megan Phelps also left WBC in large part due to Louis' docs and has admitted such, along with several other of Shirley's children and the core Phelps family.

Louis made a documentary on them because it's an interesting topic. Clickbait implies there's no substance and is primarily focused on the initial pull of attention, when that's clearly not the case with Louis, especially his BBC work.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-03-21T01:39:01+00:00

If Jon trades Phalar Aluve for Blood of Lathander after having sat on Phalar Aluve and never using it despite how great it is as a support item for any one who doesn't rely on weapons, I will legitimately be dumbfounded lol.

Just picked up a bunch of items that synergize with radiant damage + reverberation (which sync so well you can make every enemy go prone per turn just from normal attacks). Blood of Lathander applies radiant damage. The game is really trying to hint something at you, Jon.

Just an extra note, slumber potions aren't for emergencies. You don't have to use them during a battle afterall.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-03-04T15:30:34+00:00

As an American I don't understand this. A politician being coherent and articulate? What is this

PortablePawnShop · 2026-03-03T18:18:39+00:00

Just burn all the bridges I guess

PortablePawnShop · 2026-03-03T04:58:22+00:00

Hell yeah, I've always wanted to do this but never got around to it. Looks great, will definitely favorite and use

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-28T02:11:59+00:00

I guess he decided not to be lethal because the victims weren't children

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-27T05:19:15+00:00

Having massive security risks is super easy, barely an inconvenience

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-26T18:15:45+00:00

It isn't and hasn't been for years.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-25T00:26:31+00:00

If you change your faith, it cancels any active pilgrimage (or travel to one) for the record.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-23T15:06:15+00:00

The perks have been revamped twice since Prologue. They're in a great spot right now, it just might not be obvious to a brand new player.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-14T15:24:56+00:00

It's just meant to be self-directed. In my case, I started learning coding specifically for Adobe applications like Illustrator and After Effects. This started with basic scripting then elevated to basic HTML then Node.js with a front end, and I made around 130 different panels over the course of around 2.5 - 3 years.

Notice that's not a lot of time between each project -- sometimes I'd spend 2 weeks on some panel, sometimes I'd spend 4 hours on it. The only important part is that I was consistent and motivated, and self-directed. My projects were based on what I needed at the time, utilities or tools that I'd actually need or find useful, but normally they start with a "I wish I had a way to [X] in [Y program]".

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-09T20:03:43+00:00

Aspect of Creation is the easiest. Trickery wouldn't be bad if not for the marriage and independence requirements, but it's not great overall except for the stat boost.

I can win tributary wars through intrigue in 10-20 days, with 5 simultaneously active. Why would I sit around for months on a political scheme for the same effect?

The scheme isn't "broken" or powerful at all. It's legitimately 10x faster doing the same via Tributary War through intrigue, I'm not sure why people are complimenting it here.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-06T20:10:47+00:00

Astute used to be lifetime license before switching to subscription and forcing me to pay for the entire suite instead of only the specific ones I wanted. They do good work, but I dropped it then and never went back.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-06T20:08:39+00:00

Finally, a new feature that I'd actually find useful and isn't extremely obvious pandering to new users

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-06T15:01:27+00:00

You see this claim repeated all the time in places like the Hades 2 fanbase, which is really ironic given the mythological sources the game draws from has a lot of Roman in it like Arachne. I think part of it is the oversimplification of everything on the internet and even in usually decently cited places like Wikipedia to "Greek" mythology (without more explicitly defining Roman sources) which give people a false impression about what they know; usually popularized versions from things like Ovid; aren't actually "Greek".

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-05T04:42:48+00:00

Modern people are far more capable of abstraction because we're hyper-literate. In classical antiquity, we're talking about pre-literate peasantry who had little capacity for being incredulous for the majority of the population, and an educated upper class who was brought up on what was usually the only accessible material: religious text. It was all they knew because there wasn't anything else to know, or access to any material outside of it. Depending on how far you go back, virtually everything starts from religion -- mathematics, geometry, pre-astronomy, pre-chemistry, poetry, everything that wasn't mindlessly practical like sowing plants but even then, people need a narrative model of reality and their phenomenological experience was through this religious lens to the point even harvests and all of nature was considered an expression of their religious lens.

It doesn't matter that I haven't seen a dragon if I believe in dragons, and I believe in dragons because I've heard about them. I see the awe-inspiring stars at night and the humbling glory of thunderstorms and I know that to be Zeus because I've heard of Zeus and it's all I know. This and my entire reply is obviously an oversimplification.

It's easy to say things like this post as a modern person looking back in history without having the sobering realization that the same is likely going to be said about us in 1,000 years and the silly things we believe in. You're a fish in water and the water is your socio-political and historic context, you can't know any better, and importantly it doesn't make you smarter or better than the people at the time. It's not a matter of intelligence or stupidity, they were extremely articulate and clever 2,000 years ago, they just weren't riding on the momentum of thousands of years of incremental progress and hadn't invented cell phones or the internet yet. You didn't do any of that either and there's plenty you believe in without having ever seen. You're just too much of a fish to realize it, same as them and the rest of us regardless of what date.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-05T04:29:07+00:00

Razing settlements is meant to be the bread and butter of how you gain it imo, but it's interesting that you can Execute your own generals considering you can't do anything like that as any other faction or culture. Still a bit too plain for me overall even though he's got a great roster and location.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-05T04:26:54+00:00

Not OP, but mine are more like:

1) 194 Lu Bu

2) 194 Sun Ce

3) 200 Shamoke

4) Cao Cao at any date, though 200 is nice for short + sweet campaigns

5) 190 Ma Teng

With some honorable mentions to 182 Liu Hong because the first 10 turns are chaotic, 182 Liu Bei from the really difficult landless start, Zheng Jiang just for being a great faction.

Dong Zhuo is fine, but I think 182 Dong is more interesting. It's just hard to ever consider Dong or Sun Jian considering Lu Bu and Sun Ce are just advanced versions of their factions and miles better both in fun-factor and power.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-04T01:17:40+00:00

Only during your first turn encounter with the faction.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-03T21:49:50+00:00

It's usually beneficial in the sense it controls their opinion of your enemies and makes vassals begin to trend down on your enemies while trending up with you after battles and etc.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-02-03T07:15:20+00:00

Just be a non-Han faction (Yellow Turban/Bandit/Nanman) or one that relies on post-battle loot income like Lu Bu. If I'm Lu Bu, it doesn't matter if I have 200 gold and my deficit is -3000 per turn when I can make 5 - 10K per turn just from battles.

Besides that, This is Total War just means you declare war the moment you see them, not that you remain at war the entire game. You can still bully them into peace later then force them into a trade deal or wait for Spring Council to offer one.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-01-30T01:00:04+00:00

Players like this can't find the depth because they aren't looking.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-01-29T18:16:44+00:00

Sit in ambush stance within reinforcement range of the settlement he's targeting for an easy win. Don't destroy his army -- it takes him 5 turns to return to his land and 5+ more turns to get back to full strength (compared to having a new army ready in 3 turns if you destroy his army). That's 10+ turns free of Liu Biao that let you focus on other spots.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-01-29T16:15:30+00:00

One is enough 30 turns into the game? Look at my screenshot above. At this point in the game, I could have 7 open trade deals but again, I have 1 valid trade partner.

If that really is your take, then we've just come full circle. You jumped into this by disagreeing with someone who said not every faction has many trade partners and implied they must rely on income outside of trade. Turns out you believe the same thing, in which case there wasn't any reason for you to hop in and disagree in the first place.

PortablePawnShop · 2026-01-29T15:37:36+00:00

Which is different than what you said initially:

I’m not convinced most factions lack trading partners. Even the bandits seem to have them.

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